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“I Almost Hope I Get Hit Again Soon”: The Wartime Service And Medical History Of Leon C. Standifer, Wwii American Infantryman, Alexis M. Laguna

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The American GI’s experience in hospital during World War II is absent from official military histories, most scholarly works, and even many oral history collections. Utilizing the papers of WWII infantryman, Leon Standifer, this thesis offers the reader a rare glimpse of WWII military hospital life and chronicles one soldier’s journey from willing obedience to subversive action.

This thesis compares the stated goals and procedures of the US Army medical department to the experience of Leon Standifer, an infantryman who served in northern France during the last year of the war and the American occupation of Bavaria, whose service was …

‘Habituated To Drunkenness’: Opinions Of New Orleanians About Prohibition As Revealed Through Letters To The Editor Of The Times-Picayune, 1918-1922, Ryan P. Bourgeois

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Both popular and scholarly observers have portrayed New Orleans as a city both supported and burdened by its image as a diverse cultural other within the American South, historically tolerant of certain sins of the flesh. This image has been used by proponents and critics alike in order to push their respective agenda regarding the Crescent City. This thesis will not seek to discredit this image that is based largely on fact. However, using Prohibition as a case study, this thesis will use letters to the editor to uncover attitudes of New Orleanians in opposition to this reputation to reveal …

The Hydraulic Dimension Of Reconstruction In Louisiana, 1863-1879, Matthew P. Carlin

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Louisiana developed an extensive system of levees throughout the Atchafalaya Basin and along its territorial Mississippi River. This system reached its zenith on the eve of the American Civil War. It went into dramatic decline following the conflict due to the confluence of military activity, protracted irregular warfare, and neglect stemming from labor and capital revolution. These shifts intensified with the 1863 Emancipation Proclamation and finally consolidated after the ratification of Louisiana’s Constitution of 1879. The shift of responsibility for the construction and maintenance of levees during the Reconstruction Era led to many significant changes in the character and function …

“Of Nobler Song Than Mine”: Social Justice In The Life, Times, And Writings Of Fitz-James O'Brien, John P. Irish

Graduate Liberal Studies Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation will be a detailed study of the life, times, and writings of a mid-nineteenth century Irish-American writer, Fitz-James O’Brien. This will be the first full length study of O’Brien’s thought and writings. O’Brien was known, during his day, for two different types of writing: fiction of the supernatural and his writings on social justice, written in the emerging style of literary realism. It is his writings on social justice which this dissertation will explore. O’Brien’s writings on social justice covered three main topics: children, women, and animals. I look at how the historical context, O’Brien’s life, and his …

Decolonizing Playwriting Through Indigenous Ceremonial Performances, Jay B. Muskett

Theatre & Dance ETDs

This dissertation attempts to express the importance of storytelling within the Indigenous Theater framework. It does so by first analyzing the progression of the writer’s unique upbringing and analyzing the influences of story upon an indigenous identity. I will also attempt to describe the aesthetics of Native Theater along two lines of methodology which includes praxis described and developed by Hanay Geiogamah and Rolland Meinholtz. I will also explain how the script 1n2ian tries to follow those concepts of Native Theater to create a ceremonial performance that uses a blending of both methodologies.

Freemasons: Patrons Of The Enlightenment Arts, Jacob Money

Honors Projects

The Enlightenment is known as a time of great advances in science, political theory and individual rights. What is often not given proper consideration are the advances made in the fine arts. Out of this time period came the Hudson River Valley School of painting, a return to Greco-Roman architecture, and the explosion in popularity of the performing arts. In each of these cases, the historically secretive organization known as the Freemasons had a role in the patronage of these artists, architects and composers. Most people are aware of the Masons through popular media and although countless conspiracy theories surround …

Witherspoon, Lister, 1848-1925 (Sc 3431), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 3431. Letters to William Simpson, New York City, from Lister Witherspoon, proprietor of Glenartney Farms, Versailles, Kentucky, with proposals for horse breeding and sales. He discusses pedigrees, prices, and recent foals. One letterhead also lists Witherspoon as the president of Lexington Roller Mills Company, Inc., Lexington, Kentucky.

