Arts and Humanities Commons^™

"I Wasn't Born A Boy – I Was Born A Baby": Best Practices Versus Accepted Practices In News Coverage Of The Transgender Community, Anna Hornell

Journalism

As transgender people and issues have gained prominence in American media over the past few years, more and more journalists find themselves covering a small and marginalized community that they may not have any previous experience with. Using standards set by LGBT media watchdog GLAAD, this study aimed to examine how the prevalence of problematic journalistic practices in covering the transgender community has (or has not) changed in recent years. A content analysis of 1,019 U.S. newspaper articles from 2009 and 2014 revealed some significant changes: almost all GLAAD-identified problematic practices that were studied appeared less commonly in 2014, although …

Analysis Of Ipv6 Readiness Of End-User Enterprises In The North Carolina Eastern Region, John Pickard

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

On February 3rd, 2011, the Internet Addressing and Numbers Authority (IANA) allocated the last five /8 blocks of IPv4 addresses to each of the five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs). Since that event, four of the five RIRs have depleted their IPv4 allocations and began operating under final IPv4 address depletion policies. The exhaustion of the IPv4 address pools maintained by the registries means that IPv4 is now a legacy protocol and that all future Internet growth will be over IPv6. This exhaustion also means that organizations must take action to accommodate IPv6 adoption or risk compromising business agility and continuity …

Obesity Among Young American Indian Adults In North Dakota, Abby Omahen

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Obesity among American Indian young adults is a significant health problem. There is an increase in the prevalence rate of diseases associated with obesity which tend to have high medical costs and high mortality rates. Fruit and vegetable consumption, exercise, gender and education are factors which could affect obesity among American Indians. Therefore, the primary purpose of the current study was to determine if there was an association between certain factors (fruit and vegetable consumption, exercise, gender and education level) and obesity among young American Indian adults in North Dakota. The secondary purpose was to determine if there was a …

The Queer And The Bodily: Explorations Of Power In Women's Visionary Writing In The Book Of Margery Kempe 2014, Jayne Emerson Stacconi

Master's Theses

The provocative Book of Margery Kempe is a seminal text in the history of female authorship. Claiming to be the first written autobiography, The Book serves as a literary representation of womanhood during the late fourteenth to the fifteenth centuries when Margery was writing, and also speaks to circulating medieval discourses of religion, pilgrimage, and sexuality. Participating in medieval women’s visionary writing as a genre, Margery’s visionary power is a tool by which she is able to emancipate herself from the limiting roles of wife and mother. Additionally, by working within the conventions of visionary writing, Margery is able to …

Development Of A Methodology For Evaluating Quality Characteristics Of Fused Deposition Modeling, Dominique Winston Sealy

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Additive Manufacturing rapid reproductive systems are gaining popularity within the manufacturing industry. One of the many benefits of such systems has been the exploration of building practical sacrificial patterns for investment casted metals. Methods such as, Castform and Quickcast, has been developed for selective laser sintering and Stereolithography apparatus technologies respectively. Research has demonstrated significant cost savings when Additive manufacturing rapid reproductive systems are utilized for customized or small batch production of sacrificial patterns. The purpose of this study was to develop a methodology for evaluating quality characteristics of Fused Deposition Modeling. Since Fused Deposition Modeling have been demonstrated by …

The Effect Of Social Media On Public Awareness And Extra-Judicial Effects: The Gay Marriage Cases And Litigating For New Rights, Sarahfina Aubrey Peterson

Dissertations and Theses

When the Supreme Court grants new rights, public awareness is a crucial part of enforcement. Gerald N. Rosenberg and Michael J. Klarman famously criticized minority rights organizations for attempting to gain new rights through the judiciary. The crux of their argument relied heavily on the American media's scanty coverage of Court issues and subsequent low public awareness of Court cases. Using the 2013 United States v. Windsor and Hollingsworth v. Perry rulings as a case study, I suggest that the media environment has changed so much since Rosenberg and Klarman were writing that their theories warrant reconsideration. Minority rights groups …

The Reproductive Body: Exploring Reproduction Beyond Gender, Ilyssa Ann Silfen

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Most of us have been taught over the course of our lives that biological sex, gender, and reproduction are inescapably linked and, over time, this has created the illusion that these are all naturally connected. However, these “natural” connections have been formed over time after generations of repetition. While it may seem impossible to separate biological sex, gender, and reproduction from one another, it is important to deconstruct this falsely organic system from both a gender and human rights perspective.

