Digital Commons Network^™

An Examination Of Tribal Nation Integration In Homeland Security National Preparedness, Donald J. Reed

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Research has established that national homeland security policy requires a whole community or all-of-nation approach to national security preparedness. What is less clear is whether all stakeholders are integrated into or benefit from this collective effort. This narrative policy analysis examined the relationship between a federally-recognized group of Native American tribal nations and homeland security national preparedness to explore whether tribal nations are effectively integrated with the collective effort for national preparedness. The theoretical framework stemmed from a convergence of social contract theory and conflict theory. Interviews (n = 21) were conducted with preparedness authorities from government agencies, and from …

Somos Familia: Family As An Organizing Trope In 20th-21st Century Latina/O Literature, Victoria Anne Bolf

Dissertations

This dissertation examines various ways that family has been employed as a model of both oppression and liberation in Latina/o literature. Working from an interdisciplinary standpoint at the crossroads of literary and cultural studies, women’s, gender, and sexuality studies, Chicano/a studies, and Latino/a studies, this project seeks to uncover how representations of familia in U.S. Latino/a literary texts accomplish their discursive work, as well as complicating conventional formulations of kinship and family.

I examine Down These Mean Streets by Piri Thomas, in Chapter One, in terms of queer family and the counter-domestic logic of “the streets.” In Chapter Two, I …

Characterization Of The Effect Of Anti-Nogo-A Antibody Treatment On Sensorimotor Recovery After Traumatic Brain Injury, Stephen Nawara

Dissertations

Estimates indicate that over 5 million Americans are currently living with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) related disability. Much effort has been put into enhancing functional recovery with physical therapy and other rehabilitative approaches. These strategies are thought to function by facilitating the brain’s innate capacity for neuroregeneration and neuroplasticity. However, the success of these strategies may be limited due the presence of growth- and plasticity- inhibiting factors expressed in the adult brain.

The presence of the membrane protein Nogo-A has been associated with reduced neurite outgrowth in vitro, identifying it as one such molecule. In addition, rodents treated with antibodies …

Notices

Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)

No abstract provided.

Unm Latin American & Iberian Institute, 2015-16 Annual Report, Office Of Academic Affairs

UNM HLC 2018-19 Assurance Argument Evidence

A 2015 report from the Latin American & Iberian Institute (LAII), detailing its various services and programs. As stated in the About the LAII section of the report (pg. 6), the institute “was founded to coordinate Latin American programs on campus.” The report goes on to detail its outreach efforts among communities external to the university (pg. 8), its relationship to Latin American Studies (pg. 28), and other facets of the institution.

"Art Should Comfort The Disturbed And Disturb The Comfortable:" Examining Twenty-First Century Aesthetics Through Banksy's Socially Engaged Art, Margaret Henry

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Taking Viktor Shklovsky’s notion of defamiliarization as its starting point, this paper considers two twenty-first century aesthetic shifts resulting from the conditions of post-Fordist capitalism: the appearance of socially engaged art practices as delineated by Nato Thompson in Living as Form and the prevalence of what Sianne Ngai refers to as “minor aesthetic categories” within those practices. This project explores the political efficacy and theoretical possibilities of socially engaged art practices--practices which necessarily utilize minor aesthetic categories due to their ubiquity--through close examination of the graffiti artist Banksy’s exhibit, Better Out Than In. Graffiti is associated with the destruction of …

The Impact Of Detention On Juvenile Recidivism In Montana: Is The Impact Of Detention Influenced By Other Factors?, Daniel N. Acton

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The purpose of this study is to identify the effect detention has on recidivism risk as well as to identify the degree to which the effect of detention on recidivism is influenced by other variables. The data for this analysis were collected by probation officers across Montana, using the Back on Track risk assessment instrument (N=840). Although detention was the topic of interest, this analysis also tested aspects of three popular criminological theories: social bond theory, self-control theory, and life-course persistent theory. Using logistic regression, the effects of detention and a variety of other risk factors are identified. Hypothesis one …

Recovering Historical And Cultural Gems: A Review Essay On Hispanic And Folk Music Of New Mexico And The Southwest: A Self-Portrait Of A People

New Mexico Historical Review

No abstract provided.

