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Investigating Communication Of Findings In Environmental Impact Assessment And Developing A Research Agenda For Improvement, Alan Bond, Francois Retief, Angus Morrison-Saunders, Jenny Pope, Reece C. Alberts, Claudine Roos, Dirk Cilliers Mar 2024

Investigating Communication Of Findings In Environmental Impact Assessment And Developing A Research Agenda For Improvement, Alan Bond, Francois Retief, Angus Morrison-Saunders, Jenny Pope, Reece C. Alberts, Claudine Roos, Dirk Cilliers

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) aims to embed consideration of the significance of predicted environmental consequences (the findings) of proposed developments into approval decision making. Achieving this aim relies on adequate communication of the findings of the EIA to the stakeholders, especially the decision makers responsible for the approval decision. However, the naïve assumption that this communication of findings can be effectively achieved through the publication of a written report pervades legislation worldwide, despite decades of evidence to the contrary. As a first step towards improving such communication, this research identifies the contingent conditions associated with effectively transferring EIA findings from …


The Problem Of Extravagant Inferences, Cass Sunstein Jan 2024

The Problem Of Extravagant Inferences, Cass Sunstein

Georgia Law Review

Judges and lawyers sometimes act as if a constitutional or statutory term must, as a matter of semantics, be understood to have a particular meaning, when it could easily be understood to have another meaning, or several other meanings. When judges and lawyers act as if a legal term has a unique semantic meaning, even though it does not, they should be seen to be drawing extravagant inferences. Some constitutional provisions are treated this way; consider the idea that the vesting of executive power in a President of the United States necessarily includes the power to remove, at will, a …


The Human Bind, Natalie C. Tracey Jan 2024

The Human Bind, Natalie C. Tracey

Scholars Symposium

My goal in creating this piece, titled The Human Bind, was to visualize my own perspective of human connection. Everyone that we experience touches us in some way. We are all comprised of pieces of one another. We will always have these small ties, some more conscious than others. People are so vastly different in nature and our perceptions of life can result in conflicting ideas, despite these links. My subject matter was non-existent, as I wanted to make this piece without prior preparation. I put some recognizable details, such as faces and fruits, but also many non-representational aspects. I …


Making-To-Be: Documents, Facta, And Material-Discursive Agency, Elliott Hauser Jan 2024

Making-To-Be: Documents, Facta, And Material-Discursive Agency, Elliott Hauser

Proceedings from the Document Academy

This paper presents the performative analysis of agency within and surrounding documents as a path towards uniting the otherwise incompatible insights of both meaningcentric and materialcentric approaches. I contrast the terms agentical, providing agency, and agentic, possessing agency, to help clarify the apparent incompatibilities of prior approaches. I argue that a relational conception of agency, wherein the agentical/agentic distinction is blurred, preserves important virtues of both meaning and materialcentric approaches to documents. This paves the way for a unified materialdiscursive account of documents and a cure for document studies’ inherited duality malady. Extending prior work on capta (Drucker, 2011) and …


Hugh Nibley On "The Meaning Of The Atonement" Now Available Dec 2023

Hugh Nibley On "The Meaning Of The Atonement" Now Available

Insights: The Newsletter of the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship

In a recent address, Hugh Nibley discussed the significance of the atonement. "The atonement," according to Brother Nibley, "is nothing less than the answer to the Terrible Question : 'Is this all there is?"'


The Haircut, Bee Bishop Dec 2023

The Haircut, Bee Bishop

The Prairie Light Review

No abstract provided.


Meanings Of Community: Educational Developers Experience Care, Satisfying Contributions, And Belonging In A Collaboration Across Institutions, Thomas M. Colclough, William J. Howitz, Daniel Mann, Katherine Kearns, Darren S. Hoffmann Oct 2023

Meanings Of Community: Educational Developers Experience Care, Satisfying Contributions, And Belonging In A Collaboration Across Institutions, Thomas M. Colclough, William J. Howitz, Daniel Mann, Katherine Kearns, Darren S. Hoffmann

