Digital Commons Network^™

Gender Performance In Womens' Mixed Martial Arts, Linda Tompkins, Michael Ian Borer

McNair Poster Presentations

Academic research has typically focused on men who practice Mixed Martial Arts and their expression of hyper-masculinity. There is a lack of comparative work which examines women who practice MMA as a sport. This article aims to address this oversight by exploring the meaning and importance of the sports for women. The main focus is to explore how women navigate and “perform gender” in the patriarchal subculture of MMA. Drawing on a “grounded theory” approach, semi-structured interviews, content analysis, and participant observation, I developed a preliminary model of female Mixed Martial Artist. I examine three female fighter “types” (“Feminine inclined …

Male-Female Wage-Gap: A Comparison Of Different Employment Classes, Richard V. Foster, Jeffrey Waddoups, Heather Lynn Lusty, Thomas Mike Carroll

McNair Poster Presentations

This study is being conducted and presented in two parts. The first part, this report, is a statistical examination of the male-female wage gap. By evaluating the average (mean) differences between men and women within the workplace, pay differential trends can be ascertained and examined to support the need for additional study. The second stage, to be conducted Fall 2014 at the University of Las Vegas, Nevada, will use regression analysis to differentiate between explained and unexplained portions of said pay-gap to better understand how the remaining gap is related to discrimination. The data analyzed will establish baselines for both …

The Cookie Jar Dilemma, Kelcy Dolan

Faculty Curated Undergraduate Works

This article explores the possibilities in both men and women’s refusal to take responsibility in the war against rape as well as rape culture. Beginning with Zerlina Maxwell’s viral criticized appearance on the Sean Hannity’s talk show, the article questions not only why responsibility is not taken for rape throughout society, but who is responsible and how. It then moves through this question citing several specific articles, an interview and media sources. The article contemplates whether, patriarchy, masculinity, or even instinctual and primitive thought processes dictate the assumptions and responses to the responsibility in the war against rape.

TodavíA Bailamos La Cueca Sola : From Local Protest Practice Against Chile's Dictatorship To (Trans)National Memory Icon, Karolina Sonja Babic

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This dissertation is a multi-sited cultural-historical ethnography about the cueca sola, a dance that was created to denounce the disappearances of citizens during Chile's dictatorship in the 1970s. Some women with missing relatives, who belonged to the music group Conjunto Folclórico of the Association of the Relatives of the Detained and Disappeared (AFDD), created a variation on the Chilean national dance (the cueca - traditionally a courtship dance between a man and a woman) which did not involve a male partner. Instead, they performed it alone. In so doing, these women, who were among the first to denounce the military's …

The Sex Ratio, Gender Equality, And Women's Victimization : A Cross-National Analysis, Laura M. Demarco

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The relationship between the sex ratio and crime is underdeveloped in the criminological literature, particularly regarding the victimization of women. Much of the existing work draws on theorizing by Guttentag and Secord (1983) on the interpersonal dynamics related to dyadic power. In this line of research, the characteristics of structural power are largely taken for granted. Drawing on literature about gender inequality and women's victimization, this study recasts Guttentag and Secord's notion of structural power as a continuous measure of gender equality. I examine the effect of the sex ratio on women's victimization, and evaluate if that effect is contingent …

The Role That Mentors Play In Women's Work Life Balance, Rhonda Allison Capron

Theses and Dissertations

Organizational leaders need to establish policies and programs to retain quality employees. Mentorship and work life balance positively impact organizational commitment and reduce turnover intention. The purpose of this phenomenological, qualitative study was to explore the role that mentors play in helping women achieve work life balance. Two major theoretical frameworks were used as a basis of this study. Giele (2008) identified 4 life course dimensions that contribute to an individual's behavioral system: identity, relational style, drive and motivation, and adaptive style. Elder and Giele (2009) built on this work and combined elements of their paradigms to link dimensions of …

Moved To Move: Socially Contextualizing Women's Exercise Motivations, Dusti Rae Werner

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Using qualitative data from 11 interviews with women who exercise regularly, this research explores women's motivations to exercise, how they make social comparisons and how they self-evaluate their bodies through the social context of gender, socio-economic status and race. Women with intrinsic motivations to exercise find more positive, long term outcomes than those with extrinsic motivations. Women compare themselves to similar others, such as their peers to form self-evaluations more readily than they do media images. Respondents also indicated the importance of relationships in beginning and maintaining exercise regimes.

