Arts and Humanities Commons^™

The Blessed Assembly: Irreplaceable Physical Co-Presence In Worship And Healthy Hybridity Reimagined After The Pandemic In The Digital Age, Yvette, Ying Wai Lau

Doctor of Pastoral Music Projects and Theses

Because of the unprecedented and unexpected force of the pandemic since 2020, most churches around the world have experienced some online worship during the lockdown of their cities or the mandated closure of the church buildings. For many people, online worship seems to be an equivalent, if not better, alternative for gathering together—a physical co-presence in worship—even after the pandemic has ended. As necessary and vital as online worship experiences have been for Christians during the pandemic, the witness of the church from Pentecost throughout Christian history indicates that gathered worship in physical spaces is irreplaceable for faith formation and …

Reconstructing Hope And Resilience Among Kenyan Adolescent Immigrants, Julius Mwangi

Doctor of Ministry Projects and Theses

The study "Reconstructing Hope and Resilience Among Kenyan Adolescent Immigrants" explores Kenyan immigrant families' challenges in the United States and their impact on their adolescent children. It proposes a community-led mentoring program incorporating emotional intelligence competencies and faith to support adolescents' success. Additionally, the study advocates for a new immigrant parent-mentoring program to help them navigate the complex legal process to accelerate their immigration and successful acculturalization. The research contains selected Bible narratives that identify parental responsibilities towards their children and discourses on their successful utility or lack thereof. The study argues that parents and the community have a responsibility …

Texas Gothic, Taryn Uribe Turner

Art Theses and Dissertations

The emotional and the ecological combine to create my body of work titled, “Texas Gothic.” My thesis tells the stories of my oil paintings created through personal connections to a variety of landscapes, animals and experiences that share the setting of Texas.

Desire and regret take shape as animals and figures not fully formed or real. Unreliable narratives of the past are entangled with present tensions to create a painting that haunts and stalks.

And yet, there is hope!

Through nostalgia and sweetness and burdens, my paintings confront a shrouded future. The contradictions of time passing are explored in my …

Fragmented Bodies, Lauren Careese Alexander

Art Theses and Dissertations

Through Memory Webs and fragmented ceramic vessels, I express what it feels like to grow up living in a biracial body. I utilize mixed media to emulate a mixed-race experience. My Memory Webs are fashioned by painting on scraps of canvas and attaching them with crocheted wire and ribbon to speak to how my memory has impacted my identity. My fragmented ceramic vessels are cut up and stitched back together to represent disjointedness and un-belonging. All of my work is contextualized through the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley and what the Monster may represent for people of color. I also …

Queerform/Ing, Matthew Solon-Lee Weimer

Art Theses and Dissertations

My artwork is situated within and around vessels and the Queer Homoerotic World and explores sexuality as a Demisexual within them. This is accomplished through the two processes of my creation, Minivague and Queerform/ing: balancing sexual tension and explicit expression, while subverting traditional norms and stereotypes with queerness to distance oneself from stereotypical Gay Art. Altering/emphasizing makes the artwork more romantic, lighter, whimsical, softer, and tender than the figure/s and the situations actually are. The process is also emphasizing what one sees or wants to be seen. The Pink Boy becomes a celebration of intimacy of any form. I discuss …

Radical Explorations Of Radical Empiricism: William James’S Transmissive Theory Of Mind In The Context Of Visionary Experience, Rita Spellman

Religious Studies Theses and Dissertations

The dominant ontology in science is a form of materialism and it filters down into the social sciences in ways I will touch on throughout this paper. The influence of the current dominant ontology is especially apparent when it comes to experiences and phenomena that challenge its underlying assumptions which is why I will primarily focus on visionary experience and psi phenomena as studied by radical empiricists throughout the ages.

The philosophical position of William James challenges materialist assumptions by championing the idea that the only world we can speak of is the world of our experience. William James affords …

Let All The People Worship: Applying Inculturation In A Multicultural Community, Darrell St. Romain

Doctor of Pastoral Music Projects and Theses

The United States of America is growing more diverse, and its houses of worship are embracing this diversity to engage congregants and build membership. There is a tool to help worshiping communities to espouse diversity of cultures, namely Liturgical Inculturation. Liturgical inculturation, as defined by Anscar Chupungco, is the process whereby the texts and rites used in worship by the local church are so inserted in the framework of culture, that they absorb its thought, language, and ritual patterns. Incorporating the goals and functions of liturgical inculturation, worshiping communities can begin to re-evangelize themselves and celebrate unity through diversity.

