Digital Commons Network^™

The Valley Of The Dead, Morgan A. Frazier

Theses and Dissertations from 2017

Fay, a princess, lives in a secluded valley realm whose inhabitants were slaughtered 45 years ago. She has chosen her eighteenth birthday as the day she will commit suicide to join them. When her mentor and guardian learns of her intentions he stops her and tells her about what he remembers of the event and reminds her that it is her responsibility as Queen to live and take care of them. With this knowledge, the new Queen leaves the valley on a quest to find the truth about what happened the day the villagers were massacred so that she can …

Groundhogs, Tanya Mason Smith

Dissertations

This dissertation contains a collection of stories that explore loss and grief, illness and disability, parent and child relationships, and marriage and its expectations within the gay community and the south.

Self-Confessions, Brandy Dawn Clark

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

The poems in this collection pay homage to the narrative tradition of poetry, in that they tell a story, use a narrator and characters. These poems, however, are the author’s own interpretation of the narrative tradition. The poems are not formal, are not written in metered verse, and do not rhyme. The poems in this collection are a celebration of narrative poetry, and of her poetic voice. They are a mixture of free verse and prose poems, and above all—they collectively tell a story: her story.

The Promethean, Volume 25, The Velvet Night, 2017, English Department, Concordia University-Portland

The Promethean

In these divisive times, we are at the precipice of greatness. Instead of subduing our voices or using them to antagonize others, we write. We type madly and scribble hurriedly. We communicate boldly and kindly. And, when we’re done, and really proud of it, we publish a literary journal.

If America is going to heal, let it be glorious. And what’s more glorious than writing?

On behalf of Dr. Kimberly Knutsen and Sonja Baumeister, the assistant managing editor, Amber Bains, the student editors and contributors, and myself, I present this year’s issue of The Promethean: The Velvet Night. …

Then & Now: Swosu Sayre Student Anthology 2017, Terry Ford, Holley Brewer, Scott Fronenberger, Arpril Miller, Edward Almenas

Sayre Writing Workshop Anthology

This publication contains the works of students attending the Sayre campus of Southwestern Oklahoma State University in the spring, summer and fall semesters of 2017. This year’s edition also includes the winners of the college’s contest for high school juniors, called Timed W.A.R.P. (Writing And Research Project.)

This collection of works is produced in conjunction with the annual Literary Festival. Sponsors for the event are Language Arts instructors Terry Ford, Holley Brewer, and Scott Fronenberger, with help from Assistant Professor April Miller, librarian, and special thanks to the Dean of the College of Associates and Applied Sciences, Sherron Manning. Cover …

Of Mice And Mendel

Arrow Rock

No abstract provided.

Arrow Rock, Spring 2017, Full Issue

Arrow Rock

No abstract provided.

From A Traveling Daughter: A Photographic Memoir, Lilian Murnen

Honors Projects

“World sits outside the door, A voice in your heart is calling, The ends of the world await, Traveling daughter, Feel the sunshine on your face, Starlight guides your feet, Earth and Sky will carry you, Journey after journey, One mountain to the next, Voice in your heart is calling.” (Abigail Washburn, “Song of the Traveling Daughter” translated from Mandarin Chinese)

My family keeps me safe, but it is this safety that protects me from the discomfort that is necessary for growth. Like Abigail Washburn’s “voices,” my discontent and my curiosity call me to venture far beyond what I can …

I. In The Time Of The Others : A Novel ; Ii. Out Of East Pakistan : Postcolonial Colony Bangladesh As A Case Study Of Postcolonial State And Postcolonial Nation-State From East Pakistan To Independence Through The Liberation War Of 1971 : A Critical Analysis., Nadeem Zaman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is a combined creative and critical project consisting a novel and a theoretical component. The novel entitled In the Time of the Others is a fictional account set during the true event of the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971. Using the war as a backdrop, the novel tells the story of one man trying to manage his family, marriage, and financial situation by returning to an inheritance he never claimed. The journey brings him from his home in southern East Pakistan (present-day Bangladesh) to the capital city Dhaka, to the home of his maternal uncle and aunt under …

