Film and Media Studies Commons^™

Cartoon Kinship, Kelsey Bell Quinn

Master's Theses

Most people view cartoons as mindless entertainment exclusively for children. They dismiss the genre as if it only contains zany and overzealous characters who deal with simple, predictable challenges, easily resolved by the end of the episode. The negative attitude towards cartoons—or seemingly anything animated—undermines the importance of the lessons and the themes many shows do impart on their viewers, regardless of their age. Shows like Nickelodeon's Avatar: The Last Airbender cover a plethora of complex themes, but due to its status as an animated work, it has been disregarded as a show for children rather than being appreciated as …

Fugitive Colors, Natalie Rose Eddings

Theses and Dissertations

My objects are meditations on intertwining themes of labor, rest, and interiority and their shadow sides—power, subjugation and the gaze. I couple materials that have millenia-long histories such as metals, glass, paper and clay with found objects and plat materials to illustrate narratives and exhume memories. Drawn from nature and technologies of land, plant stewardship and the domestic realm, I imagine my sculptures as life supporting vessels or magical enclosures.

Through sculpture, photography and printmaking, I build structures that are space of quiet to be filled with thought, healing and development. Like incubators and seed pods, my work is protective …

Feral And Free: The Queering Of Motherhood In Rachel Yoder’S Nightbitch, Cassandra Haskell

Master's Theses

This thesis explores motherhood from a perspective that seeks to inform and challenge the patriarchal definitions of motherhood in order to simultaneously confront its restrictions and create new meanings from its institutionalized definition. The main text that this thesis analyzes is the 2021 novel Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder, as well as the 2024 film of the same name, critiquing how it successfully queers motherhood by questioning, challenging, and defying the impractical expectations placed upon mothers by society. Some secondary scholars whose works that I utilize to support my argument are authors such as Audre Lorde, Jessica Calarco, Adrienne Rich and …

Student Film Fest 2025 Playbill, Providence College Department Of Theatre, Dance, & Film

Playbill and Promotion

Providence College Department of Theatre, Dance & Film

John Bowab Studio Theatre, Smith Center for the Arts

Student Film Fest 2025

Thursday, May 1, 2025, 7PM

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS:

Fr. Ken Gumbert

COMPETING FILMS:

Will Drew ‘25, A Day in the Life: Luke Fonts, 3:49

Nariah Scott ’25, No Limit Just Miles Ft. Kimberly May, 4:25

Teddy Lucier ’25, The Growing Game, 5:53

Janet Newman ’27, Marvelous, 5:00

Rodney Lopez ’25, Lost and Found, 7:24

Gavin Sheridan ’25, Born to Die, 9:52

JURY DELIBERATIONS

The 2024 Film Festival winning film will be screened while jury …

Student Film Fest 2025 Poster, Providence College Department Of Theatre, Dance, & Film

Playbill and Promotion

Providence College Department of Theatre, Dance & Film

John Bowab Studio Theatre, Smith Center for the Arts

Student Film Fest 2025

Thursday, May 1, 2025, 7PM

Toujours Beaucoup: Representations Of Childhood And Education In 20th Century French Literature And Cinema, Delaney Drury

Poster Presentations

This project explores French literature and cinema with significant representations of education for the purpose of examining to what extent educational ideals are upheld or undermined.

The Use And Implications Of The Visual Presentation In The 2024 Presidential Debates, Emma L. Rasmussen

Journalism Undergraduate Honors Theses

In this study, the two 2024 presidential debates were analyzed for a variety of different trends including: who was on screen, the different camera shots used, and camera movement. Looking specifically at who was on screen, coding counted the moderators, Donald Trump, Joe Biden, and Kamala Harris. Six different camera shot types were also analyzed including: wide-overview shot, split-screen format, single medium shot, two-shot head on, two-shot low camera angle, and two shot high-camera angle. Camera movement behaviors were: counterclockwise motion, clockwise motion, zoom-in, zoom-out, and no movement. Video formats of the 2024 CNN and ABC debates were run through …

“More Than What [They] Made Us To Be”: From Passing To Perception In Victorian And Modern Vampire Media, Lauren Sieberg

