Digital Commons Network^™

Unsettling: The Real Influx Of Syrian Refugees, Isabel M. Riofrio, Kanyakrit Vongkiatkajorn, Marguerite Ward

Capstones

While heated arguments have been sparked by President Obama’s plan to accept more Syrians, one key aspect remains little examined in the public debate: the government’s long-running program for helping refugees establish new lives in America.

The federal government oversees a complex program to help refugees come to this country. But is is an effort that does not live up to all its promises, leaving the path more difficult for refugees to adapt to their new homeland. A NYCity News Service investigation examining hundreds of audits, financial filings and internal government reports found government-funded refugee charities contracted to help the …

A Crusade Against The “Cowboy”?: Austrian Anti-Americanism During The Presidency Of George W. Bush, 2001-2009, Brandon J. Keene

University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This essay examines anti-Americanism in Austria throughout George W. Bush’s presidency, and Austrians’ response to Bush’s neoconservative team of advisers and his military actions in Iraq following the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York and Washington. For the first time in a century, a disposition of general hostility towards the United States came from both the Austrian Left and Right during the Bush years. Austrians’ latent notions of negativity towards the United States grew inflamed over Bush’s alienation of Western Europe and his determination to go to war against the Saddam regime in Iraq. Austrian anti-Americanism began to subside …

Case Study Of The Eastern State Hospital As Evidence Of English Influence On American Ideas About Mental Illness, Grace Devries

James W. Jackson Award for Excellence in Library Research in the Social Sciences

Grace DeVries, Class of 2016 at the University of Richmond, received the James W. Jackson Award for Excellence in the Social Sciences. Her research paper is entitled, Case Study of the Eastern State Hospital as Evidence of English Influence on American Ideas about Mental Illness.

Incentives To Incarcerate: Corporation Involvement In Prison Labor And The Privatization Of The Prison System, Alythea S. Morrell

Master's Projects and Capstones

The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the entire world. The United States accounts for approximately 5% of the world’s population, yet it accounts for 25% of the world’s prisoners. Not only does the United States mercilessly incarcerate its own citizens, it disproportionately incarcerates African American and Latino men. This fact on its own is disturbing; however, when it is coupled with the fact that corporations profit from and lobby for an overly aggressive and ineffective criminal justice system, makes these statistics even more horrendous. Private prison companies such as Corrections Corporation of America and GEO Group admit …

“Katherine Dunham’S Mexican Adventure”, Theodore W. Cohen

The Confluence (2009-2020)

Katherine Dunham was an internationally recognized dancer, but her time in Mexico often gets short mention in biographies. Theodore Cohen looks at her Mexican years in the contexts of race in both Mexico and the United States.

And The Elders And Scholars Wept: A Retrospective On The Symposium: Killing California Indians: Genocide In The Gold Rush Era, Held At The University Of California - Riverside, 7 November 2014, Organized By The California Center For Native Nations, T. Robert Przeklasa

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

This retrospective looks-back on and provides a summation of “Killing California Indians: Genocide in the Gold Rush Era,” a symposium organized and executed by the California Center for Native Nations and the University of California, Riverside. It provides a synopsis of each of the papers presented as well as the presentations of the Native Community Panel, all of which all dealt with the nineteenth century genocide. Highlights of audience discussion as well as a description of cleansings and blessings offered by local spiritual leaders and the Native flute tributes that opened and closed the event are included, as well.

Vikram Hemanathan, Linda J. Hanes

International Alumni

When Vikram Hemanathan came to Western Michigan University in 2006, he initially planned for an engineer’s life of logic and analytics, but a lifelong love of the theater became his greater calling.

Indigenous Institutional Inclusion, Kristy L. Garcia

Student Publications

While attending James Cook University (JCU) in Cairns, Australia and researching Arizona University (UA) in Tucson, Arizona, I noticed differences concerning the inclusion of Indigenous representation within their educational institutions.While UA focuses on academic education and community outreach through external concentration, JCU focuses on positive cultural awareness and acts of reconciliation through internal concentration. The influence of colonization in both the United States and Australia contributed to the presence, or lack, of tribal sovereignty in Indigenous communities therefore effecting federal recognition, reconciliation, and government funding which ultimately impacted the school systems.

