Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Democracy For Resistance: Employing Participatory Democracy As A Tool For Social Resistance, Sally-Ann Akuetteh

UNF Undergraduate Honors Theses

In this paper, I argue that intentional and active participation in public life made possible by a participatory democracy is perhaps the most potent tool for resistance. This is because increased participation, even in a flawed system such as democracy, can undo previous conventions of the ‘normal’ and re-establish less oppressive institutions and an even better and more inclusive democracy. Through an emphasis on the participation of ‘othered’ groups, democracy-- which at a point served as the source of oppression for these groups by ensuring their exclusion from it-- can become a potent tool for change. The participatory democracy approach, …

Humanitarian Intervention: Moral Perspectives, Tyrome Clark

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis addresses primary concepts in the humanitarian intervention debates. I argue that humanitarian intervention is a perfect duty. The global community has a moral obligation to act decisively in the face of extreme human rights abuses. There are two contrasting theoretical perspectives regarding international relations and humanitarian intervention: statism and cosmopolitanism. These contrasting perspectives contest the relative value of state sovereignty and human rights. Some of the most prominent ethicists in the debate have determined states have a “right” to intervene militarily in the internal affairs of other states to halt severe human rights abuses but there is no …

The Ultimate Irony: An Information Age Without Librarians, Dawn S. Ady

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this thesis, the continuing relevance of the profession of librarianship in the digital age is explored and assessed. After defining the library as information itself, the thesis establishes that electronic formats replacing printed matter is not an indication of libraries becoming extinct. Further, various aspects of the profession of librarianship—including library ethics, information extraction skills, and information literacy instruction—are discussed. Additionally, the potential for librarians to play an important role in a largely “jobless” society (as forecast by some experts and scholars as well as in a recent Oxford University study) is evaluated. Finally, a proposal is made for …

Ability And Abnormality, Jessica West

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis addresses questions relating to perceptions of abilities and abnormalities found in everyday life. Abilities in this paper range from a total lack of ability to function in extreme disability to a level of ability expected by society to enhanced and radically enhanced abilities and their place in the realm of abnormality. We begin by establishing the differences between abilities and enhancements. Following this is a discussion regarding the ethical concerns of human enhancement. After this we turn to a discussion of abnormality and the social experience of abnormality. These discussions lead into establishing a basis for how many …

Quasi-Subjectivity And Ethics In Non-Modernity, Justin T. Simpson

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The inspiration behind this philosophical endeavor is an ethical one: interested in what it means to flourish as a human being – how to live well and authentically. Similar to medicine and how the ability to prescribe the appropriate treatment depends on first making a diagnosis, the focus of this work will to be understand the human condition and the ways in which subjectivity, one’s sense of self, is constituted. Given the general dissatisfaction with the modern metaphysical picture of the world, which analyzes the world in terms of the mutually exclusive and completely separate categories of nature/objects and society/subjects, …

Multi-Cultural Model Of Relational Personhood And Implementing Philosophy For Children (P4c): A Refusal Of The Illusion Of Individualism In America, Aron J. Burnett

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this thesis is to influence a re-evaluation of self conceptions in America in order to influence an alternative relational understanding of one’s self and others. This thesis begins based on the premise that individualism is a prominent aspect of American societies meaning its member’s understandings of their selves are self-centered, often non-empathetic, and in general more concerned with their own lives than that of others. The first half of this thesis is dedicated analyzing the American situation through an analysis of the sources of individualism and proving that individualism is actually an illusion that individuals falsely believe …

Humorous Developments: Ridicule, Recognition, And The Development Of Agency, Kevin Andrew Afflerbach

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this thesis I examine various theories of humor to establish an account of the functional roles of humor in social interaction and agentive development. These roles are integrated into a view of agency developed by G.H. Mead, and further refined by the recognition theory of Axel Honneth. The core thesis is: Humor is under-examined as an aspect of human interaction, because it plays such an integral role in individual agency and social development. Understanding how humor works helps to explain how agents are formed through the internalization of the expectations of others via processes of recognition, either positively or …

Role Tension In The Academy: A Philosophical Inquiry Into Faculty Teaching And Research, Nicholas Michaud

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation seeks to understand the conjunction of faculty roles as teachers and as researchers. This understanding is pursued through philosophical analysis. Discourse ethics, in particular, is used as a framework by which to best understand the roles played by faculty and if the roles of teacher and researcher are, in fact, commensurable. The purpose of the work is two-fold: 1) to develop a construct that may be used by future researchers to better understand the roles played by faculty, and 2) to suggest a best-construct that enables future researchers to propose how actual lived roles should be instantiated in …

The Difference Principle In Rawls: Pragmatic Or Infertile?, Farzaneh Esmaeili

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis attempts to provide a coherent view of the idea of ‘justice as fairness’ and, in particular, the ‘difference principle’ expressed by John Rawls in A Theory of Justice. The main focus of the thesis is the difference principle and its limits. Rawls’s conception of ‘justice as fairness’ is based on the thought experiment of the ‘original position’ in which people, considered as free and equal, deliberate under an imagined ‘veil of ignorance,’ i.e. not knowing which social roles or status they would occupy in their society. Rawls then argues that in the original position people come up with …

E Pluribus Unum? Liberalism And The Search For Civility In America, Jeannemarie Halleck

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This paper explores issues of civility in liberal democracy, and in particular, how civility and civic engagement must be regenerated in order to forward the democratic ideals of equal rights, citizen equality and collective self-government in a meaningful way. Liberal democracy presupposes a level of civility in order to uphold standards of individual liberty and freedom, however as a theory it fails to compel citizens to support levels of mutual respect.

An etymological exploration of the term civility introduces the work of puritan theologian Roger Williams, whose early writings on individual liberty as well as the role of civility and …

Food For Thought And Thought For Food: Applying Care Ethics To The American Eater, Catherine Manners Bucolo

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This piece provides an application of care ethics to the typical American diet. In the first chapter, the problems surrounding the Standard American Diet are discussed at both the individual, familial, global, animal, and environmental levels. The second chapter provides an overview of the theoretical components of care ethics, and lays a framework for analysis. The third and final chapter demonstrates how in applying many of the core principles of care, great strides can be made in remedying the numerous problems that are a direct result of typical consumption habits in the United States.

The Plausibility Of A Slippery Slope: Guantanamo Bay As An Example Of Direct/Indirect Participation In Torture And The Corruption Of Societal Morality, Dominique T N Greene-Sanders

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Although torture is considered universally reprehensible by law, including international law and human convention, it occurs routinely as an acceptable and efficient method for interrogation and intimidation. The questions that follow are: What kind of person engages in/commits acts of torture? If legalized, how would torture affect morality when an individual can be instrumentally utilized as a mere means-to-an-end? How does torture affect the victim, the torturer, and society as a whole? In order to answer these questions, I will use events at the Guantanamo Bay Detention Center to argue in favor of the plausibility for the concept of a …

Embodied Ethics : Transformation, Care, And Activism Through Artistic Engagement, Melissa Rachel Schwartz

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In what follows, I highlight negative environmental perspectives and actions based on traditional patterns of Western dualist thought with the ultimate aim of developing an alternative way of relating to the environment and the ‘other’, in general. In pursuit of such an alternative, I utilize embodied artistic practices in order to present the notion that one can engage more holistically with one’s environment, and the other. Through habitual, lifelong ‚Ways‛ cultivating specific practices generally necessary to creating and to viewing art, I argue, one can refine one’s ethical awareness and action. Following the aims of care ethics’ more context and …