Is What Is Past Always Prologue? Priming To Past Conflicts And Fear Of Terrorism Influence Americans’ Support For Military Intervention In Syria, Daniel Walter Snook Ii

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Implicit knowledge influences decision-making in a variety of areas, including conflict resolution and decisions about war. Individuals may unknowingly apply implicit knowledge from past experiences to present experiences, even if that information leads to less accurate decisions in the present experience. The current study is an exploration into how implicit knowledge of past international conflicts and fear of terrorism affects recommendations for military conflict resolution in current international conflicts. Priming is one way to make implicit knowledge salient, and participants in this study were implicitly primed to think of either the Iraq War, World War II, or no war in …

Caged Manhood : Office Culture And How Walter Camp's Daily Dozen Revitalized The Workforce, 1903-1940, Nick Sly

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This thesis is examines how culture became a means to deal with the problems of over-civilization in the early twentieth century. The realities of a salaried position and corporate work spaces had dramatically changed how the middle class felt about work. Looking at the writings of Walter Camp, the human relations movement, and the exercise culture of the period one can see how the office space was not simply a place of work but a new context for constructing masculinity and a sense of worth.

Moving Past: Making Space For Memory After The Boston Marathon Bombing, Austin Thomas Jacobs

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

In the aftermath of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, visitors from across the US and the world descended on Boston to pay their respects to the three people who were killed and the more than 260 who were injured at the race's finish line. The public commemorated the tragedy in multiple and diffuse spaces, both physical and virtual. In recognition of this fact, I use the changing location of the spontaneous shrine as an organizing structure for this study, analyzing the memorialization in three "movements,” each of which corresponds to a physical relocation of the shrine itself in the weeks …

Suggestions For Transgender Inclusion In Classical Music: A Mini-Cycle, Xavia A. Publius

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This interdisciplinary text examines the lack of transgender inclusion in Western classical music, especially through the lens of opera. By looking at the dearth of transgender characters, singers, and composers, as well as the author’s personal experiences as a transgender singer in classical spaces, this project develops a strong position on ways that Western classical music should work to incorporate transgender voices, both literally and figuratively.

Some of these methods are modeled in this thesis, such as consultations with other transgender artists, transgeneric devising, and trans-centric composing. The author worked with local transgender singers to understand their views on opera, …

Toward A Practical Civic Piety: Mitt Romney, Barack Obama, And The Race For National Priest, Richard Benjamin Crosby

Faculty Publications

In 2008, two of the leading presidential candidates emerged from controversial, outsider religious groups—Mormonism and the black church tradition. Dogged by ongoing questions from the media, each candidate produced a high-profıle public address. In this article, I argue that Mitt Romney’s “Faith in America” and Barack Obama’s “A More Perfect Union” craft competing visions for American civic piety. Drawing on recent literature in the area of practical piety, I read the speeches as evidence that civic piety may be more than a subordinating, pragmatic agreement between church and state. It may instead be read as a spiritually substantive space of …

El Árbol-Narrador En La Sangre De Elena Quiroga: Lugar Femenino De Memoria Y Trauma En La Posguerra Española, Ines Corujo Martín

Publications and Research

Este estudio ofrece una aproximación teórica a la metáfora arbórea empleada por Elena Quiroga en La sangre, obra publicada en 1952. La autora santanderina, casi desconocida en el panorama literario de la posguerra española, sitúa a un castaño como narrador y testigo principal de los hechos de la novela. La figura del árbol-narrador se abre a diversas cuestiones en torno a la preservación y reconstrucción de la memoria histórica, así como de la posición marginal de la intelectualidad femenina durante las primeras décadas del franquismo.

