People Struggle Research Articles

Breaking Barriers to Employment: The Impact of Transitional Work on Economic Self-Sufficiency for Those Facing Obstacles to Work

ABSTRACT Many people face profound barriers to employment, such as former incarceration, mental illness, or homelessness. Without stable employment, people struggle to become economically self-sufficient. Transitional, paid work may give people job skills to help them obtain and maintain employment. This study examined four employment social enterprises, which provide paid transitional work for people facing employment obstacles. Eighteen months later, those experiencing transitional work had better outcomes in terms of employment status and income, and this effect is the same across race/ethnic and gender groups. The benefits persisted even during the economic crisis created with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Social self-efficacy and mental well-being in autistic adults: Exploring the role of social identity.

In the past, research has suggested that autistic people are not able to communicate well with non-autistic people because of autistic people's communication difficulties. However, newer theories question this conclusion. It is now thought that the communication difficulties may be because autistic and non-autistic people both struggle to understand each other. This study explores how these differences in shared understanding relate to autistic people's mental well-being, confidence in social situations and social identities (groups that we belong to and that influence how we see ourselves). We created an online survey taken by 512 autistic adults, which included questions about their confidence being social with people from different groups (such as other autistic people or people they share a hobby with), about the social groups they felt they belong to and about their mental well-being. First, participants reported higher social confidence when interacting with members of a social group they belonged to. Second, being confident during these interactions was linked to higher mental well-being. Finally, the groups participants belonged to did not influence the link between social confidence and mental well-being. These findings are important as they help us better understand autistic people's experiences of social interactions and what contributes to good and poor mental well-being in autistic people. They also help us to think further about how to improve autistic people's well-being.

Family and Vocation in the Early Italian Renaissance: Boccaccio and Narratives of Filial Freedom

With an eye to joining literary and family history, this article examines Boccaccio's role in consolidating a new genre regarding the struggles of young people to choose their own paths against the constraints of paternal authority. In works of fiction, humanist scholarship, and biography, Boccaccio portrayed the struggle for filial freedom, both in terms of his own vocational aspirations as a young poet and in the struggle of young women to assert their freedom in the choice of spouse or vocation.

MERDEKA DARI IMPRIALISME-KOLONIALISME MENUJU IDENTITAS NASIONAL SERTA MENEGAKKAN KONSTITUSI UNTUK NKRI DAN UPETI DARI RAKYAT UNTUK BIROKRAT

Indonesian independence was achieved with a sense of nationalism and patriotism as well as the struggle of the Indonesian people both in the "Government, Traders, Aristocrat, Clerics and Marginal Communities" to fight "Colonialism and Imprialism" because they saw Indonesian in the face of the Dutch in a long gap of three and a half times century if calculated 350 years. National identity is known from the aspirations of young people, those who are educated who want to have ambition to be independent with the struggle and fate of suffering the same since the invaders like the State that first entered in Indonesian "Portuguese, Spanish, English, Dutch and Japanese" but a country with the nickname three "G" namely (Gold, Glory and Gospel) such as looking for "Glory, Looking for logistics or spices, Spreading the holy mission of Christianity and Catholicism" with the dominance of this young people want a revolution like countries that want independence. National identity can not be separated from regulations or constitutions that imitate developed countries from kingdoms or monarchies to a republic with democracy in each government Different axis there is a axis "Communist and there is a Liberalist axis" and this has become a culture of Indonesian government since the Order long time, new order until the Reformation Era. Taxes or tribute are collected from employees and employees or laborers, BUMS (private-owned business entities), BUMN (private mili-business entities) to be transferred to the government as procurement of "Infrastructure, Logistics, Pharmacy, Social, Education, Culture, Religion" in essence State cooking is spent in each region for the needs of the respective regional autonomy.

Military Symbolism in Modern Vyshyvankas as a Source of the Latest Cultural Coding and Meaning Making

The purpose of the article is to examine the semantic meaning of modern military symbols on Ukrainian embroidered shirts, which serves as a means and source of the latest cultural coding and meaning-making of society caused by the war and the processes of resistance to the enemy of the Ukrainian people. The research methodology is based on the application of analytical, semantic, and cultural methods, which will allow a comprehensive consideration of the issues and formulate reasonable conclusions. The scientific novelty is that for the first time in the cultural dimension, the modern military symbolism of Ukrainian embroideries is considered as a phenomenon caused by military social upheavals, which indicates an attempt to define the modern symbolic meaning of the fight against the enemy and to encode the idea of victory in embroidery. Conclusions. Based on the study of modern Ukrainian embroideries, which use the images of military symbols (samples of modern weapons and equipment used by Ukraine – Himars missile systems, Bayraktar drones, Javelin portable missile systems; as well as the Ukrainian Mriya aircraft destroyed at the beginning of the war), it has been proven that that such artistic developments and their embodiment in embroidered products of Ukrainian brands are a way and source of the latest coding of the idea of victory in the war against the Russian invaders, and, by analogy with the traditional Ukrainian embroidery, have a deep symbolic meaning for Ukrainian society as amulet codes postulating the idea of affirming the struggle of the Ukrainian people, the idea of indestructibility, strength of spirit, and preservation of national and cultural identity. The emergence and accumulation of such new symbols on embroidered clothing is in line with the general state of extreme tension/bifurcation of Ukrainian society, which requires certain stabilising and balancing actions, manifested in this case by the newest encoding of modern ideas and meanings in a traditional cultural and artistic way. This affirms the idea of spiritual unity, relaying and reinforcing the meanings and values of freedom, the struggle of the Ukrainian people for independence, the establishment of statehood and their own identity.

