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Full-Text Articles in African American Studies

Melodies Of Strength: Exploring Black Resilience In American Musicals, Maegan Murphy May 2024

Melodies Of Strength: Exploring Black Resilience In American Musicals, Maegan Murphy

Theatre Thesis - Written Thesis

This thesis examines the evolution of strategies for portraying Black resilience in musicals with a focus on narratives, musical components, and thematic progression in productions such as The Wiz, Dreamgirls, and The Color Purple. It also explores the historical context of Black resilience as it relates to the post-Civil Rights Movement era, and determines how these musicals display and challenge societal stereotypes and systemic oppression faced by the Black community. By investigating characters’ journeys and struggles for self-discovery and empowerment, this paper intends to highlight the enduring theme of resilience and its importance within the Black American …


Contextualizing Feminism Within Igbo History And An Analysis Of The Works Of Ngozi Anyanwu, Chisom Awachie May 2023

Contextualizing Feminism Within Igbo History And An Analysis Of The Works Of Ngozi Anyanwu, Chisom Awachie

Theatre Thesis - Written Thesis

Throughout Nigeria’s history, Igbo women have contended with violence from colonial and imperialist forces and misogyny from the Igbo men in their communities. In solidarity with one another, Igbo women have continued to fight back to ensure their voices are heard in politics and access to professional careers. The Nigerian- and Igbo-American playwright Ngozi Anyanwu writes about Igbo women who assert themselves and maintain their agency throughout cultural and interpersonal conflicts, similar to these historical strategies. Anyanwu’s plays The Homecoming Queen, Good Grief, and My Name…is Beatrice feature women dealing with grief, sexual trauma, and access to reproductive healthcare between …


"You Don't Climb A Pepper Tree, You Go Around It", Chisom Awachie May 2023

"You Don't Climb A Pepper Tree, You Go Around It", Chisom Awachie

Theatre Thesis - Embodied Thesis

No abstract provided.


Honoring The Spirit: A Model For Observing, Witnessing, And Celebrating Spirituality And Religion In Dance/Movement Therapy, Rebekah Brown May 2023

Honoring The Spirit: A Model For Observing, Witnessing, And Celebrating Spirituality And Religion In Dance/Movement Therapy, Rebekah Brown

Dance/Movement Therapy Theses

Research has shown that people of color are less likely to seek out therapy for mental health care. Instead, they, specifically members of spiritual Black communities, have relied on turning to leaders in religious communities or spiritual practices. There is a stigma around mental health care amongst Black communities. These stigmas are deeply rooted in the racial disparities in the mental health field and the historical oppression of our spiritual practices or rituals throughout the African diaspora. My intention is to help bridge the gap between religious/spiritual Black communities and mental health care by offering a model for observing, witnessing, …


Aesthetics & Politics: A Brief History Of Japan & The Us’S 20th Century, Ricky Brown May 2022

Aesthetics & Politics: A Brief History Of Japan & The Us’S 20th Century, Ricky Brown

Theatre Thesis - Written Thesis

This paper is a look at the combination of aesthetics and politics and how that combination effected the lives of black Americans, Japanese women and the people of Korea under Japanese occupation during the early 1900s.


Dance/Movement Therapy In Response To Continuous Race-Based Trauma, Aliesha Bryan May 2021

Dance/Movement Therapy In Response To Continuous Race-Based Trauma, Aliesha Bryan

Dance/Movement Therapy Theses

Trauma is concomitant with a lack of safety; as such, where there is a threat to safety, there is likely to be trauma. Afrodescendants living in the United States, through an ongoing lack of human regard, are often powerless to ensure their safety, and are regularly subjected to continuous, race-based trauma. Racism is deeply embedded in the nation’s institutions as well as in every relationship, and this deeply pervasive and penetrating ideology influences strongly how individuals of any race interact with others. Race-based aggression, from micro- to macro-, has a profound and continuously traumatizing effect on Afrodescendants, with similarly profound …