Digital Commons Network^™

Contemporary Hijra Identity In Guyana: Colonial And Postcolonial Transformations In Hijra Gender Identity, Shainna Ali

HIM 1990-2015

Before European colonialism, inhabitants of Guyana were Amerindians scattered across the “land of many waters” (Glasgow 1970:6; Rabe 2005:5). During the era of imperialism (1499-Guyanese Independence May 1966), the Dutch and British utilized indigenous and African slave labor as well as indentured servants from Asia to harvest cash crops (Glasgow 1970:131; Whitehead 2010:53). The British brought indentured servants across the kala pani, or dark water, from India to Guyana under the pretense of a better life. Under the harsh restrictions of colonial life, the Indian indentured laborers, negatively referred to as coolies, were culturally suppressed. Virtually, all aspects of daily …

Syncretism In Contemporary Pagan Purification Practices, Sara K. Blackwelder

HIM 1990-2015

Purification, which involves ceremonial acts or customs employed to gain purity in order td create sacred spaces, represents a vital aspect of religious practice both historically and cross-culturally (Cunningham 2003.(1988]:48). Preparations for passing into sacred spaces of worship are important elements of ritual life for nearly all faith communities. Mt thesis has two important research goals: (1) to examine the purification practices of contemporary Paganism; and, (2) analyze the degree to which contemporary Pagans have adapted a syncretic approach to these cleansing rituals. With regards to the former goal, I address the following three questions: what is the significance of …

From A Bird's Eye View: Using Satellite Imagery To Map And Analyze The Forest Islands Of The Llanos De Mojos, Bolivia, Stephanie Boothby

HIM 1990-2015

Recent discoveries about pre-Columbian societies in the Amazon have revolutionized the way researchers think about the environment, and the degree of interaction that humans have with their surroundings. New evidence indicates that ancient Amazonian populations were not only much larger and more complex than previously thought, but they were also modifying their environment and creating artificial landscapes. Although information about pre-Columbian cultures can be gained from archaeological excavations and historical accounts, the advent of new technology allows archaeologists to conduct research remotely.

Earthworks were constructed by pre-Hispanic peoples to create higher ground for occupation and agriculture, as an adaptation to …

Swine Flu, Drug Wars, And Riots: Media And Tourism In Oaxaca, Mexico, Joshua Crosby

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines how travelers evaluate and process mass media news stories about local events. Thanks to its colonial architecture, white sand beaches, and indigenous history, the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca receives millions of foreign and domestic visitors each year. Between 2006 and through 2009 Oaxaca has received a great deal of negative international media coverage, including stories of street riots, drug violence, and the fall out of the H1N1 flu virus. The overall impact of these unfavorable reports, and the resulting decline in the local tourism industry, has been predictable and severe. This thesis is based on anthropological …

Interactive Text-Image Conceptual Models For Literary Interpretation And Composition In The Digital Age, Beth Nixon Weaver

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on text-image conceptual models for literary interpretation and composition in the digital age. The models investigate an interactive blend of textually-based linear-sequential approaches and visually-based spatial-simultaneous approaches. The models employ Gestalt-inspired figure-ground segregation models, along with other theoretical models, that demonstrate the dynamic capabilities of images as conceptual tools as well as alternate forms of text. The models encourage an interpretative style with active participants in openended, multi-sensory meaning-making processes. The models use the flexible tools of modern technology as approaches to meaning-making with art strategies used for research strategies as well as a means to appreciate …

Computer Based Intervention And Its Effect On Benchmark Test Scores Of English Language Learners, Gabriel Berrio

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Florida Department of Education’s (FLDOE) Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) Report (2007) listed and defined students who are in the process of learning English as a second language as English Language Learners (ELL). The graduation rate of English Language Learners in Florida is consistently smaller than the graduation rate of the total population of students (Echevarria, Short and Powers, 2006) in part due to the requirement for students to pass the FCAT in order to graduate. ELL students face the challenge of having to learn a different language, learn the subject area content in that language, and often-times pass a …

From Shadowmourne To Folk Art Articulating A Vision Of Elearning For The 21st Century, Christina Kapp

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examines mass-market applications for some of the many theories of eLearning and blended learning, focusing most closely on a period from 2000-2010. It establishes a state of the union for K-12 immersive eLearning environments by using in-depth cases studies of five major mass-market, educational, and community-education based products—Gaia Online, Poptropica, Quest Atlantis, Dimenxian/Dimension U, and Folkvine. Investigating these models calls into play not only the voices of traditional academic and usability research, but also the ad hoc voices of the players, commentators, developers, and bloggers. These are the people who speak to the community of these sites, and …

