Arts and Humanities Commons^™

The Selected Language Styles Of African Americans In An Urban Environment, Danielle R. England

McCabe Thesis Collection

The overall scope of this research is to define and explain the different styles of African American English. What are they and how do they affect the American society? The means by which many African Americans communicate is different from what American deems as standard American English (SAE). To this date, the voice of Black America has been categorizes as Black Dialect, African American Vernacular English, and Black English. Only until recently has the Black voice been regarded as Ebonics. Where did these language styles originate and why do we continue to speak it? Of course, there is nothing wrong …

Victorian Concepts Of The Ideal Man As Evidenced Through His Relationships With Animals: "If She Don't Carry You, You May Shoot Her" Or "Remember Gyp When You Get Home", Mary Ann Peebles Soles

Theses & Honors Papers

In Victorian fiction, the relationships between male characters and the animals with which they come in contact with are interesting. The way Victorian male characters are shown to treat animals revels something about the nature of the men themselves. Therefore, it is important to examine the concept of masculinity at the time. The gender stereotypes that prevailed in Victorian England had a tremendous impact on the portrayal of men and women in the novels written at that time. Male writers, the dominant sex, chose to preserve ideals already present. Female writers did the opposite. The Victorian novelists examined were influenced …

Victorian Concepts Of The Ideal Man As Evidenced Through His Relationships With Animals: "If She Don't Carry You, You May Shoot Her" Or "Remember Gyp When You Get Home", Mary Ann Pebbles Soles

Theses & Honors Papers

No abstract provided.

Manipulating Images Of Women's Power In Elizabethen England: Elizabeth I, Spenser, And Shakespeare, Amanda Kaye Martin

Theses & Dissertations

This work celebrates the influence of Elizabeth I on Elizabethan society and literature. In the opening of his Shakespearean Negotiations. Stephen Greenblatt describes writing as an outlet for the dead to speak to the living through "textual traces of themselves" that "make themselves heard in the voices of the living". These textual traces form the foundation for the critical theory of New Historicism, which perceives such traces as a conduit for literary critics to learn about an author's view of the nation, and era, in which he or she lived. In "The Elizabethan Subject and the Spenserian Text," Louis …

Mary Elizabeth Braddon: Reconstructing Beauty From Portent Of Innocence To Potential Threat In Aurora Floyd And Lady Audley's Secret, Susan Bryant Cook

Theses & Honors Papers

This explores the “sensation novels”, Lady Audley’s Secret and Aurora Floyd by Mary Elizabeth Braddon during the Victorian Era. These “sensation novels” ushered in characters that were not who they seemed to be which evoked mystery in the story. Braddon also centered on the idea of not relying on a woman’s appearance but rather seeing the woman as she truly is.

The Jewish Immigrant Perception Of The American Dream In Abraham Cahan's Yekl And Anzia Yezierska's Bread Givers, Andrea Verschaeve

Theses & Honors Papers

Although there is a wide variety of writers in American literature, it can be said that immigrant writers are left out of the literary pool. In American literature, there is a common theme of defining the American dream. From the early colonies to now, each immigrant has their own definition of the “American dream”. However when it comes to Jewish writers, the American dream becomes a story of how the character will become a new citizen while still regarding their old culture. In “Yekl” by Abraham Cahan and “Bread Givers” by Anzia Yezierska, this Jewish-American dream is seen. Both works …

The Validity Of Selected Draw-A-Person Test Classifying Criteria Among Homosexual And Non Homosexual Males, Joel Von Ornsteiner

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore the validity of Machover's (1949) interpretation that attention to both the hips and buttocks drawn by male subjects in their first male Draw-A-Person Test (DAP) or the drawing of a female figure first are significant indicators of male homosexuality. The hypothesis was that the frequency of these homosexual indicators among non-instituted homosexuals would be significantly higher (P = < .05) than the male heterosexual group. One hundred homosexual and 100 heterosexual males were selected from groups of volunteers from two universities, one bookstore and a community center in the New York City area. The subjects were administered a DAP test in booklet format and a questionnaire. The drawings were classified for homosexual indicators blindly and independently by three judges who were trained in the use of the Machover interpretation of the DAP. Chi square analyses were calculated for the frequency of hips and buttocks and for the drawing of a female figure first and no significant differences between the self identified homosexual and heterosexual male groups in the expected direction were found. It was concluded that the lack of any significant difference between the scores of the homosexual and heterosexual males in this study casts considerable doubt on the validity of the male homosexual interpretations explored. Speculations were made concerning the widely discrepant results from past studies and this investigation. The majority of the past research had been conducted within institutional settings and there have been cultural changes over the last fifty years in both psychology and society's tolerance for the male homosexual. Unlike any previous DAP study, one-hundred urban homosexual and one-hundred heterosexual males were randomly selected. This researcher cautions that the DAP test should be interpreted with other available information, and results based on its independent use are viewed with much skepticism. Implications for future research were discussed.

