Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Dear Mama: An Exploration Of Trauma And Black Feminist Healing Practices Through Letter Writing, Bria Nickerson

Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies M.A. Final Projects

This autoethnographic project delves into the multitude of strategies I've employed over the past decade since my mother's passing to confront and heal from my trauma. Through a series of original letters spanning from girlhood to early adulthood, I narrate my journey, delving into the depths of my emotions, thoughts, and coping mechanisms as I navigate through various traumatic experiences. Guided by Black Feminist Autoethnography as its methodology and anchored in Black Feminist Thought as its theoretical framework, this project also explores the profound impact of transgenerational trauma on the psychological well-being of Black women. From enduring slavery and racialized …

Acquitted By Reason Of Paroxysmal Insanity? Science And Gender In The Nineteenth-Century Murder Trial Of Mary Harris, Emmalee Morgan

History Honors Program

The acquittal of Mary Harris in 1865 demonstrates the culmination of new social and scientific ideologies through the strategy of her defense counsel and the utilization of expert medical witnesses. While at the same time, the prosecutorial strategy embodied the opinions of gender and insanity that were being phased out.

The aim of this project is to demonstrate the overlap and reciprocal influence of science, law, and society, with narratives of gender acting as consistent undertones in these three realms. The trial and acquittal seem to fall in line with the idea that the insanity plea is a sham — …

Describing Participation In Veteran Peer Support : A Secondary Analysis Of Women Veterans' Experiences, Amanda L. Matteson

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This research explores peer support described by women who have served in the United States Armed Forces. Women military veterans are a growing subpopulation with unique experiences and challenges as women who have served in a male-dominated warrior culture. Understanding women veterans’ experiences and how they view peer support will help improve their mental health and well-being. Research questions included: (1) How do women veterans describe peer support for their mental health and well-being? (2) What does peer support mean to the woman veterans in this study? (3) For what life situations is peer support helpful for women veterans? (4) …

Feminist Critiques Of Ecofascist, Nativist Appropriations Of Indigeneity Since 2016, Breana Lynch

Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies M.A. Final Projects

This project explores recent manifestations of ecofascism within right-wing movements that deploy environmental concerns and rhetoric. Immigrants in the United States and in Europe and other global North countries have long been targeted by xenophobic policy and rhetoric guised as environmental protection. Although investigations by critical scholars including feminists on right-wing environmentalism unveiled the nativism and hate behind green agendas that are inherently anti-immigrant, I analyze recent ecofascist rhetoric and visual discourse for their harm to Indigenous communities, which is equally insidious, if less overt. This project engages with manifestos of extremists, right-wing political websites, and on-the-ground footage of alt-right …

Little Interventions Everywhere: Wielding Intersectionality To Reclaim Socialist Feminism, Siiri E. Koski

Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies M.A. Final Projects

Responding to the increased visibility of socialist politics in the United States following the 2016 presidential election, this study explores current expressions of socialist feminism and socialist feminist perspectives on and experiences with electoral politics, political action(s), and identity mediation. Nine organizers were recruited from socialist organizations to participate in a onetime, semi-structured, in-depth interview and speak on their experiences in the current moment (2015-present). The data reveals that organizers in socialist spaces have easily reconciled their socialism with their feminism and reclaimed socialist feminism as a distinct theory and practice dispersed across several social justice issues, organizations, and campaigns. …

A Statement From The Department Of Women's. Gender And Sexuality Studies In Reposne To The Majority Opinion Draft From The U.S. Supreme Court On Roe V. Wade, Department Of Women's, Gender And Sexuality Studies (Wgss), University At Albany, State University Of New York

Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Faculty Scholarship

In response to the May 3rd, 2022 leaked draft majority opinion from the U.S. Supreme Court on Roe v. Wade, the Department of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies (WGSS) at the University at Albany, State University of New York, affirms the right for women and all people with the capacity to become pregnant to have access to safe and legal abortions. We acknowledge that this is a basic right, which is part of the full reproductive freedoms under the rubric of “reproductive justice,” defined by the women-of-color-led SisterSong Collective as “the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, …

Institutionalized Normative Heterosexuality : The Case Of Sexual Fluidity, Nicole Lamarre

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Since Alfred Kinsey’s early exploration of sexual behaviors, identities, and desires, there has been a proliferation of studies on what is generally regarded today as sexual fluidity. Inquiry into sexual histories that are neither wholly heterosexual nor homosexual (or even bisexual) has been incredibly well documented by this time. Generally, theories about sexual fluidity have taken one of two positions. The first camp interprets sexual variance as a sign of changing times and crumbling sexual and gender binaries. The second group of theorists postulate that sexual fluidity is neither new nor a particularly positive or liberating social trend. Instead of …