Foreign Language Oral Assessment Practices In Florida Middle And High Schools, Grace Kerr Kellermeier

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Current foreign language pedagogy encourages a communicative approach to language learning. Instead of the reading and writing focus of the past, this communicative approach requires instruction in all skills, which include reading, writing, listening, speaking and having knowledge of associated cultures. A random sample of Florida foreign language teachers was surveyed to establish whether or not the goals and actual instructional practices were aligned. Respondents were asked to identify how much of a typical class period is dedicated to each of the five skills and how much of a typical unit test is dedicated to the same five skills. The …

The Relationship Between Thinking Maps And Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test Reading And Math Scores In Two Urban Middle Schools, Anna Diaz

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine what difference, if any, exists between the implementation and use of Thinking Maps® and students' academic achievement in Reading and Mathematics as measured over time by the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test® (FCAT). Thinking Maps® is a registered trademark of Thinking Maps, Inc. The data were examined after three years of Thinking Maps® implementation and instruction. The design of this study was quantitative, with a nonrandomized control group, pretest-posttest design (Ary, Jacobs, & Razavieh, 2002) that examined the effects on student Reading and Mathematics FCAT scores in one middle school that implemented Thinking …

What's In A Name? Genocide Early Warning Model For Humanitarian Intervention, Alexandria Lewis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

There is much debate among genocide scholars as to the causes and even accurate definitions of genocide. Early warning developed to address the increasing need for humanitarian intervention in violent conflicts around the world. As a subset of genocide studies, early warning seeks to go beyond explaining the causes of genocide. The early warning model created here uses six indicator variables - government, leaders/elites, followers, non-followers/bystanders, outsider group, and environment - to detect the likelihood of genocide within a given case study. Four cases were chosen - Kenya, Nigeria, Yemen, and Ethiopia - and analyzed using the indicator variables to …

Police Checkpoints: Lack Of Guidance From The Supreme Court Contributes To Disregard Of Civil Liberties In The District Of Columbia, Jason Fiebig

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

No abstract provided.

The Heller Promise Versus The Heller Reality: Will Statutes Prohibiting The Possession Of Firearms By Ex-Felons By Upheld After Britt V. State, Deborah Bone

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

No abstract provided.

Characteristics Of La Literatura: A Reference Study Of Spanish And Latin American Literature, David S. Nolen

Publications

The goal of this study is to examine the characteristics of scholarly communication, with particular emphasis on the usage of the monograph, in the field of Spanish and Latin American literature over a 30-year period. In addition, this study examines the age of materials referenced in an effort to gain insight into the shelf-life of these materials. Although monographs and literary works predominated, the usage of volumes of collected essays showed significant increase. Monographs, collected essays, and journal articles published within the preceding 20–25 years were most referenced.

Up To D[Eb]Ate On Raising And Control, Part 1: Properties And Analyses Of The Constructions, Susannah Kirby, William D. Davies, Stanley William Dubinsky

Faculty Publications

This is the first part of a two-part article that reviews a number of the current debates regarding raising and control constructions. The issues addressed in this part include the syntactic attributes governing their distribution; the characterization of the relevant silent elements; the empirical properties which may distinguish/unify two classes of constructions (on either syntactic or semantic grounds).

Selected Muslim Historic Monuments And Sites In Bulgaria, Samuel D. Gruber

Religion - All Scholarship

2010 report from the United States Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad on historic Muslim monuments and sites in Bulgaria. Includes information on the history of Bulgaria's muslims, as well as history and current conditions of important sites and monuments.

Antigone's Nature, William Robert

Religion - All Scholarship

Antigone fascinates G.W.F. Hegel and Luce Irigaray, both of whom turn to her in their explorations and articulations of ethics. Hegel and Irigaray make these re-turns to Antigone through the double and related lenses of nature and sexual difference. This essay investigates these figures of Antigone and the accompanying ethical accounts of nature and sexual difference as a way of examining Irigaray's complex relation to and creative uses of Hegel's thought.

Arbitration Law: Who’S In Charge?, Margaret L. Moses

Seton Hall Law Review

No abstract provided.

Ele 5270 : Content Area Literacy Instruction, Ec/Ele/Mle

Approved Course Proposals

No abstract provided.

Pay Confidentiality: A Remaining Obstacle To Equal Pay After Ledbetter, Brian P. O'Neill

Seton Hall Law Review

No abstract provided.

