Solidarity Not Homogeneity: Constructing a Superordinate Aboriginal Identity That Protects Subgroup Identities

Superordinate identities formed around shared oppression provide political and psychological resources for marginalized groups. However, superordinate identities can also threaten the identities of the subgroups they attempt to bring together. We examined how a superordinate identity was constructed to protect subgroup identities using data from 31 urban Aboriginal participants who strongly identified with both their subgroup (heritage cultures) and superordinate Aboriginal identities. Participants defined the superordinate Aboriginal identity as a fundamentally diverse category where no one subgroup was more representative of the wider category than others. Participants also put their respect for subgroup diversity into practice by regularly engaging with Aboriginal (subgroup) cultures other than their own. Finally, participants felt that representations of the superordinate Aboriginal category should prioritize local cultures. We discuss these findings in relation to research in social psychology on superordinate and subgroup identities, multiculturalism, and collective resistance and provide some suggestions for how this work may be extended.     

“We Need to Make Action NOW,to Help Keep the Language Alive”: Navigating Tensions of Engaging Indigenous Educational Values in University Education

Despite centuries of contact and conquest, Indigenous communities persist in maintaining their cultures and psychologies. Key to this success in cultural survival is the maintenance of Indigenous languages, which contain distinct worldviews. However, Indigenous languages are at risk, with fewer and fewer fluent Elder speakers. Fortunately, there remain committed groups of community educators who carry out Indigenous language education. Current mainstream teacher education programs do not typically introduce the importance of Indigenous language education to teacher candidates, who are the next generation of K‐12 teachers. We view this as highly problematic, and thus carried out a proof‐of‐concept project in which one U.S. university's American Indian/Alaska Native teacher candidates collaborated with, and learned from, Indigenous language educators during a two‐week‐long summer institute at the university. In our article, we share three main findings, based on qualitative analyses of daily‐written student journals collected during the two‐week pilot project: (a) Indigenous language education supports the social justice vision in the American Psychological Association's Multicultural Guidelines; (b) intergenerational educational opportunities are invaluable for affirming Indigenous psychologies; and (c) Indigenous community language educators do important survivance work. Our findings provide insight into how Indigenous language education is crucial for advancing education that honors Indigenous community psychological well‐being.     

Rawls on Human Rights: A Review Essay

In this essay, I first evaluate the conceptual analysis of human rights by Wilfried Hinsch and Markus Stepanians. Next I criticize Allen Buchanan’s claim that Rawls did not address basic human interests/capabilities theories of human nature. I argue Buchanan is doubly mistaken when he claims that John Rawls sought to avoid such theories because they are comprehensive doctrines. Then I evaluate David Reidy’s defense of Rawls, while questioning his efforts to show how Rawls’s list of human rights could be expanded. Finally, I accept James Nickel’s argument that Rawls has tied human rights too closely to intervention on their behalf. However, I reject his, and by implication Rawls’s, refusal to accept a two-tiered approach to human rights.     

The Convergence of Cultures and Religions in Light of the Evolution of Conciousness

This article describes a challenge to the cultures and religions of the world that the author believes is the greatest challenge that has confronted the human race in its entire history. Modernity's search for unity and postmodernity's affirmation of pluralism reflect aspects of our current situation, but more needs to be recognized. We must acknowledge that East and West must face the current challenges together. Multiculturalism and unity encompass all world cultures, and we cannot be content to read our present history only through the lens of western developments. Karl Jaspers's theory of the First Axial period of history, 800-200 B.C.E ., in which all the present world religions have their roots, is useful. It reveals that our present flowering of culture and spirit in the Western world, including our science, is not so much a product of the Western Renaissance and Enlightenment, as it is rooted in cultural events that belong to East and West equally. We are now in the Second Axial Period, which challenges the world religions to allow their energies to move toward convergence, just as in the previous millennia they moved toward differentiation. Teilhard de Chardin's thought is a guide for us, in his vision of a complex convergence of consciousness, in which differences will not be abolished but will be transformed in their coming together. This convergent perspective will also join with the perspective of rediscovering our roots in the earth, and it will repossess the spirituality of the primal peoples, in its understanding of the entire human race to be one tribe. The world religions are faced with the task, therefore, of encountering each other in "dialogic dialogue," and channeling their spiritual resources toward the solution of real-world global problems.     