Automobile Workers Strikes, Ian Greer

Ian Greer

Automobile workers' strikes occurred in essentially four eras: the lost strikes by the industry's craft unions in the early twentieth century, the dramatic sit-down victories of the 1930s, the mixture of wildcat and authorized strikes during the postwar economic boom from the 1940s through the 1970s, and the decline of strikes that accompanied the policy of "jointness' between company and union after J9S0. Autoworkers' strike strategies reflected, in part, the particular structure of the industry, which took shape in the 1920s. Auto production is a complex process of interdependent operations to produce parts and assemble vehicles, each containing tens of …

Regional Integration And Transnational Politics: Popular Sector Strategies In The Nafta Era, Maria Lorena Cook

Maria Lorena Cook

[Excerpt] This chapter argues that although economic integration between the United States and Mexico had been taking place for some time, it was the formal recognition of this process as represented by the discussions surrounding the North American Free Trade Agreement that facilitated transnational political action by non-state actors. Whereas the globalization of the economy and the prevalence of neoliberal economic policies may be considered by some to undermine popular sector organization and actions, formal recognition of regional economic integration in North America has produced a ‘transnational political’ arena that has expanded the resources available to non-governmental groups, increased their …

The Fire This Time: Ta-Nehisi Coates’S “Between The World And Me”, Bill Yousman

Communication, Media & The Arts Faculty Publications

In 1963, James Baldwin published his seminal The Fire Next Time. The first half of this foundational work was a letter to his nephew regarding America and race. In 2015 the journalist Ta-Nehisi Coates published a letter to his son, also about America and race. The literary device employed is no coincidence. Toni Morrison has anointed Coates as the successor to James Baldwin, and while that is a heavy burden for any 40 year old to bear, it is one that he just might manage to handle with grace.

Westerman, Robert V., B. 1948 - Collector (Sc 2905), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

MSS Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 2905. Letters to Leonard Burchfield, Louisville, Kentucky, from Representative William O. Cowger (3^rd District, Kentucky) and from Representative-elect Gene Snyder thanking him for his assistance in their elections. Includes two postcards from Cowger, sent from Venezuela and Cambodia.

Architectures For A Future South: Posthumanism And Ruin In The Novels Of Cormac Mccarthy, Joshua Ryan Jackson

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis reads the novels of Cormac McCarthy as posthuman southern literature to explain why fiction from the South after World War II could no longer convey a sense of place during postmodernity: that is, because the region's culture and economy were transitioning from predominantly humanistic thinking (i.e., believing that humans [and especially southern humans] are supreme beings) to predominantly posthumanistic thinking (i.e., believing that humans are not as supreme as they think they are). It argues that we can trace this ideological change over time via structural shifts in the South’s architectural record, which we see in the ruins …

Policing Slavery: Order And The Development Of Early Nineteenth-Century New Orleans And Salvador, Gregory K. Weimer

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

My dissertation explores the development of policing and slavery in two early nineteenth-century Atlantic cities. This project engages regionally distinct histories through an examination of legislative and police records in New Orleans, Louisiana, and Salvador, Bahia. Through these sources, my dissertation holds that the development of the theories and practices that guided “public order” emerged in similar ways in these Atlantic slaveholding cities. Enslaved people and their actions played an integral role in the evolution of “good order” and its policing. Legislators created laws and institutions to police enslaved people and promote order. In these instances, local government policed slavery …

Security Assistance In Africa: The Case For More, Kristen A. Harkness

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

No abstract provided.

