Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Fusion Dance: Exploring Identity And Social Possibilities, Katie Taylor

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

In this collection of personal essayettes about partner dance, particularly fusion dance, I explore themes of discovering social possibilities, evolving identity, finding connection, healing shame and celebrating joy. Fusion dance, besides being a partner dance, often seems to defy definition, but I sought to capture my experiences of attending fusion events, falling in love with the dance, navigating ups and downs on the path of becoming a dancer and allowing it to transform the way that I view myself and the world. In the interdisciplinary, exploratory spirit of the Honors College, I essay (in the original sense of “to try” …

Lazarus Taxa, Natalie Mau

Poetry MFA Theses

Lazarus Taxa explores the process of extinction in various forms-- physically, emotionally, relationally, spiritually, and more. However, this thesis also explores the idea of extinction being less of an end and more of a rebirth or rediscovery.

Samozvanets (The Pretender), Matthew Garrell, Alikzandr Malakov

Dartmouth College Master’s Theses

he Russian word Samozvanets most directly translates to Imposter in English. However, for this thesis, I have selected the alternative interpretation of Pretender. Imposter implies the taking or assuming of another’s position. Pretender, more personally, carries the meaning of presenting self as something one is not. It is through the lens of the Pretender that I examine the idea of what it means to be a member of a particular ethnicity, and to engage with one’s cultural heritage. I do this through a collection of fictional stories, investigating various lives within the Russian diaspora following the dissolution of the Soviet …

Organizing (Eternal) Identity And Identification: An Upward Glance Into Religious Institutions, Casey M. Stratton

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

This dissertation disrupts at least two religious spaces: First, scholars religiously adhering to (social) scientific norms, and second, people identifying with religious organizations (i.e., churches). First, we begin constructing a theoretical lens using poststructural ideas offered by Foucault, Derrida, and Bakhtin to read and disrupt (religious) discourse. Second, we complicate organizational identification as a concept, deeming it fixed and fluid—a paradox within religious discourses that endorse Truth and Perfection. Here, we draw from the communication constitutes organization (CCO) approach. Third, we further curate the lens by applying poststructuralism, identification, and CCO in a specific context: The Church of Jesus Christ …

Attempt At An Open Letter To The Bronx, Christopher Valdivia

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Open letter to and interrogation of the Bronx, in the form of autoethnographic writing.

¿Quién me encontrará a mí, en la noche, en el Bronx, a mis 22 años?

The Ways I'M A Fraud: Essays On Imposter Syndrome In Identity, Jack Friedman

Pitzer Senior Theses

In this day and age, great progress is being made in acceptance of all kinds of "alternative identities." With growing numbers of identities, imposter syndrome about identity rises with people feeling as though they don't fully belong to an identity group. What does it even mean to be a member of an identity group, and why do I, and many others, feel like an imposter in them? I offer two essays discussing the matter. The first covers alcoholism and how not committing fully to sobriety feels like it excludes my using the identity of alcoholic or addict. The other on …

Auto-Exploited: Narrative Explorations Of The Commodification Of Time, Grace C. Willis Ms.

MSU Graduate Theses

This thesis is an exploration of the phenomenon of the auto-exploitation of the modern individual through and in conjunction with the commodification of time. It explores the eruption of gig-work in recent decades in the United States, and the ways in which the modern individual is both consumer and product, buying and selling her own constructions of identity in order to gain time, fiscal currency and a sense of socioeconomic worth from herself and others. Using theoretical frameworks of Karl Marx, Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, Catherine Rottenberg and Byung-Chul Han, I explore the ways in which the modern individual is …