History Commons^™

Politics Of Urban Design: Racist Agendas Built Into The Environment, Chassidy Titley

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

美学、文学、白花文、和製漢語: The Allure Of Japanese Loanwords And Its Effects On Modernization In China And Japan, Justice Tyner

Senior Theses and Projects

For both China and Japan, the late 19th century and early 20th century can be characterized as a chaotic period of death and rebirth. Faced with the choices of “modernize or go bust,” the Meiji oligarchs and Qing empire scrambled to solidify a unique national identity amidst the waves of Western influence. However, both nations faced one major problem. As intellectuals rushed to adapt to Western political systems, educational systems, and philosophies, they realized both languages lacked the words to discuss the Western concepts they yearned to put into practice. Therefore, the distinguished Genro of the Meiji restoration pondered: “How …

Oysters In A Half Shell: An Environmental History Of Fishing In Shenzhen From 1960-2010, Jiawei Li

Senior Theses and Projects

As the most rapidly urbanized city in the world, Shenzhen’s history contains potential case studies of human-nature relationships. This thesis discusses the environmental history in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China from 1960 to 2010 from the perspective of the oyster industry. The study invokes the existing research about the industrial, cultural and urban planning history of Shenzhen in the last 40 years and discusses the environmental impact on marine ecology and oyster industry in Shenzhen. This thesis aims to explain the impact of Chinese environmental policies at the regional level and understand the influence on vulnerable communities and policymakers. This thesis examines …

Gesundheit, Glück Und Schrecken: Der Krankmachende Eroberungszug Der Nationalsozialisten Für Die Hygiene Aus Wissenschaftlich-Humanistischer Sicht, Nic Zacharewski

Senior Theses and Projects

Hygiene and Horror- The Ethical Considerations of The National Socialists' Conquest for Health and the Parallels to Contemporary Considerations and Consequences;

A Scientific Humanist Perspective

Nicholas Zacharewski

It is a long-held misunderstanding that evil has exceptional origins. Time and history have proven that evil is banal. An environment of economic crisis, extreme patriotism, and social rejection have all played an essential role in creating some of the greatest atrocities known in human history. The National Socialist (Nazi) party, which controlled the German state from 1933-1945, epitomizes evil. Infamous for its crimes against humanity, however, relatively unknown otherwise, are the origins …

Crónicas De Los Inocentes: Los Efectos De La Guerra Contra El Narcotráfico En México Durante El Nuevo Milenio, Citlalli Zavala

Senior Theses and Projects

In 2006, Felipe Calderón became Mexico’s 63^rd president, and within 11 days of his presidency, he declared a “War on Drugs” to combat drug-related violence that has been pervasive for more than 17 years. His plan was to send out thousands of military troops to the states most affected by narcotrafficking and violence. However, the number of homicides, kidnappings, and extorsions surged dramatically during his 6-year term and his alleged “war.” Three years later in 2009, the Spanish journalist Judith Torrea, moved to Ciudad Juarez to document the experiences of those who daily suffered the most as a consequence …

From The Drawing Room To The Guillotine: A Study Of French Women's Intellectual Involvement In The Enlightenment, Allison Rau

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

Renewal To Wreckage: Redevelopment In New Haven And The Oak Street Project, Harrison Silver

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

The Nazi Aesthetic: Nuance And Contradiction In Systematic Art Theft And Collection Efforts, Katharine J. Namon

Senior Theses and Projects

Nazi art collecting and looting was a strong and persistent undercurrent throughout World War II. The public and private practices of Nazi officials reveal both their aesthetic tastes and obsession with establishing themselves as highly educated, cultured patrons of the arts. Although the party’s artistic preferences are hard to define, it is evident that their stance on what constituted fine art and culture was entirely illogical, inconsistent, and incongruent. By examining their motives for acquiring such an astounding amount of art, the artistic tastes of individual Nazi officials, and the public exhibitions they held to advertise their values, one can …

William Byrd Ii Of Westover, Assertions Of Status, And The Paradox Of Control In Colonial Virginia, As Seen In His 1709-1712 Secret Diary, Kip Lynch

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

The Restitution Of Nazi-Looted Art In The United States: A Legal And Policy Analysis, Katharine J. Namon

Senior Theses and Projects

Restitution of Nazi-looted art in the United States is a complicated legal and policy issue. Victims and their heirs seeking restitution of their stolen art frequently encounter inconsistent legal standards at the state, federal, and international levels. Moreover, there are many different parties involved in these cases, including countries, museums, private collections, auction houses, heirs, and individuals who may have an interest in the particular work of art. Ethics must also be considered, and in the past, international principles for nations have been established to guide the process of delivering victims of wartime looting justice. Unfortunately, the current legal framework …

The Camera As A Political Tool: Examining Photography And The Sri Lankan Civil War, Brooke Samaratunga

