Please join CSDE for a seminar with Colin Gordon on Friday, May 3rd from 12:30-1:30 in 360 PAR and on Zoom (register here). Colin Gordon is Professor and Chair of History at the University of Iowa, where he has taught since 1994. Gordon will be available for 1×1 meetings throughout the day. Sign up for a 1×1 meeting here.
After the seminar, Evans PhD student Isaiah Wright will facilitate a graduate student discussion with Dr.Gordon in 221 Raitt from 1:30-2:30. Students can discuss research collaborations, professional development, academic publishing, and interdisciplinary research, among other topics. Learn more in the event poster here. RSVP to Isaiah Wright (iwrig@uw.edu) to join the student discussion.
Abstract: Drawing on a unique record of property restrictions excavated from local property records in five Midwestern counties, this research documents the prevalence of private property restriction in the era before zoning and building codes were widely employed and before federal redlining sanctioned the segregation of American cities and suburbs. This record of private restriction—documented and mapped to the parcel level in Greater Minneapolis, Greater St. Louis, and two Iowa counties—reveals the racial segregation process both on the ground, in the strategic deployment of restrictions throughout transitional central city neighborhoods and suburbs, and in the broader social and legal construction of racial categories and racial boundaries. Enforcement of private racial restrictions was held unconstitutional in 1948, and such agreements were prohibited outright in 1968. But their premises and assumptions, and the segregation they had accomplished, were carried forward by an array of private practices and public policies—including local zoning and federal redlining. Private race restriction was thus a key element in the original segregation of American cities and a source of durable inequalities in housing wealth, housing opportunity, and economic mobility.
CSDE Affiliate Gregory Bratman (College of the Environment) released research with colleagues in Plos One, entitled “Susceptibility to stress and nature exposure: Unveiling differential susceptibility to physical environments; a randomized controlled trial“. Emerging epidemiological evidence indicates nature exposure could be associated with greater health benefits among groups in lower versus higher socioeconomic positions. One possible mechanism underpinning this evidence is described by our framework: (susceptibility) adults in low socioeconomic positions face higher exposure to persistent psychosocial stressors in early life, inducing a pro-inflammatory phenotype as a lifelong susceptibility to stress; (differential susceptibility) susceptible adults are more sensitive to the health risks of adverse (stress-promoting) environments, but also to the health benefits of protective (stress-buffering) environments. This study serves as an experimental investigation of a pro-inflammatory phenotype as a mechanism facilitating greater stress recovery from nature exposure.
Read Volume 50, Issue 10 here!
CSDE Affiliate Dafeng Xu (Evans School of Public Policy & Governance) authored new research in The History of the Family, entitled “The expatriation act of 1907, marital assimilation, and citizenship-based intermarriage in the U.S.“. As both a marriage act and an immigration act, the Expatriation Act of 1907 restricted U.S. women’s freedom of marriage by stating that marrying aliens would lead to loss of U.S. citizenship. To study the effects of the Expatriation Act, Xu conducts a statistical analysis using 1910 full-count U.S. census data. Xu finds that the Expatriation Act of 1907 generated significantly negative effects on intermarriage between American women and foreign-born men, particularly noncitizens.
CSDE Affiliate Nicole Errett (Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences) released an article with co-authors in Natural Hazards, titled “Bridging underrepresented disaster scholars and national science foundation-funded resources“. The article was lead-authored by Cassandra Jean, a recent postdoctoral scholar in the Department of Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences. The intentional inclusion of various perspectives is critical in disaster and hazard research to advance science and promote equitable resilience in a rapidly changing climate. However, historically underrepresented scholars like Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC), LGBTQIA2S + community members, and women are frequently absent from these efforts. Such exclusions exist as disparities in obtaining grant support, the disproportionate validation of their research or skills, limited training or mentorship opportunities, and implicit biases towards faculty members and students. As a result, many of these scholars, who frequently study communities living in precarious conditions, are absent from utilizing equipment or have limited access to resources that can ultimately assist them in their research efforts. This paper examined the experiences of such underrepresented scholars involved in disaster and environmental-related work to understand the needs, barriers, and opportunities to accessing National Science Foundation (NSF) supported resources.