Digital Commons Network^™

Zoning And Complementary Incentives To Protect Farmland: A Case For Missoula County, Kaitlin Mccafferty

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Urban sprawl reflects an inefficient use of land that diminishes both rural landscapes and quality of life turning farms, ranches and open space into siloed suburban communities. This results in less walkable cities with more traffic and air pollution, among other negative consequences. Farmland constitutes a particularly important resource that often faces degradation or loss due to sprawl. Higher quality agricultural soils are particularly desirable for development because they are flat and well-drained. Farmland is also important for urban communities concerning food security, environmental health, and economic well being. As American cities continue to grow, farmland around urban areas has …

Avian Community Responses To Bison Grazing In North American Intermountain Grasslands, Danielle A. Fagre

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Grassland and shrubland songbird species are a guild of conservation concern in North America. Many of these species have experienced severe population declines, due to habitat loss and land use change. This makes the conservation and management of remaining habitat of crucial importance for this guild. Grazing by large herbivores is an ecosystem process in grassland systems, and in North America, one of the major historic grazers was the Plains bison (Bison bison). Bison are considered ecosystem engineers, because they modify habitat to be more or less suitable for other species, such as grassland and shrubland songbirds. Bison …

Volunteering For Vegetables: Community Agriculture And The Prospects For Building A More Democratic Food System, Kali Orton

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Scholars and activists hold varied ideas about what a more just and equitable food system might look like. Food democracy, one of these alternative food system theories, centers around the idea that all people should have equal opportunity to meaningfully contribute to the shaping of their food systems. Community farms, due to their socially-oriented qualities, present one possibility for people to develop the skills and knowledge necessary to function as food citizens and build food democracy.

This research explores and seeks to inform food democracy theory through case studies of two urban community farms – one in Missoula, Montana, and …

The Ethosophy Of The Grizzly Man: Timothy Treadwell's Three Ethologies, Blake L. Ginsburg

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This paper explores the ethical appropriateness and significance of Timothy Treadwell’s life among the bears and foxes of Alaska’s Katmai National Park and Preserve. In an attempt to reveal the formative and transformative aspects of Treadwell’s project, I rely upon an ethological framework developed by Matthew Calarco that moves beyond the narrow conception of ethology as a scientific practice aimed at systematic and rigorous documentation of the quantifiable aspects of animal behavior. While many people might be hesitant to conceive of Treadwell’s project as an ethological one, I hope to illuminate the ways in which his life among bears and …

Intelligent Personal Assistants In The Classroom: Impact On Student Engagement, Jason Patrick Neiffer

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Intelligent personal assists are as a software tool utilized by millions of consumers to interact with their smartphone, tablet, laptop or desktop computer, or smart speaker. As more mobile and computer operating systems offer the feature, more classrooms and ultimately students will have access to one of these tools, either on a school-purchased device or a personal device.

The aim of this study was to look at a specific implementation of Siri, an intelligent personal assistant platform, in upper elementary and middle school science classrooms. The researcher utilized the lense of student engagement to measure the impact of the implementation …

Wonder Woman: A Case Study For Critical Media Literacy, Adriana N. Fehrs

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

To better grasp the messages Wonder Woman is sending to its audience, a Critical Media Literacy (CML), ideological, and feminist framework is used to examine whether, and if so how, Wonder Woman succumbs to stereotypes that are often portrayed in the media. These theories will be used in the ensuing project to build a curriculum aimed at high school students.The curriculum positions students to examine the hegemonic ideologies that are represented in pop culture, specifically Wonder Woman.

