Sociology Commons^™

Among America’S Oldest, Opioid Overdoses Are On The Rise, Emma Davis

Capstones

Often overlooked in coverage of the opioid crisis, American seniors have experienced a dramatic increase in addiction in the last two decades. Drug overdoses in adults ages 55-64 have risen six-fold since 1999, according to the Center for Disease Control, and emergency visits due to opioid misuse tripled among those over 65 from 2006-2014, a study from Towson University found. This print and video piece investigates how heroin and prescription opioid use among older adults in New York City has contributed to the overdose rate; the consequences of opioid restrictions for geriatric pain patients; and the treatment options for seniors …

The Never-Ending Lap, Ennica D. Jacob, Alexis Reese

Capstones

This personal film documents the journey of a Haitian-American woman dealing with sexual trauma in a culture that doesn’t speak candidly on the topic. How can women of the African- American diaspora break the cycle of sexual trauma and what are coping mechanisms to navigate their life choices with awareness?

The Never-Ending Lap will follow Ennica’s own healing process, delving delve into the cycles of sexual trauma. The film will explore past experiences through journal entries, therapy sessions and her love for track and field as she is on the road to search for coping mechanisms and healing.

Link: https://ennicajacob.myportfolio.com/videos

Infinity Wars: Post 9/11 Superhero Films And American Empire, Peter J. Bruno

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In the last two decades, superhero films have accounted for some of the most popular and financially lucrative films of all time. This thesis analyzes some of the aesthetic and ideological dimensions of various superhero films following their post 9/11 boom. Beginning with America’s response to the events of 9/11 and a subsequent retreat into a Manichean world of good versus evil, I introduce the term “empirical reality” in order to account for the ways daily American life is shielded from the worst effects of U.S. foreign policy. On screen this manifests by perpetuating the myth of the “clean war” …

Illness And The American Workplace: Issues And Implications For Employers And Employees, Victoria R. Dolan

Student Theses and Dissertations

This project aims to identify American employee experiences and existing workplace policies and cultures surrounding illness, disability, and sick leave. This approach was taken in order to closely examine what looks to be working well for companies and workers, and what could benefit from a more human centric approach in regards to workplace policy and employee support programs. The study of employee experiences in particular represents a gap in the current scholarly literature regarding illness and illness policy in the American workplace, and more accurately represents the experiences for both employees and employers. Furthermore, it assists with distinguishing the types …

Resisting Industrial Food Systems On The Web: How Non-Profit Organizations Use Digital Technology For Sustainability Education, Aleksandr Segal

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis examines the link between how community-based organizations use digital tools with the fundamentally resistance-based philosophy that these organizations have at the core of their mission. It aims to uncover how non-profit organizations (NPOs) that work in community development through food and agriculture use digital tools, and how their digital communication strategies relate to issues of resistance to neoliberalism and industrialization in the food and agriculture sectors.

Using a foundation of existing literature on food and agriculture, climate change and waste management, critical theory, and technology in pedagogy, this thesis will contextualize how non-profits resist neoliberal regimes of de-traditionalization …

Brrap Brrap Pew Pew: Representations Of Abortion In Adult Animated Television Comedy, Erika A. Byrnison

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis documents and analyzes representation of abortion in American adult animated comedy, charging that it is under-examined and significant because representation on television in other genres has traditionally been absent or misleading. It covers theories on how pop culture communicates social norms, and posits that greater truthful representation of abortion in popular culture may be effective in reducing prevalent abortion stigma in the U.S. amongst the young by normalizing and more accurately representing the procedure. It reviews why our culture should be concerned about reducing abortion stigma in the U.S. It also identifies the “taboo ratings paradox,” wherein television …

Refracting Immigration Rhetoric: The Struggle To Define Identity, Place And Nation In Southern Arizona, Emily Duwel

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis examines the refraction of immigration rhetoric in a local context through a collection of letters to the editor of southern Arizona’s largest and only daily newspaper, the Arizona Daily Star, for the period 2006-2010. The purpose is to further insight into the process by which xenophobic nationalism is both contested and legitimated ‘on the ground,’ within a violent paradigm of nativist rhetoric and exclusion. Findings reveal essential disjunctures between and within letter-writers’ conceptions of moral proximity and the social contract—as delimiting those obligations and expectations that inhere between society, the self and the stranger—as well as competing notions …