Digital Commons Network^™

How Much Touch Can The Paper Withstand?, Aldrin Regina Valdez

Theses and Dissertations

Between embodiment and disembodiment, Aldrin Regina Valdez’s works on paper map histories of care, violence, and mourning, both personal and collective. They ask: how much touch can the paper withstand?

Indeed, In A Way, It's Worse., Jani C. Zubkovs

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates walking as both method and metaphor within an artistic practice grounded in photography. Through walking, I engage in a sustained act of seeing — one that resists the speed and consumption-driven logic of late capitalism and opens space for reflection, slowness, and heightened perception. My photographic work focuses on fragments of the built environment, particularly advertisements, signage, and residual human marks, reframing them through strategies of cropping, isolation, and recontextualization. These images question the distinction between original and reproduction, presence and absence, surface and depth. Drawing on thinkers such as Jonathan Crary, Luigi Ghirri, Siegfried Kracauer, and …

Paintings And Paintings, Anna T. Gregor

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis argues for a renewed distinction between mere paintings and capital-P Paintings, contending that meaning arises through sustained, reciprocal engagement between viewer and artwork. Amid "postmodern" disorientation, it proposes a reorientation toward individual works as sites of immanent logic and shared perception, rather than relying on external narratives or historical clichés.

The Function Of Art, Magdalen O. M. Pickering

Theses and Dissertations

With the help of machines and the powers of perception, Magdalen Pickering introduces logic to strange and fantastical subjects. The Function of Art explores a hybrid of techniques in painting, screenprinting, and computer generated imagery as Magdalen attempts to use generative printing to obscure art historical consciousness. The installation crosses into virtual reality; reframing textiles, landscapes, and the gallery space through a metaphysical lens.

E Is For Ephemera, E Rady

Theses and Dissertations

E is for Ephemera contends with an artist's role as a performer - traversing questions of identity, documentation, temporality, authority, power relations and implication of the self in response to systemic forces. Here, performances are treated as zones in which simulated scenarios sometimes offer various potential opportunities to resolve.

The Hand Reaches Out, Martin John Miller Iv

Theses and Dissertations

Through a combination of narrative description and in-depth explication, I will detail the physical experience of navigating the thesis work while tying those motions directly to personal writing. My hope is that, through this installation, I can establish a framework for relating to these systems through the felt and physical, through the suggested and implied, through the appearance of the ordinary, and on through to the interruption of the absurd.

Rewriting The Frontier: The Impact Of Collective Memory On The Mythos Of Western Settlement, Kelly E. Kooper

Theses and Dissertations

Using Paul Cohen’s methodological approach in History in Three Keys, this thesis examines the construction and debunking of the myths of manifest destiny, the rugged individual frontiersman, and the “noble savage” Native American in the writing about, experience of, and representation of the settlement American West. First, it analyzes the evolution of the historiography from Frederick Jackson Turner to William Cronon. Then it examines the experiences of four families (the Grices, Grahams, Deems, and McCormicks) who settled in Iowa and Nebraska from 1850 to 1880. Lastly, it surveys various popular cultural celebrations of the West. Through this triple lens, this …

Searching For Enslavement In Viking Age Iceland: An Exploration Of Making The “Invisible” Visible, Caitlin Moore

Theses and Dissertations

Enslavement was almost certainly a reality in Viking Age Iceland. However, the fields of Norse Studies and archaeology have traditionally used different lines of evidence to explore enslavement, and for archaeologists, the phenomenon has been left underexplored, and sometimes considered "invisible." While Norse Studies relies primarily on written texts, such as sagas and poems, archaeology focuses more on material remains, including burials and shackles. In Iceland, the archaeological evidence is more subtle - houses with annexes or pit houses, as well as signs of intensive farming and weaving, for example. The presence of any one of these could be otherwise …

Tears, Blood, And Milk: Frida Kahlo's Depictions Of Maternity, Jenny Mushkin Goldman

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis analyzes Frida Kahlo’s representations of miscarriage, childbirth, and breastfeeding as departures from idealized portrayals of womanhood in post-revolutionary Mexico. Drawing on Catholic and Mesoamerican imagery, Kahlo reframes the maternal body as a site of resistance, engaging mexicanidad (Mexicanness) to counter its patriarchal constructions of national identity and gender.

