American Studies Commons^™

Exergy Modeling To Compare Engineered Products To Biological Systems For Sustainable Design, Richard D. Stokes Jr.

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

An ambitious and novel approach to engineering design and sustainability has been taken to explore the potential of drawing parallels between mechanical and biological systems for the possible development of sustainable engineering design metrics using a thermodynamic model. This approach looks to biology. Natural selection has given biological beings and processes high exergetic efficiencies, even while being only 30-40% energy efficient on the cell level. This energy inefficiency, resulting in a release of heat, can then be used to aid in driving other biochemical processes. The Gibbs free energy becomes more negative proportionally with an increase in temperature, resulting in …

Evaluating Knowledge And Attitudes Of Undergraduate Nursing Students Regarding Pain Management, Jessica Latchman

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Unmanaged pain is a widespread problem that many cancer patients face on a daily basis. Cancer pain, which can either be caused by complications due to the disease process itself or from treatment measures used, has devastating effects on the quality of life for these patients and their caregivers. This study examined the knowledge and attitudes of undergraduate students regarding pain management.

The sample in this study consisted of 41 undergraduate students at the University of South Florida College of Nursing. The students sampled were predominantly white, (n=30), female (n=37), seniors (n=41) taking Leadership and Management in Nursing. After volunteering …

Human-Wildlife Conflict Across Urbanization Gradients: Spatial, Social, And Ecological Factors, Amanda H. Gilleland

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

As suburban and exurban residential developments continue to multiply in urban areas, they encroach on wildlife habitats leading to increased human-wildlife interactions. The animals involved in direct conflict with homeowners are often relocated or exterminated by the homeowners. Often the homeowners contact state licensed wildlife trappers to eliminate the problem animal. In this study I examined how landscape, ecological, and social factors influence the incidence of human-wildlife conflict of thirty two residential areas in the Tampa, Florida metropolitan area. These residential areas, totaling over 300 km2, are part of the urban development gradient representing a range of urban land use …

Diffuse Degassing And The Hydrothermal System At Masaya Volcano, Nicaragua, Sophie C. P Pearson

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Hydrothermal systems change in response to volcanic activity, and in turn may be sensitive indicators of volcanic activity. Fumaroles are a surface manifestation of this interaction. We use time series of soil temperature data and numerical models of the hydrothermal system to investigate volcanic, hydrologic and geologic controls on this diffuse degassing.

Soil temperatures were measured in a low-temperature fumarole field located 3.5 km from the summit of Masaya volcano, Nicaragua. They respond rapidly, on a time scale of minutes, to changes in volcanic activity also manifested at the summit vent. The soil temperature response is repetitive and complex, and …

Evaluation Of The Flicker Effect As A Generative Strategy In Enhancing Computerbased Instruction (Cbi) Of Visual Recognition And Classification, Ping Luo

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Few studies address the question of the technology-based instructional methods of visual patterns, so the overarching purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of three treatments on pattern recognition. Specifically, with a pretest-posttest control group experimental study, the effectiveness of three instructional strategies, a flicker treatment, a no-flicker treatment, and a comparison treatment, (groups respectively analyzing sequential displays of two similar images with and without a blank screen in between and simultaneous displays of two images), was compared based on recognition (memory) and classification (transfer) test scores. The group differences in learning effectiveness and efficiency were also measured …

Stoner, Joel, B. 1950 (Fa 492), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 492. Interviews, transcriptions, photographs, and miscellaneous data collected by Joel Stoner pertaining to the Bowling Green, Kentucky music scene in the 1970s.

Hickey, Frankie (Fa 511), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Foklife Archives Project 511. This collection contains a tape recorded interview conducted by Frankie Hickey with Ida Ellington Williams. It also contains short written life stories for Williams and several other African Americans from southcentral Kentucky and middle Tennessee.

Smith, C. Jason - Compiler (Sc 2242), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 2242. "Concordance to Robert Penn Warren's 'All the King's Men'" (based on the first edition). Also includes associated letter.

African American Heritage In Bowling Green And Warren County, Kentucky (Fa 509), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 509. This collection contains tape recorded interviews conducted by Maxine Ray and Theresa Lee. the interviews deal with the heritage of African Americans in Bowling Green and Warren County, Kentucky. This project was sponsored by a grant from the Kentucky Oral History Commission.

French, Mark Edward (Fa 230), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid and full-text scan of paper (Click on “Additional Files” below) for Folklife Archives Project 230. Paper: "The Sleeping Roommate" written by Mark Edward French for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class.

Hodges, Jack, Ii (Fa 227), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid and full-text scan of paper (Click on “Additional Files” below) for Folklife Archives Project 227. Paper: "Family Ghost Stories" written by Jack Hodges II for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class.

Norris, Ruby (Fa 218), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid and full-text scan of collection (Click on “Additional Files” below) for Folklife Archives Project 218. Paper: "[Folk Medicine in Cumberland County]" written by Ruby Norris for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class.

