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• 1. [Article] Latino Immigrant Students: Exploring the Relationship between Migration Experience and Education Outcomes

  The purpose of this study was to contribute to the literature on the educational outcomes and protective factors (i.e., support systems) in the lives of Latino immigrant youth, with a special emphasis ...

  Citation × Citation Citation Abstract Copy Title: Latino Immigrant Students: Exploring the Relationship between Migration Experience and Education Outcomes Author: Ramos, Karina Year: 2015 The purpose of this study was to contribute to the literature on the educational outcomes and protective factors (i.e., support systems) in the lives of Latino immigrant youth, with a special emphasis on how these experiences relate to and are impacted by their migration experiences. Using the cultural-ecological theoretical framework and the Stages of Migration framework, this study utilized an existing data set to explore the relationships between migration stress, psychological distress, experiences of discrimination, and awareness of discrimination in relation to educational outcomes in a sample of 281 Latino immigrant youth. These relationships were then examined to see if they differed as a function of perceived support, gender, and school type (i.e., middle school versus high school). Structural equation modeling was utilized to test the hypothesized model that included migration stress, psychological distress, and education outcomes. The structural model showed very good fit. Results suggest that migration stress has a significant direct effect on psychological distress and on educational outcomes among Latino immigrant youth. Participants reporting high migration stress reported greater psychological distress and had poorer educational outcomes with respect to academic grades, educational aspirations, and educational expectations. Moderation testing indicated the structural model did not vary as a function of perceived support, gender, or school. Implications for research and practice are discussed. Title: Latino Immigrant Students: Exploring the Relationship between Migration Experience and Education Outcomes Author: Ramos, Karina Year: 2015 The purpose of this study was to contribute to the literature on the educational outcomes and protective factors (i.e., support systems) in the lives of Latino immigrant youth, with a special emphasis on how these experiences relate to and are impacted by their migration experiences. Using the cultural-ecological theoretical framework and the Stages of Migration framework, this study utilized an existing data set to explore the relationships between migration stress, psychological distress, experiences of discrimination, and awareness of discrimination in relation to educational outcomes in a sample of 281 Latino immigrant youth. These relationships were then examined to see if they differed as a function of perceived support, gender, and school type (i.e., middle school versus high school). Structural equation modeling was utilized to test the hypothesized model that included migration stress, psychological distress, and education outcomes. The structural model showed very good fit. Results suggest that migration stress has a significant direct effect on psychological distress and on educational outcomes among Latino immigrant youth. Participants reporting high migration stress reported greater psychological distress and had poorer educational outcomes with respect to academic grades, educational aspirations, and educational expectations. Moderation testing indicated the structural model did not vary as a function of perceived support, gender, or school. Implications for research and practice are discussed. Close

• 2. [Article] Aspirational Migration: The Case of Chinese Birth Tourism in the U.S.

  The ways in which individuals navigate the globe today complicates previous conceptualizations of migration and mobility. Once such mode of contemporary movement which challenges scholars is known as "birth ...

  Citation × Citation Citation Abstract Copy Title: Aspirational Migration: The Case of Chinese Birth Tourism in the U.S. Author: Folse, Brandon Year: 2017 The ways in which individuals navigate the globe today complicates previous conceptualizations of migration and mobility. Once such mode of contemporary movement which challenges scholars is known as "birth tourism." This research considers birth tourism to be a form of "lifestyle migration," which I label aspirational migration. By analyzing the motivations which drive many parents to give birth abroad, I shed light on the complex and risky process, which involves a host of players, including family, friends, and a global birth tourism infrastructure. Through this drawn-out process, which begins well before the decision to give birth abroad and continues into the distant future, I argue that birth tourists and their foreign-born children become aspirational migrants and acquire cosmopolitan capital. Title: Aspirational Migration: The Case of Chinese Birth Tourism in the U.S. Author: Folse, Brandon Year: 2017 The ways in which individuals navigate the globe today complicates previous conceptualizations of migration and mobility. Once such mode of contemporary movement which challenges scholars is known as "birth tourism." This research considers birth tourism to be a form of "lifestyle migration," which I label aspirational migration. By analyzing the motivations which drive many parents to give birth abroad, I shed light on the complex and risky process, which involves a host of players, including family, friends, and a global birth tourism infrastructure. Through this drawn-out process, which begins well before the decision to give birth abroad and continues into the distant future, I argue that birth tourists and their foreign-born children become aspirational migrants and acquire cosmopolitan capital. Close

• 3. [Article] WAR BY OTHER MEANS: ENVIRONMENTAL VIOLENCE IN THE 21st CENTURY

  This dissertation studies the intersections of militarism, climate change, and environmental justice in U.S. literature and popular culture since the end of the Cold War. The project identifies different ...

