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A Text-Linguistic Analysis Of Deliberative Discourse In Hebrew With Review Of The Lxx Translation, Timothy C. Lang

Masters Theses

This thesis intends to demonstrate that linguistics, specifically the text-linguistic (TL method), may be practically applied to biblical translation and interpretation. Consequently, one may use text-linguistics to discover the biblical author’s intended meaning expressed through the structure of the text. Foundationally, the work of Robert Longacre and Kenneth L. Pike is applied. Functionally, this thesis tests the process described in the dissertation of Ewell Ray Clendenon. While the word test is used, the test is not intended to validate or invalidate the TL method. Rather, the test is analogous to that of a mathematician whereby a proof test is applied …

Mixed Race Futurity Through Contemporary Archetypes: Mutants, Cyborgs And Dhampirs, Kobe Jackson

Masters Theses

Analysis of Enlightenment philosphes reveals how the contemporary archetypes, mutants, cyborgs and dhampirs may be situated as sources for understanding mixed race positionality. Arranged on a trajectory of hybrid mythology reaching from ancient times into the present day, their contemporary relevance is put into context. Through modern speculative fiction, historical mythology and the theoretical frameworks of sociology, and philosophy, two tropes are revealed to be imposed roles for mixed race people. The first one, the tragic hybrid is a term which references a character specific to the context of American colonial slavery, the tragic mulatto. By reframing the term, tragic …

A Study On Private Piano Curriculum Using Edwin Gordon’S Music Learning Theory, Cody Chandler

Masters Theses

This quantitative descriptive research study addresses the deficiencies in modern piano educational literature pertaining to aural development at the earliest stages of piano education. Contemporary piano methodologies often prioritize music notation over aural skill development during the initial stages of instruction. This study addresses this imbalance, offering insights into curriculum selection based on its influence on competition performance scores, music theory exam results, and student retention. The participants in this study are 329 piano students who began lessons between kindergarten and twelfth grade selected from five qualified piano teachers from 2010-2024. Data was collected by recording competition and festival scores, …

Understanding The Performance And Perception Of Odawa Warfare, 1615–1700, Eric P. Morningstar

Masters Theses

This research employs the ethnohistorical method to explore how the Odawa people perceived and carried out warfare from 1615 to 1700. While historians have examined the Odawa, these Native peoples have frequently not been the central focus in the secondary literature. Many primary sources also offer a vague answer as to how the Odawa conceived and carried out warfare. This study aims to clarify historiographical inconsistencies by quantitatively analyzing a database, constructed by the author, of specific primary references to known hostilities between the Odawa, other Native groups, and Europeans. The analysis includes specific variables germane to hostilities such as …

Arranging And Communication Techniques For The Studio Music Producer: A Curriculum, Elizabeth A. Rajcok

Masters Theses

College music students who desire to pursue careers in the commercial music industry would benefit from learning all aspects of music production, including the techniques of rhythm section instruments and the intricacies of various genres. However, courses that provide students with hands-on training in communicating and arranging within a recording studio are lacking in residential collegiate contemporary and commercial music degrees. Students lacking in multi- instrument knowledge and immersion in contemporary genres may find their insufficiency is an impediment when functioning in their desired profession as a music producer post-college. The curriculum project detailed in this study is designed to …

How Music Genres Affect Test Anxiety Among Third-Grade Elementary Students, Amy Summersett Ardovino

Masters Theses

This descriptive case study investigates the effects of classical, rap, electronic, and jazz genres of music played during a test administered to third-grade elementary students. Many studies focus on three main genres, such as classical, rock, and popular music, and not new, emerging popular music genres. With learning performance being a primary concern in education, it is beneficial to ascertain if different music genres affect anxiety in third-grade elementary students. Third-grade students serve as the population for this study; the sample involves 123 third-grade students from Chelsea Park Elementary School. This study implemented the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory for Children (STAI-CH) …

Discovering The Value Of Decision-Making Through Meaningful Experiences During High School Marching Band, William V. Reese

Masters Theses

This paper reviews the decision-making skills that can be acquired during a young musician’s life while participating in the marching band. Marching band can have a major effect on a person’s life, and many things can be connected to the life practices of a civilized adult. Characteristics of good judgment can be exercised when participating in a marching band. There are a lot of decisional practices that can be displayed in the growth of a scholarly musician and their journey to becoming a responsible adult. The purpose of school is to prepare the youth for adulthood choices and marching band …

Scientific Authorial Voice: Incorporating Explicit Instruction In Undergraduate Chemistry Courses, Emma L. Becker