This …

Making Old Things New Again: The Northridge Psalter, With Antiphons Based On Lessons From The Revised Common Lectionary, Bryan Scott Page

Doctor of Pastoral Music Projects and Theses

Responsive psalmody is one of the primary musical vehicles for presenting the Psalms in worship by choir and congregation. Existing responsive psalmody features congregational antiphons with texts derived directly from the psalms. Working with the Revised Common Lectionary, this thesis presents fifty newly written and composed antiphons with texts derived from the accompanying RCL lessons. The goal of this method is to emphasize prophetic connections between the Old Testament lesson and Gospel lesson via the antiphons. This thesis also features a history of lectionary development, a detailed account of the creative process, rubrics for presenting the responsive psalmody in worship, …

Frozen Ii And Girls’ Spiritual Formation: How The Music Of An Animated Musical Resonates With Girls And Women, Cristen Mitchell

Doctor of Pastoral Music Projects and Theses

Frozen II (2019) is a popular Disney animated movie for children and depicts striking spiritual elements while weaving in feminist practices such as justice and equity, and feminist theology through representations of female spirits and connection to the earth. Through this movie, its themes, and the historical exclusion of women in the church, this thesis seeks to show that representation of women in the divine is an important, and necessary part of the spiritual and psychological development of girls and women. The methods of this thesis include exploring the following synchronicities:

1. Parallels between feminist issues in the church and Walt …

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Plenty Good Room: Using Negro Spirituals To Bridge The Racial Divide, Darnell Allen St. Romain

Doctor of Pastoral Music Projects and Theses

In 2020, the United States experienced a global pandemic and the murder of Mr. George Floyd. With the murder of Floyd, many churches were confronted with the racial divide in the United States. This thesis is a response of one community, the Prince of Peace Catholic Church in Plano, Texas. Using the folk song of Black Americans, namely the Negro Spirituals, as the foundation of an ethical-theological framework, this thesis poses one way for addressing the anti-Black structure prevalent in the Catholic Church in the United States of America. This work progresses from despair to hope, addressing the link between …

Heroines From An Ancient World, Danni Liang

Art Theses and Dissertations

A female warrior wearing different historical armor will fight against each other for territory. Ultimately, it will be presented in Unreal Engine 5 through a fusion of animation, special effects, and armor themes.

I will conduct historical research on armor in its early stages, including its structure and essential components. Then, I will choose a particular armor set from that era for production. I will study the fighting movements of different warriors and make them into animations accompanied by historical background stories.

Create three special effects, namely thunder, fire, and ice, and integrate these elements into the animation to present …

What Is This Place: Encountering The Body Of Christ In Prison And Church Through Sacrament And Ritual Musicking, Bryan Black

Doctor of Pastoral Music Projects and Theses

Churches in the United States have faced institutional decline due in part to an unprecedented half-century of intense cultural shift and digital acceleration. Many leaders responded to this disorientation with technical fixes that have exacerbated divisiveness rather than addressing the underlying crisis of alienation and loneliness. Driven by fear of decline, communities of faith have forsaken their alterity of purpose and become lost in the marketplace as a “purveyor of religious goods and services” (George Hunsberger). This thesis considers the imagery of Huub Oosterhuis’s hymn “What Is This Place?” in theological dialogue with the Voices of Hope—a choir of female …

Singing Unity—Performing Ecumenism: Musicking And Ecumenical Prayer Through The Lens Of Performance Studies, David James Anderson

Doctor of Pastoral Music Projects and Theses

This thesis examines the foundational call to Christian unity, communal prayer for unity, and the practice of ecumenism through pastoral musicking and performing unity through the lens of performance studies. It asks the question: Can we sing and perform Christian unity? The ecumenical call is considered from ecumenical documents of both the Protestant and Roman Catholic traditions since the Second Vatican Council. Ecumenical worship is considered a performance of unity viewed through the lens of performance studies with scholarship from ritual, liturgical, and church music studies. Two distinct services of ecumenical prayer are considered as “performances of unity.” One service …

Best Practices: Modulating Tension Using Contrast Lighting, Jaye Marie Williams

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this thesis is to determine the best practices for modulating tension in a level through the use of contrast lighting. To test their theories, the researcher used variations of high and low contrast lighting when creating the artifact to elicit responses to tension from the player.