Apocalypse As Utopia: The Exorcisms And Memorials Of Las Yeguas Del Apocalipsis And Queer Liberation In Chile, 1987-1997, Nicolas Poblete

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis provides a comprehensive history of the queer activist-art collective Las Yeguas del Apocalipsis (1987-1997) and their performance-based resistance to the Chilean dictatorship (1973-1990), cultural homophobia, and the HIV/AIDS crisis. Through art actions blending ritual, protest, and queer poetics, the collective redefined public space and national identity, envisioning a utopian queer apocalypse rooted in memory.

The Imposition Of A Narrative Line: The Bildungsroman As Form In Contemporary Art, Brianne Chapelle

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the work of contemporary American artists and writers Moyra Davey, Chris Kraus, Frances Stark, and Martine Syms within the context of feminist art history, theory, and practice in the post-1970s artworld. While often read as autobiographical or self-referential, their work across media uses personal narrative as a means of engaging broader theoretical and institutional concerns. Through the literary form of the bildungsroman, these artists employ narrative, fiction, and memoir—often through new and time-based media, but also through interdisciplinary modes rooted in writing—to reflect on their ongoing education as artists within an increasingly globalized Euro-American artworld. By …

“Bottom Nature”: Embodying History In Gertrude Stein’S The Making Of Americans, Yasmin Tehrani

Theses and Dissertations

This paper attempts to connect Gertrude Stein’s conception of being in The Making of Americans with her vision of the production of history. This paper then concludes that for Stein, historical subjects themselves, both individually and collectively, and the imbued qualities in their being, shape history.

Louis-Léopold Boilly’S Toddler In Mamluk Costume, Circa 1803: Feminism And Orientalism In The Napoléonic Era, Jessie Polk

Theses and Dissertations

Privately held until it came into the Met collection, Toddler in Mamluk Costume by Louis-Léopold Boilly was not widely known and hasn’t been extensively studied. This thesis seeks place it in context and argues that it is likely a portrait of a girl, a niece of Napoléon I, Zénaïde Bonaparte.

Who Are Singer-Songwriters In The 21st Century? A Case Study On The Role Of Digital Communications In Socio-Musical Activity., Miranda Commisso

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis follows ten self-identified, singer-songwriters from diverse musical and cultural backgrounds to identify commonalities, with special attention given to the ways they invest power and meaning in their music through use of social media. While these musicians are seeking capital gains through use of social media, they do it as a way to make music their livelihood, not out of a desire for excessive wealth or fame, which reflects this musical category more broadly.

The International Art Show For The End Of World Hunger By Artists To End Hunger, Coty Heinz

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the development of The International Art Show for the End of World Hunger, organized in the 1980s by the New York nonprofit Artists to End Hunger and a broad network of volunteers. It also considers the exhibition’s context, lead organizer, and impact within an extensive international tour.

The Economic Drivers Of Preferential Access, Kristie-Marie Sanchez

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines how economic theory can explain differences in preferential access across products. Preferential access is the difference between the preferential tariff and the most favored nation (MFN) tariff. This research applies the theory from Bagwell and Staiger (1990) and the empirical findings from Bown and Crowley (2013) to tariff, import flow, import demand, and export supply elasticity data, where Chile is the reporting country. The two-way fixed effects linear regression estimates how changes in import growth, the volatility of import growth, and the inverse sum of import demand and export supply elasticities affect preferential access. The estimates indicate …

Geraldo De Barros’S Fotoformas: Towards The Construction Of New Forms Of Legibility, Jay Bravo

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the legibility and reception of Geraldo de Barros’s Fotoformas within Western art institutions, using MoMA’s 2021 Fotoclubismo exhibition as a case study. It argues that the integration of Brazilian modernist photography into canonical narratives often hinges on strategic affinities with Euro-American frameworks. Drawing on institutional critique, postcolonial theory, and the concept of Anthropophagy, the study explores how Fotoformas challenges conventional photographic discourse and reveals broader dynamics of artistic legitimacy and representation.