Masters Theses

The effective development of undergraduate chemistry students for success in professional and academic careers involves emphases on content knowledge and on writing and authorial voice. Unfortunately, most undergraduate chemistry instruction wholly neglects writing and authorial voice instruction in favor of content knowledge instruction. This results in the development of chemistry students who know the content of their field but not how to communicate that knowledge or how to enter the chemistry discourse with their own research. This integrative review identified 71 pieces of scholarly literature and synthesized these sources to reconceptualize writing instruction in undergraduate chemistry and propose explicit instruction …

Abiding Presence, Abundant Provision: Water Imagery Within The Temple Motif, Mindy N. Ziegler

Masters Theses

This thesis highlights the richness of the New Testament Christological truths in the Fourth Gospel by tracing the connections John made to the Old Testament history and traditions. John wrote his Gospel account after nearly a lifetime of reflection on the Christ-event and its significance. What had been misunderstood while Jesus walked among his disciples had been illuminated by the Spirit through many years of reflection and study. The New Testament, including the Fourth Gospel, was not written in a vacuum, but drew on a rich and colorful history of Yahweh’s revelation to his people that spanned millennia. The Evangelist’s …

Technology-Based Music Instruction, Alfredo Bedolla

Masters Theses

Many beginning band and choir students lack proficiency in basic sight-reading skills. A significant learning curve exists between the late elementary and early middle school years regarding music reading competency. This study aims to ascertain the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of music notation apps such as Prodigies, Yousician, and Noteflight. The study will use a mixed-method approach. To obtain quantitative data, the study will use an experimental approach to test the effectiveness of digital notation apps on student learning by utilizing a survey. The working hypothesis is that digital notation apps will improve sight-reading skills by using the tools present in …

Teaching Instruments To Deaf And Hard Of Hearing Students, Angelina Kim

Masters Theses

This curriculum project provides information regarding teaching musical instruments to Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) students in elementary school settings. Previous studies have addressed teaching DHH students reading, writing, and general music, but not much on implementing musical instruments for DHH students. In this study, the researcher will have extensive document reviews on the importance of music education for DHH students and identify the ways to teach DHH students about instrument playing. Furthermore, the researcher will prepare lesson plans teaching musical instruments for DHH students in elementary music classrooms and add more data for analysis. The results of this …

Assessment Of Inquiry-Based Learning Practice In Response To The Science Achievement Gap Of City Schools, Lexus K. Baxendale,

Masters Theses

Over the past few decades, many city schools have seen a decline in graduation rates, attendance, rates, and standardized test scores. Once high achieving schools, are now struggling to get students to attend school let alone graduate. One specific area that has experienced this decline is K-12 science education. As a secondary science educator working within a city district, I have witnessed firsthand the substantial gaps in knowledge that many students exhibit even as they transition into high school. These gaps are often profound and can be traced back to the early stages of their education, where foundational scientific concepts …

Female Criminal Agency In Early Fourteenth-Century Norfolk, Anna K. Davis

Masters Theses

Medieval women who were on the wrong side of the law expressed agency in a specific and unusual manner. Criminal agency, as it were, was a way for them to express their wants and desires in a way that is no less valid a subject of study than actions that were legally permissible. However, this agency was constrained by medieval notions of women’s capability. This thesis examines women and their crimes found in an early fourteenth-century Norfolk gaol delivery roll to further understand how the men who ran gaol delivery “allowed” women to be criminal. As gaol delivery rolls were …

Vengeance As Piety: The Heroic And Elegiac Devil Of Genesis B, Alisa Heskin

Masters Theses

In Christian theology, the fall of Lucifer and his fellow rebel angels details the origins of angelic sin and prefigures the fall of humanity. The narrative had a strong literary tradition in early medieval England, appearing frequently in both poetry and prose. The Junius manuscript, one of four codices preserving the majority of Old English poetry, contains three accounts of the fall of the angels, with the most extensive versions being found in the poems known by scholars as Genesis B and Christ and Satan. Much of the scholarly attention Genesis B receives pertains to its interpolation into the longer …

Beings-In-Becoming: A Formative Critique Of Schellenberg's Problem Of Divine Hiddenness, Isaiah Parker

Masters Theses

This thesis aims to show that Schellenberg's problem of divine hiddenness fails as an argument for atheism because his assumptions about, and understanding of, what constitutes belief does not account for the nuanced and complex understanding of belief formation presented in contemporary psychology and recently developed dynamic liminal-belief frameworks. This paper argues that Schellenberg has been immodest in his robust claims regarding the existence of a cognitive state of nonresistant unbelief. In other words, he has misdiagnosed the human condition of doubt by unnecessarily holding to a narrow definition of belief. The complexity of belief formation necessitates a holistic credence …

Living A Life Behind Filters And Smiles, Lisa K. Bohler

Masters Theses

This thesis is built on the authentic life stories of a family that endured the painful realities of child abuse and neglect. The artist's statement provides insight into the origin of the memoir-style story and why it is appropriately labeled as autofiction. The limitations in the research were not hindrances but rather a testament to the veracity of the stories, which are true memories. The critical research paper aims to determine whether the popularity of autofiction is a genuine reflection of society.

