Digital Commons Network^™

Politics Of Belonging: Identity, Integration, And Spatial Practices Of Algerian Immigrants And Their Descendants In Paris, France, Elizabeth Nelson

Theses and Dissertations

Using a geographic framework, this dissertation explores how Algerian immigrants and their descendants perform identity and negotiate belonging in French society. Bringing together critical theorizations of race, identity, space, and place, this work investigates what it means to be a racialized minority in a postcolonial context and to learn and experience the boundaries of ‘Frenchness.’ It is based on the narratives of Algerian immigrants who have migrated to Paris, France, and their French-born children. The empirical evidence of the case studies highlights the myriad ways in which Algerian immigrants and their descendants encounter and structure their interactions with French society, …

Thinking Like An Historian: Improving Engagement Through Project-Based Learning In A United States History Classroom, George Gray

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this action research study is to determine the efficacy of project-based learning activities for improving students’ critical thinking skills and engagement in the classroom. South Carolina’s creation of the United States History end-of-course assessment has led many social studies teachers to design ‘teach to the test’ lesson plans, which this researcher’s students seem to find mundane and uninspiring. Although these teaching methods have helped some students perform well on the end-of-course test, these tactics have sapped their interest in social studies and have not prepared them to be responsible citizens in an active democracy. The social studies …

State Fragility And Sustainable Development Goals In Egypt, Mahmoud Elmakkawe

Theses and Dissertations

This study discusses the problem of state fragility in Egypt and its relationship with sustainable development goals from 2006 to 2016 through utilizing data from relevant literature and reports. Qualitatively analyzing the indicators of the two main variables: fragility and sustainable development goals, the study concludes that Egypt remains politically fragile despite various relative advancements on sustainable development goals recorded. While some progress has been made on multiple socioeconomic indicators throughout the period specified, Egypt still shows an alarming level of fragility, particularly, when it comes to political aspects of democratic governance that include security, justice, rule of law, and …

Husserl And Merleau-Ponty: A Feminist Critique Of The Phenomenological Body, Jasmin M. Makhlouf

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this thesis is to explore the phenomenological notion of embodiment, to explain the objectification and coercion that women and their bodies experience on a daily basis. I build the philosophical foundation of this thesis on Husserlian and Merleau-Pontian phenomenology, as well as, their work’s receptions in feminist philosophy of the early 20th century, mainly Simone de Beauvoir, as well as, more contemporary thinkers like Luce Irigaray and Judith Butler. Moreover, the thesis argues for a return to the traditional phenomenological notion of embodiment while incorporating elements of sexuality and sexual difference.

Spatial Orphans: Cultural Mobility And The Extranatural In Black American Literature, Kelsey Nichole Flint-Martin

Theses and Dissertations

In his 2005 book Conjure in African American Society, Jeffrey Anderson notes that America’s historical and academic interest in conjure has come in waves with each wave correlating to a different significant period in the fight for Black equality: Reconstruction, the Great Migration, and the Civil Rights Movement. In each of these movements, Black people have fought to find a way to belong in the United States as an equal, often undergoing travel and moving to different towns where they could have better economic, physical, or other freedoms. Since the start of the 21st century, there has been another revival …

Enslaved Rebellion And Abolitionist Imperialism In Britain’S Atlantic World, 1807-1884, Lewis Eliot

Theses and Dissertations

In 1807, the British Empire ended its legal involvement in the transatlantic slave trade. The relationship between slavery and imperialism had defined British American imperialism for the preceding three centuries and the end of legal British transatlantic slave trading dramatically altered the Empire’s connection to human bondage. As a result, new debates about slavery dominated the first three decades of the nineteenth century. At the same time, enslaved Africans in Britain’s West Indian colonies perpetually resisted their enslavement and in so doing forcefully inserted themselves into metropolitan abolitionist discourse. Upon the ending of British slavery in 1834, imperial officials used …

Military Communities And Natural Hazards In The United States, Logan Lee

Theses and Dissertations

The vulnerability and resilience of communities to hazards is a concept that has gained traction in the research community in recent decades. Climate change, combined with increasing damages from natural hazards, has energized researchers and practitioners alike to identify the risks to people and places from future losses. Military communities support large military bases and are composed of service members, their families, and civilian populations alike. Due to the presence of military installations and military populations, the characteristics of the population and influences in military communities are unique. However, there is a gap in current research to assess whether the …

Improving Access To Teacher Mentors For Black Students: The Mediating Role Of School Safety, Anna Flitner

Theses and Dissertations

Having a teacher mentor is associated with several positive outcomes, yet teacher mentors are not distributed evenly among youth, and children who are Black are substantially less likely to form mentoring relationships with teachers. In this study I tested a putative explanatory hypothesis for differences between Black and White children’s access to teacher mentors. Data from Waves I and III from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health were used. Linear regression models were used to predict the access to teacher mentors and a mediational analysis was conducted to determine the effect of school safety on the relationship between race …