Agency vulnerability,participation, and the self-determination of indigenous peoples

Development, understood as a process of social and economic change, can be a source of great freedom. But when individuals and groups have little or no control over that process, it can be a source of vulnerability as well. This paper proposes the concept of ‘agency vulnerability’: the risk of being limited in one's ability to control the social and economic forces that propel one into change. All individuals and groups are susceptible to harm, but indigenous groups often face the gravest constellation of such threats. In particular, indigenous peoples struggle against both individual and societal vulnerabilities and often have the least control over processes of change that affect them. The language of human rights is frequently used to justify policies aimed at reducing vulnerability. For indigenous peoples, this often takes the form of a right to self-determination, a right in part intended to reduce agency vulnerability. This paper draws a distinction between the process and the substantive aspects of self-determination, and identifies participation as a key component of the process aspect, defending its importance in decision-making in any residual areas of shared rule between indigenous and non-indigenous groups or entities. Finally, it proposes a framework for evaluating the extent and quality of participation of indigenous (or any other) peoples in decisions that affect them.     

Number as a cognitive technology: evidence from Pirahã language and cognition

Does speaking a language without number words change the way speakers of that language perceive exact quantities? The Pirah? are an Amazonian tribe who have been previously studied for their limited numerical system [Gordon, P. (2004). Numerical cognition without words: Evidence from Amazonia. Science 306, 496-499]. We show that the Pirah? have no linguistic method whatsoever for expressing exact quantity, not even "one." Despite this lack, when retested on the matching tasks used by Gordon, Pirah? speakers were able to perform exact matches with large numbers of objects perfectly but, as previously reported, they were inaccurate on matching tasks involving memory. These results suggest that language for exact number is a cultural invention rather than a linguistic universal, and that number words do not change our underlying representations of number but instead are a cognitive technology for keeping track of the cardinality of large sets across time, space, and changes in modality.     

Neoliberalism versus distributional autonomy: the skipped step in rawls’s the law of peoples

Debates about global distributive justice focus on the gulf between the wealthy North and the impoverished South, rather than on issues arising between liberal democracies. A review of John Rawls’s approach to international justice discloses a step Rawls skipped in his extension of his original-position procedure. The skipped step is where a need for the distributional autonomy of sovereign liberal states reveals itself. Neoliberalism denies the possibility and the desirability of distributional autonomy. A complete Rawlsian account of global justice shows the necessity and possibility of a charter between liberal states, assuring each a proper minimum degree of distributional autonomy     

Counseling Canadian Indigenous Peoples: The Therapeutic Alliance and Outcome

The aim of this study was to determine whether client therapeutic alliance ratings and client symptom severity were predictors of counseling outcomes among Canadian Indigenous clients. Participants included 179 Canadian Indigenous clients who completed an outcome measure at the 1st and last sessions and an alliance measure at both the 2nd and 3rd sessions. Results indicated that higher client alliance ratings at Sessions 2 and 3 and baseline client symptom severity were significant predictors of outcome. El objetivo de este estudio fue determinar si las valoraciones del cliente de la alianza terapéutica y la severidad de los síntomas del cliente fueron indicadores de los resultados de la consejería entre clientes indígenas canadienses. Los participantes incluyeron 179 clientes indígenas canadienses que completaron una medida de resultados en la primera y última sesión, además de una medida de la alianza en la segunda y tercera sesión. Los resultados indicaron que unas valoraciones del cliente más altas de la alianza en las sesiones 2 y 3 y la severidad preliminar de los síntomas del cliente fueron indicadores significativos del resultado.     

Systemic Evil and Christian Discipleship

Although the churches have focused much of their attention on the individual's encounter with evil, it is urgent and essential that this focus be expanded to consider communal systemic evil. Rediscovering this emphasis in ancient sources – biblical and Indigenous – we begin to see that engagement with systemic evils like racism and colonialism is a central aspect of Christian discipleship. There is a preliminary and important anticipation and realization of this rediscovery in The Arusha Call to Discipleship document of the World Council of Churches. In an age that is beset by the deadly intersection of multiple forms of systemic evil, it is urgent that discipleship confront the principalities and powers that corrupt and destroy life.     

Psychosocial correlates of health status among Asians, Caucasians, and multiracial subjects

The present study assessed the relationship between race and physical health in a multicultural sample. When controlling for a variety of health risk factors, the results revealed a significant relationship between race and recent and chronic physical symptoms (i.e., minor health problems) as well as past major health problems. Multiracial individuals reported more health problems than Asians or Caucasians. These findings may reflect the differences in diet and socioeconomic status (SES) as well as conditions associated with low SES such as decreased likelihood of seeking medical services and a variety of psychosocial variables.