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Stress and street life: Black women, urban inequality, and coping in a small violent city

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TitleInfo
Title
Stress and street life: Black women, urban inequality, and coping in a small violent city
Name (type = personal)
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Hitchens
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Brooklynn Kristina
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Brooklynn Kristina Hitchens
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author
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Lauren J
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Lauren J Krivo
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Advisory Committee
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chair
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Carr
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Patrick J
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Patrick J Carr
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Advisory Committee
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co-chair
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Britton
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Dana M
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Dana M Britton
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Advisory Committee
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internal member
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Payne
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Yasser A
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Yasser A Payne
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Advisory Committee
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outside member
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Rutgers University
Role
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degree grantor
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School of Graduate Studies
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school
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Text
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theses
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ETD doctoral
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2020
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2020-10
Language
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English
Abstract (type = abstract)
This dissertation examines how direct and vicarious victimization shape the bereavement, coping strategies and quality of life outcomes of low-income, street-identified Black women and girls ages 16 to 54 in two small, high-crime neighborhoods in Wilmington, Delaware. “Street life” or a “street identity” are phenomenological concepts that refer to a set of ideologies, behaviors, and spaces in low-income communities of color that are organized by personal, social and economic survival. I employ a mixed-method, cross-sectional approach which includes data from (a) 277 community-based surveys; (b) 50 in-depth interviews; (c) 22 months of ethnographic field observations; (d) 377 photos and images gathered from social media; and (e) 80 documents (newspaper articles and public records). This approach also includes a methodological framework called Street Participatory Action Research (Street PAR), which actively engages community members and the “researched” population into the entire research process.

In this study, I explore how experiencing, witnessing, and hearing about multiple forms of victimization, particularly firearm-related homicide and shootings, influences the subjective psychological wellbeing of this sample of women and girls, along with the perceived social cohesion, aesthetic quality, and safety of their neighborhoods. I develop a conceptual model to illuminate how victimization and violent death traverse through individuals and broader social networks in a small city context, and ultimately have significant implications for the lived experiences of street-identified Black women and girls. I theorize about how street-identified Black women and girls conceptualize violence and violent Black death as contextual worldviews or orientations that are steeped in their racialized, gendered, and cultural identities.

Findings provide significant evidence for how the women’s accumulated experiences with victimization influence their overall attitudes towards their community, including more negative perceptions about group connectedness and solidarity, safety, aesthetic quality, walking environment, and availability of healthy foods. The cumulative nature of violence ricochets beyond a direct victim and seeps into the material lives of the wider community, and the gradation of violent encounters structure how street-identified Black women and girls understand their neighborhoods and social world. Black female homicide survivors, or women who vicariously experience the loss of a loved one to homicide, endure a disproportionate level of traumatic, often-repeated exposure to grief and mourning due to violent Black death. I examine how this unique standpoint in oppressed communities is an uneven burden of loss that exposes them to violent harm while equipping them with a skillset to survive and thrive in adverse contexts.
Subject (authority = local)
Topic
Black women and girls
Subject (authority = RUETD)
Topic
Sociology
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Title
Rutgers University Electronic Theses and Dissertations
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ETD_11064
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application/pdf
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text/xml
Extent
1 online resource (xii, 358 pages)
Note (type = degree)
Ph.D.
Note (type = bibliography)
Includes bibliographical references
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School of Graduate Studies Electronic Theses and Dissertations
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rucore10001600001
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Identifier (type = doi)
doi:10.7282/t3-vxzg-np36
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Rights

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The author owns the copyright to this work.
RightsHolder (type = personal)
Name
FamilyName
Hitchens
GivenName
Brooklynn
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Copyright Holder
RightsEvent
Type
Permission or license
DateTime (encoding = w3cdtf); (point = start); (qualifier = exact)
2020-07-30 09:27:57
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Name
Brooklynn Hitchens
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Affiliation
Rutgers University. School of Graduate Studies
AssociatedObject
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Author Agreement License
Detail
I hereby grant to the Rutgers University Libraries and to my school the non-exclusive right to archive, reproduce and distribute my thesis or dissertation, in whole or in part, and/or my abstract, in whole or in part, in and from an electronic format, subject to the release date subsequently stipulated in this submittal form and approved by my school. I represent and stipulate that the thesis or dissertation and its abstract are my original work, that they do not infringe or violate any rights of others, and that I make these grants as the sole owner of the rights to my thesis or dissertation and its abstract. I represent that I have obtained written permissions, when necessary, from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis or dissertation and will supply copies of such upon request by my school. I acknowledge that RU ETD and my school will not distribute my thesis or dissertation or its abstract if, in their reasonable judgment, they believe all such rights have not been secured. I acknowledge that I retain ownership rights to the copyright of my work. I also retain the right to use all or part of this thesis or dissertation in future works, such as articles or books.
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Type
Embargo
DateTime (encoding = w3cdtf); (point = start); (qualifier = exact)
2020-10-31
DateTime (encoding = w3cdtf); (point = end); (qualifier = exact)
2024-10-30
Detail
Access to this PDF has been restricted at the author's request. It will be publicly available after October 30th, 2024.
Copyright
Status
Copyright protected
Availability
Status
Open
Reason
Permission or license
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2020-08-10T21:53:17
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