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F. Scott Fitzgerald As A "Hot Nietzschean": The Influence Of Friedrich Nietzsche's Philosophy In This Side Of Paradise, The Beautiful And Damned, And The Great Gatsby, Lindsey Carman Jan 2018

F. Scott Fitzgerald As A "Hot Nietzschean": The Influence Of Friedrich Nietzsche's Philosophy In This Side Of Paradise, The Beautiful And Damned, And The Great Gatsby, Lindsey Carman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Beginning in 1915, F. Scott Fitzgerald was exposed to the ideas of Friedrich Nietzsche under the guidance of mentors and from his personal reading lists. While reading Nietzsche, Fitzgerald's concern with the rise of cultural pessimism in 1920s America appeared in his fiction. Interestingly, both the philosopher and author explore the decline of Western culture in the twentieth century––a period of identity crises that affected America and Europe. This thesis investigates Fitzgerald's misreading of Nietzschean ideas that appears in his fiction to highlight the author's interest in explaining the cause of America's decline. In particular, this thesis appropriates a Nietzschean …


Neither Teacher Nor Scholar: Identity And Agency In A Graduate Teacher's Life, Caitlin Pierson Jan 2018

Neither Teacher Nor Scholar: Identity And Agency In A Graduate Teacher's Life, Caitlin Pierson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines how graduate student teachers (GTA's) employ agency in order to establish and perform professional identities. Understanding agency as interactional, performative, and acting in a way "unintended by power" (Butler, 1997, p. 15), this thesis examines the spatial practices and performances of a graduate student teacher through a mixed methods approach combining video recordings with autoethnography. This project begins by using Lefebvre's (1991) social imaginary to examine the potent arguments being made to and about GTA's from their shared office, using visual rhetorical analysis to examine how this space communicates ideas of identity and place that work at …


The Tragic City: Black Rebellion And The Struggle For Freedom In Miami, 1945-1990, Porsha Dossie Jan 2018

The Tragic City: Black Rebellion And The Struggle For Freedom In Miami, 1945-1990, Porsha Dossie

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the creation of South Florida's tri-ethnic racial hierarchy during the postwar period, from 1945-1990. This racial hierarchy, coupled with discriminatory housing practices and police violence, created the necessary conditions for Dade County's first deadly uprising in 1968. Following the acquittal of several officers charged in the killing of an unarmed black businessman, a second uprising in 1980 culminated in three days and three nights of violent street warfare between law enforcement and black residents in Miami's northwest Liberty City neighborhood. The presence of state sanctioned violence at the hands of police in Liberty City set the stage …


Counter Clockwise Culture Shock, Matthew Mercer Jan 2018

Counter Clockwise Culture Shock, Matthew Mercer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Counter Clockwise Culture Shock is a memoir focused the narrator's return to his hometown, a place he barely escaped: drug addiction, incarceration, bad relationships, alienation, an Oedipal mother, and suicidal threats. It is reflection on both culture and self, after I gained an outside perspective from Japan. The narrator is forced to relive nihilism and monotony, and face the troubles of his younger years. It describes the difficult journey of today's youth, in an evermore technologically dynamic world - with few role models able to plot a course through. This is a meditation on past actions that ended in survival. …


Violence, Religion And Politics: The Late Republic And Augustan Age, Matthew Tuggle Jan 2018

Violence, Religion And Politics: The Late Republic And Augustan Age, Matthew Tuggle

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Religion in the Late Republic was fused to politics. This study considers the relationship between violence, religion, and politics in the Late Republic and Augustan Age. It contends that Roman religion could encourage or discourage violence based upon the circumstances. The strain of Roman expansion on its political and religious institutions contributed to the civil discord that characterized the Late Republic, which created circumstances that were flexible enough for perspectives on each side to see the violence as justified. The ambition of a tribune, a sacrosanct office, could lead to circumvention of the traditional practices of the Senate, causing a …


Revisiting Roadside Attractions: A "Deep Dive" Into Florida's Weeki Wachee Springs, Rebecca Schwandt Jan 2018

Revisiting Roadside Attractions: A "Deep Dive" Into Florida's Weeki Wachee Springs, Rebecca Schwandt