Implications Of Modulating Glaciers And Snow Cover In Mongolia, Caleb Gikai Pan

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Mongolia’s cryosphere (glaciers and snow cover) drives ecosystem services and in turn, supports emerging economies in the water-restricted country. However, as Mongolia experiences long-term drought conditions and an increase in annual air temperatures at twice the global rate, the potential adverse effects of the changing cryosphere during a period of climate uncertainty will have cascading implications to water availability and economic development. Using several data sources and methods, I partitioned my dissertation into two components to determine the hydrologic and economic implications of modulations in Mongolia’s cryosphere. The first component is an examination of glacier recession in Mongolia’s Altai Mountains, …

Curated Chaos: A Rhetorical Study Of Axmen, Rebekah A. Mcdonald

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In this study, the author uses mixed methods to analyze a three-dimensional place as a rhetorical artifact. The artifact, Axmen, is a family owned, for-profit retail store and a non-profit museum outside of Missoula, Montana. Using examples of the tangible and semiotic features found within the place, the author demonstrates and translates the rhetorical messages communicated there. These messages are then contrasted with the messages the owners and curators of Axmen want to communicate. The author argues that the current curation of museum artifacts and retail products is exclusive to white males, romanticizing blue collar work. This single-lens narrative of …

Chipping Through Time: The Evolution Of Lithic Spatial Organization At The Bridge River Pithouse Village, British Columbia, Ethan P. Ryan

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Archaeological investigations at Housepit 54 within the Bridge River site have, to date, exposed 15 discreet floors primarily dating to ca. 1500-1000 cal. B.P. In this thesis, the spatial distributions of lithic artifacts from every floor are examined. Questions will be addressed specifically towards formation processes and the potential relationships between the patterning of lithic distributions as they relate to hearth-centered activity areas or domestic areas and fluctuations in estimated population. In addition, this thesis explores spatial organization as a cultural trait or concept that can be transmitted through time. Using the same methodological and theoretical approach for each floor, …

Healing Self And Community: Living Pluralism In The Anishinaabe Paradigm, Andrea A. Fitzpatrick

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Abstract: Healing Self and Community: Living Pluralism in The Anishinaabe

This thesis is a study of pluralism through Anishinaabe writers Winona LaDuke, Basil Johnston, Lynn Anderson, and others, focusing on their perceptions and pedagogies and how those perceptions inform pluralistic living. Anishinaabe methodology tends to be innately interconnected, and pluralistic. As such, it can enlighten, heal self-identity structures, and perceptions of the biosphere. I will contextualize how it is necessary to investigate the stories we learn and those we tell, how it is vital to understand where they come from. Included is analysis of how pluralism shows up in mine …

Predictive Spatial Modeling Of Wildfire Occurrence And Poaching Events Related To Siberian Tiger Conservation In Southwest Primorye, Russian Far East, Conor N. Phelan

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Siberian tiger (Panthera tigris altaica) populations worldwide have been drastically reduced in number over the past several decades. The Primorye region of the Russian Far East remains one of the final strongholds for the estimated 400 Siberian tigers remaining in the wild. As a flagship species, Siberian tigers play a crucial socio-economic role in helping agencies and non-profits to motivate, fund, and implement broader conservation efforts. Even while defended by organizations such as the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), Siberian tigers in Primorye face an onslaught of threats to their continued existence. Profound land use changes due to the …

Impacts Of Elephant Crop-Raiding On Subsistence Farmers And Approaches To Reduce Human-Elephant Farming Conflict In Sagalla, Kenya, Sophia Weinmann

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

As human and elephant populations grow in Kenya, elephants increasingly leave parks to eat farmers’ crops while foraging, which creates epicenters of human-elephant conflict (HEC). This conflict compromises farmers’ food and economic security, impedes elephant conservation initiatives, and threatens the safety of humans and elephants. In recent years, the situation has been exacerbated by drought and national-level infrastructure development that bisects key elephant habitat. Although researchers have widely studied elephant populations, few have examined the cultural, economic, and emotional effects of HEC on subsistence farmers. This project utilized a mixed methods approach to address this knowledge gap and understand the …

Meat Reimagined: The Ethics Of Cultured Meat, Valan Anthos

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In this paper I explore a relatively new technology that is being developed to try and solve some of the major issues with modern animal agriculture called cultured meat. I cover the short history of this technology and where it is at currently before addressing two different ways of evaluating the ethics of cultured meat. Responding to much of the praise for cultured meat based on consequentialist ethics, I lay out reasons for skepticism and how some of these estimates might be overblown due to those people advocating for it being situated in the ideology of ecomodernism. I argue that …