‘Our Sentiments Of Sympathy For The Late Unwarranted, Cruel, And Barbarous Massacre’: The American Jewish Response To The Damascus Affair, Matt B. Darroch

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

By looking at four American Jewish meetings that were convened in the United States, this thesis seeks to understand why they would care about a handful of Jews in a faraway land (Damascus). In so doing, it militates against Jacob R. Marcus’ argument (which dominates the historiography) that holds that American Jews felt a special connection to Damascene Jews by virtue of their shared religion. Instead, this thesis argues the American Jewish attempt to rescue the Damascene Jews was informed by prevailing intellectual currents in Western society. A product of the culture of sensibility and Romanticism, American Jews had a …

American Identity Crisis, 1789-1815: Foreign Affairs And The Formation Of American National Identity, George E. Best

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

When the Constitution was drafted in 1789, Americans did not have a sense of national identity. The process toward achieving a national identity was long and fraught with conflict. Some of the most influential events on the United States were foreign affairs. American reactions to these events reveal the gradual coalescence of national identity. The French Revolution was incredibly divisive and Americans defined their political views in relation to it. The wars spawned by it caused Great Britain and France to seize American ships believed to be carrying contraband. The American public took an active role in making its opinions …

The Next Time The World Is Going Downhill: America And The 1983 Ethiopian Famine, Bethany Sharpe

disClosure: A Journal of Social Theory

In 1983, a massive famine struck Ethiopia. Bred by a complex array of factors, thousands of men, women, and children experienced the painful effects of this humanitarian disaster as bodies weakened and widespread death took place. Throughout the famine, an unlikely partnership took place between the Communist leader Chairman Mengistu Haile Mariam and the staunchly anti-Communist White House.[1] The partnership allowed each nation to pursue strategic foreign policy goals; the United States sought to undermine the socialist PMGSE through humanitarian aid while Mengistu attempted to salvage his government’s international reputation. Soon, global attention swirled around the issue and unlikely …

The Evolution Of Prometheanism: Józef Piłsudski’S Strategy And Its Impact On Twenty-First Century World Affairs, Phillip Tadeusz Turner

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

As the Bolsheviks attempted to assert their control over the territory of the Russian Empire during the chaotic years of the Russian Civil War many ethnic groups and nations formerly part of the empire declared their independence. Józef Piłsudski as the leader of the Second Polish Republic implemented a strategy called Prometheanism that sought to secure Poland’s newly won independence by helping neighboring nations, such as Ukraine, break away from Russian control. Promethean ideas survived the destruction of the Polish state in 1939 when Poles with ties to Piłsudski or Prometheanism who fled to the West after the start of …

The X Patents: Patents Issued Under The Patent Acts Of 1790 & 1793, Robert Berry

Librarian Publications

The earliest United States patents— sometimes called “name and date patents” because they were not numbered—are distinctive in many respects. Patent specifications were not required to include claims until the Patent Act of 1870. Moreover, while the 1790 Act required a substantive examination by a Patent Board, that requirement ended with the 1793 Act, when it was deemed too burdensome. Thereafter the evaluation of the sufficiency of patent specifications was left to the courts.

The Lover's Cup, Kimberlee Relyea Guin

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This documentary film, The Lover's Cup is the story of a former Naval Officer from World War II, Dr. Phillip Trapp, who took Marines into the battle of Iwo Jima and lived to see the flag being raised on Mt. Suribachi. This 55-minute film explores his life experiences before, during and following World War II. His first-hand experiences are used to illustrate the Social and psychological impact of the Great Depression and World War II and his journey to overcome his adversity and create positive changes in the world through his subsequent education and service at the University of Arkansas …

Agency And Afro-Pessimism: Richard Wright And Ayi Kwei Armah, Emmanuel Oppong-Yeboah

Honors Scholar Theses

Various scholars in Ethnic Studies have made the claim that people of color in the United States have constituted a colony within. That is to say, by virtue of the effects of institutional racism racialized bodies in the United States have experienced a form of colonialism unique to the American context. Examining the connections between forms of subjectivity in the United States and in Africa, this paper attempts to extend the concepts “social life” and “social death” to the literature of continental Africa. Through a close reading of Ayi Kwei Armah’s “The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born,” and Richard …

Irish Women's Immigration To The United States After The Potato Famine, 1860-1900, Mackenzie S. Flanagan

Senior Theses

Thousands of single Irish women emigrated to the United States after the Great Potato Famine. These women left Ireland because social conditions in Ireland limited their opportunities for fulfilling lives. Changes in marriage and inheritance patterns lowered the status of unmarried women and made marriage increasingly unlikely. As a result, many women emigrated to the United States and, once here, worked, used their wages to help others emigrate, and most eventually married. Irish culture facilitated this mass migration by promoting the autonomy of single women yet limiting their options. Emigration did not signify a break with their Irish culture and …

