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How religious engagement shapes the college experience of African American Christian males at a predominantly White institution: a phenomenlogical approach

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Title	How religious engagement shapes the college experience of African American Christian males at a predominantly White institution: a phenomenlogical approach
Author	Rice, Stephen J.
Author email	srice@usc.edu;rice.stephen@gmail.com
Degree	Doctor of Education
Document type	Dissertation
Degree program	Education (Leadership)
School	Rossier School of Education
Date defended/completed	2012-10-23
Date submitted	2012-11-16
Date approved	2012-11-19
Restricted until	2012-11-19
Date published	2012-11-19
Advisor (committee chair)	Veneges, Kristan
Advisor (committee member)	Cole, Darnell Harris, Frank, III
Abstract	Understanding the different aspects of the college experience of African American males in a predominantly White institution is an important topic for researchers. This focus directly responds to the despairing statistics surrounding collegiate African American males, who often show lower graduation rates compared to other racial groups. The need to refocus research is especially urgent given the significant gap between male and female African American college students. One often-overlooked issue concerns the religious engagement of African American Christian males at predominantly White institutions, and how that engagement may shape their college experience. ❧ Based on the overwhelming data received by the participants, this study, which originally set out to look at spirituality in African American males, opened up to an exploration of religious engagement. The study aimed to answer the following research question: How does religious engagement shape the college experience of African American Christian males at a predominantly White institution. The research sub question is: How do African American males define spirituality? ❧ This study's framework draws upon the research of Alexander Astin, Helen Astin, and Jennifer Lindholm (2011) on the religious life of college students. These researchers categorized how students manage their religious life into three key areas: (a) religious commitment, (b) religious engagement, and (c) religious conservatism. The present study focused mainly on religious engagement. Qualitative methods, specifically phenomenology in the form of one- on-one interviews were used to gather the data. The participants were recruited through a snowball effect, which resulted in 11 students who identified as African American or Black males having a spiritual background (however they defined it) and functioning as full-time students at the host site. ❧ The results showed evidence that religious engagement shapes the college experience of African American males at a predominantly White institution. These findings were shown through (a) the various ways that students engaged in their religion lives, (b) how the students used their religious engagement to define their purpose, (c) how the students tried to develop their own personal religious identities, and (d) the importance they granted to creating their own religious communities. ❧ New findings from the study included the recognition that students were struggling to deal with aspects of college life that were odds with their religious identities. The student-participants were trying to find ways to navigate conflicting issues in college, such as having sex, partying, and consuming alcohol. At the end of the dissertation, the researcher offers recommendations and implications for university administrators to consider.
Keyword	African American males; education; religious engagement; student affairs
Language	English
Part of collection	University of Southern California dissertations and theses
Publisher (of the original version)	University of Southern California
Place of publication (of the original version)	Los Angeles, California
Publisher (of the digital version)	University of Southern California. Libraries
Provenance	Electronically uploaded by the author
Type	texts
Legacy record ID	usctheses-m
Rights	Rice, Stephen J.
Access conditions	The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the author, as the original true and official version of the work, but does not grant the reader permission to use the work if the desired use is covered by copyright. It is the author, as rights holder, who must provide use permission if such use is covered by copyright. The original signature page accompanying the original submission of the work to the USC Libraries is retained by the USC Libraries and a copy of it may be obtained by authorized requesters contacting the repository e-mail address given.
Repository name	University of Southern California Digital Library
Repository address	USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 7002, 106 University Village, Los Angeles, California 90089-7002, USA
Repository email	cisadmin@usc.edu
Archival file	uscthesesreloadpub_Volume4/etd-RiceStephe-1301-0.pdf