  Citation × Citation Citation Abstract Copy Title: WAR BY OTHER MEANS: ENVIRONMENTAL VIOLENCE IN THE 21st CENTURY Author: Hall, Shane Year: 2017 This dissertation studies the intersections of militarism, climate change, and environmental justice in U.S. literature and popular culture since the end of the Cold War. The project identifies different mechanisms enacting environmental military violence through discursive analysis of literary and cultural texts, and considers the ideas, values, and beliefs that support environmental military violence. In each chapter I trace a different dynamic of environmental violence structured through the logics of U.S. counterinsurgency theory by examining what I call “narrative political ecologies”—cultural texts that center concerns of ecology and broadly defined political economy. Chapter I establishes the stakes and questions of the dissertation. The next two chapters investigate the dynamics of environmental violence depicted within narrative political ecologies. Chapter II investigates how eruptive interpersonal violence secures more insidious, hidden forms of slow environmental violence in Héctor Tobar’s The Tattooed Soldier. Chapter III considers the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands and the environmental military violence responsible for the deaths of undocumented migrants by examining Luis Alberto Urrea’s The Devil’s Highway and the Electronic Disturbance Theater’s Transborder Immigrant Tool. Chapter IV turns to potential f wars and conflicts that may be caused by climate change as they have been depicted in speculative fiction. In novels depicting climate migrants, such as Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower (1993) and Parable of the Talents (2014), I show that even politically progressive, intersectional approaches to environmental endangerment naturalize conflict and occlude dialogic solutions to environmental change. The final chapter traces how the environmental refugee has become a paradigmatic figure in climate change discourse, particularly the aspects of this discourse where issues of national security are articulated. At the center of these texts is the figure of the migrant and narratives of migrations, and I argue that the figure of the environmental migrant offers a privileged vantage on the constitutive forces of the Anthropocene. The dissertation identifies the specific literary and rhetorical techniques that authors use to contest environmental militarization and expand the U.S. public’s capacity to creatively and compassionately reason around increased flows of environmental migrants— issues of vital importance for humane climate change adaptation. Title: WAR BY OTHER MEANS: ENVIRONMENTAL VIOLENCE IN THE 21st CENTURY Author: Hall, Shane Year: 2017 This dissertation studies the intersections of militarism, climate change, and environmental justice in U.S. literature and popular culture since the end of the Cold War. The project identifies different mechanisms enacting environmental military violence through discursive analysis of literary and cultural texts, and considers the ideas, values, and beliefs that support environmental military violence. In each chapter I trace a different dynamic of environmental violence structured through the logics of U.S. counterinsurgency theory by examining what I call “narrative political ecologies”—cultural texts that center concerns of ecology and broadly defined political economy. Chapter I establishes the stakes and questions of the dissertation. The next two chapters investigate the dynamics of environmental violence depicted within narrative political ecologies. Chapter II investigates how eruptive interpersonal violence secures more insidious, hidden forms of slow environmental violence in Héctor Tobar’s The Tattooed Soldier. Chapter III considers the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands and the environmental military violence responsible for the deaths of undocumented migrants by examining Luis Alberto Urrea’s The Devil’s Highway and the Electronic Disturbance Theater’s Transborder Immigrant Tool. Chapter IV turns to potential f wars and conflicts that may be caused by climate change as they have been depicted in speculative fiction. In novels depicting climate migrants, such as Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower (1993) and Parable of the Talents (2014), I show that even politically progressive, intersectional approaches to environmental endangerment naturalize conflict and occlude dialogic solutions to environmental change. The final chapter traces how the environmental refugee has become a paradigmatic figure in climate change discourse, particularly the aspects of this discourse where issues of national security are articulated. At the center of these texts is the figure of the migrant and narratives of migrations, and I argue that the figure of the environmental migrant offers a privileged vantage on the constitutive forces of the Anthropocene. The dissertation identifies the specific literary and rhetorical techniques that authors use to contest environmental militarization and expand the U.S. public’s capacity to creatively and compassionately reason around increased flows of environmental migrants— issues of vital importance for humane climate change adaptation. Close