Digital Commons Network^™

A Qualitative Study On The Effect Of Misattributed Parentage Experiences, Jodi Klugman-Rabb

Collected Faculty Scholarship

Identity formation is a lifelong process, significantly influenced by factors involving social groups such as family, culture, and life events. Identity confusion can result from Misattributed Parentage Experiences (MPE), when people learn they are not biologically related to a parent(s) who raised them as such, possibly triggering genealogical bewilderment, the state when uncertain knowledge of biological parents, or lack thereof, leads to maladjustment, confusion, and uncertainty (Leighton, 2012) in identity. The present study is a qualitative analysis of the effect genealogical bewilderment has on identity formation and crises for MPE adults in the United States between 2012 and 2022. Using …

Mental Health In Sports Media, Samuel Ridgley

Communication & Media Studies | Senior Theses

This paper looks at the increasingly popular conversation surrounding mental health in sports. It provides a glimpse into how common the struggle of mental health can be for many high-level athletes while also examining the narrative and expectations that society and the media have created. The paper also provides examples of prominent athletes from a variety of different sports and delves into their personal mental health experiences in the eyes of the media. The goal of this paper is to show the progression and change of how the media portrays mental health amongst athletes in today’s ever-changing world.

The Rock, Winter 2023, Whittier College

The Rock

Contents:

• President's Corner
• New Board Members
• Poet4Life
• Around the Rock
• Leadership Changes
• Societies
• Faculty Files
• Environmental Studies
• Q&A: President Dillon
• Athletics
• Advancement
• Honor Roll of Donors
• Alumni
• Board of Trustees

Langland, Father Of American Literatures, John M. Bowers

Quidditas

Geoffrey Chaucer’s position as “father of English literature” has been steadily challenged in recent years. This paper both proposes and interrogates the other fourteenth-century English poet William Langland’s possible claims as the origin for the Puritan tradition of New England and, hence, the later traditions of American literatures—in the plural. We know that the first copy of his satirical, theological dream-vision Piers Plowman arrived in New England in 1630 with the father of Anne Bradstreet, and as a result any patriarchal genealogy is already problematic because the first author in the American family-tree was a woman. Rather than the linearity …

An Exploratory Constructivist Grounded Theory Study: Science Teachers' Binary Thought Processes, Alecia Redway

NERA Conference Proceedings 2023

Using constructivist grounded theory, this study explores science teachers’ binary thought processes when interpreting students’ scientific models that are comprised of drawings. Using theoretical and inductive data, the study highlights the role of Western culture in shaping science teachers’ binary interpretation of scientific drawings. In addition, the study points out science disciplinary cultural practices that perpetuate the dominant ideologies on science assessments.

An Exploratory Constructivist Grounded Theory Study: How Secondary School Science Teachers Interpret Students’ Scientific Models That Are Comprised Of Drawing Activities, Alecia M. Redway

Selected Full Text Dissertations, 2011-

Extant literature lacks an explanation of the thought processes used by secondary school science teachers to interpret students’ scientific models that are comprised of drawing activities. In this exploratory study, a constructivist grounded theory (CGT) was developed to generate an interpretive understanding. The CGT was generated from observations, interviews, and document analyses of five research participants consisting of secondary school science teachers from lower New York State. To generate a CGT, concepts, terms, assumptions, and definitions from selected theories—decolonizing methodologies theory (DMT), visual semiotic theory (VST), and cultural studies theory (CST)—collectively provided a fresh onto-epistemological lens for initially examining and …

Making The Lover’S Leap: Wenonah, Rhetorical Colonialism, And Dissociative Memory(-)Work, Adam J. Gaffey

Communication Studies Faculty Works

This essay analyzes a display of Wenonah and the “Lover’s Leap” in Winona, Minnesota, as an example of dissociative memory(-)work. Applying dissociation to the organization of commemorative space, I attend to how the display uses markers of commemorative labor as modifying terms that invite audiences to dissociate investiture from the figure represented in order to privilege the people, actions, and temporal frameworks of those who made and maintained the memorial. This analysis proposes different dissociative units relevant to memory(-)work, including persona memorialized/persona memorializing, act memorialized/act of memorializing, and time memorialized/time of memorializing. Attention to this example of memory(-)work helps critics …

Section Iii: Collections (Evidence), Usf Libraries

SACSCOC 2025

No abstract provided.