The Grizzly, May 9, 2019, Courtney A. Duchene, William Wehrs, Sam Isola, Johnny Myers, Thomas Bantley, David Mendelsohn, Thomas Garlick, Zack Muredda

Ursinus College Grizzly Newspaper, 1978 to Present

Kingston Out, Varner in for Bear Bash • Ursinus Reacts to Symbol of Hatred • Q&A with President Blomberg • Ursinus Graduates First Wave of Education Studies Majors • Breakaway Student Productions' One Act Festival Premieres Four Student-Written Plays • Ursinus Fulbright Scholar, Jason Bennett '19, to Research Theoretical High-Energy Physics at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands • Opinions: Swarthmore Scandal Speaks to Greater Issues with Fraternity Culture; The United States Should Shorten its Work Week • Athlete Spotlight: Running Back Sam Ragland '21 • The "Thanks for a Fun Two Years" Award: You, the Fans • Bears …

A War Of Frustration: Saddam Hussein’S Use Of Nerve Gas On Civilians At Halabja (1988) And The American Response, Christopher Huber

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

The large-scale use of chemical weapons in conflict dates to World War I, but international regulations kept its use in check until Saddam Hussein’s decision to implement it throughout the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s. The consistent use of poison gas and repeated lack of international intervention allowed Saddam to murder thousands of Kurdish citizens in Halabja on March 16, 1988. This paper admits Saddam Hussein committed heinous acts of human rights violations and war crimes, but argues he was forced to make these horrific decisions by an unyielding adversary in the Ayatollah Khomeini, abandoned by an ineffective United Nations …

Why Does It Have To Be So Loud? A Social History Of The Electric Guitar, Thomas Dunne

Theses and Dissertations

In this thesis , I will examine the history of the electric guitar from it's earliest incarnations in the twentieth century up to the present day. I will argue that more than any other instrument, the electric guitar has achieved a special place in American society, and indeed has become an iconic symbol of American culture. I will further argue that the greatest electric guitarists playing in the genre of rock 'n' roll also achieved special place in American society that their peers playing in other genres did not attain. These rock guitarists were not just considered great musicians; they …

The Narrative Of Revolution: Socialism And The Masses 1911-1917, Stephen K. Walkiewicz

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis seeks to situate The Masses magazine (1911-1917) within a specific discursive tradition of revolution, revealing a narrative pattern that is linked with discourse that began to emerge during and after the French Revolution. As the term “socialism” begins to resonate again within popular American political discourse (and as a potentially viable course of action rather than a curse for damnable offense), it is worthwhile to trace its significance within American history to better understand its aesthetic dimensions, its radical difference, and its way of devising problems and answers. In short, this thesis poses the question: what ideological structures …

The Grizzly, May 2, 2019, Courtney A. Duchene, Skylar Haas, Sam Isola, Johnny Myers, Shelsea Deravil, William Wehrs, Jen Joseph, David Mendelsohn, Tom Cardozo

Ursinus College Grizzly Newspaper, 1978 to Present

Hollywood Actor Visits Ursinus • UCDC Brings Dynamic Performances to COSA • Ursinus Student Makes History by Being First Student to be Accepted in Major Program • COSA Features Play About Racism on Campus • "Calling All Textures" Event Brings the Community Together • Sophomore AJ Belville Wins Scholarship to Study in Scotland for a Year • Opinions: We Must not Ignore China's Cultural Purging; Disney's Newest "Dumbo" Fails to Soar • Football Team Preparing for Fall Season with Spring Workouts • The "Fine, We'll do This Later" Award: Kayla Quinn • Bears' Playoff Push Falls Short

The Evolution Of Slavery-Built Higher Education And Racial Supremacy In American Universities, Olivia A. Ricketts

Young Historians Conference

This paper discusses the connections between American universities and the institution of slavery. It examines four universities connections that were funded in different eras of United States history, including Harvard and Yale in the Colonial Era, University of Chicago in the Antebellum Era, and the University of Oregon in Post-Reconstruction Era, as well as what they are currently doing in the form of reparations. The thesis of the paper is that through the history of the United States, the level of association between slavery and universities decreases, due to the rise of abolitionist ideals.

What Comes After: The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, Charles S. Borah

Young Historians Conference

This paper looks at the Exxon Valdez oil spill and the response that followed, including the cleanup efforts, litigation against ExxonMobil and the captain of the Exxon Valdez, Joseph Hazelwood. Also evaluated is the governmental response to the spill, both at the state level in Governor Steve Cowper’s reaction to the spill and the laws passed and hearings held in the federal government. The paper’s thesis is that though there was judicial and legislative action taken as a result of the Exxon Valdez oil spill, it was too narrow in scope to prevent future oil spills from happening and only …

Selling Childhood: How The Middle Class Used Children In The Anti-Tuberculosis Movement (1930s-1940s), Hannah Fisher

Senior Theses

During the anti-tuberculosis movement of the 1930s and 1940s, children were chosen as focal points, with their roles shaped by society’s changing view of childhood, the emergence of the middle class, and the socioeconomic and political climate. Children were used by middle-class reformers as conduits through which to disseminate information and enact controls on the working class. Health education in schools had two main goals: (1) for educated children to become educated adults, and (2) for educated children to transform the behaviors of adults around them. Although researchers have studied middle-class interventions into children’s health, few have analyzed the role …

