Digital Commons Network^™

Derrida In Mesopotamia: On The Import Of The Cuneiform Inscriptions In Of Grammatology, Will Greenshields

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

Cuneiform writing has a small but privileged position in Derrida’s Of Grammatology – providing the text with its first two epigraphs. By elucidating the source and import of these inscriptions and evaluating Derrida’s understanding of the cuneiform writing system in reference to more recent grammatological studies, this paper explains the significance of these references to the ancient Near East for Derrida’s arguments regarding the origins of Western metaphysics and logocentrism. In the first part, I analyze Derrida’s brief paragraph on cuneiform writing in Of Grammatology as evincing a “fundamental synaesthesia” of phonetic and non-phonetic elements that problematizes the phonocentric definition …

Haunting Pasts, Cancelled Futures: Polish And Argentinian Experiences Of Postdependency, Ewa Kobyłecka-Piwońska

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

The aim of this article is to compare Polish and Argentinian experience of democratic transitions of the 1980s and 1990s. Establishing new political and economic orders in both countries did not entail a change in their citizens’ post-dependent mentality. In the first part of the paper, a connection is drawn between Polish and Argentinian collective memories in line with the methodology of transcultural memory studies (Erll, Rothberg). The post-dependent condition is articulated twofold: through the remembrance of the disappearance (of the Jews, the victims of the Argentina’s state terrorism, the indigenous peoples), and through the confusion in grasping the sense …

Queera Personalis: Theorizing A Queer Ignatian Pedagogical Paradigm In First-Year Writing, Jimmy Hamill

Jesuit Higher Education: A Journal

This article argues that putting the Ignatian Pedagogical Paradigm (IPP) in conversation with Queer Composition Pedagogy can support LGBTQIA+ students and their often-fraught positions at Catholic universities. Beginning with my history as a gay Catholic at a Jesuit college, I examine the Jesuit value of cura personalis or “care for the whole person” by asking how queer students at a Catholic college can be wholly cared for in an institution that marginalizes queer people. Locating this conversation in the context of the first-year writing classroom, a contact zone where students come from diverse personal and disciplinary backgrounds, this article links …

“Honey, Life Is Just A Classroom:” Using Taylor Swift As A Pedagogical Tool For College Composition, Liz Thomae

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

As educators, we confront the challenge of cultivating a deeper understanding of writing in an age obsessed with utilitarianism, instant gratification, and pragmatism. Students come into our classrooms inundated with these messages of utility and often find subjects within the humanities, especially first year writing, boring and unhelpful. Especially with the rise of generative artificial intelligence (AI) use in our classrooms and society at large, we as pedagogues have our work cut out for us. I propose a pedagogical approach that bridges students' interests with essential writing skills by integrating Taylor Swift's music into the composition classroom. Swift's evolution as …

Becoming A Beloved Community: A Restorative Reckoning For A Radical Conversion To Transform Discourse In Higher Education, Latasha Tomay Varlack-Butler

Dissertations

This dissertation critically examines the misappropriation of Restorative Justice Discourse (RJD) within three predominantly white institutions (PWIs), analyzing 59 institutional documents through Critical Discourse Analysis, Relational Critical Discourse Analysis, and Rhetorical Criticism (Fairclough, 1995; Vaandering, 2021; van Dijk, 2008). Tribal Colleges and Universities and South African institutions have emerged as exemplars of authentic RJD, countering co-optation within PWIs. The findings demonstrate that RJD as applied in PWIs is framed in ways that attenuate its transformative potential, perpetuating color-evasiveness (Bonilla-Silva, 2017) and obscuring the intersectional experiences of Black, Indigenous, and disabled communities (Crenshaw, 1991; Million, 2009).

Grounded in decolonial praxis (Smith, …

From Object To Architect: How Molly Bloom Designs Her Own Gaze In Joyce’S Ulysses, Mackenzie Hughes

The Criterion

No abstract provided.

Home, Exile, And Displacement In The Lord Of The Rings And The Hobbit, Sarah Park

The Criterion

No abstract provided.

How To Sell A Gendered Fantasy, Matthew Salzano, Jess X. Alexander, Belinda B. Castiblanco, Brianna Chavez, Maura Conley, Chris Connor, Antoine Jones, Ryan Kani, Christopher Munde, Kyleigh Retzlaff, Steffi Santos, Gabriella Simpson, Amberlin Smith, Jenna Zaza

School of Communication and Journalism Faculty Publications

The media analysis essays in this collection are the result of an online graduate course at Stony Brook University’s Program in Writing and Rhetoric entitled “Intersectionality and Media.” Drawing upon methods and scholarship based primarily in rhetorical studies, the course aimed to prepare graduate students in a variety of disciplines to write, research, and communicate about issues related to media, identity, and the intersectionality of oppression—especially race, class, gender, and sexuality. How to Sell a Gendered Fantasy analyzes various media artifacts (spanning digital, film and tv, music, and games) and the fantasies about gender that they contain. Gendered fantasies work …

An Exploration In Using Aesthetic Creative Modalities In Professional Supervision, Linda Young

Doctor of Ministry Theses and Dissertations

This project examines the integration of aesthetic and creative modalities into professional supervision, traditionally dominated by conversation-based methods. Drawing on over thirty years of experience in education, ministry, and supervision, it addresses the need for more creative, diverse, expressive, and reflective tools to be used in professional supervision practice. The study proposes a theoretically and theologically grounded curriculum to equip supervisors in postgraduate training with creative approaches that enrich learning, insight, and practice within the evolving landscape of professional supervision in Australia.

