VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Textuality, Performativity and Archive: Examining the Virtual Body in Socially Networked Space
Keywords: social networking
derrida
butler
archive
performativity
writing the self

This thesis argues that contemporary theorizations of online identities on social-networking sites (SNS) require more robust accounts of the relationship between language, perfomativity, and the tensions of the material/virtual binary. In her analysis of subject formation on multi-user domains, Internet sociologist Jenny Sundén uses poststructuralist philosophy to theorize identity as a process of “textual performativity”. Citing Sundén, many contemporary sociologists theorizing subjectivity on SNS use the terms “writing the self” and “performing the self” and overlook the poststructuralist philosophy that informs them. To explore the lack of philosophical analyses within sociological accounts of subject formation on SNS, and to rethink “writing” and “performing” the self, I draw on the work of J.L. Austin, Judith Butler and Jacques Derrida. I argue that creating a self on SNS is a ”sedimentation” process whereby different discursive identity performances are reiterated over time, and I investigate the implications of archiving and externalizing the self.
Centennial Celebrations in Toronto-area Schools
Keywords: history of education
centennial celebrations
Toronto
schools
pageantry
history education
Expo 67
art
music
travel
Igartua
Osborne
identities
Canada
nationalism
multiculturalism

This thesis investigates and analyzes certain significant aspects of the Centennial celebrations of 1967 as they took place in Toronto-area schools. By considering the Centennial activities involving art, travel, music and historical pageantry—those deemed most significant by educational planners—I propose to evaluate how students, and Canadians in general, were thinking and learning about Canada and its people at the time. Throughout this essay, I argue that the Centennial celebrations are crucial evidence of a developing shift in the way that Canadians conceived of national identities and a change in how students were educated about Canadian history. In particular, I will argue that the Centennial celebrations in Toronto-area schools often demonstrated the continued development of a post-imperial vision of Canada’s national character, and an approach to history education which moved beyond the traditional timeline-oriented and British nation-building narratives that dominated early-twentieth-century Canadian education.
The Varsity Man: Manhood, the University of Toronto and the Great War
Keywords: The Great War
Masculinity
University of Toronto
Militarism
The First World War
Gender
Education
Recruitment

This research examines the relationship between masculinity and recruitment at the University of Toronto during the Great War. Through a gendered framework established by historians such as Judith Butler, masculinity is approached as a constructed process that encompasses a variety of complex relationships between the individual subject and social processes. The following questions are explored: What motivated the administration the University to instate policies that first encouraged, and then forced, male students to enter active service? How did dominant discourses of masculinity influence recruitment efforts and the subsequent movement towards mandatory military training? The research reveals that gendered understandings of war and recruitment on campus presented active service as the defining moment of manhood. Enlisting, then, was understood as more than a willingness to take up arms; it publicly signified that a man was committed to the defense of democracy and to securing the freedom of generations to come.
How has Character Education been Implemented at the School Level at an Ontario Sample School Board?
Keywords: character
implementation

This paper explores character educations policy documents from two Ontario school boards as well as several published articles that report on results from research related to implementation of character education programs in Ontario and the United States. This paper examines the connection between school board documents of two school boards with the Ontario Ministry of Education character education initiative that was put in place during the 2008-09 school year. It also includes interviews with three principals at one school-board as to how they approached implementation of character education and its relationship to the goal of the school and provincial policy directives.
Learning How to Be Ukrainian: Ukrainian Schools in Toronto and the Formation of Identity, 1947-2009
Keywords: Ukrainian School
Ethnic Schooling
Identity
Ethnicity
Toronto
Ukrainian Immigration to Canada
Ukrainian Diaspora
Religion and Schooling
Ukrainian Orthodoxy
Greek Catholic
Displaced Persons
Soviet Union
intra-ethnic tension
Third Wave
Fourth Wave
Ukrainians
Ukrainian Canadians
Canadian Ukrainians
Ukrainian Organizations in Toronto
Regionalism in Ukraine
World War II
USSR
Ukrainian Catholic
Ukrainian School Board Toronto
Collective Memory
Ukrainian Canadian History
Conflicting Identities
Conflicting Naratives of History

