Suchergebnisse

This dissertation engages with the classic linguistic anthropological question of literacies in the context of the rapid technological shift in Ghana, West Africa. It examines the slippage between widespread claims of technological transformation made by global tech entrepreneurs and their local partners on the one hand, and the uneven practices through which students at different levels of socioeconomic access are socialized into digital literacies on the other. Specifically, it considers the role of shifting local notions of hierarchy and epistemic rights in the uptake of digital literacies. Situated as a response to the dearth of research into digital literacies in contexts outside of the post-industrial world, this dissertation argues for greater attention to the pedagogies through which such literacies are taught, in the face of the persistent, widely held belief that digital technology represents a straightforward panacea for the problems of poverty and underdevelopment. It first considers widespread claims about technological transformation in light of rote pedagogical practices in Ghanaian schools. Close examination of classroom practices in the socialization of ICTs reveals that the deference to elders and authority figures that organizes classroom routines lies orthogonal to the values of learner-centric, critical thinking-oriented values that inform the design of computer hardware and software imported from the Post-Industrial world. The embedding of technologies into contexts of rote learning thus does not produce educational transformations, but rather tech taught by rote. The latter half of the dissertation engages with the phenomenon of the 'New Ghana,' a diffuse alternative public sphere born in part from Ghana's economic efflorescence relative to the ongoing global economic crisis. I focus especially on the practices through which Ashesi university, an elite tech-focused liberal-arts-based institution at the core of the New Ghana, socializes students into modes of universalist ethical action, critical knowledge production, and ways of speaking that explicitly challenge the age-graded respect hierarchies of the status quo. The organizing principle of Ashesi's institutional efforts to reshape the habitus of Ghanaian youth into "a generation of ethical, entrepreneurial leaders for Africa" is a belief—shared by many within and beyond Ghana—in the transformational power of technologies to bring about political change and economic development. In the dissonance between these spaces, I argue that, despite claims about the kinds of participatory democracy and economic spheres that new technologies enable, the forms of print and digital literacy necessary to participate in these domains remain exclusive—thus reproducing class hierarchies even as age-graded hierarchies are dismantled.

Social movement scholarship has found that social movement organizations (SMOs) rarely have much effect on issues related to war and the military. This article examines how one Israeli women's human rights organization, MachsomWatch (MW), succeeded at providing direct aid to Palestinians, intervening with the military and established media standing. This article explains that MW was most successful when it maintained a nonthreatening insider disposition that drew on distinctly particularistic cultural norms in interactions with the soldiers in ways that emphasized their commonality with the soldiers due to their shared ethnic, religious, and national origins. This analysis suggests that it is productive for movement scholars to think of movement targets as agentic actors who are networked together in ways that may sometimes be permeable to certain groups of activists. This article argues that thinking of both political opportunity structures and targets at the micro level may provide significant insight into understanding social movement outcomes.

This article examines the relationship between the National Organization for Women (NOW) and CODEPINK, a women's peace organization in 2004. NOW and CODEPINK both sought to mobilize women to protest the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and also to fight against the threats to women's rights that emerged from the policies of policies of the George W. Bush's presidential administration. Using content analysis of e-mails sent to supporters and survey data from individuals at protests, I find that despite their overlapping agendas, there were significant differences in the two organization's framing and tactical repertoires. CODEPINK drew upon individualistic maternalist framing and had a broad tactical repertoire. CODEPINK was able to draw women into protest in a way that resonated with popular cultural norms and recent women's mobilizations. By contrast, NOW drew upon libera l, rights-based feminist framing that focused on legislative change and drew upon a narrow range of movement tactics. The article argues that rather than creating divisions and undermining collaboration, this diversity in women's movements helps to foster a symbiotic relationship that mobilized diverse women. Taking a long historical view, I argue that this symbiosis is fundamental for the longevity and continued vitality of the U.S. women's movement.

AbstractAt first glance, humor and politics may appear oppositional. Politics is often understood as serious, important, and grave, while humor is perceived as lighthearted and frivolous. Beneath the surface, however, it is evident that humor and politics are actually inextricably linked and have been throughout political history. This paper interrogates the tensions between humor and seriousness, importance and frivolity, and legitimate and dismissible to examine the manifestations of humor in social movement protest. I discuss how humor is used as a communicative and emotional strategy for social movement activists and organizations and focus on two constellations of movement humor: humor directed outside the group in the forms of tactics and frames, which I term external humor, and the role of humor in leadership, collective identity, and emotional labor, termed internal humor. To illustrate the role of humor in protest, I integrate examples from scholarly research, media depictions, and participant observation data to provide examples of how humor is manifest as an external tactic, social movement frame, and its potential role in strengthening ties to leadership and collective identity. The essay concludes by highlighting some potential paths for future study about the relationship between humor, ideology, identity, and power.

The theory and practice of social movements come together in strategy-whether, why, and how people can realize their visions of another world by acting together. Strategies for Social Change offers a concise definition of strategy and a framework for differentiating between strategies. Specific chapters address microlevel decision-making processes and creativity, coalition building in Northern Ireland, nonviolent strategies for challenging repressive regimes, identity politics, GLBT rights, the Christian right in Canada and the United States, land struggles in Brazil and India, movement-media publicity, and corporate social movement organizations. Contributors: Jessica Ayo Alabi, Orange Coast College; Kenneth T. Andrews, U of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Anna-Liisa Aunio, U of Montreal; Linda Blozie; Tina Fetner, McMaster U; James M. Jasper, CUNY; Karen Jeffreys; David S. Meyer, U of California, Irvine; Sharon Erickson Nepstad, U of New Mexico; Francesca Polletta, U of California, Irvine; Belinda Robnett, U of California, Irvine; Charlotte Ryan, U of Massachusetts-Lowell; Carrie Sanders, Wilfrid Laurier U; Kurt Schock, Rutgers U; Jackie Smith, U of Pittsburgh; Suzanne Staggenborg, U of Pittsburgh; Stellan Vinthagen, U West, Sweden; Nancy Whittier, Smith College.