Digital Commons Network^™

Coming-Of-Age Of Teenage Female Arab Gothic Fiction: A Feminist Semiotic Study, Zoe Hurley, Zeina Hojeij

All Works

This feminist semiotic study explores the folkloric imaginary of the jinn in the context of children’s and young adults’ Arab Gothic literature. Across the Middle East, the jinn is a common trope in literature, folklore and oral storytelling who, in diegetic terms, can manifest as the Gothic figure of an aging female, deranged older woman or succubus (known as sa’lawwa in Arabic). In this study, a novel feminist semiotic framework is developed to explore the extent to which the Gothic female succubus either haunts or liberates Arab girls’ coming-of-age fictions. This issue is addressed via a feminist semiotic reading of …

Design And Applications Of Fmoc-Histidine And Aspartic Acid Tripeptides As Proton Conductive Materials, Shejla S. Pollozi

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The increasing demand for clean and sustainable energy has driven forward rapid improvements in polymer-electrolyte fuel cells and the use of ion-conducting polymers (ionomers) as proton exchange membranes and catalyst binders. While perfluorinated electrolytes have been commercially used as conductive membranes for nearly four decades, a new class of sustainable, conductive materials has emerged, inspired by the efficiency of charge transport processes in biological systems. These molecules, knows as peptide amphiphiles (PAs), have gained popularity as building blocks for the bottom-up fabrication of nanomaterials through supramolecular self-assembly. Supramolecular nanostructures, often in the form of hydrogels, are held together via non-covalent …

Salty: A Diffractive Inquiry Of Visceral Knowing And Embodied Aesthetics, Mei Ling Chua

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation takes a diffractive, onto-epistemological approach to everyday practices with salt in order to articulate an expanded understanding of meaning making and knowledge production. This research reckons with and challenges dominant modes of knowing that engage a Cartesian perspective to situate knowing as the exclusive domain of the mind in both form and topic of inquiry. This research acts simultaneously as both a direct practice of and metacognition about knowledge production by examining 1. the embodied (including sensory and emotional aspects) and 2. the relational (including interpersonal and socio-cultural) dimensions of experience as visceral knowing. This articulation of …

Pleasure And Power In A Cover Culture: Audiences, Musicians, And Venues In İZmi̇R’S Popular Music Scene, Yılmaz Onur Sönmez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The live popular music scene in İzmir, Turkey, is dominated by slow-changing cover repertoires that are performed by musicians who have been on stage for a few decades, at places that have been hosting covers shows for a prolonged time. In this dissertation, I question the reasons behind this practice, which I call cover culture, and analyze it from the three different but interrelated perspectives of audiences, musicians, and venues. My analysis relies on the fieldwork data I collected between March 2019 and May 2022, and on my long-term involvement with and observations of the scene since the early 2000s. …

“All The Evil Music Has:” Musical Representations Of The Vamp In Interwar American Popular Media, Martha Schulenburg

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation explores the vamp as a symbol of sociosexual deviance in film and American popular music of the 1910s and ‘20s. Abbreviated from vampire, “vamp” came to be used as a term for sexually voracious and predatory women in the early 20^th century. Following the unprecedented success of the 1915 film A Fool There Was, vamps then became a staple in American popular media. My project examines the process of remediation and cultural dissemination at the dawn of mass media via the vamp in music. Vamps were pervasive in cinematic accompaniment, vaudeville, jazz, and Tin Pan Alley …

John Singer Sargent In Spain: Eluding The Stereotype, Cristina Domenech

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The aim of this thesis is to present John Singer Sargent's unique vision of Spain as well as to analyze this part of his work through the use of methodologies such as Orientalism and Spanish cultural studies, an approach that has not been undertaken to date.

The thesis intends to demonstrate that Sargent's early paintings -along with those of his American counterparts who traveled to Paris- were strongly motivated by the prevailing cultural orientalism of the moment in France, one of those extensions being the so called españolismo that exacerbated the most stereotyped dimensions of Spanish history and culture.

