2009 MMUF Journal

The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2009 The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2009 Institutions participating in the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program A collection of scholarly research by fellows of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program Barnard College Macalester College United Negro College Fund Participants Morris College Bowdoin College Oberlin College Allen University Oakwood University Brooklyn College (CUNY) Princeton University Benedict College Paine College Brown University Queens College (CUNY) Bennett College Paul Quinn College Bryn Mawr College Rice University Bethune-Cookman University Philander Smith College California Institute of Technology Smith College Claflin University Rust College Carleton College Stanford University Clark Atlanta University Saint Augustine’s College City College of New York (CUNY) Swarthmore College Dillard University Saint Paul’s College Columbia University University of California at Berkeley Edward Waters College Shaw University Connecticut College University of California at Los Angeles Fisk University Spelman College Cornell University University of Cape Town (South Africa) Florida Memorial University Stillman College Dartmouth College University of Chicago Huston-Tillotson University Talladega College Duke University University of Pennsylvania Interdenominational Theological Center Texas College Emory University University of Southern California Jarvis Christian College Tougaloo College Grinnell College Washington University Johnson C. Smith University Tuskegee University Harvard University Wellesley College Lane College Virginia Union University Haverford College Wesleyan University LeMoyne-Owen College Voorhees College Heritage College Williams College Livingstone College Wilberforce University Hunter College (CUNY) Yale University Miles College Wiley College Morehouse College Xavier University Through subtle shades of color, the cover design represents the layers of richness and diversity that flourish within minority communities. The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2009 A collection of scholarly research by fellows of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program Preface It has been an honor to assemble this collection of original research from undergraduate recipients of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship (MMUF). Having welcomed approximately 3,300 undergraduate students into its ranks as Fellows, the MMUF program continues to realize its aim of increas- ing the number of minority students and others with a demonstrated commitment to eradicating racial disparities that pursue PhDs in the arts and sciences. Indeed, with more than 311 fellows who have earned their PhDs and are now actively teaching, MMUF is making significant inroads in reducing the serious underrepresentation of certain minority groups on faculties across the nation. The articles presented in the 2009 MMUF Journal showcase the original research of fellows who participated in the program during the academic year 2008–2009 as well as recent alumni of the program. This year’s MMUF Journal spotlights the contributions of just a few of this generation of emerging scholars as they make new forays into the scholarly world. Fellows were encouraged to sub- mit works showcasing their intellectual endeavors, especially the culmination of research conducted under the supervision of their MMUF faculty mentor. The diverse articles in this year’s journal reveal the breadth of perspectives represented in the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship 21 fields of designated study.* The issues probed in the essays range from Jeff Yamashita’s exploration of competing portrayals of Japanese American identity and Maisha Rashid’s examinations of contemporary attitudes towards the rights of Arab and Muslim Americans to Donavan Ramon’s analysis of historical and modern literary depictions of slavery. The breadth of students’ research topics—traversing the globe and spanning disciplines, historical eras and conceptual commitments—shows both their promise in the pursuit of knowledge and engage- ment with their world(s). It has been a grand pleasure to once again read and select the articles for the journal. Whether explor- ing the influence of racial politics on gender performativity, risks associated with the prevalent prob- lem of water contamination, the politics of virtue in status in Italian architecture, or the ambivalent consequences of color-blind politics—these students are examining issues critical to our understand- ing of underrepresented groups and society at large. Their engaging questions and analyses are a testament to the added value—and necessity—of such scholars to diversify the homogenized nature of institutions and provide