Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Han-Nationalism Throughout The Ages, Weiying Wu

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

Beginning in the 1980s, a trend of traditional studies known as “guo xue,” (国学) meaning national studies, proliferated in the wake of socioeconomic changes in China. In particular, it encompassed the revival of Confucianism, giving rise to related activity such as the establishment of “national studies institutes” (国学院) and “Han study centers”. Yet despite its popularity, the legitimacy of “national studies” came under the critical scrutiny of historians who argue that that contemporary “national studies” have either consciously or subconsciously co-opted Han traditions and practices over other ethnic cultures that made up the social fabric of past and present China, …

Political Economy Of The Middle East: Historiography And The Making Of An Episteme, Jordan Rothschild

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

The Great Divergence accelerated a process of Western European states dominating the majority of the world’s geography and people economically and geopolitically. Given the stakes of this shift and its ramifications for all of the history that followed, and the significant way that the divide continues to shape our world, this phenomenon is subject to considerable debate within the historiography. This paper uses the Great Divergence as a departure point to analyze the different schools of political economic history, from the flawed sociologies of the early 20th century theorists to the World Systems Theorists and beyond. A key aspect of …

Attempted Book Bans: The Censorship Of Queer Themes In The 1950s, María J. Quintana-Rodriguez

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

This article aims to explore queer book banning during the 1950s in response to Cold War national defense tactics. The decade witnessed the formation of the first public LGBTQ+ rights organizations in the United States as well as a rise in queer literature and publications. This publicization of queerness in society was seen as a rejection of traditional societal norms and threatened the Cold War-imposed gender ideology. In addition, the fear of Communist expansion led to the conflation of homosexuals and Communists, categorizing queerness and queer-related themes as immoral and as an interference in the United States' fight for democracy. …

Silence From The Great Communicator: The Early Years Of The Aids Epidemic Under The Reagan Administration, Jacqueline A. Ortiz

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

1981 not only commenced Ronald Reagan’s presidency but also marked the beginning of the AIDS epidemic, caused by the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). The early framing of the disease as an exclusively homosexual affliction disadvantaged gay communities. This sexually transmitted disease proliferated across the United States; yet, the AIDS epidemic failed to reach the Reagan administration as a top priority until it was too late. When discussing the Reagan administration’s early response to AIDS, historians tend to follow one of two positions: avoid mentioning the disease and in its entirety; or blame Reagan’s homophobia for the deaths of thousands of …

“Spreading The Gospel Of Good Taste”: Home Design And American Character, Anna Maher

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

During the early twentieth century, a plethora of design pamphlets, magazines, organizations, exhibits, lectures, and more were established to fill a perceived demand for guidance on interior home design. Home decoration emerged as an important method to create an American taste that reflected democratization, emphasizing thrift, hard work, and intelligence in design across the class spectrum; the nation’s unique interaction with its own history and the history of the world; and the growing capabilities and responsibilities of a professional design community. Primarily through discussions of furniture, color schemes, and wall and floor decoration, popular magazines and guidebooks from the early …

The Limits Of Solidarity: Leftist Jewish Israeli Activism For Palestine In The 1960’S And 2010’S, Ryann M. Hubbart

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

What does it mean for Jewish Israelis to engage in Palestinian solidarity? How do they navigate their positions of privilege in their activism? To explore these questions, I begin with a historical trajectory of the rise and fall of leftist Jewish Israeli activist organizations in response to global and local developments. I focus on two periods and their organizations: The Israeli Socialist Organization in the 1960’s and 1970’s and Ta’ayush and Physicians for Human Rights Israel in the 2010’s. In both cases the individuals in question are a very small minority of Israelis. From there I analyze these organizations and …

The Desert A City: A Study Of Antony The Great’S Life, Hanyang Chen

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

This paper attempts to provide an insight of asceticism and its development in Egypt through the literal work Athanasius's Life of Antony. It sets out to explain how the peculiar geography and environment in Egypt contributed to the development of asceticism and how the practices of St. Antony reflected the contemporary ideas on soul and body.