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

We share insights from a mixed methods study to describe the experience of educational developers participating in a community of practice (CoP). This CoP consisted of 19 leaders at eight institutions, serving collectively as facilitators of a hybrid, across-institutional, seven-week workshop series on course design for graduate students and postdoctoral scholars. From results of a survey examining the functional and sustaining features of the community, we illustrate that members experience the community aspect of our CoP primarily as a sense of satisfaction/personal fulfillment and, to an extent, in the effectiveness/productiveness of collaborations between members. Members of our CoP experience several …


Appointment And Its Impact On Expression And Structure Oct 2023

Appointment And Its Impact On Expression And Structure

Journal of the Faculty of Arts (JFA)

Research Title: Designation and its Impact on Expression and Structure.Research Objectives: Reveal the concept of appointment and indicate its relationship to syntax and morphological formula.Research methodology: The research method is descriptive and analytical.The most important results: Appointment has ways and faces and is not limited to its standardization between denial and knowledge, and the research has answered two questions, the first is what is the concept of appointment? Second: Does the designation have an impact on the expression and structure?This research is a look at the meaning of the appointment tried to show its concept among grammarians, which is part …


Communicating Indirect Feelings: American Stories Of Indirect Experiences, Susan Hess Lawson May 2023

Communicating Indirect Feelings: American Stories Of Indirect Experiences, Susan Hess Lawson

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The words people use to describe indirect human experiences and how narratives play a role are examined within qualitative research. The problem is that some people have difficulty communicating indirect experiences, and few studies have examined the issue. The purpose of this qualitative narrative research study was to examine how people who encountered indirect communication in their lived experiences can communicate the indirect experiences and messages they received. The theory guiding this study is the indirect communication theory as it relates to Communicating Indirect Feelings (CIF). The definition of CIF is how people attempt to communicate indirect feelings for shared …


Growing In Grief: A Meaning-Making Expressive Arts Therapy Method Developed For Bereaved Youth, Jessica Wilson May 2023

Growing In Grief: A Meaning-Making Expressive Arts Therapy Method Developed For Bereaved Youth, Jessica Wilson

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

Approximately 5.3 million youth in the United States have experienced the death of a sibling or parent. They face challenges such as an increased risk of depression, anxiety, substance use, and other detrimental effects on adjustment. A small subset of this population experiences significant emotional and behavioral difficulties, characterized by an inability to function in major life roles, a preoccupation with the loss, and separation distress. Modern grief literature describes meaning-making as an adaptive coping process contributing to a sense of renewed hope and self-efficacy and a reduction in distressing grief symptomology. Expressive arts therapy is an effective way to …


Speak Now To Forever Hold Your Piece: On Aesthetic Ownership And Interpretation, Spencer Heitman May 2023

Speak Now To Forever Hold Your Piece: On Aesthetic Ownership And Interpretation, Spencer Heitman

Honors Theses

The primary objectives of this research are to describe ways in the interpretation of art-objects is shaped by their ownership and to endorse fan culture participation as a mechanism through which people might be led to aesthetic value. This analysis shall be grounded in an understanding of trust and shall point the reader toward care, noting that these phenomena positively correlate and help interpreters to receive meaning of more abundance and depth. It will be initially claimed that art interpretation is itself contribution to aesthetic dialogue with artists. This claim is grounded in an understanding of art’s communicative capacities and …


The Invisible Box, Rafael Yaluff May 2023

The Invisible Box, Rafael Yaluff

Theses and Dissertations

A work of art is something so simple that it puts you in front of it. And through its simplicity it makes you aware of yourself in front of it, it gives you yourself. This paper explores the creative process from a structural perspective


Shade, Jonathan Bolton May 2023

Shade, Jonathan Bolton

All Theses

SHADE is an exhibition of graphite pencil drawings that place viewers on the precarious edge of meaning. Techniques of representational drawing such as form and perspective vaguely allude to latent, traceable narratives, then destabilize the viewer’s search with confounding two-dimensional spaces, and loosely defined forms. Small, mundane scenes such as campsites, diners, and bars, are enveloped or obscured by dense, graphite expanses of skin-like surfaces. These elements destabilize viewers’ convenient categorizations of darkness, fog, or space. The identifiable scenes have reduced contexts: facial expressions, interior décor, and landscape features. These are obscured or withheld to reduce visual justifications for the …