This thesis seeks to explore the complex relationship between society’s reproductive mandate and the reality of the various processes of …

Depressives And The Scenes Of Queer Writing, Allen Durgin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

My dissertation attempts to answer the question: What exactly does a reparative reading look like? The question refers to Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick's provocative essay on paranoid and reparative reading practices, in which Sedgwick describes how the hermeneutics of suspicion has become central to a whole range of intellectual projects across the humanities and social sciences. Criticizing this dominant critical mode for its political blindness and unintended replication of repressive social structures, Sedgwick looks for an alternative in what she calls reparative reading . Past attempts to expand on Sedgwick's brief yet suggestive remarks regarding reparative reading have foundered due to …

"Do You Live On Spruce Street Or Are You Straight?" The Boundaries Of Philadelphia's Gayborhood And The Production Of Queer Identities, Lauren Elisabeth Manley

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis is an examination of queer residential and socializing patterns in Philadelphia during the 1930s through 1950s, and discussion of the relationships between geographic space, social location, and queer identity. The production and maintenance of the neighborhood known as the Gayborhood participated in the construction of a "gay" identity that was race, class, and gender specific. This specific identity formulation was maintained and mobilized by various groups for their own sense of identity and community building. Looking at other neighborhoods that also had significant queer residential and socializing populations during this period, I interrogate concepts such as identity, community, …

The Presentation Of Trans In Everyday Life: An Autoethnographic Exploration Of Gendered Performance, Elijah C. Nealy

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The life experiences of transgender men are an understudied area in social work research. Given the negative experiences many transgender men have utilizing the medical and social service systems, greater understanding is needed about how these men negotiate their identities in an array of relational contexts. This dissertation uses autoethnography to explore how one transgender man navigates his identity as a man, father, and social work professional.

Viewed through the theoretical frame of Erving Goffman's work, and in dialogue with masculinities studies and queer theory, this study finds that trans men are continually negotiating their identities in varying relational contexts, …

Crossing The Law: Trans Activism, Aleatory Materialism, And The Analyst's Discourse, Christopher M. Bomba

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis examines contingency to elucidate transgender activism’s leadership in radical politics. I take up Louis Althusser’s theory of aleatory materialism to politicize everyday encounters. Trans activists gain a parallax view through gendered (mis)recognition that reveals the structure of ideology’s vanishing points. By contrast, I criticize a cisgendered viewpoint and demonstrate the logical errors that result in transphobic behavior through Jacques Lacan’s version of the prisoner’s dilemma. I conclude to theorize trans activism’s engagement with the state through Lacanian analytic technique. This technique does not result in traditional “treatment,” but instead fuels activism with knowledge of the structures that must …

Racism, Heterosexism, Depression, And Hiv Risk Behaviors Of Native Men Who Have Sex With Men: Findings From The Honor Project, Matthew Alan Town

Dissertations and Theses

Racial minority men who have sex with men (MSM) experience greater levels of discrimination and higher rates of HIV infection. However, little is known about the associations between racial and heterosexist discrimination and HIV risk behavior. Further, little is known about the mechanisms of the association between racial and heterosexist discrimination and HIV risk behavior. There is some evidence to suggest that depression may be a mechanism that mediates the relationship between racial and heterosexist discrimination and HIV risk behavior. Thus, one purpose of this study was to investigate the extent to which discrimination based on both race and sexual …

Framing Identity: Repudiating The Ideal In Chicana Literature, Michael A. Flores

All NMU Master's Theses

In the 1960s Rodolfo “Corky” Gonzalez penned his now canonical, epic poem “I Am Joaquin.” The poem chronicles the historic oppression of a transnational, Mexican people as well as revolutionary acts of their forefathers in resisting tyranny. Coinciding with a series of renewed, sociopolitical campaigns, collectively known as the Chicano Movement, Gonzales’ poem uses vivid imagery to present an idealized representation of Chicanos and encouraged his reader to engage in revolutionary action. Though the poem encourages strong leadership, upward mobility, and political engagement the representations of women in his text are misogynistic and limiting.

