jason.defay.org | you're grounded, chicken!

I was recently contacted by a publisher from Lambert Academic Publishing who was interested in publishing my dissertation as a 'print on demand' monograph. I decided not to take them up on their kind offer & have instead published the full text right here on my website free of charge.

To read it online please click here: http://jason.defay.org/?q=node/108  Or to download a PDF version you can click here http://defay.org/jason/academic/J-DeFay_Dissertation.pdf

SOURCE: KPBS Reporter Tom Fudge, April 15, 2009: LINK

Glioblastoma is a brain cancer that's best known, today, for afflicting Senator Ted Kennedy. It's long been known for creating the most common and aggressive type of brain tumor. A UCSD scientist says he's learned how a gene mutation helps the tumor to grow, and his new research may show a way to starve the tumor. Kun-Liang Guan is a professor of pharmacology.

Clinical trials are strictly controlled human studies of new and emerging therapies or new and different ways of using known treatments. In addition to helping others by contributing to medical research, clinical trials may offer an alternative for patients who have failed to respond to standard medical treatment.

A NIH sponsored research study appeared recently in the journal Nature and adds to the growing body of scientific literature suggesting that the moderate consumption of wine has numerous health benefits.

In this study wine consumption was shown to reduce the risk of diabetes and extend the lives of mice who were fed high fat diets (60% of daily calories).

Other studies have suggested there many other benefits of regular MODERATE consuption of wine. These include including lower risk of heart attacks, better insulin regulation, lower cholesterol levels and decreasing the growh of cancer cells.

While in graduate school at UC San Diego, I did a bit of teaching and a whole lot of reading. Like many aspiring young scholars, I have an online curriculum vitae you may peruse.

I also wrote many papers including two field exams in two different fields of sociology. The idea of the field exam is to demonstrate mastery of two areas within the discipline, and they are considered by many to be scholarly hoops one must jump through if they wish to join the ranks the ivory tower.

For the benefit of other graduate students, I have provided links to my two field exam papers. Please feel free to browse, and if you would like to use any content, I'd appreciate a formal citation!

Social Movements | International Migration

Among the numerous papers I wrote, I also assembled one somewhat larger paper called a dissertation. In my case I chose to write about the newly emerging racial and ethnic identities of Afro-American immigrants to Los Angeles.

Here you can download and read my doctoral dissertation and find out more about the Garifuna people. As part of my research, I also compiled a table of various Garifuna population estimates. The table combines estimates from local governmental census figures, academic research, journalistic research and UN figures.

• Garifuna Population Estimates (Word format)

Garifuna Settlement Day Survey 2000: I administered the following survey to Garifuna Settlement Day participants on November 11th, 2000 (Los Angeles, Holy Name of Jesus church). If you would like additional information about this survey, please send me a message at "jason 'at' defay.org" and I'll try to get back to you as quickly as I can.