Digital Commons Network^™

The League Of Nations High Commission For Refugees From Germany After 1935, Sergio Vlahovich

Masters Theses

The League of Nations’ effectiveness as a bureaucratic body has been hotly contested. Almost since its founding, critics of the League viewed its humanitarian and peacekeeping missions as failures. This thesis reevaluates these criticisms by studying the League’s work on behalf of refugees from Germany from the end of 1935 up through the Second World War. The thesis focuses on the activities of the League after James G. McDonald, High Commissioner for Refugees Coming from Germany, resigned in December of 1935 and during the time the Intergovernmental Committee for Refugees (ICR) began its work on the issue of refugees fleeing …

Scientific Development Vs. Political Strategy: Nasa’S Commitment To Science Following The First Moon Landing, Sean Van Buskirk

Masters Theses

This work looks at the scientific program of NASA during the Space Race. (1961- 1975) During this period of the Cold War, NASA shifted it role from a political asset of the United States strategy to an agency of scientific discovery. This was not a smooth transition due to political opinions on the wastefulness and role of NASA. Many politicians, citizens and even scientists had doubts about the scientific potential of NASA’s manned missions to the Moon. Despite the power politics, the administrators at NASA were able to break out of the political arena and create a balanced program where …

Korean War Coverage In High School History Textbooks, Zarek Nolen

Masters Theses

This content analysis investigated coverage of the Korean War in recent high school U.S. history textbooks. Open coding techniques applied to six textbooks yielded data for the following categories: background of the war, the outbreak of the war, the sequence of the war, the conclusion of the war, the devastation of war, the effects of the war, U.N. and U.S. politics, the Chinese intervention, General Douglas MacArthur, and African Americans in the military. Data from these categories were compared and scrutinized against historians’ knowledge using axial coding techniques. This study's findings support past research on Korean War coverage in high …

Debt, Death, And Deregulation: Neoliberalism, Human Rights, And American-Argentine Relations, 1976-1983, Billy Davis

Masters Theses

Between 1976 and 1983, Argentina was governed by a military government that oversaw both a brutal campaign against communism and a process of neoliberalization. During this period, the United States provided substantial economic support to Argentina through its approval of loans that enabled Argentina’s economic transformation. Early on, the United States was largely apathetic and complacent in regard to Argentina’s Dirty War. During the administration of Jimmy Carter, the United States attempted to confront the Argentine military government about its human rights abuses. However, a substantial contingent within the Carter administration pushed back against this initiative and worked to protect …

“That New Africa Is Ready To Fight Its Own Battles": Kwame Nkrumah, The United States, And The Quest For A Modern Ghana, 1957-1966, Godwin Gyimah

Masters Theses

This project examines the United States-Ghana relationship and how the relationship transformed Ghana, 1957-1966. African leaders such as Dr. Kwame Nkrumah had declared: "That new Africa is ready to fight its own battles and show that after all, the black man is capable of managing his affairs." Despite the non-alignment philosophy, Ghana was not neutral regarding the West and East blocs rivalry. The thesis argues that it was through the United States' government and private firms' contributions that Ghana was able to achieve the mark of a modern nation through industrialization, universal education, and the expansion of international trade economy. …

What We Expected From National Socialism: Hermann Rauschning And Danzig's Lnterwar Radical Right (1918-1942), Nima Lane

Masters Theses

This project uses Dr. Hermann Rauschning as a case study to analyze the transformation of the German intellectual right, stretching from his early career in the Weimar Era to the post-1945 era. Rather than offer a purely narrative biography, this study uses the figure of Rauschning to examine the fate of the German right from the Kaisserreich to the aftermath of World War II. Rauschning, born in 1887, was both a political and intellectual figure. However, these aspects of Hermann Rauschning are not necessarily separate. Although some historians see Hermann Rauschning as unique, I argue that he is in fact …

The Meaning Of A Woman's Work: Refugees, Statelessness, Nationality, And The Women's International League For Peace And Freedom, 1918-1931, Monica Burney

Masters Theses

This work analyzes how the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) sought to influence how the League of Nations approached questions of nationality and statelessness between 1918 and 1931. Especially important were the WILPF's efforts to aid women and children who remained in Turkey following the Armenian genocide, as well as the organization's efforts to address the statelessness crisis that arose following the dissolution of Austria-Hungary. Their activism helped to pressure the League of Nations into creating the Commission of Enquiry on Deported Women and Children in Turkey and Asia Minor. Their efforts to end statelessness culminated in …