It’S Complicated: Field Hockey And Feminism In The United States, Dara Anhouse

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

Only in the United States is field hockey considered a "women's sport," and the story of its unusual transformation of male-dominated “hockey” from the British Isles to women’s-only “field hockey” in America reveals a deeper connection between sport, feminism, and society. A symbol of unlocked freedom for the "New Woman" at the turn of the twentieth century, under Title IX the sport becomes a case study in how gender is reproduced in modern society.

Full Issue: Volume 1, Issue 2, Editorial Board

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

No abstract provided.

On Becoming A Woman: A Body Horror Examination Of Dance Nation, Marley Goldman

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

This paper explores how the darker recesses of the human body’s potential, that of blood and seeping carnage, have long been associated with the feminine; and women themselves find dark catharsis in the genre of body horror. The concept of the monstrous feminine has been studied extensively in fields of gender studies, media studies, and psychoanalysis, all seeking to explain why the gendered experience can be portrayed so aptly through horror. The paper close reads Dance Nation, a feminist play exploring puberty and gendered anger, alongside two works of body horror: Jennifer’s Body (2009) and Hatching (2022). The paper …

Landmarks: “Throwing Like A Girl: A Phenomenology Of Feminine Body Comportment, Motility, And Spatiality” And A Room Of One's Own Applied, Grace Benson

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

This essay seeks to understand the author’s relationship to her body through theoretical feminist texts. It uses Iris Marion Young’s “Throwing Like a Girl: A Phenomenology of Feminine Body Comportment, Motility, and Spatiality,” Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own, and the author’s own life to examine the relationship between perception, queerness, and self-confidence. The account put forward here applies Young’s discussion of feminine bodily comportment and spatiality to the author’s experiences learning to fight and subsequently accept her own body. Tying Young’s comparison of the body to feminine existence to Woolf’s discussion of a room of one’s own, …

Multispecies Kinship In Fabrizio Terranova’S Haraway: Story Telling For Earthly Survival, Nicole Daly

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

This piece examines how director Fabrizio Terranova's 2016 documentary Haraway: Story Telling for Earthly Survival argues for embracing a framework of multispecies kinship between humans and non-human others. While telling the story of Haraway's life and her contributions to feminist scholarship, his documentary highlights various "contact zones" between humans and non-human animals in ways that destabilize the human/ non-human animal hierarchy and urge viewers to pay attention to the inevitability of non-human animal involvement in the process of becoming(-with). In my analysis of the film, I incorporate a variety of Haraway's works in addition to ideas from theorists of feminist …

A Meditation On Afrosurrealism, Black Gender, And The Non-Human, Logan K. Shanks

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

Quotidian Black life is characterized by our ability to alchemize violence into generative life-sustaining properties of matter. In this paper, I will measure Black matter based on anything produced and engaged by Black collectives. While Black existence is not tied to white violence, descendants of enslaved Black people enter our worlds of worlds greeted by a white captor. It is not until we consciously recognize that we are in his dream that we can work to escape the white captor’s circadian rhythms. Through this paper, I will tease out the contradictions of our Black living-unliving. I will employ an anti-methodological …

Introduction: Toward An Ethical Mutilation Of The "Human" And "Body", José E. Valdivia Heredia , '23

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Words Matter: Crafting And Critiquing Rhetorically Effective Styles (Engl 002w) Syllabus, Natalie Mera Ford

Aydelotte Curricular Grants

What does it mean to write an awkward or a clear sentence? Who determines what counts as appropriate or "good" writing, and how are such notions of standardized English currently being challenged? Can a scholarly voice be an authentic personal voice, too? In this course, we will examine the grammatical building blocks of written style while scrutinizing larger cultural concerns about the effectiveness of distinct styles. While recognizing famous tenets of style in creative writing, we will primarily focus on stylistic features of academic, civic, and professional discourse. We will learn grammatical terminology and apply it in analyzing and evaluating …

