Itago Winnie
Historically, oil exploration in Africa has brought the resource curse: countries with more abundant natural resources have poorer development outcomes, due to corruption and environmental degradation. Itago will compare new oil producers Ghana and Ugandawhich share many similarities despite Ugandas semi-authoritiarianism and Ghanas greater democracy and transparency to understand this phenomenon. To evaluate the effect of petro-policies and public participation on environmental and socio-economic outcomes in the two nations, Itago will gather data on government policies, revenue collection, and allocations in the Ghanaian and Ugandan capitals, followed by interviews with […]
Ana Cristina Gomez-Vidal
The rise of China is arguably the single most important event to shape international politics in the 21st century. The United States understanding and response to Chinas ascent will shape global political stability. The U.S. Government, through legislative mandate, created two commissions, the Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC) and the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCESRC), whose purposes are to ensure that Congress has the information necessary to make effective decisions relating to Sino-US affairs. Cristinas research project seeks to undergo a content analysis of the information generated by […]
Michael Papias
In 2017, more than 690,000 children spent time in foster care, and on any given day in the US, more than 443,000 children are in foster care. One-third of all foster youth are children of color, with 93,507 children identifying as Hispanic/Latinx. People identifying as Latinx are the fastest growing group in the child welfare system. Michael will be interviewing Latinx foster youth from across California, focusing on the cultural and family identities of each participant. Familia/family, culture, and ethnic identity are cornerstones of the Latinx community, so how do […]
Voulette Hattar
Allegra Saggese
Land serves as the primary source of energy in the world. UC Berkeleys Oxford Tract is currently under consideration for development from a student garden and research facility to a student housing project. Allegra will create and subsequently critique a cost-benefit analysis of the proposed project versus its current use, bringing forward underlying assumptions which justify costs and benefits that both connect and avoid the relationships land use has to greater ecological systems and constraints. Comparing traditional techniques for economic and financial modeling deployed in land development with ecologically nested […]
Chance Grable
Since the 1970s, two simultaneous processes of mass incarceration and deindustrialization have transformed the US into a postindustrial society with the largest incarceration system globally. Chance’s research will explore the intertwined history of these two processes through a close study of the prison siting in Youngstown, Ohio, an extreme example of deindustrialization. Through this study, Chance will attempt to answer why prisons emerged in deindustrialized geographies and the resulting social, political and economic impacts. In addition to government documents and oral histories, Chance will examine the archive of activist couple […]
Michelle Gallarza
The Northeast section of the San Fernando Valley is home to one of the largest populations of Latinos in the United States, second only to East Los Angeles.In contrast to the more well-known and affluent suburbs of the west Valley, this region faces issues stemming from poverty, residential segregation, environmental racism, and divestment. Meet Each Need with Dignity (MEND) is a poverty relief organization that has existed for over 40 years in the area’s most vulnerable community known as Pacoima. Michelle’s research seeks to uncover how this nonprofit organization has […]
Esperanza Padilla
Autism is typically understood as a disorder rather than an identity. However, the emergence of the autism self-advocacy movement and virtual spaces suggests that autism is more than a diagnosis for many individuals. Esperanza Padilla’s research seeks to delve beyond the medical models interpretation of autism to find out how autistic individuals develop their sense of self. Padilla’s research will utilize both survey data and in-depth interviews to gather information about autistic adults life experiences. She will then analyze her findings using the sociological framework of Symbolic Interactionism by Herbert […]
Sydney Garcia
Everyone experiences stress to varying degrees. Past scholarship has connected awareness of the news to stress while linking stress to adverse mental and physical health outcomes. Given that minority groups are significantly overrepresented in news relating to criminal activity, and news coverage under the Trump Administration has increased negative depictions of immigrants, Sydney will travel to Californias Central Valley to investigate the impacts of such coverage on Latinx farmworkers. She will use daily diary methodology to uncover the relationship between daily self-reported awareness of the news, stress levels, emotions, and […]
Shelby Mack
Black girls are disproportionately impacted by school discipline policies and practices that render them vulnerable to abuse, exploitation and dehumanization. It has been shown in multiple studies that Black girls who are suspended or expelled are more likely to become incarcerated later. Shelby Macks research seeks to identify factors such as school discipline, criminalization and gender violence in order to understand how enrichment programs can disrupt the school to prison pipeline epidemic among Black girls in Oakland, CA. Her research will employ in-depth interviewing, purposive sampling and non-participant observation of […]