Patterned Adolescent Socially Deviant Behavior, Raymond B. Smith

Theses and Dissertations

Research suggests that most adolescent youth AY (AY) will engage in socially deviant behavior (SDB) beginning from ages 10-14, peak in rate of participation at 16-17, and begin to desist thereafter (ages 17 and older). AY participation in SDB varies by frequency and severity, ranging from minor acts such as smoking cigarettes to behaviors that threaten the safety of self and others. Most AY do not participate in SDB to harm, however, but instead are attempting to express autonomous function from parental and adult oversight. During adolescence, youth become aware of their physical transformation to adulthood and growing sense of …

Investigating Technology Integration In A Technology Driven School: A Descriptive Research Study On Skill, Self-Efficacy, Barriers, And Integration Practices, Kela L. Sharpton

Theses and Dissertations

Administrative observations show the use of digital technologies to facilitate learning and technology skill development are inadequate among teachers at a Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math (STEAM) accredited magnet school with International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) based student technology guarantees. The purpose of this descriptive research study is to describe teachers’ skill and confidence levels of technology use, teachers’ perception of barriers to their technology integration, and levels of in-class technology integration in a STEAM accredited middle school with student Technology Guarantees in order to develop recommendations for future professional development and technology acquisition.

The research study …

Shaping A Queer South: The Evolution Of Activism From 1960-2000, A. Kamau Pope

Theses and Dissertations

Queer activism dismantles and challenges normativity in spaces that criminalize, oppress, and perpetuate violence towards queer folks. Using Cathy Cohen’s model of radical queer politics, this thesis examines the South as a place that has been shaped over time by queer activism. Beginning with 1960 and the founding of SNCC sets the tone of how the South is non-normative and queer in the context of the United States, yet still a perpetrator of white supremacy, sexism, and homophobia. With a sole focus on the region of the U.S. South, this paper diverges from the narrative of urban queer movements, and …

Media Combat: The Great War And The Transformation Of American Culture, Andrew Steed Walgren

Theses and Dissertations

This project examines the role of professional musicians, stage performers, civilian entertainment organizations, and the federal government in the formation of a nationalized, wartime cultural apparatus during the United States' involvement in the First World War (1917-1919). This process was contested, fragmented, and incomplete, but it laid the foundational groundwork for federal cultural initiatives and programs during the 1930s and 1940s. In many ways, the war forever altered the relationship between American citizens and the federal government. Specifically, this project examines two major cultural arenas – music and theater – by looking at the institutions and actors that transformed them. …

Transgressive Migrations: Gender Roles, Space, And Place In American Novels, 1900-1999, Selena Gail Larkin

Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, I examine how gender roles combine with changes in space and place to affect women protagonists in twentieth-century American literature. I argue that as these characters migrate, the (self-)perception of their identities shift. Particularly, their outward performances as well as their internal awareness change. My analysis concentrates on the novel genre because of specific characteristics—plot, characterization, and narration. The chosen literary works on which I focus are The Grapes of Wrath (1939), Quicksand (1928), Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), The Dollmaker (1954), and Under the Feet of Jesus (1996).

Concepts that I …

“What Can There Be But Witchcraft?”: History, Women, And Witches In Sylvia Townsend Warner’S Lolly Willowes And Graham Swift’S Waterland, Thomas Bedenbaugh

Theses and Dissertations

The ambiguous relationship between history, women and witchcraft in Sylvia Townsend Warner’s Lolly Willowes and Graham Swift’s Waterland foregrounds the constructedness of historical narratives while also recuperating women’s marginalized positions within history. Both novels link historical narratives with the received ideas upon which norms of gender, sexuality, and the nation are constructed. In recognizing this, both authors challenge the monolithic male gaze of history, revealing it to be a story which, totalizing as it may be, is not in fact “natural.” While many women in both novels are configured as haunting figures - women who confuse the boundary separation presence …

Sanctuary Poetics And Contemporary Us Culture, Alex Howerton

Theses and Dissertations

Sanctuary Poetics and Contemporary US Culture argues that contemporary poets of color create spaces of safety, relation, and justice through the act of writing as resistance itself. Sanctuary Poetics discusses poetry responding to the myriad crises of our contemporary moment, and considers how poets, through formal techniques such as ekphrasis or synecdoche, envision moments of shelter and connection that provide necessary relief to imperiled populations. I introduce the idea of a sanctuary poetics through Amanda Gorman’s recent poem “The Hill We Climb,” performed at Joseph Biden’s inauguration. The first chapter covers citizenship and the work of the Undocupoets, a multiracial …