A novel face-name mnemonic discrimination task with naturalistic stimuli

Difficulty remembering faces and names is a common struggle for many people and gets more difficult as we age. Subtle changes in appearance from day to day, common facial characteristics across individuals, and overlap of names may contribute to the difficulty of learning face-name associations. Computational models suggest the hippocampus plays a key role in reducing interference across experiences with overlapping information by performing pattern separation, which enables us to encode similar experiences as distinct from one another. Thus, given the nature of overlapping features within face-name associative memory, hippocampal pattern separation may be an important underlying mechanism supporting this type of memory. Furthermore, cross-species approaches find that aging is associated with deficits in hippocampal pattern separation. Mnemonic discrimination tasks have been designed to tax hippocampal pattern separation and provide a more sensitive measure of age-related cognitive decline compared to traditional memory tasks. However, traditional face-name associative memory tasks do not parametrically vary overlapping features of faces and names to tax hippocampal pattern separation and often lack naturalistic facial features (e.g., hair, accessories, similarity of features, emotional expressions). Here, we developed a face-name mnemonic discrimination task where we varied face stimuli by similarity, race, sex, and emotional expression as well as the similarity of name stimuli. We tested a sample of healthy young and older adults on this task and found that both age groups showed worsening performance as face-name interference increased. Overall, older adults struggled to remember faces and face-name pairs more than young adults. However, while young adults remembered emotional faces better than neutral faces, older adults selectively remembered positive faces. Thus, the use of a face-name association memory task designed with varying levels of face-name interference as well as the inclusion of naturalistic face stimuli across race, sex, and emotional expressions provides a more nuanced approach relative to traditional face-name association tasks toward understanding age-related changes in memory.

Image Classification for Breast Cancer Using a Modified Convolution Neural Network Architecture

The most common type of cancer that results in death is breast cancer. In the world, millions of people struggle with this disease. Breast cancer can affect men and women but women are more affected. For awareness, it is necessary to understand the sign and symptoms of breast cancer. The most common sign is an abnormal lump in the breast. But there may be many reasons of develop abnormal lumps. Computer-Aided Diagnosis (CAD) is extensively used in pathological image analysis to help pathologists enhance diagnosis efficiency, accuracy, and consistency. Recent studies have looked into deep learning methodologies to improve the effectiveness of pathological CAD.

Valuation struggles in the Ecuadorian Amazon: Beyond indigenous people's responses to oil extraction

Conflicts resulting from oil extractivism can be seen as ecological and cultural distribution conflicts, and have involved Latin American indigenous movements attached to their land and environments as providers of livelihood and cultural identity. In Ecuador, some have argued that this has become a 'standard narrative', essentializing the struggles of indigenous people. And the various agreements found historically between indigenous people and large companies operating in their territories seem to legitimize such criticism. But how to understand the choices of indigenous groups, with incommensurable needs, values, and claims, in the presence of extractive projects involving incommensurable local outcomes? Through an analysis of the different claims of indigenous people who voted in favor of oil extraction projects in their territories in the ITT fields of the Ecuadorian Amazon, I show how oil extraction coupled with 'social compensation' might create non-conflictive, but problematic situations, rather than conflicts. Indeed, the perception of an incommensurable loss, related to ecological and cultural difference, does not necessarily translate into opposition to mining or drilling. This is especially important in countries where the right to prior consultation could legitimize the expansion of oil activities in indigenous territories.

Integrated Mediapipe with a CNN Model for Arabic Sign Language Recognition

Deaf and dumb people struggle with communicating on a day-to-day basis. Current advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) have allowed this communication barrier to be removed. A letter recognition system for Arabic sign language (ArSL) has been developed as a result of this effort. The deep convolutional neural network (CNN) structure is used by the ArSL recognition system in order to process depth data and to improve the ability for hearing-impaired to communicate with others. In the proposed model, letters of the hand-sign alphabet and the Arabic alphabet would be recognized and identified automatically based on user input. The proposed model should be able to identify ArSL with a rate of accuracy of 97.1%. In order to test our approach, we carried out a comparative study and discovered that it is able to differentiate between static indications with a higher level of accuracy than prior studies had achieved using the same dataset.