new perspectives in our quest for knowledge. We present students’ original research in the MMUF Journal in continued support of their aim to obtain doctorates and become exceptional scholars. We hope you will enjoy their articles. Jovonne J. Bickerstaff Meg Brooks Swift Editor Contributing Editor MMUF Graduate Student Advisor, 2006–2009 MMUF Coordinator, 2006–2009 Harvard University, PhD Candidate in Sociology Harvard University *Designated fields for the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship: Anthropology, Area Studies, Art History, Classics, Computer Science, Demography, Earth Science, Ecology, English, Ethnomusicology, Foreign Languages, Geology, History, Literature, Mathematics, Musicology, Philosophy, Physics, Political Theory, Religion, and Sociology. The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2009 Table of Contents 2 43 Alicia Adams, Brown University Melinda C. Rios, Wellesley College Public Policy and the Black-White Infant A Magnificent Display of Virtue in the Palazzo Scala Mortality Gap 49 6 Alexander Robel, Duke University Westenley Alcenat, Macalester College Modeling Future Hurricane Climatology The Idea of Black Republicanism: Post-Revolutionary Haiti and Early African American Political Thought 54 Mentors: Professor Peter Rachleff and Professor Darius Scott, Morehouse College James B. Stewart For the People, By the People: Secondhand Shopping Spaces 13 Maureen D. Barradas, Carleton College 59 Critique of Patriarchy/Proposal of Equal Power: Natalie Yasmin Soto, City University of New York, Chaucer’s “Physician’s Tale” Hunter College A Comparative Study of Latina/o Literatures: 17 Memory and the Longing for Home [an excerpt] Joshua Bennett, University of Pennsylvania Mentor: Dr. Candice M. Jenkins Boxing with the Hands of Time: An analysis of race and disability in The Curious Case of Benjamin 63 Button Sharon Tran, Macaulay Honors College at CUNY Mentor: Dr. Jackson Queens The Violence of Color-Blind Politics: De-Realizing 21 the Loss of Race Anthony Coleman, Williams College Paris Is Burning: An Archive of the Tension between 68 Ontology and Performativity Brandi M. Waters, University of Pennsylvania Desvelos: Reflections on Discrimination and Art 25 in Seville, Spain Aundeah Kearney, Princeton University The Emancipation of an Approximation: 71 The Social Work of Kara Walker’s Imagery Maya Wei-Haas, Smith College Geochemistry of the Northampton Landfill: 29 Are the Soils and Water Contaminated? Kojo Minta, University of Pennsylvania Mentor: Robert Newton The Aesthetic of the Acetic: Godly Despair in Early Modern England 76 Jeff Yamashita, Macalester College 34 Conflict of Interest: Japanese American Identity Donavan L. Ramon, City University of New York, after World War II Hunter College Mentor: Professor Christopher Scott “Incidents” of “Signifying” in Kindred: Comparing Octavia Butler’s and Harriet Jacobs’s Depictions of Slavery Mentor: Dr. Candice M. Jenkins 37 Maisha Rashid, Barnard College Testing Our Tolerance: American Attitudes toward Limitations on the First Amendment Rights of Arab and Muslim Americans Mentors: Dr. Paula McClain and Dr. Scott de Marchi 1 Public Policy and the Black-White Infant Mortality Gap Alicia Adams, Brown University Alicia Adams, a junior and Human Biology major, grew up began to approach the infant mortality rate of whites. By in Waukegan, IL and plans to pursue a combined MD/PhD 1990, however, the black-white infant mortality gap had (sociology) after she graduates in 2011. Her aim is to link the increased substantially, and children born in Uruguay had a social and the biological in order to better address the causes and statistically higher chance of reaching their first birthday consequences of health inequality and design potential solutions. than black children born in inner-city Boston, despite their Alicia is particularly interested in how the social worlds of proximity to a world-class medical center.4 By 2003, the rel- marginalized populations alter their bodies and cause illness. ative infant mortality rate was worse than it was in 1964, with the black infant mortality rate reaching 2.3 times the rate of white infants.5 Abstract Existing literature has focused on potential genetic The black-white infant mortality gap is worse today explanations for the black-white infant mortality gap. As evi- than it was in 1964, prior to the Civil Rights Act that banned dence for a genetic cause, authors often cite the recurrence discrimination and desegregated hospitals. Although some of preterm birth in an individual woman and birth timing research suggests that the reason for the racial difference in trends among family members.6 While these correlations infant mortality rates is genetic, this paper investigates the certainly exist, they conflate the biological and the

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