La imaginería arbórea no se limita a la obra quiroguiana, sino que se repite en …

When Income Depends On Performance And Luck: The Effects Of Culture And Information On Giving, Pedro Rey-Biel, Roman M. Sheremeta, Neslihan Uler

ESI Working Papers

We study how giving depends on income and luck, and how culture and information about the determinants of others’ income affect this relationship. Our data come from an experiment conducted in two countries, the US and Spain, which have different beliefs about how income inequality arises. We find no cross-cultural differences in giving when individuals are informed about the determinants of income, but when uninformed, Americans give less than Spanish. Culture and information not only affect individual giving, but also the determinants of giving and the beliefs about how income inequality arises. Beliefs partially moderate cross-cultural differences in giving.

Masjids, Ashrams And Mazars: Transnational Sufism And The Bawa Muhaiyaddeen Fellowship, Merin Shobhana Xavier

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The Bawa Muhaiyaddeen Fellowship is a community that formed in relation to the Tamil teacher Muhammad Raheem Bawa Muhaiyaddeen (d. 1986). Bawa’s teachings attracted diverse followers- those with Islamic inclinations, those from Jewish, Hindu and Christian backgrounds, and those seeking to transcend religious creeds. With his passing and no appointed successor, the communities that developed during Bawa Muhaiyaddeen’s lifetime rely now on the institutions and spaces established by him. These include a mosque and burial shrine (mazar) in Pennsylvania and an ashram and shrine in Sri Lanka. This case study of the Bawa Muhaiyaddeen Fellowship and its parallel …

Neither War, Nor Peace: Everyday Politics, Peacebuilding And The Liminal Condition Of Bosnia-Herzegovina And Northern Ireland, Branka Marijan

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This thesis focuses on cultural and everyday practices of local populations in post-conflict peacebuilding. It builds on the “everyday” turn in critical peacebuilding literature by recognizing the everyday as political. Rather than examining the practices of political elites this thesis is concerned with the ordinary citizens of these societies. In other words, I show that it is through practices and cultural forms of expression that local populations enact their agency, at times supporting and at times contesting the broader peacebuilding project. Moreover, rather than viewing the everyday acts as hidden or as evidence of resistance to the dominant peacebuilding approaches …

Imperatives In Informal Organizational Resource Exchange In Central Europe, David Jancsics

Publications and Research

This paper challenges the mainstream social scientific approach that emphasizes “moral inferiority” in corruption and bribery in Central and Eastern Europe. We argue that in many cases, people participate in informal organizational resource exchanges not because of immorality or greed but rather because of powerful external forces. By using the case of contemporary Hungary to support this argument, this paper provides a systematic analysis of such imperatives. The findings of 50 in-depth qualitative interviews suggest that two main imperatives can be distinguished; macro-level social and meso-level organizational forces. Macro-level forces may be linked to historical paths, Hungary's socialist and pre- …

An Examination Of Relationships Between Mindfulness, Personality, Anxiety, And Depression In Americans And Japanese College Students, Melissa Stiksma

Electronic Theses and Dissertations 2010 - 2019

Mindfulness – nonjudgmental awareness of the present moment - has recently garnered significant attention in psychological literature for decreasing clinical symptoms. Certain personality traits such as emotionality, however, can predict higher levels of anxiety and depression. The present study examines whether mindfulness mediates the relationship between personality traits and perceived stress and depression in nonclinical populations. A total of 321 participants from two samples—American and Japanese undergraduates —self-reported scores on measures of mindfulness, personality, perceived stress and depression. Cross-cultural comparisons following measurement invariance tests also allow for insight into the definition of mindfulness, especially given the Eastern religion origin of …

Mobile Learning, John M. Traxler, Helen Crompton

Teaching & Learning Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

#Blacklivesmatter: The Investigation Of Twitter As A Site Of Agency In Social Movements, Joseph Lawrence Flores

