Drag Artist Interviews, 2021

This public dataset contains transcripts of 25 in-depth semistructured interviews with drag artists. This follows up on an available dataset of 8 interviews of drag artists conducted by SIUE student Destiny Baxter in 2020, available at https://spark.siue.edu/siue_fac/134/, and 22 interviews of drag artists conducted by SIUE students in 2019, available at https://spark.siue.edu/siue_fac/104/ All 2019, 2020, and 2021 interviews used the same instrument, with the exception of an additional question added in 2021 about the pandemic

Communities Moving Past the Daddy Daughter Dance: Adapting Gender-Exclusive Events for the 21st Century

Executive Summary Parent-child community events like father-daughter dances are a celebrated tradition in many communities. However, when these events specify the gender of who can participate, they exclude many families. They also tend to reinforce gender stereotypes (e.g., a dance for girls and a sports event for boys), and are legally questionable for public school and associated P.T.A./P.T.O. sponsors that may be violating federal Title IX requirements and for local governments that may be violating the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause. Contemporary U.S. society is made up of families that come in diverse forms and structures. Two-parent households may have a working mother and stay-at-home father or two parents of the same gender. Some children live with only one parent, sometimes due to factors such as deployment, death, divorce, and incarceration. Excluding families from these events prevents them from participating in community events meant to foster and celebrate family bonds, ultimately adding unnecessary stressors and stigmatizing these families and children. To address these concerns, over the past decade a growing number of communities across the United States have adapted their family events to make them gender inclusive. From Rhode Island to North Carolina to Wisconsin to Oregon, schools, local governments, and other sponsors of gender-exclusive parent-child events have adapted their events to be welcoming and inclusive. These communities strive to ensure the whole community is represented, and that they bring families in the community together, providing equal access to community events. Daddy Daughter Dances become Family Dances or Spring Flings. Me and My Son Bowling becomes a Bowling Bonanza. These events have been expanded to preserve the opportunity for parents and children to bond, including for fathers with their daughters, while also ensuring that girls who like bowling, boys who like dancing, nonbinary children, widowed parents otherwise considered the “wrong” gender, and other community members are able to participate in events that are designed for the community of which they are a part. A number of organizations, from the American Civil Liberties Union (A.C.L.U.) to the American Association of University Women (A.A.U.W.) to PFLAG National to the National Coalition for Women and Girls in Education (N.C.W.G.E.), support communities making these events gender inclusive. However, these changes have not occurred without resistance, often rooted in an attachment to tradition, a desire to enforce values and normative gender roles in our society, and a fear that inclusive policies are part of a cultural politics they find troubling. However, public institutions have responded that they should serve their entire constituency, regardless of any staff or politician’s personal views. Regardless of who lives in their community, communities that have adapted their events seek to serve all the children and families who live there. Being inclusive does not mean ending a tradition; it means finding a way to continue a tradition and bring more people into the celebration. A family dance that used to be a Daddy Daughter Dance still welcomes fathers and daughters to attend together. Families and community leaders seeking change want to be able to participate in community traditions with their family and for these events to be welcoming to their neighbors. Across the country, gender-exclusive community events are being challenged. Some have changed and become gender inclusive. Others continue to exclude members of the public. Advocates, community leaders, and decision-makers in communities with gender-exclusive events seeking to create equal access to these community events can advocate for and adopt changes to specific events or broader inclusive policies that requires these events be inclusive. Community leaders can work to create inclusive policies that represent their whole community and bring families of all kinds together

Sense of Belonging in the Profession and Program of Study Among Nutrition and Dietetics Students

