Articles
Linguistic Imperialism: A Case Study on the Disappearance of Indigenous Languages in Hispanic America
By Anshu Singh
Race is a central organizing factor that has mobilized several political initiatives in global politics (Zvobgo and Loken, 2020). According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, race is “any one of the groups that humans are often divided into based on physical traits regarded as common among people of shared ancestry”.It is an interesting point to note that the concept of race is not ancient. The emergence of racial categories has its roots in colonialism (Zevallos, 2017). The colonial powers used violent and psychological tactics to dominate foreign lands. They justified the act as a civilizing mission. Religion and language have been used to establish colonial dominance (Zevallos, 2017).
The topic is relevant because it highlights the colonial atrocities that led to linguistic damage to the region's indigenous languages. Moreover, each language is a representation of race, culture, and history, which deserves to be saved (Fanon 1952). Most importantly, the topic sheds light on the discourse at the intersections of language, race, culture, power, etc., which is imperative.
Summer Special!
Cultural Frameworks and Subjective Wellbeing Among International Students
By Lingyi Wang
In recent years, the international student population pursuing higher education abroad has grown exponentially. In 2020, over 5 million students left their home countries to study overseas (UNESCO, 2021). This trend highlights the need to examine how this unique group perceives and experiences wellbeing. Wellbeing is a complex, multidimensional concept with both objective and subjective facets (Dodge et al., 2012). Hedonic wellbeing involves feelings of pleasure and avoidance of pain, while eudaimonic wellbeing emphasizes self-realization and meaningful pursuits (Antaramian, 2017). Students often view wellbeing as a balance between these hedonic and eudaimonic elements. This balanced perspective highlights the importance of understanding students' subjective perceptions of wellbeing in order to gain critical insights into their ability to thrive. Within subjective wellbeing, cultural factors seem to play a key role, especially for international students encountering diverse worldviews while studying abroad. Understanding culturally-diverse conceptualizations of subjective wellbeing provides critical insights into international students' ability to thrive abroad. This literature review synthesizes key findings on how cultural frameworks shape international students' subjective appraisals of wellbeing, highlighting emerging research on cultural measurement biases and relativist construals. It also evaluates current methodological approaches and proposes future research directions to promote contextualized, student-centered assessments of wellbeing.
Summer Special!
A Dilemma: East Asian LGBTQ+ Communities in the Western World
By Zirui He
After more than a century of human rights campaigns and social change, the legal, political, and civil rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or other gender and sexual minorities (LGBTQ+) have improved significantly in the UK since the second half of the 20th century, creating the possibility of a more equal and diverse society flourishing (McDermott et al., 2008). This pattern is also seen in other parts of the globe, particularly economically advanced countries (Fetner, 2019). This paper aims to analyse the impact of LGBTQ+ communities of East Asian heritage in Western Society. It considers international students as well as East Asians born into immigrant families to shine light upon the unique challenges, conflicts, and opportunities they may experience when studying in Western host countries such as the US or the UK. This has the purpose of exploring the lived experiences of LGBTQ+ groups of East Asian ethnicity neglected in academic research, to investigate the intersecting parts of LGBTQ+ and minority rights, to understand the connections between culture, belonging, and identity, and to increasing the visibility of these intersecting groups in order to promote a friendly, equal, and diverse society.
Norms and Parliamentary Misconduct: The German AfD and Democratic Erosion
By Carla Forster
This article seeks to conduct an analysis of Levitsky and Ziblatt’s democratic erosion framework by applying it to the empirical case of Germany. This serves two purposes: to assess the comparative applicability of the framework in academic literature and conduct a brief assessment of the health of Germany’s parliamentary democracy. I argue that their framework alone is not sufficient: it fails to consider important aspects of democratic realities and is at times self-contradictory. It still offers valuable insight but is not able to account for changes in German democracy since the Alternative für Deutschland (Alternative for Germany, AfD) has been in power. As a radical right-wing actor, the AfD has significantly influenced German party competition and the political system as a whole by reviving competition and changing parliamentary culture. Levitsky and Ziblatt’s framework is unable to take this into account when judging democratic erosion but remains helpful as a starting point when assessing the normative status of democracies.
© DW