"Homesick For You:" An Archival Analysis Of Love Letters From World War Ii, Cambria B. Acheson

English (MA) Theses

In this project, I cherish and explore a collection of correspondence exchanged between a married couple during World War II. Applying an embodied research approach that incorporates archival, historical, and cultural studies, I analyze key elements of these letters with special attention for themes of love and family, valuing their insights to touching personal stories that nuance the dominant narratives of history. I contend for the preservation and discussion of these letters and similar artifacts, advocating for their lasting significance within both past and present contexts and their irreplaceable contributions to the cultivation of collective memory and empathy across generations.

Hearing God's Word Through Ecclesial Listening, Nathan Burrow

Doctor of Ministry Theses and Dissertations

This project dissertation was designed to enhance ecclesial listening when sermons are preached at the Hillcrest Church of Christ. The challenge of listening to the Word of God in a way that forms community is not unique to Hillcrest. It is a common problem for preachers and churches today. Our context, marked by shifts in church membership, societal division, and the isolating effects of digital culture, calls for a renewed emphasis on listening as a church community. This project explores the ways in which we can cultivate practices that encourage ecclesial listening—a way of hearing the preached Word that draws …

Bathrooms As Borders: Moms For Liberty And The Policing Of Women’S Spaces, Eva Burklund

Theses/Capstones/Creative Projects

As debates about transgender identity and inclusion influence discussions and policy across the United States, it is important to understand the rhetoric and manifestations of transphobia and trans exclusion. One organization advocating for the exclusion of transgender individuals is Moms for Liberty which is dedicated to preserving parental rights. On their official X (formerly Twitter) account Moms for Liberty often voices their opposition to the inclusion of transgender women in women’s sports and women’s private spaces, justifying their exclusive stance by denying transgender women’s womanhood. They additionally cast themselves as the authorities on who is a woman and who is …

Coalitional Belonging As Praxis: First-Year Writing And Student Community Creation In The Post-Dei University., Kendyl C. Harmeling

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation began as a study into how students interpret and engage language and actions from their institutions of higher education which allege to be supporting and supportive of universally diverse, equitable, and inclusive campus community belonging. Occurring within a locally and globally turbid context of exponential and variable challenges to diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts by institutions of power – like those of higher and public education – this dissertation seeks to understand how, within and without institutional support for DEI, students self-sponsor and community-sponsor their ways of knowing and being to claim space for their belonging on campus. …

Queered Tradition: Disidentificatory Practices Of Queer-Affirming Religious Space, Amanda R. Peterson

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Responding to high rates of religious trauma in the United States, particularly for LGBTQ people, this study investigates the rhetorical moves made in protestant Christian spaces to consider what makes these spaces safe and affirming for queer people. Specifically, I consider the rhetorical impact these churches make through not only their space but also their liturgy and online presence, which informs the embodied experience of the space.

Through autoethnographic research, I look at three local churches—Metropolitan Community Church of Omaha, Urban Abbey, and Elevate Church–the first two queer-affirming and the third conservative. Findings show the various church elements negotiated with …

Rhetorical Hermeneutics After The Posthuman Turn, Michael Noricks

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation revisits Steven Mailloux's (1989) concept of rhetorical hermeneutics, according to which persuasion always conditions our interpretive practices. Seeking to bring Mailloux's insights into conversation with rhetorical theory's posthuman turn, my inquiry begins with the following questions: How might posthuman theories of meaning-making allow us to extend or reimagine rhetoric's relation to interpretation? How might recourse to rhetorical hermeneutics help us understand posthuman rhetoric? Can we indeed theorize a posthuman rhetorical hermeneutics? If so, what does it entail? What are its affordances? What are its contexts? How does it affect our understanding of rhetorical situations and the artifacts produced …

Reenvisioning Identities That Precede Us: “Body Acknowledgement” As Social Justice Practice Within A Communication Ethics Course Redesign, Wendy Kz Anderson, Ollivia Webster, Nicole Yang, Cass Bryant, Taylor Herr

Feminist Pedagogy

We infuse this conversation of “body neutrality” through social justice responsiveness (compassion, equity, and accountability of body/presence privilege) by specifically attending to intersections of race, gender, and body mindset built into our identities. In reimagining the term “body-neutrality” through identity engagement, we introduce the term “body acknowledgment” as an active interpretative state. As a co-authored pedagogical “co-conspiring” for racial justice (Houdek and Ore, 2021, p. 92), we (instructor, teaching assistants, and previous students) offered a course redesign centering social justice strategies to address the following question: How can dialogue about intersectional communication work toward redesigning learning with difference and develop …