- Author: Julienne Cancio
Saoimanu "Saoi" Sope, UC Agriculture and Natural Resources digital communications specialist, was born on Aunu'u, an island in American Samoa, but raised in Southern California. She attended UC Santa Cruz for her undergraduate degree in film and digital media. While in the program, she felt lost compared to her peers.
“I didn't know what type of stories I wanted to tell through film, especially compared to my other classmates,” Sope said. “For a lot of them, it seemed like they had been planning on being filmmakers their entire life. This major was my backup plan.”
To gain more perspective, she took on a second major in community studies, a unique and interdisciplinary field that prepares students to apply the lessons they learn in the classroom to the real world, through a six-month field study.
Sope completed her field study at the RYSE Youth Center in Richmond, teaching Black and Brown youth how film can be used as a tool to navigate their trauma. Through this experience, Sope learned about public health, which she pursued in her master's program at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health.
In 2018, Sope learned about UC ANR as an employee of Driscoll's. Her boss at the time coordinated a field trip to the UC ANR office in Davis to learn more about successful agriculture communications. Four years later, in June 2022, Sope joined the Strategic Communications team.
“It was a full-circle moment,” she said. “When UC ANR posted the job description for the role I have now, I saw it and applied like anyone else. Luckily, I got an interview and now I'm here.”
When talking about her interactions with Southern California researchers and staff as a digital communications specialist, Sope attributes much of her success to her culture and upbringing. “I think one of my superpowers is that I can work with people in a way that makes them feel valued and seen and heard,” she explained.
She talked about her Samoan background, one that emphasizes the importance of hospitality. Known as the “happy people of the Pacific,” Samoans are very big on caring for and hosting others, Sope said. “How we treat others reflects our value of community,” she explained.
Sope brings this into the room with the people she is interviewing and to the impactful stories she is writing. She makes it known to her interviewees that their time is valuable and their story is worth reading.
As she grows older, Sope said, she realizes how much of her culture has influenced her work ethic. She appreciates that May is Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month, an opportunity to celebrate and bring recognition to the beautiful and diverse cultures of marginalized communities in the U.S.
Although AAPI communities are clumped into one phrase, it is important to remember that there are many diverse groups of people within this term that are often overlooked, such as Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders.
When speaking about her Polynesian culture, the saying “it takes a village to raise a child” really speaks to Sope. In Samoan culture, it is common for parents to give legal guardianship of their child to other family members. In the U.S., this is formally known as adoption. This is the case for Sope; she was “gifted” to her adoptive mom by her birth mom.
“But one thing that's really beautiful about the Samoan culture is that we always know where we come from,” she said. “We know who our birth parents are…it's not a secret, and it's not shameful.”
Overall, Sope is most proud of coming from a culture that places such a high value on community. This can be seen through her influential writing, bringing awareness and attention to UC ANR staff and researchers who make great contributions to the academic world and the greater SoCal communities.
In conveying their stories, Sope said she hopes they realize and reflect on their potential and the importance of their own work.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The Bohart Museum is located in Room 1124 of the Academic Surge Building, 455 Crocker Lane. The event is free and family friendly.
Among artists represented will be UC Davis graduate student Srdan Tunic; undergraduate students Allen Chew, Francisco Basso and Brittany Kohler; and UC Davis alumna Megan Ma; plus the work of the late scientific illustrator Mary Foley Benson (1905-1992), who worked for the U.S. Department of Food and Agriculture, the Smithsonian before retiring and moving to Davis. She also worked for UC Davis entomologists.
Tunic, a UC Davis candidate for a master's degree in art history, will present a seminar on Benson from 11 a.m. to noon, Oct. 15, in Room 1010 of the TLC Teaching and Learning Complex, 482 Hutchison Drive. (See separate news story on Tunic and see research story on Mary Foley Benson by forest entomologist Malcolm Furniss)
"I will focus on the visual material, and start by saying a few words about the museum, and then talk about Mary's life and art chronologically, paying special attention to her work at UC Davis," Tunic said. "At some point I will briefly touch on scientific illustration and how artists make this sort of work, and near the end, mention other illustrators I encountered during this process, and wrap up motivating people to dive into their local collections."
The family arts-and-crafts activity at the open house will be to "create your own Pokemon card," said Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum and a UC Davis distinguished professor of entomology. Also planned: eating insects, creating gall ghosts (from oak galls), learning about cochineal dyes, and showing off insect tattoos.
"We would love to have folks come and show off their insect tattoos," Kimsey said.
The UC Davis museum, founded in 1946 by noted entomologist Richard M. Bohart (1913-2007), is dedicated to teaching, research and service. It is the home of a global collection of eight million insect specimens. The collection is now the seventh largest in North America and includes terrestrial and fresh water arthropods. The museum is also home of the California Insect Survey, a storehouse of the insect biodiversity of California's deserts, mountains, coast, and the Great Central Valley. In addition, the Bohart features a live "petting zoo" (Madagascar hissing cockroaches, walking sticks and tarantulas) and an insect-themed gift shop, stocked with T-shirts, hoodies, jewelry, posters, books and insect-collecting equipment.