The Tongue Schizochronick: Linguistic Archaism In Thomas Pynchon's Mason & Dixon, Timothy Perry O'Connor

Masters Theses

In Thomas Pynchon's novel Mason & Dixon, Reverend Wicks Cherrycoke regales his family with tales of the titular pair. The novel is written in a pastiche of late-Enlightenment-era English, which expresses an attack on modernity. Modernity, according to Pynchon, explores entropy and excludes Christ. Subjunctivity and storytelling provide a way to make contact once again with a more hopeful paradigm. The novel joins premodernity and postmodernity through its language's aurality, variability, and polysemy. The pastiche serves to undermine modernity's ambitions by satirically embracing archaic language; adopting Enlightenment parlance gestures ironically at the outmodedness the era's -theorized progress. Aurality appears in …

Feminine Language For God In The Hebrew Bible And The Implications For The Image Of God In Women, Shanté Grossett O'Neal

Masters Theses

Genesis 1:27 affirms that God created males and females in his image, suggesting that there are both masculine and feminine aspects to God's nature. Despite this, evangelical Christians often emphasize God's masculine attributes and minimize God's feminine qualities. This thesis seeks to promote awareness of the feminine language for God in the Hebrew Bible and to consider its implications for understanding the image of God in women. The research begins with a historical overview of feminist and evangelical scholarship on language for God, as well as an introduction to the Conceptual Metaphor Theory and its application in Biblical Studies. The …

Community Engagement In Art & Design Colleges, Mah Rukh Raja

Masters Theses

This thesis titled ‘Community Engagement in Art & Design Colleges: Case Studies from Pakistan’ highlights the importance of community-engaged practices in education, specifically within the realm of art and design, and examines the effect of community engagement on student learning. It focuses on the importance of creating opportunities for reciprocal, community-engaged learning where responsibilities, roles and credit are shared equally among students, community partners, and educational institutions to develop projects that are in the best interest of communities.

This research coincides with the introduction of community and civic engagement in undergraduate education in Pakistan. Its primary objective is to serve …

Half Dawn, Catherine Ashley

Masters Theses

By presenting these words on paper, I have given entry into a microcosm of recent research, questions, and creative explorations. There is potential for disconnection when trying to turn your head inside out and present it in a way that feels beautiful for other people. I’m trusting the moments of authenticity I’ve found in my wandering. Segue. Relationship. Gesture. Illusion. My musings all stem from notions of temporality. Time dances on the farthest ends of both immensity and desolation. I’ve spent stretches of time asking the people, texts, and experiments around me to define time in a way that I …

Lucid Dream: Embracing Uncertainty, Zhiyun Zhang

Masters Theses

Glass is a tool, a projection surface, a medium for optical phenomena. It creates a tangible link between physical space and perception, transcending the physical realm to reshape our sensory perceptions and resonate within our psyche, deepening our understanding. Inspired by cosmic and natural phenomena, my installations narrate the contemplation of the moon and the appreciation of rainbows. They reference historic optical technologies, incorporating glass, mirrors, light, darkness, and space to produce an encounter that extends beyond personal experience, resonating with our collective unconscious, uniting us in profound ways. The blurred boundaries between observer and observed, reality and illusion, sensory …

Never Real Historians, Emily Bluedorn

Masters Theses

Never Real Historians is a graphic inquiry into how surfacing hidden histories can lead to a liberatory and layered design practice. It is both a record of my process and a template for future making and future ancestors. Mining inheritance can be an ambiguously murky territory, full of contradictions, collisions, and tension between the past and present. My hope is that this thesis functions as a model of navigating that terrain, by interacting with storied objects and ephemera, in order to revive forgotten and marginalized histories. By re-examining my own shared and personal inheritances, as an American woman designer living …

Naturify 2300, Yarina Yiwei Dai

Masters Theses

In my art practice, I explore the interplay between human desires to manipulate and anthropomorphize nature, as seen in the technological augmentation of plants and living entities. This investigation delves into how this intersection, alongside empathy towards these creations, contributes to fears of uncontrollability and the risks of addiction and excessive dependence on technology.

