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Hi Friend! Msw Portfolio Of Community Building And Advocacy, River Gerard Segar

Graduate Student Portfolios, Professional Papers, and Capstone Projects

This MSW Portfolio emphasizes the importance of being rooted in community and demonstrates how to engage in community building in a way that helps center marginalized voices. This portfolio also highlights advocacy in the United States for transgender people and asserts the need for increased cultural competency in clinical practice with people in non-monogamous and/or kink relational structures.

Hunting, Craftsmanship, And Migration: The Ethnobiology Of The Raute Nomads Of Nepal, Ramesh Prasad Adhikary

Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

This study explores the ethnobiology of the Raute nomads in Nepal, a dwindling hunter-gatherer group facing threats from modernisation, deforestation, and sedentarisation policies. Despite growing ethnobiological research on indigenous knowledge, there remains a scholarly gap in integrated analyses of how nomadic practices like hunting, craftsmanship, and migration interlink to promote sustainability, particularly in South Asian contexts. Drawing on six weeks of ethnographic fieldwork with a single Raute community (n=15 key informants via purposive sampling for interviews; 3 focus groups of 6-8 participants via convenience sampling), this research employs participant observation, in-depth interviews, and focus group discussions to address this gap. …

Say It In Kiswahili: The Impact Of English As The Medium Of Instruction On Students' Comprehension And Expression In Tertiary Education, Tamasha Kitalima

Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

The challenge of using and understanding English Language by Kiswahili L1 speaking learners is dominant in Tanzania. Having English as a foreign language (i.e. not largely spoken at social contexts) make it not accessible to many. Moreover, in Tanzania research shows that English being the medium of instructions to all subjects (except Kiswahili, Chinese, French, Arabic, and Historia ya Tanzania) from secondary schools to universities limit these learners from understanding academic content, expressing themselves in written and spoken forms, and succeeding in exams. The present study aimed to explore how the use of English as the language of instruction affects …

African Women's Struggle Against Patriarchy: Challenging The 'Un-African' Narrative Of Feminism, Olufunso Temitope Olubanjo-Olufowobi

Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

This paper critically examines the assertion that feminism is a Western import and incompatible with African cultures by demonstrating that African women have participated in activism and liberation struggles prior to the emergence of the term ‘feminism’. Although the term ‘feminism’ did not originate within African societies, it was subsequently adopted to describe these longstanding struggles. Through historical analysis and a review of existing literature, this study highlights that pre colonial African societies often afforded women considerable autonomy and leadership, which were later diminished by colonial and post-colonial patriarchal systems. The marginalisation of African women across the political, legal, and …

The Data Driven Body, Kimberlyn P. Konen

Departmental Honors & Graduate Capstone Projects

This paper examines how wearable fitness technologies function as persuasive digital tools that shape cultural understandings of health. Through a qualitative rhetorical analysis of popular devices such as Fitbit, Apple Watch, Garmin, and WHOOP, the study explores how interface design, data visualizations, notifications, and marketing materials communicate implicit messages about wellness. Rather than acting as neutral measurement tools, fitness trackers promote specific values, including quantification, discipline, optimization, and self-surveillance. Findings reveal that these devices define health through numerical metrics, encourage consistent productivity, frame wellness as competitive performance, and use emotional feedback to reinforce success or failure. Additionally, marketing imagery promotes …

From Farewell To Fáilte: The Voices Of Iowa’S Irish Daughters, Katie Hermanson

History Theses, Dissertations, and Student Creative Activity

Irish women’s immigration to Iowa brought rich culture and lasting impacts, despite their contributions being silenced by history. Women left Ireland for economic opportunity and education abroad to support their impoverished families. Millions emigrated between 1830 and 1915, spreading across the world. The Irish women who came to the United States encountered discrimination and cultural stereotyping as they worked in domestic service, developed religious orders, taught school, owned businesses and raised families. Women bore the burden of supporting their families in Ireland by sending remittances home and communicating between countries. Their cultural identity as exiles dwelled in guilt for leaving …

Teacher Shortages In Arkansas Rural School Districts: Employed Teacher’S Perceptions Of The Impact On Their Effectiveness, Carloss Guess