Assimilation Or Acceptance: The Effects Of Industrialization On Appalachians In Anne W. Armstrong's This Day And Time And Harriette Arnow's The Dollmaker, Susan Litton Haslet

Theses & Honors Papers

The novels This Day and Time and The Dollmaker were studied in this thesis. Both novels accurately present some of the effects that early industrialization had on the land and people of Appalachia. The authors of these novels, Anne Armstrong and Harriette Arnow, write about their subjects with honesty and authenticity, and having themselves witnessed many of the events in their novels. These authors are able to write from personal observation and memory as they capture on paper a period of transition in Appalachia and the character of its residents before and after they were influenced. The bittersweet events in …

The Pronunciation Of English Vowels By Native Arabic Speakers: The Relationship Between Age Of Learning, Perception, And Production, Joel Ramez Atallah

Archived Theses and Dissertations

Research on immigrant communities has shown that age of first exposure to a language is strongly correlated with the learner's ultimate attainment in pronunciation. Flege's Speech Learning Model, which hypothesizes a relationship between the foreign accent of late learners and their ability to perceive non-native phonetic contrasts, is one attempt to explain this phenomenon. However, few studies have compared the perception and pronunciation of sounds directly, and there is a paucity of research on age and pronunciation in formal learning environments The present study focussed on the relationship between Age of Learning and the perception and pronunciation of English vowels …

Siamese Connection, Rosecrans Baldwin

Senior Scholar Papers

No abstract provided.

We Are Not Who We Are, Patrick Bishop

Senior Scholar Papers

No abstract provided.

Cyborg Identity And The Destabilization Of Epistemological Boundaries In Thomas Pynchon’S V. And Gravity’S Rainbow, Scott Kaufman

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

From Margaret Walker To Terry Mcmillian : The Decline Of Moral Values In Female Characters In Twentieth Century African-American Fiction, Kristy A. Cage

Electronic Dissertations and Theses

"From Margaret Walker to Terry McMillan: The Decline of Moral Values in Female Characters in Twentieth Century African-American Fiction" deals with how over the course of a century female characters have gone from strong moral beings to promiscuous immoral beings. It uses four novels written by prominent African-American women to present the decline of moral values. Margaret Walker, in her novel Jubilee, set in the civil war era, presents a strong moral being in Vyry Ware Brown. Toni Morrison's Nel Wright, in Sula, is slightly less moral than Walker's Vyry. The decline in moral values begins with April Sinclair's Coffee …

Mysticism And Meaning In Gloria Naylor's Bailey's Cafe And Mama Day, Crystal L. Carodine

Electronic Dissertations and Theses

Negative images of black females are often depicted in American fiction. Black female authors are accepting the challenge of reconstructing these negative images into more positive ones. Gloria Naylor is one of these authors who has taken on the quest of focusing on the black female in her novels. Her novels, Bailey's Cafe and Mama Day, are two of her tools used for reconstructing images of black femininity. She uses the character of Eve (Bailey's Cafe) and Mama Day (Mama Day) to depict strong, initiative women.

John Donne's Sacred Aesthetics And Protestant Eschatology In La Corona, Karen R. Knudson

Master's Theses

The operative figure for describing John Donne's religious poem, La Corona, is not a circle, as it has often been characterized, but a spiral. This figure incorporates the linear narrative and climax of the poem while maintaining the circularity of on-going spiritual experience. Scholars such as Patrick O'Connell and Elizabeth Hodgson are correct in viewing the poem as Donne's "ars poetica sacra" - his apologetic for the religious poet. But such scholars see either a climax and resolution for the speaker of La Corona or an unresolved question of his place as a poet. This paper argues that while …

Faulkner's Narrative In The Sound And The Fury And Absalom, Absalom!, Gerard Lassahn

Theses & Honors Papers

In this, the author compares and contrasts the use of narrative in two of William Faulkner’s most famous works, The Sound and the Fury and Absalom, Absalom!. It also determines how narratives play a role in Faulkner’s work and how the reader understands the story. The author demonstrates how the narrative in Absalom, Absalom! seems to lead the reader farther away from characters while the narrative in The Sound and the Fury draws the reader closer to the characters as they are given insight into their thoughts and feelings.

Go And See The Band: Rock N' Roll As Art And How We Deal With It, Sebastian Blanco

Honors Theses

This is my ode to the curse of loving rock 'n' roll. The curse of always having to defend my love of power chords and high-energy bass lines. The curse of trying to describe to people the distinction my mind makes between Pearl Jam and Aerosmith, Ani DiFranco and Jewel. The curse of looking at someone as I explain how important rock 'n' roll is to me, and seeing they don't understand a word. I have devoted the last six years of my life to listening, understanding, learning about rock music, and I do not consider that time wasted. I …

Ishmael's Definitions Of Self In Melville's Moby-Dick, Kenneth Potter

Honors Capstone Projects and Theses

No abstract provided.

