Arts and Humanities Commons^™

The Disproportionate Affects European Standards Of Beauty Have On Black Women, Marina Palladinetti

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

This Thesis addresses the way European standards of beauty disproportionately affect Black women and Black girls in a Euro-American society. European standards of beauty have detrimental effects on Black women’s overall well-being and self-esteem. The methodology used for this thesis is evidence gathered from memoirs, novels, and collections of essays discussing European standards of beauty and colorism. This thesis addresses the experience of mixed-race people in Euro-American societies. Hair and skin complexion are addressed as features that are used to measure distance from the ideal beauty standard. This thesis includes close readings of The Bluest Eye and Their Eyes Were …

"A Narrative Is A Living Body”: Trans-Relations In Contemporary Transmasculine Fiction, Madison Rougier

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

This thesis explores how recent novels are able to expand representations of transgender experiences and promote identification with these characters and their experiences, even if the reader is not trans themself. It begins by delving into a brief history of transgender narrative and the problems associated with these narratives having been primarily in the form of memoir. It then examines how Rose Tremain’s Sacred Country, despite being one of the first instances of a fictional narrative focused on a transgender man, reflects similarly problematic narrative characteristics to those found in memoir. Proposing a concept of trans-relational reading, which promotes identifications …

Promethean Romanticism: A Study Of The Shelleys' Prometheus Figures, Madison Storm

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

In David Greene's translation of Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound, the figure Prometheus declares, “You would find it hard to bear these trials of mine, / since for me death is not decreed at all. / Death would indeed be a riddance of my suffering, / but, as it is, there is no limit set / for pain, save when Zeus falls from his seat of power.” The term “Promethean” is typically ascribed to narratives that contain themes or characters that relate to Prometheus: the ancient Greek Titan that gave fire to humanity as was eternally punished as a consequence by Zeus. …

Advancing Agroecological Agroforestry: A Vermont Participatory Storytelling And Story Mapping Project, Sydney Blume

Food Systems Master's Project Reports

Agroforestry is the intentional integration of trees into agricultural landscapes. Advancing agroforestry has the potential to support just food system transition, but it must take direction from traditional approaches (culturally-embedded, millennia-old agroforestry practices in forest ecosystems) and agroecology (the movement, science, and practice for just and sustainable food and agricultural systems). An agroecological approach to agroforestry is essential to avoid agroforestry replicating the logics and harms of industrial agriculture and to encourage learning from traditional agroforestry practices, and likewise, traditional approaches to agroforestry can support a transformative agroecological transition through redesign of agroecosystems and shifting perspectives and ethics. This paper …

Seed & Story Conservation: A Rooted Historical Documentation And Analysis Of Living Seed Stories In The Us Northeast, Celia Luanna Nesbitt

Food Systems Master's Project Reports

Often a neglected item in our current industrialized food system, seed is now typically seen as a commodity. Agrobiodiversity is in decline with diverse crop varieties being lost from cultivation and memory, further threatening levels of biodiversity. Research indicates that seed systems are crucial for the conservation of crop diversity and local adaption of cultivars. Globally, people are working to grow and share seeds that support seed production based around the premises of community-based production and (agro)biodiversity. This project and paper draw attention to the regional seed work in the US Northeast. Through a participatory approach, and an active participation …

Get Rich And Die Trying: Capitalism, Its Repetitions, And The Financial Plot, Richard Chapman Matis

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Most people want to be rich, and the reasons why usually do not require exposition. Despite gospel warnings about the difficulties of the wealthy entering paradise, multitudes clamor for the possibility of facing this dilemma firsthand. Tales from antiquity and mythologies utilize recognizable archetypes such as the profligate spender or stubborn miser that are still employed as rote moral instruction today. In one sense, exchangeability between positions of rich and poor is a staple of social storytelling because of its universal mutual intelligibility across time and place. Modern readers can likely identify descriptors and coding of rich and poor, despite …

Unsere Neue Heimat: German National Identity In The Pages Of The Südwest Newspaper, 1910–1914, Patrick Sullivan

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

In recent decades, historians have increasingly recognized the significance of German colonialism. Though short-lived in relation to other European overseas empires (created in 1884 and dissolved in 1919), the German colonial empire had a substantial historical impact. Historians have drawn particular attention to colonialism’s influence on national identity within the Deutsches Reich. To many Germans in the recently formed nation-state (founded in 1871), the foreign possessions represented Germany’s status as a world power and a mission to spread German culture across much of the globe. The colonial settler press was an especially important institution to such imperialist modes of thought. …