Blurring The Spectrum: Exploring Queer Conservatism, Austin P. Mejdrich

Masters Theses

Running parallel to the groundbreaking and historic advancement of LGBTQ rights over the past decade has been the rise in the prominence and public discourse of queer conservative thinking. From the Log Cabin Republicans to far-right nationalistic politics, queer conservatives underscore both diverging ideologies within the modern American conservative tradition and the increase of far-right politics in Western societies. This study argues that queer conservatism, while traditionally less explored in the broader context of sexuality politics, is consequential to an understanding of the LGBTQ community and queer politics. Thus, an exploration of queer conservatism as a political ideology is explored, …

Things Miraculous And Strange: A Poetic Interpretation Of The Death And Afterlife Of Agnes Sampson, Ann Mary Hart

Masters Theses

In this collection of poems, I tell the story of Agnes Sampson's 1591 trial for witchcraft, her torture and death, and her response to these events from the afterlife. Using persona perspectives and utilizing a variety of poetic forms, I reveal the voices, thoughts, and feelings of Agnes and others involved in the trials in hopes to give a full and well-rounded account of the events in a compelling and creative way. Included in the collection are erasures on some of James VI' s poems with the goal of turning them into responses to his actions from Agnes. Using this …

"A Babe In The Woods?": Billy Graham, Anticommunism, And Vietnam, Daniel Alexander Hays

Masters Theses

This thesis focuses on famous evangelist Billy Graham's role in the Vietnam War, both as a public supporter and private advisor. It argues that, contrary to his self-depiction, he was no "babe in the woods," no mere neophyte or bystander. Rather, America's most famous preacher was an active participant in promoting and even planning the war. Graham's evangelical theology, with his premillennialist beliefs, led to his intensely anticommunist worldview, where communism was the Antichrist. His public support buttressed the presidents prior to and during the Vietnam War and, sometimes, Graham even delved into policy recommendations for the war.

Graham's role …

Incarcerated, Transported And Bound: Constructing Community Among Transported Convicts From Britain To The Chesapeake, 1739-1776, Michael I. Bradley

Masters Theses

"Incarcerated, Transported, and Bound: Constructing Community among Convicts Transported from London to the Chesapeake, 1739-1776" explores the movement, migration, the malleability of identities, and development of communal ties among transported convicts. This thesis utilizes information on more than 3000 convicts brought to the colonial Chesapeake region. Precise details are currently available for more than two hundred transported convicts. In many cases the convicts can be followed from their birthplace to London to their trial and imprisonment, continuing to their transportation to the Americas, their new lives in the Chesapeake, and, in some cases, their flight and return to Great Britain. …

A Long Strange Trip Through The Evolution Of Fan Production, Fan-Branding, And Historical Representation In The Grateful Dead Online Archive, Anna Richardson

Masters Theses

This study explores how a digital music archive tells the story and contributes to the public memory of cult bands. Utilizing the Grateful Dead Archive Online (GDAO) as the primary data source, the researcher obtained a population of 26,835 items and categorized them by the production method of fan or band, item type, era, and logo. Content analysis illustrated themes within the archive in relation to the fannish production and activity within the fandom of the Grateful Dead. The span of this specific fandom spreads across five decades and sheds light onto the ways in which the fandom surrounding cult …

The Power Of The Periphery: Aid, Mutuality And Cold War U.S-Ghana Relations, 1957-1966, Moses Allor Awinsong

Masters Theses

This project interrogates how economic self interest motivated periphery states such as Ghana to use foreign policy as a vehicle to attract improved development assistance from superpowers, in this case the United States. While the United States viewed its aid program in Ghana in stringently Cold War terms, Kwame Nkrumah and his advisors were less inclined to get deeply concerned about Cold War ideology. This project shows that Ghanaian agency was manifested in the Cold War through the new state's construction of a foreign policy image that made it a prominent African voice globally. It then examines how that image …

"Favorite Of Heaven": The Impact Of Skin Color On Atlantic Ethnic Africans In The Eighteenth Century, Kimberly V. Jones

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

'We Live In The Midst Of Death': Medical Theory, Public Health, And The 1793 Yellow Fever Epidemic, Alyssa A. Peterson

