Digital Commons Network^™

Dear Sycamore, Anna Schenker

MFA in Visual Art

I create paintings, sculptures, and rubbings to pay tribute to the earthly beings found within my immediate surroundings. I use indexical processes that stain, trace, and record to preserve a moment in time. The process of rubbing is a tactile and meticulous activity of excavation. It is an imprint of what was once there, a mapping of attentive contact. The works are dependent upon the physicality of the host as I engage directly with the plants, seeds, weather, and trees that surround me. The rubbing’s flatness actively constructs a new reality; a liminal space hovers between the impression and the …

This Is A Present From A Small, Distant World, Samantha Slone

MFA in Visual Art

I make toxic pastoral paintings in the style of the Dutch and Old Masters, and media installations which depict natural landscapes as distanced, deconstructed forms. What I explore most in my practice is our damaged relationship with land and nature, and our capitalist and media ecologies as artificial landscapes which suspend us from the natural. In a dissection of the dualisms of man and nature, and progress and sustainability, I create microcosms of our detached condition.

Other Oceans, Other Skies, Sharlene Lee

MFA in Visual Art

I create immersive installations, performances, and time-based media artworks that delve into stories of belonging, feminism, and language as power. These stories offer a potential for transformation from viewer to participant and a shift in how our world is seen and experienced. Through an exploration of perception and affect, I challenge dominant narratives, prompting a contemplation of contemporary power struggles for control.

In this text, I examine the impact of historical borders and migration on my life while also investigating questions of home, shared values, and rituals that contribute to one’s sense of belonging. I also highlight my commitment to …

Extracted Entities And Their Images As Spectres, Seulki Seo

MFA in Visual Art

In this paper, I propose the concept of “Extracted Entity” as a means of postcolonial and technocolonial analysis through the lens of Othering. Extracted Entity, which is a term I coined in 2019, refers to an entity that has been involuntarily removed from its place of origin and relocated elsewhere, either through force or chance. By tracing the trajectory of Extracted Entity’s migration, I explore the role of art and technology to demonstrate how the concept could be a clue to overcome Othering.

The Voice Of One Crying In The Wilderness, Megan Kenyon

MFA in Visual Art

I am a Midwestern, Christian, and feminist artist. I make work about the beautiful, broken, and absurd ways in which American evangelical culture influences lives, especially women’s lives. I’m dragging everything into the light by deconstructing and critiquing the world in which I live, move, and have my being. I do this by harnessing prophetic imagination and incarnational space to shine a light on how patriarchy infects evangelical Christian theology and practice. Using prophetic imagination through photographic self-portraiture and text (my own and found texts using the Bible), I seek to make plain the effects of white, Christian patriarchy on …

Azul, Amarillo, Rojo, Jorge Rios Morales

MFA in Visual Art

My most recent body of work was produced out of the pleasure of exploring pure formal and processual painting. In this text—divided by sections titled like a traditional opera to highlight the mise-en-scene quality of my artwork—the reader will find clues about the context, inspirations, and desires that led to my current practice, such as my ambivalent condition as an immigrant, my exposure to post-conceptual abstraction embodied in Christopher Wool’s provocative oeuvre, and my interest in offering the viewer the experience of what I call “an aesthetic interrogation.” l have privileged in this thesis my own voice and character with …

Forget Us Not, Jamie Harris

MFA in Visual Art

I create because I mourn, to seek comfort in the knowing and sharing of Suppressed Histories, and to find joy in the rediscovering of lost stories. I create the vessel, which for me is akin to the human body. A form containing memories, wisdom, a soul, and a space for transportation between plains. I paint to capture moments in times of joy and sorrow. To make memoriam, I pay homage to past, present, and future.

My Kinship With The Trees, C. Daniela Shapiro

MFA in Illustration & Visual Culture

This paper explores facets of patriarchy affecting women and the natural world. The paper suggests a cultivation of allyship and relationality between women and nature due to a shared experience of objectification within patriarchy. The separation of women from nature through origin stories, science, religion, language, and advertisement will be discussed. Examples from the graphic memoir Running without Moving are employed to emphasize this philosophy, including first person accounts.

