Explore the vast range of titles available.

ZOOT SUIT (n.): the ultimate in clothes. The only totally and truly American civilian suit. -Cab Calloway,The Hepster's Dictionary, 1944 Before the fashion statements of hippies, punks, or hip-hop, there was the zoot suit, a striking urban look of the World War II era that captivated the imagination. Created by poor African American men and obscure tailors, the \"drape shape\" was embraced by Mexican American pachucos, working-class youth, entertainers, and swing dancers, yet condemned by the U.S. government as wasteful and unpatriotic in a time of war. The fashion became notorious when it appeared to trigger violence and disorder in Los Angeles in 1943-events forever known as the \"zoot suit riot.\" In its wake, social scientists, psychiatrists, journalists, and politicians all tried to explain the riddle of the zoot suit, transforming it into a multifaceted symbol: to some, a sign of social deviance and psychological disturbance, to others, a gesture of resistance against racial prejudice and discrimination. As controversy swirled at home, young men in other places-French zazous, South African tsotsi, Trinidadian saga boys, and Russian stiliagi-made the American zoot suit their own. InZoot Suit, historian Kathy Peiss explores this extreme fashion and its mysterious career during World War II and after, as it spread from Harlem across the United States and around the world. She traces the unfolding history of this style and its importance to the youth who adopted it as their uniform, and at the same time considers the way public figures, experts, political activists, and historians have interpreted it. This outré style was a turning point in the way we understand the meaning of clothing as an expression of social conditions and power relations. Zoot Suit offers a new perspective on youth culture and the politics of style, tracing the seam between fashion and social action.

In recent decades, rapid growth of the U.S. Hispanic population has raised concerns about immigrant adaptation, including fertility. Empirical research suggests that Hispanics, especially Mexicans, might not be following the historical European pattern of rapid intergenerational fertility decline (and convergence toward native levels). If confirmed, continued high Hispanic fertility could indicate a broader lack of assimilation into mainstream American society. In this paper, we reexamine the issue of Hispanic and Mexican fertility using an approach that combines biological and immigrant generations to more closely approximate a comparison of immigrant women with those of their daughters' and granddaughters' generation. Contrary to cross-sectional results, our new analyses show that Hispanic and Mexican fertility is converging with that of whites, and that it is similarly responsive to period conditions and to women's level of education. In addition, we employ a mathematical simulation to illustrate the conditions under which cross-sectional analyses can produce misleading results. Finally, we discuss the import of the fertility convergence we document for debates about immigrant assimilation.

This paper addresses the following questions: Overall, on average, how did child and youth well-being in the United States of America change in the last quarter of the 20th century? Did it improve or deteriorate? By how much? In which domains or areas of social life? For specific age groups? For particular race/ethnic groups? And did race/ethnic groups disparities increase or decrease? To address these questions, some 28 national-level time series of social indicators in seven quality-of-life domains - material well-being, social relationships (with family and peers), health, safety/behavioral concerns, productive activity (educational attainments), place in community (participation in schooling or work institutions), and emotional/spiritual well-being - are reviewed. Twenty-five of these time series date back to 1975 or earlier, while three are based on indicators that commenced in the 1980s. The 25 time series that date back to 1975 are indexed by percentage change from the base year 1975 - that is, subsequent annual observations are computed as percentages of the base year values. Similarly, all 28 time series that are available by 1985 also are indexed separately with 1985 as the base year. This is followed by the construction of seven domain-specific summary well-being indices in which each of the component time series in each of seven well-being domains are equally weighted. The seven component indices then are combined into two equally-weighted summary indices of child and youth well-being - the first of which is based on the 25 social indicator time series that date back to 1975 and the second of which is based on the 28 time series that date back to 1985. We also examine the impact of averaging the well-being indicators across the individual time series rather than across the seven quality of life domains. For this, we calculate corresponding base year 1975 and 1985 summary well-being indices that average equally across the individual component series. Basic findings about trends in child and youth well-being in the United States in the last quarter of the 20th century are shown to depend on both the base year and the formula by which the summary indices are calculated. Findings about child and youth well-being also are dependent upon the specific indicators and domains used in the composition of the summary indices. Using our general indices as metrics by which to measure change, we reach several conclusions. First, using 1975 as a base year - overall conditions of life for children and youths in the United States deteriorated fairly steadily for a number of years in the 1980s and reached low points in the early-1990s. From 1993, they then began an upturn that continued through 1998 towards, but still slightly below, 1975 levels. In other words, while some domains and conditions of life for children/youths improved by 1998 as compared to 1975, others deteriorated. Averaging across all of the domains of life and conditions included in our summary indices, the basic finding is that the overall quality of life of children/youths in the United States was not better in 1998 than in 1975. Using 1985 as a base year, the trend in overall well-being for children/youths shows a similar pattern of decline through the early-1990s followed by an improvement through 1998 to levels slightly above those of the 1985 base year. In other words, compared to 1985 base levels, average conditions of well-being for children/youths in the United States had slightly improved by the late-1990s. Additional findings are discussed pertaining to trends over time in each of the seven domains of well-being, trends within infancy, childhood, and adolescence/teenage age groupings, and trends in race/ethnic-group-specific comparisons and disparities.