This thesis follows the development of the Ukrainian identity in Toronto since World War II. It explores the formation of collective memory by the Third Wave of Ukrainian immigration who arrived in Toronto in the early 1950s and the crystallization of a particular Ukrainian identity within this community. In particular, it looks at the role of the Ukrainian schooling system as an important institution shaping the community’s understanding of Ukrainian identity. It also discusses the challenges to that identity since the arrival of the Fourth Wave of Ukrainian immigration which began in 1991. It charts the intra-group tensions which arose in the community due to different understandings of what it means to be Ukrainian and describes how competing Ukrainian identities found within the Fourth Wave of immigration have shifted the dynamic in the Ukrainian community, explaining low involvement of Fourth Wave members within community institutions such as the Ukrainian school.
Inattention and Written Expression Difficulties in Children with Normal and Poor Word-reading Skills
Keywords: Inattention
Written expression
Reading
Learning
Literacy

This study examined written expression skills in children with attention problems with and without word reading difficulties. The sample consisted of 28 children with attention problems (AP) only, 18 children with coexisting attention and reading problems (ARP), and 34 children without attention or word reading difficulties (TYP). Curriculum-based measurement (CBM) indices of accuracy and fluency, plus teacher ratings of handwriting, spelling, and overall writing skills were used to assess children’s written expression skills. The analyses indicated that the AP and ARP groups received significantly lower scores on all measures of written expression than the TYP group. The ARP group scored significantly lower than the AP group on the teacher ratings of writing and spelling. These findings suggest that inattention is significantly related to written expression difficulties independent of word-reading skills.
Impact of Working Memory Deficits on Academic Achievement in Adolescents with Attention-deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder
Keywords: Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder
Working Memory
academic achievement
executive functions
working memory deficits
adolescents

This study examined the impact of working memory deficits (WMD) on the academic achievement of adolescents with ADHD. Adolescents (n=79) aged 13 to 17 years with a clinical diagnosis of ADHD were subtyped into those with and without WMD based on impairment in at least two measures, and then compared on their academic achievement and clinical profile. Results indicated that adolescents with ADHD plus WMD (23%) manifest significantly lower academic achievement than those with adequate WM. By contrast, there were no group differences in psychiatric comorbidity, severity of ADHD symptoms and psychological adjustment. We also found a unique contribution of WM to academic achievement over and above that of other clinical features. These findings suggest that WMD compromise the educational attainment of a subgroup of individuals with ADHD. Individuals with ADHD should be screened for WMD to prevent academic failure and WM should be considered as a treatment target.
Examining Performance Monitoring in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
Keywords: ADHD
performance monitoring
error monitoring
cognition

Behavioural symptoms, cognitive deficits, and findings from electrophysiological, neuroimaging and genetic studies all suggest atypical performance monitoring in ADHD. Performance monitoring involves error detection and post-error behavioural adjustment and is crucial to behavioural self-regulation and reinforcement learning, both of which are dysfunctional in ADHD. Therefore, post-error slowing was examined in children with ADHD and controls using a modified flanker task both with, and without, error detection provided. There was a significant main effect of group on post-error slowing across conditions and when error-detection was provided, significant post-error slowing deficits were found in children with ADHD. These findings suggest that the performance monitoring deficit in ADHD is specific to post-error behavioural adjustment and supports the inclusion of this deficit in the neurocognitive profile of ADHD. Findings are discussed in terms of current neurocognitive reinforcement learning models of ADHD.
The Effects of Morphological Awareness on Reading in Chinese and English Among Young Chinese Children: A Longitudinal Study
Keywords: morphological awareness
English Language Learners
bilingual children
reading
vocabulary