Best Practices For Teaching Shifting Gameplay Styles, Matthew Grabowski

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores four different methods (Golden Path, Punishers & Reinforcers, Teaching in Threes, and Forced Teaching) for teaching players how to engage with shifting gameplay styles within video games using Nico Fridja’s Valence Theory [1]. Using the Far Cry 5 Arcade Editor, the researcher created a single-player video game level in which all four teaching methods were tested in tandem with one another. The goal of creating this level was to evaluate the validity of the teaching methods and their ability to shift gameplay valences, specifically between stealth-focused gameplay and push-forward firefight combat gameplay.

Best Practices: Encouraging The Modality Between Melee And Ranged Combat Styles, Austyn Wiles

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This thesis aims to determine what gameplay factors encourage and discourage players from switching between melee and ranged playstyles while in combat scenarios. The practices for the artifact were found in action-focused video games and then incorporated into a standalone level in a Dying Light mod.

Utilizing Valence Theory To Influence Player Navigation In First-Person Shooter Multiplayer Maps, Yousha Qu

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This research explored tactical & visual valences, different valence weights and the transformation of valences under different circumstances in first-person shooter multiplayer maps, then incorporated them into a level artifact, utilizing the valences to influence player navigation.

Using Multi-Staged Puzzles To Improve Backtracking In Level Design, Yufei Tian

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This study explores the potential best practices in using multi-staged puzzles, which involve backtracking, in video games. The researcher focused on enhancing the players’ experiences by applying elements of the flow theory to an artifact level in Dying Light 2. Playtesters’ feedback suggested that best practices in multi-staged backtracking puzzles improve flow state entry and increase enjoyment.

Best Practices: Using Semiotics In Environmental Storytelling, Conger He

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores an aspect of environmental storytelling known as “semiotics.” Semiotics conveys information and relevant interconnections to an individual through visual representations. There are diverse types of semiotic elements, including symbols, icons, and indexes. The researcher examined the use of semiotics in video games and derived seven best practices for conveying story beats and relaying aspects of a video game’s narrative. The researcher implemented these semiotic-related practices into a custom Fallout 4 level, gathered testers to play the level, and asked the testers to give their opinions on the experience. The researcher analysed the tester’s feedback to conclude whether …

Using Push And Pull Principles To Improve Non-Linear Level Navigation, Aiwen Zhang

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This thesis studies the Player’s habits of navigation when they are in an open-world environment. It incorporates assumptions of best practices utilizing the Push and Pull level design theory that guides the Player in a free-flowing, exploratory environment and utilizes these practices in an open-world level in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.

Using Graph Theory To Create A 3d Miniscaped, Non-Linear Level, Donghua Li

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This study focuses on how to use the Graph Theory and the Dominion Theory to design a three-dimensional (3D) non-linear, miniscaped level layout in a video game. Using these theories, the researcher aimed to aid players in navigating non-linear levels (which are notoriously difficult to traverse). Consequently, the researcher created a methodology outlining the best practices for constructing a level using Graph Theory and Dominion Theory. The researcher constructed a game level in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim to explore the effectiveness of this methodology. Testers played the level and provided feedback regarding their experiences. The researcher analyzed this data …

Best Practices: Implementing Dense Level Design Through Reuse Of Space, Shuo Zhang

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This research explores the correlation between Dense Level Design and the Reuse of Space in video games. It provides assumptions about best practices for implementing Reuse of Space to attain Dense Level Design. To evaluate these best practices, an artifact level is developed for Dying Light 2: Stay Human. The practices are evaluated through an analysis of survey results.

Prospect And Refuge: Modulating Level Pacing Through Spatial Composition, Yifan Li

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the concepts of Prospect space and Refuge space in video games and their influences on game pace. Based on the assumption that a Prospect space increases pacing while a Refuge space decreases pacing, the researcher created a custom level artifact (using both space types) to achieve an ideal pacing curve. By analysing playtesters’ experiences, the researcher was able to examine the influence of Prospect and Refuge space on pacing and formulate a set of best practices to help game designers modulate pacing through spatial composition.

