Digital Commons Network^™

.Com Or .Gov: Should The First Amendment Care? A Proposed Alternative To Moody V. Netchoice, Llc's Editorial Discretion Rule, Jt Degrinney

University of Cincinnati Law Review

No abstract provided.

A View From Inside: The Federal Government's Pivotal Role In Securing And Advancing Access To Justice, Kalpana Kotagal

University of Cincinnati Law Review

No abstract provided.

Educational Broadcasting

Communication Research Trends

Pioneers of new communication technologies such as Edison and Marconi hoped that one of the major uses of their inventions would be to bring education to the masses. Lord Reith, the founder of the BBC public service concept of broadcasting, emphasized education in his famous triad, summarizing the aims of the BBC: 'to educate, to inform and to entertain'. The biggest markets and returns on capital investment were to be found in providing entertainment, however, and the less regulated broadcasters moved steadily in that direction. Today, broadcasting is firmly fixed in the minds of the public as primarily a means …

Túrin Was Dead: To Begin With. Death, Fate, And A Happy Ending In The Book Of Lost Tales, Thomas Hillman Phd

Journal of Tolkien Research

The final weight of the Tale of the Children of Húrin is crushing. Only the prophecy that Túrin will slay Melkor in the Last Battle offers any relief. Yet its first version, “Turambar and the Foalókë,” has an ending one might call happy. For Túrin’s death is not the end of his story, but its turning point. A coda details the afterlife of Túrin and Nienor, which begins in sorrow and ends in joy, but it is Fionwë, not Túrin, who kills Melkor (LT I 219; II 116). By the “Sketch of the Mythology” in 1926 Túrin has replaced Fionwë, …

Protective Factors Against Child Maltreatment Among Postpartum Mothers, Maggie Mann, Hank Puls, Matt Hall, Cristy Toburen, Ann Mattison, Jennifer Anderson, Francesca Donohue, Heather Willaims, J Sprague-Jones, James Anderst Md, Msci

Research Days

Background: Child maltreatment risk arises from a balance of risk and protective factors (PF). Prevention efforts — most notably evidence-based home visiting — focus on strengthening PF. Yet the prevalence of PF across maternal characteristics remains unknown.

Objectives: Compare frequency of PF against child maltreatment between mothers with and without risk factors for maltreatment and across race and ethnicity.

Methods: This was a cross-sectional study of 480 English- and Spanish-speaking mothers prospectively enrolled during their birth hospitalizations at UH. Participants completed the validated Protective Factors Survey, 2nd Edition, which assessed domains of PF against child maltreatment on a 0–4 scale, …

The Roles Of Productivity, Emotions, And Identities In Classroom Discourse. A Response To "Productive Discussion Across Political Differences: Understanding Students’ Experiences With Comfort And Discomfort Within Structured Discussions Of Public Policy Issues", Anne-Lise Halvorsen, Thomas (Tomás) Aviles

Democracy & Education

“Productive Classroom Discussion across Political Differences: Understanding Students’ Experiences of Comfort and Discomfort within Structured Discussion Strategies” offers a fresh perspective on high school classroom discussions by centering the role of emotions–in particular comfort and discomfort–and their relationship to students’ identities. In this response, we describe how this perspective on emotions and identities is vital and humanizing. We then build on the study’s considerations of emotions and identities in discussion, particularly for students from marginalized backgrounds, and offer additional perspectives about the purpose, format, and framing of these kinds of discussions.

Learning To Talk And Listen In Elementary Social Studies: Exploring A Third-Grade Teacher’S Decision To Use Classroom Talk For Community Building, Jane C. Lo

Democracy & Education

With mounting polarization in the political arena and media sources, trust of one’s neighbors and of teachers are facing increasing strain in the United States. Furthermore, teachers continue to struggle with how to teach high-quality, nuanced, social studies, especially in the elementary setting, where time and resources for social studies has been depleting for decades (e.g., Fitchett et al., 2014; Heafner, 2018). Within this context, this study presents a case of a third-grade teacher who chooses to use discursive talk as a way to support high-quality social studies and to build community in her classroom. Findings suggest that classroom talk …