The Bohart is open to the public year-around (except for holidays) Monday through Thursday from 9 a.m. to noon and from 1 to 5 p.m. It is closed to the public on Friday to enable research activities. Admission is free. For more information, access the website or contact the museum at bmuseum@udavis.edu.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Then you'll want to attend the Bohart Museum of Entomology open house on "Insects, Art and Culture" from 1 to 4 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 15 on the UC Davis campus.
The Bohart Museum is located in Room 1124 of the Academic Surge Building, 455 Crocker Lane. The event is free and family friendly.
Among artists represented will be UC Davis graduate student Srdan Tunic; UC Davis undergraduate students Allen Chew, Francisco Basso and Brittany Kohler; and UC Davis alumna Megan Ma; plus the work of the late scientific illustrator Mary Foley Benson (1905-1992), employed by the U.S. Department of Food and Agriculture, the Smithsonian before retiring and moving to Davis. She also did illustrations for several UC Davis entomologists.
Tunic, a UC Davis candidate for a master's degree in art history, will present a seminar on Benson from 11 a.m. to noon, Oct. 15, in Room 1010 of the TLC Teaching and Learning Complex, 482 Hutchison Drive. (See research story on Mary Foley Benson by forest entomologist Malcolm Furniss)
The family arts-and-crafts activity at the open house will be to "create your own Pokemon card," said Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum and a UC Davis distinguished professor of entomology. Also planned: eating insects, creating gall ghosts (from oak galls), learning about cochineal dyes, and showing off insect tattoos.
"We would love to have folks come and show off their insect tattoos," Kimsey said.
The UC Davis museum, founded in 1946 by noted entomologist Richard M. Bohart (1913-2007), is dedicated to teaching, research and service. It is the home of a global collection of eight million insect specimens. The collection is now the seventh largest in North America and includes terrestrial and fresh water arthropods. The museum is also home of the California Insect Survey, a storehouse of the insect biodiversity of California's deserts, mountains, coast, and the Great Central Valley. In addition, the Bohart features a live "petting zoo" (Madagascar hissing cockroaches, walking sticks and tarantulas) and an insect-themed gift shop, stocked with T-shirts, hoodies, jewelry, posters, books and insect-collecting equipment.
The Bohart is open to the public year-around (except for holidays) Monday through Thursday from 9 a.m. to noon and from 1 to 5 p.m. It is closed to the public on Friday to enable research activities. Admission is free. For more information, access the website or contact the museum at bmuseum@udavis.edu.
- Author: Latimes.com by Gary Robbins
UC San Diego has begun using new words to refer to Latinos and Chicanos in a move that reflects the profound change that's occurring nationally in the way many people define their gender and sexuality.
The gender-specific terms Latino and Chicano are being selectively replaced with Latinx and Chicanx to promote acceptance of virtually anyone who falls under the headings. The change is being promoted by students, social justice activists and the LGBTQ community, which are trying to get people to look beyond conventional notions of gender, sex and appearance. As broadly used, Latino refers to people of Latin American origin or descent.
Latinx includes men and women of Latin American descent, people who are not exclusively male or female, people who don't think of themselves as a man or a woman, and people who don't act or dress in ways that are common to people of their gender. The same basic definition applies to Chicanx, with the exception of heritage. Chicanos are Americans of Mexican descent.
“This is about making the university more inclusive,” said Becky Pettit, UC San Diego's vice chancellor of equity, diversity and inclusion. “We're meeting students where they are.”
The university also is trying to more broadly appeal to Latinos, an area where it has lagged behind some University of California campuses. The new word changes, made this week, mean that the school will use Latinx and Chicanx in a lot of its official communications, such as news releases and publicity. The words also might end up being used in the naming of certain campus events.
Schools like Grossmont and MiraCosta colleges already use those terms in their publicity. So does UC Irvine. The University of San Diego holds a Chicanx/Latinx graduation.
But deeper change is being sought. And it involves two words — Latinx and Chicanx — that are not widely used by the general public, partly because there's confusion about what the words mean and how they are pronounced.
People are especially perplexed by Latinx, which was reflected in a reader survey published this year by Remezcla, a media company.
The survey found that readers were almost evenly divided between pronouncing Latinx as latin-x and la-teen-x. A small percentage preferred lah-tinks. Still others have suggested referring to Latinos as Latin@, a gender-neutral term that hasn't caught on.
Colleges and universities are often among the first places for new language to appear. That's precisely what's been happening over the last couple of years.
At UC San Diego, it is no longer uncommon for a person to announce their “personal pronouns” when they introduce themselves at a meeting.
For example, a person might say, “My pronouns are he/him/his” or “she/her/hers.” Or the person could ask to simply be referred to as “they” because their gender identity doesn't neatly match that of a man or a woman.