His presentation of the “black-shawled …

Unmasking Wagner's Grail: Homoeroticism, Androgyny, And Anxiety In Parsifal, Tyler Cole Mitchell

Masters Theses

Most readings of Wagner’s final music drama Parsifal seek to illumine a clandestine presentation of Wagner’s racist doctrine or make sense of a less-shrouded but still ambiguous panegyric to Christianity. However, little scholarly material addresses Wagner’s provocative account of sensuality and homoeroticism in this Bühnenweihfestspiel [Stage Consecration Festival Play]. This thesis explores desire and homosexuality within the drama and considers how and why Wagner masks these themes through the opaque mythos of religion, race, and community. Parsifal was partly informed by Wagner’s own complex neuroses: his sexual anxieties and scandals, amalgam of German philosophies, and confusion concerning Germanness. As filtered …

A New Mmpi-2 Measure Of Psychopathy: An Empirical Approach, Erin M. Greene

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of the current study was to develop a new scale on the MMPI-2 to identify individuals with global psychopathy, as measured by the PCL-R. The study consisted of four smaller studies, including 1) derivation of the scale 2) cross-validation 3) external validation, 4) factor analysis. The derivation sample consisted of male prison inmates (N = 170) and a second sample of male prison inmates (N = 126) was utilized for cross-validation. A third sample of male and female college students (N = 308) was utilized for the purpose of correlating the developed scale with existing measures of personality …

A Qualitative Study Of Stakeholders‘ Beliefs About The Elements Of Teacher Induction Programs Most Effective In Increasing Teacher Competence, Lynn Pretorius Simmers

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The ultimate purpose of any school is the success and achievement of its students‖ (Wong, 2004a, p. 41). As studies confirm ―teacher and teaching quality [as one of] the most powerful predictors of student success‖ (Wong, 2004a, p. 41) in an educational setting, research about the experiences of beginning teachers and teacher induction programs continues to emerge. Consequently, as induction programs continue to grow and change to meet the various needs of beginning teachers across our nation, efforts to determine if desired results are being achieved must be considered. Therefore, the beliefs and perceptions of various stakeholders concerning the elements …

Leadership In African American Politics: The Role Of President Obama On The Issue Of Same-Sex Marriage, Kevin Christopher Faulk

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In 2008, African Americans overwhelmingly supported Senator Obama in his bid for the Presidency. Their supported averaged at 95% of African American voters. At the same time that Senator Obama was on the ballet, Prop 8 - legislation designed to amend California's Constitution to define marriage as between a man and woman - was passed with a large majority of African American support. Why did strong Democrats vote in favor of a law that most Democrats rejected? Previous research has concluded it was the role of the Black Church in African American politics that moves the community to a more …

Using Writing Studio Pedagogy To Help Students Reclaim Their Disabilities And Sexualities In A High School Writers' Workshop, Matthew Kim

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is an exploration into what students stand to gain from being mentored in terms of reclaiming their disabilities and sexualities. Writing studio pedagogy supports the following ideas: an understanding that composition is a social process and, therefore, must take place in a social environment, an acceptance of multiple composing tools, multiple problem-solving strategies, an acceptance that students possess many and different creative thinking processes, an awareness that spatial design matters for successful teaching and learning, and, finally, an understanding of writing as play. My primary research question is how can practicing writing studio pedagogy transform the writing classroom …

