Africana Studies Commons^™

Black Transnationalism And Diaspora In Hip Hop: An Analysis Of Billy Woods’ “Asylum”, Rayli Dornan

Anthós

This paper examines Billy Woods' 2022 song, "Asylum" from the album Aethiopes, situating it between the frameworks of Black transnationalism and diaspora. Woods critiques colonialism and constructs a collective Black cultural identity through lyricism and sampling, despite the universally destructive effects of colonialism. The methodology of this paper involves close reading and listening to "Asylum," supported by theoretical perspectives on Black transnationalism and diaspora. This research also incorporates historical context and Woods' personal background to frame the song's narrative. Key materials include the song's lyrics, its samples, and relevant academic literature on colonialism and Black identity. "Asylum" critiques colonialism …

Shake Ya Ass, But Watch Yourself: An Intersectional And Decolonial Approach To Exploring The Sexualization Of Female Recording Artists And The Empowerment Of Women In The United States, H.B. Rebeka

Dissertations

This dissertation, titled Shake Ya Ass, But Watch Yourself: An Intersectional and Decolonial Approach to Exploring the Sexualization of Female Recording Artists and the Empowerment of Women in the United States, critically examines the phenomenon of sexualization of women in the music industry and its impact on female empowerment. Through an intersectional and decolonial feminist lens, the study delves into the historical and socio-cultural contexts that shape the portrayal and perception of female recording artists in the United States.

The research traces the roots of feminism and the commodification of racial stereotypes through music, exploring how female empowerment has been …

Determining Factors For Improved Uptake Of Harm Reduction Services In The United States: A Study Of Inclusive, Culturally Sensitive Messaging, Lauretta Ekanem Omale

Dissertations

Harm reduction refers to public health policies and programs aimed at decreasing the adverse consequences associated with drug use. While harm reduction services (e.g., syringe exchange programs) can mitigate health risks, marginalized groups face barriers to service access and utilization, partially due to ineffective messaging approaches that fail to align with cultural values and experiences. A one-size-fits-all approach to messaging can negatively impact service utilization, health outcomes, and health disparities. Ineffective communication can lead to poor adherence to treatment, poorer health outcomes, and increased adverse events.

Culturally insensitive communication contributes to stigma, mistrust, and lack of perceived relevance, discouraging service …

The Village On The Stage: Dramaturgies Of Modernity In African Concert Dance, Margit N. Edwards

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

My dissertation, The Village on the Stage: Dramaturgies of Modernity in African Concert Dance, analyzes the underlying theatrical logic in African concert dance through a dramaturgical model I call the village on the stage. The village on the stage dramaturgy has had multiple iterations over the 20^th and 21^st centuries both across the African continent and the African diaspora. Commonly presented within the world-dance market as neo-traditional African dance, the village on the stage refers to a set of practices of staging traditional dance and music of Africa and the African diaspora and serves as a …

A Journey To A Black Woman’S (Read Black Girl’S) Joy And Her Story Of Coming Home, Brittany Lauren Brock

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This is an auto/ethnography about the self-actualizing journey of reclaiming storytelling as my native tongue and my journey to joy. Throughout, using my story and the stories of so many others, I not only lay out the wounds (the pain, the loss, then the hope that comes) within the academy and outside in the world but I also use storytelling as a tool of healing—my tool of healing—to show how I wrote myself free.

When Black women (read Black girls) go through The Reckoning (the moment we realize something isn’t right with how we are perceived by others) …

Le Rôle Des Médias Dans La "Crise Anglophone" Au Cameroun, Arrayán Chia Vanegas-Farrara

CISLA Senior Integrative Projects

This essay is about a country with twenty-six million people, including 1.5 million refugees and a lot of problems due to the Anglophone crisis. It gives an in-depth view on the complex yet vibrant multilingualism in Cameroon with over 240 ethnic groups and many languages. The economically disadvantaged parts of Cameroon are the Anglophone regions such as the North-West with poverty rates at 57% and the South-West at 21% respectively for the year 2019. The article reflects upon how colonial legacies have given rise to contemporary social uneasiness in Cameroon, mostly within Anglophone regions. Additionally, this article highlights how economic …

Eng 155: Introduction To Literary Studies, Joseph Donica

Open Educational Resources

An OER syllabus covering the ways humans have read and continue to read literature from a variety of critical and theoretical perspectives. An emphasis is placed on the application of critical thought to writing expository essays and responding to readings.