Race, Fantasy & Enjoyment, Edwin Owusu

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Why has the institution of race remained resilient given what we know about its detrimental impacts? Why do we enjoy race and who has access to that enjoyment? Is black trauma endemic to this enjoyment and can blackness be divorced from it? I hypothesize that we live in an episteme that has transitioned from physiological need to surplus enjoyment. This enjoyment has allowed humans to conceptualize their relations beyond the physical and necessary. Racial enjoyment is psychical because it involves how we enjoy and not how we know (enjoyment v. knowledge). There is a collective investment in race that subtends …

An Ill-Suited Memorial? Nazi Atrocities In Publications On The American Right, 1930-1985, Sandor Farkas

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

From 1930 to 1985, reactions to Nazi atrocities in the Saturday Evening Post, Wall Street Journal, and National Review represent a sampling of the American political right’s understanding, memory, and use of the Holocaust. A touchstone for evil in American culture and politics, few scholarly works have explored the origins of the Holocaust’s outsized role in American political discourse, and fewer have seriously considered the American right’s role in this evolution. Nazi atrocities assumed their role in American politics because the novelty of Nazi crimes against Jews and their post-war consequences received persistent media attention. On the American political right, …

Horror And Representation: Violence In The Construction Of Postindian Literary Identities, Caleb Hayes

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Across the contemporary literary and cinematic marketplace there is an increasing prevalence of “Indigenous fictions”, particularly those within or adjacent to the horror genre. Historically, the representations of Indigeneity across the forms of fiction in the United States and Canada have been limited to that of colonial constructions meant to uphold European land claims and cultural dominance. These images have been proliferated through commercially successful and culturally significant novels, paintings, and films, from the early captivity narratives of the 17th century and the romantic Indian epics of the 19th century to the 20th century’s examples of the western and horror …

Organizational Supports Of Rape Culture In Higher Education, Mary Beth Seller

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Rape culture has roots in our gendered history of the United States which manifests itself on college campuses as well. Attending college has been found to be the riskiest time for women in terms of sexual assault, as up to 1 in 4 women may experience some type of sexual assault or attempt during their collegiate years. This study explored how one college campus, the University of Vermont (UVM), has organizational policies, procedures and values that are perceived to support rape culture on campus.

Guided by critical feminist theory as its epistemological foundation, this qualitative study uses an applied thematic …

Otto Strasser, The Nazi Party, And The Politics Of Opposition, James Francis Hughes Ii

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

What do we know about Otto Strasser? He and his brother Gregor were highly influential in the early years of the Nazi party; therefore, what should we consider when looking back? To fully understand the individual, we must investigate and analyze: Strasser's post-Nazi Party life, his post-Nazi political aspirations, and the apparent whitewashing of his past as a Nazi. The latter of which most individuals gleaned solely from the fact that he, himself, an ardent National Socialist, was, nonetheless, an opponent of Adolf Hitler. By analyzing Strasser's assertions in his numerous books, articles, and chapters, and comparing them with the …

Declarations Of Womanhood: Trans Lives, Livelihoods, And Afterlives Of American Women 1890-1954, Juniper Oxford

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

“Declarations of Womanhood” examines the lives of individuals who were assigned male at birth and lived as women in the decades before the availability of sex reassignment surgery in the United States and the highly sensationalized transition of Christine Jorgensen. Shifting focus away from medical transition, of which the fifties-era press contended that individuals like Jorgensen and Charlotte McLeod “became” women through the act of surgery, this study moves toward a focus on social transition, exemplified through the words, actions, and social interactions of women moved away from their assigned gender before the 1950s. With their stories recounted in local …

Group-Level Frameworks For Data Ethics, Privacy, Safety And Security In Digital Environments, Juniper Lovato

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

In today's digital age, the widespread collection, utilization, and sharing of personal data are challenging our conventional beliefs about privacy and information security. This thesis will explore the boundaries of conventional privacy and security frameworks and investigate new methods to handle online privacy by integrating groups. Additionally, we will examine approaches to monitoring the types of information gathered on individuals to tackle transparency concerns in the data broker and data processor sector. We aim to challenge traditional notions of privacy and security to encourage innovative strategies for safeguarding them in our interconnected, dispersed digital environment.

This thesis uses a multi-disciplinary …

The Reformist Exemplum Of The Monastic Bishop In Bede's Ecclesiastical History Of The English People, Christopher Kelm

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Throughout his Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum, Bede displays a recurring interest in and admiration for the lives of bishops who also live as monks. The reason for this is better understood in the context of Bede’s Letter to Egbert, written a few years after the completion of the Historia, and a few months before Bede’s death. In the Letter, Bede complains of contemporary Northumbrian bishops who lack any personal discipline and who fail to adequately provide pastoral care for their oversized dioceses, while they yet demand excessive tributes from the laity; he also laments the presence of “false monasteries,” which …