Teaching Dobbs Where Divisive Concepts And Abortion Are Restricted: Teacher Learning, Controversial Issues, And Mixed-Reality Technology, Rebecca C. Geller

Democracy & Education

Though scholarship has long championed the positive impacts of classroom considerations of controversial or difficult issues, teachers have often hesitated to broach divisive topics for numerous reasons, including legislation purporting to limit controversy in classrooms and, often, that they had limited or no preparation to teach controversies, especially not politically contentious sociopolitical contexts. I worked with a research team to use a mixed-reality teaching simulation of a controversial issue discussion as a low-stakes learning context for developing skills for collective pedagogical reasoning. The teaching simulation centered on Dobbs v. Jackson, the 2022 Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v. …

Fostering Open-Minded Political Engagement Through Online Interscholastic Discussions: Toward Reducing Affective Political Polarization, Brett L. M. Levy, Alina Lewis

Democracy & Education

This study explores how political discussions among diverse youth can support students’ open-minded political engagement. For this study, we collaborated with two teachers to adapt and enact instruction aimed at supporting students’ discussion of controversial issues across political, geographic, and cultural boundaries. During an instructional unit exploring various ways to strengthen our election system, students engaged in discussions with their classmates and with peers from another school via an online video discussion board. We collected data through observations and interviews. Our findings indicate that the instruction enhanced students’ understanding of their political bubbles and their motivation to engage in boundary-crossing …

The Role Of Consumers In The Retail Design Process, Constant Berkhout, Katelijn Quartier

Designing Retail and Services Futures SIG

Marketing and design emphasise consumer-centricity and advocate for a participatory, co-creative role for consumers. However, retail designers often view consumers as constraints with limited influence on store design. A literature review analysing retail design from a consumer perspective reveals three key approaches: brand-based frameworks, which align retail design with brand identity; handover-based frameworks, which incorporate consumer insights in a design brief; and empathy-based frameworks, focused on understanding consumers through iterative design. In these frameworks consumer participation remains minimal. Barriers to greater involvement are largely linked to the role of the designer. The review suggests that a more creative and participatory …

Matching The Narrative Fragments And Customer Identity Fragments In Omni-Channel Fashion Retail, Jinze Lyu

Designing Retail and Services Futures SIG

Omni-channel fashion retail integrates diverse channels and touchpoints, generating complex overlaps and combinations. In this dynamic environment, fashion brand narratives need to shift from selling products to selling experiences. This transformation challenges brands to maintain narrative coherence while adapting to distinct channel characteristics. Simultaneously, consumers exhibit varied identity expressions across channels, reflecting different consumption needs. However, existing narrative design approaches struggle to accommodate this fluidity. This study introduces a Narrative Design Alignment Framework, examining narrative fragments from the brand’s perspective and identity fragments from the consumer’s perspective. By mapping brand narratives and consumer identities across channels, the framework aligns these …

Drivers And Obstacles To Collaborative Fashion Consumption (Cfc): A Literature Review, Gabriela Fabro Cardoso

Designing Retail and Services Futures SIG

The environmental impact of the fashion industry, driven by overproduction and waste, requires a transition to sustainable models. Collaborative Fashion Consumption (CFC), which includes resale and rental services, offers alternatives to traditional ownership consumption habits. While resale markets are thriving, rental services, while logistically complex, are attracting considerable research interest. In this context, this paper examines the rise of CFC, highlighting the importance of digital platforms in facilitating more sustainable practices, and uses a qualitative approach to systematically analyse existing literature to understand the dynamics of CFC services and identify key challenges and opportunities for future research.

“Restless And Uneasy…Thin And Stretched”: The Ring, The Ringbearers, And Bodies In Psychological Crisis In Tolkien’S The Lord Of The Rings., Sara Brown

Journal of Tolkien Research

The attachment that Tolkien’s Ring-bearers have for the Ring, a twisted and perverted form of love, is sterile and barren; it leaves those affected unable to settle and form fruitful, loving relationships with others, an effect that Tolkien referred to as a “Ring-restlessness.” Gollum, Bilbo, and Frodo all suffer, to their own degree, from the psychological crisis caused by the Ring that renders them uneasy and agitated. This paper examines this crisis through a psychological lens, exploring how the Ringbearers are living in discord with their true selves, and struggling with the meaninglessness of life that the Ring leaves behind.