God Will Wipe Away Every Tear - A Phenomenological Study Of Two Faith-Based, Grief Support Groups, Cynthia Velerianee White Apr 2023

God Will Wipe Away Every Tear - A Phenomenological Study Of Two Faith-Based, Grief Support Groups, Cynthia Velerianee White

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this phenomenological, qualitative study was to describe the impact of GriefShare, a faith-based, grief support initiative for the participants at Diamondhead, Mississippi and Gulfport, Mississippi. The theory guiding this study was Robert Neimeyer’s social constructionist theory as it explains the meaning found in GriefShare’s narrative processes. The study participants were nine females and one male who attended at least three GriefShare sessions. The researcher interviewed and audio-recorded all participants using Otter ai. live transcription. The researcher used the constant comparison method and member checking to analyze the data collected during the interviews. As participants described their lived …


How We Thrive: Black Clergywomen Experiencing Intersectionality And Influenced By The Strong Black Woman Schema, Karen Elizabeth Harden Apr 2023

How We Thrive: Black Clergywomen Experiencing Intersectionality And Influenced By The Strong Black Woman Schema, Karen Elizabeth Harden

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to understand the lived experiences of Black women in church leadership (e.g., pastors, clergywomen) who experienced intersectionality and were influenced by the Strong Black Woman (SBW) motif, specifically in the Black Church in the southern United States. Intersectionality and the SBW schema were the guiding theoretical frameworks in this study. With adherence to these guiding theories, the participants were asked to describe their experiences with intersectionality while influenced by SBW and to examine well-being as it pertained to their lives and ministerial calling. Despite the emergence of more women in ministry, the barriers …


Secondary Teaching Thriving: Investigating Secondary Teacher Well-Being And Contributing Factors To Thriving, Ryan H. Nichols Apr 2023

Secondary Teaching Thriving: Investigating Secondary Teacher Well-Being And Contributing Factors To Thriving, Ryan H. Nichols

PhD in Education

The purpose of this study was to examine secondary teacher thriving using the PERMA well-being model. This non-experimental, quantitative survey aimed to discover secondary teachers’ well-being and how the dimensions of well-being are predictive of thriving among secondary teachers in the United States. Using a comprehensive researcher-created instrument assessing participants’ sense of thriving and PERMA well-being, the study resulted in statistically significant findings with 55 secondary teachers participating in the survey. Both sense of thriving and the dimensions of thriving were statistically significant in a one sample ttest. Demographics, such as school classifications, years of experience, and geographic locations, were …


Subjective Well-Being Of Teachers In K-12 Christian Schools, Julianne Rettig Apr 2023

Subjective Well-Being Of Teachers In K-12 Christian Schools, Julianne Rettig

Doctor of Education (Ed.D)

This non-experimental, quantitative study aimed to examine the factors that influence the self-perceived well-being of teachers in K-12 Christian schools. The sample for this study was convenient, non-probable, and purposive and comprised of 81 teachers from one Christian school system in Florida. The measurement tool used in this study is based on Seligman’s (2011) work on well-being. The Workplace PERMAH Profiler is a valid and reliable (α = .94) instrument that measures flourishing in terms of six domains: positive emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning, accomplishment, and health. The internal reliability of study participant responses to survey items associated with the construct …


Saudi Parents As Advocates For Their Young Children With Disabilities: Reflections On The Journey, Sadeem A. Alolayan Mar 2023

Saudi Parents As Advocates For Their Young Children With Disabilities: Reflections On The Journey, Sadeem A. Alolayan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Although special education advocates have played an essential role in obtaining rights for individuals with disabilities, there is still much unknown about their motivations, challenges, roles, and the meaning they made from their experiences. Research into Saudi parent advocates of children with disabilities and their complex daily life issues have seldom been investigated, with rare studies that focus solely on Saudi early intervention services needs and supports. This qualitative study aimed to explore the experiences of Saudi parents of children with developmental disabilities who are special education advocates in their communities. One of the goals of this study was to …


Generations Of Reason: A Family’S Search For Meaning In Post-Newtonian England (Book Review), Calvin Jongsma Mar 2023

Generations Of Reason: A Family’S Search For Meaning In Post-Newtonian England (Book Review), Calvin Jongsma

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

Reviewed Title: Generations of Reason: A Family's Search for Meaning in Post-Newtonian England by Joan L. Richards. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2021. 456 pp. ISBN: 9780300255492.


