Digital Commons Network^™

The Experience Of Place, Rosemary Kehoe Peacher

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate the human experience of place. A phenomenological approach was utilized employing an unstructured open-ended dialogical interview method. Twenty participants, including ten younger and older adults, were asked to describe places which were special to them.

Interpretation of the interview transcripts revealed five themes descriptive of one's experience of place: Identity, Connection, Security, Possibilities, and Beauty/Awe. The experience of time was interwoven with all five themes.

The theme of Identity comprises the way in which a place can strengthen one's sense of self, provide continuity across the developmental life span, and trigger poignant …

The Relationship Among Parenting Styles, Home Environments, And Children's Curiosity, Amy Baldwin Crockett

Doctoral Dissertations

In this research, the relationships of parenting styles, attitudes, and child-rearing environments with children's curiosity, the relationships of parenting styles and attitudes with child-rearing environments, and the indirect relationships of parenting styles and attitudes with children's curiosity through child-rearing environments were explored. Seventy-four parent-child dyads were recruited from area day care centers. Oldest children between 3 and 6 years old were studied. Parents were administered a demographic information questionnaire, the Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment Inventory--Revised (HOME), and the Child-Rearing Practices Report (CRPR). Children were administered the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test--Revised (PPVT-R), the Complexity Task, the Preference for …

Assessing The Role Of The Domestic Dog As A Native American Food Resource In The Middle Missouri Subarea Ad 1000 - 1840, Lynn M. Snyder

Doctoral Dissertations

The journals of early European explorers and fur traders, as well as ethnographic records, document the integral part domestic dogs played in the village life and economy of the Plains Villagers in the Middle Missouri Subarea. Early travelers on the plains also remarked on the consumption of dog meat in association with certain rituals and ceremonies, and noted the use of dogs as an emergency food resource.

This study focuses on nearly 7000 large canid skeletal elements from six Plains Village sites in the Middle Missouri Subarea dating from approximately A.D. 1000 to 1840. Two indicators of the continued importance …

The Dialectics Of Power And Dissent: A Study Of The U.S. Army's Chemical Stockpile Disposal Program, Carol Griffith Davies

Doctoral Dissertations

This research is a study of power in contemporary American society which calls into question the assumptions of openness and permeability so cherished by the pluralists. Within a power framework, we explore the functional realities of government that illuminate why some powerful interests manage to prevail with some consistency, while the broad public is assigned to a lesser task. The context for the study is the U.S. Army's $ 11 billion dollar Chemical Stockpile Disposal Program (CSDP). The Army's decision to use on-site incineration for the destruction of the stockpile ignited a social movement in opposition. Employing participant observation and …

The Evolving Economic Impact Of Tourism On The Greater Smoky Mountain Region Of East Tennessee And Western North Carolina, L. Alex Tooman

Doctoral Dissertations

Tourism is evaluated in the Greater Smoky Mountain Region from the early 19th century to the present. During the modern era of the automobile - after the creation of the national park in the 1930s - the tourist industry has demonstrated itself to be a fairly complex agent of change, not only exhibiting various stages of development but also with a diversity of types and scale of operations.

By employing a composite approach this dissertation attempts a broad evaluation of the impact of tourism. The destination life-cycle approach developed by geographers, in which tourists destinations are viewed as evolving through …

Hunter-Gatherers, Mobility, And Technological Organization: The Early Archaic Of East Tennessee, Philip James Carr

Doctoral Dissertations

Behavioral variability exists in past hunter-gatherer lifeways but there is no simple means to study this variability and gain an understanding of past hunter-gatherer lifeways and culture change. Previously, archaeologists have depended, in large part, on ethnographic accounts to make inferences concerning past hunter-gatherer behavior. However, the revisionist debate and evaluations of the role of hunter-gatherer ethnography for archaeological interpretation point to the problems caused by an overemphasis on ethnographic data.

One solution is that archaeologists begin to examine prehistoric hunter-gatherer settlement-mobility patterns. Mobility is a behavior that is related to both social and economic strategies so it provides an …