ATU Theses and Dissertations 2021 - Present

ABSTRACT

TEACHER SHORTAGES IN ARKANSAS RURAL SCHOOL DISTRICTS: EMPLOYED TEACHERS’ PERCEPTIONS OF THE IMPACT

ON THEIR EFFECTIVENESS

Carloss Guess

Teacher shortages in rural school districts remain a persistent challenge that affects instructional quality, teacher workload, and professional sustainability. The purpose of this qualitative phenomenological study was to explore how teachers in rural Arkansas perceive the impact of staffing shortages on their instructional roles, workload, and professional well-being. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with 10 K–12 teachers representing elementary, middle, and high schools and across varying career stages. Interview transcripts were analyzed using an inductive qualitative approach and the constant …

What Do We Owe A Drowning Coast? Examining Louisiana's Coastal Crisis Through The Lens Of Environmental Justice, Owen M. Plaisance

Honors Theses

This thesis argues that human contributions to Louisiana’s coastal land loss constitute a form of environmental injustice that cannot be adequately addressed through frameworks focused solely on aggregate welfare or distributive fairness. While utilitarian and Rawlsian approaches offer important insights, both are limited in capturing the full scope of harm caused by environmental degradation. In coastal Louisiana, land loss undermines not only economic resources and physical security but also the substantive freedoms required for individuals and communities to live meaningful and culturally rooted lives, while disrupting ecological systems and non-human flourishing. To address these limitations, the thesis develops the Capabilities …

Analyzing Best Practices In Large-Scale Digital Archaeological Databases, Chloe M. Vizier

Honors Theses

Archaeological databases, the foundation of archaeological analyses, have changed drastically alongside the rise of new digital tools in the twenty-first century. Digital databases, alongside other digital tools, must therefore be evaluated for their efficiency and effectiveness within the field. This thesis seeks to determine a set of best practices within large-scale digital archaeological databases through analyzing an existing example: The Paleoindian Database of the Americas (PIDBA). PIDBA is composed of multiple state-level datasets, a trait that both invited collaboration and creates discrepancies in data entry. Though examining both PIDBA's user-facing website and one of its most robust state-level datasets, the …

Values-Based Clinical Ethics: A New Model Of Health And Ethics Consultation For Patients Suffering In Extremis, Adam Trainer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation argues that contemporary clinical ethics is inadequately equipped to support patients suffering in extremis because it relies on an insufficiently discriminating account of health and a constrained model of moral reasoning. Drawing on Bernard Lonergan, it reconceives health as an emergent, multi-layered, heuristic notion shaped by biological, psychological, social, and existential goods. On that basis, it critiques principlism’s global applicability thesis and the undergirding claim that its principles form part of the common morality, arguing that this justificatory structure is philosophically insufficient and practically limited for clinical ethics in cases marked by profound suffering, moral plurality, and normative …

Beyond The Bricks: The Friends Of The Burns-Belfry Online, Madeline M. Webb

Honors Theses

This capstone project was completed to offer a new website to the members of the Friends of the Burns-Belfry Museum and Multicultural Center. This project entailed research into the importance of a museum’s digital presence, the significance of community and cultural spaces for historically marginalized groups, and the role of community engagement initiatives for students and community leaders. All findings were considered and implemented into the website and website manual deliverables.

Joy Beyond Circumstance: Crafting A Picture Book That Challenges Western Perceptions Of Joy, Sarah L. Stockett

Honors Theses

This thesis explores the creation of a children’s picture book as a method of challenging Western perceptions of happiness, particularly the assumption that material abundance determines joy. Drawing from two service-based experiences with Zoe Ministries in Kitale, Kenya, the project centers on The Glad Rag, a picture book in which a single piece of fabric travels through many hands and becomes many useful items. Through this narrative, the book invites young readers to consider resourcefulness, gratitude, and joy that transcends circumstance.

The project uses a mixed-methods research approach. Primary data were gathered through participant observation and informal conversations on …

Esports Cosmopolitan Canopy, Reice Hicks

Honors Theses

This thesis concerns the area of sociology. Specifically, it is a sociological study of a community on Ole Miss’s campus and how they form what is known within the sociology field as a “cosmopolitan canopy,” a term coined by Elijah Anderson. Using this term, I proceed to prove not only how the Ole Miss Esports club falls under this jurisdiction, but the effects of esports on the youth as a whole, both positive and negative. All of my data was extracted via literature review, online research, note-taking, visual observation, and one-on-one interviews with people involved with the club. The entire …