Elsewhere: In Defense Of Daydreaming, Alex Braden

MFA in Visual Art

Much like music, organic life is an absurd, improbable, and serendipitous instance. I set circular, electric, acoustic, and magnetic forces in motion and allow them to coalesce freely in the hopes of synthesizing unexpected moments of beauty, connection, and harmony.

Enhancing Small And Medium-Sized Enterprises' Performance Through The Implementation Of Erp Systems, Fatimah El Chediak

Theses

Small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) have recognized enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems as vital for enhancing organizational efficiency, decision-making processes, and overall competitiveness. However, the effective implementation of these systems frequently presents a variety of obstacles that can prevent the attainment of their potential benefits. The purpose of this research is to investigate the critical success factors and obstacles that influence the implementation of ERP systems in SMEs and to provide suggestions for overcoming these obstacles and optimizing ERP adoption. The study employs a mixed-methods approach, combining a comprehensive literature review with primary data collected from a survey administered to …

Augmented Reality Shopping Guide: Enhancing Efficiency And Experience, Shengyang Luo

Theses

Shopping is important in our life, especially food shopping. Almost every family needs to go shopping once per week and spend lots of time and energy on it. This project proposes the design of an application to help people have a better shopping experience by saving time, saving energy, and saving money. The application combines online shopping and in-person shopping in a new shopping mode. People don’t need to pay the expensive delivery fee and wait a long time to get food which could be unfresh. And they also don’t need to spend lots of time at the supermarket, which …

Efficiently Annotating Source Code Identifiers Using A Scalable Part Of Speech Tagger, Gavin Burris

Theses

This thesis details the process in which a part-of-speech tagger is developed in order to determine grammar patterns in source code identifiers. These grammar patterns are used to aid in the proper naming of identifiers in order to improve reader comprehension. This tagger is a continuation of an effort of a previous Ensemble Tagger [62], but with a focus on increasing the tagging rate while maintaining the accuracy, in order to make the tagger scalable. The Scalable Tagger will be trained on open source data sets, with a machine learning model and training features that are chosen to best suit …

The Tower: An Act-Based Product System That Helps Porn Addicts Eliminate Shame And Develop Healthier Habits Aligned With Their Core Values., Adetayo E. Oke

Theses

Pornography is a media phenomenon that has either educated or plagued the minds of young adolescence and teens, the topics that involve sex. Stated in a paper with (Lewczuk, K) [pornography usage has seen a rapid three times increase]; “(310%) between October 2004 and October 2016–starting from an estimated 2.76 million in the first period to 8.54 million.” The rise of pornography usage has thus caused new cases of Porn Addiction. What may seem like harmless addiction, pornography identifies as a new drug consumed by heterosexual men, and some women primarily consume it. According to studies, from (Kuer 90.1.), people …

Fourthspace: The Role Of Active Social Inclusion In The Workforce Entry Of Syrian Refugees In Scandinavia, Anisa Abeytia

Master's Theses

The 2015 displacement of Syrian refugees into Scandinavian countries provoked a refugee integration policy adjustment that focused on workforce and higher education entry. It is a policy approach that requires attention on barriers to workforce entry to ensure effective policy implementation. This article provides insight into the larger, often overlooked barriers of Eurocentrism and historical biases on refugee labor integration and provides policy solutions to reduce their impact. Active social inclusion (ASI) and Fourthspace are introduced as a framework to reduce biases to workforce entry and integration time barriers faced by Syrian refugees. ASI can provide mechanisms to increase access …

The Relationship Between Family Communication Patterns, Conflict Strategies, And The Development/Management Of Eating Disorders, Ana Moyers

Honors College Theses

Eating disorders persist as one of the most prominent psychological and physiological illnesses among young adults and adolescents. Nonetheless, most research in the field focuses on external factors that influence the development of these disorders such (i.e., social media and an idolized body image). There is less research to investigate the role of an individual’s environment, more specifically the family dyad and communication related to such eating disorders. The family unit remains, often, the primary means of socialization for individuals during developing years, thus, this study seeks to expand on how current family communication and family climate contribute to eating …

The Psychological Impact Of Adolescent Violence Exposure: The Roles Of Coping And Social Support, Kelsey Gnade Coulthard