Masters Theses

Much has been written on the history of disease in early America, especially surrounding the 1793 yellow fever epidemic that ravaged Philadelphia. The stories of the men and women who lived through and were affected by it, including the physicians who treated the victims, have been thoroughly covered by historians. What has yet to be discussed is the medical context in which this epidemic existed. Medical education, scientific thought, and particularly past experiences came together during this outbreak to influence both the medical establishment and governments’ decisions regarding their appropriate response. Doctors’ medical education predisposed them to beliefs and preferred …

Butchered Bones, Carved Stones: Hunting And Social Change In Late Saxon England, Shawn Hale

Masters Theses

Textual, archaeological, and art historical evidence all point to a significant reorganization of Anglo-Saxon society in the tenth and eleventh centuries. Changes in landownership, the development of proto-urban centers, the growth of merchant and artisan classes, as well as the proliferation of occupations associated with royal and regional administration, collectively altered the Anglo-Saxon social order. This radical reorganization benefitted some groups of individuals and threatened others with decreased social standing. Established elites and the nouvuae riche utilized exclusionary measures to counter any degree of social mobility provided by economic and political changes.

Shifting hunting practices and perceptions are particularly emblematic …

"Fine Dignity, Picturesque Beauty, And Serious Purpose": The Reorientation Of Suffrage Media In The Twentieth Century, Emily Scarbrough

Masters Theses

Throughout the first half century of the woman's suffrage movement, the women of the movement were depicted as dastardly, masculine women who usurped the family structure with their penchant for politics. In the twentieth century, a new generation of woman's suffragists took command of their appearance in the media. Instead of controversial figures, woman's suffragists were envisioned as normal, beautiful women and mothers. Through the use of mass media, woman suffragists restructured their campaign to convince the general public that society needed women to clean up politics. In doing so, suffragists sacrificed their goals of sexual equality in favor of …

Anglo-American Relations Between The 1953 Coup And The 1956 Suez Crisis, Aaron F. Psujek

Masters Theses

The Cold War and global politics brought upheaval to the Middle East in the 1950s. The conflict between the United States and Soviet Union shaped the history of the region at the same time it brought war to Korea. Britain's relationship with the U.S., especially in the Middle Eastern theater, was shaped by the Cold War. British intelligence, political, and press members and agents used the tensions to bring the United States in to help them in the various crises that swept the Middle East in the 1950s. This strategy served to bring the two countries closer together in the …

Separating The Whites From The Chaff: Whiteness, Blackness, Racial Exclusion In The Midwest Agrarian Mind, Philip Mohr

Masters Theses

This thesis approaches the construction of race through the vantage of one agrarian magazine, the Prairie Farmer. It analyzes the rhetoric of the people who wrote for this magazine to distinguish changing attitudes toward whiteness and blackness in the rural and agricultural Midwest from the end of the Civil War to the Great Migration. While whiteness was equated with what the Prairie Farmer saw as the active, progressive farmer, blackness was associated with stupidity, laziness, and threat to property. From this, the thesis argues we can build a base of knowledge from which to analyze the roots of racism …

A Neighbors' War: Provost Marshals, Desertion, The Draft And Political Violence On The Central Illinois Home Front, 1861-1865, Jason A. Miller

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

Westfield College: Fighting For The Soul, Ryan M. D'Arcy

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

War And The Sentimental Past: Memory And Emotion In The Aftermath Of The Franco-Prussian War, Chad R. Cussen

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

"The Lower Class Of Traitors Have Also Their Architects Of Plots": The London Irish, The United Irish, And The Creation Of Irish Identities, 1780-1800, Erin K. Crawley

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

Lola's Story: Writing Comfort Women In World War Ii History Of The Philippines, Krishna Ignalaga Thomas

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

Capturing Opportunity: How The Conquest Of James I Shaped The Society And Culture Of Mallorca, 1229-1247, Patrick W. Harris

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

Six Degrees Of Guillelmus Mancip: A Study Of Connections Between Donors To The Military Orders In 12th Century Toulouse, Eric D. Orr

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

Soil Sisters: Independent Land Owning Women In Coles And Douglas Counties, Illinois, 1870-1930, Rachel E. Kleinschmidt

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

"I See By This Woman's Features, That She Is Capable Of Any Wickedness": Murderous Women, Public Justice, And The Social Order In London, 1674-1799, Annie Tock

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

Evangelical Religion And Benevolent Reform In The Antebellum Urban Southwest: Natchez And Vicksburg, Mississippi, 1800-1860, Matthew S. Berry

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

The Rhetorical Negotiation Of Thomas Jefferson In Secondary U.S. History Textbooks, Josh Robison

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.