The State And The Spirits: Voodoo And Religious Repression In Jim Crow New Orleans, Kendra Cole

Honors Theses

Voodoo transitioned from a religion that caused its practitioners to be criminalized and apprehended by the state to a lure used to entice visitors to the Crescent City. This thesis attemtps to show how the public perception of Voodoo shifted in the late nineteenth-century from a hidden threat to a public novelty. I explain this shift through analyzing New Orleans guidebooks, newspapers, and court cases at the turn of the twentieth-century. This thesis fills the gap in the scholarship pertaining to the twentieth-century. I achieve this by drawing upon more extensive literature on the oppression of African-derived religions in other …

"A Trained And Trustful Soul" : Life And Literature Of A Black Louisville Artist In Minstrel America., Emma Christine Bryan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores the century-long theatrical expression of blackface minstrelsy within the larger context of the United States, but specifically studies its popularity in Louisville, Kentucky from 1878 to 1925. This study is meant to bring to the fore the pervasiveness of blackface minstrelsy, and how it was used to demean, degrade, and oppress African American populations before, during, and well after Emancipation. This work is not meant to memorialize the craft of minstrelsy, however, but rather attempts to show how black individuals of the time were actively working to both reclaim the detrimental stereotypes of blackface minstrelsy, while also …

Young Americans For Freedom And The Anti-War Movement: Pro-War Encounters With The New Left At The Height Of The Vietnam War, Ethan Swift

Kaplan Senior Essay Prize for Use of Library Special Collections

While a vast amount of contemporary scholarship has been dedicated to student activism during the late 1960s and early 1970s, very little of it has focused on those who supported the war in Vietnam. The few authors who have written on the topic tend to present pro-war activists as a mild-mannered force that used conventional and congenial tactics to advocate for victory in southeast Asia. This paper will upend this characterization by examining how members of the conservative organization Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) saw themselves as a besieged minority at American universities and responded to the radicalism of the …

From Spacewar! To Twitch.Tv: The Influence Of Competition In Video Games And The Rise Of Esports, Robert Boyle

Senior Theses

Since their inception in the 1950s, video games have come a long way; with that advancement came more popularity, a growing demand, and an evolving culture. The first person shooter (FPS) video game genre and the competitive scene that was born out of it is an ideal case study to analyze this change over time. To understand how video games became so popular, one must examine their history: specifically, their development, impacts the games have had on society, and economic trajectories. Similar to traditional professional sports, video games experienced a cultural shift around their lucrative profit margins and unfolding professionalization …

The Sigh Of Triple Consciousness: Blacks Who Blurred The Color Line In Films From The 1930s Through The 1950s, Audrey Phillips

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis will identify an over looked subset of racial identity as seen through film narratives from the 1930’s through the 1950’s pre-Civil Rights era. The subcategory of racial identity is the necessity of passing for Black people then identified as Negro. The primary film narratives include Veiled Aristocrats (1932), Lost Boundaries (1949), Pinky (1949) and Imitation of Life (1934). These images will deploy the troupe of passing as a racialized historical image. These films depict the pain and anguish Passers endured while escaping their racial identity. Through these stories we identify, sympathize and understand the needs of Black …

Comales And Colonialism: An Analysis Of Cuisine And Ceramics On A 17th-Century New Mexican Estancia, Adam C. Brinkman

Graduate Masters Theses

The archaeological site of LA 20,000 is an early colonial Spanish estancia, or ranch, in New Mexico that was occupied between A.D. 1630 to 1680. Spanish estancias became the homes and work spaces for people with a wide range of cultural backgrounds. In this thesis, the author analyses the ceramics and ground stone assemblage of LA 20,000 to understand the daily practice of cuisine on this rural frontier. Cuisine has important symbolic components related to an individual’s identity. Through the practice of cuisine, inhabitants consumed foods that fit conceptions of acceptability, enacted preparation and cooking methods that were taught intergenerationally, …

North Of Ourselves: Identity And Place In Jim Wayne Miller’S Poetry, Micah Mccrotty

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Jim Wayne Miller’s poetry examines how human history and topography join to create place. His work often incorporates images of land and ecology; it deliberately questions the delineation between place and self. This thesis explores how Miller presents images of water to describe the relationship between inhabitants and their location, both with the positive image of the spring and the negative image of the flood. Additionally, this thesis examines how the Brier, Miller’s most prominent persona character, grieves his separation from home and ultimately finds healing and reunification of the self through his return to the hills. In his poetry, …

Shirley Family Letters (Sc 3403), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid and scans (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 3403. Letters received by the Shirley family of Eagle Station, Carroll County, Kentucky. A nephew writes of his new job with a Fort Wayne, Indiana newspaper, a specialist with the Dixie Poultry Journal gives advice on treating worms in poultry, and Albert Shirley writes his wife Lydia from their daughter Kathleen’s home. Includes a doctor’s notes on the health of Kathleen’s young son Robert.