“Cora Unashamed”: Relationships and Their Racial Implications

Injustice, oppression, and bad treatment are among those habits that have been lingering in societies that many writers have been trying hard to address throughout the ages. Among those writers is Langston Hughes in his story “Cora Unashamed” where he has boldly presented the real struggle of black people with a white system.“Cora Unashamed” appeared in his work The Ways of White Folks (ed. 1971). The important relationship in this story is that of the white and black races; in the story, Cora represents the blacks while the Studevants and their daughter are white. Worth mentioning is the male-female relationship in this story. By exploring the concept of racial master-slave relationship and studying the idea of the whites’ superiority, the paper aims at scrutinizing how the whites use racism and slavery to approve their domination over the blacks. Besides, it investigates the impacts of slavery and racism on the blacks. Close-reading method is employed to analyze the story. Besides, the contextual method which focuses on intrinsic and extrinsic elements is utilized. The result of the analysis shows that race helps in the whites’ domination over other minorities, particularly the blacks. In other respect, master-slave relationships have their great negative economic impacts on the poor people.

Indigenous Temporary Accommodation in Florianopolis: Participatory Project and State Actions

This article presents the design process adopted for the design of Indigenous Temporary Accommodation in Florianopolis - Santa Catarina - Brazil, focusing on design strategies and changes in the proposal, considering State actions and the participation of the indigenous community. These proposals were developed through an outreach project at the Federal University of Santa Catarina, addressing the importance of indigenous presence in the city, the constant struggle of indigenous people for physical and symbolic spaces in contemporary society, and the social role of architects and urban planners within these challenges. A participatory project process is adopted as a methodological strategy, which comprises theoretical and documentary research stages, joint actions with the indigenous community, interactions with the State, preparation of guidelines, and architectural proposals. As a result, the architectural proposals developed based on community demands are presented, as well as the changes from the different strategies built using State actions to handle the issue. It is believed that when considering the different actors involved in the design process, possibilities broaden both to enable the execution of key public facilities in the city and to make these meet the wants and needs of the communities involved.

Resisting Without Violence: KNPB and Transnational Advocacy Network Towards West Papua Referendum

After Indonesia’s authoritarianism collapsed in 1998, the fight for independence in West Papua became diversified, focused on physical resistance and strategic international diplomatic steps. The National Committee for West Papua (Komite Nasional Papua Barat or KNPB) is an organisation that tends to use a non-physical and non-violence approach. The approach garners support from the international community as they fight for the right of self-determination for the people of West Papua. KNPB’s international diplomacy has become a sort of strategic shift in the struggle of the West Papuan people, which initially tended to be instrumental, but eventually became wider by adopting a transnational advocacy network. This study uses the theoretical framework of non-violent resistance from Gene Sharp in explaining KNPB’s movement and the transnational advocacy network from Keck and Sikkink to explain KNPB’s international political relations. This research relies on documentation studies and interviews with key figures in the struggle for Referendum and Papuan independence. KNPB has consistently linked its local actions with independence movements and the global struggle for human rights. KNPB often frames its efforts as a part of their struggle to reject violence against the people of West Papua. The non-violent resistance movements and actions carried out by KNPB are indeed directed to gain public attention, especially from the international public. Their approach aims to show the Referendum’s importance and create an international agenda related to Indonesia’s actions in West Papua.

The Role of Indonesia’s Islamic Philanthropic Institutions in Poverty Alleviation During the Covid 19 Pandemic 2022

The Covid-19 pandemic has had a tremendous impact on both health and the economy. One of the impacts is the increase in poverty in Indonesia where lot of people struggle for their daily needs. As one of the countries with the largest Muslim population in the world, Indonesia has a number of philanthropic institutions to enhance the welfare of society, one of which is BAZNAS. Through BAZNAS, it is hoped that cooperation with the government, the community, and other zakat management bodies to manage zakat nationally, to alleviate poverty and to improve people's welfare can be implemented. This is a qualitative research with a case study type. A case study research describes the current state of the research object based on facts and sober data. Zakat management is carried out according to their duties and responsibilities as stipulated in Zakat Management Law No. 23 of 2011. BAZNAS' efforts in eradicating poverty through zakat have been considered successful. Poverty alleviation carried out by BAZNAS RI contributed to 17.77% to the poverty alleviation of the national zakat program. In addition, this result contributes 0.31% to national poverty alleviation based on BPS.

From Quiet Life to Political Activism: Memories of tenants rebellions in Mexico

The Red de Desalojados de la Ciudad de México is a group led by people affected by forced evictions, that has been resisting evictions and revealing ways in which different real estate groups, in collaboration with the authorities, prioritize economic interests over the rights of the inhabitants. In conversation with Rufina Galindo a member of the Network of Evicted in Mexico City, we talked about the effects of the earthquake on the living conditions of people, frauds and corruption that make the complex struggles of people for life and home even herder, organizing against eviction violence, including networking and coalition building.

