Digital Commons Network^™

Collisions: The Enlivened Entanglements Of The Object-Self, Grace P. Smith

Masters Theses, 2020-current

This piece is a performance collage centered around objects and our entanglements with them. Through unpacking five objects in my life and their histories and interrogating three interwoven levels of narrative (the historical, the personal, and the aesthetic), I playfully displace the subject/object hierarchy to contribute to broader theoretical discussions regarding the agency of objects, resulting in novel insights through the collisions produced from the performance collage.

Zoo Animal, Kristen Gainey

The Echo

No abstract provided.

An Eyeful Of Stars, Ainsley Buss

The Echo

No abstract provided.

The Legend Of The Sea Squids, Stephen Turner

The Echo

No abstract provided.

Preface & Table Of Contents, Furman University

The Echo

No abstract provided.

Echo 2025 - Complete Issue

The Echo

No abstract provided.

Creative Expression Through Worldbuilding: A Study On The Connections Between Literature And Music Through Analysis Of Brandon Sanderson's The Stormlight Archive, Lauralei S. Palmer

Honors Theses

This thesis examines the worldbuilding connections visible throughout fantasy literature and musical works. Though their tools seem different, authors, composers, and performers use equivalent techniques to draw in their audiences and produce an immersive, emotional experience. This research focuses on American author Brandon Sanderson’s highly detailed worldbuilding in his epic fantasy series, The Stormlight Archive. The Stormlight Archive exhibits the three pillars of worldbuilding: completeness, invention, and consistency. This research also examines Franz Liszt’s Les Préludes, a symphonic poem based on Alfonse Lamartine’s poem, Ode. Finally, this thesis culminates in the fusion of literary and musical worldbuilding in description …

Art In Itself: The Vision Of Three Female Mississippi Artists, Jane E. Thomas

Honors Theses

This thesis is a collection of longform, narrative-style journalistic profiles on artists in Northeast Mississippi. These artists include Carol Roark from Enid and Hannah McCormick and Coulter Fussell from Water Valley. Each profile highlights an individual artist’s work, from her background, inspirations, process and distinctiveness as a creator. These profiles required studio visits and extensive interviews, as well as secondary interviews with clients, gallery owners and art curators. An overarching theme between the three artists is their ability to recognize artistic potential in their immediate surroundings; Roark paints landscapes from her own backyard, McCormick paints scenes from everyday life and …

Contributors, Diamond Line Editors

Diamond Line Undergraduate Literary Magazine

No abstract provided.

Diamond Line - Spring 2025, Diamond Line Editors

Diamond Line Undergraduate Literary Magazine

No abstract provided.

When The Siren Sounds, Madelynn H. Morgan

Persimmon Creek

Growing up being the daughter of a fire fighter was not easy. I had a very absent father growing up, and this was due to his work in the fire service. Through this reflective essay, I discuss what growing up as a first-response family was like, and how it has shaped me into the adult I am becoming.

Imaginary Friends: Engaging The Unconscious Mind Through Picture Books, Cleonique Hilsaca

MFA in Illustration & Visual Culture

“Imaginary Friends” investigates the potential of the ‘imaginary friend’ as a narrative device in picture book storytelling. By combining the research of Marjorie Taylor on ‘imaginary companions’ and Lois Rostow Kuznets on ‘toy animals’ in literature, I seek to give form to the concept of the imaginary friend, to then explore the phenomenon further by delving into the intellectual heritage of the imaginary and the unconscious mind. To explain how the imaginary friend works as a visual metaphor in illustrated narratives, I borrow principles of image-making and their effect on children, as discussed by Martin Salisbury, Morag Styles, and Molly …

Undefinitive, Lan Mu

MFA in Visual Art

My thesis project, Undefinitive, examines the cyclical process of destruction, transformation, and rebirth through installation, ceramics, and text. With a deep unease toward my own gendered body, I investigate how vulnerability, both physical and psychological, can become a site of resistance and empowerment. Drawing from feminist theory, Chinese mythology, and stream-of-consciousness narratives, my work explores the monstrous and the fragmented as inseparable states of one’s becoming. Through references to body art, speculative fiction, and queer theory, I reimagine femininity and queerness as forces capable of dismantaling societal structure and forging new modes of existence.

Set in a post-apocalyptic world where …

How Kirby’S Return To Dream Land Deluxe Subverts Narrative Expectations, Kelley I. Hale

Aurora

The Kirby series has been around for over 30 years, and very little has been done to research it. This is a shame, as I believed (and still do believe) the series has a lot to offer in terms of research. For this paper, I analyzed Kirby's Return to Dream Land Deluxe, a Switch remake of the Wii game Kirby's Return to Dream Land. I analyzed the cutscenes found within the game using fantasy theme criticism. I did this to explore how the game subverts narrative expectations, as well as show that Kirby games have value when it comes to …

Studio One Volume 49, Studio1 Literary Club

Studio One

No abstract provided.

Reimagining Heroes: The Evolving Narratives Of Helen And Achilles In Feminist Greek Mythology Retellings, Elena A. Smith

Honors Scholar Theses

“Reimagining Heroes: The Evolving Narratives of Helen and Achilles in Feminist Greek Mythology Retellings” is an analysis of an array of novels, monographs, and critiques regarding the genre of mythology retellings. Combining feminist ideas with historical examples, this thesis delves into why retellings are so popular in the twenty-first century and why the stories of Greek Antiquity have stayed relevant.