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This digital public history project explores one of the oldest and longest running of Florida's roadside attractions, Weeki Wachee Springs, during the years considered to be the park's heyday, the 1950s through the mid-1970s. With the 75th anniversary of the park approaching in 2022 and preliminary discussions of a new or expanded mermaid museum, there is a growing need to document the experiences of aging former employees and preserve park-related ephemera from that period. For this project six oral histories of former mermaids and former employees have been recorded, transcribed, and made publicly accessible through RICHES, the University of Central …


Gee, Officer Krupke: An Actor's Casebook, Eric Eichenlaub Jan 2018

Gee, Officer Krupke: An Actor's Casebook, Eric Eichenlaub

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In 2016, I was cast as Officer Krupke in a production of West Side Story at Orlando Shakespeare Theater in Partnership with UCF. Even though Krupke can be thought of as a minor character in the play, bringing him to life required a great deal of research and imagination. In order to ground myself in the reality of the role, I researched the effects of implicit bias in modern policing, applied that research to Uta Hagen's Nine Questions, and brought that knowledge into the rehearsal hall and onto the stage. I examined how my character's interactions with Lieutenant Schrank influenced …


Boitawl: Soil, Lost And Left, Bishnupriya Chowdhuri Jan 2018

Boitawl: Soil, Lost And Left, Bishnupriya Chowdhuri

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Boitawl ("Boi"- lack, devoid of, "Tawl"- bottom/ ground/ foundation), the word in one of the Bengali dialects refers to one without a ground beneath her feet. The thesis, a hybrid collection of prose and verse including narratives and graphic vignettes, flash, fabulist and short stories, prose poems and free verse imagines the inside worlds of such un-settled existences. In the process, the pieces connect migration, memory, childhood and lost towns with fractured humans caught in between - to reveal what lies under pillars of desires, the shapes of unsaid longings and recurrent images in their dreams.


Using Hashtags To Disambiguate Aboutness In Social Media Discourse: A Case Study Of #Orlandostrong, Nicholas Dearmas Jan 2018

Using Hashtags To Disambiguate Aboutness In Social Media Discourse: A Case Study Of #Orlandostrong, Nicholas Dearmas

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

While the field of writing studies has studied digital writing as a response to multiple calls for more research on digital forms of writing, research on hashtags has yet to build bridges between different disciplines' approaches to studying the uses and effects of hashtags. This dissertation builds that bridge in its interdisciplinary approach to the study of hashtags by focusing on how hashtags can be fully appreciated at the intersection of the fields of information research, linguistics, rhetoric, ethics, writing studies, new media studies, and discourse studies. Hashtags are writing innovations that perform unique digital functions rhetorically while still hearkening …


A Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual And Transgender + Student Support Group Within A Central Florida State College: A Qualitative Study, Remy Ansiello Jan 2018

A Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual And Transgender + Student Support Group Within A Central Florida State College: A Qualitative Study, Remy Ansiello

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

For decades, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) + students attending institutions of higher education have been marginalized and have experienced hostility and outright discrimination, causing the need for student support groups for this population on college campuses. Recent laws passed at a national level have brought a greater level of equality to this minority group; however, feelings of marginalization, homophobia, heterosexism, and heteronormative culture persist. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to ask how students participating in an LGBT + support group within a Central Florida public state college perceive their experiences in college. The researcher also asked …


Constituting Rhetorical Agency In A Feminist Discursive Space, Ella Raynor Jan 2018

Constituting Rhetorical Agency In A Feminist Discursive Space, Ella Raynor

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis details an analysis of a project called Exposing the Silence in order to learn about agency and discursive space. This gallery for traumatic birth stories serves as a relevant site for better understanding how women are constituting their experiences with embodied autonomy and rhetorical dis/empowerment and how they come together to visually and discursively form a feminist space online. I completed a rhetorical analysis of the birth narratives and of an interview with Lindsay Askins, one of the creators of Exposing the Silence. My study finds that a dyadic relationship between embodied autonomy and rhetorical agency exists while …


A Digital Media Exploration Of The Federal Writers' Project's Folk Song Collecting Expeditions In Depression Era Florida, Holly Baker Jan 2018

A Digital Media Exploration Of The Federal Writers' Project's Folk Song Collecting Expeditions In Depression Era Florida, Holly Baker