What Is Art Hungry For? Food And The Collective Performance Of Life, Sophie Kaufman

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines FOOD, the artist-run restaurant founded in 1971 SoHo, as a feminist, collective artwork. Centering overlooked figures like Carol Goodden and Tina Girouard, it explores how FOOD reimagined authorship, labor, and space, linking artistic, economic, and social experimentation through archival research, spatial theory, and feminist art history.

Shifting Alliances: Are Black People Increasingly Identifying As Republican?, Clamont C. Mack

Student Theses and Dissertations

This paper investigates claims that Black Americans are increasingly aligning with the Republican Party. Drawing on theories of party identification and political realignment, I compare competing perspectives to determine appropriate indicators of realignment within the Black community. Using quantitative analysis across several datasets, I find a modest rise in Republican identification over the past decade, but a more pronounced decline in Democratic affiliation. These findings suggest not a realignment toward the Republican Party, but rather a dealignment from the Democratic Party. This challenges popular media narratives of realignment and instead points to growing political disengagement among Black Americans.

A Limit That Recedes, Chloe Wilcox

Theses and Dissertations

In "A Limit that Recedes", I discuss my art practice in terms of accumulation and techniques of reproduction, such as casting, printing, and repetitive actions. I contextualize my work among artists such as H.C. Westermann, Isa Genzken, and Paul Thek. The work featured in this thesis explores ideas of aspiration, longing, and failure, and explores themes of the fraught relationship of the human and nature.

Testimony Before The Puerto Rico Advisory Committee To The United States Commission On Civil Rights On The Role That Race And Ethnicity Play In The Treatment Of The People Of Puerto Rico By The Federal Government, Yomaira Figueroa, Carlos Vargas-Ramos

CUNY Centro, The Center for Puerto Rican Studies

The Insular Cases, whether the narrow or more expansive canon, have structured the political relationship between Puerto Rico and the United States for more than a century. The genesis of this “third-way” of understanding and structuring the territorial relationship with the United States rested on the very ethnocentric and indeed racist ideology pervasive at the time in U.S. ruling circles, whereby there was a hierarchy of dominance and control that placed White Anglo Saxon Protestant men at the top and subordinated all other ethnic and racial groups in a gradation of subservience and exclusion.

The Struggles For Equality And Democracy In Modern China: Which Was More Influential?, Angelina K. Lambros

Publications and Research

This paper analyzes the struggles for democracy and equality in modern China, from the fall of the Qing Dynasty to the Tiananmen Square movement. It considers which struggle was more influential, evaluating the recurring theme of a fight for democracy in China since the New Culture Movement, and a quest for social and economic equality that Mao and the Chinese Communist Party committed themselves to. Ultimately, the paper concludes that the struggle for democratic norms and institutions was always present among the Chinese people, but it did not succeed in pushing the government or the Party to adopt political reforms. …

Querying The Ecological Sublime: Colonial Aesthetics, Anticolonial Thought, And The ‘Double Fracture’, Tacuma Peters

Publications and Research

This article examines the ecological sublime in its relationship to the history of colonial aesthetics, anticolonial thought, and contemporary colonialism. It argues that, while Edmund Burke utilized the sublime in support of colonialism (including settler colonialism) in North America and colonial slavery, Samson Occom and Ottobah Cugoano developed versions of the sublime to contest British colonialism in the Americas. The history of this aesthetic contestation has not been represented in scholarship on the ecological sublime, which, this article shows, has a vexed relationship with historical and contemporary colonialism. The article argues that the ecological sublime exhibits the “double fracture” of …

Punishing Pregnancy Loss: Miscarriage Criminalization As An Embodied Carceral Practice, Robin O'Hanlon

Publications and Research

The persecution of Brittany Watts, a 34-year-old Black Ohio woman arrested in September 2023 after experiencing a miscarriage, is emblematic of pregnancy loss criminalization as an embodied carceral practice. In the United States, the expansion of “fetal personhood” laws, coupled with a desire to punish imperfect pregnancies, have coalesced to produce policies and practices which actively police and criminalize pregnancy loss. The carceral regime of fetal personhood is further reinforced by medical paternalism and surveillance. I argue that the policies and practices which police pregnancy loss are rooted in a series of carceral logics, which are in turn reinforced by …