Students Of Color At Predominantly White Institutions—The Experience, Shamar Barker

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Today, many people in society advocate for higher education. Parents, above all, are usually the biggest advocates for education. While this support is necessary, important, and appreciated by all students, especially by minority students, encouragement from our loved ones only signify the tip of the iceberg. This is because of the grueling experience that many students of color face at predominantly white institutions. Only then is the magnitude of said support put to the ultimate test, raising the question of how far support from family and peers really gets you when navigating a system that may not have been tailored …

“But Because We Are Christian”: The Exploration Of Communication Frames And Identity Negotiation Among African Immigrants And Black Americans In A Multicultural Church, Hawa Diakite

Masters Theses, 2020-current

This qualitative thesis examines identity negotiation and communication frames used among African immigrants and Black Americans who attend a multicultural church. Exploring the intersection of identity, race, and faith among African immigrants and Black Americans is valuable towards understanding the dynamics of their relationship in the context of Christian communities in the United States. As African Christian immigrants navigate the complexities of racial realities in the United States, their faith can serve as a safe place that shapes their sense of self and community belonging. Similarly, many Black Americans historically have drawn upon their Christian faith as a place of …

Cliffhanger, Micah Mickles

MFA in Visual Art

I am Micah Mickles, a mixed-media visual artist in St. Louis, Missouri. My artwork is deeply rooted in my personal experiences and serves as a memorial and monument to counteract the enduring effects of grief and loss. What sets my work apart is the transformative impact of my everyday encounters, inspired by my 14 years of experience working at Trader Joe's. These encounters have led me to reflect on my profound connections with diverse communities. By delving into the hidden narratives of mundane materials encountered in the workplace, I prompt a reexamination of convenience and supply chain origins. Inspired by …

See Me Show Me: Black Women Representation In Television Sitcoms, Lauryn Jennings

Master's Theses

Television is a commonplace item within the households of America. It brings the family together as well teaching people about other people. With this Black women have been shown in one-dimensional images that are harmful. Although these stereotypes are old they are still present within modern television sitcoms.

My Sauce! Living In The Polyrhythm, Zakiya Harris

Theses and Dissertations

This paper contextualizes “Ghana: The Place Where the Chief Sleeps,” for which Harris served as dance captain, rehearsal director, dancer, stager and choreographer. Harris details how her work living inside the polyrhythms of performance, practices, and pedagogies can produce a holistic West African dance education for students.

Rejection, Creation, And Abolitionist Futures: Sustaining Ecosystems Of Care Under Neoliberal Violence 1980-Present, Maya Phelps

Senior Honors Papers / Undergraduate Theses

The enforcement of the child welfare system through policies, funding practices, and ideologies is a national investment in the nuclear family as a critical social institution to the United States (US); this investment communicates to the broader population that conforming to this heteropatriarchal, white supremacist conception of family provides protection from state intervention to those who conform. My project interrogates child welfare’s enforcement of normative families, and the resistance from Black family formations and kinship based on their social position and its relation to power. Focusing on the period between 1980 and the present, I examine the ways Black family …

A Quartet Of Consequence: Randolph, Rustin, Baker & Levison & The Movement They Made, Jonathan Klein

Graduate Masters Theses

The historiography of the civil rights movement has been dominated by a debate over the proper placement of the historian’s lens. Should it provide a top/down view concentrating on high profile leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr., or should it have a bottom/up focus that zeroes in on courageous grassroots leaders? Some historians have argued for a both/and approach with perspective on both the leaders at the top and at the bottom and how they interacted. What has been missing from this debate is the decisive impact made by networks of leaders who set aside their own narrow interests to …