Atatürk's Balancing Act: The Role Of Secularism In Turkey, Patrick G. Rear

Global Tides

The intersection of religion and politics in the form of a civil religion has been present since time immemorial. This paper looks specifically to the relationship between Turkey’s development of a secular civil religion after gaining independence and the advancing of women’s rights and democratic values. In examining the intersections of state and religion in a secular Islamic society, it draws parallels to the French civil religion as it came to be following the French Revolution. Though Atatürk and other secularists were strong forces in developing the civil religion, the paper also examines liberal democratic and conservative Islamic groups in …

Diplomacy & Negotiation, Liefke M. Cox

Master of Liberal Studies Theses

Over the course of history when women have been involved in the diplomatic, political, social, and economic structure of a country it has been found they are one of the key ingredients to building an effective and stable democracy. Investing in women strengthens the back bone of any society. Top CEO’s, such as Tupperware’s Rick Goings and Warren Buffett, have also publically supported this assumption. I argue that women in different societies have traits that have been instilled in them culturally which in turn translate directly to their ability to handle diplomatic situations and business negotiations. Societies, however intentionally or …

“I’M A Jesus Feminist”: Understandings Of Faith, Gender, And Feminism Among Christian Women, Megan Pritchett

Scripps Senior Theses

The emergence of the Christian Right and the feminist movement in the mid-to-late 20th century have had a significant impact on the political, psychological, and social landscape of the U.S., and this is especially true for Christian women who sit at the cross-roads of these movements. To understand the context surrounding this group, I examine different areas of sociological literature: the primacy of gender and religion in identity formation, Christian marriage and gender roles, the “culture wars” of the Christian Right, and a brief overview of feminist theory. Utilizing qualitative research methods, I interviewed 13 self-identified Christian women to learn …

Call To Duty: Women And World War I, Jennifer D. Keene

History Faculty Articles and Research

"Watching loved ones depart, uncertain if they would return—this was an experience that women around the world shared during the Great War. The continual scene of women sending men off to fight was troubling; paradoxically, it was also a familiar, traditional ritual that reinforced gender roles within western societies. "

Sexual And Reproductive Health Of Women Living With Hiv In Egypt: Unmet Needs And Unfulfilled Dreams, Doaa Oraby, Nahla G. Abdel-Tawab

Reproductive Health

The gender profile of the HIV/AIDS epidemic has changed since it emerged 30 years ago when infections were concentrated in key populations of men such as injecting drug users and men who have sex with men. In 2012, women accounted for nearly 50 percent of the estimated 35.3 million people living with HIV/AIDS globally. In the Middle East and North Africa, 44 percent of infected adults are women. The past 30 years have also witnessed remarkable improvements in access to high-quality information and medical services, including services for prevention of mother-to-child transmission of the virus. With care and treatment for …

Conflicts Within The Black Churches, Angelique Harris

Social and Cultural Sciences Faculty Research and Publications

This essay examines conflicts concerning sex, sexuality, and gender within Black churches. Black churches are American Protestant churches with a predominantly Black leadership and congregation. Often serving the oppressed and underprivileged, Black churches have a history not only of providing for the spiritual needs of Black Americans, but also of fighting for social justice. Increasingly, controversies have begun to emerge within these churches, about gender equality, HIV/AIDS and safer sex education, and, perhaps the most controversial, about homosexuality and same-sex marriage. This essay discusses how Black churches have responded to these issues and the impact that HIV/AIDS has had on …

The Status Of Women Under Neoliberal Reform; A Test Of Two Theories, Donnett Lee

Dissertations and Theses

No abstract provided.

Modeling Risk For Sexually Transmitted Infections In Women In A Court-Ordered Substance Treatment Program, Frances Deavers

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Developing a comprehensive model of Sexually Transmitted Infection (STI) risk factors and their inter-relationships is vital to improving methods of risk identification and treatment delivery. The CDC posed three general categories that may serve as a framework for such a model: sexual network, individual behavior, and social/ structural risk. None of the extant risk models incorporate measures from all three categories. Additionally, none of these models, generally focused on individual behavior, use medical data on infection as their outcome variable. This is problematic because the ultimate outcome of infection is also influenced by sexual network and social/ structural variables, in …

Women, Law, And Human Rights In Cameroon: Progress Or Status Quo?, Victoria M. Time

Sociology & Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

This paper assesses what progress there is in Cameroon regarding women’s statuses. Based on a qualitative strategy, the paper examines laws that are in place to address women’s plight in the country. The paper argues that while progress is being made on some levels, the status quo, that is, female marginalization is still entrenched in other facets. The paper advances recommendations for creating an egalitarian society.

