Digital Commons Network^™

Binary Gendered Language: A Qualitative Study Of Psu Students, Dakota Abercrombie

University Honors Theses

This study explores experiences of gendered language in use in academia among two marginalized groups: women and those identifying beyond the gender binary. Guided by the theory of linguistic relativity this study attempts to understand specific ways in which gendered language, including generic language may show up and contrasted within these groups. While this data is not generalizable, the findings indicate that both women and nonbinary students experience binary pronoun use in written formats such as syllabi. However, nonbinary students describe more negative feelings associated with this experience. We also noted participants' gender identities intersecting with other identities, leading to …

E-Lit's #1 Hit: Is Instagram Poetry E-Literature?, Kathi Inman Berens

English Faculty Publications and Presentations

Preface

A lot has happened in the world, and in e-literature, since my essay débuted as a conference presentation then a publication in electronic book review in 2018. Global protests against the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor during the pandemic summer of 2020 sparked reckoning with how banal, mainstream, and lethal is white supremacy. Six months later, in response to specific critiques about access and equity inside the Electronic Literature Organization, its Board of Directors published a statement about Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) as a core value. As an editor of the Electronic Literature Collective Volume 4, …

Using A Digital Entertainment Tax To Strengthen Local Information Infrastructure In The United States: A Conceptual Exploration, Lee Shaker, Antoine Haywood

Communication Faculty Publications and Presentations

As traditional local media decline, how might state and local governments provide support for local information infrastructure? We offer a proposal for states (or communities) to tax digital entertainment and then leverage existing community media centers (CMCs) to facilitate the distribution of the proceeds to local media outlets. Compared to other public subsidy plans, this approach is viable nationwide without federal action and offers several advantages that could lead to more immediate and durable support for local information infrastructure. To contextualize our proposal, we model both the possible revenue generation and distribution of funding that would result from its implementation.

Talking About Weight: Weight Stigma And Information Seeking, Alexandra N. Henrici, Lillian H. Mantel

Student Research Symposium

Guided by the Risk Information Seeking and Processing (RISP) model, this study explores the relationship between fear of discussing weight-related topics, or weight-related communication apprehension and weight bias internalization and tests the inconsistent RISP relationship between risk perception and information insufficiency. It investigates differences in weight-related communication apprehension in those who previously sought weight-related information from interpersonal or mediated sources. Using a survey of 64 undergraduate communication students, the study found that high levels of weight bias internalization correlated with high levels of weight-related communication apprehension. The study did not find a significant difference in weight-related communication apprehension based on …

Manga In Bookstores, Claire L. Curry

Student Research Symposium

In recent years, manga has seen a surge in popularity. This research seeks to provide insights into the role of manga in U.S. bookstores and its implications for reader discovery. Through observations at bookstores in the Portland area, including Books with Pictures, Kinokuniya, Powell’s, and Barnes and Noble, it was examined how manga is presented to readers. Factors considered include manga’s physical placement in the store and surrounding sections as well as shelving methods and categorizations like genre labels, particularly for manhwa, manhua, and light novels. Display tables, end caps, and shelf talkers also demonstrate an unique way for bookstores …

Evaluating Equitable Success In Literary Spaces: A Portland Book Festival Case Study, Tia-Theo I. Thompson

Student Research Symposium

In 2015, data expressing the lack of diversity in literary institutions was made publicly available, yet equitable change remains slow. How do literary institutions achieve and evaluate successes in equity? Do certain factors expedite this transition?

In a three year Diversity and Inclusion plan (2019-2022), the Portland nonprofit, Literary Arts, drastically altered their internal and external practices to accommodate/introduce BIPoC writers, presenters, and employees. The equitability of this plan is assessed at the Portland Book Festival (PBF), 2023. Data concerning the identities, placement, and publications of Writers and Presenters at PBF is analyzed within the context of the goals set …

Bridging Barriers To Digital Accessibility: An Opportunity For Technical Editors, Julian Luck

Book Publishing Final Research Paper

Digital content is overwhelmingly inaccessible across the web, and web accessibility is a particularly wicked problem. Technical editors with accessibility specializations serve as a part of the solution, however, the market for these professionals is emerging and poorly understood. The purpose of this research is to explore this emerging market and determine the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats for these editors. Considering the limited body of knowledge surrounding this market, I utilize a variety of diverse web resources including peerreviewed journal publications, blogs, forums, and trusted web accessibility resources and organizations. The findings, contextualized by my identity as a disabled …

Language Representation Diversity In Independently Translated Literature, Cecilia Too