Ending The Civil War And Consequences For Congress, Paul Finkelman, Donald R. Kennon

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

The social changes and human and economic costs of the Civil War led to profound legal and constitutional developments after it ended, not least of which were the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments and the many laws devised to protect the civil rights of newly freed African Americans. These amendments and laws worked for a while, but they were ineffective or ineffectively enforced for more than a century.

In Ending the Civil War and the Consequences for Congress, contributors explore how the end of the war both continued the trauma of the conflict and enhanced the potential for the new birth …

Women Of The War: Female Espionage Agents For The Confederacy, Sarah Stellhorn

Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal

Although historians have frequently examined the role of women on the home front during the Civil War, women who contributed to the cause in more direct ways, such as espionage, are often neglected. An in-depth examination of specific females spying for the Confederacy, such as Rose O’Neal Greenhow and Belle Boyd, proves that their actions, both remarkable and uncharacteristic of women at the time, had a direct impact on the war. A vast network of spies and smugglers existed not only in the southern and border states but also throughout the North, even in Washington D.C. itself. This network was …

Wilson, Alexander Gordon, 1888-1970 (Sc 3384), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Manuscripts Small Collection 3384. Letters of WKU English faculty member Gordon Wilson to fellow faculty member Frances Richards and her sister Mary Ellen Richards, Franklin, Kentucky. The folklorist and accomplished amateur ornithologist writes effusively about his life and post-retirement work, including his autobiography and his linguistic and bird studies in the Mammoth Cave region. He reports various bird sightings and counts to Mary Ellen, discusses upcoming speeches and publications, shares news of his family, friends and health, and thanks Frances for gifts of phonograph records. Includes notes from his wife written after his death.

Nidoto Nai Yoni "Let It Not Happen Again": The Effect Of World War Ii And Mass Incarceration On Japanese American Women's Gender Roles, Laura Bohuski

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

This thesis analyses the experiences, memories, and events of the World War II mass incarceration of Japanese Americans to determine what changes this traumatic event engendered in the gender roles of Issei and Nisei women. The events of incarceration separated families and broke down traditional societal norms leaving a deeply emotional and psychological scar upon the Japanese American community. Ironically, new opportunities arose for Issei and Nisei women as both a result of the effects of the mass incarceration upon the Japanese American community and because of governmental pressures such as labor shortages and the cost of housing over one …

The Mass Murder Of The European Jews And The Concept Of ‘Genocide’ In The Nuremberg Trials: Reassessing Raphaël Lemkin’S Impact, Alexa Stiller

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

Nuremberg’s prosecutors prominently used Lemkin’s genocide concept. They also dealt in detail with the mass murder of Europe’s Jews. However, for them ‘genocide’ and the Holocaust were not congruent. They used different definitions of Lemkin’s concept and interpreted the relationship between the mass murder of the European Jews and the entire mass violence of the Nazis differently. Lemkin had little influence on the application of his concept in the Nuremberg trials between 1945 and 1949. The implementation of the 1948 United Nations Genocide Convention put an end to the broad use of the original concept from 1944. Although both Lemkin …

Importing The American Dream: Japanese Hardware And Soft Power, Kenneth S. Klein

Tenor of Our Times

This paper explores the nature and reception of Japanese imports, both material and cultural, to America in recent history. It puts special focus on elements of popular culture such as film, television, sport, and video games to show how the content of Japanese imports shifted from being predominately hardware based to software based by the end of the 20^th century. The paper also explores the degree to which the Japanese identity of various products was hidden or emphasized in their advertisement and presentation. Throughout, the theme and question of quality is discussed. The American perception of the quality of …

19th Century Development Of Refrigeration In The American Meat Packing Industry, David I. Smith

Tenor of Our Times

The United States, particularly the city of Chicago, proved to be the center for the development of modern refrigeration. The meat-packing industry of Chicago was known worldwide and proved to be the forefront for technological development in refrigeration. Certain technologies such as refrigerated railway cars and cold storage facilities proved to be monumental to advancement in the industry. The invention of the refrigerator car revolutionized the industry by providing efficient and reliable transport for chilled, packaged meat and removed the old system of transporting livestock, saving immeasurable amounts of money. Cold storage facilities revolutionized the industry through providing efficient year-round …