Effects Of Gender Bias And Gender Inversion Stereotypes On Assessment Of Personality Traits And Diagnosis Of Personality Disorders, Beatrice Charmaine Mosier

Doctoral Dissertations

Past research has shown the results of gender and gender role biases on the diagnostic decision-making process, particularly with regard to personality disorders. This bias has implications for homosexual individuals, as they often are viewed as displaying traits of opposite sex individuals. With regard to personality assessment, current research continuously supports a more dimensional conceptualization of personality pathology. In the most recent edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, a hybrid model of personality assessment, which utilizes both categorical methods and dimensional approaches, has been added as an alternative model. The study explored the effects of …

Yes We Can: A Dyadic Investigation Of Cognitive Interdependence, Relationship Communication, And Optimal Behavioral Health Outcomes Among Hiv Serodiscordant Same-Sex Male Couples, Kristine Elizabeth Gamarel

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Research suggests that couples who adopt a "we" orientation in relation to illness demonstrate greater resiliency and an increased capacity to cope with stressors. HIV serodiscordant couples (one partner is HIV-positive, the other is HIV-negative) have been identified as a critical mode of HIV transmission. The present study integrates dyadic coping models and interdependence theory to examine whether cognitive interdependence (i.e., the extent to which couples include aspects of their partner into their self-concept) and communication strategies are associated with sexual behavior, antiretroviral therapy (ART) adherence, depressive symptoms, sexual satisfaction, and relationship satisfaction. The study also tested whether the associations …

The Relative Impact Of Identity On Lgbt Api Outness: A Quantitative Analysis, Jessica Lee

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In the United States, the intersecting relationship among race, sex, gender, and sexuality plays a significant role in one's identity development and socialization. Especially for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) Asian Pacific Islander (API) individuals, such interplay presents a continuous task of processing and presenting different identities. Employing a national sample of over 500 LGBT API individuals and utilizing multivariate regression analysis, this thesis explores how LGBT API individuals' sexual and racial identities affect their decisions in coming out to family, friends, co-workers, and other community members. Findings indicate that the level of discomfort in racial/ethnic and/or LGBT community …

"For The Voices": The Letters Of John Wieners, Michael Seth Stewart

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

American poet John Wieners is thoroughly disenfranchised from the modern poetic establishments because he is, to those institutions, practically illegible. He was a queer self-styled poete maudit in the fifties; a protege of political-historical poet Charles Olson who wrote audaciously personal verse; a lyric poet who eschewed the egoism of the confessional mode in order to pursue the Olsonian project of Projective (outward-looking) poetics; a Boston poet who was institutionalized at state hospitals. Wieners lived on the "other side" of Beacon Hill, not the Brahmin south slope, but the north side with its working-class apartments and underground gay bars. Though …

Gay And Lesbian Travel Writing: A Present In Need Of A Different Future, Michael Verdirame

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The first half of this thesis will detail the history of travel, as well as the primary reasons why people travel and why it is such a lucrative industry. This will be followed by an account of the history of travel writing, with a specific emphasis on the various types of avenues available to travel writers and the reasons why people feel compelled to write about their travels. The first half will then conclude with a content analysis of three current gay and lesbian travel publications available on different media platforms--Passport Magazine as an online magazine, Man About World as …

Exploring Connections Between Efforts To Restrict Same-Sex Marriage And Surging Public Opinion Support For Same-Sex Marriage Rights: Could Efforts To Restrict Gay Rights Help To Explain Increases In Public Opinion Support For Same-Sex Marriage?, Samuel Everett Christian Dunlop

Dissertations and Theses

Scholarly research on the subject of the swift pace of change in support for same-sex marriage has evolved significantly over the last ten years. The shift has gone beyond the scholarship's initial description amongst demographic groups on how opinion has changed on gay rights issues, like same-sex marriage, to an examination of why the change has occurred. A great deal of the initial research on the topic seemed to focus on demographic traits that suggested a greater propensity toward support for same-sex marriage as time went on. Is the existent literature sufficient to explain why such a dramatic change in …

