Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Why Russia chooses to confront the West directly while China does not? Intuitively,China should confront the West while Russia should silently observe the process:because Russia's development is oil-dependent,while Chinese is stronger and diversified

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: How do Western perceptions of Africa influence the international community?s policy-making towards African conflict? Towards examining this question, this paper will focus on the international community?s perceptions of, and policies towards, the recent violence in Darfur, Sudan (2003 to present). This case will focus on the international community?s response to the Darfur crisis during the formative months following the Sudanese Liberation Army?s (SLA) high-profile offensive in February 2003. In particular, it will examine how the popular recollections of the international community?s failure to name the Rwandan crisis of 1994 as ?genocide? has influenced international NGO and regional actor lobby efforts directed towards Western state and UN agency policy-makers today. The historical experience in Rwanda and the question of ?genocide? has provided a pivotal perceptual battle ground between different Sudanese, African and international agents in the clash over the appropriate international policy response to the Darfur crisis.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Labels such as “settler” for invading groups establishing territorial dominance, and/or “hostile” for indigenous groups resisting the cultural and political invasion, are primary sources for ethnic hatred and racial conflicts. Dominant group interpretations and media uses reinforce “progress” and “civilized” descriptors which justify and rationalize their violent suppression in the name of “law and order” networks they control. The first wide-spread usage of such terms was in the pacification of the “wild west” territories of the United States, against indigenous peoples as “savage” Indians. Contemporary usage exactly resembles past forms, including Israeli and U.S. media descriptors for “settlers” new towns in Palestinian lands, especially the “west bank” area.
These labels are products of ethnocentric racism and cultural domination arising from conquest and colonialism, and are prime purveyors of supremacist ideologies and ethnic hatred. We analyze their historical usage in 19th century western United States and contemporary usage in the Israeli-Palestinian conflicts, finding strong parallels. We observe there are near continuous examples of such terms in the media, extending out from a Euro-American global dominance, and resonating with regional conflicts, as in Israel. We stress that unpacking linguistic terms is central to non-continuance of racial hatred, and remains critical in tough times when new forms such as “terrorist” replace old forms, with potential affect on civil rights and an erosion of hard-won “equal treatment” laws, possibly interfering with peace negotiations and conflict resolution.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: In this paper I attempt to understand the relationships between teacher expectations; race and ethnicity; and inter-ethnic interactions within schools. Through a review of interviews with West Indian, African American, and white teachers at a high school in Brooklyn, New York with a large West Indian population, I discuss the complicated nature of teacher-student matching, and its impact on achievement. I have found that West Indian teachers have strong points of connection with their West Indian students, and clearly serve as their advocates when cultural differences such as parental nonparticipation, lack of discipline, and avoidance of eye contact come up. Non-West Indian teachers, however, also find ways to connect with West Indian students. White teachers draw upon the common experience of immigration, and African American teachers draw upon common experiences of race prejudice and American race relations. The downside of strong identification with one group of students—in this case, West Indians—can sometimes lead to a distancing from others—in this case, African Americans. West Indian teachers usually identified strongly as West Indian, sometimes in opposition to African Americans. Hence, although recruiting teachers of color to serve our increasingly diverse school population is important, teacher training must also spend time on diversity training and developing intercultural understandings.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: The American West has always been a powerful and attractive region for Americans and non-Americans to visit, read about, and view. From the western dime novel of the 1860s to contemporary Ralph Lauren interior designs, the West is a distinctive of American regions that has been avidly appropriated and rearticulated in American popular cultural productions. As we leave the twentieth century and enter the new millennium the ever-increasing, global entertainment industry continues to seek “unique” regions to attract a rising cadre of regional, national, and transnational viewers. In addition to popular culture, historians have claimed that tourism has been a powerful shaper of regional perceptions and the marriage of tourism and regionalism has come to the fore in productions such as Billy Crystal’s City Slickers (1991) to E! Channel’s Filthy Rich Cattle Drive (2005). American popular culture reveals a contemporary fascination with this distinctive regional tourism industry. However, the relationship between tourism, popular culture and regionalism remains illusive and the dude ranch industry’s role in constructing region is unrealized.

Dude ranching began as a small, informal, and elite activity in the 1870s. As the U.S. agricultural industry reeled from the post World War One agricultural depression dude ranching became an important and influential touristic activity through until the 1950s. Fashioning a liminal “right of passage” into the West for wealthy easterners and Europeans became a central concern for dude ranchers and the Dude Ranch Association, formed in the mid 1920s. During the heyday of the industry between 1920 and 1950, dude ranch operations exploded over the Northern Rockies as dudes and dudeens sought a distinct western experience that placed them in liminal space between “tourist” and “insider” through a combination of architecture, landscape architecture, music, food, language, oral histories and stories, and physical activities such as horse-riding, hunting and rodeos.

Drawing on materials produced by individual ranches, state and national dude ranch associations, railroad and airline promotional materials, and popular culture texts (film, literature and popular magazines), this paper asks how the dude ranch industry in Montana and Wyoming, the industrial heartland of the industry, created a strong sense of region through a carefully shaped liminal space (between tourist and insider) that provided a “right of passage” experience. In particular, this paper examines the ways gender and class shaped the liminal space of the dude ranch, and explores how popular culture appropriated that experience to create a the American West.