Using Spatial Composition To Influence Player Tension, Canny Yuan

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

This thesis focuses on how space and level geometry in a video game influence a person’s tension. The researcher explored a few potential best practices, which a level designer might utilize when employing spatial composition in video games. By modifying a space's density, size, and openness, a designer can effectively increase or decrease the player’s spatial tension. To explore the effectiveness of the best practices and the related spatial methodology, the researcher recruited playtesters to play the thesis artifact, a customized game level in Dying Light called, “A Way Out.” The researcher then analyzed the heart rates and experiences of …

Unveiling New Realms: Enhancing Procedural Narrative Generation And Npc Personalization Using Ai, Tanishq Chawla

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

A System Design Framework used to train GPT - based agents can significantly help improve current Procedural Narrative and Character (NPC) Personality Generation Models in games. This approach can lead to a Richer Gameplay Experience that allows players to craft their own Personalized and Unique stories.

Best Practices: Enhancing Narrative Communication Through Environmental Shifts, Xinyu Zhang

Level Design Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this research is to integrate traditional storytelling methods with environmental shifts to test the effectiveness in enhancing player immersion and narrative communication. The researcher created a custom single-player level in Fallout 4, which tasks players with investigating a case and finding out the truth of the quest’s narrative with the help of environmental shifts. The researcher collected data on the effectiveness of their researched, environmental shift best practices by observing testers’ playtests and their subsequent understanding of the story.

Hollywoodlandia: Celebrity Women, Movie Culture, And American Public Womanhood, 1916-1950, Skye Cranney

History Theses and Dissertations

This project proposes to study the ways in which celebrity women’s behavior may have encouraged American women to challenge, but not necessarily subvert, traditional gender roles even as Hollywood publicity continued to emphasize the importance of those same roles in women’s lives. It does that by examining three sites where celebrity women prominently lived, worked, played, and volunteered between 1920 and 1950: the Hollywood Studio Club, a boarding house only for women in the entertainment industry, in Los Angeles; the Sun Valley Ski Resort, the first modern ski resort in the American West, in central Idaho; and the Hollywood Canteen, …

Shipwrecked Spaceship With Undersea Overgrowth And Dynamic Weather System, Konstantine Soldatos

Art Theses and Dissertations

This artifact depicts an underwater overgrowth scene featuring coral, barnacles, sea urchins, and various sea-life enveloping the iconic Slave-1 ship from Star Wars. The ship exhibits visible damage to its hull and substructures, resulting from missile impacts and prolonged decay subsequent to a crash landing in the ocean. Consequently, remnants of destroyed substructures are interspersed with coral growth, transforming the ship into an artificial reef. The artifact comprises four distinct scenes: an initial pristine underwater environment teeming with flourishing kelp, vibrant sea life, and animated corals; a subsequent chaotic scene depicting a vortex that evacuates the water from the environment; …

Accounting For The Gift: Theology And Ethics In Accounting, Daniel Sebastian

Religious Studies Theses and Dissertations

Accounting is often assumed to be a neutral presentation of the facts of economic activities and actions. Its double-entry system means that it is always in balance and comports to the rigor of mathematical formulas, and it is taken to be a matter of empirical counting that lends it certainty as well. The dissertation argues that this description of accounting is inadequate. Accounting is better seen as a political tool and technology for producing trust that can help resolve social conflicts. As such, accounting is not value-neutral but carries within it a particular sociality that has moral implications. These moral …

Community Connect: A Strategy To Mitigate The Effects Of Church Shopping On Small Urban And Rural Congregations, Jimmy Greene

Doctor of Ministry Projects and Theses

While serving as an ordained elder in The United Methodist Church, I began to realize that church shopping poses an existential worry to the survival of small churches in North America, mainly those with limited resources. The demand of some church shoppers for social amenities like indoor gyms and theater-style folding seats over personal relationship with God creates low morale for small churches, which often lack a positive response strategy.

This research study proposes a mitigating strategy, Community Connect, to address the social, psychological, missional, and ecclesiological impacts of church shopping on small churches. This socio-missiological, ecclesiological, and pedagogical approach …