This thesis comprised two longitudinal studies examining the role of morphological awareness in Chinese and English reading among Chinese children. In Study 1, participants were 84 kindergarten and first grade Chinese-speaking English Language Learners (ELLs) from Canada. Children’s morphological awareness, vocabulary and reading comprehension in English were assessed at two measurement points spaced one year apart. Study 2 involved the Chinese-Canadian children from Study 1, and 98 kindergarteners and first graders from China. Their morphological awareness, vocabulary and reading comprehension in Chinese were measured at the beginning of two successive academic years. Study 1 showed that for the ELLs, morphological awareness explained increasingly large proportions of variance in English vocabulary and reading comprehension with age. In Study 2, compound awareness significantly predicted Chinese vocabulary for children from both countries. Taken together, the two studies substantiated that morphological awareness contributes to reading in Chinese and English across different language-learning contexts.
Understanding Substance Use Treatment Motivation: The Role of Social Network Pressure in Emerging Adulthood
Keywords: Substance Use
Emerging Adulthood
Treatment Motivation
Motivation to Change
Social Pressure

Research has shown that social pressure is related to treatment motivation and plays an important role in treatment engagement in adults with problematic substance use. Despite the shifts in autonomy and decision-making in emerging adulthood, the factors affecting treatment motivation (e.g., readiness to comply with treatment) and motivation to change (e.g., problem recognition and taking steps towards change) during this period have been largely ignored. In this study, 134 youth presenting to an outpatient substance abuse program completed questionnaires investigating substance use history, mental health, social pressure to reduce use and enter treatment, and motivation. Results indicated that peer pressure accounted for significant variance in internal positive and internal negative treatment motivation. Family pressure was related only to external treatment motivation. Neither social network source had a significant impact on motivation to change. Limitations, directions for future research and treatment implications are discussed.
Poetry Composition and Revision: An Expert Novice Study
Keywords: Poetry
Composition

Expertise in poetry reading and writing have been examined in previous studies using think-aloud protocol analysis of expert and novice participants. These studies have revealed important information about the way in which expert readers understand poetry and the way in which expert writers compose and revise expository pieces of writing. However, there are no previous studies that examine how expert and novices compare in terms of poetry composition. The current study confronts this gap by analysing the how expert and novice poets engage in a task of poetry revision and composition. Analysis of think-aloud protocols indicates that expert poets think more about processes of recursive revision and strategies for creative engagement, than do novice poets. In addition, issues of syntax and semantics drive the revision process for experts, whereas novices are concerned with issues of whether the poem conforms to expectations of poetic form and poetic textual devices.
Understanding Treatment Effectiveness for Aggressive Youth: The Importance of Regulation in Parent-child Interactions
Keywords: childhood aggression
parent-child interactions
treatment
regulation
real-time interactions

Reviews summarizing hundreds of studies cite Parent Management Training (PMT) and Cognitive-Behaviour Therapy (CBT) as some of the most effective interventions for aggressive youth (e.g., Brestan and Eyberg, 1998). However, variability in outcomes persists, and we have yet to understand why certain interventions only produce behaviour change in some children. Using a clinical sample of 57 children (53 boys, 4 girls) and their mothers enrolled in a combined PMT/CBT program, the current study examined the relation between changes in real-time parent-child interactions, and children’s externalizing outcomes from pre- to post-treatment. Results showed that dyads who were regulated in their interactions over time reported greater reductions in externalizing symptoms from pre- to post-treatment compared to dysregulated dyads. Changes in mean levels of affective content (e.g., negativity) were not associated with aggressive outcomes. Findings suggest that dyadic regulation may be an important process associated with treatment success for aggressive youth.
Why Bullying Victims are Not Believed: Differentiating Between Children’s True and Fabricated Reports of Stressful and Non-stressful Events
Keywords: Deception
Children