During The Pandemic: A Perspective From A First-Year Teacher, Caleb T. Johnson Feb 2023

During The Pandemic: A Perspective From A First-Year Teacher, Caleb T. Johnson

Journal of Graduate Education Research

This feature article aims to blend oral impressions with concrete "best" practices in secondary education. Through the most basic methods used throughout history--listening, interpreting, and translating stories shared among groups of people--this singular perspective questions whether the conversations among teachers positively impact the narrative of educating students as COVID-19 continues to have effects that are more difficult to perceive. Without bringing the two parties into conversation, the article offers its readers the observation and reflection of one who is invested in students' learning in the context of the classroom as much as the context of a world still dealing with …


Explanatory Ultimacy, Epistemic Access, And Evil: A Community Theodicy, Jonathan Michael Huls Jan 2023

Explanatory Ultimacy, Epistemic Access, And Evil: A Community Theodicy, Jonathan Michael Huls

Masters Theses

This is a work about meaning and value. How do human persons find meaning? Why do human persons have value—or do we? A stubborn problem of meaning is evidenced by the perennially treated theistic problem of evil. How is an all-powerful, all-knowing, and morally perfect God compatible with a world filled with violence and hate? If God is powerfully perfect, why is His world not perfect too? This project endeavors to notice that an answer to this problem depends on properly grounding human access to meaning—especially the meaning of the words God, and evil. It is argued herein that there …


Spirituality, Religiosity, And Happiness : Identifying The Nexus, Lok Sang Ho Jan 2023

Spirituality, Religiosity, And Happiness : Identifying The Nexus, Lok Sang Ho

SERC Working Paper Series

Using data from 52 countries in wave 5 of the World Value Survey conducted during 2004 and 2008, we test two alternative approaches in spirituality measures. The first is based on the more traditional understanding that spirituality is associated with meanings, God, prayers/meditation, and formal religions. The second is based on the common spiritual teachings of all the major religions that is summarized by the LIFE (Love, Insight or Wisdom, Fortitude, and Engagement) framework proposed by Ho (2014). It was found that this alternative approach, which focuses on the spiritual teachings rather than theology, offers better explanatory power for Total …


Caring For The Sufferers Among Us : Job Through The Lens Of Classical Rhetoric And Modern Psychological Trauma Studies, Abbie F. Mantor Jan 2023

Caring For The Sufferers Among Us : Job Through The Lens Of Classical Rhetoric And Modern Psychological Trauma Studies, Abbie F. Mantor

ATS Dissertations

No abstract provided.


“Wilfrid Sellars And Pragmatism”, Willem A. Devries Jan 2023

“Wilfrid Sellars And Pragmatism”, Willem A. Devries

Faculty Publications

A brief survey of Wilfrid Sellars' relation to Pragmatism, focusing on the priority of the practical in the constitution of meaning, the critique of the given, and sociality of thought and inquiry.


Transitioning From Military To Civilian Life: An Examination Of Acculturation In Veterans Previously Deployed To Warzones, Katherine Anne Lucas Jan 2023

Transitioning From Military To Civilian Life: An Examination Of Acculturation In Veterans Previously Deployed To Warzones, Katherine Anne Lucas

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The transition of veterans from military to civilian life may be conceptualized as a cultural transition (i.e., acculturation). This is based on the idea that the military contains its own culture quite distinct from that of the U.S. civilian population. For veterans, this transition presents psychological and social challenges and potential difficulties consistent with those seen in immigrants transitioning to a new country from their respective countries of origin. These psychosocial difficulties are especially pronounced in combat veterans, who experience higher rates of psychopathology compared to veterans who have not experienced combat. The current study examines the impact of warzone …


The Pursuit Of A Meaningful Life Through Taoism And The Golden Ratio, Robert Q. Williams Ii Jan 2023

