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Aleph Volume 21 Table of Contents

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Aleph Volume 21 Table of Contents

Period Products and Period Power: Investigating Knowledge, Sexuality, and Attitudes with Menstrual Cup Usage

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Stigma toward menstruation is closely linked to a lack of knowledge about menstrual health taboos and negative attitudes toward sex and bodies. The menstrual cup (MC), an alternative menstrual product to pads and tampons, may mitigate these negative perceptions through the high levels of body contact and menstrual and anatomical knowledge required to use it. Hence, the current study examines the relationship between MC usage and 1) knowledge about menstruation and reproductive anatomy, 2) personal comfort with sexuality, and 3) attitudes toward menstruation. This study utilized a quantitative survey to investigate the attitudes and experiences of 180 menstruators ages 19-34 and the menstrual products they use. As predicted, more frequent MC usage was associated with higher knowledge, greater comfort with sexuality, and lower disgust and shame toward menstruation.

Aleph Volume 21 Letter from the Editor

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Aleph Volume 21 Letter from the Editor

Sinners, Victims, or Survivors? Prostitution in the Moral Landscape of Eighteenth-century England

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This paper explores the moral and social landscape of prostitution in eighteenth-century England, analyzing how prostitutes were perceived and represented in various cultural, economic, and legal contexts. In particular, it focuses on the interplay between moral judgment and social necessity that characterized the public discourse surrounding prostitution during this period. Through an examination of primary sources including Bernard de Mandeville’s satirical work, A Modest Defence of Publick Stews (1724), and William Hogarth’s visual narrative series, A Harlot’s Progress (1732), alongside contemporaneous writings on notable figures like Sally Salisbury, this research investigates the nuanced perceptions of prostitutes as sinners, victims, and survivors. It argues that prostitution in eighteenth-century England was not merely a moral or legal issue but was deeply intertwined with the socioeconomic conditions of the time by highlighting how urbanization, economic necessity, and...

Chinese Archaeology as a Function of Politics

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Before one can address the pressing questions within any discipline, it is worth investigating the narratives and assumptions that undergird the answers. In Chinese archaeology, there have been observable points in time where politics have exerted significant force on academic opinions - certain political epochs correspond to homogeneity in opinion. This begs the question: in the context of Chinese archaeology, how exactly has politics affected archaeological interpretations of discoveries and theoretical frameworks? Within the modern era, I look to three major eras that have well-documented effects on Chinese archaeology to chart the changes in the discipline over time: 1) the Republican era, 2) the Maoist era, and 3) the post-reform period (i.e., 1978 and onwards). In interpreting these broad eras and the political views that characterize them, I will appeal to Michel Foucault’s concept of the episteme. That is, the underlying assumptions that ground the way people understand...

Transcending Boundaries: Blood Writing as a Catalyst for Transformation

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This paper delves into the practice of blood writing in Chinese Buddhism, a unique ascetic ritual dating back to the 6th century CE. Blood writing involves practitioners using their blood to transcribe sacred texts, both embodying sacred Buddhist scriptures and imbuing the practitioner with power. This work traces the origins of blood writing as a reflection of indigenous Chinese beliefs surrounding blood, the body, and morality while drawing attention to the influence of Indian Buddhist ideologies on this practice. Historical and ethnographic accounts of blood writing emphasize its transformative power, not only for individual practitioners but also for broader sociopolitical dynamics. Drawing on multiple embodiment theories, this work analyzes the performative nature of blood writing, highlighting its role in shaping cultural values and ideologies. Blood writing transcends conventional boundaries, embodying spiritual and cultural values, and ultimately serves as a potent force...

Aleph Volume 21 Staff List

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Aleph Volume 21 Staff List

The Liberatory Potential of Menstrual Cups

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Dominant menstrual discourse constructs menstrual blood as a stigmatized bodily fluid that evokes disgust. Through the enactment of Foucault’s biopower, internalization of this discourse results in a culture of concealment, wherein menstruators’ bodies are problematized and require self-monitoring, management, and sanitization through technology such as menstrual products. Through a case study of menstrual cup company DivaCup’s marketing and social media posts from menstrual cup users, this research uses the theoretical lens of feminist science and technology studies to examine the sociotechnical system of menstrual cups and the extent to which they can be considered a liberatory technology. This research argues that menstrual cups have the potential to facilitate open discussions that push back against dominant menstrual discourse and the culture of concealment, while also necessitating increased embodiment and body literacy compared to conventional disposable products. However,...