To date, limited research has been conducted to identify differences in children’s truthful and deceptive statements concerning stressful events. The present study uses automated linguistic software to detect linguistic patterns and objectively differentiate between the true and false stressful reports of bullying and non-stressful reports of sports events 7- to 14-year-olds. Results revealed that children displayed different linguistic patterns when reporting true and false stories, and between stressful and non-stressful stories. A discriminant analysis reliably differentiated between true and false stressful and non-stressful stories, though the veracity of non-stressful stories was more accurately classified than stressful stories. Experiment 2 revealed that adults were below chance levels in accurately identifying children’s true and false reports of stressful events (bullying), with confidence ratings and experience with children failing to improve accuracy scores. Taken together, results reveal that children are able to fabricate emotional and stressful stories that closely replicate their true reports.
Working Memory and Academic Achievement in Children With Attention-deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
Keywords: ADHD
working memory
academic achievement

This study used pre-existing data to examine whether children with ADHD, with and without working memory (WM) deficits, differ in their academic achievement and clinical profiles. 73 children (26% female), aged 6-12 years, with a confirmed diagnosis of ADHD had completed standardized achievement tests of reading, mathematics, and written language. Six WM measures and three parent and teacher questionnaires probing behaviour and executive functioning were administered. Of the sample, only 26% met the criteria for a WM deficit. Children with WM impairments were found to perform significantly worse than those without WM impairment on all achievement clusters, with no clinical profile differences. Poor WM is not universal in ADHD, but its presence is associated with lower academic achievement scores. Clinicians and educators should consider that underlying impairments in WM may be the contributing factors to academic difficulties in children with ADHD. Interventions targeting WM skills need to be implemented.
Reading Racism: Race and Privilege in Young Adult Fiction
Keywords: Children's literature
Young adult literature
Racism
Anti-racist education

The novel Bifocal, a fictional young adult novel that examines the racist backlash that occurs at a high school after a male Muslim student is arrested on terrorism charges, was published in 2007 and has received wide critical acclaim for its portrayal of issues of racism. Working from an anti-racist framework, this research interviews two teachers who have used the novel in their classrooms, and considers the value and limitations of the book as an anti-racist teaching tool. Through discussions about specific themes in the novel and its overall presentation of racism, I argue that, while Bifocal presents some useful interventions, it also reflects a simplistic and individualistic perspective on racism and how racism can be addressed. I also examine the ways that Bifocal – and young adult literature in general – can be read in order to encourage more critical discussions about systems of racism and privilege.
Multiculturalism and the De-politicization of Blackness in Canada: the case of FLOW 93.5 FM
Keywords: Canada
Black
identity
multiculturalism
radio
broadcasting
advertising
consumerism
music
Toronto
Canadian Radio-television Telecommunications Commission
FLOW 93.5 FM
Milestone Radio
Broadcasting Act
African Canadians
government policy
communications
sociology
popular culture
capitalism
urban
CRTC
Canadian Broadcasting Company
CBC
history
new media
Facebook
Toronto District School Board
TDSB
Black History
Multiculturalism Act
hip hop
Black Canadians
Black community
law
radio license
systematic racism
critical discourse analysis
racist discourse
Denham Jolly
Milestone
Kanye West
nationalism
diversity
disc jockey
Black music
urban music
pop music
programming

This thesis presents a case study of Canada’s first Black owned radio station, FLOW 93.5 FM, to demonstrate how official multiculturalism, in its formulation and implementation, negates Canada’s history of slavery and racial inequality. As a response to diversity, multiculturalism shifts the focus away from racial inequality to cultural difference. Consequently, Black self-determination is unauthorized. By investigating FLOW’s radio license applications, programming and advertisements, this thesis reveals just how the vision of a Black focus radio station dissolved in order to fit the practical and ideological framework of multiculturalism so that Blackness could be easily commodified. This thesis concludes that FLOW is not a Black radio station but instead is a multicultural radio station – one that specifically markets a de-politicized Blackness. As a result, multiculturalism poses serious consequences for imagining and engaging with Blackness as a politics that may address the needs of Black communities in Canada.
Multiracial Men in Toronto: Identities, Masculinities and Multiculturalism
Keywords: multiracial
men
toronto
mixed race
multiculturalism
identity
identities
racialization
race
masculinity