Living Archaeology: A Comparative Perspective On How Archaeologists Can Study And Document The Present, Alia S. Moran

Honors Capstones

Archaeology has long remained a social science that has tended to exclude sustained consideration of contemporary societies in the analysis of material culture. In recent decades, approaches such as ethnoarchaeology and the archaeology of the contemporary have expanded the field to include the study of present-day societies through material culture. Inspired by my involvement in the Thais in Illinois Project, which focused on documenting the Thai American immigrant experience in the greater Chicago area to produce an oral history collection, alongside other goals, this thesis intends to further explore how archaeological practice can be used to understand everyday issues in …

Phenomenological Philosophy Of Psychedelics: Psychedelic Experience In The Modes Of Saturation And Flesh, Michael V. Kramer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This work seeks to develop the nascent sub-field of the phenomenological philosophy of psychedelics. Beginning with a general overview of key aspects pertinent to psychedelic studies, the focus then turns to a general disciplinary discussion of current approaches within the philosophy of psychedelics, as well as psychedelic philosophy—a distinction which is technically deployed. Special consideration is given to the specific approach known as the “natural philosophy of psychedelics,” which is taken as the philosophical foil to the preferred approach of phenomenological philosophy. A survey of the extant literature regarding the implementation of phenomenology within psychedelic discourse is then provided …

The Priene Synagogue Community And Jewish Diaspora Prominence In Late Antique Cities, Amari Pavati

Undergraduate Honors Theses

The late antique synagogue of Priene, like other synagogues in the region and potentially beyond, acted as an “urban center” for the community it served. I argue that the urban context of diaspora synagogues like the Priene synagogue has been under explored, and that analysis of Jewish communities within their changing urban contexts reveals the place of Jewish communities within late antique society. Synagogues served multiple functions for their communities, some visible from archaeological evidence and other known from textual evidence. The Priene synagogue, for example, was laid out and artistically decorated to mark the central, sacred nave as separate …

Predator Or Prey: The Analysis Of Gender And Race On The Perception Of Black Men As Sexual Assault Victims, Jordyn Livingston, Dr. Florencia Cornet

Caravel Undergraduate Research Journal

Men sexual assault victims have gained more attention in recent years. Despite the growing sociological literature on violence against men, previous research provides little acknowledgment of Black men sexual assault victims. In this manuscript, I analyze emerging literature in the socio-medical sciences to explore how gender and race affects the perceptions of Black men as sexual assault victims. Specifically, I utilize intersectionality as a theoretical framework to synthesize literature on blackness and masculinity in sexual assault victims to conclude that there is an intersectional point that disadvantages Black males, portraying them as sexual predators. In so doing, I provide research …

The Jewish Athena: The Political Genesis Of The State Of Israel, Julius Sykes, Roger Deal

Caravel Undergraduate Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Commercializing The Body: Trade. Contract, And Agency In The Merchant Of Venice, John Gullege, Jennifer Tyburczy

Caravel Undergraduate Research Journal

In this article, I take Shakespeare’s play The Merchant of Venice as my backdrop to explore and illuminate how the commercialization of flesh and body in the play can only fully be understood through its contextualization in sociological concepts of gift-exchange, early modern contract law, and the rise of the merchant class during this period. At this time, English economy, contract law, and cultural notions of agency/autonomy were all shifting and expanding both theoretically and pragmatically, and much has been said about the historical consequences these changes caused – how mercantile culture permeated English society, how the reexamination of contractual …

Sexism In Unexpected Places: An Analysis Of Country Music Lyrics, Anna Rogers

Caravel Undergraduate Research Journal

This study aims to show that sexism exists in all facets of society by exposing its existence in the widely unexpected area of country music. Within sociology, much work has been done on sexism in the popular musical genres of rock and rap, but little attention has been given to country music. The focus of this study is an area of society where sexism is often thought to be less salient. In order to do this I will use a perspective developed from sociological perspectives on culture, gender, and music, and look at popular country songs for sexist lyrics. Using …

Florence Normal College Quarterly, Faculty Of Florence Normal College

Documents

Faculty Quarterly Journal of Florence Normal College, October 1910.

Florence Normal College Quarterly, Faculty Of Florence Normal College

Documents

Faculty Quarterly Journal of Florence Normal College, March 1911.