Don't Go Unless You Mean It : A Novel With Critical Afterword : Heteronormative Masculine Performance In Contemporary Fictions Of The Rural American South., Nathan N. Gower

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation consists of a full-length novel for an adult audience as well as a substantial critical afterword to elucidate and complicate germane thematic concerns of the creative artifact. The novel, leaning on the rich traditions and many genre conventions of fictions of the American south, tells the story of an unlikely underground coal miner in Blue Banks, a fictional southern town set in the caverns and rolling hills of the western Kentucky coal fields. The narrative follows its fish-out-of-water protagonist, Cody Culver, a fledgling academic who thought he had escaped his fate as a third-generation coal miner when he …

His Scent Of Sandalwood., Lujain Almulla

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This creative thesis is a collection of fictional stories, connected by a common geographical and cultural thread: Kuwait. The stories unravel across a span of four thousand years. The poetic-prose style of the opening vignette is a nod to the earliest form of writing that makes up the bulk of Kuwait’s literature: poetry. The abstractedness of the two opening pieces reflects the lack of a deep-rooted national identity, and a brevity in Kuwait’s historical record. The remainder of the thesis explores the evolution of this national identity, as well as the infiltration of Western culture into modern Kuwait, and its …

Re::Humanity, Paisley Summer Ford

Senior Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Beacon, Samantha Eroche

Senior Honors Theses

Beacon is a short, relatively low production value screenplay about two people coming to know each other better, about them coming to know themselves better and to grow as human beings. When Kate Clarence realizes she’s discovered the journal of her favorite pen-named author from childhood—“C. Rimes”—she embarks on a journey to return it to him, whoever he is. She’s delinquent on her rent, her bookshop’s failing, she’s far from her landlocked Midwest home and family, and she’s single; the obligation to return the journal is a welcomed adventure and reprieve. However, when she comes to the conclusion that C. …

Let It In And Let It Go, Sarah Warner

Senior Honors Theses

The following ten chapters comprise the beginning of a larger novel, one which focuses on a young woman’s journey to both accept the mistakes she has made and forgive herself for making them. Carson Cadwell returns to her small hometown after spending the last six months at college in the nearby big city. During this time her mother, who has struggled with breast cancer for years, has finally passed away. Carson, who cut off all contact with her family while she was at school, is now forced to face the reality of what she left behind. Carson, who moves into …

Dinner At Eight, Anastasia M. Berkovich

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

This creative thesis is comprised of six short stories of fiction in various styles and lengths, as well as a critical introduction wherein I discuss the various influences on my work, ranging from Charles Baxter and Karen Joy Fowler to Doležel and John Gardner. All of these stories share a theme of family and loss. Each story also grapples in some way with changing times and places. I have endeavored, by using rhyming action, repeating images, and melodrama, to give each story a great sense of emotion, a feeling both specific to the story but connects to the wider reading …

Table Of The Sun, Christine Bettis

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

My creative thesis is a 48-page collection of poems titled Table of the Sun. Each poem is an intimate interrogation of varied ecological, romantic, and/or political disasters ranging from the Dakota Access Pipeline, cruel love, and Donald Trump. Some poems are reckonings, and others work to heal trauma, heartache, clinical illness, and supernatural afflictions like those experienced by the Tarantati of Puglia. Some are combative, it's true. Water is everywhere and it is multitudinous as an agent of destruction, cleansing, and transformation, and as a life-giver. The collection was influenced by readings, lectures, and courses I've experienced at UNLV, including …

Radio Spring, Kristian Louis Warren Einstman

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Abstract

This thesis, submitted for completion for the Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing, is a manuscript of poems entitled Radio Spring. The collection reckons with distance. The poems move through a domestic landscape, observing the ecstasy and despairs of a variety of relationships within a widespread community. Through subjective, sensual experience, the distinct movements of the collection explore the process of separation, lamenting loss, and the process of acclimation to the limits of distance. In the final movement the poems reach an acceptance that the members of any relationship must remain individual and that there is joy in …