Expressionist Playwrights From The Lost Generation : The Move Away From German Expressionism, Robert Andrew Ellis

Master's Theses

This thesis examines the use of Expressionism, and expressionist elements in the plays of four writers that were part of the Lost Generation. The thesis gives a brief history and definition of Expressionism. It also looks at the plays chronologically, and notes how the use of German Expressionism, present in the early works of Rice and Lawson, was discarded by the later authors in favor of the less-political elements of Expressionism that were originally developed by August Strindberg. Authors and plays include: Elmer Rice's The Adding Machine, John Howard Lawson's Roger Bloomer and Processional, Thomas Wolfe's Welcome to …

Records Of Women Scorned: Anomic Feminine Imagery In The Poems Of Felicia Hemans, Karen Dale-Doucet

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Stage Directions Uncovered : The Author's Voice In Modern English Drama, Erin Nelson

Honors Theses

The introduction of the modern director at the end of th4e nineteenth century had a major impact on both the role of dramatists in the theatrical process and the way they use stage directions within playscripts. This change will be demonstrated by a study of the way English-speaking dramatists make their intentions known through the scripted stage directions, or didascaliae, in dramatic texts.

Verboden: The Private Letters Of Ed Edson: An American Pioneer In A Dutch Community 1880-1944, Mollie Edson

All Graduate Projects

This is a senior project in History, English, and Political Science about the letters and correspondence of Ed Edson from 1880-1944. It includes letters, photos and scans of correspondence.

Ordinary Children Extraordinary Legacies: Childhood During The American Civil War, Deborah S. Holder

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

War heroes do not have to wear uniforms, display meritorious medals for bravery and sacrifice, or voluntarily fight for their country in military regiments. The real heroes are all people touched by conflict. The strategy of war positions the powerful against the powerless, thereby creating an absurd imbalance within society. Hence, ordinary citizens become heroes not by decision but by circumstance; had they a choice, they most certainly would not choose to participate in war. Joseph Heller once said about his war novel: "Catch-22 says that people in power have a right to do to us anything we can't stop …

The Role Of Community In Two Novels By Barbara Kingsolver, Rebecca K. Calwell

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Throughout her career, contemporary writer Barbara Kingsolver has written novels that appeal to both readers and critics. Beginning with The Bean Trees in 1988, through Poisonwood Bible in 1998, Kingsolver established herself as a rising star among contemporary writers. In a review of one of the Kingsolver’s books, one critic said, “It seems there is nothing she can’t do” (Smith 3).

Kingsolver sets herself apart from many of her peers in both her style and her themes. Raised in Kentucky, but now living in Arizona, she has a gift for storytelling. Her dialogue is strong, especially in its ability to …

Uncertain Identities : Aristocratic Women Of English Renaissance Drama, Kimberly Ann Turner

Master's Theses

Often, women stand out as being some of the most interesting and ambiguous characters in English drama. In this study, I examine moments in five Renaissance plays in which female characters reject the extreme dichotomies that were used by society to describe women. In the first portion of the paper, I look at the ways in which malcontents are similar to unconventional female characters in that they both challenge existing patriarchal structures. Secondly, I explore the characters of Mellida, Sophonisba, and Desdemona who begin to assert their own desires, while at the same time, they continue to embody more traditional …

Nene Gare, A Biographical Study: Australian Novelist, 1919-1994, Rosina Squarcini

Theses : Honours

This thesis undertakes an introductory biographical study of Australian writer, Nene Gare, and a critical reading of her work with special reference to The Fringe Dwellers. The author of this study has sought to establish the basis for that novel's positive literary reception. The research has been directed at correcting, in part, the comparative neglect of this writer. Nene Gare's life and work has been surveyed in the belief that this study will contribute to the current knowledge of twentieth-century Australian fiction writers as well as showing the critical reception to Nene Gare's work as a part of Australian …

The Sacrifice Of Les Murray, Jill Reading

Theses : Honours

Les Murray's vivid and evocative poetry has made him a major Australian literary figure. Critics routinely note the sophisticated, often highly wrought nature of Murray's poetic language and acclaim his technical virtuosity, including gifts for pun, paradox, aphorism, idiom and metaphor. The themes of both Murray's poetry and his non-fiction prose often revolve around the divisions he sees in Australia between cultures, between society and people, and within individuals themselves. Despite his efforts to bring healing to these schisms, however, the poet is criticised for his frequent dogmatism and didacticism, which mark his work as divisive. Although Murray professes to …

Loneliness Underneath Laughter : Aspects Of Alienation In The Early Plays Of Tom Stoppard, Steven Hounsome

Theses : Honours

This thesis investigates the various states of alienation that exist in the early plays of the British dramatist Tom Stoppard. By first defining alienation (and discussing the areas of contention which surround the concept), it proceeds to argue that whilst Stoppard has been greatly revered as a comic writer his works are equally consequential for their sensitivity and insight. They depict a prolificacy of characters who fail to assimilate with their society, can no longer relate to those around them and, as is often the case, reach for, but never manage to grasp a sense of their own identity. The …

Reconsidering Swinburne's Relation To Whitman, David B. Donlon

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

The Fox And The Lion: Machiavellian Characters And Tactics In Renaissance Tragedies By Christopher Marlowe And Jacobean Tragedies By John Webster, James Craig Austin

Theses & Honors Papers

This thesis examines the ideologies of Machiavelli and how Webster and Marlowe adapt them into their plays. It looks at how the characters in these works of literature exhibit Machiavellian behaviors and how their lives and the world around them change as a result.