The issue of gender identity also has surfaced in the way students apply for undergraduate admission to the University of California system.
Students can now choose from heterosexual/straight, bisexual, gay and lesbian to describe their sexuality.
Under gender, they can select gender nonconforming, genderqueer, transgender, trans man, trans male, trans woman or trans female.
Making a selection — which is voluntary — can be confusing. Some of the terms aren't well known to the general public, and some have multiple meanings.
The UC says that genderqueer refers to “a person whose gender identity and/or gender expression falls outside of the dominant social norm of the assigned sex, is beyond genders, or is some combination.”
The new California Gender Recognition Act is likely to make all of these terms more familiar to a wider audience. The act, which begins to take effect Jan. 1, will make it easier for people who are transgender, nonbinary or intersex to obtain state-issued IDs that specify their gender.
“Terms and practices change over time,” said Dayo F. Gore, an ethnic studies professor at UC San Diego. “It doesn't mean it is a zero-sum game. The important thing is how do we think about the changes. It gives us a chance to be open and speak.”
The San Diego Union-Tribune asked Pettit whether some people will view words such as Latinx as an act of political correctness, leading to blowback against the campus.
“I think the nature of higher education as institutions is to create spaces for resistance and for people to redefine themselves and for people to redefine the world that they want to live in,” Pettit said.
“I don't mean to sound flippant, but that's what universities exist for: to allow people to think freely, to allow people to redefine and shift culture.”
Robbins writes for the San Diego Union-Tribune.
Source: Published originally on latimes.com, 'Latinos' is out, 'Latinx' is in at UC San Diego in nod to evolving gender and sexuality terms, by Gary Robbins, December 2nd, 2018.
- Author: Jason Alvarez, UC Merced, University News
Latinos suffer from some of the highest obesity rates in the nation. Health officials have tried to intervene with messaging that encourages healthy eating and healthy behavior, but these campaigns have met with little success.
Now a new study Opens a New Window. from UC Merced public health Opens a New Window. Professor Susana Ramirez suggests that efforts might be more successful if strategies encouraged Latinos to “decolonize their diet.”
Obesity risk among Latinos reflects a broader trend that public health experts have termed the “dietary acculturation paradox.”
“The paradox comes from epidemiological findings over the past 50 years that show that increased acculturation into mainstream U.S. culture is bad for your health,” Ramirez said. “If you look at immigrants born and raised in other countries who came to the U.S. as adults, they tend to be healthier than their American children.”
According to Ramirez, much of the problem stems from children of immigrants adopting American diets. These diets tend to be highly processed and high in unhealthy ingredients like fat, sodium and sugar. They're also low in healthy ingredients like fiber, complex carbohydrates and fresh fruits and vegetables.
This remains true despite gains in income and education, which are generally associated with better health outcomes. But Ramirez's new study provides insight into why the acculturation paradox affects Latinos.
Ramirez and her collaborators surveyed young, bicultural women — ages 18-29; of Mexican descent; living in the Central Valley; fluent in English — about diet and cultural values.
“We started talking to this audience to learn about the factors that influence their decision-making around diet,” Ramirez said. “We also wanted to know what features of health messages are persuasive to this particular audience.”
“Thinking of themselves as Mexican is a source of pride for these second- and third-generation women,” Ramirez said.
Participants also reported a desire to eat healthy. They listed portion control, balanced meals, and fruits and vegetables as part of a healthy diet; fried foods and foods high in fat and sugar were seen as unhealthy. They were also able to identify specific consequences of unhealthy eating, including obesity and diabetes.
The findings suggested that the prevailing wisdom about healthy diets had reached the group, but those messages weren't having the intended effect.
“Everybody was able to tell us what eating healthy was,” Ramirez said. “But we found that participants were saying ‘when I'm with my Mexican family and I'm expressing my Mexican culture, that is being unhealthy.' Culture is at odds with health.”
Ramirez had identified a second paradox, one that pitted kitchen against culture. Though respondents viewed traditional Mexican cooking as essential to maintaining their ethnic identity, most described Mexican food as inherently unhealthy and incompatible with a healthy diet.
“Healthy-eating promoters often encourage traditional food. But there's a disconnect there,” Ramirez said. “If you're going to tell Latinos to eat their traditional foods, that's priming them to think of unhealthy things. That can cause confusion.”
The solution, according to Ramirez, is a new approach to health communication — an approach that builds on the importance of Latino culture and frames the issue in ways that are relevant to the community.
“Healthy living messages often don't take culture into account,” Ramirez said. “For me, that suggests a pretty radical approach to health communication, an approach that's empowerment based.
“Talk about food and nutrition as rights they can advocate for in their community. Talk about how Latino populations are disproportionately targeted in marketing for junk food and fast food in their communities. It's an approach that empowers young Latinas to decolonize their diet."
Source: Published originally on UC Merced, University news, Kitchen and Culture Clash When Promoting Healthy Eating to Latinos, by Jason Alvarez, March 22nd, 2018.