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This digital thesis project examines the folk song collecting expeditions of the Federal Writers' Project (FWP) in Florida between 1935 and 1942. The FWP carried out numerous folk music collecting expeditions in Florida through the Works Progress Administration. Folklorists such as Zora Neale Hurston, Alan Lomax, and Stetson Kennedy led the expeditions and traveled throughout Florida to record blues, "jook" songs, work songs, and traditional music from African American, Cuban, Czech, Greek, Minorcan, Seminole, and Slavic communities. While romantic notions of nationalism in the 1930s often promoted homogenization, the FWP emphasized inclusiveness and highlighted cultural diversity. The FWP's approach challenged …


Searching For Home At Château De La Guette And Beyond: Social And Spatial Dimensions Of Jewish German And Austrian Children's Journey To Flee Nazi Persecution Via Children's Homes In France, Sarah Schneider Jan 2018

Searching For Home At Château De La Guette And Beyond: Social And Spatial Dimensions Of Jewish German And Austrian Children's Journey To Flee Nazi Persecution Via Children's Homes In France, Sarah Schneider

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examines the experiences of a group of Jewish German and Austrian children who were sent on the Kindertransport to France in an effort to escape Nazi persecution. Using oral history interviews from the USC Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive, written testimonies, personal papers, and archival collections from organizations such as the OEuvre de Secours aux Enfants (OSE), this study analyzes the children's experiences at the Château de la Guette children's home in France and their subsequent time at the children's home Hôtel des Anglais in La Bourboule. This thesis examines the social and spatial dimensions of the children's …


Exploring A Three-Dimensional Narrative Medium: The Theme Park As "De Sprookjessprokkelaar," The Gatherer And Teller Of Stories, Carissa Baker Jan 2018

Exploring A Three-Dimensional Narrative Medium: The Theme Park As "De Sprookjessprokkelaar," The Gatherer And Teller Of Stories, Carissa Baker

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines the pervasiveness of storytelling in theme parks and establishes the theme park as a distinct narrative medium. It traces the characteristics of theme park storytelling, how it has changed over time, and what makes the medium unique. This was accomplished using a mixed methods approach drawing data from interviews with creative professionals, archival research, fieldwork, and an analysis of more than eight hundred narrative attractions. The survey of narrative attractions revealed the most common narrative expressions to be dark rides and stage shows. Source material tends to be cultural tales (legends, fairy tales) or intellectual properties (generally …


Small Nothings, Leah Washburn Jan 2018

Small Nothings, Leah Washburn

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Small Nothings is a collection of ten short stories exploring the connection between place, friendship, and family. Set in Missouri's capital, a variety of characters grapple with different types of separation and loneliness. Couples struggle with emotional distance, children try to reconnect with their parents, and an old woman faces the loss of her independence. Through small conflicts and choices, these stories revolve around isolation, disconnection, and absence. How do missing presences affect family and friendship? How do people deal with change through everyday choices?


What Remains, Michael Leavitt Jan 2018

What Remains, Michael Leavitt

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Grief is a personal thing, as unique as it is ubiquitous, and each character in What Remains approaches their grief in a different way and handles it with differing degrees of success. The collection blends both realist and fabulist stories in its efforts to explore these themes, from the eponymous "What Remains," in which a man attempts to reconcile his feelings about the death of his abusive, absentee father, and what that means for his relationship with his own son; to "Convoy," a story of a Marine who confronts the culture of violence into which he's been indoctrinated, and which …


Seeing Living Things: Observations Of Figures From The Outside In, Forrest Deblois Jan 2018

Seeing Living Things: Observations Of Figures From The Outside In, Forrest Deblois

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This writing accompanies the outcomes of my studio practice over the last three years, focusing on two bodies of work of paintings and drawings. In it I describe and analyze multiple influences tied to the progression and change in my studio practice. I began the process of my work with images and subjects from my home state of Florida, frequently juxtaposing the wildlife and humans, now I see this pattern as a byproduct of a studio practice functioning as a introspective reflection of what I experience, the things that I understand and the things that I don't. I deconstruct elements …


Audience Engagement In Theatre For Young Audiences: Teaching Artistry To Cultivate Tomorrow's Theatre-Goers, Julie Woods-Robinson Jan 2018