Bioengineering and genetic modification have cultivated unprecedented developments, allowing humans to manipulate the fundamental building blocks of life. My research speculates on this technology further, modifying the genetic code of organisms and creating bioengineered wearable entities with enhanced traits or entirely new functionalities. The primary objective …

Call And Response : Experiments In Storytelling, Deanne Fernandes

Masters Theses

Being part of RISD's inaugural Masters of Illustration cohort has been an immense honor. This journey has been nothing short of transformative and healing, as it has allowed me to unearth layers of self-discovery through my creative practice.

In my thesis, I introduce a fresh research methodology rooted in the principles of call and response, with adaptability, creativity, and storytelling as its foundational pillars. Through the lenses of visual storytelling, experimental animation, graphic journalism, and fictional world-building, I demonstrate how these techniques can effectively bridge the gap between theory and practice. This dynamic approach fosters meaningful connections among diverse perspectives …

Industrial Tenderness, Elbert Girón

Masters Theses

Industrial Tenderness surveys the relationship between visual language, cultural expression, and diasporic practices through the design of functional sculptures. These designed objects seek to communicate cultural legibility, or intuitive cultural belonging, to Mexican-American peoples by challenging legacy notions of design language. Through a proposed design language framework and designed objects, Industrial Tenderness seeks to affirm a pluriversal practice of industrial design.

Legacy industrial design confines design language to a heavily prescriptive canon, resulting in a stark monocultural language that is unrepresentative of perspectives outside of a legacy dominant white eurocentricity founded in thinking from the Bauhaus and Ulm schools. Through …

Echoes Of Heights: Sustaining Tradition For Education And Community In The Tibetan Plateau, Junyue Wen

Masters Theses

In the Tibetan Plateau region, where most children need to leave their homes to attend boarding schools, this thesis research focuses on the development of Community Learning Centers (CLCs) as a transformative solution to bridge the gap between distant homes and schools. The development and design of tradi- tional Tibetan dwellings focuses on history, culture and nature in terms of appro- priateness and cultural heritage. By transforming Tibetan traditional dwellings into community-based learning centers, these centers will become multi-func- tional spaces that enhance mental health by promoting community engagement, supporting cultural preservation, and assisting students in transitioning between boarding school …

Bridge Between Calligraphy And Architect, Tianhao Zhong

Masters Theses

The tradition of calligraphy is divided by time, categorized by eras rather than by years, months, or days. As an art, calligraphy is the tangible manifestation of human spiritual ideals, an organic blend of an individual's calligraphic skills and spiritual philosophy. The strokes and lines of calligraphic art imbue Chinese characters, "carved into a single aspect," with a form of movement, enriched with musical rhythm. The structure of the characters symbolizes the laws of universal movement, embodying a beauty that captures the essence of all, hence known as "the sound of silence" and "the form of the formless." It is …

Dimensional Dialogues, Farida Abousteit

Masters Theses

Dimensional Dialogues, a multi-installation series, offers us a place to interact with language in a way that is whimsical and transcends our need to understand and comprehend language. We remove the tensions of language barriers by finding beauty and personal connection to typography, now scaled up to a human scale and reacting in real time to our movements. A process begins from ancient practices of designing Arabic Calligraphy, to creating Graphic Outputs of that calligraphy, to technologically heavy and new works in creating 3D models of these works that can be projected and respond to human movement. These installations, in …

Asili, Husna Abubakar

Masters Theses

ASILI is a Swahili word meaning ORIGIN, SOURCE, and ESSENCE. It can also mean the fundamental principal of a culture. It is not cognitive, it is metaphysical.

The work that I do explores the preconceptual, prespatial and pretemporal organization of culture, specifically African culture and even more specifically, Swahili culture.

I use multiple techniques to interpolate a visual voice to an othered people both continental and abroad. I explore the mythoform that connects the mystical and dive into what of it that becomes a practice within Swahili culture. I take experience from my life as a Swahili woman, from the …

Sircling The Cquare, Latika Balachander

Masters Theses

As we journey into an increasingly virtual and intangible reality, is there an opportunity for our tactile fabrics to journey with, and even reorient us? Can they exist in our future worlds to remind us of the value of current traditional, low-tech practices that we may soon forget?

Referencing the fundamental fabric languages of knitted and woven structures, this collection of garments, that I term “Earthsuits,” embody the stages of metamorphosis as we adjust to a new phase of our perceptive reality. With an emphasis on circling, we loop through virtual squares like screens and pixels, to the circles of …