Digital Commons Network^™

A Stylistic Analysis Of Edvard Grieg’S Slåtter, Norwegian Peasant Dances, Op. 72, Zhiyuan He

Theses and Dissertations

Slåtter, Norwegian Peasant Dances, Op. 72 is a composition for solo piano by Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg (1843-1907). This set is one of his greatest contributions to piano literature, and shows his attempt to bring the traditional folk music to the rest of the world. The object of this study is to aid musicians toward a better understanding of Slåtter through a stylistic analysis of the work. The study includes historical information about the composer and his connection with nationalism in Northern Europe, and conveys how Slåtter can be considered a culminating work representing traditional Norwegian style characteristics.

The document …

Foxy Ladies And Badass Super Agents: Legacies Of 1970s Blaxploitation Spy And Detective Heroines, Carlie Nicole Todd

Theses and Dissertations

The presentation of Black femininity in Blaxploitation spy and detective films like Cleopatra Jones (1973), Foxy Brown (1974), and Get Christie Love! (1974) – depicting powerful, independent, and multidimensional characters – was a sharp departure from the derogatory images of African American women in film prior. These films also included some of the first Black spy and detective film heroines – Foxy Brown, Cleo Jones, and Christie Love – that portrayed a “serious” female detective or government agent as the main protagonist and center of the film’s action. These Blaxploitation heroines were unique in how their characters departed from prior …

“The Once And Future Audubon:” The History Of The Audubon Ballroom And The Movement To Save It, William Maclane Hull

Theses and Dissertations

This paper analyzes the history of the Save the Audubon Movement – an activist movement in the 1980s and early 1990s protesting Columbia University’s plan to demolish the Audubon Ballroom and replace it with a modern biomedical research complex. The Audubon Ballroom is best known for being the site of Malcolm X’s assassination and was a major landmark to New York Hispanic and African Americans. It takes a cultural history lens, giving special attention on the emerging hip-hop culture that became the primary voice of protest in New York City in the 1970s through the 90s. This paper begins with …

Technology Experience: Measurement Development And Validation, Hyejo Hailey Shin

Theses and Dissertations

Think about yourself traveling to somewhere in the 1990s, 2000s, 2010s, and 2020s repeatedly. What would be the most significant difference among those four periods? There would be many differences, including clearer sky and clean air. Imagine how you would plan your three-day vacation. You might need several travel guidebooks and travel agents to plan your trip if you were in the 1990s. In the 2020s, you just need to download some mobile apps to plan and even create organized travel itineraries. After arriving at the destination, how would you find the way to a tourism attraction? You just need …

Who Said It First? : Linguistic Appropriation Of Slang Terms Within The Popular Lexicon, Rachel Elizabeth Laing

Theses and Dissertations

Linguistic appropriation is an area of study that has been under-researched, even as it has become all the more relevant due to the rapid dissemination of slang and linguistic trends during the digital age. There are clear ties shown between individuals’ and groups’ identity and language. This study specifically examines the appropriation of African American Vernacular English (AAVE) and LGBT language by creating an Acceptability of Appropriation scale and assessing potential relationships between linguistic appropriation, intercultural tolerance, and LGBT tolerance. These results are then examined through the lens of the communication theory of identity (CTI) and potential identity gaps that …

Exploring The Impact Of Utilizing Real Patients During Nutrition Counseling Training, Ashlyn R. Hayes

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore the educational advantages real patients can offer dietetic students in nutrition counseling training. In addition, this study observed the impact of training with real patients on dietetic students' nutrition counseling confidence. Six dietetic students were purposefully selected to participate in semi-structured individual interviews. Students expressed their opinions and experiences regarding their nutrition counseling training sessions with both simulated and real patients. Each interview was audio-recorded and later transcribed verbatim. Using a grounded theory approach, key themes were identified from the data. Findings from this study indicated that practicing nutrition counseling with real …

The Globalgothic Vampire: Application Of And Benefits For The English Studies Model, David Lawrence Hansen

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation utilizes canonical vampire texts interlaced with pop-culture story-worlds and international cultural remediations to demonstrate the flexibility of the Globalgothic as a viable and valuable research lens to facilitate skills-based learning in undergraduate students by utilizing each of the four branches of the English Studies Model; literature, linguistics, rhetoric, and pedagogy. For this dissertation, I will be using the term Globalgothic as suggested by Glennis Byron. The focus of this literary lens is not merely to look at the conventions traditionally associated with the gothic genre, such as crumbling houses, a sense of foreboding, dark omens, and damsels in …

Balancimi I Kreativitetit Dhe Kostos – Shtëpia E Mallrave Gërmia, Fjolla Shala

Theses and Dissertations

Në Kosovë duke marrë parasysh se zhvillimi ka qenë më mbrapa se në vendet e tjera si pasojë e tranzicionit dhe zhvillimit ekonomik, njerëzit çdo vit e më shumë kanë shfaqur interesim për Art dhe Kulturë. Arti tash e disa kohë ka qenë pjesë e jetës sonë prandaj kërkesa për hapësira kulturore është duke u rritur çdo vit e më shumë.