Undoubtedly, …

Stand-Up Comedy Visualized, Berna Yenidogan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Stand-up comedy has become an increasingly popular form of comedy in the recent years and comedians reach audiences beyond the halls they are performing through streaming services, podcasts and social media. While comedic performances are typically judged by how 'funny' they are, which could be proxied by the frequency and intensity of laughs through the performance, comedians also explore untapped social issues and provoke conversation, especially in this age where interaction with artists goes beyond their act. It is easy to see commonalities in the topics addressed in comedians’ work such as relationships, race and politics.This project provides an interactive …

The Devil Is In The Details: Witchcraft Materiality And Systems Of Belief In Early Modern France, Ryan Evelyn

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

My approach to the early modern French witch figure, as defined by their materiality, considers the representation of things, objects, and substances in texts. It was inspired by the surge in material culture studies, whose genesis in the 1980s and 1990s spurred theoretical approaches to (re)considering human interactions with objects, the way in which materials can be manipulated to serve various ends, and which objects were deemed culturally significant. I employ this approach to a (re)assessment of the witch figure as illustrated in demonologies, medical texts, and imaginative literature as early as the 14^th century spanning into the early …

Confusion Of Tongues: Translation And Transfers Of Attachment In A Post-Monolingual Condition, Hiji Nam

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

“Confusion of Tongues” proposes an intersubjective, dialogic approach to translation, psycholinguistics, and patient and clinicians’ relationships to the “mother tongue” and secondary languages. By tuning in to linguistic and translational shifts, stutters, and gaps, the study presents a consideration of the challenges and rewards presented by what I call a “post-monolingual clinical condition.” An individual’s self-state in a specific language will be shadowed by the emotional history and associations one brings to that language, which will also ripple into the counter-transferential matrix—we might call this the “transference to language,” or attachment styles that manifest and repeat an individual’s forgotten libidinal …

Being Multicultural In The Workplace, Fiorella Morales

Dissertations

As the workforce becomes increasingly diverse and organizations elevate their efforts to address issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), it is critical to engage in a deeper investigation of the experiences of multicultural individuals at work. In this qualitative study, nine multicultural individuals were interviewed using a sociological lens to gain their perspective on the relationship between their identity and their work experiences. The primary research questions that guided this study were: (a) how do multicultural individuals influence the workplace? In turn, (b) how do their workplace experiences affect their identity and sense of self? Data was coded and …

The Construction Of Third Space In Elif Shafak’S Two Novels, Nurul Hanun Asyifa, Bastian Zulyeno

International Review of Humanities Studies

This article analyzes how public spaces—in the forms of two cafes and a tavern—are constructed as a third space in Elif Shafak's two novels, “The Bastard of Istanbul” (2008) and “The Island of Missing Trees” (2021). This research is a qualitative study with an approach in spatiality. The theory used in this study is the theory of Thirdspace by Edward Soja. The results of the study indicate that as the representation of the third space, the two cafes and a tavern in Shafak's two novels promote resistance to the conflicts and their impacts on the two conflicting groups, as well …

Convergence Culture In The Practice Of Mobile Legends: Bang-Bang Game, Indira Novianti, Ike Iswary Lawanda

International Review of Humanities Studies

Games in our cultures are sustained passing through dynamic changes of society and technology Online games in digital world today allow players to play together in ubiquitous, every players access the games through their mobile phones . Mobile Legends: Bang-bang, has caused a cultural convergence compared to its previous MOBA games using PC computers. The coordination which used to play in player actions filled with strategics and creativities addressing morality and self interest in strategy. Online game MLBB with its excellence in modes converges the behavior of the players more into individual players. The analysis about cultural convergence sustains by …

The Essential Of Semar Power In The Play Of Bathara Kala Tundhung-Surya Ndadari By Ki Manteb Sudarsono, Dewi Dian Lestari, Darmoko Darmoko

International Review of Humanities Studies

This paper discusses the essential of Semar Power in the puppet play entitled Bathara Kala Tundhung-Surya Ndadari. The play Bathara Kala Tundhung-Surya Ndadari was taken into consideration in conducting this research because it is a unique play, namely the Ruwat play and the Mahabharata story play which were united through the experience of the presence of Semar characters in a puppet play by Ki Manteb Sudarsono. The main problem in this research is how the essence of Semar Power is formulated in Batara Kala Tundhung-Surya Ndadari. This study aims to formalize Semar's power as the holder of the superiority of …

