scholarly journals A Community, a Remedy against Social Fragmentation in Roots, the Saga of an American Family

2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
May Matta
Keyword(s):  
American Family ◽  
Social Fragmentation ◽  
African Slaves ◽  
Foreign Land ◽  
Alex Haley

Alex Haley embarks on a journey to discover his roots, based on the stories he had been told by his grandmother. His visit to Gambia and his conversations with griots yield the amazing book, Roots. The book explores various themes including religion, race, manhood, and community. Of these themes, community stands out most. Throughout the book, Alex Haley mentions the different ways in which the community remains together despite the challenges. During all the phases of enslavement, the role of the community in the lives of the Africans is evident. Therefore, this research provides evidence that community is the remedy against social fragmentation in Roots. Moreover, the research informs the reader about the meaning of community to one of the main characters, Kunta. It also touches on the ways in which African slaves managed to retain their identity in a foreign land, despite the hindrances to community unity. 

Tracing New Genealogies

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer J. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Country Of Origin ◽  
American Family ◽  
Community Or ◽  
Immigration Laws ◽  
Shared Experiences ◽  
Biological Relationships

Chapter four turns to a more intimate form of affiliation than either nation or community: family. The period from the 1970s onward has produced the greatest concentration of cycles since modernism, because writers embraced the cycle to express the contingency of being ethnic and American. Family, rather than community or time, is the dominant linking structure for many of these cycles, reflecting how immigration laws placed family and education above country of origin. This chapter focuses on the role of family in the production and reception of Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club (1989), Julie Alvarez’s How the García Girls Lost Their Accents (1991), and Jhumpa Lahiri’s Unaccustomed Earth (2008). These cycles argue that subjectivity—and by extension gender and ethnic attachments—derives not only from biological relationships but also from “formative kinship,” which originates in shared experiences that the characters choose to value.

Alex Haley, As A Family Genealogist Who Traced His Roots From His Ancestors.

Think India ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (6) ◽  
pp. 2569-2572
Author(s):  
K. STALIN ◽  
S. S. Jansi Rani
Keyword(s):  
American Family ◽  
American Writer ◽  
Popular Novel ◽  
Seven Generations ◽  
Alex Haley

Alex Haley, a famous biographer, novelist and a family genealogist of an American writer. His most popular novel Roots is published in the year 1976. Roots: The Saga of An American  Family, has 688 page fictional description of the genealogy of his family beginning with a kidnapped his ancestors of village Gambia. Roots covering seven generations, the story did not stop here. Alex Haley went two centuries back to find the trace of Kunta Kinte’s roots existence. Haley did claim that his actual ancestor was identified as Kunta Kinte as per the Griot, the story teller.

Social and Familial Childrearing: An Examination of Daycare and the Modern Family

1983 ◽  
Vol 165 (4) ◽  
pp. 375-397
Author(s):  
Carol S. Klass
Keyword(s):  
Historical Perspective ◽  
National Policy ◽  
American Family ◽  
Policy And Practice ◽  
High Quality ◽  
Self Identity ◽  
The Family ◽  
Modern Family ◽  
Changing Patterns

American families' need for out-of-home childcare increases at an accelerated rate each year; yet our society lacks a policy for—and even a national commitment to—high-quality daycare. Such a national policy needs to be formulated within an examination of the tensions between social and familial childrearing. This essay explores these contextual issues from a historical perspective. The essay discusses: first, changes in the family as they relate to changes in the economy and polity; second, the role of the family as the basis for the young child's self-identity and internalization of society's values and practices; and third, the potential implications of changing patterns of the structure and functioning of the American family. Finally, the essay examines historical and current daycare policy and practice in relation to the family and the broader social structure.

Folklore and Folklife of American Family and Friends

2018 ◽  
pp. 866-887
Author(s):  
Caren Neile
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
American Family ◽  
Friendship Groups ◽  
Performative Utterance ◽  
Family Narrative ◽  
Mode Of Transmission ◽  
Group 2 ◽  
American Society

The folklore of family and friends is a primary social frame of traditional knowledge, promoting distinctive values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors. Their associated narratives share certain characteristics. They have long been mined by folklorists as popular forms of personal experience narrative, and their transmission is somewhat gender dependent. Unlike friendship narrative, however, family narrative is widely studied in its own right. This chapter argues for a deeper study of friendship narrative, given (1) its role as a performative utterance, reflecting agency that helps form and maintain the group; (2) its horizontal, egalitarian mode of transmission; (3) the effect of the relative ephemerality of friendships; and (4) the role of gossip. The tension between tradition and innovation in American society and the growing importance of friendship groups in the culture, particularly through social media, make friendship narrative an increasingly compelling area of folklore scholarship and a potential means for countering intergroup hostilities.