Nevoja për të organizuar qendra kulturore, salla koncertale, teatro, galeri artistike ka ndikuar që dizajni i brendshëm të kërkohet më shumë, në mënyrë që të ofrohen hapësira adekuate.

Dizajni i brendshëm ka arritur të përmirësoj brendësin e një ndërtese …

E Ardhmja E Afërt, Diellza Sahiti

Theses and Dissertations

Futurizmi është një lëvizje artistike që filloi në fillim të viteve 1900. Në këtë kohë futurizmi është një nga konceptet më të ndikuara dhe në trend. Kjo lëvizje ndikon në jetën moderne me reflektimet e saj në arkitekturë e modë duke ndryshuar shumë fusha si në letërsi, arte pamore dhe dizajn. Ky koncept që ne shpesh e hasim në epokën tonë është një nga elementet më të domosdoshëm në jetën tonë. Marrëdhënia më logjike është se moda dhe arkitektura sigurojnë një strehë për njerëzit në dimenzione të ndryshme shoqërore.Të dy fushat kalojnë nëpër disa epoka ku dizajni kalon nga kompleksiteti …

Unsettling, Cynthia Groya

Theses and Dissertations

Unsettling is an experimental essay film created during COVID-19 shelter-in-place isolation, documenting remembrances of traumatic life events and the impact these memories have on my vision and life. Preparing to leave my home, my marriage and the lifestyle I have inhabited for fourteen years, I contemplate, “What are memories?” “What do you hold onto from the past and what do you let go?” This film documents my personal journey exploring love, loss, denial, grief and acceptance, told in the third person. The personal ramifications of historic racism, cancer, divorce and white supremacy and the role these issues play in the …

Giglife.Nyc: Blood, Sweat, Tears And Glitter., Erik B. Slavin

Theses and Dissertations

In New York City there's a community of artists who have rejected the obvious choices that the world has offered them and pursued a life of performance and glitter, of bright lights and fire and sensuality.

These performers are extraordinarily compelling. They're artists with lives crafted to entice and delight our gaze. GigLife.NYC: Blood, Sweat, Tears & Glitter is an observational documentary film that invites the viewer, drawn in with the promise of titillating spectacle, to discover the object of their desire is engaged in artistic, romantic, political and economic struggle.

Broken Harts: Mourning The Human/Animal Divide In Shakespeare’S As You Like It And Wordsworth’S “Hart-Leap Well”, Jennifer Jourlait

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis compares the deer scenes in Shakespeare’s As You Like It and Wordsworth’s “Hart-Leap Well.” Both raise questions about man’s right to hunt animals with impunity. Shakespeare’s Jaques superficially takes up the issue of animal rights whereas Wordsworth’s personification of the stag evokes the reader’s sympathy for the animal.

Gus Solomons Jr.: Analyzing The Dances Of An Early Black Postmodernist, Zsuzsanna Orban

Theses and Dissertations

Gus Solomons jr. was one of the first Black dancers to participate in the Judson Dance Theater workshops, but was never fully integrated into the white, postmodern dance world. This thesis looks at several of his works which exemplify his use of site-specificity and innovative technologies, including dual-screen video dances.

The Gridded Time Of Waiting; Or Is Not Aristotle’S Metaphysics; Or A Kind Of Idealist Trap; Or In My Secret Life, Olivia Divecchia

Theses and Dissertations

Theoretical musings, descriptions, articulations of process, quotations and anecdotes form a constellation of thoughts about the trappings of the grid, ontology, the subject, the window, translation and other things.

The Grid As Organizing Principle Of Space, Information, Time, And Display, Sam Sherman

Theses and Dissertations

Over the past several centuries, the grid has colonized nearly every aspect of human life. This text traces the development of the grid in technology and art, and links the grid’s proliferation to the rise of modern governance. The grid has become the primary tool by which government exerts social control via the production of spectacle. As such, artists have increasingly recognized the grid as a central problematic to confront rather than reiterate. Within this context, I consider two of my videos: Today’s News (2020) and Tiles (2020).

Be Coming - Transcendence Born From The Concrete, Kathryn Alter

Theses and Dissertations

My interactive virtual world, be coming, is a response to the question, “what happens when art that is made to be performed cannot be shared in a live performance?” In answering this question, I also use as theoretical tools certain works of Benjamin, Deleuze, Guattari and Peter Zumthor.