This thesis draws from ten semi-structured interviews with multiracial men in Toronto, Canada. It is an exploratory study that examines how participants experience race, masculinities and identities. Multiracial identities challenge popular notions of racial categories and expose social processes of racialization and the shifting nature of social identities. I explore how gender impacts participants’ experiences of multiple, fluid or shifting racial identities, and the importance of context in determining how they identify themselves. Participants also discussed the impact of multiculturalism and their understandings of racism in Canada. There were differences in the experiences of Black multiracial men and non-Black multiracial men in terms of how gender and race impact their lives. These differences imply that the colour line in Canada is shifting and that categories like ‘whiteness’ are being redefined. Analyses of these topics are taken up from an anti-racist and critical mixed race studies perspective.
My Journey, Our Journey, Their Journey: The ‘Say-Walahi’ Generation
Keywords: Somali Youth
Somali dhaqan

The aim of the study is to look at the social formative processes of the Somali-Canadian youths, known as the ‘say-wallahi’ generation, go through. My research primarily focuses on how I learned to survive as a racialized person in the White Canadian nation space by holding onto my Somali identity, and how my journey diverges and converges with Somali-Canadian youth. First, I examine how the media socially constructed the Somali identity through a colonial gaze in a Toronto Life article. Secondly, I narrate some of my own schooling experiences for they speak to the deep psychological and spiritual scars that I embody as a racialized Somali. Especially, my interest is to show how instrumental Somali dhaqan was to my survival of the colonial/racializing gaze. Finally, I stress the importance of and the need for Somali youth to engage in de-colonizing/ de-racialization processes that encompasses their re-discovery of their indigenous Somaliness.
Loaded Words: Race, Ethnicity, Language and Culture in the Construction in Chinese-Canadian Identity
Keywords: Chinese, Canadian, Race, Ethnicity, Language

This thesis presents an ethnographic study based in the city of Toronto on how ethnic Chinese negotiate their ambivalence towards the category “Chinese-Canadian”, particularly in relation to discourses about race, ethnicity and language. It is the finding of this study that second generation, economically privileged ethnic Chinese women are likely to feel most comfortable with the aforementioned category, in relation to their counterparts. This is because they are most likely to be able to speak Chinese and English, as well as seek out a vocabulary that allows them to make sense of their experience. They are also likely to be most comfortable because, as Chinese is a feminized category, they more easily fit into the mold of what a Chinese person is “supposed” to be like. Ethnic Chinese men, however, are less comfortable with the category and assert their masculinity by engaging in humour driven in racial and ethnic stereotypes.
"A Clinic for the World": Race, Biomedical Citizenship, and Gendered National Subject Formation in Canada
Keywords: medicine
biopower
citizenship
race

On October 21st , 2005 the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that immigration officials “can no longer assess potential immigrants to be ‘medically inadmissible’ to Canada solely on the basis of a person’s disability” and their likelihood to make “excessive demands on Canadian social services” (Chadha 2005, 1). In this thesis I will explore this ruling using a methodological approach that engages practices of: self-reflexivity; tracing historical and political genealogies; and case study analysis. What I am interested in thinking about is how this moment gestures to the necessity of conceptualizing the nation, nationalism, and citizenship as highly medicalized terrains. Through an engagement with transnational and black feminist theorizing, anticolonial studies, and disability studies, I will suggest that “medical inadmissibility” is one of many regulatory mechanisms that work to fashion the Canadian nation-state as white, healthy, fit, and productive.