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Research demonstrates that children and adolescents experience a wide range of exposure to violence with rates ranging from 20% and 50% (Finkelhor & Dziuba-Leatherman, 1994; Finkelhor et al., 2005; Zimmerman & Posick, 2016). Violence exposure has been associated with several negative outcomes including biological, psychological, family-based, and academic problems. Further, studies have examined potential protective factors that may buffer against these consequences, with inconsistent results surrounding the roles of coping and social support. However, many of these studies use either an overly generalized definition of both violence exposure and/or social support or use very specific type of violence within a …

Exrna-Eclip Intersection Analysis Reveals A Map Of Extracellular Rna Binding Proteins And Associated Rnas Across Major Human Biofluids And Carriers, Emily L Laplante, Alessandra Stürchler, Robert Fullem, David Chen, Anne C Starner, Emmanuel Esquivel, Eric Alsop, Andrew R Jackson, Ionita Ghiran, Getulio Pereira, Joel Rozowsky, Justin Chang, Mark B Gerstein, Roger P Alexander, Matthew E Roth, Jeffrey L Franklin, Robert J Coffey, Robert L Raffai, Isabelle M Mansuy, Stavros Stavrakis, Andrew J Demello, Louise C Laurent, Yi-Ting Wang, Chia-Feng Tsai, Tao Liu, Jennifer Jones, Kendall Van Keuren-Jensen, Eric Van Nostrand, Bogdan Mateescu, Aleksandar Milosavljevic

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Although the role of RNA binding proteins (RBPs) in extracellular RNA (exRNA) biology is well established, their exRNA cargo and distribution across biofluids are largely unknown. To address this gap, we extend the exRNA Atlas resource by mapping exRNAs carried by extracellular RBPs (exRBPs). This map was developed through an integrative analysis of ENCODE enhanced crosslinking and immunoprecipitation (eCLIP) data (150 RBPs) and human exRNA profiles (6,930 samples). Computational analysis and experimental validation identified exRBPs in plasma, serum, saliva, urine, cerebrospinal fluid, and cell-culture-conditioned medium. exRBPs carry exRNA transcripts from small non-coding RNA biotypes, including microRNA (miRNA), piRNA, tRNA, small …

Sensor-Controlled Digital Game For Heart Failure Self-Management: Protocol For A Randomized Controlled Trial, Kavita Radhakrishnan, Christine Julien, Matthew O'Hair, Rachel Tunis, Grace Lee, Angelica Rangel, James Custer, Tom Baranowski, Paul J Rathouz, Miyong T Kim

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

BACKGROUND: Heart failure (HF) is the leading cause of hospitalization among older adults in the United States. There are substantial racial and geographic disparities in HF outcomes, with patients living in southern US states having a mortality rate 69% higher than the national average. Self-management behaviors, particularly daily weight monitoring and physical activity, are extremely important in improving HF outcomes; however, patients typically have particularly low adherence to these behaviors. With the rise of digital technologies to improve health outcomes and motivate health behaviors, sensor-controlled digital games (SCDGs) have become a promising approach. SCDGs, which leverage sensor-connected technologies, offer the …

Impact Of Social Media On Political Development And Stability In Nigeria, Helen Remilekun Oluleye, Lilian K. Maduagwu, John I Muyiwa Adeniyi, Adamu Baba Musa

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

Abstract

The invention and rapid advancement of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) has attracted considerable attention on the impact of social media on various human development. With the emergence of social media, people around the globe nascent democracies which have started using their online presence to engage in political discussions. This led to the creating of various strategies in ensuring and maintaining political development in Nigeria. This paper aims to discuss how social media impacted on political development and stability in Nigeria. To achieve the afore stated; the meaning of social media is discussed, the concept of political development and …

System Including Conoscope Lens For Measuring Polarization Characteristics Of Wide Field-Of-View Lenses, Aiqing Chen, Xiaobo Tian, Weihua Gao, Chandra Sekhar Kakani

Defensive Publications Series

A lens measurement system including 1) a light source, 2) a lens mounting support configured to hold a lens so that light emitted by the light source is incident on the lens, 3) a conoscope lens positioned to receive light refracted by the lens, and 4) a polarization camera positioned to receive light emitted from the conoscope lens.

