Digital Commons Network^™

Black Culture: A Societal Problem, Quamesha Brown

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

American society, regardless of what history has been told, has never been a society that is truly free of social prejudices especially for its black community. The many depictions of black people in America has caused a number of psychological and physical difficulties for black communities. In this paper, the main topic is the ways in which black culture is portrayed in American society and how that representation has affected the black community and the black experience. Although there are common experiences shared between people in the black community, the black experience is highly individualized; there is no singular definition …

Pressing: Where The Objective Meets The Subjective, Mariana Parisca

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

Through this essay I describe the theoretical and anthropological ideas that led to the creation of the Cushing Series. An interest in the obsession with photography in popular culture leads to an understanding of the permeation of structured reasoning beyond scientific research and into everyday life. Taking evidence from photography, and philosophy of science I establish the limitations of structured reasoning, both as a way of perceiving the world and as an understanding of identity, and define surface and frame as its physical representation. Using Sartre’s existential theory and phenomenological anthropology I then describe the infinite subjective existence of …

Syncing Umbanda And Science (Sus): Using Umbanda’S Holistic Healing Methods To Increase Access To Healthcare, Alex E. Rosenthal

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

In 1988, after the 1985 termination of the military dictatorship in Brazil, the constitution was rewritten to guarantee individual rights to all citizens of Brazil. Among the various other rights that the new constitution protected, anyone in Brazil was granted the right to government-funded healthcare under the regulation of the Unified Healthcare System, SUS. Because of structural inequalities in Brazil as well as the rise of privatized healthcare, equal access to healthcare is not a reality in modern-day Brazil. Many citizens who live in the periphery are limited to understaffed and underfunded primary health centers.

This monograph explores the healing …

The Final Frontier: Navigating From Material To Virtual, Alexandra Neuman

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

Humankind’s continual creation of and progression into virtual space is a hugely significant event on our evolutionary timeline, one that signifies a sort of imminent and already in-process departure. While the more popular notion of our species’ eventual exodus is linked to outer space and planetary exploration, our existing conceptualization of cyberspace connotes an identical unknowable vastness and sense of discovery, with its depiction relying on nearly identical imagery. The projection of a virtually based human future is thereby left with an already carved out spot in the collective imagination. The lone floating astronaut locked into a suit unable to …

Implicit Prejudice And Its Implications For How Communities Should Respond To Racial Injustices, Harry Kainen

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

In the spring of 2013, a racially controversial incident occurred on the Washington University Campus. The incident raised questions about the racial tolerance of the university community as well as exactly who should be held responsible for the injustice. Most importantly, the community’s response to the incident exemplified how a community with the potential for substantial collective action can fail to mobilize and improve when they are called upon to do so. This paper examines recent psychological research that studies the existence of subconscious racial prejudices in order to examine its implications in community responses to racial injustices. Results show …

Parenting Preschoolers With Disruptive Behavior Disorders: Does Child Gender Matter?, Antonya M. Gonzalez

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

Parental responses to child behavior can have an important impact on later behavioral outcomes. Children with Disruptive Behavior Disorders often engage in externalizing and disruptive behaviors, which usually elicit negative responses from parents. Boys are more frequently diagnosed with these disorders, resulting in a dearth of literature on parental responses to girls with Disruptive Behavior Disorders. Studies have found that parents react more negatively when girls engage in disruptive behavior, plausibly because it is contrary to societal gender expectations. The current study investigates this dynamic within the population of preschoolers with Disruptive Behavior Disorders. I predicted that parents would show …

Humanitarianism And The Anthropology Of Hunger, Kate Klein

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

While the early view of hunger as the product of a world population too large to sustain has largely been eliminated, and the mainstream international community has come to accept that food insecurity results from issues of distribution rather than an insufficient global food supply, the emphasis on biotechnology in agriculture, humanitarianism in international aid, and social justice in international human rights law in the contemporary era has contributed to other barriers that prevent hunger alleviation.

In this thesis, I argue that these previous contemporary developments have had the capacity to hide hunger. My analysis of technology and humanitarian aid …

Evolutions In Class Visibility, Morality, And Representation In Chilean Teleseries: From Military Regime To Current Moment, Sadie Smeck

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

This work begins by exploring the concepts of class and class-consciousness as they are represented in the Chilean teleserie, Pobre Rico (2012-13), examining elements of class-marked aesthetics, linguistics and spaces in Santiago as these are manifested in the television program. The work will question how these representations relate to national, urban realities, and problematize the manner in which they at times reflect, exaggerate and/or misrepresent particular attitudes, dynamics and realities of class stratification in present-day, urban Chilean society. The work then examines how representations of class in Chilean television and media have evolved in the past three decades, since the …

Risking It: An Examination Of Risk Perception Amongst Obstetricians And Certified Professional Midwives In Missouri, Allison R. Horan

Undergraduate Theses—Unrestricted

The concept of risk is pervasive in contemporary discussions of childbirth –both amongst professionals and consumers. While risk is often presented as an objective entity, in reality it is an elusive concept to define, particularly within the context of maternity care. Since the nineteenth century, obstetricians and midwives have conceptualized the risks of birth differently. This thesis examines how two groups of practitioners in Missouri, obstetricians (OBs) and certified professional midwives (CPMs), perceive risk in pregnancy and childbirth. By combining archival investigation techniques with original qualitative research, I hope to demonstrate that risk in maternity care is far from a …