НАЦІОНАЛЬНО-ВИЗВОЛЬНІ ЗМАГАННЯ ІТАЛІЙСЬКОГО НАРОДУ У ТВОРЧІЙ СПАДЩИНІ КИРИЛА ТРИЛЬОВСЬКОГО

The article reflects the essence of the national liberation struggles of the Italian people for their liberation from Austrian rule in the 19th century and their place in the creative heritage of the prominent Ukrainian jurist and social and political figure Kyrylo Trylovskyi.

The existence of gluten-free and functional pasta in Hungary

Nowadays, instead of traditional wheat grains, alternative cereals, also known as pseudocereals, are increasingly coming to the fore. The reason for this is, among other things, that more and more people struggle with food allergies and intolerances. Gluten-related disease - such as gluten sensitivity - is a chronic disease of the small intestine with malabsorption, which is triggered by gluten, a vegetable protein found in certain cereals, in people who are sensitive to it. Because of this, the demand for foods in which alternative gluten-free pseudocereals play a prominent role has understandably increased. Our research and development goal was aimed at getting to know and examining the different raw materials and their functional enrichment possibilities, which has led to the development of a new range of pasta products.

Pemanfaatan Situs Benteng ASAKOTA Sebagai Destinasi Wisata di Kabupaten Bima

The resistance of the people of Bima in defending the kingdom's territory from Dutch colonial occupation has taken quite a long time where Fort Asakota has an important role as a maritime defense strategy. The purpose of this study was to find out the struggle of the Bima people against the VOC (Verenigde Oost Indische) government from the territory of the Bima kingdom. The results showed that Fort Asakota had an important role in the containment strategy, because it was located in a strategic place to drive away VOC warships that wanted to enter the Bima kingdom because it was in the middle of the sea when high tide and low tide would merge with mainland. Asakota Fort was built during the time of Sultan Abdul Khair Sirajuddin as a sea defense fortress at the entrance to the Bima kingdom. At that time the kingdom of Gowa-Tallo had been defeated by the Dutch company and ended with the Bongaya agreement.

Mexico's Post-Revolutionary People's Movements - Movements after Revolution: A History of People's Struggles in Mexico. By Miles V. Rodríguez. New York: Oxford University Press, 2022. Pp. 240. $55.00 cloth.

Mexico's Post-Revolutionary People's Movements - Movements after Revolution: A History of People's Struggles in Mexico. By Miles V. Rodríguez. New York: Oxford University Press, 2022. Pp. 240. $55.00 cloth.

Emotional reflexivity in the time of COVID-19: working-class emotional practices

We share findings from a qualitative study on emotions in Scottish working-class households during lockdown. The results challenge existing research focused on emotional capital, which often suggests that working-class people struggle to provide emotional resources to those close to them. Using the concept of emotional reflexivity we show how these household members cared for each other’s feelings, challenging deficit views of working-class emotionality. This research offers a novel understanding of working-class participants collaboratively making space for each other to feel, many favouring acts of care rather than talking. The COVID-19 lockdown, however, tended to reinforce gendered practices of emotion work, although some participants drew on emotional support beyond the household to try to mitigate this burden. The emotionally reflexive practices seen in these households suggest that sustaining more equality in emotional wellbeing relies on navigating material circumstances, is not always about verbal sharing, is often an interactional achievement, but also means resisting unrealistic expectations of intimate relationships within households as the fountainhead of all emotional succour.

‘Uncovering hidden struggles among disaster survivors in Tanzania: Are they vulnerable survivors or resilient victims?

Understanding experiences of disaster survivors as they struggle to bounce back from disaster-caused traumatic experiences, requires concerted and focused efforts involving scholars and practitioners. Developing countries like Tanzania accommodate people who after crisis end up living in misery and not completely recovering. Notwithstanding, however, those labeled resilient or vulnerable usually simply portray a distorted 'face value' reality of the struggles endured. Using a qualitative approach informed by a Chordal Triad of Agency Conceptualization, the paper’s main objective is to uncover hidden struggles among disaster survivors. By recapitulating on the previous study conducted in Kagera14, I extend the argument based on ‘mundane’ experiences to enlighten complexities people encounter as they survive multiple disasters. Findings indicate that understanding vulnerability and resilience encounters among survivors, requires scrutinizing reductionist and exceptionist approaches normally applied by disaster responders often for concealed interests. This process produces vulnerable survivors and/or resilient victims. The paper therefore, unpacks post-disaster struggles among survivors considering their real voices mostly as always ignored by actors. I conclude that struggles of people cannot be summed up without a critical examination of their experiences.