Communication Commons^™

Coming Home Again: Television Sitcom Revivals, Brandon K. Hedgepeth

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

This thesis argues that the success of television situational comedy revivals correlates with television’s technological affordances as they have evolved over the past half-century. Specifically, three revival series are examined within this study, consisting of The New Leave it to Beaver (1983-1989), Fuller House (2016-2020), and The Conners (2018-Present). This paper uses the revival case studies to showcase their parallel relationship with the introduction of cable television and streaming media, alongside the resurgence of broadcast television to highlight the changing media landscape and the intertwined nature between technological advancement and the revival form. The study’s investigation of how nostalgia intersects …

More Than Representation Heartstopper: A Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis, Tracyann Josephine Harmer

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

This thesis is a multimodal critical discourse analysis of Netflix’s Heartstopper, written with the goal of understanding its methods of representation and queer world creation. Through analysis of the ideology of heteronormativity as it relates to masculinity, internalized homophobia, homophobia, and mental health, I expand upon the significance of queer representation for queer audiences, heterosexual audiences, and producers of queer media. Through a nuanced analysis of these themes, I display how and why Heartstopper has had enormous success and expand upon the cultural phenomena surrounding this media. Finally, this thesis places these nuanced analyses into the real-world reaction to …

African-American Parents’ Cultural Understandings Of The Concept Of Autism And Implications For Parental Communication And Health Management, Kellie J. Fennell

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

In 2023 the Centers of Disease Control reported that around 1 in 36 children are diagnosed with Autism in America and that the prevalence has increased by 178% since 2000 (CDC, 2023). Despite increases in awareness and diagnosis past research finds that the discussions of ASD in African American communities is minimal (Fombonne, 2003; Yeargin Allsopp et al., 2003). This disparity is important considering that African American children receive an ASD diagnosis years later than their white counterparts and are much more likely to be misdiagnosed (Mandell et al., 2009, 2002).

Given the history of a lack of representation of …

The Contextualization Of Myth: Identification Of Myth In The Propagation Of Narrative Across Generational Boundaries, Joseph G. Ponthieux

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

This thesis demonstrates the unique correlation between myth and the propagation of narrative across generational boundaries. It argues that myth occurs in the intersection of belief, semiotics, and context, and further enables a way of re-encoding a narrative with a dual contextuality. This dual context preserves a narrative’s literal context while endowing it with a new or modified myth context and affords the audience a selection of choices for how to receive a narrative experienced as myth. To demonstrate this correlation a Myth Context Reception Model is designed for the purpose of identifying ascendent, obscure or emergent myths evident in …

Lifespan Communication And Career Development Of Black Teachers: A Socio-Ecological Approach, Veronica Whinnett Hurd

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

This thesis unlocks the lifespan story of nine Black participants as they reflected on the communicative practices that guided their career journey towards becoming a teacher. Through the lens of Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) socio-ecological development model, the microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, macrosystem, and chronosystem were examined to understand the content of career-related memories and with whom or what the communicative experiences occurred with across the participants’ lifespan. This study also takes an in-depth look at how the content of the memories evolved across Erikson’s (1964) childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood developmental periods, and the influence of the proximal and distal socio-ecological environments …

Americans’ Willingness To Communicate With Mexican Immigrants: Effects Of Ethnocentrism And Immigration Status, Stephanie Leanne Harris

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

Prompted by the 2016 United States (US) Presidential election, the topic of Mexican immigration has come to figure prominently in contemporary societal discourse. This study explores the willingness of US citizens to communicate with Mexicans as a function of US citizens’ ethnocentrism and Mexicans’ immigration documentation status. Specifically, this study measured ethnocentrism (Neuliep & McCroskey, 1997) and general willingness to communicate (McCroskey, 1992) of US citizens and then considered the relationship of these variables to their willingness to communicate with documented and undocumented Mexican immigrants. The study also explored the potential role that various lifespan variables, such as early communication …

Communication Support And Religious Support In Managing Occupational Stress In Military Careers: A Career-Span Approach, Shantonee' Malee Mitchell

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

This thesis reports an exploratory and descriptive study of communication support and religious support used by military personnel to manage occupational stress over the course of a career and their perceived effectiveness at helping to manage occupational stress. Drawing on a lifespan communication approach, this study employed a careerspan perspective where occupational stressors and sources of support (human and religious) are examined over the course of military careers. Results find three different groups of sources of communicative support were used in different ways to help manage military occupational stress: sources within the military, sources outside of the military, and religious …

From Fandom To Franchise: Generational Discourse Among Fans And Producers, Nicholas C. Benson

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

Generational discourse surrounding fandom has been an understudied area of media studies. Using Disney's TRON franchise as a case study, this thesis looks at that discourse as it exists in two areas. The first chapter draws on interviews with several actual TRON fans and looks at how the concept of generation is imagined within the TRON fan community. The second chapter draws from promotional interviews done with TRON creator Steven Lisberger to analyze the way the concept of generation functions within the decision making practices and formation of career capital within Hollywood. Ultimately, this paper concludes that the concept of …

Zombies As A Generational Metaphor: Connections Between George A. Romero, Zombies And Fandom -- A Critical Study, Alfredo Torres

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

Since the creation of the modern day zombie by George A. Romero in his directorial debut with the genre altering film Night of the Living Dead in 1968, zombie have been associated with becoming a metaphoric representation of social and cultural issues surrounding the times these films were released, with Romero's films being at the forefront of this phenomenon. A review of Romero's career including his influences was examined as well as the film history of the zombie subgenre, the connections it has to its fans and how the fans influenced the development of the genre. A survey was connected …