Book Publishing Final Research Paper

The purpose of this survey is to determine the diversity of language representation in translated literature. Specifically, this study will examine three independent presses and one imprint that publishes literary works, both fiction and nonfiction. This paper surveys the languages represented in the translated works published by these presses over the course of five years, from 2018 to 2022. A case study of one independent press, Other Press, is conducted to further study the genre and country representation in translated literature. This study finds that European languages, particularly Western European languages, are overrepresented in translated literature by more than a …

Evaluating Equitable Successes In Literary Spaces A Portland Book Festival (Pbf) Case Study, Tia-Theo Thompson

Book Publishing Final Research Paper

How do literary institutions achieve and evaluate successes in equity? Do certain factors expedite this transition? To understand the impact of Literary Art’s Discovery Model on diversity in literary spaces, data concerning all BIPOC Writers & Presenters at the Portland Book Festival 2023 was collected and analyzed by book placement, genre, and age category (among additional subcategories). Acknowledgement of publishing industry trends and activism within literary communities appear to be significant factors while curating authors with equity in mind.

Manga In Bookstores, Claire Curry

Book Publishing Final Research Paper

In recent years, manga has seen a surge in popularity. This research seeks to provide insights into the role of manga in U.S. bookstores and its implications for reader discovery. Through observations at bookstores in the Portland area, including Books with Pictures, Kinokuniya, Powell’s, and Barnes and Noble, it was examined how manga is presented to readers. Factors considered include manga’s physical placement in the store and surrounding sections as well as shelving methods and categorizations like genre labels, particularly for manhwa, manhua, and light novels. Display tables, end caps, and shelf talkers also demonstrate a unique way for bookstores …

Prose By Any Other Name: Analyzing Changes To Translated Book Titles In Japanese And English, Angela Griffin

Book Publishing Final Research Paper

This research analyzed the ways in which book titles are changed in translation from English to Japanese and Japanese to English. The titles of one hundred books, fifty in Japanese and fifty in English, were sorted into three main categories of translation based on Tsukawaki’s research on translated sci-fi movie titles (2009): those using the Japanese katakana script, literal, and semantic. For Japanese to English titles, literal translations accounted for 68% of the data and semantic translations for 20%, while Japanese to English titles were literally translated only 48% of the time but semantically 34%. The changes made to translated …

Digital Comics Subscription Service Usage And Its Impact On Printed Comic Buying Habits: The Digital Comics Subscription Loop, Isaac Swindle

Book Publishing Final Research Paper

This study developed a digital comics subscription loop that borrows from consumer loyalty research done in publishing and marketing studies. The proposed loop uses comic publisher’s proprietary subscription platforms as a “book showroom” to allow consumers to sample titles, driving physical sales. Original survey data was then gathered about comic book consumers’ usage of digital subscription platforms and what drives them to make physical purchases. The data was then compared to the proposed model, finding significant cross-medium consumption, as well as many reported completions of the Digital Comics Subscription Loop. The survey data found that over 80 percent of respondents …

Exploring Consent: An Analysis Of Consent In Dark Romance And Contemporary Romance Books, Janeth Hernandez

Book Publishing Final Research Paper

This research paper analyzes whether consent is found more frequently in dark romance or contemporary romance books by examining the language used, who speaks the phrases, and the contexts in which they are spoken. This paper explores the dominant sexual script in contemporary romance books and its influence on representations of consent, contrasting this with the absence of such a script in dark romance, which permits more varied incorporations of consent. This analysis was done through content analysis-- word frequency, consent analysis, and thematic coding. Word frequency provided evidence of consent use in the books, while consent analysis and thematic …

Understanding Quadrature Modulation By Designing A 7mhz Iq Test Bench To Encode The Polybius Square, William Lee Bradley

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis outlines the design of an IQ Test Bench that allows for experimentation of quadrature modulation techniques. Quadrature modulation utilizes two signals I and Q, 90° out of phase from each other, to greatly increase communication data rates. Using Desmos, a thorough mathematical analysis of waveform mixing is presented, and constellation diagrams are plotted from the results. From this an ancient fire signaling technique known as the Polybius Square is encoded into the system. The IQ Test Bench is built from fundamental components that would be contained within an RFFE: a local oscillator and two frequency mixers. The LO …

The Pacific Sentinel, February 2024, Portland State University. Student Publications Board

The Pacific Sentinel

Editor: Eva Sheehan

Articles in this issue include:

• Earth Mama
• Spotlighting Black Artists Through a Mix of Mediums
• The Dresden Dolls in Portland: A Punk Cabaret
• Let Knowledge Serve the City
• Artificial Intelligence
• Surviving Seasonal Struggles
• What We're Enjoying
• Events Calendar & Extras

The Pacific Sentinel, November 2023, Portland State University. Student Publications Board

The Pacific Sentinel

Editor: Eva Sheehan

Articles in this issue include:

• Letter from the Editor
• Death Cab for Cutie Co-Headline with the Postal Service for a Twenty Year Anniversary Release
• When the Writers Come Out at Night
• Fall of the House of Usher
• A Professor's Literary Life
• Donuts & Crypto
• Seeing Static in Jane Removers' Census Designated
• What We're Enjoying
• Events Calendar & Extras

Automating Intended Target Identification For Paraphasias In Discourse Using A Large Language Model, Alexandra C. Salem, Robert Gale, Mikala S. Fleegle, Gerasimos Fergadiotis, Steven Bedrick

Speech and Hearing Sciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Purpose:

To date, there are no automated tools for the identification and fine-grained classification of paraphasias within discourse, the production of which is the hallmark characteristic of most people with aphasia (PWA). In this work, we fine-tune a large language model (LLM) to automatically predict paraphasia targets in Cinderella story retellings.

Method:

Data consisted of 332 Cinderella story retellings containing 2,489 paraphasias from PWA, for which research assistants identified their intended targets. We supplemented these training data with 256 sessions from control participants, to which we added 2,415 synthetic paraphasias. We conducted four experiments using different training data configurations to …

A Multimodal Discourse Analysis Of Nasa's Instagram Account, Danica Lynn Tomber

Dissertations and Theses

In an increasingly interconnected society where science and technology are advancing at a rapid pace, knowledge dissemination, specifically in terms of public engagement and popularization, must be both encouraged and critically evaluated. As an internationally recognized government agency that is dedicated to the advancement of space exploration and present on several social media platforms, the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) provides a useful lens from which to analyze large-scale messaging of multimodal scientific information. Although there is a substantial amount of linguistic research into political and government-based messaging in social media, there is not much literature on the …

Collaborative Action In Informal Social Networks Of Wildfire Managers In Northwestern Wyoming, Hannah Lynn Spencer

Dissertations and Theses

Wildfire is a cross-boundary, collective action issue. Previous research has demonstrated the importance of collaborative relationships in wildfire for purposes such as increasing capacity, trading information, and facilitating landscape-scale mitigation projects. However, a stakeholder's location in social networks, as well as personal factors, may impact their collaboration. Furthermore, stakeholders must prioritize their own organizational goals and responsibilities, which may differ from those of their collaborators. I used interview and survey methods to investigate these questions in the context of wildfire management professionals in northwestern Wyoming. For the interviews, I selected 12 individuals with high betweenness centrality who were involved in …

People And Power: Person-First Language Usage And The Criminal Justice System, Casey E. Orr

Amplify: A Journal of Writing-as-Activism

Language is power. Word choice and terminology, especially those referring to people, are expressions of societal norms and institutional power. Dehumanizing crime-first terms and labels are abundant and common in criminal justice contexts despite being protested by system-involved individuals and activists. Instead, many advocate for person-first terms wherein identifying language emphasizes an individual’s humanity. With a peace-focused anthropological framework, this paper presents the case for person-first language in criminal justice contexts. It is evident that adopting first-person language usage regarding the criminal justice system is necessary after analyzing and considering the multiple sources, such as the voices of those who …

An Industry-Standard Profit And Loss Statement For Book Publishing Professionals In The United States, Jackie Krantz

Book Publishing Final Research Paper

Title profit and loss statements (P&Ls) in book publishing are valuable predictive tools for newly acquired titles. They inform the press on how money will be moving through the press in relation to the book’s production, revealing the book’s estimated value and level of profit. However, there is no industry-standard template. This lack of a template makes it difficult for new industry professionals to learn about P&Ls; prevents knowledge of one press’s P&L from being transferrable throughout the industry; and causes smaller presses to potentially neglect this useful tool due to the steep learning curve. The solution is to create …

It's A Mean, Mean World: Social Media And Mean World Syndrome, Samantha Kemp

University Honors Theses

Born from cultivation theory, which suggests that media has a profound effect on viewers' perceptions of the world around them, Mean World Syndrome is a psychosocial phenomenon that describes increased levels of fear, anxiety, and pessimism, as well as an overall perception of the world as "meaner" than it actually is, as a result of heavy viewership of violence-related mass media. Mean World Syndrome has primarily been associated with television consumption, but a major societal shift towards consumption of social media instead of television over the last two decades necessitates investigation into how social media affects its users. Through an …

The Association Of Patient-Provider Language Concordance With Healthcare Comprehension Among Latino/As In Oregon, Grace Parra

University Honors Theses

Background: The purpose of this study is to describe the need and preferences among Mexican-origin Latinos in Oregon for language-concordant healthcare providers. We hypothesize that the presence of a language concordant provider is associated with greater health care comprehension.