English (MA) Theses

Throughout Victorian Gothic horror fiction, vampires function as deviant figures, maneuvering within social confines of passing until their status quo-threatening identity is exposed. Of the popular vampires from this period, most gradually fail to maintain status as social insiders—as demonstrated with Bram Stoker’s Count Dracula or Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla, who possess the temporary capacity to pass until their hidden monstrosity is revealed over time. Even if Gothic monsters are confined to a limited space and time far from society, this is still not enough; in accordance with the Victorian culture of morality policing by dominant groups, the vampiric Other …

Gendered Film Criticism And “Intolerable Images”: Representation Of Female Trauma In Brady Corbet’S Vox Lux (2018), Alison Kreul

Film and Media Studies (MA) Theses

This thesis explores Brady Corbet's 2018 film Vox Lux, focusing on its portrayal of female trauma and the subsequent gendered division in its critical reception. The film centers on Celeste, a survivor of a school shooting who rises to pop stardom, depicting an eighteen-year narrative that transforms her personal trauma into a public spectacle and a critique of American culture. Through theoretical frameworks from Judith Lewis Herman, E. Ann Kaplan, Jacques Rancière and Susan Sontag, this thesis examines how the film's fragmented narrative and stylistic shifts represent the long-term psychological aftermath of trauma, manifesting as emotional dysregulation, substance abuse, …

Phenomenologies Of Women's Illness In Ingmar Bergman's 1970s Films, Sophia Rubino

Film and Media Studies (MA) Theses

It is no surprise that the chronically ill Ingmar Bergman featured recurrent motifs of illness throughout his oeuvre. What is more surprising is that this consequential component of these works remain largely unexplored. Cries and Whispers (Viskningar och rop, 1971), Face to Face (Ansikte mot ansikte,1976), and Autumn Sonata (Höstsonaten, 1978), are pivotal examples of this shift, where illness is not merely an individual experience for these women but a complex, embodied phenomenon that profoundly shapes interpersonal relationships, particularly within family structures. This thesis conceives phenomenologies of illness in three 1970s films by Ingmar Bergman – Cries and Whispers, Face …

He Who Rules "Cinema" Rules Everything: Kalimán As Bridge Between 1960s And 1970s Mexican Cinema, Jose Emilio Reyes Rocher

Film and Media Studies (MA) Theses

Kalimán is a Mexican superhero whose adventures, along with his sidekick Solín, take them around the world and across various media platforms: radio, comics, and cinema. The cinematic tales of Kalimán reflect significant changes in Mexican cinema, society, and culture. The two Kalimán films, El Hombre Increíble and El Siniestro Mundo de Humanón, occupy a unique liminal position in Mexican National Cinema, capturing the transformations that took place during the early 1970s until 1976, a time now known as the Prodigious Decade.1 The Kalimán films also draw inspiration from “churro” films, particularly from the Luchadores genre, films often considered excessive …

"A Miniature Replica Of Life": Reality, Critique, And The Burden Of Representation In Oscar Micheaux's Body And Soul, Maria Lagomarsino

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

With the release of his controversial silent film Body and Soul (1925), filmmaker Oscar Micheaux elicited strong reactions from censors, critics, and audience members alike. While some praised the work as a triumph of Black filmmaking, others were horrified by Micheaux’s corrupt preacher storyline and supposedly negative characterizations. The creation of this film occurred during a particularly fraught period of history, which saw some Harlem Renaissance figures argue that only positive depictions deserved a place in the public discourse. With Body and Soul, however, Micheaux refused to be limited by this undue burden of representation. In this thesis, I further …

Her Hideous Progeny: Frankenstein'S Legacy, Adaptability, And Contemporary Prominence To Critical Story Telling, Ryan Penske

English (MA) Theses

This thesis situates the narrative of Frankenstein by Mary Shelley with two contemporary adaptations Get Out (2017) by Jordan Peele and Poor Things (2023) by Yorgos Lanthimos. The original 1818 Frankenstein text is composed of different discourses about race, gender, monstrosity, and what it means to be an abject other. As a text full of critical discourse, it has reached great popular culture legacy and has become adapted numerous times over the past two centuries. This thesis explores and acknowledges instances where the text has been adapted and applied to harmful discourses, such as British Prime Minister George Canning’s use …

A Narrative-Focused Machine Learning Approach To Predicting Feature Film Success, Arisa T. Trombley

Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (MS) Theses

For decades, the field of film production has been driven by marketability, and it has relied on gut feelings and subjectivity to produce feature films. The analysis of the relationship between a screenplay’s narrative and a film’s success has been widely overlooked due to the challenges involved in data acquisition and complexity. This study investigates the predictive power of narrative structure on film success and aims to build evidence for hypothesized narrative principles. The results suggest that narrative structural elements exhibit moderate predictive power, with strong support for the alignment of the 2nd act crucial moments and the 2nd act …

Horror Films And Why We Enjoy The Genre, Jessica Thomason

Theses

This project focuses on the research of horror films and why certain individuals enjoy the genre despite having taboo subjects. The primary focus is to find the answer to the research question “why do some individuals enjoy horror?”. The aim of this research was to identify a connection between why individuals enjoy horror through the content. The research then informed the creative process behind the painting series that accompanies this project.

