Digital Commons Network^™

Party Of The Century: Juárez, Díaz, And The End Of The "Unifying Liberal Myth" In 1906 Oaxaca, John Radley Milstead

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

I will analyze the posthumous one-hundredth birthday celebration of former Mexican president and national hero, Benito Juárez, in 1906 Oaxaca City, Mexico. The Juárez celebration took place during the lengthy presidency of fellow Oaxaca native and former political rival Pofirio Díaz (1876-1911). Even though the two men experienced an antagonistic relationship, Díaz embraced the celebration and emphasized his connection to Juárez and, by extension, liberalism, the dominant political ideology. By all accounts, people enthusiastically took part in this official commemoration. But the festivities hid three years of contentious preparations whereby people questioned the political legacy of both men and even …

A Question Of Indian Identity In The Plecker Era: The Monacan Indian Nation In The Twentieth Century, Jennifer Marie Huff

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

During my undergraduate career at the University of North Texas, I began to have a fascination with American Indian tribes whose histories were not well known to the general public. As I studied Virginia history, I became curious about the Monacan Indian Nation and how they have handled the controversy over their existence and identity to the Monacan Indian Nation of the seventeenth century. My Master’s thesis deals with this very question and how their Indian identity has been impacted by the Racial Integrity Act of 1924 and the actions of Walter A. Plecker. Plecker took particular interest in the …

Celts And Romans: The Transformation From Natural To Civic Religion, Matthew Taylor Kennedy

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

This paper is a case study dealing with cultural interaction and religion. It focuses on Roman religion, both before and during the Republic, and Celtic religion, both before and after Roman conquest. For the purpose of comparing these cultures two phases of religion are defined that exemplify the pagan religions of this period. These are natural religion and civic religion. They have different foci and are represented by different sorts of deities, rituals, and priests. Roman religion shifted from natural religion in the period of the monarchy to civic religion in the middle and late republic largely due to outside …

Capturing A Complex Moment: Pictorial Representations Of The Shenandoah Valley In The Mid-Twentieth Century, Angela Lee Walthall

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

This thesis includes the work, research, and findings that culminated from a non-traditional project that revolved around the processing and analysis of the William Garber Photograph Collection, which is housed in Special Collections of Carrier Library at James Madison University. After processing the photograph collection according to standard archival practice, I analyzed the images to make conclusions about life in the Shenandoah Valley during the post-World War II era. As I delved further into the photographs, I became increasingly aware of three trends: rural modernization, the prevalence of white supremacy, and an emphasis on tourism in the region. Secondary work …

Soldiers In An All Volunteer Force, Joshua Aaron Webster

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

This work focuses on several themes that deal with the idea of motivation in the military. The primary focus is to view the soldiers in the “all volunteer” force in order to examine their sources of motivation. The majority of sources came from interviews conducted with active duty, reservist, and retired soldiers who were deployed to Iraq and/or Afghanistan. The work examines how the evolution of the “all volunteer” force has changed since its inception in 1973, primarily focusing on the soldiers who were involved in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are several reasons for why a citizen …

Slavery And Empire: The Development Of Slavery In The Natchez District, 1720-1820, Christian Pinnen

Dissertations

“Slavery and Empire: The Development of Slavery in the Natchez District, 1720- 1820,” examines how slaves and colonists weathered the economic and political upheavals that rocked the Lower Mississippi Valley. The study focuses on the fitful— and often futile—efforts of the French, the English, the Spanish, and the Americans to establish plantation agriculture in Natchez and its environs, a district that emerged as the heart of the “Cotton Kingdom” in the decades following the American Revolution. Before American planters established their hegemony over Natchez, the town was a struggling outpost that changed hands three times over the course of the …

Christian Progress And American Myth: A Deep Cultural Analysis Of Spatiality And Exceptionalism In Struggles Over American Indian Lands, Bradley J. Klein

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Although typically characterized in politico-economic, social, and environmental terms, land struggles involving American Indian communities can be more accurately and valuably characterized as deep culture conflicts over the problem of space. As scholars like Vine Deloria Jr. and Tink Tinker contend, a significant distinction can be noted between the traditional American Indian and White Western approaches to this problem regarding how human communities should relate to particular spatial locations. In short, while Indian peoples tend to situate their identities relative to clearly defined places or lands, individuals of European descent are inclined to subordinate spatial relations to temporal concerns. Considering …

