Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Resurrected Criminals, Time-Loops, And Faustian Bargains: The Speculative Edge Of 1940s Film Noir, Tyler P. Bolden

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

In the 1940s, as film noir reached the height of its generic consolidation, a more uncanny and supernatural variant emerged in its shadow: speculative noir. While the genre's hard-boiled lineage, Expressionist aesthetics, and the lyrical fatalism of French Poetic Realism define its conventional form, certain films of the period reconfigured noir through Lovecraftian horror, gothic motifs, weird science, and ontological rupture. This neglected strain of noir stretched the genre's murky boundaries beyond fatalistic crime narratives into what science fiction writer Fritz Leiber calls the "dark dangerous forest"—a space of eerie, indeterminate forces. Although critics such as James Naremore and Christopher …

As Above, So Below: The Cognitive Impact Of Found Footage Horror, Josephine Railston

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

What makes a horror movie good? Why do we like horror movies? Using the 2014 movie As Above, So Below my poster presentation explores the cognitive impact of found footage horror on its viewers. Employing the use of a handheld camera and first person perspective, the film is able to immerse its audience in a supernatural version of the Paris Catacombs. I discuss found footage as a narrative tool, particularly focusing on how it amplifies psychological and physical responses like fear and anxiety.

Cuentos De Barro, Daniel Anthony Vasquez

Theses and Dissertations

Cuentos de Barros addresses the complexities of creating art and processing indigenous heritage and personal history as a Salvadoran immigrant within a neo-colonial society. Centering ritual, care, and healing, the artist imbues sculptures with tenderness using abstract forms and the tactile manipulation of unfired clay and graphite.

Stitch Theory, Brittany Adeline Adama King

Theses and Dissertations

This paper weaves personal history together using “stitched” citational text, supporting the concept that an archive can function as support, as worn; as garment.

To What Extent Is Social Media A Tool For Political Mobilization?, Bridget Westrum

Political Science Theses and Capstones

This study looks at the potential impacts of social media advocacy on mobilizing the pubic. Drawing from the Pew Research Center’s 2018 American Trends Panel, I look at Americans’ views of technology, political involvement, and their perceptions of social media and online engagement. I found that younger respondents view social media as more important to their political engagements. I find a significant relationship between census region and perceived importance of social media on issue involvement, as well. Respondents from the southern United States who consider themselves to be "very liberal" report a greater influence of social media on their involvement …

Flexing In Popular Songs From 2024 - 2023, Jasmine Ayon, Sky Romeo, Christian Casaerez, Alexa Adame, Kesi Land

Undergraduate Research Symposium Podium Presentations

Purpose:

Music is a major agent of socialization. As an art form, music carries with it messaging and rhetoric capable of reaching people en masse. With this in mind, it is vital that we pay a careful eye to music in order to understand what messaging is reaching the public at large. This project is intended to build off of the current literature on music, rhetoric, and socialization by understanding what artists in music brag about - flex - as a means of gaining cultural capital.

Transgressive Fiction And The Problem Of Negative Affect: A Case Study Of Samuel Delany’S Hogg, Brian Thornton

Master's Theses

Samuel Delany began drafting Hogg in March of 1969 and worked on it intermittently before completing the novel in October of 1973.1 Yet Hogg remained unpublished until 1995 before finally seeing the light of day “during the ‘transgressive turn’ in American literature” (Mitchell 1). As such, the novel is historically situated along what Jonathan Mitchell calls a “dual temporality,” which “allows the novel to be located as an intervention in two key moments in America’s LGBT+ history: first, the developments in identity politics coming out of the socio-political cultural shifts of the 1960s; and, second, the post-AIDS awareness 1990s”.

In The Shadow Of Justice: How The Mythos Of The Batman Balances Major Ethical Theories And Demonstrates The Pursuit Of Ideal Justice, Camille Bewley

Honors Theses

For more than eighty years, the Batman character has exhibited a unique synthesis of major theories of Justice, and through his experiences as a vigilante, exemplified the pursuit of the ideal virtue of Justice. Because virtue requires a lived example to be understood, Batman is one of the foundational stories fulfilling this need for one of America’s prominent pillars. Within the horror of Gotham City–a corrupt, fictional society–Batman’s actions as a vigilante, walking a tightrope to maintain morality even above the law might not only be justified, but necessary. The Batman’s nature, balancing ethical theories and maintaining hope in the …