“Power And The Orientations Of Resistance In Twentieth-Century American Literature”, Victoria Eleanor Chandler

Theses and Dissertations

"Power and the Orientations of Resistance in Twentieth-Century American Literature” analyzes the intersections of space, power, and the possibility for alternatives to power structures. I argue that social power circumscribes the spatial possibilities of normative and non-normative subjectivities. In particular, power curtails the ability of marginalized subjects (such as women, queer people, and people of color) to forge alternatives to the current social order. In dialogue with recent scholars of race studies, feminism, and queer theory, this project reveals how dominated subjects employ their quotidian spaces as sites of resistance and survival. The literature I examine in this dissertation identifies …

A Multilevel And Spatial Analysis Of Oral And Pharyngeal Cancer In South Carolina, Deborah M. Hurley

Theses and Dissertations

Objective: Disparities in the distribution of oral and pharyngeal cancer exist worldwide. This is also true in the United States and in South Carolina. Differences exist in oral and pharyngeal cancer stage and survival by race and sex, with higher incidence rates for Whites but higher proportions of late-stage cancer and lower survival for Blacks. This study was conducted to evaluate whether any differences exist in the spatial distribution of oral and pharyngeal cancer stage at diagnosis and survival, and to evaluate the association of income inequality, material deprivation and other measures of social determinants of health (contextual risk factors) …

Health Communication Blindspot: A Case Study Of Harmful Algal Blooms In The South (Habits), Jaron Hoani King

Theses and Dissertations

A Harmful Algal Bloom (HAB) is a complex natural event that occurs when algae is in its growth stage and creates a harmful toxin as waste. HABs create both ecologic and public health challenges. The hypothesis of this thesis is that state and federal governments have different readability scores when compared side-by-side as measured by Simple Measures of Gobbledygook (SMOG). Because governments are the entity that most often claims responsibility for shared resources, this case study represents a snapshot of current governmental messaging about HABs in the South Atlantic states. These states have a long history of HAB events in …

Using Aeolian Depositional Lag Times To Relate Dune Vegetation And Topographic Change, Jacquelyn Brianna Ferguson

Theses and Dissertations

Sediment deposition impacts dune morphology and is a product of many environmental factors. Dune vegetation is related to post-storm dune recovery and morphology. Though it is widely agreed that vegetation impacts sediment deposition, this relationship has not yet been quantified in the field. This research was conducted at Isle of Palms, a meso-tidal barrier island in South Carolina, where we collected topographic and vegetation data over an incipient foredune. Vegetation data were classified by functional type (dune-builder or dune-stabilizer) or land cover (sand, wrack). We identified land cover changes resulting in greater surface roughness. To relate land cover change to …

The Challenges Of Transport And Egyptian Women’S Participation In The Job Market, Radwa Abo Shady

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis aims to explore the effect of transportation on development in general and as a barrier to women’s contribution to the labor market in particular. A survey using a mixed method was filled online by working women in Egypt about their trip and perception about the transport problems. A framework was created to describe the relationship between different factors affecting women’s options. The findings suggested that transport parameters have an impact on the freedom of transport and eventually the final decision to join the labor market. The findings match the literature that transport should be gender-sensitive to empower women …

Ordinary Power: Frontier Sentimentalism And Cultural Perceptions Of Gender In The Nineteenth-Century West, Erin Elizabeth Hastings

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis will examine nineteenth-century women and their primary role in the cultural formation of frontier sentimentalism. White, middle class women primarily moved west with their husbands and families, initially to the Midwest in the early nineteenth century, and were continuing to settle in the Great Plains and further west by the end of the century. The first generation of women who migrated west were the pioneers of frontier sentimentalism, but it prevailed in successive generations of westering women. This thesis will argue that in the formation of their own form of sentimentalism, nineteenth-century women were at the heart of …

The Value Of An Anthropology Degree: Why Undergraduates Major In Anthropology And How It Prepares Them For Life After College, Maria Kitchin

Theses and Dissertations

“What are you gonna do with that degree?” is a question frequently asked of anthropology majors. This question implies that the value of a college degree is only about getting a job and that the field of anthropology is not useful to that end. In fact, the popularity of anthropology and related liberal arts fields has been declining even as the number of students enrolled at universities has steadily increased. In a moment when the value of a liberal arts degree is questioned in public discourse, I explore the motivations and goals of students who have chosen to study anthropology …

Economic Moat: A Line Of Defense For The Defense Industry, Karina M. Fernando

Theses and Dissertations

Defense contractor financial performance is traditionally measured using accounting profit. In academic literature, accounting profit has been proxied through different applications of accounting rates of return. However, the use of these rates pose certain limitations. First, accounting rates of return have been applied inconsistently. Next, academic research has not typically assessed accounting returns against a firms opportunity costs. As a result, there is a literature gap in defense research that assesses whether defense contractors earn sustainable returns beyond the cost to produce those returns.