Sense of belonging may positively impact student performance, especially in marginalized groups. This study aimed to examine sense of belonging among a diverse group of nutrition and dietetics students. An online survey investigated students’ feelings of belonging, isolation, and connection to the field of nutrition and dietetics and department of study. The survey was distributed through email to the nutrition and dietetics student body in the Department of Nutrition at Metropolitan State University of Denver. Quantitative data were analyzed as count and percentage. Overall sense of belonging scores were calculated as an average on a 5-point scale (1-strongly disagree to 5-strongly agree). Qualitative data was analyzed using a grounded theory approach. Respondents (n=44) were primarily female (86.0%, n=37), White (74.4%, n=32) or Hispanic (27.9%, n=12), 20-29 years of age (60.5%, n=26), and planned to become Registered Dietitian Nutritionists (83.7%, n=36). Most students felt they belong in the field (34.1%, n=15, agreed; 36.4%, n=16, strongly agreed) and in the Department of Nutrition (38.6%, n=17, agreed; 31.8%, n=14, strongly agreed). Qualitative data in the department community revealed positive perceptions of student connections. Qualitative analyses revealed several barriers to belonging including financial challenges, lack of connections, imposter syndrome, and the desire to see more diversity in the field. Sense of belonging contributes to student success. Nutrition and dietetics programs should aim to address barriers to belongingness, especially among marginalized students

Exposure to aflatoxin and fumonisin in children at risk for growth impairment in rural Tanzania

Growth impairment is a major public health issue for children in Tanzania. The question remains as to whether dietary mycotoxins play a role in compromising children's growth. We examined children's exposures to dietary aflatoxin and fumonisin and potential impacts on growth in 114 children under 36 months of age in Haydom, Tanzania. Plasma samples collected from the children at 24 months of age (N = 60) were analyzed for aflatoxin B₁-lysine (AFB₁-lys) adducts, and urine samples collected between 24 and 36 months of age (N = 94) were analyzed for urinary fumonisin B₁ (UFB₁). Anthropometric, socioeconomic, and nutritional parameters were measured and growth parameter z-scores were calculated for each child. Seventy-two percent of the children had detectable levels of AFB₁-lys, with a mean level of 5.1 (95% CI: 3.5, 6.6) pg/mg albumin; and 80% had detectable levels of UFB₁, with a mean of 1.3 (95% CI: 0.8, 1.8) ng/ml. This cohort had a 75% stunting rate [height-for-age z-scores (HAZ) < −2] for children at 36 months. No associations were found between aflatoxin exposures and growth impairment as measured by stunting, underweight [weight-for-age z-scores (WAZ) < −2], or wasting [weight-for-height z-scores (WHZ) < −2]. However, fumonisin exposure was negatively associated with underweight (with non-detectable samples included, p = 0.0285; non-detectable samples excluded, p = 0.005) in this cohort of children. Relatively low aflatoxin exposure at 24 months was not linked with growth impairment, while fumonisin exposure at 24–36 months based on the UFB₁ biomarkers may contribute to the high growth impairment rate among children of Haydom, Tanzania; which may be associated with their breast feeding and weaning practices

Campus Chronicle

https://openspace.dmacc.edu/campuschronicle/1347/thumbnail.jp

Campus Chronicle

https://openspace.dmacc.edu/campuschronicle/1291/thumbnail.jp

Campus Chronicle

https://openspace.dmacc.edu/campuschronicle/1294/thumbnail.jp

Campus Chronicle

https://openspace.dmacc.edu/campuschronicle/1292/thumbnail.jp

Campus Chronicle

https://openspace.dmacc.edu/campuschronicle/1295/thumbnail.jp

Social capital and HIV-serodiscordance: Disparities in access to personal and professional resources for HIV-positive and HIV-negative partners.

As people living with HIV are living longer lives, they have a correspondingly greater opportunity to enjoy long-term romantic and sexual partnerships, including with persons who do not live with HIV ("serodiscordant" relationships). In these dyads, asymmetries may emerge in access to social resources between partners. In this paper we examined how serodiscordant couples access informal (interpersonal, such as family and friends) and formal (practitioner, such as doctor or social worker) social resources for health. We recruited 540 participants in current serodiscordant relationships, working with 150 AIDS service organizations and HIV clinics across Canada from 2016 to 2018. Our findings demonstrate that partners with HIV have greater access to formal resources than their partners (through health care professionals, therapists/counselors/support workers), while both persons have similar access to resources through informal social relationships (family and friends). Furthermore, the findings indicated that HIV positive partners accessed more varied forms of support through formal ties, compared to HIV negative persons. We offer recommendations for changes to how HIV-negative partners in a serodiscordant relationship are served and cared for, and particularly, the importance of moving toward dyad-focused policies and practices