“More Than What [They] Made Us To Be”: From Passing To Perception In Victorian And Modern Vampire Media, Lauren Sieberg

English (MA) Theses

Throughout Victorian Gothic horror fiction, vampires function as deviant figures, maneuvering within social confines of passing until their status quo-threatening identity is exposed. Of the popular vampires from this period, most gradually fail to maintain status as social insiders—as demonstrated with Bram Stoker’s Count Dracula or Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla, who possess the temporary capacity to pass until their hidden monstrosity is revealed over time. Even if Gothic monsters are confined to a limited space and time far from society, this is still not enough; in accordance with the Victorian culture of morality policing by dominant groups, the vampiric Other …

Harmonic Innovators And Cultural Catalysts In American Jazz: The Social Impact And Musical Innovations Of Louis Armstrong In The Real Ambassadors, Duke Ellington's Sacred Concerts And John Coltrane's A Love Supreme, Marcia C. Vandervinne

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

Abstract This capstone project explores how three landmark jazz works—Louis Armstrong’s The Real Ambassadors (1961), John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme (1965), and Duke Ellington’s Sacred Concerts (1965–1973)—responded to the social challenges of the Civil Rights era while advancing the artistic stature of jazz. Each composition challenged systemic racism through its unique blend of innovation and cultural expression: Armstrong’s performance in The Real Ambassadors used satire to critique American racial hypocrisy; Coltrane’s A Love Supreme presented a spiritual and musical journey grounded in modal development and personal transformation; and Ellington’s Sacred Concerts fused jazz with sacred and classical traditions to elevate …

Love Y Ganas; A Revolutionay Revelation, Thomas J. Salas

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

My thesis does not have an abstract.

Moving The Goalposts: American Sports Coverage In Newspapers And The Construction Of Gender, Race And Sexuality In The Olympics In 1928, 1932, 1936., Jacob Havers

All Theses

This thesis takes an in-depth look at the media coverage of women in the Olympics in 1928, 1932 and 1936. Specifically following the track athletes Kinue Hitomi, Louise Stokes, Tidye Pickett and Mildred “Babe” Didrikson the thesis explores how by being athletic women they had their identities as feminine figures heavily questioned and scrutinized in newspapers at the global level. The harshest of these critics was often the American media, who held strict standards of race, gender and sexuality in the late 1920s-mid 1930s. They sought to uphold these standards at the global scale, and the American media’s interrogation of …

"Troublesome Medicine Man": Representations Of The Sword Bearer Incident In Newspaper Coverage, Cara Sue Swaim

History Undergraduate Honors Theses

Newspaper coverage of Native Americans during the nineteenth century had an “artistic bias,” or a tendency to emphasize action, danger, and treachery as a part of the “Indian formula.” This meant that vast amounts of journalistic zeal was spent on instances of conflict and tension between tribes, within tribes, between tribes and white settlers, or between tribes and the U.S. military, while times of peace and instances of cooperation received miniscule amounts of attention. This was largely motivated by a desire to justify American western expansion and the need to “civilize” Native groups. This “Indian formula” was also applied in …

Book Review: Local Signs And Wonders: Essays About Belonging To A Place, Susanna R. Smith

Georgia Library Quarterly

Book Review of Local Signs and Wonders, by Richard Rankin

The Sound Of Young America/The Soul Of Young America: A Sonic Rhetoric Inquiry Into 1965 And The Music Defining A Generation In Crisis, Jessica Dyche

All Dissertations

The Sound of Young America/The Soul of Young America: A Sonic Rhetoric Inquiry into 1965 and the Music Defining a Generation In Crisis builds a case for sonic rhetoric theory that sees sonic rhetoric move outside of pedagogy, becoming a valuable tool for rhetorical analysis outside the classroom. To this end, The Sound of Young America/The Soul of Young America employs sonic rhetoric concepts and methodology grounded in cultural rhetorics, social history, and sociomusicology to inquire into the cultural and social relevancy of rock music, specifically to this project, in 1965. Sonic rhetoric sees sound and music as underexplored, but …

The Adirondack Frontier: Reclaiming A Vital Role In Shaping The Nation, Peter Nelson

Master's Theses

The traditional version of Adirondack history from the revolutionary period to the middle of the nineteenth century, which portrays the region as unexplored primeval wilderness, is nineteenth-century romantic mythology. It ignores thousands of years of Indigenous habitation and misrepresents early Euro-American activity in the region as well. In fact, from the earliest days of colonial exploration of North America until the middle of the 19th-Century, New York's Adirondack region was a dynamic American frontier, as important in shaping the destiny of the nation as the Northwest Territory or, later, the West. Activities in the Adirondack frontier contributed to the decimation …