Methods: This is a cross sectional study in collaboration with the General Consulate of Mexico. We developed a 20-item survey that includes questions about socio-demographics, a validated language-based acculturation scale, and questions regarding language concordant care experience and preferences used in previous studies. We are recruiting at the Mexican Consulate 500 Latino/as ages 18 or older who had a healthcare visit …

Social Media And Society: An Investigation Of How Female Athletes Use Instagram, Kathleen Amore

University Honors Theses

Athletes increasingly leverage social media so they can share experiences first-hand, sell products, and promote their personal ideas and skills. Female athletes can become empowered through Instagram's ability to give a 'voice' to the object through captions, as well as its' ability to generate revenue through endorsements. Female athletes who find the most success on Instagram often post content that highlights their sexuality and personal life over their sport. Their success is found through a form of 'self-objectification', which can be seen as empowering and/or regressive to women’s sports. To explore this tension, my research project focused on the intentions …

Contextualizing The Role Of Answerers' Gaze Orientation In Turn Taking, Cassidy Moore

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis extends our understanding of the role of gaze orientation in turn taking, answering the following research question: When an answerer withdraws their gaze from a questioner at the completion point of the first turn-constructional unit of their answer, is this a practice for communicating that their answer-turn-so-far is not transition relevant (i.e., that the answerer is not complete with their turn and will continue speaking)? Data are videotapes of 274 information-seeking sequences drawn from 28 dyadic, mundane, English conversations between close friends. The methods are mixed, including conversation analysis and coding for statistical purposes. Data were transcribed for …

The Pacific Sentinel, June 2023, Portland State University. Student Publications Board

The Pacific Sentinel

Editor: Dan Chilton

Articles in this issue include:

• Letter From the Editor
• Android Flowers of the Future
• Gary Numan Tours North America
• Emily King, the Queen of Hearts
• Who Protects Us?
• The Landing to Close Its Doors
• The First (& Forgotten) 'R'
• Celebrate the Legacy, Ignore the History
• Donuts & Dao's
• About Town
• What We're Enjoying

Hegemonization Of Whiteness In The Latinx Community, Ava N. Jakubowski

University Honors Theses

This literature review aims to explore the discourse on how whiteness engages with the LatinX community. The majority of the literature asserts that whiteness is hegemonized in the LatinX community. Addressed are the claims made for how these two groups intersect, drawing on a variety of prevalent research and experts in the field. This review is situated within the social science field, with an emphasis on communications, psychology, and sociology. The current power dynamics between these two groups is explored through a variety of lenses including the assimilation and racial boundary paradigms. Also addressed are areas in the research that …

The Identification Of Representation Gaps In Diverse Us Children's Picture Books, Alena Rivas

Book Publishing Final Research Paper

This paper addresses this research question: which intersectional identities remain underrepresented in diverse US children’s picture books? The analysis is based on two datasets, one from Diverse BookFinder (collected December 2022–April 2023) and another from a survey of librarians (collected January 2023–April 2023). Each book in the Diverse BookFinder collection features a non-white character in the following racial/cultural categories: Asian/Pacific Islander, Biracial/Multiracial/Mixed Race, Black/African American, Brown Skinned/Unspecified Race, Latinx/Hispanic, Middle Eastern/Arab, Multi-Racial Cast of Characters, Native American/Indigenous, and White/Caucasian. These identities were cross tabulated with the following identities to measure intersectionality: Gender (Nonbinary, Transgender, Gender Non-Conforming, Intersex, and Unspecified); LGBTQIAP2S+; …

Audible Inhalation As A Practice For Mitigating Systemic Turn-Taking Troubles: A Conjecture, Jeffrey D. Robinson

Communication Faculty Publications and Presentations

Extending Jefferson’s analysis of the limited utility of turn-constructional-unit (TCU)-initial particles in managing overlapping talk, this article limits itself to a similar turn-taking context/position in which current speakers bring TCUs to places of possible completion when it is relevant for next speakers to take a turn of talk. This article examines situations in which current speakers continue to audibly inhale in the transition space, arguing that inhalations (a) are pre-beginning actions; (b) bestow a weaker right to speak next than does talk; (c) are not accountable for obscuring next speakers’ talk (if it eventuates); (d) allow for beginning TCUs while …

Pandemic Collaborative Governance Facilitation: A First Look At Covid-19'S Impact On Collaborative Governance, Amelia Webb

University Honors Theses

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a profound effect on Collaborative Governance Facilitation, prompting a need to examine continuing impacts and repercussions. This study investigates the effects of COVID-19 on Collaborative Governance Facilitation by exploring the perspectives of facilitators who worked through this period. Using a qualitative approach, and incorporating elements of Grounded Theory and Phenomenology, a focus group was conducted with facilitators operating in the greater Pacific Northwest that identified several emerging themes and patterns in the facilitators' pandemic experiences. The analysis revealed significant insights in several key areas: the assessment phase, pace and productivity, equity and demographic differences, building …