Hina Hanta: The Circle Of Metacognition, Tina Bly

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The articles of this dissertation combine to make an autobiographical written study, a Scholarly Personal Narrative of life writing. The work culminates with a research study by way of a Talking Circle among a group of scholarly elders who gathered to share guidance for Indigenous scholars navigating colonial structures in our sites of knowledge production. Utilizing a Mixed-Methods approach, this sharing was transcribed, coded, and examined via Western thematic analysis. Through stories, casting an international light, analyses reveal a work of written guidance not only for Indigenous scholars, but also for education stakeholders, for those claiming diversity, equity, and inclusion, …

Lingering With Hegel And The Madhyamaka School: Lack In Anna Karenina And Swann's Way, Oliver Bissell Creech

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Jacques Lacan observes that desire has the inherent flaw of always being disproportionate to the object of desire. Marcel Proust’s Swann’s Way and Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina reveal the key role that lack, or the negative, plays in the way desire gets out of control. Applying Hegel’s thought on the negative to Swann’s Way and Anna Karenina, I interrogate models of love and relationships to the negative to confront the dilemma perceived by Lacan. I note how the role of the negative in Swann’s Way and Anna Karenina runs parallel to the role of impermanence and emptiness in the Madhyamaka …

The Sublime Object Of Digitality: Psychoanalysis And Cyberspace, Grady Kennison

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Psychoanalysis, from Freud to Lacan and beyond, offers a unique toolkit for theorizing and understanding the visible and invisible effects of our collective digitization. In this project, I will work through central concepts of psychoanalytic theory – including Lacan’s three orders, the objet a, and more – while both rethinking our understanding of cyberspace via psychoanalysis and rethinking our understanding of psychoanalysis via cyberspace. Our subjectivity and our public discourse are today irrevocably intertwined with digital technology and cyberspace; psychoanalysis, as a theory centered on subjectivity and discourse, is an indispensable framework for reckoning with our plugged-in lives.

Envisioning Equitable Access To Secondary Literacy Learning Through Sociocultural And Critical Approaches To The Implementation Of Multitiered Systems Of Supports, Audrey Flynn Richardson

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

ABSTRACT

The acquisition and operationalization of literacy are of critical importance to all learners. The use of literacy and language abilities including reading and writing as well as critical thinking and communication are essential to accessing one’s human and civil rights (Goodwin & Jiménez, 2019). Because the acquisition of these skills and abilities does not always happen with automaticity or in the same way for all students, public schools are asked to provide layers of comprehensive support for students in their literacy learning. Since the reinstatement of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) in 2004, state and federal educational …

“Glory To The Heroes!” The Commemoration Of The Oun And Upa In The Ukrainian Diaspora, Liam John Hilferty

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

In the late 1930s and early 1940s, the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists(OUN) was highly connected with Nazi Germany. After a failed declaration of statehood, their position towards Germany ostensibly changed, marking a shift from collaboration to resistance. The main organ of this resistance was the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). However, the OUN and UPA did not openly resist the German occupation of Ukraine as strongly as they claimed. They were more focused on slowing the advance of the Red Army and a violent campaign of ethnic cleansing against Poles in Volhynia. After the war, millions of displaced Ukrainians found shelter …

Making Meaning Through Leadership: An Exploration Of College Men, Masculinity, And Motivation To Lead, Katharine Stango

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

In my previous role as the Assistant Director for Campus Programs at the University of Vermont, (UVM) I noticed fewer and fewer college men pursing leadership opportunities during their time in college. Student affairs practitioners and scholars recognize the benefits and enhanced outcomes students gain by participating in meaningful activities in college (Astin, 1984; Dugan, 2006; Komives et al., 2005; Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005; Quaye et al., 2019; Tinto, 1987). When college men are responsible for higher numbers of conduct violations, sexual misconduct issues, and high risk drug and alcohol use in college (Harper & Harris, 2010; Young et al., …

Adele Of Champagne: Politics, Government, And Patronage In Capetian France, 1180-1206, Maria L. Carriere

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Adele of Champagne (r. 1160-1180) was the third wife of King Louis VII of France (r. 1137-1180) and the mother of Philip II (r. 1180-1223), descended from the powerful Champagne family in the kingdom of France. Between 1180 and her death in 1206, Adele navigated the transition of power between her husband and her son, was appointed to the role of guardian of the kingdom during her son’s absence on the Third Crusade, and administered her dower lands during her widowhood, bestowing her patronage on the religious institutions and individuals she favored. Her activities in this period underscore the importance …

The Origins Of Manufactured Dissent And The Efficacy Of Climate Change Narratives, Emma Elisabeth Giering

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The year of 2020 revealed many things about the fragility of socially constructed institutions and the public trust which grants such entities legitimacy, which is perhaps what reinvigorated social discourse surrounding the existential threat posed by climate change. Amid a pandemic, Americans watched wildfires engulf much of the west coast, environmental regulations unravel in the hands of the Trump administration, and Wall Street begin trading futures contracts on the U.S.’s water supply. Given the ever-expanding record of environmental travesties, how are citizens to respond, and from where should they derive their inspiration for response?

