Digital Commons Network^™

Death And Photography In East Asia: Funerary Use Of Portrait Photography, Jeehey Kim

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation expands and elaborates upon my 2009 project, 'Korean Funerary Photo-Portraiture,' which examined the uses of portrait photography in funerals and ancestor worship in Korea. By extending the geographic scope of the earlier project to encompass East Asia, its aim is to investigate how funerary photo-portraiture is intertwined with geopolitical issues across the region.

In order to explore the historical and socio-political layers of vernacular photography in East Asia, this dissertation compares the practice of funerary photo-portraiture in five countries by examining the basic concepts underpinning it. China, Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and Vietnam all incorporate portrait photography into funerals …

Turning To Culture In Times Of Crisis: Global Toolkits And Urban Reinvestment In Buenos Aires, Jacob H. Lederman

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

As cities transition from industrial to post-industrial forms of development, new activities based on leisure and entertainment have come to comprise a greater share of urban economic growth. Drawing upon 10 months of qualitative fieldwork, this research examines the emergence of new urban policies, increasingly reliant on cultural and touristic production, which gained importance in Buenos Aires after Argentina's devastating 2001-2002 economic crisis. Through interviews and fieldwork with policymakers, everyday cultural producers, and the urban poor situated at the margins of these changes, the dissertation seeks to illuminate how local officials reconceived of culture as a form of economic development …

A Review Of Teacher Preparation In New York City: Through An Analysis Of The Teacher Academy, Naomi Uchechuwku Nwosu

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The purpose of this study has been to explore alternative and traditional teacher preparation programs through an analysis of the City University of New York's Teacher Academy program. This study explored the following three aspects of the Teacher Academy: (1) the planning phase- identifying the goal of the Teacher Academy and how the program was envisioned to change teacher preparation within the City University of New York, (2) the implementation phase- identifying the components of the Teacher Academy that were aligned with either or both alternative and traditional teacher preparation programs, and (3) the discontinuation phase- the decision by program …

Women Of Faith: Adaptation Of African American Women Breast Cancer Survivors, Pearline Lincoln Okumakpeyi

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The purpose of this study was to gain an understanding of the adaptation experience of African American women breast cancer survivors. The African American women's perception of the influence of faith on the breast cancer survivorship experience was explored.

This study utilized the directed qualitative content analysis method, which extracted themes and patterns that emerged in a narrative content. The 15 study participants were self-identified African American breast cancer survivors. The study was conducted using semi-structured interview questions that were derived from the modes of the Roy Adaptation Model (RAM). The discussion was framed within the context of the themes …

Health Exposure, Socio-Economic Vulnerability, And Infrastructure At Risk To Current And Projected Coastal Flooding In New York City, Lesley Patrick

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This work uses a GIS-based methodology to develop and map a composite physical exposure, social vulnerability, and critical facilities index for New York City populations exposed to the current and predicted 100- and 500- year coastal floods. The objective is to illustrate how sea-level rise may affect future 100- and 500-year coastal floods in New York City, how these changes in future flood scenarios will affect the number and distribution of people at risk and their associated physical and socioeconomic impacts, and how these impacts will vary among neighborhoods.

Sea-level rise throughout the 21st century will result in increased flood …

Three Essays On The Cost Of Debt Capital, Katarzyna Nelicka Platt

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation consists of three chapters that examine how product market competition affects the cost of public bond debt and how credit rating adjustments influence the cost of debt and leverage of industry rivals.

Chapter 1 explores how competitive threats affect the yield spread of corporate bonds. I find that firms that face high levels of competition also face higher costs of debt. After controlling for common bond-level, firm-level and macroeconomic variables, I find that bondholders of firms that are subject to increased competition demand significantly higher credit spreads than holders of otherwise similar bonds. My analysis also reveals that …

The Pulitzer Prize And Women: An Investigation Into Three Decades Of Winning Plays By Female Dramatists (1981-2009), Kathleen Potts

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Dramas by women had won the Pulitzer Prize six times in the years spanning from 1921 to 1958, followed by an unexplained absence of female winners from 1959 to 1980. Then in the 1980s three women won and women continued to win up until the present day. Covering three decades - the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s - this dissertation investigates these Pulitzer Prize-winning plays by female dramatists: Crimes of the Heart by Beth Henley; 'night, Mother by Marsha Norman; The Heidi Chronicles by Wendy Wasserstein; How I Learned to Drive by Paula Vogel; W;t (a.k.a. Wit) by Margaret Edson; …

Relationship Of Students' Spelling Gains To Teacher Knowledge And Teacher Practice, Alison Puliatte