The Impact Of Studying Abroad On The Intercultural Spiritual Formation Of Harding University Latin America Students, Jeremy Daggett

Harding School of Theology Dissertations and Theses

No abstract provided.

The Limits Of Presence: Constraints On Women’S Political Representation In Serbia And Montenegro, Anja Vojvodić

Publications and Research

Women’s political representation has increased globally over the past few decades. Women are entering the political world in more significant numbers. This increase is visible among the countries of the former Yugoslavia. Within the last three decades, women have become present in greater numbers across the parliaments of the former Yugoslavia, primarily due to the adoption of gender quotas due to women’s movement activism. But is the presence of elected women enough to empower them politically and create “space” for activism, advocacy, and subsequently higher levels of substantive representation? In this work, I pose this main research question and focus …

Stress Response In Relation To Gender, Adverse Experiences, And Personality, Alyssa Kramer

Theses & ETDs

Behavioral responses to stress have typically been characterized as “fighting” or “fleeing.” However, humans may show a more complex set of behavioral strategies that are influenced by factors such as gender socialization, trauma, and personality. Fawning has recently been introduced as a response to stress that involves conflict avoidance. Although this term has been used colloquially, there is little empirical research that explores the fawn response and how factors such as gender, trauma, and personality may be involved in this stress response. The purpose of this study is to conduct an initial exploration on these factors. Sixty-nine undergraduate participants were …

Paradise Lost And Found And Lost And Found: Staging A Possible Future Through Workshop Facilitation, Nicole Silvera

Theses & ETDs

New College of Florida’s 58th Street Campus Development Plan has been in development since 2020. The plan has been deemed a “high-priority project” in the New College Master Plan as it will complete the College Drive loop by creating a two-lane paved road connecting 58th Street and College Drive. The road would pave through an underutilized greenspace and cost the school over $.600,000. There are multiple species of trees and animals that live in the greenspace, and it is a prime outdoor space suitable for students, faculty, staff, and guests to connect with the Earth and with each other. This …

Performing The Shift: Jewish Racial Identity In American Vaudeville And Its Social Context In The Early Twentieth Century, Jude Zelznak

Theses & ETDs

This thesis approaches the subject of Jewish racial identity in America through the lens of vaudeville performance. By combining the study of race with the study of performance, the distinctions made between white, Anglo-Saxon Americans and Others in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries are explored in a multifaceted manner. I argue that said division is inherently visible in the notion of national identity that performers and audiences formed in the presentation of otherness in onstage performance. Vaudeville, specifically, presents simultaneous methods of resistance and receptivity toward the prospering divisions in whiteness. Beginning by contextualizing the shift in perceptions …

Hombres, Pumas Y Jaguares: Imágenes Del Poder Chamánico En Los Vasos Líticos Del Noroeste Argentino, María Alba Bovisio

Segundo congreso internacional de iconografía precolombina. Barcelona, 2023. Actas.

El presente trabajo se centra en el análisis de unos vasos de piedra, producidos en la región valliserrana del noroeste argentino durante el Período Formativo, que se destacan por su escaso número, su particular iconografía que gira en torno a felinos y humanos masculinos, y la maestría en su ejecución. Estos recipientes habrían estado asociados al consumo de sustancias psicoactivas en rituales de carácter chamánico. A través del análisis iconográfico articulado con las características materiales y funcionales se indaga el rol de estos objetos como agentes de legitimación y constitución del poder ejercido por los chamanes.

This paper analyzes lithic …

Rebuilding Old Empire: Bbc And Indigenous Language Broadcasting In Nigeria, Ololade Afolabi

Communication, Media & The Arts Faculty Publications

Using the framework of postcolonial and critical cultural studies of communication, this essay examines the rise of BBC indigenous language broadcasting in Nigeria. Taking an interdisciplinary approach from the fields of language studies, media studies, and cultural studies, the essay argues that media and communication contact that occurs between colonists and their previous colonies cannot be taken as coincidental or casual; therefore, the need to combine the local and global in theorizing new frameworks for understanding this complex relationship and the power dynamics that occurs alongside it.