The Perception And Treatment Of Insanity In Southern Appalachia, Carla Joinson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In the nineteenth century, the perceived ability of alienists (the early term for mental health specialists) to cure insanity eventually led to lavishly-constructed insane asylums supported by taxpayers. Simultaneously, the hope of a cure and a changing attitude toward insanity helped destigmatize mental illness and made institutionalization of the insane more acceptable. This regional study investigates insane asylums within Appalachia between 1850 and 1900. Primary sources include period articles from professional publications, census data, asylum records, period newspaper articles, and patient records. The study provides background on the medical environment of nineteenth-century Appalachia and investigates the creation and function of …

The Role Of Magic In Fantasy Literature: Exposing Reality Through Fantasy, Martin Cahill

English

No abstract provided.

The Presidential Election Of 1840 In Rochester, New York, Brian Schantz

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

Rochester, New York was one of America’s first boom towns, exploding from a population of 15 people in 1812 to nearly 20,000 just 25 years later. Its location on the crux of the Erie Canal and Genesee River made it an economic force, with flour milling as its staple industry. For my project, I have examined Rochester’s growth through the 1830’s and studied it through the lens of the heated presidential election of 1840.

The election of 1840 is often considered to be one of the first “modern” elections. The campaign between incumbent Democratic President Martin Van Buren and Whig …

Buffalo, New York’S Citizen Soldiers: Personal Histories Of Combat, Trauma, And Returning Home After The Second World War, Drew H. Lewandowski

History Theses

Buffalo, New York’s Citizen Soldiers: Personal Histories of Combat, Trauma, and Returning Home after the Second World War

This thesis focuses on interviews from nine World War Two veterans who are from Buffalo, New York and the immediate surrounding areas. Included are three infantry men from the European theatre, including one paratrooper. Three who served in the Pacific theatre, including one medical officer, a medic, and one man served in the occupation of Japan. The remaining three served in the Air Corps in Europe, one pilot, one bombardier, and one fighter pilot.

Through extensive interviews, both written and filmed, this …

Master Of Your Domain: Descriptions Of Interior Space In The Works Of Charles Dickens And Elizabeth Gaskell As Social Justice Commentary, Ryan P. Bowers

English Theses

Abstract

One of the results of the industrialization of Victorian England was a further straining of the relationship between the rich and poor. This was evidenced by events such as the Preston Strike, a prolonged labor battle between the workers and the masters of the cotton mills. Charles Dickens’s periodical Household Words covered the strike on two occasions, with Dickens himself writing the second article on the event. An attempt to bridge this cultural divide between the classes was undertaken by Elizabeth Gaskell in North and South, a novel that first appeared in Household Words and by Dickens himself …

Furnish The Balance: The 1863 Roots Of Hard Strategy In The American Civil War, Angela Maria Riotto

Master's Theses

Scholars consider U.S. Major General William T. Sherman's 1864 Meridian campaign as the origin of hard war strategy during the American Civil War. While Sherman's 1864 expedition is a clear demonstration of hard war, it did not begin there. Rather, U.S. Major General Ulysses S. Grant's planned and Sherman's implemented destruction of Jackson, Mississippi in May 1863 was their first use of hard war and is key to understanding the Union's acceptance of hard war strategy. Chapter I and Chapter II of this thesis explore the Army of the Tennessee's march to Jackson and Sherman's destruction of the city, along …

Philosophical Influences In The Art Of War Found In The Romance Of The Three Kingdoms, Nathaniel Ethan Clark

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

“Philosophical Influences in The Art of Warfound in The Romance of the Three Kingdoms” is an examination of Sunzi’s philosophy about leadership in The Art of War as applied to the moral character, or lack thereof, of historical Han Dynasty leaders, Liu Bei and Cao Cao. In Luo Guanzhong’s The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the two are fictionalized with oppositional personalities and corresponding philosophical bases. I explore the ways in which their actions embody or reject the philosophy found in Sunzi’s The Art of War.