Victim Or Villain: Female Resilience And Agency In The Face Of Trauma In Chimamanda Adichie’S, Purple Hibiscus (2003) And Tsitsi Dangarembga’S, Nervous Conditions (1988), Adaobi Juliet Chukwuma

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As long as disparities persist in the way women are treated as compared to their male counterparts, the issue of gender will continue to call forth literary productions. For this reason, female writers are on a mission to dismantle the stereotypes that keep women confined to societal roles. Grounded in a feminist framework, this study focuses on the gender disparity theme in Chimamanda Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus and Tsitsi Dangarembga’s Nervous Conditions. The aim is to examine how these writers represent the trauma of women living in an African patriarchal system. The traumatic experiences of the female characters in both texts …

Bedeviled Beauty: My Journey Through White American Theater Institutions, J'Aila C. Price

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Game console: Oculus Quest

World: American Theater Institutions

Player: Minority

Place: United States

Level: “Ain’t no way.”

This thesis explores the contrast between the Westernized philosophies ingrained in my education and my identity as a Black female artist. It sheds light on the difficulties of pursuing higher education in the arts and the gaps that arise from limited exposure to culturally diverse Black resources, revealing the systemic issues in Western performance education. The paper also discusses the insights gained from my journey as a Black female artist, focusing on my thesis performance of Blood at the Root, which is …

Breaking The Rule Of Silence: Childbirth And Gendered Power In Efuru And The Joys Of Motherhood, Sunday Elliott Uguru

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This study examines the thematic preoccupation of childbirth in the formative period of feminist discourse in African literature through a critical study of selected novels of Igbo women of southeastern Nigeria. The novels studied represent the earliest published African texts in English by women. The period under focus falls within the emerging stage of Nigerian literary tradition in its written form with a dominant presence of men. This study investigates the women novelists' perspective toward the failure of male authored works to represent women's childbirth experience. Through a critical reading of Flora Nwapa's Efuru and Buchi Emecheta's The Joys of …

The Author And Apartheid: Building Pro-Blackness At Bgsu Through James Baldwin And The Anti-Apartheid Movement, Noah C. Fitch

Honors Projects

The stories of anti-apartheid and James Baldwin at BGSU provides a basis for a building of pro-Blackness in the on-campus community. Through the contextualization and narrative building through a historical sociological framework, these two events show the extent of activism in the 1970s and 1980s rather than the traditional narrative that is discussed. By expanding that narrative, it also expands the narrative surrounding the history not just of BGSU, but the way universities frame their own histories. Additionally, these events take place in the era when the transition from looking at Civil Rights to Human Rights is more prevalent and …

Shaky Foundations: Cultural Classifications In Museum Collections Management Systems And The Endurance Of Colonial-Era Terminology, Carlee S. Forbes, Erica P. Jones

Artl@s Bulletin

This article uses two musical instruments with attached ancestral remains and labeled as “Asante” from the Fowler Museum at UCLA to consider effects of style-based cultural classifications that appear in museum databases today. We highlight the sway of past classifications over our current understanding of objects that is prolonged by the problem of confirmation-bias in museum collections management systems. We then indicate how working across disciplines stimulated a more nuanced understanding about the complexities of artistic styles for musical instruments with attached human remains in the Akan-speaking region of West Africa.

Cet article étudie deux instruments de musique incorporant des …

What Does It Mean To Keep Kissing-Close To The Evidence, And Why Might It Matter?, Susan Elizabeth Gagliardi, Constantine Petridis

Artl@s Bulletin

African art specialists often lack detailed information to assess the original meanings, uses, and contexts of so-called historical or traditional arts of Africa, and they rely on indirect evidence to interpret the works. Thus, claims about African arts often reflect speculation rather than irrefutable details. When specific documentation for an object does exist, the circumstances of its creation require careful evaluation as well. The assessment of the quality and reliability of any claim is of particular importance in attempts to determine an object’s place of origin in the ongoing debates about restitution.