Theses and Dissertations
This collection includes both ASU Theses and Dissertations, submitted by graduate students, and the Barrett, Honors College theses submitted by undergraduate students.
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- All Subjects: Social Work
- Language: English
Description
For asylum seekers pursuing claims in the United States, immigration court is often a hostile environment, as a site of exclusion and criminalization. Generations of social and political rhetoric about immigrants’ worth, deservingness of safety and dignity, and humanity are codified into law and policy, which is then enacted on the lives and petitions of thousands of immigrants pursuing their rights to refuge. Asylum seekers are fleeing violence and harms that are often compounded along the journey, in a continuum of structural and interpersonal violence throughout their migration and often continued in the destination country, through detention, deportation, and the court process itself. Immigration court’s purpose is to adjudicate asylum claims; while this decision is executed by judges, the court context where asylum seekers petitions are audienced are made up of prosecutors, legal advocates, expert witnesses, social workers, interpreters, court staff, and others who shape the way that petitioners’ claims are evaluated and the space in which asylum seekers’ claims are heard. This study uses a qualitative ethnographic method, drawing on human rights and critical theories to study immigration court as a culture, and to interrogate how members of this culture understand the nature of the court, their roles and relationships within the immigration enforcement system and how the immigration process identifies and responds to trauma. Data collection spanned 8 months, and included observation of 161 immigration hearings across the four Arizona immigration courts. Participants (n=73) represented various key professions within and adjacent to the court: judges, ICE trial attorneys, defense attorneys, court staff, interpreters, legal team members such as paralegals and social workers, detention center staff, and community advocates. Findings address the physical court space, the roles and professions that interact in the court, and the atmosphere of the court. These center securitization and the ideological friction of the court, credibility determinations as a site of contested power, hostility and adversariality, and the limited approach to human rights and narrow acknowledgement of trauma. These findings contextualize professional and policy recommendations, as well as implications for education and future research.
ContributorsMathis, Cherra M (Author) / Androff, David (Thesis advisor) / Cook Heffron, Laurie (Committee member) / Firoz, Malay (Committee member) / Messing, Jill (Committee member) / Castañada Acosta, Rocío (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2024
Description
Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) is a common experience among (lifetime prevalence 16.5% - 54.5%); however, current research, intervention programs, and policies tend to target women of child-bearing age, leaving older adult women feeling unseen and unheard. The purpose of this study was to provide a more accurate picture of violence against women over the life course. Guided by Life Course Theory, the characteristics of trajectories of IPV events and IPV-related help-seeking were assessed among a sample of community-dwelling women aged 60 or older residing in the Southwest United States (n = 52). Semi-structured retrospective interviews were conducted using a Life History Calendar (LHC). The characteristics of trajectories of IPV by type (physical, psychological, sexual) and by frequency (high, low) were examined. The impact of experiencing Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACES) on trajectories of violence were analyzed to account for childhood victimization in the life course. To better understand IPV-related help-seeking behaviors, the characteristics of trajectories of IPV-related help-seeking by age, type of IPV, and frequency of IPV were examined. Generalized linear mixed modeling was used to evaluate whether the probability of experiencing IPV and seeking IPV-related help changed over the life course. Half of the women in the sample experienced IPV at age 45 or later (n = 28; 53.8%), with approximately one-quarter of the women in an intimate relationship reporting IPV at time of interview (n = 6; 27.3%). Findings revealed curvilinear characteristics of IPV experience by type and frequency over the life course, with the probability of IPV events increasing earlier in life then decreasing later in life. Compared to previous studies that report IPV events decreasing in the latter 20s, the probability of experiencing IPV events increased later into adulthood (mid to late thirties among women in the study sample). The probability of seeking IPV-related help increased earlier in the life course and then declined, with the occurrence of IPV of all types significantly affecting trajectories of help-seeking behavior. Findings from this study contribute evidence needed for the recommendation of IPV screening into older adulthood and the adaptation of supportive services for older women seeking IPV-related help.
ContributorsGarbe, Renee Andersen (Author) / Stalker, Katie C (Thesis advisor) / Oh, Hyunsung (Committee member) / Messing, Jill (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021