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study examined the impact of classroom teachers' linguistic knowledge and spelling instructional practices on Grade 2 and 3 students' spelling gains over the course of one school year. The purpose of this study was to identify teacher level variables that impact student spelling gains. This study employed a correlational research design aimed at finding relationships between two independent variables and one dependent variable. The two independent variables were teacher instructional practices and teacher linguistic knowledge. Teacher level variables were identified through two measures, an Instructional Practices Questionnaire and a Linguistic Knowledge Survey. The dependent variable was the student spelling …

Income Inequality And Vulnerabiility To Flood Hazard In Brazil, Rebecca Rasch

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Social theorists suggest that income inequality within a society leads to a breakdown of social cohesion, spatial segregation, and as a result, uneven public resource access. I will assess whether this social phenomenon is important to consider when measuring vulnerability to climate change in urban, middle-income countries. To test this relationship, I create a flood hazard vulnerability index at the municipality level and determine whether income inequality, measured at the municipality level, is a predictor of municipality vulnerability to flood hazard. The flood hazard vulnerability index incorporates socioeconomic, built environment and natural environment data, providing a more holistic approach to …

The Journal Of Mother Studies: A Peer Reviewed, International, Interdisciplinary, Open-Acess, Digital Humanities Hybrid Project, Martha Joy Rose

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Academic Journals are an established forum for educators and researchers to disseminate information within their field. Journals act as mediators of knowledge, advancing the canons within specific areas of study. There are currently two journals that focus on motherhood from an interdisciplinary perspective and one that focuses on fathers. However, none of these determine a specific foundational definition of what the field is, what it hopes to study, and how it will advance itself. Rather, these journals are general collections of a great number of things that touch on varying subjects regarding motherhood and fatherhood. This thesis argues for the …

Technology And The Glass Imagination: Isolation And Closeness From The Window To The Screen, Sarah Elizabeth Welsh

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In computer and cell phone screens, as in 19th-century architecture, glass employs a frame to show a specific picture, and keeps us at a distance from what lies behind it. Glass' dichotomies in technology (transparency and reflection, isolation and closeness) have become stronger metaphors for our experience with technology. This paper will look at the similarities between the language and metaphors created by glass in 19th-century architecture and 21st century technology, and glass' role in connecting us to and alienating us from the world 'outside.' In so doing, the role of glass in the imagination and its impact on modernity …

Taking The Venereal Out Of Venereal Disease: The Public Health Campaign Against Syphilis, 1934-1945, Erin Wuebker

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In the early 20th century, venereal diseases (VD) were estimated to affect 10-40% of the population at some point in their lives. If untreated, the long-term effects of these illnesses were serious--sterility, heart disease, paralysis, blindness, insanity, and even death. In spite of this, VD had often been a taboo and underfunded issue because it had long been associated with marginalized groups, immorality, and hypersexuality. However, attitudes about and the visibility of venereal disease within American culture changed dramatically in the 1930s. By the end of the decade the topic was widely covered in popular media, and governments at every …

The Effects Of Childhood Sexual Abuse On Parenting, Erin Ann Williams

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Childhood sexual abuse (CSA) is a pervasive problem that has been the focus of substantial empirical research. While negative outcomes such as psychiatric diagnoses or health problems have been well documented, the literature regarding the effects of CSA on parenting is sparse and has produced conflicting results. Moreover, the existing research on CSA's effect on later parenting has several methodological limitations (e.g., retrospective data) and has failed to find any consistent explanatory mechanisms/pathways for which CSA is most likely to impede parental success. The present study examined whether a history of CSA leads to negative parental outcomes (i.e., how they …

Essays On The Economics And Methodology Of Social Mobility, Benjamin Zweig

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation consists of three essays which aim to extend the methodology and analysis of the study of social mobility. In the first essay, differences in intergenerational mobility across race and across the parent's earnings distribution are explored through a nonparametric framework. Components of mobility are differentiated and analyzed separately in order to get a comprehensive account of heterogeneities in mobility. Several important differences are found including higher expected mobility for white households, higher idiosyncratic mobility for black households, larger disparities in expected mobility at the high end of the earnings distribution, and much higher rates of overall intergenerational persistence …

Surface Plasmon And The Effect Of Coupled Resonances In The Enhancement Of Phonon And Molecular Modes In Semiconductors, Syed Islam

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The presence of surface plasmon resonance in semiconductors is not a typical point of discussion in the research community. While the presence of surface plasmon resonance in metals is widely accepted due to the presence of free electrons in conduction bands, the existence of surface plasmon in semiconductors has been generally ruled out due to the absence of free electrons in conduction bands. In this dissertation, we show that semiconductors are able to support surface plasmon in valence band. We also demonstrate, by using the Mie theory, that semiconductor nanoparticles can be designed so that the surface plasmon can be …

The Odyssey Of North Korean Defectors: Issues And Problems In The Migration Process, You Gene Kim