Senior Theses and Projects

This research project is based on an analysis from photographs from newspaper and online media archives. All of the images the newspapers published from three specific media sources will be examined. These photographs have been accessed through online archives. This study will focus on images from the tail end of the war specifically from the years 2007-2009, as the war ended in May 2009. This project will focus on international sources and how they portrayed images of the Sri Lankan war. Domestic sources were not considered due to the inherent bias Sri Lanka has with the Civil War. News sources …

The Indigenous Poster Child Of The Lost Cause: An Examination Of The Historiography Of Brigadier General Stand Watie And The Legacy Of Cherokee Confederate Involvement During The Civil War, Corey Cheung

Senior Theses and Projects

Stand Watie, the only Indian Brigadier general to serve on either side during the Civil War, has a legacy that is intertwined with the problematic beliefs like that of the Lost Cause and his image has undergone a revision that aims to exploit his Indigeneity for the purpose of exalting the wider Confederacy. This paper seeks to examine how the historiography of biographies on Watie contributed to this image that dominates the public imagination and how the effects of this portrayal can be observed in the modern day.

Understanding The Complexities And Origins Of Gun Violence In Chicago, Christopher Bilicic

Senior Theses and Projects

This thesis attempts to re-think the way lawmakers, policy makers, and everyday Chicagoans look at and talk about gun violence in Chicago. I attempt to do this by taking a historical approach where Chicago's history of housing and police discrimination against its black communities is outlined. In doing this, I seek to show that many of the factors that are driving violence in the city's black neighborhoods - such as legal cynicism and concentrated inequalities - were created by this discriminatory past. Urban gun violence in Chicago is heavily concentrated in and driven by its black neighborhoods. After taking a …

"There Is No Corruption In The World So Bad": Archbishop William Laud, William Prynne, And Secret Histories Of Caroline England, 1633-1646, Brendan W. Clark

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

Les Esprits Vodou, L’Oncle Sam, Et Le Crucifix : Les Relations Endommagées Entre Le Monde Occidental Et Haïti Dans Bain De Lune, Catherine S. Freeman

Senior Theses and Projects

In her novel Bain de Lune, Haitian writer Yanick Lahens opens the doors of her native country to a Western readership that may be unfamiliar with its culture and history, in part because it has been mistreated by Western powers ever since gaining its independence in 1804. Readers are transported to the heart of a culture rich in Haitian Vodou traditions through the interwoven stories of the villagers of Anse Bleue, who struggle to survive the political instability of their country. Vodou is foregrounded through the narrative of the spirit of Cétoute, a young woman who is found dead on …

The Twentieth Century Downfall Of Professional Midwifery In Britain And Its Gendered Connotation, Katherine Epstein

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

Les Femmes Algériennes, Le Patriarcat Et Les Féministes Blanches Dans Inch’Allah Dimanche Et Viva Laldjérie, Bailey Cook

Senior Theses and Projects

This thesis explores the politically charged topic of the representations of Algerian women in contemporary Franco-Algerian cinema. Yamina Benguigui’s Inch’allah Dimanche and Nadir Moknèche’s Viva Laldjérie were both released in the early 2000s, in the midst of debates around feminism, secularism (or laïcité) and the so-called Islamic “veil.” At a time when some white French feminists were speaking on behalf of Algerian women, claiming they were “oppressed” while glorifying French culture, these films highlight a plurality of Algerian women’s experiences in a postcolonial context. Inch’allah Dimanche depicts women’s immigration during France’s policy of regroupement familial in the early 1970s, …

Riots And Rebellions: Memory Of Newark's Long Hot Summer Of 1967, William Tjeltveit

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

Marriage And Motherhood: The Moral Connection Between “The Heptameron” By Marguerite De Navarre And “The Lessons Of Anne Of France”, Sophie Klieger

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

The Architecture Of Violence: The Reign Of Terror And The Character Of Bloodshed, Aidan Turek

Senior Theses and Projects

Revolutions are pivotal event in political history, compressing far-reaching social changes into the space of a few years. The French is the best understood revolution, and yet political scientists have focused more on the causes of revolution, its initial phase, and the consequences. This scholarship ignores the Reign of Terror, and revolutionary violence more broadly, despite the central importance of violence in shaping the course of revolutions. This thesis breaks down the Reign of Terror as an exemplary phase of violence via three broad ecumenical theoretical approaches, and in so doing makes vital connection between social and political developments on …

The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict In The Trump Era: A Human Rights Perspective, Manny Rodriguez

Senior Theses and Projects

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been an ongoing war in the Middle East that began in the mid-20th century. Over the last seventy years, the region has been characterized by widespread violence and war as disputes over territory and religious freedom have heightened tensions between the Israelis and Palestinians. Many countries, especially the United States, have attempted to resolve the conflict and bring peace to the region. Since the conflict started, U.S. presidents, both Republican and Democrat alike, have generally maintained a similar, pro-Israel approach while attempting to be inclusive of the Palestinian community. However, the election of Donald J. Trump …

The Permanent Liminality Of Pakistan's Northern Areas- The Case Of Gilgit-Baltistan, Hamna Tariq