The Trend Of Dagestan’S Young Moslem Generation Towards Digital Platforms And The Responsibility Of Local Ulama Through Social Media, Yasmin Mumtazah, Ahmad Fahrurodji

International Review of Humanities Studies

This study discussed the tendency of the young moslem generation of Dagestan in using social media such as YouTube, Instagram, and VKontakte. The goal of this research was to answer the responsibility of related ulama on the digital platform used by Dagestan's young generation. The netnographic method was employed as a tool to assist researchers in communicating via digital platforms. According to the findings of the netnographic research, social media is not a solution to the problems of Dagestan Muslims. Although social media was a gathering place for the younger generation to learn about Islam, this did not guarantee that …

Ambivalence In Gender Portrayals In Goosebumps (2015) And Goosebumps: Haunted Halloween (2018), Tyasyifa Wimahavinda Kardono, Dhita Hapsarani

International Review of Humanities Studies

The horror genre is notorious for sexist depictions of female heroines, which heavily imposes traditional gender stereotypes. This paper analyses Goosebumps (2015) and Goosebumps: Haunted Halloween (2018), which are the movie adaptations of R.L Stine’s horror book series. It aims to see the possibility of the female heroines and male heroes to defy conventional gender stereotypes and determine the female heroines’ agency as horror movies tend to objectify the female characters. This paper uses the Cult of True Womanhood (Welter, 1966), Male Gender Role Identity (Pleck, 1981) and representation theory (Hall, 1997) to analyse the dialogues and interaction of the …

“Narimo Ing Pandum”: How Highlander Women Perceive Poverty As A Destiny In Gunungkidul, Yogyakarta, Wasisto Raharjo Jati

Masyarakat: Jurnal Sosiologi

The Javanese proverb “narimo ing pandum”exemplifies a belief among poor people to accept their impoverishment as the Divine will of God. This belief, however, has the adverse effect of habituating people to accept poverty. Such perception is conditioned, among others, by the availability of state-provided social aid as well as family or community support, which has helped the poor to stay afloat in moments of crises. In a patriarchal society, poverty poses even more risks and challenges for women, who are often conditioned to be reliant on men to survive. As such, poor women are likely required to find …

The Dynamics Of Military-Police Relations In Post-Authoritarian Indonesia (1998 To 2020), Bayu A. Yulianto

Masyarakat: Jurnal Sosiologi

Among myriad significant institutional changes in post-authoritarian Indonesia (1998-present) is the split of Indonesian police (POLRI) from the armed forces (ABRI, renamed into TNI after 1999). No longer locked in a dominant-subordinate configuration, the interaction between both institutions intensified in areas where they intersect. Drawing upon the theory of Strategic Action Field (SAF), this study attempts to capture the dynamics along the newly-established trajectory. It shall be argued that far from being one-dimensional, the relationship between both institutions has been marked by conflict, competition, and cooperation; depending on the SAF. Finally, this research proposes a new framework to assess the …

Structural And Cultural Aspects Of Fisherman Family Education Problems In Waruduwur Cirebon, A Syatori, Suciyadi Ramdhani, Nurlaili Khikmawati

Masyarakat: Jurnal Sosiologi

According to the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), Indonesia's education quality is ranked 74th out of 79 countries. The data highlights issues including high tuition costs, unequal access to educational institutions, as well as mismatch between education system and local culture; all commonly found in fishing communities. This ethnographic study seeks to investigate cultural and structural factors that affect the lagging education of children of fishermen in Waruduwur village, Cirebon, West Java, Indonesia. The findings indicate that both factors are interlinked, significantly shaping collective views on education as well as children’s participation in schooling. Patterns observed in the study …

What Is A Child? The Conception Of Childhood Viewed Primarily Through The Funerary Culture From The Predynastic Era To The Middle Kingdom, Courtney Mcrae

