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Item Sacred Connections: Using Faith-based Narratives to Create Matricentric Empowerment Spaces for Syrian Refugee Women(Journal of Social Work and Christianity, 2020-04-24) Thomas, KayteChristian social workers are called by both faith and professional ethics to welcome refugees. The Syrian conflict has created the largest refugee crisis the world has ever known, and while women and children are extremely vulnerable, the unique needs of refugee mothers are often overlooked in both policy and practice. Great importance is placed on motherhood roles in both Western and Arabic cultures, and providing targeted support to uplift refugee mothers can have significant positive ramifications as Syrian refugees resettle into their new lives. Guided by Brené Brown’s insights on empathy and drawing parallels from crossover stories of Biblical women in both Christian and Islamic traditions, the author uses sacred connections to build empathy and enact social change. This paper highlights ways that Christian social workers can adopt a matricentric (mother-focused) approach and provides a recommended interfaith model for intervention with Syrian refugee mothers.Item Insights from Parents about Caring for a Child with Birth Defects(International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2013-08-07) Lemacks, Jodi; Fowles, Kristin; Mateus, Amanda; Thomas, KayteBirth defects affect 1 in 33 babies. Having a child with a birth defect impacts the whole family. Parents of children who have birth defects face unique challenges and desire to make life better for their kids. They also want to help to prevent birth defects in the future. Some of the challenges parents face involve communication with healthcare professionals, quality of life issues, creating awareness and advocating for research and funding, finding resources and support, and helping teens transition to appropriate, specialized adult care. This paper addresses these issues and their sub-issues, provides examples, and makes suggestions for improvement and research.Item The Intersection of Social Work and Syrian Women with Refugee Status: A Transnational Matricentric Feminist Perspective.(ProQuest, 2021) Thomas, Kayte; Yancey, GaynorSocial workers have a history of engagement with refugees since the inception of the profession. However, many social workers engage with clients without knowing about their refugee status, and globalization and forced displacement is causing this to be a more frequent issue at this time. The Syrian war has created the largest refugee crisis the world has ever known, and yet the United States has had a lackluster response to welcoming Syrian refugees despite a strong record of previously welcoming refugees. With the recent change in presidential administration, it is expected that Syrian refugees will soon be welcomed in this nation. As such, social workers need to be prepared to support them effectively. Within the population of Syrians with refugee status, women (particularly mothers) are most at risk; therefore, this dissertation seeks to understand more about the relationship between Syrian mothers with refugee status and the social workers who support them. To accomplish this, a qualitative phenomenological study was conducted to gain insight into the dynamics between two resettled Syrian mothers, the refugee resettlement workers, and the state refugee office workers in Chapter Two. The following chapter, Chapter Three, looks at a quantitative survey of social workers in North Carolina to understand more about their perceptions towards Syrian women with refugee status in order to help the field become more prepared for future arrivals. From there, Chapter Four presents a conceptual article which creates a model for social workers who identify as Christian to welcome Syrian women with refugee status by creating a deeper and more empathetic understanding of each other through the use of crossover texts from the Holy Bible and Holy Qur’an. Altogether, this dissertation offers recommendations for social workers to improve their work with Syrian women with refugee status from a transnational feminist perspective which stands in solidarity with Syrian women on their journey and urges social workers to critically reflect upon their own perceptions in the process.Item The Choral Music of Hamish MacCunn(2013) Oates, JenniferThe career of Hamish MacCunn illustrates the vital importance of choral music, including festival commissions, to British composers. Since the time of Handel choral music had played an integral role in the musical fabric of British life. Even Mendelssohn, whom the British Isles adopted as their own, cemented his reputation with oratorios performed at choral festivals. In the nineteenth century the rise of tonic sol-fa and the popularity of choral festivals and provincial choral societies provided opportunities for composers to write large works (such as oratorios and cantatas), as well as smaller genres (including partsongs, occasional pieces, and sacred music), to secure their professional reputations. Composers who successfully fulfilled festival commissions for large choral compositions—like Sir Arthur Sullivan, Sir Edward Elgar, and Ralph Vaughan Williams—elevated their careers. Within this choral-based music culture MacCunn emerged as a leading composer in Britain. His meteoric rise to fame on the back of his Scottish choral-orchestral works performed at London’s Crystal Palace shows how successful choral compositions could launch a composer’s career. After achieving early prestige with Scottish works, however, he failed to complete an 1890 Norwich Festival commission, which marked the beginning of his slow decline as a composer. Realizing the limitations of his self-created Scottish artistic persona, MacCunn began to explore new genres and styles, though commissions for occasional works generally failed to spark his musical imagination. MacCunn’s twenty-five extant unaccompanied partsongs—all but four of which were written between 1883 and 18935—illustrate what he could write when free from national tendencies and reflect the evolution of his musical style better than his Scottish works. This exploration of MacCunn’s choral works (particularly his a cappella choral compositions) provides an interesting perspective from which to view his life, career, and musical output. It also sheds light on the importance of choral music in Britain, the challenges faced by composers of the time, and the complex issues of national identity in the British Isles.Item Brigadoon: Lerner and Loewe’s Scotland(2009) Oates, JenniferSince the 1950s, Brigadoon has been accepted as a representation of Scotland. Brigadoon’s Scotland consists of a highland landscape with lochs, mists, castles populated by fair maidens, warlike yet sensitive kilted men and bagpipers. Much of this comes from the invented traditions of Scotland, particularly kilts and clan tartans; late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Scottish literature; Scottish propaganda for tourism following WWII; and Scottish popular culture. In spite of Lerner’s well-written book, Loewe’s charming music, and Agnes De Mille’s exciting choreography, the Scottishness of the work received, and still receives, the most attention. Brigadoon’s inauthentic or dubious depiction of Scotland points to the complex relationship between popular culture, history, and art. But, is Brigadoon Scottish? While Scottish intellectuals would say no, the fact that Brigadoon draws upon Scottish literary traditions, whatScotland’s own popular culture produced as “Scottish,” and devices that are viewed as Scottish by the Western world, it is.