Indecent Bodies In Early Modern Visual Culture: An Introduction, Fabian Jonietz, Mandy Richter, Alison Stewart

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Faculty Publications and Creative Activity

Indecency ‒ the polar opposite of propriety, appropriateness, respectability, decorum ‒ has played a central role in our understanding of Early Modern cultural norms since the beginning of art history as an academic field in the nineteenth century. Accordingly, the concept of indecency was fundamental to historical and contemporary discourses that attempted to balance social limits on indecorous behaviour and images. At the same time, the appeal of such visual imagery, the attraction of graphic depictions of bodies and their actions, resulted in conflicting responses on the part of viewers. Historically, decency and indecency played defining roles in both the …

“I Don’T Want To Cook”: Reconfiguring The Domestic Space In Nineteenth-Century American Literature, Rida Leonard

CGU Theses & Dissertations

In the scholarship that considers ways in which the concept of domesticity features in the lives of black and white women in history, there is less discussion of how these women’s unique challenges led them to alter the traditional domestic space. This dissertation first assesses a range of nineteenth-century American newspapers to understand the prevalent social milieu and then closely analyzes select literary texts of the time, to argue that the distinct racial circumstances that framed black and white women’s struggles enabled them to reform the domestic space as needed. Analysis of the nineteenth century press reveals that while white …

Finding Etheridge Knight: A Case Study On A University’S Public Humanities Project, Hanako Gavia, Lisa Farley

Scholarship and Professional Work – Education

No abstract provided.

More Than The Renaissance: The Reclassification Of The Disney Animated Films Of The Classics Period, Alia R. Tyner

Publications and Research

Over the past ten years, more than 200 peer-reviewed articles with Disney in their titles have been published across disciplines, especially in the humanities and social sciences. Beginning in the 1930s with Disney’s first motion picture, the company, its venues, acquisitions, movies, and other products have become a robust research topic for academics, constantly refreshed with new ideas and perspectives. As Disney celebrates its 100th anniversary in 2023, researchers and readers examining the movies could benefit from some consistency in how the passage of time is described, and yet the methods of classification of these movies are not robust or …

The Erotic Work Of Asian American Activism: Harnessing Kink, Queer, And Sex Worker Praxis, Chelsea Shi-Chao Liu

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This thesis discusses the harnessing of alternative, kink, and queer sexualities within the Asian American community towards anti-racist and sex work positive activism during the COVID-19 pandemic era of anti-Asian violence. It opens by tracing the shooting on Asian massage parlors in Atlanta, Georgia in 2021 to historic immigration legislation such as the Page Act of 1875 that enshrined hypersexualized racism. The paper then analyzes the role of race and racial representation in the history of the BDSM (Bondage/Dominance, Dominance/Submission, and Sadomasochism) subculture from the 1950s to 2020s, tracking the emergence of groups like the Asian American Feminist Collective (AAFC) …

Black Feminist Poiesis: Locating “The Uses Of The Erotic” Within Black Domesticity, Kiandra S. Jimenez

CGU Theses & Dissertations

What does being human mean for women who were artists denied the ability to live life on their own standards? What did it mean to live a creative life when your body was captured and held within a system that surveilled and penalized you for things like writing, reading, or the idea of creating was impossible? In Alice Walker’s “In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens,” she asks us to consider what it meant to be a Black woman artist when you are considered “the mule of the world,” and are stuck toiling away—as a launderer, a maid, a cook, a …

"Real Queens Fix Each Other's Crown": Addressing The Misseducation Of The Blackgirl, Tiffani J. Smith

CGU Theses & Dissertations

To what extent, do Blackgirl collectives imbue its participants with values that inspire them to pursue a college education? Blackgirl collectives have the potential to promote intellectual diversity, justice, and equality that can deter violence and exclusionary policies in the pursuit of a higher education. The objective of this dissertation research project is to: (1) explore the ways in which these collectives increase their community cultural wealth, (2) understand the ways in which these collectives mission of empowerment, intellectual development, community, and social justice impact their higher education persistence, and (3) discover the intrinsic and extrinsic attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors …

Voices Of Endo: Cultural Factors Influencing Delayed Diagnosis Of Endometriosis, Arline Karen Votruba

CGU Theses & Dissertations

An estimated one in ten people born with internal reproductive anatomy, meaning the vagina, cervix, uterus, fallopian tubes, and ovaries, live with endometriosis, which is about 200 million people worldwide. Endometriosis is a disease in which the growth of endometrial-like tissue grows around the reproductive organs, rectum, bladder, or throughout the body in places it does not belong. Endometriosis often leads to devastating effects such as painful, prolonged menstruation, nausea and bowel issues, pain that radiates down the legs, and it is a leading cause of fertility challenges. Endometriosis is diagnosed through laparoscopic surgery, in which a surgeon inserts a …