Identifying Four Year Average Cloud Field Regimes From World Wide Merged Cloud Analysis Dataset By Way Of K-Means Clustering, Stewart G. Almeida

Theses and Dissertations

Joint histograms of cloud top height (CTH) and optical depth (OD) are created using the World-Wide Merged Cloud Analysis (WWMCA) dataset over a four year period (2014-2017) to identify average cloud field regimes and assess the application of utilizing the WWMCA dataset with the AFIT Sensor and Scene Emulation Tool (ASSET). Two selected regions encompassing the Florida peninsula and a portion of the Pacific Ocean off the west-central coast of South America are examined over the months of January and July. Cloud field regimes are identified by running generated hourly OD-CTH histograms through k-means clustering, with optimal cluster number ( …

Spatiotemporal Analysis Of Variability In Soil Volumetric Water Content And Spatial Statistical Methods For Management Zone Delineation For Variable Rate Irrigation, Isak Lars Larsen

Theses and Dissertations

Irrigated agriculture is the largest user of freshwater in a world experiencing increased water scarcity and water demands. Variable rate irrigation (VRI) aims to use water efficiently in crop production, resulting in good yields and water conservation. With VRI, the grower is able to employ custom irrigation rates for different parts of a field. Adoption of VRI has been limited due to the complexity of matching irrigation to spatiotemporal crop water needs and the cost/benefit economics of VRI equipment. The goal of this study was to quantify spatiotemporal variability of VWC in a field that has uniform soil type and …

Examining The Impact Of Logistics On Military Strength Among East Asian Nations Using Data Envelopment Analysis, Meaghan E. Crandell

Theses and Dissertations

The current narrative in logistics revolves around modernization and the rapid development and deployment of capabilities, which is a sentiment echoed across the Air Force and the DoD alike. However, the combination of intangible and tangible aspects of logistics can make it challenging to find a foundational place to start the process. The purpose of this study is to evaluate logistical factors to include land area, infrastructure, labor force, and GDP and their relationship to military power. This foundation will provide a baseline of areas for improvement and replication. Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and linear regression were leveraged to analyze …

Assessing The Effectiveness Of Afwerx Ability To Influence Regional Participation Rates And Capture Cluster Specific Technological Innovations, Colin M. Sandor

Theses and Dissertations

The 2018 National Defense Strategy (NDS) emphasized capturing innovation through partnerships with non-traditional defense contractors. Furthermore, the NDS outlined the need to rapidly acquire new technologies to maintain a competitive advantage against our adversaries. The AFWERX program is the Air Forces attempt to accomplish these goals. AFWERX seeks to capture innovations occurring within the private sector of the United States by placing itself geographically within top innovation ecosystems. An approach that creates a setting where the Air Force is one of many investors, who benefit from the learning and investments across the entire network. The research within this paper examines …

Arreidis ( Roots ): Fala Language And It S Quest For Identity, Claudia Sánchez Sánchez

Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, native speakers’, and past academics’ views of Fala are explored, along with the sociolinguistic and ideological dimensions of those views. This dissertation also investigates Fala’s orthographic reform, Fala’s recognition as a language at the regional and national level, and the repercussions it has had on research involving Fala. More generally, I present the case of Fala as an example of the effects that language ideologies can have on minority languages that, like Fala, with a small speaker population, may see themselves unrecognized and forgotten by governmental linguistic policy efforts given their size. In order to do this, …

Planting Defamation In Arkansas: A Legal Historical Analysis Of The Development Of Defamation Laws In Arkansas During The 19th Century, Jessica Michelle Beel

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis analyzes the early defamation laws in Arkansas by the constitutions of Arkansas, the laws of Arkansas from 1812 to 1874, and Arkansas case law from 1812 to 1874 as concerning defamation, libel, and slander. This research shows how defamation, libel, and slander developed in Arkansas from early territorial periods to the end of the Reconstruction period. These laws were the foundations and the precedent for today’s defamation statutory and case laws in Arkansas, without these laws, it may be argued that defamation in Arkansas would have been decades behind the American legal system. This research advocates for the …

Internet Regulation In Egypt: Outcomes And Policy Recommendations, Sara Eldemerdash

Theses and Dissertations

With the rapid developments the Internet is witnessing, the topic of internet regulation sees itself taking center stage in a rising global debate among many stakeholders. This debate centers around hot topics and fundamentals such as the rights of free speech and access to information, intellectual property, as well as user and data privacy, and security issues. Egypt is no exception; especially after the uprising and mass demonstrations in 2011 and the growing concerns around internet regulation and freedom of expression.

This thesis aims at examining the development process of the current Internet regulation policy in Egypt to study its …