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

As an extension of mediated communication practices, social media sites have continued to increase the complexities of understanding how they not only affect the real world, but how they continue to effect communication practices in general. Due to the fact that social media sites exist as a mass mediated platform with high amounts of interpersonal communication elements, social media has become an important object of research when understanding how they can provide voice and agency to those who exist outside of traditional media power structures. By observing events in Ferguson, Missouri and Baltimore, Maryland involving police and unarmed civilians, activists, …

Damas Y Caballeros, Guadalupe Mendez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Collected Poetry - Manuscript over socio - political and culturally relevant context.

Assessing Western Australian Year 11 Students’ Engagement With Responding In Visual Arts, Julia Elizabeth Morris

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Responding to visual arts is an important outcome of both the Western Australian and the Australian (F-10) Curriculum in Visual Arts (ACARA, 2014; Curriculum Council, 2008; School Standards and Curriculum Authority, 2014a). Responding is important because it facilitates students’ development of visual literacy, or the ability to decode and recode meaning through visual media (Flood, 2004; Flood & Bamford, 2007; Avgerinou & Petterson, 2011). This mixed methods research study investigated Western Australian students’ engagement in responding within Year 11 Stage 2 Visual Arts. A diagnostic instrument was created to quantitatively assess the engagement of 137 Year 11 Visual Arts students. …

Infant Feeding Practices Of Emirati Women In The Rapidly Developing City Of Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, Hazel Gardner, Katherine Green, Andrew Gardner

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Rapid economic and cultural transition in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has been accompanied by new challenges to public health; most notably a rapid rise in chronic disease. Breastfeeding is known to improve health outcomes in adulthood, is associated with reduced risk of developing chronic disease, and is therefore an important public health issue for this rapidly increasing population. Factors associated with infant feeding practices were examined in a cohort of 125 Emirati women and their infants, with data collected at birth and 3, 6 and 15 months postpartum by questionnaires and interviews. Participants were recruited in the Corniche Hospital, …

Rethinking The Reporting Of The Mass Random Shooting – Or Is It An Autogenic Massacre?, Glynn Greensmith, Lelia Green

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

The crime of the mass random shooting seems frighteningly common, yet around the world there are probably no more than about 26 per year: one per fortnight. The apparent randomness of the crime is one of the aspects which assures it of its publicity. Another is the traditional practice on the part of the gunman (and they are all men) of making a statement about his motives, or leaving a room or a box or a website of his grievances, to be uncovered and wondered at. The media’s focus on the genesis and impact of each mass random shooting is …

Bringing Sexy Back: To What Extent Do Online Television Audiences Contest Fat-Shaming?, Debbie Rodan

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

The latest reality program about weight loss makeover, Australian Channel Seven’s Bringing Sexy Back maintained the dominant frame of fat as bad, shameful and unsexy. Similar to other programs’ point of view, only slim bodies could claim to be healthy and sexy. Conversely the Fat Acceptance movement presents fat as beautiful, sexy, and healthy. But what did online audiences in 2014 think about Bringing Sexy Back? In this article online-viewer-generated comments are analysed to find out: a) whether audiences challenged and contested the dominant framing; and b) what phrases did they use to do this. The research task is …

Geo-Based Technologies, Tourists And Bushfires In Northern Australia, Donnell Holloway, David Holloway, Lelia Green

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

This paper analyses how the use of geo-based technologies can play a role in the safety of tourism operations and tourist travel — especially in the case of bushfires. The study uses data from 42 qualitative interviews with tourists, tourism operators and other stakeholders in the remote Kununurra area of Western Australia carried out in 2012 and 2013. We contend that the spatiotemporal nature of tourism has stimulated considerable development in a range of geo - based technologies. The paper argues that geo-based technologies are an integral part of fire suppression and mitigation practices, and that tourists’ familiarity with geo-based …