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis uses an interdisciplinary analysis of the theories involving cultural ideas of childhood, as well as archaeological approaches to studying the funerary material culture related to children, in an attempt to determine the role of children in ancient Egypt. To achieve this, the author examines grave goods in relation to child burials from the Predynastic (5000-3200 BC) to the Middle Kingdom (2055-1650 BC) to examine the correlation between funerary material cultures with different stages of childhood. The author used these time periods in order to properly conduct an in depth analysis of early Egyptian culture. The author also analyzes …

Understanding Basic Relational Concepts In Directions: A Study Of Native Mexican And U.S. Children In Early Elementary Grades, Adrian E. Tovar, Zheng Zhou

Perspectives on Early Childhood Psychology and Education

The present study uses both quantitative and qualitative approaches to examine: (1) U.S. and Mexican children’s ability to understand basic relational concepts in directions; and (2) to analyze language arts and math textbooks to determine the levels of complexity in directions (i.e., number of qualifiers or concepts embedded in the directions). A total of 265 first grade (n = 128) and second-grade (n = 137) children in Mexico were assessed using the Boehm Test of Basic Concepts-Revised (BTBC-R) Applications Booklet. Their performance was compared to the U.S. standardized sample of the BTBC-R to make cross-cultural comparisons. Results from the quantitative …

Hubungan Parasosial Idol Group Korea Selatan Treasure Melalui Aplikasi Weverse, Amalia Qoriana Nurfadilah, Euis Sulastri

Multikultura

Penyebaran budaya K-pop melalui idol group semakin sukses di berbagai belahan dunia. Hal ini tidak lepas dari pemanfaatan media sosial seperti Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, dan Youtube. Industri hiburan Korea Selatan membuat inovasi baru dengan menciptakan beberapa aplikasi media sosial. Inovasi yang dilakukan industri hiburan Korea Selatan adalah penggemar dapat mengunggah pesan untuk idola, lalu idola akan memilih beberapa unggahan penggemar untuk diberikan komentar atau cheer. Aplikasi yang memiliki fungsi tersebut bernama Weverse. Weverse mengumumkan bahwa TREASURE menjadi artis pertama naungan YG Entertainment yang bergabung. Melalui aplikasi ini, diharapkan penggemar di seluruh dunia dapat berkomunikasi dengan TREASURE. Intensitas komunikasi yang tinggi …

Loss-Of-Function KCa2.2 Mutations Abolish Channel Activity, Young-Woo Nam, Mohammad Asikur Rahman, Grace Yang, Razan Orfali, Meng Cui, Miao Zhang

Pharmacy Faculty Articles and Research

Small-conductance Ca²⁺-activated potassium channels subtype 2 (K_Ca2.2, also called SK2) are operated exclusively by a Ca²⁺-calmodulin gating mechanism. Heterozygous genetic mutations of K_Ca2.2 channels have been associated with autosomal dominant neurodevelopmental disorders including cerebellar ataxia and tremor in humans and rodents. Taking advantage of these pathogenic mutations, we performed structure-function studies of the rat K_Ca2.2 channel. No measurable current was detected from HEK293 cells heterologously expressing these pathogenic K_Ca2.2 mutants. When co-expressed with the K_Ca2.2_WT channel, mutations of the pore-lining amino acid residues (I360M, Y362C, G363S …

“For The Moment, I Am Not F*Cking,” I Am Tweeting: Platforms Of / As Sexuality, Jacob Johanssen

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

This article develops the argument that digital platforms are significantly infused with originary (and unconscious) residues of the sexual. Drawing on Laplancheian conceptualizations of sexuality, I argue that the digital has always been sexual(ised) in itself – a process that precedes and exceeds the erotic or pornographic. For Laplanche, sexuality is constitutive of the human subject as such. Infantile sexuality is shaped and transformed in an enigmatic relation with the caregiver. Drawing on this model as an analogy, I claim that users are drawn to platforms because they (unconsciously) desire to return to infantile sexuality and a holding environment but …

Amazon Web Services, The Lacanian Unconscious, And Digital Life, Marshall N. Armintor