Uncle Tom's Women : Slavery And Black Female Sexuality, Natalia Davila

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

In the United States, Black women grapple with harmful cultural representations of their womanhood and sexuality that are rooted in the minstrel tradition. Specifically, Black women are represented as objects of consumption or hypersexual. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin reveals an engagement with the minstrel tradition that has demonstrated both a perpetuation of negative portrayals of Black women but also a departure from these images. This paper focuses on the responses to Stowe’s characterization by the authors Zora Neale Hurston in Their Eyes Were Watching God and Gayl Jones in Corregidora that reclaim the minstrel tradition to reveal the …

Cuerpos Femeninos En Concursos De Mujeres O 'Reinados' En Colombia, 1991-2018, Ernesto L. Ebratt

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Incorporando perspectivas sociológicas y feministas sobre el cuerpo e información clave obtenida durante el trabajo de campo realizado en Colombia (entrevistas cualitativas y búsqueda de archivos), esta disertación explora las dinámicas entre las experiencias de los cuerpos femininos y fuerzas sociales en el contexto de la globalización neoliberal durante el periodo de 1991 a 2018 en Colombia. Este proyecto se concentra en tres competencias de mujeres: el Reinado Nacional de Belleza, el Reinado de la Independencia y el Reinado Wayyú. Documenta las experiencias o historias individuales de las concursantes acerca de sus cuerpos dentro y fuera de las competencias, sus …

The Societal Perception And Judgements Of Sexual Violence Targeting Victims From Varying Demographic Backgrounds, Hanna Bogart

Psychology

Abstract Sexual violence affects people of all color and gender, but extant research has mostly focused on reactions toward female (and often White) survivors. With a sample of 77 undergraduate University participants (Mage = 18.82), the current study examined the effects of survivors’ race and gender on recommended punishment of the sexual violence incidents. The results indicated that severity of the assault and recommended punishment for the perpetrator had a significantly positive relationship, such that individuals’ recommended more severe punishments for more severe sexual violence incidents. Furthermore, sexual violence incidents involving female victims were recommended more severe punishments than those …

The Method In The Madwoman : Functions Of Female Madness And Feminized Liminality In Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, And "The Yellow Wallpaper", Ivy Elizabeth Poitras

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This critical thesis explores how three literary portrayals of “madness” in female characters of the mid-to-late 19th century written by women writers (Bertha Mason of Jane Eyre, Catherine Earnshaw of Wuthering Heights, and the Narrator of “The Yellow Wallpaper”) operate as instruments within their work to provide commentary on the anxieties, fears, and ideological stereotypes of women and femininity of the era, as well as contradictions and concepts pertaining to confinement, the female body, gendered Gothic tropes, and societal oppression. The significance of this analysis lies in the consistency and endurance of these issues as they withstand modern development, making …

The Influence Of Ethnic Identity Commitment, Discrimination, And Sexism On Sexual Risk Behaviors Among Latina College Students, Melissa M. Ertl

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

According to intersectionality theory, exposure to experiences of oppression predispose individuals from disadvantaged groups to experience disparities in health. Such disparities are evident in the sexual health outcomes among college student-age Latina women living in the US, who tend to report significantly worse sexual health outcomes than their peers. Guided by intersectionality frameworks, the present study examined Latina college students’ sexual risk behaviors in relation to ethnic identity and experiences of discrimination and sexism. Commitment to ethnic identity was expected to negatively relate with sexual risk, and experiences of discrimination and sexism were hypothesized to moderate the association between commitment …

What Does "Caliban's Woman" Sound Like? : A Study Of Indo-Guyanese Women's Emergent Voice In The Us, Caitlin Irene Janiszewski

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Abstract

“Queen Of The Underworld And Mistress Of The Labyrinth;” An Exploration And Critique Of Females In The Bildungsroman, Melissa Aucompaugh

CURCE Annual Undergraduate Conference

I explore the female bildungsroman expressed as a Counter Bildungsroman, the coming of age through a singular sexual event, coupled with a “a fall” and the Contra Bildungsroman, a more complex entrance into womanhood that reconfigures the female coming of age as rebirth instead of a fall. The first chapter, The Counter Bildungsroman, exposes how the Counter Bildungsroman’s coming of age scenario portrays the problematic expression of sexuality (or lack thereof) and entrance into womanhood in the film Labyrinth and the poem “Goblin Market.” Symbols emerge as supplements for the denied sexuality: the consumption of fruit …

A Renewed Call For Feminist Resistance To Population Control, Anne Hendrixson, Ellen Foley, Rajani Bhatia, Daniel Bendix, Susanne Schultz, Kalpana Wilson, Wangui Kimari

Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Faculty Scholarship

We are feminist advocates for reproductive, environmental and climate justice who are deeply concerned about rising sea levels and rising inequalities. We are troubled that population numbers, composition and movements are often seen as causing or worsening climate change, environmental degradation, poverty, war and conflict. For instance, the United Nation’s 2019 World Population Prospects says that rapid population growth will stand in the way of accomplishing the Sustainable Development Goals related to poverty, equality and hunger.