Navigating Barriers to Healthcare: Exploring Health Disparities within Immigrants in Los Angeles and Strategies for Effective Intervention

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The current exploratory review examines the upstream factors influencing health disparities in the current healthcare landscape, particularly in the context of the immigrant population in Los Angeles. Specifically, the Latino/Hispanic immigrant population serves as a key case study, offering insights into immigrant experiences and contributing to a nuanced understanding of the broader immigrant population. Upon extensive research, the paper identifies three primary root factors: first, the underutilization of healthcare services due to anxieties related to immigrant status; second, a lack of substantial education and resources hindering accessible healthcare; and third, discriminatory practices in healthcare facilities targeted at immigrants. Characterizing such health disparity as a broader social inequality issue rather than mere isolated individual concerns, the paper asserts a need for effective interventions aimed at addressing the fundamental barriers to immigrant access...

Classica Africana: Black Classicism and the Ownership of Narrative

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Within the previous decade, the burgeoning re-imagination of the Greco-Roman canon in an African American context, presently referred to as “Black classicism,” has traversed artistic mediums not only as a cultural transliteration but an active subversion, rejection, and reclamation of the sociological underpinnings of a historically eurocentric area of study. Though modern reception studies are fraught with racial prejudice accusing Black authors of passively imitating—or merely deriving influence from—antiquity, I argue that the neoclassical inventions of Phillis Wheatley, W.E.B. Du Bois, Rita Dove, and Robert Hayden have transposed myth’s most defining elements onto two prominent social narratives: the public reception of African American scholarship and the collective female consciousness. Of these elements, imagery invoking the movement across transitory ‘liminal’ states has been enfranchised to actively subvert the traditionally-eurocentric classical canon while transferring...

Living Under the Undocumented Umbrella The Mixed-Status Family Complex: U.S. Citizens with Undocumented Parent(s)/Guardian(s) Framework

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

An immigrant-made city, Los Angeles has served as the heart of the Immigrant Rights Movement for decades. From the 2006 immigration reform protests to Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), Los Angeles has rarely neglected the topic of immigration. Yet, one lived experience seldom recognized is that of mixed-status families (i.e., families that are not uniform in legal status). Approximately 1 in 5 individuals identify as either undocumented or having an undocumented family member. Acknowledging that mixed-status families vary, I focus on the mixed-status of U.S. Citizens with Undocumented Parent(s)/Guardian(s) and, consequently, how a U.S. citizen’s life is altered by living under the undocumented umbrella. In this paper, I propose the existence of the Restriction of Mobility, (Active) Family Separation, Second-Hand Undocumented Trauma, and (Un)Documented Double-Consciousness under a developing framework called the Mixed-Status Family Complex. By reviewing existing literature...

Community, Politics, and Policing in Macarthur Park

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Over the course of its 140-year existence, Macarthur Park in the Westlake neighborhood of Los Angeles has witnessed a range of diverse phases, from a luxurious recreation area to a locality grappling with issues of crime and poverty. Through the lens of local news coverage, this paper explores the changing landscape of community, politics, and policing in the park and how it has shaped identity and revitalization efforts. By critically analyzing policing initiatives and community-oriented efforts aimed at mitigating crime, the paper outlines the park’s evolution into a vibrant, safe space while shedding light on the challenges posed by racism and immigration status. The focal point of the paper revolves around immigrant political activism in Macarthur Park, focusing on multiple case studies, including the May Day Rally in 2007. This rally, disrupted by LAPD violence, becomes an example of infringement on the First Amendment right to speech and assembly of immigrants. The study...

Aleph Staff 2022-2023

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Aleph Staff 2022-2023

“Time and Momentum Are on Our Side”: An Examination of the People’s Republic of China’s Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This paper seeks to reconstruct the People’s Republic of China’s COVID response from the beginning of the outbreak to life after the end of zero-COVID (end of 2019-early 2023). I present four different periods within this timeframe where China adjusted its strategy, both domestically and internationally. Namely, these are the early phase (E), pre-vaccine phase (PrV), post-vaccine (PV) phase, and post-zero-COVID (PZC) phase. Given the recent jettisoning of zero-COVID policies by Chinese authorities in late 2022 following the A4 Revolution 白紙革命, I believe this paper serves to add greater context to the events leading up to this, contextualize the situation in China after zero-COVID, and situate China’s domestic response to COVID within global discussions of how better to manage pandemic response.