Beneath The Glass Ceiling : What Causes Some Qualified Female Educators To Remain In The Classroom While Others Obtain Leadership Roles?, Allison J. Jordan

Graduate Dissertations and Theses

There is a dispoportionate number of female administrators in relation to the number of female-helmed classrooms in the United States. Jordan tackles the issue of gender in educational leadership. While the removal of legal and social barriers to administrative leadership in the twentieth century may have seemed to point the way toward a female-dominated leadership structure, she finds that female educational leaders are underrepresented at all levels. The study focused on Central Virginia. Jordan tried to uncover the common themes among female educators, including what differences existed between qualified classroom teachers and women who held positions of educational leadership.

Que No Te Eduque La Rosa De Guadalupe - Stereotypes In Telenovelas, Ana Gomez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Gender-based discrimination and gender-based violence prevail in cultures where sexism and violence are usual. According to feminist organizations our best solution is education from an early age. However, in places where means of formal education are scarce, we may turn to alternative solutions such as television. Television has been examined in multiple studies for its role in the formation of gender, and other type of stereotypes. But also it has been considered a useful tool in challenging traditional notions about gender and in helping to promote social change. For this reason, a textual analysis was conducted on La Rosa de …

Normalizing Abnormality: An Exploration Of Social Forces Driving Gendered Disparity In Rates Of Anxiety Disorder Diagnoses, Sara Tebeau

Senior Independent Study Theses

According to recent statistics provided by the National Institute of Mental Health (2013), American women are twice as likely as men to face diagnosis with an anxiety disorder. While there are existing bodies of sociological and feminist work theorizing both the social construction of mental illness categories and the historical pathologization of women, there is no contemporary dialogue centered on gendered disparity in anxiety diagnosis rates. In this paper, I contribute to ongoing discussion of neoliberal influence on the gendering of mental illness through an exploration of the forces contributing to disparity in rates of diagnosis with anxiety disorders. In …

Islamist And Secularist Women In Egyptian Politics: Convergence Or Divergence?, Ahmed Bekhet Mr.

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

Islam oppresses women and has many restrictions on women’s participation in politics. Women have fewer rights under the Islamic Shari‘a (law). Is this true or not? Does Islam really exclude women from political participation? Are Islamists, who have their political agenda, supporting or oppressing women? Are Islamist feminists, who are a contemporary phenomenon especially in the Middle East, politically active or inactive? Are liberal or secular women in Egypt more democratic than Islamist women or the opposite? Such questions will be addressed in the following research with emphasis on examining the role of women in Egyptian politics during Ikwhan’s - …

Reflections On The Potential Of Gender Theory For North American Pentecostal History, Linda M. Ambrose, Leah Payne

Faculty Publications - Portland Seminary

In this article we show how gender is a useful category of analysis for students of North American pentecostal history. First, we provide a working definition ofthe term gender (a term with a plethora of meanings!). Then we cite a few examples from current scholarship that demonstrate how gender as a theoretical construct illuminates certain aspects of the North American movement. Finally, we reflect on the potential benefit of using gender to recount a variety of pentecostal histories, both North American and beyond.

“Women Made It A Home”: Representations Of Women In Social Studies, Mardi Schmeichel

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

This article explores recently published P–12 social studies lesson plans that include women to examine how attending to women is “getting done” in the field and how the lessons represent women and women’s experiences. Using discourse analysis methodologies, the author demonstrates that women have been included as topics in ways that do not work toward disrupting problematic discourses about gender norms. Through their avoidance of issues of power and patriarchy, most of the lessons fall short of addressing gender inequity—in the past or the present—in a significant way. More critical attention to women and gender in lessons, as well as …

Women With Guns: The Guerrilleras Of The Civil War Of The El Salvador 1979-1992, William Ryan Hamlet

Open Access Theses

Civil war raged in El Salvador from the 1970s through the 1980s as guerrilla armies, united under the Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional (FMLN), aimed to overturn what they considered to be an oligarchic repressive regime. Of these FMLN forces, approximately thirty percent were women. Using personal stories derived from a series of in-person interviews with former combatants, this thesis explores the why and how women joined and were included in the guerrilla forces as well as their roles and responsibilities as armed combatants. In addition, given the decade long duration of the conflict, I explore the evolution …

The Choral Hierarchy Examined: The Presence Of Repertoire For Women's Choirs In Monographs On Choral Literature And Choral History, Lauren Elizabeth Estes

Theses - ALL

Women's choirs have been perceived as less prestigious than and inferior to mixed choirs. There is a well-documented choral hierarchy in academia that favors mixed choirs above other choir types. Most frequently, the delineation of the choral hierarchy places women's choirs at the bottom. Books about choral literature and choral history are influential media for those selecting repertoire for choirs. In this study, the monographs recommended as resources on choral literature and choral history by the American Choral Directors Association were surveyed to ascertain the quantity and kind of repertoire included for women's choirs as compared to the quantity and …

Women, Feminism, And Aging In Appalachia, Sherry Kaye Ms.