Dynamic Torso Reflection Filtering For Interactive Binaural Spatial Audio Based On Biologically Constrained Imu Drift Compensation, Philip Robinson, William Owen Brimijoin Ii, Antje Ihlefeld

Defensive Publications Series

An audio uses information uses a biologically constrained IMU drift compensation for audio spatial rendering to drive a dynamic filtering process to better reproduce the acoustic effects of head on torso orientation on the HRTF.

Physical Activity In Managing Stress Among Managers During The Covid-19 Pandemic – A Systematic Review, Anna Hryniewicz, Anna Gmiąt, Magdalena Jaroch-Lidzbarska, Mariusz Lipowski

Baltic Journal of Health and Physical Activity

Introduction: During the COVID-19 pandemic managers experienced additional stress connected with taking responsibility for workers at the time of a worldwide crisis. Maintaining a high level of physical activity in this specific group possibly could have contributed to keeping both management skills and health condition at a high required standard. The purpose of this review is to verify the range of scientific interest on the subject of physical activity among managers as a stress coping strategy during the pandemic. Materials and Methods: For this systematic review six studies were chosen (two of them are qualitative descriptive, three are cross-sectional, one …

Mutual Aid: The Other Law Of The Jungle. Gauthier Chapelle And Pablo Servigne. Cambridge, Polity Press. 2022. 310 Pp, Tom P. Flower Dr

Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis

In 1902, the anarchist Peter Kropotkin published Mutual Aid in which he promoted a radical perspective on evolution in which cooperation, as well as selfishness, drive the form, diversification and organization of life on earth. Despite initial recognition, Kropotkin’s contributions have been largely forgotten, even as modern evolutionary theory has recognized the central role of cooperation. In Mutual Aid: the other law of the jungle, Pablo Servigne and Gauthier Chappelle restore Kropotkin’s insights to their rightful place as foundational for our understanding of evolution. They further seek to overturn the pernicious misconception of the 20^th century, that nature is …

The End Of Sovereignty. Antonio Negri, Translated By Ed Emery. Cambridge, Polity Press, 2022. 220 Pp, Jodi Dean

Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis

No abstract provided.

Anxiety In The Capitalism Of Late Modernity, Toyo Kawabata

Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis

The logic of capitalism affects both individuals and society. Alienation augments existential anxiety in the current precarity capitalism, which keeps urging competition among individuals to survive in capitalism and grow more. Excessive individualism, materialism, and consumerism in capitalism may weaken social ties and lower self-recognition, augmenting the existential anxiety of individuals. Losers in capitalism aggravate their anxiety whereas even winners may keep being anxious in the never-ending competition in capitalism. As long as people are kept engaged in capitalism, the pressure of the competition leads to a vicious cycle that keeps inducing anxiety, which signifies the precarity of capitalism. Existential …

Asking For It: Gendered Dimensions Of Surveillance Capitalism, Jessica Rizzo

Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis

Advertising and privacy were once seen as mutually antagonistic. In the 1950s and 1960s, Americans went to court to fight for their right to be free from the invasion of privacy presented by unwanted advertising, but a strange realignment took place in the 1970s. Radical feminists were among those who were extremely concerned about the collection and computerization of personal data—they worried about private enterprise getting a hold of that data and using it to target women—but liberal feminists went in a different direction, making friends with advertising because they saw it as strategically valuable.

Liberal feminists argued that in …

Social Pathologies As Educational Injustices, Esther Neuhann

Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis

For Axel Honneth, not all social problems can be understood as injustices. Therefore, he introduces the additional diagnostic concept of social pathology. In his book Freedom’s Right (FR), it is defined as an accumulation of persons’ inability to adequately participate in social institutions due to misunderstanding them. In contrast, injustices consist in the denial of access to social institutions for certain groups. According to the aim of presenting an ‘extended’ theory of justice in FR, Honneth intends to reconstruct all institutions necessary for realizing individual freedom in a liberal-democratic society. Like in the historical model of his project (Hegel’s Elements …

Three Photographs, Sarah Dignan

Floodwall Magazine

No abstract provided.

Warp Test, Jonathan Sladko

Floodwall Magazine

No abstract provided.

The Sparkling Heat I Found In The Bathtub, Delaney Otto

Floodwall Magazine

No abstract provided.