American Studies Commons^™

Sex In The Sixties: Playboy's Contradictory Contribution To Social Change In The 1960s, Emily Stucky

The Cardinal Edge

This paper summarizes the perceptions of Playboy magazine during the height of its influence, from 1955 to 1975, through the lens of social justice advocates in the 1960s. Many historical scholars characterize Playboy magazine as strictly anti-feminist, while others would cast Hugh Hefner as liberating in his ideology and political views, seen through reviews of the magazine throughout the 1960s and comments from Hefner himself. But it is more likely Playboy’s legacy is much more complicated than either of these positions allow. Playboy occupied a conflicting role in the 1960s: liberating in its post-war sex standards for both men …

Review Of Bitstreams: The Future Of Digital Literary Heritage, Kara Watts-Engley

Journal of Contemporary Archival Studies

Literary production has always been tied to specific developments in technology. This has become all the more apparent since the advent of personal computing and our digital media age. How might an awareness of technology’s impact then affect the future of literary creation, critique, and preservation? For Matthew Kirschenbaum’s Bitstreams: The Future of Digital Literary Heritage, this is among the core questions of literary, archival, and bibliographic studies in the contemporary digital media age.

“Pristine Truth” Ecopsychology: The Natureness Remedy

The International Journal of Ecopsychology (IJE)

As was best seller predicted by ecological science experts in 1949, (2a) most educated people today recognize that in personal, social and environmentally hurtful ways our senselessly abused lives increasingly are breaking our world. Although no core cause or remedy for this catastrophe is known, this “Natureness” article makes both available. Sadly, by continually omitting its special “Pristine Truth,” all the knowledge in the world can’t stop modern humanity’s suicidal mismanagement of Nature’s life as it flows around and through us. (2) Instead, our present-day conquer-Nature worldview teaches us to excessively disconnect from, exploit and illegally war against Nature’s flow …

New Coyote (Qomu'tsau) Stories: "About Time"

The International Journal of Ecopsychology (IJE)

No abstract provided.

~The River~ (Poem By Raymond Carver)

The International Journal of Ecopsychology (IJE)

"[...] Felt the hair rise as something touched my boot. Grew afraid at what I couldn’t see. Then of everything that filled my eyes— that other shore hung with heavy branches, the dark mountain range behind. [...]"

The Library Wants To Kill You: Places Of Information As Battleground And Sanctum In Halo, Mackenzie Streissguth

Proceedings from the Document Academy

Video games are often a widespread access point for studying information-seeking behaviors, as a large portion of the population (and its youth) play them. Understanding how real-world analogues, like libraries, are portrayed in games can give us insights into how they mirror conflicts of reality. By examining the depictions of information systems and accompanying curators in Halo: Combat Evolved (2001), we can begin to investigate the perceptions of libraries and their antagonism in ludonarratives. Resulting analysis reveals multiple layers of archival hostility that are ultimately upended in later iterations in the game series, changing the nature of the library itself. …

This Sounds Like An Episode Of The X-Files: Analyzing How Twitter Users Interpreted The Covid-19 Pandemic Through The Lens Of Sci-Fi Television, Nicole Neece

Proceedings from the Document Academy

While science fiction has a long-standing habit of predicting future technologies, The X-Files’ focus on anatomical manipulations as a means of control resulted in a plotline that inadvertently mirrored the COVID-19 pandemic which occurred a few years later. The proximity to such a similar, real-world situation resulted in some audiences interpreting their own experiences through the framework of sci-fi television, demonstrating that the discursive environment crafted through the text of The X-Files is continually applicable to contemporary anxieties and paranoia even after the show finished airing. In this article, I argue that The X-Files’ critiques of real-world abuses of …

Nostalgia's Complicated Role In Contemporary Pop Culture, Ethan Clawsie

Pop Culture Intersections

Over the past several decades, there has been a growing trend of nostalgia in popular culture, with the number of remakes, reboots, and revivals of classic films, television shows, and music at an all-time high. Dozens of old TV shows have also been rebooted in the past few years, old movies are being remade, much of the music that’s been released lately has been engineered to sound like it came from the past, and a subset of recent video games either build upon old games (like Pokémon GO), or are made to look and feel like old games (like Flappy …

Barbie: For Better Or Worse, Renee Ho

Pop Culture Intersections

This article covers a history of Barbie, as well as an analysis of the live action Barbie movie. Barbie lovers and haters alike often debate whether the iconized doll is a feminist figure. Those who critique her argue that the messages she sends are superficial, or that Barbie perpetuates an unrealistic beauty standard and causes harm to the mental well being of her audience, especially because most of her target audience is made up of younger, impressionable girls. However, there is no doubt that Barbie can also be a role model for her audience. She was the first doll to …

‘Following The Line Of Least Resistance’: African American Women In Domestic Work, 1899–1940, Taylor Simsovic

Armstrong Undergraduate Journal of History

This paper examines the challenges faced by African American women employed in domestic service between 1899 and 1940, with a focus on how race, class, and gender intersected to shape their experiences. Specifically, the study investigates how these women continued to perform reproductive labor as they migrated from the South to Northern states during the Great Migration. Drawing on a range of primary and secondary sources, the analysis argues that Black women's persistent employment in undervalued labor within white American homes was driven by the mutually constitutive systems of capitalism, white supremacy, and patriarchy. These systems channeled Black women into …

The Lost Fortune Of The Virginiaman: Analyzing The History Of The Beale Ciphers Using Historical Land Grants, Simon E. Rosenbaum