Queering Sexual Development Frameworks : A Dynamic Systems Approach To Conceptualizing Other-Sex Sexuality Among Lesbians, Kolbe Franklin

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Essentialist models of sexual identity development have dominated social discourse and public opinion since the 1980s. This perspective posits that sexual orientation is an intrinsic, core identity that has roots in specific biological factors. Based on this perspective it is assumed that a person’s sexuality will manifest in a linear fashion throughout the life course. Notably, this model positions individuals with same-sex sexual attractions and behaviors as specific “types” of people. While this perspective has become largely institutionalized in public opinion, within academic research on sexual orientation, there has been little consensus on the veracity of this model. Specifically, the …

The Fiction Of Women In Contemporary American Literature : The Borderlands Of Intersectional Feminism, Postcolonial American Studies, And Creative Writing, Skye Anicca

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

A collection of nine short stories entitled THE TROUBLE WITH BRIGHT GIRLS is unified by women’s diverse coming-of-age experiences in late twentieth century transnational America. The story collection relies on techniques that highlight dislocation—temporal skips and wide temporal frames, fragmented and recursive narratives, borrowed genres, absurd premise, anti-heroines and anti-epiphanies—which gesture toward collective human experiences while troubling notions of universal knowledge and values and resisting redemption or closure. The critical introduction situates the collection through the theoretical lens of intersectional feminism, informed by Gloria Anzaldúa’s concept of the borderlands, and in relation to field of multiethnic/transnational literature of the U.S. …

The Contribution Of Acculturative Stress To Body Dissatisfaction Among Latina College Women : Testing The Moderating Effects Of Ethnic Identity And Differentiation Of Self, Julien Alexandra Almonte

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Despite extensive research on the high prevalence of body dissatisfaction and eating disorders among white college women, minimal research has been conducted on Latina college women’s experience of body dissatisfaction. Recent research indicates that Latina college women have a high prevalence of body dissatisfaction and eating disorder pathology. The purpose of the present study was to extend this line of study by investigating the role of acculturative stress as a predictor of body dissatisfaction in Latina college women. Additionally, the study examined the potential buffering effects of ethnic identity and differentiation of self as moderators of the relation between acculturative …

Unbecoming : A Collection Of Short Fiction, Angélica Luisa Valentín Schubert

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This collection contains nine short stories addressing various concepts and issues relating to contemporary femininity in the United States.

Activismo, Literatura Y Cambio Social En El Caribe Hispano: Aproximación En Tres Movimientos, Maria Alejandra Aguilar Dornelles

Languages, Literatures and Cultures Faculty Scholarship

Este ensayo convoca a la reflexión de los vínculos entre literatura, activismo y cambio social en el Caribe hispano privilegiando ciertas intervenciones lideradas por mujeres, las cuales han contribuido a la defensa de mejores condiciones de vida y a un pacto social más equitativo. Teniendo en cuenta la diversidad y movilidad que caracteriza a la región caribeña, esta reflexión comienza examinando las organizaciones feministas autónomas que surgieron en la década del 70 en Puerto Rico para luego desplazarse hacia el trabajo de cuestionamiento a la historia planteado por la poesía de Aída Cartagena Portalatín en República Dominicana, concluyendo con una …

Marianismo Beliefs, Ethnic Identity Commitment, And Acculturative Stress Among Recent Latina Young Adult Immigrants, Lauren E. Dasen

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Because young adult, Latina/o immigrants encompass a rapidly growing minority group in the U.S., there is need for empirical literature focusing on their mental health and the ways in which it relates with identity and culture. The primary aim of the present study was to examine the relations among dimensions of marianismo beliefs and indices of acculturative stress as moderated by ethnic identity commitment among recent Latina young adult immigrants.

"Remarks On A March" : A Female Perspective On Gender, Rank, And Imperial Identities During The French And Indian War, Erica Ingrid Nuckles

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This dissertation expands and complicates the study of women who accompanied and contributed to the British army in the French and Indian War (1754-1763), while also exploring the ways in which the war affected gender, rank, and imperial identities within the army and, more broadly, the British colonies in North America. This is done through the lens of Charlotte Browne, a British middling widow and mother who served as matron of the British army’s General Hospital for the entirety of the war. Browne kept a journal for much of her service that traces her journey with the army from London …

"I Think That's Really What It Comes Down To, Is Intimacy": Lgbtq+ Polyamory And The Queering Of Intimacy, Emily Pain