“It’s Going to Be Okay”

2018 ◽  
pp. 117-138
Author(s):  
Mary Robertson
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Family Formation ◽  
American Family ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Gender Identities ◽  
Same Sex Couples ◽  
White Middle Class ◽  
Younger Age ◽  
And Gender

Acknowledging that the youth of Spectrum tend to disclose their sexual and gender identities to parents at a relatively young age, this chapter explores the role of family in the formation of these youths’ sexualities and genders. It was often the case with Spectrum youth that, rather than rejection, they encountered loving support about their sexuality from their parents. The youth of Spectrum are of a generation of kids who are the first to grow up in a society in which same-sex couples and genderqueer parents rearing children have become significantly socially acceptable. The chapter argues that young people are sharing their queer sexual and gender identities with their parents at a younger age because of gender non-conformity that leads parents to make assumptions about their child’s sexuality because they are more frequently exposed to LGBTQ family members and loved ones and because these particular parents do not conform to the white, middle-class, heteropatriarchal regime of the Standard North American Family. Queer family formation has broad implications not just for same-sex couples but for the way U.S. society understands and recognizes family in general.

Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Latin American Family Firms

2017 ◽  
pp. 497-516
Author(s):  
Verónica Baños-Monroy ◽  
Edgar Ramírez-Solís ◽  
Lucia Rodríguez-Aceves
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Family Firms ◽  
Family Businesses ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
American Family ◽  
Secondary Sources ◽  
Main Driver ◽  
Global Entrepreneurship

This chapter examines the role of entrepreneurship and innovation in the development of family businesses in Latin America. The socio-economic dynamics of such region is an interesting field for research, mainly because: it is a major manufacturing hub with growing importance in retail; it experienced a huge economical shift in the last ten years causing the growth of the middle class (an increase of 50 million people); family firms in the region are the main driver of growth and employment. The authors focused the analysis on Mexico due to its singular characteristics, making it a representative example of the region. Based on secondary sources, a characterization of the entrepreneurship and innovation in family owned and managed firms in the region is reviewed. Moreover, based on the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor database, the authors present some recent data related with entrepreneurship levels in the region and its impact in terms of innovation. Finally, public policy implications are provided in order to encourage entrepreneurship and innovation in family businesses.

scholarly journals Public Service Media, Old and New: Vitalizing a Civic Culture?

1999 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Dahlgreen
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Civic Culture ◽  
Digital Television ◽  
Commercial Television ◽  
The Public ◽  
Public Service Broadcasting ◽  
Social Fragmentation ◽  
Service Project ◽  
Democratic Character

Abstract: By the mid-1990s, the crisis in public service broadcasting in Sweden had passed and a new stability had emerged. In this situation, the two non-commercial television channels share the airwaves-and the public-chiefly with the new commercial terrestrial channel, TV4. This channel manifests a form of "popular public service." Yet the new stability is being challenged by social and cultural developments in Sweden, especially various forms of social fragmentation. The main argument is that a key role of public service broadcasting must be to enhance the democratic character of society. This can best be achieved by promoting what is called a civic culture, and the text discusses what this entails. The discussion concludes with some reflections on the emergence of digital television and how it could best further the public service project. Résumé: Au milieu des années 90, la crise dans la radiodiffusion de service public en Suède prend fin et une nouvelle stabilité s'instaure. À ce moment-là, les deux chaînes de télévision non-commerciales partagent les ondes-et le public-principalement avec TV4, une nouvelle chaîne terrestre commerciale. Cette dernière offre une forme de «service public populaire». Aujourd'hui, cependant, certains développements sociaux et culturels, surtout sous diverses formes de fragmentation sociale, sont en train de bouleverser cette nouvelle stabilité. L'idée principale est qu'un rôle clé de la radiodiffusion de service publique doit être de mettre en valeur la nature démocratique de la société. La meilleure façon d'accomplir cet objectif est de promouvoir ce qui s'appelle une culture civique, et l'article discute de ce qu'une telle culture comporterait. La discussion prend fin avec certaines observations sur l'émergence de la télévision digitale et la manière dont celle-ci peut faire avancer le projet de service au public.

scholarly journals Riding the Wave: Daily Life and Religion among Brazilian Immigrants to Japan in the Age of COVID-19 Pandemic

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (11) ◽  
pp. 943
Author(s):  
Hugo Córdova Quero ◽  
Nilta Dias
Keyword(s):  
Daily Life ◽  
Faith Communities ◽  
Religious Institutions ◽  
Immigration Control ◽  
The World ◽  
Foreign Land ◽  
Areas Of Concern ◽  
Brazilian Immigrants ◽  
The One

In March 2020, the world folded before an imminent pandemic. Community gatherings, events, and rituals quickly moved online. Jobs halted or were conducted remotely. The fear of the COVID-19 pandemic impacted different areas of daily life. In this article, we propose examining and analyzing the experiences and narratives of Brazilian migrants in Japan. With the Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Act amendment on 8 December 1989, thousands of Japanese descendants born and raised in the Americas migrated to Japan. They are the offspring of Japanese immigrants who established colonies in the Americas in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Over time, the community of Brazilian immigrants in Japan fluctuated from being a minority to become the fifth-largest ethnic group of immigrants. Our analysis focuses on two areas of concern in times of the COVID-19 pandemic: daily life—including gender, and religion. On the one hand, daily life became cumbersome due to issues related to language and the hardships of accessing health services in a foreign land. On the other hand, we state that in the process of adaptation to the new society, the role of faith communities has been notable in offering support to these immigrants. Religious institutions, in particular, confronted the fact of moving their support and activities online with the consequent difficulties for those who are not tech-savvy or lack reliable connectivity. Both situations impacted Brazilian immigrants in different ways during the COVID-19 pandemic and highlighted the agency they displayed in coping with its consequences.

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