Comparison And Improvement Of Different Access Methods In Femtocell Networks, İbrahim Demirdögen

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A variety of wide band wireless systems have been pushed towards their limits in order to meet growing interest for high data rate in wireless communications.In particular, the limit due to the spectrum scarcity forces communication systems to utilize the spectrum resource at maximum efficiency level. One of the methods that allow effective spectrum employing is to cover multiple systems over same spectrum source by allowing bearable interference to occur between them. Femtocells have been recently introduced as a remedy to spectrum scarcity and coverage problems in current cellular structures. Femtocells are personal use base stations and they share the …

Dust, Ash, And The Sublime: Tracing Kant's Aesthetics In Cormac Mccarthy's The Crossing And The Road, Ben Gerdts

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

My thesis entails an examination into the presence of the sublime in two novels by Cormac McCarthy: his postmodern western The Crossing and his apocalyptic work The Road. I draw on Kant's aesthetic theory of the sublime, specifically focusing on the Dynamical and Mathematical sublime in relation to the settings of these two narratives. For the sake of brevity, I limit my study to nature's and religion's relation to the sublime in these works. Areas of particular interest to me include: a) How/why the characters of each novel appear unaffected by or even resigned to the lack of control …

Illusion In Troilus And Cressida, Edward Janz

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is an examination of Shakespeare's 1603 satire Troilus and Cressida that looks at illusion and the value given to it by means of war, Helen of Troy, and ultimately the two lovers themselves. Although it is depressingly obvious throughout the drama that life is an illusion, it is also obvious that there is a need for that illusion, and an equally profound necessity to have the illusion debunked.

The first part of the thesis examines the impact of war on Troy. This part concentrates on the myth of the hero, who like Falstaff presents himself to the world …

Re-Tooling An American Metropolis, Robert Shawn Hott

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Re-tool:

v.tr. re-tooled, re-tooling, re-tools

1. To fit out (a factory, for example) with a new set of machinery and tools for making a different product.

2. To revise and reorganize, especially for the purpose of updating or improving.

The American ideals inherent in the suburbs are the promise of space, affordability, convenience, and traditional family life; conversely the public realms of the suburban typology become disconnected from each other as well as the larger city. The Generic City condition in which the periphery is no longer captivated by the center from which it was created is pervasive in the …

Carbon Dioxide Capture From Fossil Fuel Power Plants Using Dolomite, Drupatie Latchman

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The main objective of this research is to develop a simple and cost effective separation method that captures carbon dioxide from power plant flue gas, as a pure stream that can be stored using regenerable dolomite (calcium magnesium carbonate) as the sorbent. The developed dolomite sorbent was evaluated for carbon dioxide capture capacity using muti-cycle tests of cyclical carbonation/calcination experiments in the thermogravimetric analyzer (TGA) model SDT 600. The variables controlled in the experiment were weight of calcium oxide and sintering time of the sample. The dolomite materials investigated were from two sources Alfa Aesar and Specialty Minerals. The prepared …

Elevating Communication, Thao Thanh Nguyen

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The products of vehicular transportation have led the modern traveler into a crisis of place. The modern journey that is held within ceaseless flux, confine movement to edges facilitating prompt passage yet negating active participation. These edges govern movement, highlighting points of destination while simultaneously obscuring our journey in between travels. The limited participation and extended observation of one's place within the concurring boundaries renders the senses dormant, causing passivity and reluctance to participate or communicate with the city. These lines of movement, demanding our attention toward beginning and end but omitting the middle, transforms the city, home, and place …

“An Indescribable Sound” In William Faulkner’S The Sound And The Fury, Lynn Ramsey

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Sound and the Fury is a noisy book. Through the audible, the barely audible, and the silence, William Faulkner supports his narrative design with sound beyond dialog to inform and inflect the destabilizing narrative voices. This essay explores Faulkner's use of the sound and noise of the novel as another narrative voice. Faulkner's rich use of sound as a recurring motif, almost a persona or narrator itself, functions not merely to animate the action, the characters, and the title; it also speaks in the "hush" and the freighted "stiffly sibilant" whispers of those who dare not speak, or are …

Refusing To Go Silently: Female Wit As Combating A Culture Of Silence In Frances Burney And Elizabeth Inchbald's Texts, Megan M. Weber

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the hands of two prominent authors, Elizabeth Inchbald and Frances Burney, a critical paradox concerning female silence arises: while both authors operate very successfully in the publishing world, both do so while subverting impositions of silence, exhibiting a clear breach of propriety. An examination of Inchbald's novel A Simple Story and play Wives as they Were, Maids as they Are and Burney's novel Cecilia and play The Witlings, elucidates how each author adapts literary genres to portray female wit, exposing eighteenth-century impositions of silence in the process. By engendering female characters with the ability to employ humor as …