The Guarantee Of Freedom And Dignity? Colombian Land Reform, The Alliance For Progress, And The United States, Thomas A. Costello

Honors Scholar Theses

Although the United States had involved itself in programs of land reform in Korea, Japan, and Western Europe in the mid-20^th century, prior to the establishment of the Alliance for Progress, there was little discussion of encouraging such programs in Latin America. The purpose of this thesis is to examine the attitudes towards land reform in Colombia prior to the signing of Colombian Law 135. By examining documents from the Kennedy administration, this thesis proves the United States exerted its influence on Latin American nations in the early 1960’s to promote the enacting of national agrarian reform projects. Furthermore, …

Webster ('Web-Stər) N. One Who Weaves Or Unites, Taylor P. Wilcox

History Capstone Research Papers

This paper examines Noah Webster's impact on the United States during the early 19th century through his linguistic work. His standardization of American English spelling and pronunciation, as well as his addition of Americanisms to The American Dictionary of the English Language, created a national culture that united the states at a time when their differences threatened to tear them apart.

Chinese, Russian, And U.S. Space Warfare And Defense Developments, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Creative Materials

Provides information on the historical development and evolution of Chinese, Russian, and U.S. military space programs from 1985-2015. Places particular emphasis on the multiple U.S. Government agencies involved in military space programs.

Defying The United States: General Douglas Macarthur, Luke G. Mueller

Honors Projects, History

General Douglas MacArthur continually disobeyed his superiors officers throughout his entire career, yet he never received any punishment. He eventually became one of the most decorated U.S. soldiers and rose to the rank of General by the time his career was over. However, as his career progressed, his defiance increased. It was not until President Harry S. Truman relieved him of command during the Korean War that MacArthur received any kind of reprimand. Because of this, MacArthur threatened not only U.S. security and democracy, but also world peace.

Book Review: Thomas C. Field, Jr. From Development To Dictatorship: Bolivia And The Alliance For Progress In The Kennedy Era., Dustin Walcher, Thomas Tunstall Allcock, Philip E. Muehlenbeck, Amy C. Offner, James F. Siekmeier, Thomas C. Field Jr.

Publications

This document offers reviews and discussion of Thomas C. Field, Jr.’s book From Development to Dictatorship: Bolivia and the Alliance for Progress in the Kennedy Era. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2014. ISBN: 978-0-8014-5260-4 (hardcover, $45.00).

Vivien Thomas: Master Craftsman, Gifted Teacher, And Unsung Hero., Alisha Joyner, B.S., Charles J. Yeo, Md, Pinckney J. Maxwell, Iv, Md

Department of Surgery Gibbon Society Historical Profiles

The field of pediatric cardiovascular surgery gained international recognition in 1944 with the first successful correction of a tetralogy of Fallot congenital anomaly in a 15-month-old patient. Dr. Helen Taussig (1898 to 1986), a pediatrician at Johns Hopkins Hospital, recognized the need for the procedure. Dr. Alfred Blalock (1899 to 1964), Chief of Surgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital, is credited with performing the surgery. However, there is an unsung hero who for many years did not receive a single mention in the medical literature. Vivien Thomas (1910 to 1985) was Dr. Blalock’s research assistant who is said to have stood …

Francis Daniels Moore: One Of The Brightest Minds In The Surgical Field., Sara L. Low, Bs, Charles J. Yeo, Md, Scott W. Cowan, Md, Ashesh P. Shah, Md

Department of Surgery Gibbon Society Historical Profiles

Francis Daniels Moore was a pioneer ahead of his time who made numerous landmark contributions to the field of surgery, including the understanding of metabolic physiology during surgery, liver and kidney transplant, and the famous Study on Surgical Services of the United States (SOSSUS) report of 1975 that served for decades as a guideline for development of surgical residencies. He was the epitome of what a physician should be, a compassionate and dedicated surgeon, innovative scientist, and a medical professional dedicated to quality medical education across all specialties.