Girl In Action: Junior Bazaar, 1945-1948, Rose D. Bishop

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis provides an overview of Junior Bazaar, a short-lived magazine for teenage girls published by Hearst between 1945-1948. Under the supervision of art director Lillian Bassman the magazine featured a variety of aesthetic devices — such as photomontage, asymmetrical layouts, the selective use of color, and playful placement of graphic forms — in efforts to distinguish itself from other publications on the market and construct a visual space specific to its teenage readers. Bassman’s unconventional stewardship of Junior Bazaar made room for an up-and-coming set of photographers, including Richard Avedon, Robert Frank, Diane Arbus, Louis Faurer, and other …

Us, Abundantly: From Africa To The Americas, Karisma Jay

Theses and Dissertations

"Us, AbunDantly," a Live theatrical dance performance and film, delves into the African Diaspora and its influences. An artistic and academic project built upon the amplification of Black excellence and Black pride, this paper contextualizes a work within the oral histories and contemporary dance studies of a powerfully ancestral community.

Framing A Pandemic: Evaluating Nigerian Print Media Reportage Of China Before And Following The Coronavirus (Covid-19) Pandemic, Ernest Chukwunyere Makata

Theses and Dissertations

This study investigates the effect of the Coronavirus pandemic on the framing of news about China/Chinese by three selected Nigerian Newspapers, The Punch, The Nation, and The Sun. A total of 350 articles mentioning China or Chinese were examined using the content analysis method to determine the news writers' dominant frames. The research employs the qualitative method. Three frames emerged as dominant in the analysis, the Economic Consequence Frame, the Human-Interest Frame, and the Conflict Frame. The result shows that Nigerian Newspapers paid more attention to China after the index case of COVID-19 in Nigeria. It also discovered that most …

672 Years Of Plague: Reconquest, The Last Dream Of King Alfonso Xi Of Castile: Hermeneutics Of A Play, Jose Sarzi Amade

Theses and Dissertations

The proposed work here is a literary creation: a play accompanied by a critical study on it. The work (second part) introduces us to characters that thanks to the contest of the dream dimension - the invention of the last dream of the King of Castile, Alfonso XI - make a trip in the future. They flee from the medieval plague of 1348, sail to the unknown and meet, after crossing the Atlantic Ocean, in 2020, in dystopia. Things are deteriorating and navigators end up being expelled from this place. The framework of the play was built around stories of …

The Emerging Science Of Wellness In The College Writing Curriculum, Peggy Suzuki

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation argues that the college writing curriculum – and indeed any educational program---would benefit from an emphasis on human wellness and the arts. Wellness consists of one’s emotional, social, spiritual, physical, intellectual, and vocational well-being. Additionally, students’ environmental circumstances, like home life, finances, diet, exercise, and work obligations play a huge role in balancing personal health, especially in marginalized communities. Since one’s physiological and psychological connection impacts one’s identity and health, improving writing in the classroom requires holistic and creative approaches for rewiring individual thinking. I draw from positive psychology, where concepts like complex optimism and positive emotions nurture …

By A Thread: Adapting And Understanding The Literary Past Through Contemporary Costume, Sherry Bollero

Theses and Dissertations

For over four hundred years, Shakespeare’s plays have been adapted from text to the visual realizations on the stage and later the screen. Scholarship has attended to the playscript and the performance, but it has largely neglected the position of the costume as a bridge between the literary past and contemporary adaptation. This project contends that costumes as adaptations themselves play a significant role in contemporary constructions of the literary past. In particular, the project attends to the contribution of costumes in the visualization of Shakespeare’s histories on screen. To explore this topic, the project considers several aspects. Specifically, the …

The Default: The Paradox Of Play And Productivity, Yeon Geong Hwang

Theses and Dissertations

Society takes a dim view of idleness, regarding downtime as wasted time, but what if society’s view is wrong? This thesis champions daydreaming; it advocates for quirky, playful experiences that improve quality-of-life by avoiding burnout and mitigating tedium. Borrowing language from the Theatre of the Absurd, The Default challenges society’s attitudes toward productivity, striking a new relationship between a cubicle worker and a set of seemingly-familiar but surprising objects. Reflecting on the absurdity of contemporary work-life imbalance, the objects and narratives depicted in The Default invite playful interactions, when objects that appear to be normal behave unexpectedly. The Default is …

Creating A Collaborative Culture: Can Online Learning Circles Spark Innovation And Promote Intrapreneurship?, Christian Deveaux Greer

