Structural Power, Systemic Poverty, and Entrenchment Among African American Males

Poverty and structural power are immensely broad phenomena shaping economic and social architectures of societies globally. However, among the depth of complex mechanisms covertly functioning to perpetuate poverty, this chapter identifies structural power as one of the critical social constructs influencing systemic poverty. To explore structural power as a social force influencing systemic poverty, as a conceptual framework, and as means to support the overtone of social injustice, throughout this chapter an adaptation of the adverse childhood experiences (ACE) model is used. Through a more narrowed approach, the researcher uses the ACE model to explore structural power and systemic poverty through four experiential factors: educational, social, physical, and psychological. The experiences are motived by structural power and defined within the context of systemic poverty to explore the influence of those experiences on entrenchment of African American males later in adulthood.

Attitudinal Judgments of Dialect Traits and Colorism in African Americans

This study demonstrates how language and complexion influence professional and social perceptions of African Americans. This study contains an online verbal-guise survey where participants either saw a photo of a lighter skin-toned African-American male and female or an electronically darkened version. Audio was attached to each photo, which contains traits of African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) in the case of the male and Standard American English for the female. The results suggest African-American females are more likely to experience colorism in professional traits while African-American males are more likely to experience colorism in social traits. Additionally, the respondent’s race influences perceptions of AAVE.

COVID-19 Modulates Inflammatory and Renal Markers That May Predict Hospital Outcomes among African American Males

Background and Objectives: African Americans and males have elevated risks of infection, hospitalization, and death from SARS-CoV-2 in comparison with other populations. We report immune responses and renal injury markers in African American male patients hospitalized for COVID-19. Methods: This was a single-center, retrospective study of 56 COVID-19 infected hospitalized African American males 50+ years of age selected from among non-intensive care unit (ICU) and ICU status patients. Demographics, hospitalization-related variables, and medical history were collected from electronic medical records. Plasma samples collected close to admission (≤2 days) were evaluated for cytokines and renal markers; results were compared to a control group (n = 31) and related to COVID-19 in-hospital mortality. Results: Among COVID-19 patients, eight (14.2%) suffered in-hospital mortality; seven (23.3%) in the ICU and one (3.8%) among non-ICU patients. Interleukin (IL)-18 and IL-33 were elevated at admission in COVID-19 patients in comparison with controls. IL-6, IL-18, MCP-1/CCL2, MIP-1α/CCL3, IL-33, GST, and osteopontin were upregulated at admission in ICU patients in comparison with controls. In addition to clinical factors, MCP-1 and GST may provide incremental value for risk prediction of COVID-19 in-hospital mortality. Conclusions: Qualitatively similar inflammatory responses were observed in comparison to other populations reported in the literature, suggesting non-immunologic factors may account for outcome differences. Further, we provide initial evidence for cytokine and renal toxicity markers as prognostic factors for COVID-19 in-hospital mortality among African American males.

Qualitative Description and Black Males: On Race, the Body, and Researching the Unimaginable

In this article, I explore how race and the body are central to social and education research on Black males. The guiding question of this essay is, How has the Black male body been conceptualized over time through qualitative description? I argue that, as Black males entered into new systems of reasoning, the Black male body was examined in different ways. Drawing from Sylvia Wynter’s concept of subjective understanding and David Theo Goldberg’s concept of racial knowledge, I explore the temporal and spatial meaning of qualitative description in the context of African American males. I conclude this essay by arguing for a different approach to qualitative description of Black males that moves beyond recycled stories of deficits or counter-narratives and on to explore the unimaginable.

A healing-centered approach to preventing urban gun violence: The Advance Peace Model

Urban gun violence is the result of and contributes to trauma for both individuals and communities. In the US, African American males between 15 and 34 years old bear the greatest mortality burden from gun violence. Community-based approaches that use credible, street-level outreach workers to interrupt conflicts, mentor the small number of offenders in each community, and offer them alternatives to violent conflict resolution, have demonstrated success in reducing firearm homicides. Yet, few of these approaches explicitly aim to also address the traumas of structural violence that contribute to gun crime, including dehumanizing policing, extreme poverty, and institutional racism. This commentary describes a program called Advance Peace that aims to explicitly use a healing-centered approach to address the traumas associated with violence as a means to reduce gun crime in urban communities. We describe the trauma-informed, healing-centered approach used by Advance Peace, the components of its intensive outreach strategy called the Peacemaker Fellowship, and some impacts the program is having on trauma and healing. The evidence comes from observations, interviews, and the voices of Advance Peace participants and staff. We suggest that exploring the inner workings of the Advance Peace model is critical for identifying ways to support trauma-informed healing-centered approaches in Black and brown communities that have been ravaged by racism, incarceration, and heavy-handed state violence.

Abstract P084: The Association Of Socioeconomic Status With Ideal Cardiovascular Health In African American Males

Introduction: African American (AA) men are burdened by high cardiovascular risk and have the highest age-adjusted all-cause mortality rate in the United States of America (US). Socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with improved cardiovascular risk factors in majority populations, but there is a paucity of data in AA men. Hypothesis: We hypothesized that higher levels of socioeconomic status would be associated with higher attainment of ideal cardiovascular health in AA men. Methods: We examined the association of socioeconomic status measures including education, income, occupation, and insurance status with an ideal cardiovascular health (ICH) score which included blood pressure, glucose, cholesterol, body mass index (BMI), physical activity, and smoking in African American Male Wellness Walks (AAMWW). Six metrics of ICH were categorized into a three-tiered ICH score 0-2, 3-4, 5-6. Ordinal logistic regression modeling was performed with adjustment for age. Results: Among 1,444 men, 108 (7%) attained 5-6 ICH metrics at baseline. After adjustment for age, none of the baseline indicators of socioeconomic status were associated with attainment of ICH. Conclusion: In our community-dwelling sample of AA men, the proportion of individuals with highest scores for ICH was very low, and SES was not associated with greater attainment of ICH. Strategies to increase attainment of cardiovascular health in AA men by health care professionals and policymakers need to incorporate intentional interventions beyond the scope of SES in order to advance health equity in AA men.