Pig Trauma Models: A Civilian Perspective On Ar-15 Post-Cranial Skeletal Trauma, Lauren M. Kenney

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In the last decade, our country has seen an unprecedented wave of terror that has been punctuated by increasing events of gun-related violence. Consequently, the use of firearms against civilians or upon targets containing civilians has inevitably had a direct impact on the health of the individuals affected, and in many cases these events have concluded with mass number fatalities. The driving force for this research falls to the lack of available literature regarding traumatic skeletal injuries associated with high-velocity firearms outside of realm of the military. The effects of these types of weapons on civilians, which result from their …

Ecology, Epidemiology, And Evolutionary Genetics Of Canine Distemper Virus Spillover In African Lions, Julie Kay Weckworth

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The impact of emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) on the health and persistence of wildlife populations is an increasing conservation concern. Large carnivores are particularly vulnerable to EID impacts because they often occur in small, isolated populations with demographic and genetic challenges to long-term persistence. Ecological forces that isolate carnivore populations, e.g. agricultural intensification, simultaneously increase the probability of disease exposure from domestic species and can amplify population susceptibility to infection.

Canine distemper virus emerged as a conservation threat to African lions when an explosive epizootic caused the death or disappearance of a third of the Serengeti lion population in 1994. …

The Sylvan Blindspot: The Archaeological Value Of Surface Vegetation And A Critique Of Its Documentation, John S. Harris

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Surface vegetation at archaeological sites is a resource overlooked in cultural resource management. Drawing upon comparative documentary surveys of site forms and human surveys of 161 archaeologists in 12 U.S. states, this thesis explores why surface vegetation offers archaeological data potential; how archaeological documentation is an artifact of archaeologists, shaped by various subjectivities; and how improvements can be made for vegetal description in cultural inventory site forms. The surveys offer a critique on how the site form records are a product of disciplinary training oversights, differing work background experience, cultural bias, limitations in botanical knowledge, regional differences in U.S. archaeological …

Strange Rarities, Cori Crumrine

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

‘Strange Rarities’ is a compelling and odd coupling of words, and similar to this body of work, this phrase both masks and reveals its references. ‘Strange’ defines something unfamiliar or extraordinary; ‘Rarity’ describes something that is uncommon, or the quality of being rare. Paired together, a ‘strange rarity’ refers to an object, a feeling, or a something, which discourages familiarity and excites wonder and awe.

Bottom-Up And Top-Down Controls On Food Webs In Headwater Streams, Miriam O. Bayer

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Headwater streams account for 70% of stream channel length in the USA and are important as hotspots of nutrient uptake and native biodiversity. Biofilm, the mixed auto- and heterotrophic microbial community covering stream substrates, is where the majority of nutrient processing occurs, and forms the base of stream food webs, particularly in heavily shaded, oligotrophic streams. Both bottom-up (e.g., nutrients, light) and top-down (i.e., consumption) processes are known to affect periphyton, the autotrophic component of biofilm, but little is known about what controls the biofilm community as a whole. Top-down effects are common in streams, where fish are often the …

Cut And Run, Hamish Rickett

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

Common Condition, Georgia D. Dennison

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

Rib, Taylor White

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

RIB challenges the narrative of Adam, Eve, and the Garden of Eden through the women of “SKULL,” “BONE,” “SCAR,” “SPINE,” “BLOOD” “CUNT,” “HAND,” and “HAIR.”

Beak Doctor, Bryn L. Agnew

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Beak Doctor is an excerpt from a novel in progress concerning the life of Brennan Madigan as he grows up in northeastern Ireland and later works as a plague doctor in Venice during the Thirty Years War. The excerpt's primary themes are loss, madness, mythology, religion, and mortality.