This thesis focuses specifically on Helen of Troy, Achilles, and the events of the Trojan War in The Iliad. Comparing the epic with retellings of its events may reveal why these characters, gods, and heroes have continued to be discussed …

Tapestry Of Culture: The Power Of Storytelling Among Native American Cultures: The Search For History, Culture, And Identity, Maurysha Cuttino

Master's Theses

Storytelling is a centerpiece within cultures to remember the past, find faith, and establish comfort within a community setting. This thesis will explore how storytelling has become a means of entertainment and much more. This paper will focus specifically on how storytelling works for the inner workings of Elders in Native American communities, as well as how multifaceted storytelling can be understood in the importance of its culture and people. Further, we will see how these stories create moral lessons for communities and act as guidance for individuals. We will look at the way storytelling has evolved and changed with …

Transgressive Fiction And The Problem Of Negative Affect: A Case Study Of Samuel Delany’S Hogg, Brian Thornton

Master's Theses

Samuel Delany began drafting Hogg in March of 1969 and worked on it intermittently before completing the novel in October of 1973.1 Yet Hogg remained unpublished until 1995 before finally seeing the light of day “during the ‘transgressive turn’ in American literature” (Mitchell 1). As such, the novel is historically situated along what Jonathan Mitchell calls a “dual temporality,” which “allows the novel to be located as an intervention in two key moments in America’s LGBT+ history: first, the developments in identity politics coming out of the socio-political cultural shifts of the 1960s; and, second, the post-AIDS awareness 1990s”.

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 …

Arrow Rock, Spring 2025, Full Issue

Arrow Rock

No abstract provided.

Encanto The Musical: An Exploration Of Translating Media From Film To Stage, Isabel Perez-Flores

Whittier Scholars Program

I’m going to be honest: I did not go into this project with the intent of radically changing Encanto. I had some points I wanted to expand upon, some improvements and edits that I felt the film could have utilized, but overall, I was satisfied with the way the story was told. The real change, I’ve come to realize, lies not in the story and the script itself, but in the way the story is told. The obvious change is that this version of Encanto, in an ideal world, would be performed in front of a live audience, in a …

Untethered And Unraveled: Isolated Motherhood In The Liminal Stage, Ashton K. Wronikowski

All Theses

In examining Kate Chopin’s The Awakening alongside anthropologic theories of liminality, this paper examines the becoming women traverse as they transition between various social roles: girl, woman, mother. Edna is a maternal character attempting to unweave herself from her roles as mother and wife, and she finds this desire to go backwards to the freedom she experienced as a girl is proven to be impossible. The unmooring of her psyche and her subsequent suicide is indicative of a failure, not of her own accord, but in the social preparation and support she receives within her new identity. Social anthropologists further …

V.1 Spring 2025, Center For Arts & Language, Students Of Risd, Risd Archives

All Student Newspapers

v.1 is a publishing platform for the ongoing work, ideas, discussions, debates, and aspirations of students at the Rhode Island School of Design. The Spring 2025 issue has the theme "Take It as a Sign" and features pieces on baby fever, spreadsheets and recording information, aura and technology, a trip to Horseshoe Bend, the new Art and Computation department at RISD, home and belonging, Illustration student projects related to sensitive experiences, red brick architecture in Providence, and technology and the English language, along with interviews of students in their studios, poetry, and other creative writing.

I Pray To Colors, Jane Damon

Calliope

No abstract provided.

The Bones: A Novel-In-Progress, Chris Stark

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.

Love Y Ganas; A Revolutionay Revelation, Thomas J. Salas

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

My thesis does not have an abstract.

Maria Sabina And The Wise Ones, Robin Bruce

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Maria Sabina was born Maria Sabina Magdalena Garcia in 1894, in the principality of Huautla, located in Oaxaca, Mexico. She’s known as a healer and poet, though she would most likely refer to herself as a woman doctor, whose language becomes beautiful with the help of the psylocibin mushroom, which she affectionately refers to as little saints or holy children. In 1953, American banker, R. Gordon Wasson and his wife, pediatrician Valentina Pavlovna, were the first non-Indigenous people to witness one of Sabina’s ceremonies. Novice ethnomycologists and anthropologists, the couple traveled to Southern Mexico to witness a ceremony in which …

The Depths Of Horror: Exploring The Manifestation Of Fear In The Natural World, Jordan Eugene Easley

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The horror genre is uniquely powerful in that it is one of the only hands of fiction with the ability to reach off the page and follow you. The feeling of fear originally formed in the confines of a scary story can lie dormant in the reader after the story has finished and be resurfaced later by a related trigger. On a late night after work walking through a deserted car garage, home alone in the middle of a storm, or stumbling into an abandoned hospital, the reader is imbued with an ability to detect a threat that was previously …

Locura Progeny, Cindy Longoria

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Growing up in a dysfunctional home with few supportive resources was my inspiration for writing this creative non-fiction work. The goal for Locura Progeny is to connect with people who have had a similar upbringing but felt compelled to not talk about it due the stigma it carries. I wrote this work in first person using a chronological timeline similar to an episodic novel. Each chapter is an important event or memory in my life that shaped my views on my future self and the key people in my life. This story is impossible to tell without focusing on …

H.O.V. - A Novel, David Christopher Rout

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

In this novel. An agribusiness executive from Toronto lives as a homeless man in 1990's Los Angeles. He's wanted for a crime in Canada and is unable to find conventional work. His living involves being a professional passenger for morning and afternoon commuters who wish to use the High Occupancy Vehicle lane. After falling in love with a clerk at a used paperback store, he must confront his choices and deal with the circumstances of his wife's death.