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Since the Great Famine in the 1990s, many North Koreans have emigrated in search of better lives in South Korea or other countries. However, they face hardship and peril in every phase of this odyssey. In China, North Korean defectors suffer from the constant threat of being arrested and deported by the Chinese authorities. Furthermore, the Chinese government has refused to grant refugee status to North Korean defectors because of its desire to maintain positive diplomatic relations with North Korea. Consequently, most of the defectors aim to go to South Korea, though some young and educated North Koreans prefer the …

Psychosocial Sequelae Of Homicide Among Murder Victims' Family Members: An Appraisal Of Depression, Grief, And Posttraumatic Stress, Sarah Kopelovich

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The current investigation explored what is known regarding the psychological sequelae of the post-homicide experience for murder victims' family members and friends (MVFM). Participants were also asked about whether they felt they had attained closure, a term which populates anecdotal and theoretical accounts of MVFM's experience. Previous literature guided a theoretical definition of closure as a dimensional construct that represents adaptive functioning following a murder, and includes (1) absence of disabling symptomatology, (2) absence of ruminations about the event or murder victim, and (3) subjective return to baseline functioning. This quasi-experiment consisted of a between-subjects cross-sectional design. The dependent variable …

Attenuation Of Methamphetamine And Nmda-Induced Toxicity By Leptin In Murine Striatum, Nawshin Hoque Kutub

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Methamphetamine (METH) is an addictive illicit psychostimulant that is neurotoxic and causes permanent brain injury. METH-induced neurological damage affects areas of the brain that mediates emotions, motivation, cognition and critical thinking. In the striatum METH neurotoxicity intertwines several factors such as dopamine (DA) overflow, glutamate signaling, and free radicals formation causing oxidative stress. In addition, excessive dopaminergic innervation leads to severe reduction in DA terminals, DA transporters (DAT), and vesicular monoamine transporters (VMAT)-2. METH use causes permanent damage which cannot be recovered even after three years of abstinence. Understanding the mechanism of METH-induced neurodegeneration will provide an avenue towards identifying …

Development Of Instructional Competencies For Assessing And Managing Suicide Risk For Baccalaureate Nursing Education, Abigail Kotowski

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Suicide is a major health problem and a leading cause of death throughout the world. Reforming health professional education has been identified as a primary goal for suicide prevention, and although nursing leadership is involved in this reform, nurses frequently lack the competence to care for patients in suicidal crisis. An identified gap in baccalaureate nursing education is instructional competencies for assessing and managing suicide risk. Instructional competencies are targeted components of knowledge, attitudes, and skills that nursing students need to know in order to assess and manage patients expressing suicidal ideation. This study aimed to develop a set of …

Bank Monitoring: Impact On Equity Reit Risk And Return, Mariya Letdin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The first half of this paper studies the impact of bank screening on the risk of asset collateral pledged against secured loans for a sample of US equity REITs. Using a unique, hand-collected data sample, I show that bank screening results in lower risk assets being pledged as collateral, a finding confirmed by property type risk and location risk. Further, I find evidence consistent with the role of monitoring for secured, non-recourse mortgage loans. Finally, examining risk at the company level, I find that screening and monitoring of REITss assets via utilizing secured mortgage financing (as opposed to unsecured, recourse …

"Young Men Of The Stones": Gendering The First Palestinian Intifada, Karen Lauria

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The First Palestinian Intifada (1987 - 1993) began on December 9, 1987 with riots protesting the killing of a young Palestinian man by the Israeli Defense Forces. The riots quickly grew into a much larger grassroots uprising -- Intifada -- against Israeli occupation. In the following weeks and months, the Occupied Territories were engulfed in waves of protests, demonstrations, boycotts, and other acts of civil disobedience, which continued until 1993. Although Intifada protestors represented a cross-section of Palestinian society, encompassing both old and young, male and female, a single, particular masculine trope soon came to dominate-that of young male activists …

No Shortcuts: The Case For Organizing, Jane Frances Mcalevey

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation will explore how ordinary workers in the new economy create and sustain power from below.

In workplace and community movements, individuals acting collectively have been shown to win victories using a variety of different approaches. In this dissertation, I will argue that different approaches lead to different outcomes, often very different outcomes. I will use a framework throughout of three broad types of change processes; advocacy, mobilizing, and organizing, though my emphasis is on the latter two. And I will argue that each is productive of a different kind of victory.