Double, Double, Toils And Troubles: Analyzing The “Magical” Relationships Between University Leaders’ Personality Traits And Their Self-Efficacy In Leadership Situations, Fay Ludvine Boudreaux

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This present study investigated the relationship between higher education leaders’ personality traits and their self-efficacy in leadership situations. A total of 151 leaders employed across the nine institutions within the University of Louisiana System completed a survey that prompted them to identify their personal values, traits, and skill sets, as derived from the online Pottermore quiz, the official Harry Potter Hogwarts House sorting instrument. This niche personality metric was chosen to cater to higher education’s evolving landscape, as it welcomes an influx of Millennials into leadership positions. Participants’ responses were eventually recoded to “sort” them into their respective Houses: Gryffindor, …

Sacred Connections In Cartoonish Places: Exploring The Implications Of Teotl In Avatar: The Last Airbender (2008), Makenzie P. Morrison

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Taking Avatar: The Last Airbender (2008) seriously, Sacred Connections in Cartoonish Places explores the animated children’s series and how it is understood through the monistic Nahua (Aztec) concept of teotl. Relying on James Maffie’s text Aztec Philosophy: Understanding a World in Motion (2014), this thesis determines that Avatar: The Last Airbender benefits from monistic analysis. This analysis results in a breakdown of the show into four body chapters. These chapters respectively explore Aang’s role as a monistic representative, the differences between the physical and spirit worlds presented in the show, the kind of relationships that appear in the series, and …

Belly Dance In Nebraska: Identity, Social Acceptance, And Perseverance, Alex R. Mohr

Dissertations and Doctoral Documents, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2023–

Belly dance is an art form as well as an often-contested practice due to tensions over dress, terminology and cultural practices within the belly dance community because the dance originated outside the United States. Additionally, there is often a need to prove the legitimacy of the dance to those outside its sphere because it is often stigmatized due to the early association with exotic dancing. Belly dance is inherently geographic, as seen through its places of origin, music and movement styles, global spread, practitioners, and spaces of practice. However, it has not been well-represented in geography, and there is also …

“Re-Storying” Anne Shirley And The Adhd Child: A Crip Genealogy Of Anne Of Green Gables, Darian Aleyna Wilson

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This thesis explores the contested nature of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), focusing on its cultural and historical constructions. While ADHD has been included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders since 1980, its legitimacy remains a subject of debate across medical, disability studies, and historical scholarship. Using Eli Clare’s critique of diagnosis as a tool rather than a fact, this project examines how ADHD is both pathologized and re-storied within societal and medical discourses. It highlights the tension between medical classifications and lived experiences of those diagnosed with ADHD, particularly in the context of girlhood.

The central …

Heartbeat Of The Heartland: Sonic Engagement With Hip-Hop In The American Midwest, Lauren R. Millhorn

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This project analyzes Hip-Hop artists from the American Midwest through the context of the Midwest’s construction as a nostalgic, peaceful area where conflict seems nonexistent. This study applies Adam Ochonicky’s concept of nostalgic spatiality, or “instances in which nostalgia is projected onto a physical environment, thereby altering the perception, understanding, and/or experience of that space and its accompanying cultural sphere” (Ochonicky 29) to close readings on Midwest Hip-Hop texts. In the case of the Midwest, projected nostalgia is rooted in whiteness and propels the narrative that the Midwest is predominantly occupied by white people who maintain its peace and serenity …

Efecto De Soles, Natalia Soriano Moreno

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

En este texto quiero exponer cómo fue el proceso de creación de Efecto de soles, el cual se desarrolló entre los años 2022 y 2025. El libro presenta la cotidianidad de un barrio que un día se ve afectado por distintos cambios en la naturaleza cuando aparece un fenómeno particular: los soles de algunas casas se vuelven cuadrados y aumentan su nivel de alumbramiento. Esto hace que el entorno natural del barrio comience a cambiar: aparecen gusanos fosforescentes, las flores pierden su olor, la lluvia se vuelve negra, las mariposas se van y a los árboles les salen hojas de …

Not Just A Good Ole Boys Club: Studying The Personal, Performance, And Professional Roles Of Women In Bluegrass, Lydia Hamby