The Pursuit Of A Meaningful Life Through Taoism And The Golden Ratio, Robert Q. Williams Ii

CMC Senior Theses

What constitutes a meaningful life is perhaps the most crucial question we can ask ourselves throughout our lifetime; for what we know, the desire to become knowledgeable of a definitive answer is a journey traveled by humans as early as the 6th century BCE. Nonetheless, history illustrates various paths that brave individuals took to provide guidelines for today’s society to reflect on and choose whether or not they wish to follow them. To portray some of these philosophies in greater detail, we begin by exploring the term “meaning” from a metaphysical perspective and then the categories such philosophies might fall …


Ibn Qutaybah Al-Dinuri's Critical Measures And Statements Of Judgement, Arabe Hejaze Farouq Arabe Hejaze, Ismael Al-Gayam Dec 2022

Ibn Qutaybah Al-Dinuri's Critical Measures And Statements Of Judgement, Arabe Hejaze Farouq Arabe Hejaze, Ismael Al-Gayam

Association of Arab Universities Journal for Arts مجلة اتحاد الجامعات العربية للآداب

This research presents Ibn Qutaybah al-Dinuri's efforts in establishing literary standards and critical terms and the issues of ancient and modern in literature, as well as lexical items and meaning, and the indication of the critical judgement terms for the critic's stance on poetry from objective points of view such as linguistic and phonological aspects, and following the way of the ancients as to the division of the poem, the effect of the quantity and quality on the poets ranking, and general taste. The research shows that Ibn Qutaybah was creative and influenced the critics who came after him. The …


Architectural Representations Of Human Rights, El-Bastawissi Y. Ibtihal, Youssef Maged Nov 2022

Architectural Representations Of Human Rights, El-Bastawissi Y. Ibtihal, Youssef Maged

BAU Journal - Creative Sustainable Development

The United Nations defines the Human Rights as the rights of all human beings, regardless of race, gender, language, religion, nationality, or any other status. These rights include all claims to live freely, to educate and work in equality, and to inhabit humanistic urban and architectural spaces. Throughout the history of architecture, civilisations have generated different perspectives towards respecting the human rights. Temples of Ancient Egyptian Architecture crushed the human scale to introduce religious experiences to their visitors. Tibetan temples over mountains enforced people to make anti-humanistic journeys to reach them. After thousands of years, the mega-scale palaces and cathedrals …


Exploring The Meaningful Qualities Of Transactions In Virtual Environments For Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Gamers, Karen Mccarthy, Shasta Rice, Amanda Flores, John Miklos, Alex Nold Aug 2022

Exploring The Meaningful Qualities Of Transactions In Virtual Environments For Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Gamers, Karen Mccarthy, Shasta Rice, Amanda Flores, John Miklos, Alex Nold

Occupational Therapy | Faculty Scholarship

To date, most research on massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) has focused on the effects playing MMORPGs have on players’ health and wellness. The virtual environment of MMORPGs has yet to be explored as a space where meaningful occupations occur. This qualitative descriptive study examined the virtual environment using a transactional perspective to describe the qualities of gaming to which MMORPG players ascribe meaning. Participants included six MMORPG players with experience playing World of Warcraft, Runescape, or Guild Wars 2. Data were gathered using interviews, participant observation, and a focus group, and analyzed using thematic analysis. Three themes were …


The Three Faces Of Donald Davidson’S Pragmatic Literary Theory, Qiao Zhang Aug 2022

The Three Faces Of Donald Davidson’S Pragmatic Literary Theory, Qiao Zhang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Donald Davidson is mainly interpreted as a pragmatist by the neo-pragmatists. However, Davidson’s pragmatism is more complex regarding its application in literary theory, which presents him through three faces: the neo-pragmatist Davidson, the intentionalist Davidson, and the radical interpreter Davidson. Davidson’s theory of irregular language becomes the basis of the neo-pragmatists’ philosophy of language as a defense of the original status of unfamiliar languages, such as literary language, in linguistic communication. However, there is a conflict between Davidson’s intentionalism and the pluralist hermeneutic of neo-pragmatists. The former accuses the latter of violating Davidson’s long-held anti-conventionalism principle and pleads for a …