Cultural Of Authenticity And Commodification: Analyzing The Aesthetic Waves And Collective Culture In The 2010s And 2020s, Stefanny Leung Yu

Student Theses

The “authentic self” is curated, aestheticized, and most notably, commodified. Digital algorithms, likes, views, and engagement are more than just digital metrics, they are the management of performance. For millions of other users — including the author herself — social media is the locus of personal expression. Most notably, sites like Tumblr, where users in the 2010s posted hazy images or overly filtered graphics along with melancholic song lyrics that match the vibe of the moment, expression was earnest and idealized. Today, social media in the 2020s, new creators like Hannah Neelaman, better known as Ballerina Farm, dress in pastoral …

Exploring The Biasing Effects Of Gender On Personality Disorder Diagnoses Formulated By Artificial Intelligence, Zoe Colclough

Student Theses

Gender bias is prevalent in personality disorder assessments, and while artificial intelligence has been posited as a solution to improve diagnostic objectivity and accuracy, the potential for such technologies to propagate human gender bias in mental health contexts remains underexplored. This study investigated the influences of gender bias on the diagnostic performance of ChatGPT-4o for personality disorders using three factorial research designs, which involved experimentally manipulating patient gender in a combined sample of 360 vignettes and case studies. Vignettes were synthesized through a novel artificial intelligence-assisted methodology established for this research, and case studies were identified from the literature. Significant …

Transfer Of Material Derived From Polymer-Jacketed Bullets During Cycling And Discharge, Ethan A. Frazer

Student Theses

The goal of this study was to determine alternative ways to connect a polymer-coated bullet to the handgun from which it was fired. Polymer-coated bullets are lead projectiles encased in a synthetic coating, which may vary between brands and/or models, to reduce barrel friction and heavy metal exposure. Federal Syntech^® Total Synthetic Jacket (TSJ) ammunition presents unique challenges to firearms examiners as its synthetic coating may not retain the individualizing striations found in traditional unjacketed or metal-jacketed bullets.

In this study, 9mm TSJ ammunition was fired through multiple traditionally rifled aftermarket Glock barrels. Cloth targets were set up at …

Examining Portrayals Of Gender In The Design Of Ai Voice Assistants, Olivia Fratangelo

Student Theses

This capstone project provides a theoretical framework for shifting the ways in which we think about and discuss anthropomorphized features of technological products, focusing specifically on applying this framework to the gendered design of AI voice assistants. The goal in providing this framework is to prompt readers to consider how we can think more critically about technology beyond our “preferences” and biases. Our roles as consumers of technology do not have to be passive ones. In fact, the dialectical relationship between humanity and technology makes everyone who contributes to society not just a consumer, but a developer of technology in …

Notes From The Field - Conference Proceedings, Summer Fellows 2024, Center For Latin American, Caribbean, And Latino Studies (Clacls)

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

CLACLS presents proceedings papers from the second CLACLS Summer Fellows Showcase Conference, held on November 7, 2024. The day-long event showcased fieldwork results of CLACLS 2024 Summer Fellows, and was curated into five panels: “Feminist and Queer Critical Perspectives”, “Transnational Exchanges/Diasporic Experiences”, “Ecocritical Lenses”, “Social Movements, Cultural and Economic Practices and Political Imagination", and "Countering State/Official Narratives.”

Community-Level Analysis Of Anti-Asian Hate Crime, Jisoo Cho, Jinuk Jeong, Christopher Han-Fai Seto

Publications and Research

Motivated by the surge in anti-Asian hate crimes during the COVID-19 pandemic, this study examines the community characteristics associated with the likelihood of their occurrence from 2020 to 2023 through interracial conflict and social disorganization perspectives. Analyzing data from the New York City Police Department and the American Community Survey across 2,198 census tracts, we find that communities with higher levels of Asian population, racial heterogeneity, and residential instability have higher odds of experiencing anti-Asian hate crime. However, concentrated disadvantage and defended neighborhoods (White, Black, and Hispanic) are not significant across all estimated models. These findings have important implications for …