Playing With Power: An Autoethnographic Study Of "The Last Of Us" As A Black Gamer, Adrienne Domasin

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This research project concerns the types of meaning making that video game players and audiences can derive as active participants in the realm of digital media culture. This dissertation argues that embodied play as viewers and audiences has the potential to relieve the alienation caused by capitalism and its desire to strip individuals of their humanity through reification. This study contributes to academic studies of fandom by prioritizing my dissertation as an unapologetic expression of my fandom and the source of knowledge production that drives my research through a critical autoethnographic lens. As an acafan, I analyze my ludic experiences …

Female Pleasure And Theories Of Desire In Narrative Structure: Evolution, Futurity, And Species Survival In The Post-Human And Science Fiction Imaginary, Laura L. S. Bauer

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation explores the complex relationship between an expanded narratological theory of narrative desire, inseparable in its relation to evolution and biological reproduction, and the future survival of humanity imagined across the narrative structures of three 21st-century works of dystopian science fiction. By examining the genre's potential to address species survival specifically through female forms of desire identified as narrative recurrence, prolonged duration, and emotional resolution, this study concurrently develops a metatextual methodology that cultivates the overlooked liminal space of quiescence. This analytical framework emphasizes narrative structure over theme-based analysis to unlock the radical imagination present in the texts …

Dismantling The Master's House: A Decolonial Blueprint For Internationalization Of Higher Education, Bhavika Sicka, Minghui Hou

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Faculty Publications

While critical scholars have attempted to decenter internationalization, limited research has aimed to understand internationalization efforts in the context of the socio-historical particularities of the postcolonial condition. This paper takes a decolonial perspective in the study of internationalization, in light of the Eurocentric tendencies of modernity, whose major manifestation in higher education is neoliberal globalization. We unpack internationalization in the U.S. and examine how it is embedded in and reproduces neoliberalism, racism, and colonialism. Since decolonization is not merely deconstructive but also regenerative, we reconceive what it means to be international and recommend how internationalization can be deployed as a …

Contact-Tracing Apps As Boundary Objects Of Pandemic Governance: The State-By-State Approach To Contain The Spread Of Covid-19 In The United States, Eugene Jang, Jeeyun (Sophia) Baik, Katrin Fischer

Communication: Faculty Scholarship

Digital contact tracing has been claimed as imperative to controlling the spread of COVID19. However, the state-by-state approach in the United States led to divergences in contact tracing. This study analyzed contact-tracing apps as “boundary objects” through which each state worked toward the governance of the pandemic without having a formal consensus. Through media coverage and walkthrough analyses of three digital contacttracing apps in Alabama, California, and New York, we closely investigated both convergences and divergences of the apps. In the process, we located the implications of Google/Apple’s Bluetooth-based exposure notification system for digital contact tracing within and beyond state …

Restorative Pedagogy To Build Community In The Classroom: Autoethnographic Reflections From Faculty, Sheila Mcmahon, Zara Ahmed, Michelle Bemiller

School of Leadership and Education Sciences: Faculty Scholarship

Restorative justice (RJ) is a philosophy and set of practices that center harms and needs. Within a classroom setting, an RJ pedagogical approach invites a process of shared learning that attends to critical issues of equity, power, and voice. Utilizing an autoethnographic approach, this manuscript includes critical reflections from three faculty members from diverse disciplines and positionalities about the use of RJ approaches to teaching in our respective classrooms. This paper includes discussion about the intersection of RJ with critical pedagogy, power differentials, and pragmatic issues of classroom structure learning design.

Imperial Anxieties And Urbane Transgressions: The Indianos Of Benito Pérez Galdós’S Lo Prohibido, Stacy L. Davis

Decimonónica

Chapter eleven of Lo prohibido (1884-5), “Los jueves de Eloísa,” presents a detailed description of a lavish Restoration era dinner party. As narrator-protagonist José María Bueno de Guzmán outlines the sumptuous dishes, elegant décor, and coy intrigues taking place among the elite society members present, Eloísa’s husband, Pepe Carrillo, lies dying in an adjacent room; his cries of agony cause the distinguished guests to drop their forks and run to his aid; that is, all but one. Colonial entrepreneur Don Alejandro Sánchez Botín remains seated and, as the obese man continues to eat, the sounds of his chewing loudly …

"I Smiled As I Died": An Intermediate Performance On Gendered Violence In The Bible, Tara Sandlin

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

No abstract provided.