Audience Engagement In Theatre For Young Audiences: Teaching Artistry To Cultivate Tomorrow's Theatre-Goers, Julie Woods-Robinson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As a teaching artist and theatre educator, I believe an important part of the theatre-going experience is when an audience engages with the play before and after the performance: learning about context, analyzing the production, and identifying themes relevant to the play. Theatre is a powerful teaching tool with regards to empathy and political and social awareness, but also, for young audiences, theatre can help students understand content in other subject areas like language arts, history, and even health. This thesis develops best practices for creating effective audience engagement with young people in theatre in the form of Field Trip …


Momentum, Moment, Epiphany: The Psychological Intersection Of Motion Picture, The Still Frame, And Three-Dimensional Form, Mark Gerstein Jan 2018

Momentum, Moment, Epiphany: The Psychological Intersection Of Motion Picture, The Still Frame, And Three-Dimensional Form, Mark Gerstein

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

My journey from Hollywood Film production to a Fine Arts practice has been shaped by theory from Philosophy of Mind, Cognitive Psychology, Film, and Art, leading me to a new visual vocabulary at the intersection of motion picture, the still image, and three-dimensional form. I create large mixed media collages by projecting video onto photographs and sculptural forms, breaking the boundaries of the conventional film frame and exceeding the dynamic range of typical visual experience. My work explores emotional connections and fissures within family, and hidden meanings of haunting memories and familiar places. I am searching for an elusive type …


House Vs. Home: Defining Place Through Identity, Ryan Gleason Jan 2018

House Vs. Home: Defining Place Through Identity, Ryan Gleason

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A house is a place of safety. A home is a place of belonging. Though different a house always desires to become a home, but it can only be so through a connection to self. It is a home that is an extension of one's identity. Through the mirror, which is the home, and through an understanding of schema theory a person's being can be understood through one's ideas, place, self, family, rituals, memories, and feelings. Each of these factors act as a layer of brick building a strong foundation or a crackling fireplace adorned with family portraits making the …


Life, Death, And Awakening: As Seen In Reflections Of Nature, Diane Parks Jan 2018

Life, Death, And Awakening: As Seen In Reflections Of Nature, Diane Parks

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

My objective, in undertaking this three year MFA degree has been to create and produce metaphorical paintings which communicate my deepest feelings about my personal experiences of life, death, and nature using various types of landscapes as subject matter. My goal has been to explore many processes of painting, using a range of color palettes to suggest and inspire emotional responses from viewers that are similar to my own. Ultimately my intention has been to share feelings of empathy between myself and a viewer through the art I've produced. This thesis body of work chronicles my three year journey.


E.A.I. Anxiety: Technopanic And Post-Human Potential, Zachary Mandell Jan 2018

E.A.I. Anxiety: Technopanic And Post-Human Potential, Zachary Mandell

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Robots have been a part of the imagination of Western culture for centuries. The possibility for automation and artificial life has inspired the curiosity of thinkers like Leonardo Da Vinci who once designed a mechanical knight. It wasn't until the 19th century that automated machinery has become realized. The confrontation between human and automation has inspired a fear, referred to as "technopanic", that has been exacerbated in tandem with the evolution of technology. This thesis seeks to discover the historical precedence for these fears. I explore three modes of knowledge (Philosophy, Economics, and Film Theory) to examine the agendas behind …


The Neighborhood & Cat Eyes: Stories, Brad Barth Jan 2018

The Neighborhood & Cat Eyes: Stories, Brad Barth

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Neighborhood & Cat Eyes: Stories is a collection of short stories dealing with themes related to isolation, otherness in the modern world, and suburban dread. These two sets of stories deal with different variations on these themes. In the "Cat Eyes" collection of stories, isolation becomes a more prominent thread. These four stories each center on a different individuals afflicted with having cat eyes in place of normal human eyes. Through the lenses of childhood, adulthood, and someone not afflicted with the cat eye condition, otherness and isolation are explored. Each individual offers a unique glimpse into the lives …


When Coquis Sing: Introducing Young Audiences To Death And Bereavement Through An Original Play, Michelle Loricco Jan 2018

When Coquis Sing: Introducing Young Audiences To Death And Bereavement Through An Original Play, Michelle Loricco