Aleph Volume 20 - Author Biographies

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Aleph Volume 20 - Author Biographies

Stories of (S)kin: Afro-Asian-Indigenous Relationalities and Anti-Blackness in Diasporic Filipinx Hawaiʻi

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

In this paper, I explore how Filipinx settlers in occupied Hawaiʻi are racialized in proximity to Blackness, in relation to US-centric and colonial articulations of Blackness, and within the settler colonial system of power and domination in the transpacific. Across the Filipinx diaspora, critiques of white skin valorization are conceptualized primarily as colorism where Asian beauty and desirability are routed through the white colonial imagination. However, drawing from ethnographic research on local skin whitening discourse among first and second-generation Filipinx-American settlers in Hawaiʻi, I consider how these stories of skin reveal how Filipinx settlers are racialized in proximity to Blackness, where Blackness is denigrated, whiteness reigns supreme, and Kanaka Maoli are entangled in US racial binaries. As such, I move beyond colorism to argue that the processes of racialization indexed by skin whitening is an anti-Black project of US empire that renders dark-skin...

Vacuum of Social Mobility: Warehouse Labor’s Impact on Young Workers in California’s Inland Empire

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Racialized Neoliberalism is resculpting the fabric of Southern California’s Inland Empire. Riverside and San Bernardino Counties, located directly east of Los Angeles, encompass the largest hub of warehousing and logistics in the United States. These warehouses serve key roles in the supply chains of companies such as Walmart and Amazon. This project attends to the disproportionate placement of warehouses in communities of color, analyzes the discourse of local politicians who support these neoliberal developments and focuses on the experiences of youth (aged 18-22) who are pushed into warehouse work. By illuminating the impact that warehouses have on youth in the Inland Empire through interviews, this project argues that neoliberal economic developments do not empower but, rather, harm minoritized communities. This generational impact is reflected in young workers’ experiences of social mobility, wage slavery, and time poverty. Through Convenience Sampling and Nomination Recruitment...

From the “Mississippi of the West” to the “City of Second Chances”: Contextualizing the Racial and Ethnic Composition of Las Vegas

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Las Vegas’ residential terrain has often been overlooked beyond the city’s history of extreme spatial and economic segregation in the mid-1900s due to its development as a tourist city. This research reflects that history in the 21st century through the lens of population geography, which demonstrates that heavy in-migration to Nevada after 1990 flooded a landscape of severe segregation and thus reshaped the city’s racial and ethnic boundaries. A comparison between patterns of racial and ethnic distribution with access to quality education as well as the distribution of gated communities reveals that historical barriers to minority mobility persisted in new, more fluid forms after these waves of immigration. Namely, the overall geographical tendency of Las Vegas subregions with the highest proportions of gated communities and high-quality educational institutions to be areas with majority white populations demonstrates that systems of community and educational privatization...

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Aleph - Table of Contents - Volume 20 (2022-2023)

Female power through Daoism in the Tang Dynasty

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This paper examines how female Daoists achieved ideological political power within the Confucian feudal society in the Tang Dynasty in ancient China. It compares the influence of the three core religions Ru Shi Dao to show the social background of the Tang Dynasty, serving as a basis for discussing women’s empowerment. The paper demonstrates that Daoism played a significant role in helping women obtain the liberation of their physicality, step out of their nuclear family, and obtain social power. The paper employs Michael Mann’s theory on sources of social power to understand the power structure in the Tang Dynasty. It examines classical texts on Confucianism and Daoism, as well as Chinese poems, providing both theoretical support to the social order of the Tang Dynasty and individual experience in the specific social environment.

Lithium Extraction and Hydropower Development in Bolivia: Climate Mitigation versus Indigenous Environmental Justice

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Located at the heart of the Amazonian-Andean geobiological interface, Bolivia is uniquely situated with an ecologically diverse landscape, a politically active Indigenous population, and natural resources that attract foreign interest. As climate change mitigation gains international traction, Bolivia’s potential to provide lithium globally and hydropower regionally has prompted exploitation of the land by the Bolivian government. In a nation where the Indigenous majority has defined the rights of Mother Earth in its Constitution, the destructive nature of these projects calls attention to the novel issue of justifying environmental degradation with a promise to save the world from climate change. By examining primary and secondary sources, this paper explores the friction between development for sustainability and Indigenous environmental justice in Bolivia. In my investigation, I question whether investing in renewables that cause environmental degradation is inherently contradictory...

Letter from the Editor

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Letter from the Editor

Concepts with Compassion: How ContraPoints Uses the Video Essay Format to Promote Intellectualism and Catharsis