Response Of Amphibian And Invertebrate Communities To Wetland Mitigation In The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, Leah K. Swartz

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Wetlands play a critical role in supporting freshwater biodiversity and ecosystem services, but human activities have resulted in large-scale loss and degradation of these habitats across the globe. To offset the decline of wetland area, mitigation wetlands are now frequently constructed, but their ability to replace the functions of natural habitats, including providing habitat for native fauna, remains uncertain. A recent highway reconstruction project in northwestern Wyoming caused impacts to and the destruction of multiple natural wetlands. To mitigate this loss, new wetlands were constructed along the highway corridor. To evaluate the performance of these created wetlands relative to reference …

Decolonization And Political Engagement For The Health And Wellbeing Of The Selish, Ksanka And Qlispe People, Anita Louise Dupuis

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

What would a contemporary cultural model for health and wellbeing look like for an Indigenous community and what domains would feature prominent today? How would this model be reflected in governance for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT)?

This autoethnographic, interdisciplinary, action research study suggests ten cultural domains for inclusion in a contemporary cultural model for health and wellbeing for the Selish, Ksanka and Qlispe (SKQ), the Indigenous Nations of the CSKT. It then provides a revised, annotated draft of a culture-based constitutional governance structure, which integrates, synthesizes, and incorporates these ten domains.

The key purposes of the study …

Backward Masking With Simultaneous Early, Middle And Late Evoked Potentials, Silas Smith

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Auditory processing disorders (APDs) affect a diverse range of people. These types of disorders impair auditory function, despite the outer, middle and inner ear maintaining proper function and health. APD is not necessarily related to auditory thresholds. When people with APD have difficulty discriminating sounds in connected speech, it may be due in part to an effect called Backward Masking (BM). Masking occurs when one stimulus inhibits another, which can lead to a variety of impairments. The neural locus of APDs is for the most part unknown, including the specific conditions which cause BM. A better understanding of these processes …

Early 20th Century Xenophobic Perceptions Among American Security Rally Of Montana Participants In 2016, Christian S. Boyce

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The goal of this research was to investigate immigration perceptions among participants in the American Security Rally of Montana using in-depth interviews and participant observation qualitative techniques. The thesis was guided by the following questions. What are the perceptions of participants among the American Security Rally of Montana with respect to immigration, where do they come from and why are they are created? The main theme highlighted by participants was one of xenophobia. This xenophobic rhetoric was predominantly directed towards potential Syrian refugee migrants to Montana but also encompassed a perspective pertaining to Hispanic/Latino undocumented migrants. Theodore Adorno’s notion of …

Median, Amy Petit

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Median reflects my observation of changing forms of communication in the digital age and how that affects personal interaction, expression, and the value that we assign to objects. The sculptural objects in this exhibit stem from my formative experiences of frequent relocation, as well as a professional background in the fast-paced technological world. These factors, combined with contemplative and repetitive sculptural practices, help illustrate the anxiety and discomfort that can accompany rapid advances in communication practices. My research situates my work within contemporary art by drawing on the relevance of indexical signs, reliquaries, current discussions of communication in the digital …

Drivers Of Demographic And Socioeconomic Shifts At The Bridge River Site (Eerl4), British Columbia, Sarah Nowell

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

ABSTRACT

Nowell, Sarah, M.A. Spring 2017 Anthropology

Drivers of Demographic and Socioeconomic Shifts Regarding the Bridge River II – Bridge River III Transition at the Bridge River Village (EeRl4), British Columbia

Chairperson: Dr. Anna Marie Prentiss

The Bridge River site is located near the confluence of the Bridge and Fraser Rivers in the Mid-Fraser canyon near Lillooet, British Columbia. This region has long been popular for archaeologists seeking to understand the emergence of wealth-based inequality in complex hunter-gatherers. Housepit 54 is one of over 80 pithouses or s7ístken that was continuously occupied throughout most of the village history. It …

Sharing Nature: Rival Visions Of Environmental Discourse, Charles B. Hayes

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In this paper I compare and evaluate the work of Steven Vogel, Akeel Bilgrami, and Jedediah Purdy regarding the place of normative conceptions of nature in political discourse. I argue that it is not in principle undemocratic, nor is it theoretically illegitimate, nor domineering to hold and express ideas involving normative conceptions of nature. On the contrary, it is often exemplary political discourse, well suited for deeply questioning our impact on the world and for inspiring collective change.

"Perhaps," She Said, "Looking Itself Could Be An Antidote.", Sarah Moore

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.