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis documents the play development process of When Coquis Sing, an original play for young people that introduces the death of a parent on stage. Through the analysis of research from leading child psychologists and practical instruction from the Dougy Center, the National Center for grieving children and their families, this research defines important terms and demystifies language surrounding death to aid caregivers in having clear and concise conversations with children about death. The purpose of this document is to counter the American cultural perception of death as a taboo topic for children. Hosting open conversations about death leads …


Nothing Buried Stays Buried, Stephanie Porven Jan 2018

Nothing Buried Stays Buried, Stephanie Porven

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Nothing Buried Stays Buried is a collection of poems that embraces raw imagery, threads of magical realism, and allusions to classical mythology in an attempt to make sense of the tangible and intangible losses experienced by its speakers. Told through the voices of confessional speakers who struggle with loneliness, identity, faith, and death, the collection aims to delve into contrasting themes that have long been perpetuated by Greek and Roman mythology: passionate love and violent death, liberation and violation, the natural alongside the celestial. Poems such as "What You Left Behind," "Loneliness Braids My Hair," and "If You Die First" …


Red Tide And Other Stories, Heather Vazquez Jan 2018

Red Tide And Other Stories, Heather Vazquez

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Red Tide and Other Stories is a fictional collection of eleven short stories in which characters react to their struggles with loss, frustration, regret, loneliness, and love. Each story presents a strong sense of place and moment, while examining how characters are influenced by these elements. While individual stories present new characters and scenarios, they are connected by elements of water and include aspects of coasts and shorelines in the setting of the real world. The commonality of water in the stories works to demonstrate a connectivity between all people and cultures because water is shared and linked between continents …


Structural Inclusion Tools For Theatre Teaching Artists, Leah Thomas Jan 2018

Structural Inclusion Tools For Theatre Teaching Artists, Leah Thomas

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The term "inclusion" has been increasing in its use with students of various abilities, specifically students with autism. Creating inclusion work is a growing need within the field of theatre, and a catalyst for this work can be seen through the creation of the Theatre Development Fund's sensory-friendly performances in 2011. These sensory-friendly performances are primarily marketed to families and students who have been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, as ASD often creates a sensory sensitivity to bright lights, sudden movements, or loud sounds. As a theatre practitioner, the guiding question of my research is exploring whether inclusion practices can …


Emergent Narrative: Stories Of Play, Playing With Stories, Eric Murnane Jan 2018

Emergent Narrative: Stories Of Play, Playing With Stories, Eric Murnane

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Emergent narrative, a phenomenon of unexpected contextual stories arising through play, has been researched in the field of game studies since 1999. However, that discussion largely lies in the realm of theoretical stories which are generated by either the system or the player. The purpose of this dissertation is to deepen our understanding of emergent narrative by examining real-world examples of the phenomenon. Four hundred player posts were gathered from forums relating to the video game Skyrim (a large, open world fantasy roleplaying game) and analyzed using a mixed-method framework which is informed by digital ethnography, fan studies, and game …


The First Florida Cavalry (Us): Union Enlistment In The Civil War's Southern Periphery, Tyler Campbell Jan 2018

The First Florida Cavalry (Us): Union Enlistment In The Civil War's Southern Periphery, Tyler Campbell

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In 1863, along the southern periphery of the American Civil War, a Union Brigadier General began recruiting Southern white men into a Union cavalry regiment known as the First Florida Cavalry (US). This study investigates the regiment and those who enlisted in it to show the fluidity of Southern loyalty during the Civil War and the conditions of the Deep South Homefront that existed on the periphery of Union occupation and continue to exist on the periphery of Civil War historiography. While scholars have recently addressed many aspects of Southern dissent in the Civil War, significantly less attention has been …


To The Memory Of Brave Men: The Imperial War Graves Commission And India's Missing Soldiers Of The First World War, Roger Sims Jan 2018

To The Memory Of Brave Men: The Imperial War Graves Commission And India's Missing Soldiers Of The First World War, Roger Sims

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the commemoration of Indian soldiers who died during the First World War by the Imperial War Graves Commission, Britain's official government body overseeing all imperial commemoration efforts. For the soldiers of the Indian Army their war experience was split between the Western Front in Europe and Mesopotamia in modern-day Iraq. They were also far more ethnically, religiously, and lingually diverse than their British and Dominion counterparts. In order to examine how geography, religion, and the imperial relationship affected Britain's commemoration of India's war dead, this study uses the Commission's own records to recreate how the IWGC created …