Digital Commons Network^™

“Nails Done, Hair Done, Everything Did!”: Consumption And The Creation Of Black Feminine Selves, Simone Reid

Honors Theses

This thesis examines how race and gender shape the meaning that Black women associate with their beauty consumption practices and spending. Much of the existing feminist scholarship on beauty has been postfeminist, privileging the concept of agency and empowerment over structural realities. However, the materialist feminist frame has more utility to address how beauty operates within the lives of Black women as a form of distinct gendered racial oppression. The concept of aesthetic capital emerges from the materialist feminist perspective and suggests that beauty demands the investment of considerable economic resources and can deliver economic returns. Despite this, aesthetic capital …

Overstimulated - An Immersive, Multimedia Art Installation, Quinn Devlin

Honors Theses

This thesis provides the explanation, inspiration, research and progression of an immersive, multimedia art installation that emulates the idea of a “sexual dystopia.” It explores how our dichotomy of inadequate sex education and hypersexual, gender-based media is resulting in a dystopian sexual reality for women in particular. The work portrays a future world in which sexual and fertility technology is so advanced and accessible that real men and women no longer interact. As a result, women and objects become one in the same.

Female literary icons are over-sexualized to suggest that porn-culture is a by-product of a historical framework that …

The Rise And Fall Of Gilmore Girls' Feminist Legacy, Mckenna Ahlgren

Honors Theses

This thesis explores the feminist legacy that the television series Gilmore Girls (2000-2007, 2016) built during its original airtime and how its later revival diminished that legacy. Gilmore Girls’ main characters are three generations of women within the Gilmore family, providing a unique opportunity to analyze their feminist identities and characterizations relative to different iterations of feminism. This paper examines how the youngest Gilmore, Rory, is influenced by her mother’s and grandmother’s embodiments of feminism. Their expressions of femininity and sexuality, their approaches to motherhood, and their behaviors in their romantic relationships throughout the series correlate with the predominate feminism …

Breaking The Glass Slipper: Analyzing Female Figures' Roles In Disney Animated Cinema From 1950-2013, Brianna Prudencia Gutiérrez

Honors Theses

In this study, heroines and villainesses in nineteen Disney animated films from 1950- 2013 are characterized as traditional, complex, or non-traditional. A total of twenty-four female characters are classified based on their representation, actions, personality traits, appearance, and relationship status. Traditional female figures are beautiful dependent on male figures and engage in a heterosexual relationship as part of their "happily ever after." The traditional female figures in this study are Cinderella from Cinderella (1950) Lady from Lady and the Tramp (1955) Aurora (Sleeping Beauty) from Sleeping Beauty (1959) and Duchess from The AristoCats (1970). Complex female figures are, in the …

We Came! We Stripped! We Conquered! The Sextremist Feminists Of Femen In Ukrainian Historical Context And Contemporary Controversy, Jayeon Kim

Honors Theses

In 2008, Anna Hutsol, an economist by training, founded feminist organization FEMEN (Megginson 2011). Comprised mostly of university-educated women, FEMEN has received international media coverage, encountered controversy, and received death threats for their topless protests. For their activism, French magazine Madame Figaro ranked one of the founding members Inna Schevchenko on the 13^th position in their list of Women of the Year (Madame Figaro 2012). They have delivered lectures on their movement at international forums and universities. FEMEN now has chapters in Brazil, Tunisia, France and Germany. FEMEN activists attribute their visibility to “sextremism,” their tactic of using the …

The Quest For Identity: Human Rights In The Aftermath Of El Proceso In Argentina, Jennifer F. Dalenta

Honors Theses

My thesis involves an analytical study of the Madres and the Abuelas of the Plaza de Mayo and a documentary on these two human rights groups framed around the issues of identity and human rights and their importance for all individuals in both a political and personal respect. Through my research, I concluded that the Madres must be conceptualized as a revolutionary organization that combines both feminine and feminist elements in order to achieve its ultimate goals. I argue that the Madres must be interpreted and understood as a combination of these two frameworks, and that due to the complexity …