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Aging has become a problem for men and women in Western societies where youth is touted and revered as a standard of success by which individual value is measured and esteemed. Older women in particular find that as they age they face discrimination in the form of ageism and social diminution. The purpose of the study is to remedy a lack of scholarship on aging in Appalachia and to establish a precedent for future studies. A liberal, feminist approach is used to analyze the results of recorded interviews and to interpret transcripts of relevant data. The results of the analysis …

“Someone’S Got To Do It” – Primary Care Providers (Pcps) Describe Caring For Rural Women With Mental Health Problems, Maria C. Colon-Gonzalez, Jennifer S. Mccall-Hosenfeld, Carol S. Weisman, Marianne M. Hillemeier, Amanda N. Perry, Cynthia H. Chuang

School of Medicine Publications

Objective: Little is known about how primary care providers (PCPs) approach mental health care for low-income rural women. We developed a qualitative research study to explore the attitudes and practices of PCPs regarding the care of mood and anxiety disorders in rural women.

Method: We conducted semi-structured interviews with 19 family physicians, internists, and obstetrician-gynecologists (OBGYNs) in office-based practices in rural central Pennsylvania. Using thematic analysis, investigators developed a coding scheme. Questions focused on 1) screening and diagnosis of mental health conditions, 2) barriers to treatment among rural women, 3) management of mental illnesses in rural women, and 4) ideas …

Tight Void, Brooke Burns

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is a memoir that draws on the life experience of two promiscuous women, Brooke and Karen. Both characters come from upper-middle class backgrounds, have extremely similar family lives, and take two very different paths in both their education and sexual behavior. While the women both retain their strong friendship throughout the narrative, eventually, Karen, and her decision to become a prostitute, takes its toll. Though they remain supportive of one another, Karen's lifestyle of sex, drugs, and partying begin to create a disconnect between them. This thesis sheds light on the true nature of female promiscuity: its relation …

Effects Of Acculturation On Mammography Utilization Among Korean American Women, Jungeun K. Kim Phd

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between acculturation and mammography utilization among Korean American (KA) women. The specific aims of this study were to determine the differences in demographic characteristics, perceived health beliefs, self-efficacy, and knowledge of breast cancer, and mammogram history among the four cultural groups (American identity, Bicultural, Korean identity, and Marginality) of KA women, and to examine the effects of the level of acculturation on the likelihood of getting a mammogram. Breast cancer remains the most commonly diagnosed cancer among KA women. However, KA women consistently have lower screening rates for breast cancer. …

The Uneven Representation Of Women In Asian Parliaments: Explaining Variation Across The Region, Devin K. Joshi, Kara Kingma

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Although home to the majority of the world's women, Asia is the continent with the smallest proportion of women in Parliament. Rarely studied from a comparative perspective, this article examines the uneven representation of women in the lower houses of contemporary Asian parliaments. While socio-economic modernization and industrialization are generally expected to increase the proportion of women in positions of political influence, we find that differences in electoral and party systems across Asia play a greater role than levels of female literacy, urbanization, or per capita income. In particular, Asian parliaments with strict quotas and a higher number of (three …

Women And The Second Estate In 16th Century Zambezia: Gendered Powers, A 'Puppet' African Queen And Succession In Vakaranga Society, 1500–1700, George G. Levin

Master's Theses

Women in vaKaranga society of the 15th to 17th centuries have been portrayed as oppressed by an "extremely patriarchal" system, but the reality, while still fitting the simple classification of a 'patriarchal' monarchy, indicates quite a bit more negotiation of gendered powers than women, as a class, experienced in the Mediterranean or East Asia. The vaKaranga were the architects of Great Zimbabwe, the capital of a growing state, colonizing their cousins of the Zambezi river, which their Kusi-Mashariki Bantu forefathers had traversed southward a millennium before. Civil war had (apparently) split one nation into two states, Mutapa (Monomotapa) and Khami …