Armstrong Undergraduate Journal of History

Since the mid-19th century, the mystery of the Beale ciphers has confounded cryptanalysts, intelligence agencies, historians, and treasure hunters alike. Countless works of scholarship have analyzed the story, the ciphers, and possible locations for the massive buried treasure allegedly in rural Bedford County, Virginia. However, prior methodology applied to historiography on the subject has been unsuccessful in making headway in an understanding of the history and location of the Beale treasure. In examining prior scholarship in conjunction with recorded land grants and associated archaeological scholarship, this paper proposes a new direction for research into the Beale cipher mystery and new …

Situating The Child’S Voice Within Children’S Fashion: An Interdisciplinary Examination Of The Child’S Engagement With The Clothing They Wear, Melinda Byam

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This paper examines the child’s relationship with children’s fashion, the clothing they wear, and their fashion consumption practices. Using a wardrobe approach to fashion, and an understanding of the child as the expert in their own lives, the author questions how the child engages, interacts, and experiences children’s fashion considering that how they use, think, and speak about their clothing is minimally consulted. Situating this research within a theoretical foundation set by Goffman and Simmel (social behavior), Featherstone (consumer culture), and Merleau-Ponty and Entwistle (embodiment), this text examines fashion from the point of view of the child, hypothesizing how future …

Doc/U/Ment: Affinities In 20th And 21st-Century Documental Poetics, Katherine Payne

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation presents, analyzes, and builds on the existing literary genealogy of documental poetry. In 2020 Michael Leong proposed the term documental poetry to describe the turn toward source materials in 21^st-century North American poetry, seen in longform research-based poems that explicitly incorporate documentation and seek to intervene in cultural memory. Using Ludwig Wittgenstein’s concept of family resemblance, I argue that there are clear affinities between 21^st-century poets and their 20^th-century literary forerunners, also that an expansion of the scope of documental poetics is needed. The three nodes of connection I examine are works …

A Study Of Geo-Regional Place-Consciousness In American Literature, Eugene Slepov

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The ancient Greek notions of topos, or place, and choros, or region, emerge from a an oral, narrative-based tradition that predates geography. These concepts remind us that that best source of material to study place is to be found in literary fiction. American fiction in particular will give us the evidence by which we can compile a qualitative, experiential understanding of the role of place in people’s lives. This dissertation inquires into the formation of the imaginative constructions that characters put upon place—such as through the process of consolidating and dwelling in places—and the way place puts …

White Supremacist Print Culture And The Creation Of White Working-Class Ideology In 1860s New York City, Anna Meyer

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

J. H. Van Evrie believed in the biological basis of white racial supremacy and Black inferiority beliefs which he spread in his publications throughout the 19^th century. He generated support for Copperhead politicians, pro-slavery Northern Democrats, who would enact his racial policies, in his newspaper the Weekly Caucasian, published in New York City during the Civil War. He adapted the presentation of his racial theories to appeal to the economic concerns of among working-class white men and Irish immigrants by using allegories about the Civil War. The newspaper created a sense of white nationalism and racial solidarity with …

Justice, Pandemics, And Museums In Cyberspace: Archaeology Museums’ Decolonization Projects During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Samuel Besse

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This paper explores three Archeology Museums (Historic St. Mary’s City, James Madison’s Montpelier, and the American Museum of Natural History), their attempts at addressing the colonial narratives that museums are built on, and how the Covid-19 pandemic and protests over George Floyd’s death affected these projects. I place a special effort on the online presence of these museums, as this is the main way visitors interacted with the museums during the pandemic. After discussing the origins of museum’s decolonization efforts and their efforts to make an online presence, I talk about the Covid-19 pandemic and the events around George Floyd’s …

“Making It” In America: Understanding The American Dream In Trump’S America, Dayla Weems

Masters Theses

"Making it in America: Understanding the American Dream in Trump's America" is a comprehensive study of the American Dream's complexities in West Texas. Spanning from the 2016 presidential election to the present, the thesis explores how individuals from diverse backgrounds pursue the American Dream in a region dominated by the oil industry and unique cultural dynamics.

Using ethnographic interviews, primary sources, oral histories, and visual analysis, the research unveils the experiences of Ana Maria Jimenez, Stephanie Carrasco, Maricela Fuentez, David Whaley, and Emmanuel Rojas, representing a cross-section of West Texas. They offer valuable insights into the region's challenges and opportunities. …

Recognizing Freedom: Zitkala-Ša's Fight For Native Citizenship, Camille J. Karpowitz

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

Minority groups protesting and petitioning for civil rights have been fundamental to United States history. Before the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, Zitkala-Ša, a Native American rights activist, positions herself as a voice for Native citizenship. Within the native community, however, the issue of citizenship was not as easily advocated for, due to past injustices perpetrated by the United States government. As a result, Zitkala-Ša has been labeled an assimilationist or one who connect to either Natives or Americans.

While her advocacy for citizenship does not go unnoticed by scholars, it is often ignored in her works outside of political …

The Life Of An American Catholic Radical: Review Of Christian Anarchist, Ammon Hennacy, A Life On The Catholic Left, William L. Portier

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

Witnessing Conspiracy Theories: Developing An Intersectional Approach To Conspiracy Theory Research, David Guignion

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation proposes an intersectional approach to conspiracy theory research that engages conspiracy theories and conspiracy theorists by considering their proximity and affiliations with hegemonic power structures. Against challenges to conspiracy theories based on their lack of empirical legitimacy (Rosenblum and Muirhead 2019) and building on arguments that propound their status as “subjugated knowledges” (Bratich 2008), this dissertation argues that conspiracy theories can be vectors of anti-oppressive resistance against systemic forces that disenfranchise racial, gender, and class minorities. Conspiracy theories are not a homogenous phenomenon; they are particular instances of potentially generative suspicion against powerful forces. The dissertation deploys Kelly …