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study investigates gender disparities in professional bluegrass music. Through a mixed methods approach, combining quantitative data from festival lineups and qualitative interviews with six professional female bluegrass musicians, this research provides a comprehensive view of gender dynamics in the industry. The quantitative analysis of eight major festivals in the Appalachian region reveals that women comprise on 8.87% of performers on average, indicating systemic exclusion. Qualitative data from interviews and participant observations at Blue Highway Fest explores the social and institutional practices that sustain these disparities, revealing roles such as the “singer girl” sex appeal, manager, and token female. This …

Book Review: Midnight Cry: A Shooting On Sand Mountain, Ann Fuller

Georgia Library Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Black Events As Narrated By Black People: Contextualizing America’S Framing Of Progression In News, Social, And Academic Writing, Tyrina Horton

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This paper is a critical examination of collective and public memories of public events that impact Black lives as constructed in news, social, and academic writing. Using Black mundane life to explore and build localized context and attitudes towards these events, I examine whether the collective memory of an event, as framed by public discourse, accurately portrays how Black communities experienced them. This paper explores what it means for Black people, to experience a disconnect with written accounts of public events that do not properly account for the many layers of Black experience, highlighting where there’s a failure to tell …

The Hodgepodge Creation: Amalgamated Adaptation In Video Games, Tom Chen, Tom Chen

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Amalgamated adaptation is a concept that involves blending multiple sources into a hodgepodge creation. This practice has become commonplace among game creators in recent years, yet it is neither readily covered nor explicitly mentioned in current video game scholarship. My previous research highlights the profound application of amalgamated adaptation to older texts, particularly myths and sacred texts from various cultures or communities. This method grants creators the autonomy to reinvent these texts in bold and extreme ways, achieved by melding borrowed ideas that complement and, at times, synergize with one another. I argue that single-source adaptations of myths, when reshaped …

Voicing The Margins: Contemporary Chicana Autobiographical Writing, Veronica Morales

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Chicana literature's emphasis on personal and collective narratives provides an essential critique of societal norms and injustices, illustrating how the intersections of gender, ethnicity, and class shape the lived experiences of Mexican American women in a rapidly changing world. This study analyzes nonfiction autobiographical narratives by three Chicana writers—Ana Castillo, Cherrie Moraga, and Sandra Cisneros—and the historical contexts of their production and reception. These texts focus on different aspects of Chicanismo, and when placed in conversation with each other they illuminate the multifaceted experiences of Chicanas from diverse backgrounds. All three writers have become well established in Chicana studies and …

Beyond Just The Negros’ Art: Langston Hughes And The Poetic Renewal Of Black Musical Tradition, Samuel Adewumi

All Theses

Where do we begin the study of Black music in America? Is there even a beginning to it? As a poet, how does Langston Hughes contribute to its continuance during the Harlem Renaissance? These are some of the questions that shape the trajectory of this research. In it, I set a precedent for African orature in future studies of Black music in America. Essentially, I trace the survival of African orature and Langston Hughes’s role in the sustenance and utility of its style and themes in the early 20th century. Through it, I argue that Hughes’s poetry serves not as …

From Slaveship To Championship: Pan-Africanism, The Black Atlantic, And Reframing The Rumble In The Jungle., Garret S. Mccorkle

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The “Rumble in the Jungle” is often remembered as Muhammad Ali’s triumphant return to boxing glory, yet its deeper historical and cultural context remains understudied. This thesis reframes the 1974 heavyweight championship in Zaire as a global spectacle shaped by Pan-Africanism and Paul Gilroy’s theory of the Black Atlantic. More than a fight, it was a performance of Black identity, unity, and cultural return. However, this work argues that these themes—though deeply meaningful to many—were also strategically deployed by figures like Don King and Mobutu Sese Seko for promotional and financial gain. Through an analysis of marketing materials, fighter personas, …

Literary Postcritique And American Transcendentalism: Helping Students Practice Community-Building By Rewilding Literature In The Classroom, Tate Aldrich

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Literary postcritique is an emergent theoretical approach to literature that has elicited skepticism among many in academia because of its central claim that their unchecked overreliance on suspicious and symptomatic reading styles is diminishing the pedagogical potential of our reading together. To restore this potential, Rita Felski, a champion of literary postcritique, suggests adopting an aesthetic reading style, a mid-level interpretation that neither indulges in the formalists’ habits of close scrutiny nor in the cultural critics’ wider lens of political and social contexts. In The Limits of Critique and Hooked, Felski argues that an aesthetic reading style can develop …