Senior Theses and Projects

Since Pakistan’s inception, Gilgit-Baltistan, a sprawling region in Northern Pakistan, has not been granted provincial status due to its colonial association with the disputed region of Kashmir. Gilgit-Baltistan refutes its forceful integration with Kashmir, an unfortunate remnant of British divide-and-rule strategy, and demands provincial recognition and constitutional rights. Pakistan unfairly claims that it awaits the UN-sanctioned plebiscite in Kashmir to determine the region’s status. However, the likelihood of a plebiscite is little to none, since the Indian government officially annexed Indian-held Kashmir in August 2019, breaching the UN resolution on the plebiscite. A region that has been at the mercy …

Hell Hath No Appetite Like A Woman: Food Imagery In The Lives Of The Wife Of Bath And Margery Kempe, Rhone O'Hara

Senior Theses and Projects

This thesis focuses on the medieval texts of Chaucer’s “Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale” and The Book of Margery Kempe. Specifically it analyzes The Wife of Bath, as one of Chaucer’s most famous literary characters in The Canterbury Tales written in 1387 and Margery Kempe, a medieval mystic whose story is known as the first autobiography written in English in the 1432. Furthermore, this thesis explores how the Wife of Bath and Margery Kempe's relationships with literal and figurative food define their experiences as middle-class medieval wives. It is through food that the Wife of Bath and Margery …

La Conquista RetóRica: La AutolegitimacióN De HernáN CortéS Y Su JustificacióN Del Colonialismo EspañOl A TravéS De Las Cartas De RelacióN (1519 - 1526), Kent Shi

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

Die Ästhetik Des Dritten Reiches, Aidan Turek

Senior Theses and Projects

The specter of fascism haunts democracies the world over, leading to valuable new research into the criminal fascistic regimes of the past, most notably Germany’s experience with Nazism. However, scholarship regarding the Third Reich often tends towards institutional and biographical portraits, leaving underexamined the deep connection between Nazism and the arts. Architecture was at the heart of the Third Reich’s cultural Weltanschauung and serves not only to inform us of the social mores affecting and informing leaders of the time, but also as a masterful depiction of how space can be manipulated towards ideological ends. By working through the built …

Fomo, Liquid Courage, And The Intoxicated Self, Lindsay Pressman

Senior Theses and Projects

“Binge-drinking” cannot simply be recognized as a feature of campus culture, but as the product of a profoundly alienating one, made strikingly evident by our creation of a separate world (“drunk world”). We have created a small world of impossible possibles that exists in the corners of the actual; a separate world, in which the imagining of the self, other, and the world, is not only permissible but promoted. At the heart of college students’ “partying hard” is a longing, hope, and dogged determination that the liberating and unifying aspects of this world can overwhelm the actual...and in the meantime …

Sympathy For The Devil - The Gothic As Social Commentary In Charles Dickens' Novels, Tiara Desire-Brisard

Senior Theses and Projects

No abstract provided.

Gewalt Und Gedächtnis: An Examination Of Gerhard Richter’S 18. Oktober 1977 In Relation To The West German Mass Media, Matthew Mcdevitt

Senior Theses and Projects

In 1988, Gerhard Richter completed 18. Oktober 1977, the controversial fifteen-painting cycle that details the history and memory of the Red Army Faction (RAF), the homegrown left-extremist group that terrorized the Federal Republic of Germany from 1970 until 1977, carrying out a campaign of bank robberies, bombings, and kidnappings in support of its armed struggle against contemporary capitalism and the perceived threat of reemergent fascism in postwar West Germany. Richter appropriates found media and police photographs to cast the RAF and the events of the “German Autumn,” the period of intense and escalating confrontations between the RAF and the …

Gewalt Und Gedächtnis: Gerhard Richters 18. Oktober 1977 Und Die Westdeutschen Massenmedien, Matthew Mcdevitt

Senior Theses and Projects

In 1988, Gerhard Richter completed 18. Oktober 1977, the controversial fifteen-painting cycle that details the history and memory of the Red Army Faction (RAF), the homegrown left-extremist group that terrorized the Federal Republic of Germany from 1970 until 1977, carrying out a campaign of bank robberies, bombings, and kidnappings in support of its armed struggle against contemporary capitalism and the perceived threat of reemergent fascism in postwar West Germany. Richter appropriates found media and police photographs to cast the RAF and the events of the “German Autumn,” the period of intense and escalating confrontations between the RAF and the …

Das Ss-Helferinnenkorps: Drei Phasen, Drei Frauen, Hayden Mueller

Senior Theses and Projects

Since the end of World War II, scholarship on the Third Reich has focused predominantly on men. Recent developments in the field have brought women into view, but their roles, motivations, and contributions remain under-researched. The SS-Helferinnenkorps, created for the dual purpose of relieving male communications staff for service on the front and establishing a vetted group of women embodying Himmler’s weibliche Ideal, has remained largely overlooked, and the little serious scholarship available presents the organization as a separate unit. To fill gaps in the research as well as bring about an understanding of the SS-Helferinnenkorps in the context of …