Predicting Steroid Concern Through Tiktok Use And Self-Esteem, Adam Lorio, Brandon C. Bouchillon, Sisi Hu, Jennifer Mortensen

Journalism Undergraduate Honors Theses

This study examined student perceptions of steroid use through a survey of 154 participants. While self-esteem did not directly predict steroid concerns, specific TikTok engagement patterns revealed complex relationships. Using TikTok to pass time correlated with viewing steroids as a public health issue, whereas surveillance-based use was associated with lower self-esteem. Using the platform to interact was positively related to self-esteem, highlighting how different modes of engagement can shape perceptions about individual and collective health.

“But Where Are Those Good Old-Fashioned Values?”—The Racial Politics Of Animated Satire In Family Guy, Jordanne Greenidge

Master's Theses

Few animated shows have shaped American pop culture quite like Family Guy. Known for its rapid-fire cutaway gags and irreverent humor, the series has remained a television mainstay since its debut in 1999, despite frequent criticism and even two cancellations. Created by Seth MacFarlane and based on his 1995 student film The Life of Larry, Family Guy has built its reputation on pushing the boundaries of taste, especially when it comes to race, gender, and politics. Though often defended as satire, the show’s use of racial humor raises questions about its true impact: Do its portrayals of Black characters challenge …

Double, Double, Toils And Troubles: Analyzing The “Magical” Relationships Between University Leaders’ Personality Traits And Their Self-Efficacy In Leadership Situations, Fay Ludvine Boudreaux

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This present study investigated the relationship between higher education leaders’ personality traits and their self-efficacy in leadership situations. A total of 151 leaders employed across the nine institutions within the University of Louisiana System completed a survey that prompted them to identify their personal values, traits, and skill sets, as derived from the online Pottermore quiz, the official Harry Potter Hogwarts House sorting instrument. This niche personality metric was chosen to cater to higher education’s evolving landscape, as it welcomes an influx of Millennials into leadership positions. Participants’ responses were eventually recoded to “sort” them into their respective Houses: Gryffindor, …

Dekonstruktion Der Afd: Eine Analyse Der Rechtspopulistischen Deutschen Partei Der„Alternative Für Deutschland”, Elizabeth A. Breckenridge, Elizabeth Breckenridge

Departmental Honors & Graduate Capstone Projects

Die Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) ist eine rechtsextreme populistische Partei, die innerhalb eines Jahrzehnts rasch an Macht gewonnen hat, insbesondere in den ostdeutschen Bundesländern, aufgrund ihrer Betonung der Nationalisierung, ihrer populistischen Rhetorik und ihrer Anziehungskraft auf Wähler, die Ängste vor Einwanderung und kulturellem Wandel hegen. Die AfD hat es innerhalb von fünf Jahren geschafft, eine starke Wählerschaft zu mobilisieren, 2017 Sitze im Bundestag zu erringen und gilt nun als wichtigste Oppositionspartei zu den etablierten Parteien. Die AfD ist die erste rechte Partei seit 1945, die aufgrund des Aufstiegs rechtspolitischer Ideologien bedeutende Wahlerfolge erzielen konnte. Aufgrund des reaktionären Pendelschwungs nach dem …

“How Can I Make This Real Life?”: Realism, Politics, And Simulational Rhetoric In Video Games, Samuel Rowles

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

Video games are becoming an increasingly relevant aspect of modern culture, both shaping discourse around topics of labor, play, and art, and being shaped by the society they are created within. Scholars have examined the link between video games and player behavior since the 1990s and found that there is little concrete proof that video games alter behavior on their own and are simply one part of a much larger context. But with video games increasing in complexity and accuracy, it becomes necessary to examine whether video games are capable of convincing players about truths of the real world through …