Structural Analysis And Assessment Of Scholarly Style, Natalie Mera Ford

Aydelotte Curricular Grants

Does academia encourage an effective academic writing style? Do writers across the disciplines communicate in ways that uphold the values and purposes of liberal arts education? Has the turn in higher ed and scholarship to more public-facing audiences affected how scholars try to reach readers? What stylistic adjustments or improvements would you like to see in the texts you read—and are asked to write—in college? This project asks you to delve into these questions, among others, in relation to a sample of scholarly writing of your choice. Your goal is to analyze and assess how grammatical structures, both in individual …

Sacrificial Ritual And The Palace Of Nestor: A Reanalysis Of The Ta Tablets, J. Morton, N. G. Blackwell, Kyle W. Mahoney

Classics Faculty Works

The Ta tablets are a series of Linear B documents from the Palace of Nestor at Pylos that inventory vessels, fire implements, slaughtering paraphernalia, and furniture. This article argues that all the equipment documented on the Ta tablets pertains to a single large-scale ritual cattle sacrifice and was not equipment for the banquet that would have followed the sacrifice. The argument is rooted in a reanalysis of the tables listed on the Ta tablets that concludes that they were used for the slaughter and butchery of sacrificial cattle. Discussion proceeds from there to the sacrificial ritual use of the other …

It’S What Our Grandmas Did: Decoding Black Wellness, Joy, And Liberation In Contemporary Digital Hoodoo Practice Through A Cooperative Healing Literacies Framework, Patrick Li , '23

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

Hoodoo, Conjure, and Rootwork refer to the constellation of African American traditions of spiritual and physical healing, ancestral devotion, retaliation, and protection created in response to chattel slavery. The current study investigates the multimodal potentials of Hoodoo for holistic healing in the contemporary digital age. Expanding on Erika Gault’s definition of digital Black religion studies as “the study of Black folks’ digital pathways to healing and wholeness (freedom) and their religious contribution to the development of digital technology,” I triangulate a framework of Hoodoo Healing Literacies (HHLs) using practices of Rootwork, Conjure, and CyberHoodoo. These practices correlate to bio-psycho, psycho-spiritual, …

Centering Diné Literacy In Ela Classrooms: Developing Co-Conspiratorship For Indigenous Sovereignty, Shaadiin King , '23

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

No abstract provided.

¿Gays, Maricas O Algo Más? La Más Draga’S Queer Performance Of Mexicanidad At The Intersection Of Art, Nationalism, And Popular Entertainment, José E. Valdivia Heredia , '23

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

No abstract provided.

Full Issue: Volume 1, Issue 1, Editorial Board

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Sex In The Bible: A Poetic Female Retelling, Gabriella Raffetto

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

In my poetic analysis, I tease out the differences between Biblical and modern conceptions of rape. Many of my ‘episodes’ feature rape narratives between a husband and wife or concubine/slave; in the Biblical narrative, these relations were not considered rape, because rape only constituted relationships outside of legal bounds. In this way, I attempt to diversify preexisting stories in the Biblical narrative, making monsters out of praised patriarchs; even God is not safe from becoming the villain. In this way, I paint the patriarchal system in the Bible as a gothic house disguised in tradition and spirituality that women must …

Development Of Southern Interracial Marriage And Divorce: Why Our Children Are Code-Switching, Zoe R. Grant

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

The fundamental basis of my final paper will be of my own lived experience. In my paper, I will argue that as a result of an interracial divorce, mixed-race children are learning to code-switch leading to a greater sense of empathy and community. I will pull from the theoretical framework of Gloria Anzaldua’s “Borderlands La Frontera: The New Mestiza” as well as other sources to support my claims.

By focusing heavily on a southern perspective, I will question whether or not a history of southern interracial marriage causes a strain on nuclear families. Are interracial children having new experiences, and …

Mommy, Me, And We: Why Black Mothers Have Turned To Doulas, Janessa Harris

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

Maternal mortality mates have disproportionately affected black mothers for far too long due to the lack of value that black bodies hold in medical spaces. Because of this concerns voiced by black people are often disregarded and ignored until the very last minute. But what if this was changed? This paper will focus on how black mothers have worked against Western medical systems that silence our voices, but instead turn to doulas who work to make these mothers feel seen, heard, and cared for. Through this, we make birthing a careful and collective effort to turn Mommy&Me to Mommy&We.