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In late 2011, ex-Amazon developer Steve Yegge’s rant about his former company described Amazon’s rapid transformation from an online bookstore to a web-services entity with a ruthlessly unified platform, all guided by the idea that the company’s effort to streamline its internal efficiency could be monetized, and the resultant software products sold through Amazon Web Services. The media consumerism that fed Amazon’s early years funded a surveilling behemoth, one that everyone feared Microsoft would become. As such, AWS has become a manifestation of the internet’s Lacanian unconscious (even providing the services and hosting for Reddit), structured around the optimization of …

Purloined Significance: How Recidivism Algorithms Capture, Transform, And Automate Our Intersubjective Unconscious As Data, Macy Mcdonald

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

Ever since ProPublica published their groundbreaking analysis of Northpointe’s Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions Core Risk and Needs Assessment software (COMPAS) in 2016, this web-based decision support system (DSS) has spawned a wide range of critiques and charges of racial bias. COMPAS provides a full suite of decision support applications to the US prison-industrial complex, including algorithmically derived recidivism predictions that increasingly guide parole decisions. The larger conversation surrounding COMPAS raises the question of how we analyze powerful, and yet opaque, data assemblages. In this article, I model an allegorical analysis of data assemblages. I argue the skills …

Community Despite Connection: Resisting The Digital Logics Of Optimization And Failure, Irina Kalinka

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

If a certain brand of aspirational tech-utopian discourse is to be believed, those privileged enough to be plugged into digital information technology are living through a golden age of connection. Platforms claim to facilitate sharing and partaking, bring people together, and bestow upon them new and improved spaces to gather and build communities. While reality differs decidedly from such idealized conceptions, it is nonetheless crucial to ask what kind of guiding vision is being instituted through such representational efforts: namely, the figure of community made operational and optimizable. This project will reject such idealized visions of coherent communities drawn together …

The Social Sinthome, Ryan Engley

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

Much of the critical discourse on social media misidentifies its problematic features as bugs, or problems to solve. Supposed solutions to these problems tend to focus on individual actions. We should delete the apps, own our own data, never click on recommended videos, and realize that we are the product. But if predatory algorithms succeed by individuating people—selling people “choice” and “options” as it harvests user data—then an entire online ecosystem arranged through the logic of that design can neither be meaningfully challenged nor effectively understood at the level of the individual alone. Transformative action addressing social media can only …

#Emotional: Exploitation & Burnout In Creator Culture, Sarah Thorne

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In recent years, a growing list of content creators have published videos announcing that they are leaving YouTube, taking a break, or reducing their upload schedule (Alexander). Many of these young creators state that their decision resulted from burnout, caused by a relentless schedule and obsession with YouTube’s algorithm and analytics— tools essential to success on this highly competitive creative platform (Srnicek). Its opaque algorithm, however, induces anxiety; an affect described as that which “arises when the subject is confronted by the desire of the Other and does not know what object he is for that desire” (Evans 12). Here, …

Everybody Wants To Be A Fascist Online: Psychoanalysis And The Digital Architecture Of Fascism, Anthony Faramelli, Imogen Piper

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

Félix Guattari and Franco Berardi have both argued that media ecologies and psychic ecologies are intimately intertwined and as such, any exploration of the collective unconscious must engage with how the mind is formed with and through media. This understanding of networks of interdependence necessitates an exploration of how platformization has impacted users” collective psyche. Drawing from psychosocial theory, psychoanalysis and the work of Félix Guattari, this article analizes the micropolitics of desire of digital platforms, with an explicit focus on how algorithmic structures amplify extreme Right content, allowing fascisms to metastasis throughout digital spaces. It will first examine the …

“There Is No Pandemic”: On Memes, Algorithms And Other Interpassive Forms Of Right-Wing Disbelief, Scott Krzych

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

This essay examines several prominent memes that have circulated on Right-wing social media during the Covid-19 pandemic. The memes coordinate what I describe as a mode of interpassive humor, which positions those who “believe” in the crisis as naïve dupes, infantilizing those subjects who have fallen prey to the idea that they should take the pandemic seriously, and thereby delegating fearfulness to the other so that reactionary Covid-19 denialists may continue with their lives unaffected. The essay thereby seeks to draw suggestive lines of affiliation between studies of digital memes, evolutionary mimetics, and psychoanalytic theory, pointing to the algorithmic …