Sir John Gardner Wilkinson: The Preservation And Pillage Of Ancient Egypt, Megan Ryan

Global Tides

This paper analyzes the debate over the role of John Wilkinson in the development of Egyptology in the late-nineteenth century. Scholars have debated the early importance Wilkinson had during his lifetime. Some argue that Wilkinson’s work was marginalized during his lifetime, and that his research was not fully appreciated until the past twenty years. Here, I demonstrate that Wilkinson’s work formed the foundation for the work of many of his contemporaries. This, coupled with a number of other arguments, indicate that Wilkinson’s work must have been seriously considered among academic circles during his time.

The Pretext Of Textualism: Disregarding Stare Decisis In 14 Penn Plaza V. Pyett, Margaret L. Moses

Faculty Publications & Other Works

No abstract provided.

Language Impairments And Their Affect On Literacy, Christina Savoie

Honors Capstones

Language impairments can have a profound impact on future reading skills. When detected early, intervention from speech-language pathologists (SLPs) and reading teachers, can lessen the severity of literacy impairments. Therefore, it is imperative SLPs are aware of the correlation between reading disabilities and language impairments to better serve the children on their caseloads. Working together, classroom teachers, parents, reading teachers, and SLPs can identify and appropriately serve children with language and reading impairments. It is criticalfor children with language impairments to be assessed early and often for problems in reading in order to prevent academic setbacks, because improving literacy skills …

Acoustic Vowel Space Differences Between Cochlear Implant And Hearing Aid Users, Elizabeth Glyda

Honors Capstones

This study examines the acoustic vowel space of three children aged 4 to 5 years with varying levels of hearing. One of the children had cochlear implants with a profound unaided hearing loss. One child wore hearing aids with a mild unaided hearing loss. One child had normal hearing. Participants' production of isolated vowels, words, and a sentence were acoustically analyzed using the Speech Filing System program to determine the acoustic distinction between each child's vowels. It was hypothesized that the child with normal hearing would have the largest acoustic vowel space due to her ability to utilize auditory feedback …

Arbitration Law: Who's In Charge?"., Margaret L. Moses

Faculty Publications & Other Works

No abstract provided.

Brands Competition And The Law., Spencer Weber Waller

Faculty Publications & Other Works

No abstract provided.

An Escape Route From The Medellin Maze, Anthony S. Winer

Faculty Scholarship

Many in the United States who follow international law have tracked the course of the Supreme Court's 2008 Medellin case' especially closely, both before and after the Court's issuance of the decision. The case concerned the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations (the "Vienna Convention, "Convention" or "VCCR"), which imposes certain obligations on the authorities of a State Party when they imprison a national of another State Party. Among these duties is the obligation to inform the foreign prisoner that the Convention affords the prisoner the right to communicate, while in prison, with consular officials from the prisoner's home country. Authorities …

Cs 771-01: Natural Language Processing Techniques, Shaojun Wang

Computer Science & Engineering Syllabi

No abstract provided.

Report, Collection Assessment: Digital Media Studies, 2010, University Of South Florida St. Petersburg. Nelson Poynter Memorial Library

All-Library Assessments Reports, Summaries & Misc Reports

A report assessing library collections that support the Department of Journalism & Media Studies.

Phenomenology Of Embodied Dreamwork With Puerto Rican Women: A Dissertation, Lourdes F. Brache-Tabar

Expressive Therapies Dissertations

The author investigated the experience of embodied dreamwork. Participants were eight Puerto Rican women who were chronically ill, of low socioeconomic status, who lived in Boston. The data were analyzed using transcendental phenomenology. Each participant engaged in one embodied dreamwork–unstructured interview session lasting approximately 1.5 hours. In addition, each participant drew a picture of how she felt after the dreamwork interview. This snowball, purposive sample gave detailed information about how they experienced embodied dreamwork. The participants’ statements were grouped into themes: (a) sense of place—environment, surroundings, spatiality; (b) the players—self, others; (c) plot; (d) in the sea of emotions—naming affective …

Text And Texture: An Arts-Based Exploration Of Transformation In Adult Learning: A Dissertation, Enid E. Larsen

Educational Studies Dissertations

This research explored the transformational and co-transformational potential of collage, assemblage and mixed media in an accelerated undergraduate adult course on imagination and creativity. The methods were qualitative and arts-based artist-teacher inquiry within a constructivist art class for ten, female adult learners. Informed by the researcher's living inquiry through visual auto-ethnography, a collagist methodology shaped the research, including syllabus construction, course delivery and data gathering. Process was an emergent and interpretative analytic tool, drawn from multiple perspectives of artwork and reflections by the students, and the multiple identities inherent to the artist-teacher researcher.