It’S Not About Brooklyn, Elee Maybelle Oak

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

My work at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas in the Master of Fine Arts Creative Writing program has culminated into a collage form hybrid comprised of vignettes, poetry, and other creative works. The writing engages central themes, through the Queer gaze of the character Sissy. She became suspect at an early age because of her odd aptitudes along with a physical appearance that never fit. She dodged and at times embraced an identification as a sort of side show curiosity, and an intoxicated freak of gender, race, and talent. She survived physical and mental attacks. Then she blindly stepped …

The Diagnosis, Lucille Lang Day

Westview

No abstract provided.

A Quiet Congregation, John Grey

Westview

No abstract provided.

In Post Memoriam: An Exploration Of Family And Grieving, Courtney A. Mauck

All NMU Master's Theses

This collection of essays, poems, and fiction details the author’s exploration of familial trauma and grief. The author wrestles with the concept of “postmemory” as theorized by Marianne Hirsch and questions what it means to have the experiences of someone else passed down through generations. The collection includes essays on the connection between eggs and ovarian cancer, the exploration of animal magnetism, as well as a fictional recreation of a familial story. By braiding several forms of writing together, the work aims to create an interwoven narrative that questions the very concept of memory.

Story Problem Solving, Brian D. Kalina

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

This project paper will explore and define the relationship between the Creative Problem Solving (CPS) and the timeless concept of storytelling. Since the beginning of time, people have been sharing stories to relate their experiences and their solutions to overcome challenges and obstacles. CPS is a more modern methodology that aids people in their approach and their ability to generate plans and solutions to overcome challenges and obstacles. Therefore, the premise of this project is to seek answers to the questions; (1) How might we look to stories as frameworks for solving our problems? and (2) How might we marry …

Belt Of Pearls, Danielle Lee Henry

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Belt of Pearls is a collection of poems concerned with the idea of home in both places and in

people. The speaker wrestles with dissatisfaction with home as a place of origin. The ties of

family, familiar landmarks, and old relationships are outgrown; the feeling of belonging becomes

associated with a lover instead. The poems attempt to locate relationships in geographical scenes

largely through the language of weather and flora. Images of light and the way it strikes a scene

are particularly important. Influences of the collection include Robert Hass, Tracy K. Smith, and

Deborah Landau.

Solitude And Our Projected Dreams, David E. Jamison

Theses and Dissertations

“Cineplex” is a creative writing manuscript discussing isolation, escapism, and the way narrative inherently distorts our understanding of the world. Many of my characters are isolated people who create their own fantasies to escape otherwise dreary circumstances. Others try to live their lives by a narrative they see on television or in the news and ultimately discover that reality is infinitely more complex than they have been lead to believe.

Child Protection, Caroline Deluca

Gandy Dancer Archives

No abstract provided.

Fall, Grace Gilbert

Gandy Dancer Archives

No abstract provided.

Red Oak, Juliana Schicho

Gandy Dancer Archives

No abstract provided.

911, Macaulay Glynn

Gandy Dancer Archives

No abstract provided.

Please Hold: Pushing The Comedic Movie Culture Forward, Lonanthony Phillip Parker

Theses and Dissertations

Growing up I always loved to watch movies. I was fascinated with the way the actors and actresses on the screen could spread joy, laughter, sadness, and anger, even making you fall in love by something they said or did. It has been my dream to have the same effect on people through the power of cinema as well. I am going to talk about multiple movies that I feel played a huge part in pushing the comedic movie culture forward. I want to break down and discuss three factors in these movies that I feel are vital when one …

Cacophony, Noha Elbadry

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

When I began writing Cacophony, I was living in Cairo, Egypt. I had graduated with a double major in both Journalism and English and Comparative Literature and had worked as an editor/journalist at one of Egypt’s leading newspapers, Al-Ahram, under the Middle East Politics beat. To this day, working as a journalist is by far the worst experience of my life. I hated it. Not only because most of the news which fell under my beat was often incredibly grim, but because I felt I was being taught to strip the art out of language, to use language to just …