This thesis answers the above question …

Developing Identity: Exploring The History Of Indonesian Nationalism, Thomas Joseph Butcher

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

This thesis examines the history of Indonesian nationalism over the course of the twentieth century. In this thesis, I argue that the country’s two main political leaders of the twentieth century, Presidents Sukarno (1945-1967) and Suharto (1967-1998) manipulated nationalist ideology to enhance and extend their executive powers. The thesis begins by looking at the ways that the nationalist movement originated during the final years of the Dutch East Indies colonial period. The first section highlights how the nationalist movement was disunified in its attempts to gain political autonomy from Dutch colonial control. It moves on to talk about the impact …

Familiar Forms, Unfamiliar Containers: A Formal Examination Of The Body, Mind, And Community In Black Women’S Science Fiction And Fantasy, Cameron Clark Bauserman

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Black Women’s writing is ultimately a study in intersectionality and, as such, formalism provides a productive ontology for parsing the intersections of various forms. Using formal theorists Anna Kornbluh and Caroline Levine’s works as a starting point, this thesis examines the formal treatment of the body, mind, and community in Black Women’s Science Fiction and Fantasy (BWSFF), specifically in the works of N.K. Jemisin and Octavia Butler. The act of defining genre is a historically informed act. As such, this thesis demarcates BWSFF as its own distinct genre because of its treatment of the aforementioned forms. Furthermore, the works within …

Black Resilience And Empowerment Through Self-Affirming Self-Care At Predominately White Institutions Of Higher Education, Vicki L. Garrison

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

The institution of higher education, especially predominately white institutions of higher education (PWIHE), perpetuates the subjugation of Black people through the existence of traditional societal ideologies, values, and practices that function with and reinforce racism as the norm. Limited research exists about self-care strategies that assist Black students with navigating PWIHE. The purpose of this study is to explore strategies of self-care that can assist Black students to more healthily and successfully navigate a PWIHE. This qualitative narrative study illuminates Black experiences, empowers Black voices, and validates Black truth while extracting and capitalizing on Black agency to generate knowledge for …

A Case Of Sexual Misconduct: Gender Dynamics, Cultural Hegemony, And The United States Military In The Pacific 1945 - Present, Liam Thomas Edwards

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

This research will focus on the sexual misconduct of the United States military following the end of the Second World War in the Korean peninsula, Japan, and the Philippines. In this research, I will argue that the United States military engaged in a system of widespread sexual misconduct in the Pacific following the conclusion of the Second World War. Its success in distancing the institution from this behavior in the historical record and historical memory has much to do with its place in the international system today. The hegemonic power that the United States represents on the world stage has …

Bound To Slavery: Economic And Biographical Connections To Atlantic Slavery Between The Maritimes And West Indies After 1783, Sarah Elizabeth Chute

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Born in Africa, shipped to the West Indies, enslaved in the American colonies, and promised freedom in Colonial Canada: this well-known narrative traces a journey from tropical climates to northern temperate zones, from slavery to freedom. However, in the late eighteenth century, thousands of Black people experienced a journey from slavery in the American and West Indian colonies to continued enslavement in the Maritimes (Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island). Their stories challenge our understanding of the more familiar narrative that traces the lives of free Black Loyalists who went from slavery to freedom in the Atlantic world …

A Deed Without A Name: Magical Social Reproduction In Shakespeare’S Midsummer Night’S Dream, Macbeth, And The Tempest, Emily Thibodeau

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

This paper is an exploration of William Shakespeare’s play-texts featuring magical women— A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Macbeth, and The Tempest—through the lens of Social Reproduction Theory. By engaging in thorough examination of the embodiment of Shakespeare’s magical women on the stage and in performance, this paper seeks to uncover the ways in which modern attitudes, assumptions, and biases about sexuality, reproduction, motherhood, and parenting are revealed through the reception of characters who precede the current moment by hundreds of years. The Love in Idleness flower, the Weird Sisters’ prophesies, and Prospero’s magical manipulation of the island’s inhabitants all center around …

Queer Anxieties In Washington State History, Michael Diambri

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

Through the interpretative lens of “queer anxieties,” this thesis overviews the history of cultural anxieties about nonnormative gender and sexuality in Washington State since 1889. While employing a capacious “queer” framework, this study highlights the creation, dissemination, and management of individual and cultural anxieties about gender and sexuality. In doing so, this study posits how an “anxious turn” can benefit the study of Washington’s history. Ranging from the 1880s to 1990s, this work overviews a wide variety of phenomena which invoked anxiety including: sodomy laws, interracial sexual relations, cross-dressing, the creation of homosocial male spaces, gay travel, LGBT activist organizations, …