Grief, Grieving, And Permission To Mourn In The Quenta Silmarillion, Dawn M. Walls-Thumma

Journal of Tolkien Research

Tolkien asserted on multiple occasions that death was a primary theme of his work, and there are over ninety deaths of named characters in the Quenta Silmarillion alone. In reading the Quenta Silmarillion as historiography, the universality and psychologically powerful experience of death, grief, and mourning allows the narrators of the Quenta Silmarillion to shape how readers perceive characters, events, and themes in the text. Assuming Pengolodh as the primary narrator, this paper investigates how Tolkien used a limited, flawed, and biased narrative point of view as a strategy to shape reader responses and theme. Characters who die in the …

Mourning And Melancholia In The Lord Of The Rings, Ali Mirzabayati

Journal of Tolkien Research

This paper analyzes how Denethor and Théoden respond differently to the deaths of their sons in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. Initially consumed by grief, Théoden embraces hope with Gandalf's support, while Denethor descends into despair. Employing Freud's essay "Mourning and Melancholia" (1917), we examine how Théoden and Denethor illustrate differing reactions to mourning and melancholy in the face of loss. Recognizing developments in psychoanalytic theory, the paper moves beyond simple binaries to offer a nuanced exploration of grief and attachment in Tolkien's narrative.

The Only Thriller J.R.R. Tolkien (Never) Wrote: Jungian Shapes Of Evil In “The New Shadow”, Martin Hauberg-Lund Laugesen, Bo Kampmann Walther

Journal of Tolkien Research

J.R.R. Tolkien's The New Shadow, a fragment set in the Fourth Age of Middle-earth, offers a rich but often overlooked exploration of the psychological and cultural implications of peace following the defeat of Sauron. Although Tolkien abandoned the project, dismissing it as a mere “thriller”, the text presents significant insights into the dynamics of generational conflict, the origins of Evil, and the moral challenges of a post-heroic world. This paper examines The New Shadow through a dual lens: first, by contextualizing Tolkien’s depiction of good and evil within Christian ethical frameworks, and second, by applying Carl Gustav Jung’s psychological …

The Mariner And His Astronomer Father: Victorian Masculinities In Númenor, Kristine Larsen

Journal of Tolkien Research

A number of authors have analyzed the relationship between Aldarion and Erendis in the Unfinished Tales work "The Mariner's Wife." The strained relationship between Aldarion and his father, Tar-Meneldur, fifth king of Númenor, is less frequently examined, with the exception of the elder’s exasperation concerning his son’s desire for seafaring and reticence in marrying – a necessity to carry on the line of Kings in the island nation. What most commentators do not seem to note is that Meneldur is an interesting character himself, not only as Tolkien’s only named astronomer but in how Tolkien’s depiction of this avocation may …

The Moral Function Of Invented Languages In J.R.R Tolkien's Legendarium, Mareike Huber

Journal of Tolkien Research

For J. R. R. Tolkien, the languages he invented for Middle-earth came first, the stories second. Much of his linguistic creation was based on the idea that the sound of a language can create a sense of pleasure or displeasure in those hearing it, irrespective of the meaning behind the words. This can be seen in the ways the sound of the elvish languages on the one hand and Tolkien’s other invented languages such as Khuzdul or the Black Speech on the other, are described not only by Tolkien himself but also by readers of his works. The way a …

Tolkien And Attachment Theory : A Theory To Bind Them All?, Lelie Bremont

Journal of Tolkien Research

Tolkien and Attachment theory: One Theory to Bind Them All?

Ever since the first publication of The Hobbit in 1937, Tolkien’s works have been dominating the fantasy genre, often imitated but rarely equalled. Dozens of scholars over decades have looked for the reason behind this success, the secret ingredient that made Middle-earth so compelling.