Intimate Frontiers: Indians, French, And Africans In Colonial Mississippi Valley, Sonia Toudji

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Historians have agreed that the French were more successful than their competitors in developing cordial relations with Native Americans during the conquest of North America. French diplomatic savoir faire and their skill at trading with Indians are usually cited to explain this success, but the Spaniards relied upon similar policies of trade and gift giving, while enjoying considerably less success with the Indians. Intimate Frontiers proposes an alternative model to understand the relative success of French Colonization in North America. Intimate Frontiers, an ethno-historical examination of the colonial encounters in the Lower French Louisiana, focuses on the Social relations between …

American Revolutionary Thinkers Unjust Wars, Limited Government And Natural Rights, Adam Spera

HIM 1990-2015

Historically unjust wars have never improved the standard of living for the American citizen and have served to suppress the inherent natural rights of the human beings involved. In conclusion, I combine contemporary and historical arguments to highlight the continuing stream of injustice that exists in American foreign policy.; The conceptual bases of this thesis include the philosophical constructs of Just War Theory, limited government, and natural rights as applied to foreign policy. Just War Theory was originally articulated by St. Augustine and represents the requirements a nation must satisfy to wage war justly. Building upon the basis of Just …

Resurrecting Inanna: Lament, Gender, Transgression, Kimberly Torres

HIM 1990-2015

This essay, which is at once a literary critical examination and a theological exploration of the Hebraic scriptural book of Lamentations in relation to ancient Sumerian lament, employs a mixed critical approach (e.g., form, feminist, postmodern, reader response), to address various lyrical, contextual, and thematic elements common to both the biblical Lamentations and the older Sumerian compositions. Specific focus is given to issues of gender and gender-malleability, as well as the notion of "transgression" and the various meanings that may be attached to this word in various contexts, theological or otherwise. Also addressed is the means by which the lament …

Valley Of Fire Petroglyphs: A New Perspective On An Old Idea, Eric John Pacl

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This research paper proposes to enhance the approach used in the interpretative methods of petroglyphs, in particular those located in the Valley of Fire State Park in Southern Nevada. Along with the actual content, the contextual element of elevation, in relation to ground level, will be used in an analysis of the petroglyphs located in the park. Intermittently throughout the park petroglyphs are visible at various elevations, from current ground level to the top of the rock formations several hundred feet vertically. It is this contextual element of elevation that will be key in the attempt to begin interpreting both …

The Nation Before Taste: The Challenges Of American Culinary History, Andrew P. Haley

Faculty Publications

Food is material and familiar, and because it is, we are often overconfident about our ability to understand the culinary past. It is easy to believe that if we can discover the recipe for some forgotten dish, the history of the dish becomes intelligible. When it does not, it tempts those who consume culinary history to impose modern sensibilities on our predecessors. The Nation before Taste" argues that historians and museum curators must be especially vigilant when presenting the history of food. Reviewing a series of historical challenges that stemmed from studying the United States in the late nineteenth and …

The Unbought Grace Of Life: Chivalry In Western Literature, Richard N. Boggs

Master of Liberal Studies Theses

The code of chivalry has a rich literary history. From the violence and misogyny of pre-chivalric ancient Greece and Rome, the chivalric code was constructed in a deliberate effort to curb and improve the most violent aspects of male behavior. The chivalric male ideal was built upon the tripartite foundation of the ancient archaic virtues, the gallantry of Germanic barbarians, and the Christian beatitudes. Chivalry sought a male ideal which brought raw strength and power under the concept of legitimate authority. By casting the literary male ideal – the knight – into the role of the defender of the weak …

Missions, Republicanism, And Anti-Catholicism: The Ideological Origins Of The Methodist Church’S Support For The Mexican-American War, Luke Clay Schleif

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

The Methodist Church’s support of the Mexican-American War arose from its commitment to the missionary endeavor and spreading the gospel. The self-imposed mission of the Methodists to evangelize the nations and their commitment to the United States war with Mexico cannot be understood without taking into account two other developments. Of first importance was the Church’s adoption of republicanism. By the 1840s, the Methodist Church accepted republicanism as the best form of human government and inextricably linked it to Protestant Christianity. Protestant (or biblical) Christianity was now not only necessary for salvation but was also a necessary component for political …

The Lure Of Lucre And The Hurdle Of Poverty: The Cistercian Fusion Of Spirituality And Monastic Business, Lindsey Smith

History Undergraduate Honors Theses

In this honors thesis, I examine the development of the Cistercian monastic order, founded around 1098 CE, within the contexts of the burgeoning of a new kind of monastic business, moneylending, usury, and mercantilism of the high Middle Ages. I argue that the immense anxieties of the Cistercian Order concerning the practices of moneylending and participation in the larger economic system, particularly regarding grants of land, arose primarily from the order’s preoccupation with ritual purity, both of the individual monk and of the monastery as a physical space.