Spinoza On Invidia: A Social Theory Of Anti-Migrant Affect, Kevin Scott Jobe

Philosophy Faculty Publications

This paper develops a Spinozist social theory of anti-migrant affect by interpreting contemporary hostility toward immigration through the concept of invidia (envy). Drawing on recent empirical research on ‘superiority-seeking’, whereby individuals derive status utility from excluding others, the paper interprets invidia as an affective hatred of equality. For Spinoza, envy is caused not by actual material loss but from the imagination that misconceives shared goods as exclusive possessions. This social theory of invidia inverts readings that locate envy in migrants themselves, instead arguing that, in Spinoza’s Political Treatise, the democratic multitude harbours invidia against migrants when they are perceived as …

Exploring Identity Through Clay: A Humanistic Art Therapy Case Study With A Blind Chinese Adoptee, Virginia Jade Leicht

Expressive Therapies Theses

This qualitative case study explored how working with clay in art therapy can help support a blind man’s identity exploration. This paper addresses the problem of many traditional therapeutic approaches within the art therapy realm: They rely too heavily on visual engagement, which can limit the accessibility and opportunities for self-exploration and identity development for those who are blind. The study was grounded in current research and foundational theories based on the humanistic art therapy approach. Clay is considered an accessible medium that engages multiple senses and allows for emotional exploration and meaning making, specifically through tactile and sensory-based engagement …

The Bonds Of Family: A Case Study On Interconnectedness In The Prison-Industrial Complex, Cameron Stone

Binghamton University Undergraduate Journal

Beginning in the 1960s, a rightward shift in politics and “War on Drugs” policies propelled the United States toward mass incarceration. The result was a prison population of around 2 million people, in which minority groups have been disproportionately imprisoned. While historians and legal scholars have examined the policies and legal structures behind mass incarceration, oral historians working in the tradition of social history emphasize the importance of narratives of those most impacted yet traditionally neglected. This paper specifically examines the relatively unstudied Columbia University's 2019 Mass Incarceration oral history collection, which explores the interconnected perspectives of one family’s experience …

Making As A Method For Knowledge Production, Nithikul Nimkulrat, Camilla Groth

DRS Summer Meetings

No abstract provided.

The Moral Influences On Non-Denominational Christian Students’ College Major Decision And Future Career Outlook, Makayla Frame

Honors Projects

This is an undergraduate research project for the Honors College. A qualitative research project in the form of case studies was conducted on the influence of Non-Denominational Christian morals and values on how college students decide college major and future career. Non-Denomination students in particular were chosen for this study because of the recent rise in popularity of the Non-Denominational belief in the US, especially among young adults.

The study outlines previous research on the Christian religion, the history of Non-Denominationality, and how typical college students decide their major. The conclusions of the study are that Non-Denominational Christian college students …

Red, White, And Quahog: An Analysis Of Political Satire In Family Guy, Kendall Swaim

Departmental Honors & Graduate Capstone Projects

This study examines how fictional television shows use satire to portray politics. Specifically, it analyzes irony, exaggeration, and humor styles identified by Martin et al. (2003) in the television show Family Guy. Additionally, this study explores how references to real political figures and events contribute to the show’s satirical framing of politics. The qualitative content analysis of 10 politically centered Family Guy episodes to address the question: "How does the fictional television show Family Guy use satire (humor, irony, and exaggeration) to portray politics?" The analysis revealed three key themes: the portrayal of politics as idiotic, the use of timely …

The Journey Of Accompaniment: Pastoral Care Education For The Laity At The University Church Of Christ In Abilene, Tx, Alejandro Ezquerra

Doctor of Ministry Theses and Dissertations

This Doctor of Ministry project addresses the need for intentional pastoral care formation among lay members at the University Church of Christ in Abilene, Texas, with particular attention to its bilingual ministry context. Grounded in the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers as articulated in 1 Pet 2:9, the project argues that pastoral care is not the exclusive responsibility of ordained clergy but a shared calling within the body of Christ. In response to congregational interest in chaplaincy and caregiving, a five-session curriculum titled The Journey of Accompaniment: Forming Hearts for the Ministry of Care was developed to equip …

"It's A Book You Grab And Squeeze, And Blood Comes Out.” Modernization Of The Colombian Army's Training During U.S.- Funded Plan Colombia And Security Policies: Falsos Positivos And Bodies As Merchandise (2002–2008), Maria Isabel Palacio Cano

ELIN Graduate Theses

No abstract provided.