In arguing my case, that advocacy, mobilizing, …

Middle School Girls In Postfeminist Times, Susan Mccullough

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation, based on an ethnographic case study conducted in the 2013-14 school year, examines early adolescent girls and their teachers and the way in which they experience gender and gender relations in the public middle school context in New York City. Current research into schools in the United States tends to focus on the experience of those students who are in crisis. For the most part, girls are not considered to be a demographic in crisis in public schools in the United States today. Because research on gender and schooling that highlights the success of girls is based on …

Three Faces Of Human Exceptionalism: Genius, Saint, Monster, Mary Clare Feldmann Mckinley

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

An exposition of the artistic genius invokes the perennial challenge to determine intersections between ethics (or morality) and aesthetics. As the human figure of the aesthetic realm, the genius meets its match in two counterparts of the ethical realm: the saint and the monster. Indeed, the genius shares traits with both figures, drawing closer to the saint in its communicative capacity while also revealing a prodigious nature more akin to the monster. This dissertation poses the following question: between the saint and the monster, does the genius resonate more with one than with the other? As one strategy to find …

Apple Picking: The Rise Of Electronic Device Thefts In Boston Subways, Kendra Gentry

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

As mobile technology advances and the demand for WiFi and phone coverage increases, electronic device theft is becoming an international problem in metropolitan public transportation systems. Using transit police reports, this dissertation applies crime opportunity theories to understand which factors increased electronic device theft in Boston subway stations from 2003-2011.

This approach addresses previous studies regarding crime on public transportation, robbery and larceny on subways and electronic device theft - as none have focused on this problem as the theft of a "hot product" within a "hot environment." Negative binomial regression, crime script analysis, sign tests and temporal pattern identification …

Network Modeling Of The Mental Lexicon: Phonological Links Within And Between Communities, Jennifer Anne Gerometta

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Graph theory is a branch of mathematics that is used to study networks. Recently, graph theoretic techniques have been embraced by the cognitive sciences, and used to study the developing lexicon, semantic memory, and first and second language organization (Carlson,et al., 2011, Kennet et al., 2011, Wilks & Meara, 2002, Zareva, 2007) Graph theory can give valuable insight into the underlying phonological structure of language. Studying phonological networks contributes to our understanding of how the mental lexicon develops, and results of experimental studies on lexical processing can be used to test whether the proposed network structure is plausible. The goal …

Nepantla And Ubuntu Ethics Para Nosotros: Beyond Scrupulous Adherence Toward Threshold Perspectives Of Participatory/Collaborative Research Ethics, Monique Antoinette Guishard

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Participatory Action Research (PAR) refers less to a method and more to a continuum of approaches to collaborative inquiry. Within PAR, ideally, some phenomenon has been identified as a mutual area of concern to researchers and community members; working together they design, conduct, analyze, and disseminate the findings of a shared piece of research and coordinate action(s) aimed at using research to redress injustice. If PAR is embraced holistically boundaries inevitably blur as research team members become enmeshed in each other's lives. This blurring while momentous can give rise to ethical quandaries that IRB centered research ethics are inadequate to …

The State Of The Oligocene Icehouse World: Sedimentology, Provenance, And Stable Isotopes Of Marine Sediments From The Antarctic Continental Margin, Daniel William Hauptvogel

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The Oligocene Epoch (34-23 Ma) was a dynamic time in Antarctica, with previous ice volume estimates suggesting fluctuations from below 50 % up to 140 % of modern all while atmospheric CO₂ decreased from above 1,000 ppm in the Early Oligocene to near modern levels by the Late Oligocene. Most of what is known about the Oligocene Antarctic cryosphere however, is derived from distal sedimentary records that can only provide a generalized view of the cryospheric dynamics in Antarctica. To better understand regional differences in Antarctic glacial dynamics, proximal records are needed. This dissertation advances our understanding of these …

Maturation Of Speech Discrimination And Attentional Requirements In Late Childhood, Judith Ann Iannotta

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The ability to perceive speech sounds and contrasts continues to be refined throughout the course of development. While emerging models suggest that development is characterized by shifts from an attentionally demanding mode of processing speech sounds to one that occurs relatively automatically, the specific developmental time-course of these changes remains unclear. The present work reports the findings of two experiments that aimed to provide insights into the time-course by which neural processes underlying speech discrimination in children and adolescents becomes automatic. The experiments used event-related potentials (ERP) measures, with a particular focus on mismatch negativity (MMN) - a developmentally-sensitive index …

Implications Of Muscle Activation Patterns On Balance In The Elderly, Arielle Bailey, Goldie Baum, Hadassa Radzik, Aruna Woods

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

More than one third of adults ages 65 years old and older fall each year in the United States. This can result in trauma, hospital admissions, and potential death. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of waist-pull perturbation training on balance in the elderly. There were two experimental groups, elderly non-fallers (n=9) and elderly fallers (n=5) between ages 65-86, and a control group comprised of young, healthy subjects (n=10) ages 21-31. All subjects underwent baseline and post-training measurements using EMG recordings of the tibialis anterior, gastrocnemius, vastus lateralis and semimembranosus. Training was performing using repeated waist-pull …