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Polyamory is an intimate practice, identity, and philosophy that permits open and honest relationships with multiple partners and centers on values such as communication, trust, and egalitarianism. The limited body of existing research on polyamory has contributed important perspectives towards a sociological understanding of polyamorous relationship negotiations and family challenges; however, it has focused primarily on privileged groups, drawing participants from polyamorous communities that are largely comprised of white, middle-class, heterosexual cisgender men and bisexual cisgender women. LGBTQ+ (‘queer’) lives have been severely marginalized in this literature, reinforcing oppressive gender and sexual hierarchies and leaving many important questions unanswered. Moreover, …

Women’S Liberation, Family, And The Fight For Daycare At The University At Albany, Sheri Sarnoff

History Honors Program

On October 9 1970, the Albany Student Press, the University at Albany’s student newspaper, featured an article entitled, “Day Care A Basic Issue,” which discussed the Pierce Hall Day Care Center. The students using the center claimed that the University’s Administration contradicted their original support for the on-campus daycare center. The students exclaimed, “issue after issue has been fabricated (Space, money etc) to stall the progress on the Center.”¹ The article also featured a quote from a spokeswoman from the Women’s Liberation Front arguing that, “the Administration has continually enjoyed putting forth the facade of working with women, when …

Consciousness Engendered Throughout Lena Dunham's "Girls" : Female Subjectivity Vs The Problem Of Post-Feminism, Heeyeon Kim

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The inequality between genders is an idea still endorsed in everyday life throughout media, political discourse, and relationships. Gender discrimination spurs feminists to strive for equity and has become the motivation for the changing and progressive message in their writings and artworks. Lena Dunham’s HBO TV series Girls is such a work and is distinctly unique when compared to Hollywood’s presentation of the standard image of women, and thus, has been used as an initiation into the study of post-feminism and the contemporary media. Dunham’s attitudes and ideas shown in Girls has the same vigorous feminist movement resembling the rebelliousness …

Sexism Makes Me Sick : An Examination Of Potential Mediators In The Link Between Sexism And Women's Mental Health, Kristin L. Mclaughlin

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

It has been well established in the literature that discrimination is related to negative mental health outcomes. Consistent with this research, studies have found women’s exposure to sexist discrimination is associated with a host of mental health problems. Moreover, research on women’s exposure to a specific form of sexism called sexual objectification suggests links with specific psychological outcomes related to poor body image and eating problems. Based on a theoretical framework informed by system justification theory, this study attempted to unify and extend research on perceived sexism and objectification theory by investigating benevolent sexism and self-objectification as potential mediators of …

Grassroots Activists And Movements Against Female Genital Mutilation And Cutting Bridged With Political Alliances : Agency Power And The Potential To Bring About Change, Aisha Kearney

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

In this thesis I highlight grassroots activists and social movements/mobilization against FGM/C throughout some of the regions where it's concentrated, and consider the political alliances that have aided these activists and their movements towards declines in the prevalence of the practice. I consider the recent outlawing of the practice in the Gambia (last year) which was strongly motivated by grassroots activists originally from the Gambia and the transnational political alliances they were able to form. I examine activists and movements in Senegal, paying particular attention to the approach of NGO TOSTAN. I also highlight long standing histories of grassroots activism …

Who Feels Included At Work? : Intersectionality And Perceptions Of Diversity And Inclusion In The Workplace, Courtney J. Dallaird

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

There is a difference between diversity and inclusion in the workforce. More specifically, there is a difference in the understanding and experience that the U.S. cultural meaning of these words creates when interpreted and applied in a workplace setting. Understanding this difference is essential to the work businesses do in actualizing human capital as well as in creating and interpreting methods of providing access, recognizing diversity, and now, increasingly, moving towards a rhetoric of inclusion in the workplace (Roberson, 2006). This research looks at the existing body of knowledge around historical disenfranchisement and the evolution of diversity and inclusion research …

Education And Women Mathematicians In The Middle East, Syeda Tooba Zahra

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Middle Eastern women have made important contributions in the field of Mathematics. The purpose of this thesis is to understand the educational background for women in the Middle East and look at the life and contribution of a sample of women mathematicians in representative Middle Eastern countries such as Turkey, Lebanon, Iran, and Pakistan.

Working Mothers' Work And Family Satisfaction : The Influence Of Time Demands And Time-Based Conflict, Lauren Berger

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The present study sought to examine a comprehensive model of work-family conflict and family-work conflict for working mothers. Specifically, the study tested time-based work-family conflict and time-based family-work conflict as mediators of the relations between the predictor variables of work hours, work demands, and family demands, and the outcome variables of work satisfaction and family satisfaction. It was expected that time-based work-family conflict and time-based family-work conflict would fully mediate these relations. A total of 677 working mothers in the United States participated in the study. Structural equation modeling was used to examine the hypothesized fully mediating model, as well …