Skin Stories And Family Feelings: The Contradictions Of Skin Picking In Mother And Daughter, Katrina Jacinto

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

Skin picking, otherwise known as dermatillomania, is considered to be a medical disorder by the DSM-5. However, the embodied experiences of skin picking in myself and my mother do not align with the neat definitions offered by psychiatry. Through autoethnographic material and an ethnographic interview with my mother, I argue that skin picking is a bodily technique that is pathologized through stigma. In particular, I suggest that skin picking reveals the body as a polyvalent entity, in which the same features and practices take on different meanings in different bodies. This frames the discrepancies between mine, and my mother's, experiences. …

Malintzin: La Mujer Americana, Alma D. Elías Nájera

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

Malintzin was a controversial Indigenous woman whose contributions to the Aztec conquest raised questions about what it meant to be a traitor with a limited agency. This essay recontextualizes Malintzin’s demonized identity and challenges masculinist sociocultural curations of gender, history, and knowledge production by infusing feminist theory into the cultural imaginaries of gender and racial stratification. By reintroducing Malintzin as a feminist emblematic figure trying to regain selfhood within an exploitative White cisheteropatriarchal society, her existence gives voice to those silenced by the violence of colonization, Manhood, and gender oppression. To do this, the author takes up the work of …

Hija De La Chingada: Visibility And Erasure Of La Malinche In Contemporary Mexican Discourse, Tania Del Moral

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

The mystification and subsequent reduction of La Malinche in Mexican national discourse presents a problem in which patriarchy and colonialism bind the native Mexican women into two archetypes: either traditional or treacherous. Historical accounts have fallen short of describing the woman behind the myth of La Malinche, further compartmentalizing her into a traitor to her people. Scholars such as Octavio Paz and Gloria Anzaldúa have illustrated her subjugation and erasure, highlighting this binary. This paper, however, considers a postcolonialist perspective to analyze La Malinche's story as one of erasure; particularly the ways that language was used by the Spanish Crown …

Àṣẹ After Man: The Rupture Of The Christian-Colonial Project As Decolonial Ceremony, Eden Segbefia

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

This project is a theoretical exploration of the Yoruba concept of àṣẹ and its role in unsettling the hierarchies imposed by Christian colonialism. Sylvia Wynter's explanation of the ways in which Christian colonialism has affected the very concept of Man proves crucial here. Àṣẹ is an example of a decolonial concept because of its ability to rearrange animacy, especially as it is conceived in Western European epistemology. Wynter and other interlocutors are utilized to support this argument and imagine new possibilities in considering the relationships between Christian colonialism, alterity, plasticity, and animacy.

Queer Ecologies: A Final Syllabus/Zine Product Of Our Independent Study, Yeh Seo Jung, Ray Craig

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

This zine is the product of our independent study course Queer Ecologies, which is an exploration of bio-social systems using a queer and feminist theoretical lens. We aim to look critically at knowledge formation and construct alternative visions for more just and sustainable relationships between science, nature, and ourselves. While queer theory most directly interrogates the normative structure of heterosexuality both in humans and in biology more broadly, these studies include analyses of hierarchy, power, and value. Queer Ecology can be used to examine phenomena such as climate change, extinction, pollution, species hierarchies, agricultural practices, resource extraction, and human population …

Masculinized Sovereignty: Understanding Violence Towards Mice And The Nonhuman, Anisha Prakash

Crossings: Swarthmore Undergraduate Feminist Research Journal

This paper attempts to analyze how the definition of the normative “human” categorizes bodies that represent alternative political order against settler colonialism, and how the subjects that go against the dominant ideal of human are prohibited from living a free life, if not altogether eliminated. While conducting research, I view the lab as a site of social advancement where the differences between humans and nonhumans create a community of shared purpose. An interrogation of the laboratory as a site of violence can help us better understand how the State’s capitalist modes of advancement and production harm those of indigenous people, …