The Genre Formerly Known As Punk: A Queer Person Of Color's Perspective On The Scene, Shane M. Zackery

Scripps Senior Theses

This video is a visual representation of the frustrations that I suffered from when I, a queer, gender non-conforming, person of color, went to “pasty normals” (a term defined by Jose Esteban Munoz to describe normative, non-exotic individuals) to get a definition of what Punk meant and where I fit into it. In this video, I personify the Punk music movement. Through my actions, I depart from the grainy, low-quality, amateur aesthetics of the Punk film and music genres and create a new world where the Queer Person of Color defines Punk. In the piece, Punk definitively says, “Don’t try …

The Queer Blogger: Interrogating The Commodification Of Identities, Anne Lacy

Cultural Studies Capstone Papers

Using Queer blogs found throughout American blogging networks, while drawing upon Marxism, Michel Foucault’s notions of confession and coming out, and Gramsci’s concept of hegemony, this project is a materialist analysis that unveils how Queer identities are being consumed and commodified. In contemporary American society a phenomenon is occurring online: Queer blogs are acting as a platform where subjectivities are attempting to resist hegemonic notions of identity while they are simultaneously being incorporated into a capitalistic agenda of subject formation. This project ultimately calls upon an act of resistance, as these Queer blogs are in fact a negotiable space for …

Take Off Your Masc: The Hegemonic Gay Male's Gender Performance On Grindr, Duncan Shuckerow

Cultural Studies Capstone Papers

The hegemonic Grindr clone is a gay male Grindr user who enforces the privileging of traditional masculine gender performance and condemns effeminacy. Through this project’s own field work along with the website “douchebagsofgrindr,” the hegemonic Grindr clone is here within analyzed. Drawing upon the theory ofhegemony articulated by Gramsci, a historical analysis of the 1970s urban gay male clone, and contemporary analysis and research, the project argues that the hegemonic Grindr clones, while only a minority group of Grindr users, rules over the cyberspace as sexual gatekeepers. Hegemonic Grindr clones maintain their privileged status on the application through depicting and …

Queer Tastes: An Exploration Of Food And Sexuality In Southern Lesbian Literature, Jacqueline Kristine Lawrence

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Southern identities are undoubtedly influenced by the region's foodways. However, the South tends to neglect and even to negate certain peoples and their identities. Women, especially lesbians, are often silenced within southern literature. Where Tennessee Williams used literature to bridge gaps between gay men and the South, southern lesbian literature severely lacks a traceable history of such connections. The principal objective of this thesis is to explore the ways in which southern lesbians manipulate food metaphors to describe their sexual desires and identities. This thesis only begins to lay out a history of southern lesbian literature as many lesbian writers …

The Ordinary Trip: Heteronormativity And Homophobia In Young Adult Literature From 1969 To 2009, Laurie Barth Walczak

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines books published for and marketed toward teen readers as cultural products and artifacts with the potential and the power to help shape young readers' ideas and understandings of the world, culture, and society around them in order to identify and investigate hegemonic forces or ideological apparatuses at play in young adult literature. From among the earliest young adult novels with characters who depict diverse gender and sexual identities, such as John Donovan's I'll Get There. It Better Be Worth Trip. in 1969, to the most contemporary, including Nick Burd's The Vast Fields of Ordinary in 2009, the …

An Exclusionary Revolution: Marginalization And Representation Of Trans Women In Print Media (1969 – 1979), Emylia N. Terry

Honors College Theses

Stonewall, the act most associated with sparking gay liberation in 1969, was preceded by several events of queer insurrection. These events, which often featured trans people of color playing central roles, are not widely known. Similarly, Stonewall itself has been mythologized in order to be palatable within mainstream society, effectively whitewashing its history. This research utilized archival investigation and discourse analysis, as well as the concepts of symbolic annihilation and trans-misogyny, in order to examine certain publications’ representations of trans women from 1969 – 1979. I found that mainstream publications such as the Chicago Daily Tribune and the Los Angeles …