Justifying Peacemaking In Afghanistan, Ethan Taylor

Honors College Theses

The situation in Afghanistan seems to be about as dire as it was in the 1980s. One major difference, though, is that Soviet forces no longer occupy the country, and at least the United States/NATO occupation is under the pretext of a humanitarian effort. Even so, the tragic process of U.S.-led state-building that has unfolded these last ten years has yielded little in terms of an effective government or infrastructure of any kind. If anything, the terrorist threat that the U.S. hoped to quell has become more elusive and determined than ever. Ethnic rivalry and warlordism are as prevalent as …

The Cinematic Essay: Argumenative Writing And Documentary Film, Zachary Snow

All Theses

The cinematic essay, also known as the essay film, is an extension of the documentary genre which replaces the impossible task of objectivity with a more subjective, argumentative approach. The existence of this form arguably dates back to the birth of the documentary, but certainly encompasses more recent endeavors like Errol Morris' investigative work, the experimental features of Chris Marker, and the political exposes of Michael Moore. Until the recent growth in digital technology, which has decreased the financial burden associated with the cost of film stock and other aspects of production, essayistic cinema was mostly created by professional filmmakers, …

Varieties Of Deer Imagery: Gender And Cosmology In Prehistoric Belief Systems Of Central Asia And South Siberia., Luke Champouillon

Undergraduate Honors Theses

In the Altai Mountains of far-western Mongolia near the convergence of China, Kazakhstan, and Russia, the Biluut Rock Art Complex contains over 9,000 petroglyphs. Hundreds of associated archaeological features including stone mounds and different types of standing stones are also present. Perhaps most crucial to connecting Biluut rock art with these features are deer stones, found not only here, but also throughout northern and central Mongolia, the larger Altai region, and Central Asia. These monuments bear important connections to khirigsuurs, Bronze Age burial mounds of stone encircled by ringed “fences”. Stylized “Mongolian deer” engraved on the classical type of deer …

Reinforcements On The Border: The Utah National Guard's Role In The Punitive Expedition, 1916-1917, Thomas Reese Dubach Jr.

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

In June 2006, in a plan to mitigate illicit border crossings, President George W. Bush called the National Guard to the border to build a fence. Almost ninety years to the day earlier, President Woodrow Wilson mobilized the National Guard to the border to protect it from raiders and smugglers who were part of the Mexican Revolution. Most Utahns are aware that the Utah National Guard spent time on the border to construct the fence. However, most do not know that the Utah National Guard served on the border as part of President Wilson’s mobilization. In 1916, a civil war …

American Propaganda, Popular Media, And The Fall Of Jacobo Arbenz, Zachary Carl Fisher

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

In June 1954, President Jacobo Arbenz Guzman of Guatemala resigned in the face of a coup led by Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas. While the United States publicly denied involvement, the coup was in fact the culmination of a plan called PBSUCCESS (CIA codeword), led by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Although PBSUCCESS lived up to its namesake, it was aided (both intentionally and unintentionally) by various U.S. media outlets. For the duration of Arbenz Guzman's regime, he and his country had been the subject of U.S. suspicions of undue Communist and Soviet influence. A general anti-Communist attitude permeated virtually all …

Liberian Clergywomen And The Women Of Liberia Mass Action For Peace : Causal Factors For Clergywomen's Participation Or Nonparticipation And The Impact On Clergywomen's Leadership In The Liberian Church, Katurah York Cooper

ATS Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Time And Fortune, Tiffany C. Anderson

Theses and Dissertations - UTB/UTPA

Time and Fortune, a graphic novel script, takes the true story of John Harrison’s competition for the longitude prize, as told by Dava Sobel, and seeks the changes that could have culminated had Harrison sought other avenues for his product. Considering his judge was his competitor, if Harrison made a secret copy of H-4, a watch that accurately holds the time from homeport, and gave it to a sailor invested in its success, naval military power could have changed today’s world as we know it. Imagining that John Harrison changed one small decision in his life, this storyline sets a …

"Threads Of Belief", Erum S. Javed

Theses and Dissertations - UTB/UTPA

As the needle pierces the fabric, the thread finds its way. As the needle lays its rhythmic path, the thread follows the needle, creating a specific sound and pattern. The needle and the thread together create something new or mend something old. As an artist I have found my direction, and sensitivity, the same as the thread that finds its way by filling and tying the spaces between other threads in the fabric. As I draw the point through every stitch, I am drawing a thought, a moment, an expression from past and present. I seek a thread, a theme, …