Theses and Dissertations

Traditional organizational structures can be stubbornly inflexible and woefully under-optimized for cross-departmental project collaboration. Leaders seeking to innovate within the confines of these structures often have to empower themselves to create ad hoc agile teams that foster creative problem-solving, unlock social capital, and generate value early and often. As the President & CEO of a nonprofit science center in the Midwest, I have discovered that some of our most valuable ideas have sprouted and bloomed because distributed leaders, operating essentially as intrapreneurs, discovered ways to use their informal social networks to break through silos and successfully collaborate across departmental lines. …

Understanding The New Wealthy: Ideologies, Consumption Patterns, And Organizational Strategies For A New Generation Of High-Net Worth Individuals, Ana Brant

Theses and Dissertations

Despite the fact that the Ultra High-Net Worth (UHNWI) belong to the wealthiest, most powerful, and influential group of consumers in the society, and nearly 70% created wealth on their own, current marketing approaches fail to consider what drives consumption behavior of this group of consumers and how can brands maximize their socio-economic impact. Across two studies, I develop a model that guides theory and practice regarding this consumer group. The first part of the first study deployed netnography and grounded theory to understand the ideologies of 30 self-made UHNWI derived from self-presentation on 3,393 Instagram posts. To ensure self-made …

Communication At The Center: A Modest Proposal For An Oral Communications Center At Virginia Commonwealth University, Bryant E. Pugh

Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

Communication at The Center: A Modest Proposal for an Oral Communications Center at Virginia Commonwealth University

Bryant E. Pugh, BFA

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts at Virginia Commonwealth University.

Virginia Commonwealth University, 2021

Committee Chair: Aaron D. Anderson, PhD, Department of Theatre

This thesis explores the potential for the creation of an oral communication center on the campus of Virginia Commonwealth University. It utilizes the author's personal experience in teaching oral communication in higher education and his students' experience. It examines the primary research, both past, and …

Beyond The Social: Artist Project Spaces, 2003 To 2016., Clare L. Van Loenen

Theses and Dissertations

This research examines storefront project spaces in the early 2000s that offered alternative approaches to the programming, organizing, and archiving found in conventional museums. I propose that such sites impacted participatory visual culture by offering a reformulatory role for arts’ practices, one that organized itself across disciplinary boundaries, chose a collaborative rather than competitive approach, and processed the ideological implications of their group work. Focused on three specific sites—Machine Project in Los Angeles, Elsewhere in Greensboro, and Mess Hall in Chicago—this study details the museological, pedagogical, and archival challenges of these artist-convened organizations. My interdisciplinary investigation offers a reference point …

"With The Commodity In The Hand": A Practical Investigation Of The Intersection Of Material Culture With Performance Theory, Katharine M. Given

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the intersection of performance theory and material culture through the practices of garment reconstruction. In chapter 1, I examine key theorists in the fields of material culture and performance studies and articulate the connections between the two fields. In chapter 2, Using practice as research, I recount the experience of building reproduction garments from the eighteenth century using historically appropriate tools and methods, as well as the experience of wearing those garments. Finally, in Chapter 3, I walk through a possible historical examination of my encounter with these reconstructed garments, and consider the way in which feminine …

Repair In An Economy Of Trauma: How Identifying Traumas As The Basis For Teacher Artmaking Contributes To Resiliency In Managing Traumatic Stress, Danielle R. Houdek

Theses and Dissertations

REPAIR IN AN ECONOMY OF TRAUMA:

HOW IDENTIFYING TRAUMAS AS THE BASIS FOR TEACHER ARTMAKING CONTRIBUTES TO RESILIENCY IN MANAGING TRAUMATIC STRESS

By Danielle Raddin Houdek, BFA, MAE

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Art Education at Virginia Commonwealth University.

Virginia Commonwealth University, 2021.

Major Director: Dr. Sara Wilson-McKay

Associate Professor, Department of Art Education, School of the Arts

Objective: Through this research project, the impact that secondary traumatic stress has on art educators and how artmaking contributes to resiliency in managing secondary traumatic stress was examined. The research question is: …

Hamburger Helper Recipes, John Alex Goss

Theses and Dissertations

Hamburger Helper Recipes is a collection of essays and public addresses that aim to recuperate castoff and misfit material surrounding industries and tools which produce science-fiction fantasies, specifically videogames and television shows. The following essays confront the normative violence of capitalism, whiteness, and hetero-patriarchy that socially and technologically haunt these imaginary worlds and build hegemonic idealogy into their audiences. This collection takes industrial materials and software from their intended commercial purposes of production and “success” into places of abjection and quiet breakdown. The author’s own proximity to masculine and often toxic "work cultures'' within industrial spaces of coding and manufacturing …