Nicole Guédeney is a French psychiatrist specializing in Attachment Theory. Attachment Theory emerged in the early 20^th century and combines psychology with anthropology and ethnology to explore the early attachments created between a baby and the adults surrounding them and how these attachments determine the …

Perceiving The Perceiver: “Viewing” Sauron Through The Gestalt Theory Of Perception, Cameron Bourquein

Journal of Tolkien Research

This paper uses Gestalt theory, the Gestalt laws of perception, and the reception theory of Wolfgang Iser to elucidate the character “Sauron” as he appears in The Lord of the Rings, The Rings of Power, and Tolkien’s wider legendarium. It argues firstly that Sauron’s high degree of indeterminacy and ambiguity suggests he can be read as a gestalt entity, one the reader creates by mentally constructing a whole from (seemingly) disparate parts. Building on the semiotics work of Nagy (2013), it argues that Sauron in The Lord of the Rings can be read as gestalt across the spatial, …

Fears And Pains And Rages: The Psychology Of Gandalf's Anger, Nicholas Birns

Journal of Tolkien Research

We are used to seeing emotions in Tolkien as coded morally. Lust or possessiveness is evil whereas care and forbearance are good. There are some emotions, though, that cross these moral boundaries and one of these is anger Moreover, anger in Tolkien is very coded in terms of gender, as it is nearly always male rage. After examining the cases of Saruman and Wormtongue (angry because the world will not cooperate with their plans) and Thingol (angry because he realizes he has just postponed his doom rather than staved it off), we will examine the case of Gandalf. Gandalf is …

Joining The Symposium, Matthew Macdonald

Parnassus: Classical Journal

No abstract provided.

Euripides’ Bacchae, 1165-1180, Jango Janigian

Parnassus: Classical Journal

No abstract provided.

Friends And Foes: Multifaceted Native Representation In Honoratissimi Benefactores, Matthew Macdonald

Parnassus: Classical Journal

No abstract provided.

A Friend Of Virtue: Cicero And Maimonides On Ideal Friendship, Lilly Baumfeld

Parnassus: Classical Journal

No abstract provided.

Parnassus: Classical Journal (Volume 12, 2025), Parnassus Contributors

Parnassus: Classical Journal

No abstract provided.

Participant 010: Reiki Master With Three Years Of Experience (White; Female; Germany)

0885: Reiki and Well-Being Interviews

This is an interview about Reiki and its connection with overall well-being with a Reiki Master holding three years of experience (White; Female; Germany). She was interviewed on May 14, 2025. The participant agreed to the terms outlined in the verbal informed consent form before this interview. Some of the broad conversations during this interview were about Reiki's use to help with physical health for her personally and with another family member; Reiki's ability to help (re)build relationships with others; and Reiki's ability to help the participant feel more grounded. Lindsey Harper was the interviewer and the primary investigator for …

Discrete Dirac Equations, Bilender Paşaoğlu Allahverdiev, Hüseyi̇n Tuna

Turkish Journal of Mathematics

In this paper, regular discrete Dirac systems are considered. Some fundamental properties are studied concerning self-adjointness, orthogonality of eigenfunctions, and eigenfunction expansions.

Independent Vs. Signed Musicians: Does Thier Status Affect Their Success?, Zachary Vincent

Honors Projects in Mathematics and Economics

As technology has advanced and become more widely available, and as the public learns more about the recording industry and its workings, more musicians are choosing not to sign with record labels, becoming independent musicians. This now raises the question: does a musician’s status of independent or signed determine their level of success? It has been previously found that independent musicians have a more difficult time competing with signed musicians due to the resources provided by record labels and the way labels negotiate with large streaming platforms, giving signed labels more opportunities to be seen in the public eye, but …

What Sacrifice Looks Like: Stories From Mixed-Status Latine Families In Nyc, Alejandra M. Romero Sanchez

CISLA Senior Integrative Projects

What Sacrifice Looks Like explores the lived realities of mixed-status Latine families in New York City, shedding light on how immigration policies, legal precarity, and cultural expectations shape their everyday experiences. Drawing on survey responses and in-depth interviews with individuals from these families, this study examines the emotional, psychological, and material sacrifices made in the face of systemic exclusion. Themes of family separation, generational responsibility, and the pressure to embody the “quintessential immigrant” emerge as central to understanding how (i)legality affects identity, family dynamics, and aspirations. Grounded in a human development lens and informed by scholarship on immigrant justice, this …