Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Vida En Sombras, Tommy Canales Burns

CGU MFA Theses

Verisimilitude. What is reality? Subconsciously we are acting out and absorbing information collating data and in turn responding with instincts. Learning processes to view and shape this world. I think of the Hermann Hesse’s doppelganger, the idea of a shadow self. Group identities can also have strange shadow selves. It is bizarre to look back at history and see the changing context of social norms, fashions, traditions, scientific, philosophical, and political thought. Art is a sign of the times, creating space for the inner dialogue of collective consciousness to be purged and hashed out.

When I'M With You, Jenny Ziomek

CGU MFA Theses

Everything I make is related to books. My artwork functions as visual storyboards or is used directly in books. Props and videos are inspiration for drawings. My paintings are meant to feel like pages from a larger narrative. Often, the formats through which stories are told are as important as the stories themselves.

Iain Muirhead, Iain Muirhead

CGU MFA Theses

Artist IAIN MUIRHEAD seeks possibility in a world of massive change. His work cultivates instability and chases an ungrounded experience. Systemic complexity and creative destruction are characteristic. Muirhead uses paint, objects, photography, installation, and video to break apart and reconfigure form and space. Terror often looms. Entropy gives way to emergence.

Tapestry, Alana Medina

CGU MFA Theses

The wall pieces are intentionally left to be crude, unrefined, and raw. A look at the world with a border, walking backwards to a beginning, what it was like before the traffic of the mind. Itinerant qualities along with an objective dissidence bring about an experience of tribal nomadic earthy hues. The paintings stay close to my interpretation of the earth, similar to the sculptures. Like twins born in the same embrace with contemporaneous qualities they exist together with a connection in materiality. There is a relationship between my paintings and sculptures; a mutual dependence seen and experienced together that …

Stratum, Raneem Fadul

CGU MFA Theses

My work is an expression of the relationship between my own culture, and the American culture and way of life that I have had a chance to interact with, observe, and reflect on throughout the past few years. My concepts were inspired by the industrial nature of the area that I live in, where I gradually realized that I was surrounded by dozens of workshops and garages. Given that my home is the spiritually-rich, fairly traditional, and non-industrial Saudi Arabia, this typical American experience has been, to me, one with much room for reflection, due to the extreme contrast. The …

Kimono, Elizabeth D. Hoffman

CGU MFA Theses

Globalization opens up opportunities for the international community to push for freedom of expression. It is precisely because the history of kimonos is a multi-cultural one, invented by the Chinese, then adapted and adopted by the Japanese, then altered by Western colonialists and changed as it permutated from the aristocracy to the middle class and to laborers, that I felt that it was relevant to today and the cross-cultural influences of globalization. This summer, I purchased two authentic Japanese kimonos, (one an everyday cotton one to use as a model for my drawings, and the second, an elaborate silk one …

20,082,026, Ruoxi Li

CGU MFA Theses

The whole idea of my work came from me questioning about the relationship between industrialization and human beings. Our generation look and think conforming to a public standard. When being asked question our answer is not based on our preferences, but whether it matches what we’ve been taught.

Sharon Si-Chen Ye Artist Statement, Si-Chen Ye

CGU MFA Theses

Everyone is a separate individual. When individuals become aware that they are alone in this world, they can spend more time getting along with themselves and listening to the voice coming from the depths of their heart. This is the main idea of my works. I want to build a silent world with many creatures to make people feel and know that they are alone without feeling lonely.

Aesthesia, Cindy G. Garcia

CGU MFA Theses

My art practice in itself, is first and foremost about me as a Human on this planet. Second, I am drawn to the cognitive dissonance that happens within each individual, this is key to the majority of my work. For this show I really wanted to emphasize; A: The textural, corporal involvement that I personally really enjoy and get satisfaction out of. B: The color of Life. C: The beauty in very introspective particular instances that happen in day to day life.

A Crocodile Passed By Today, I Said Hello, He Said Hello, That Annoyed Me, Mayra A. Villegas

CGU MFA Theses

The creatures in my paintings are vastly invested in catering to my sensibilities. Emotional cowardice, impulsive politeness: through them, I am relieved of those personal culprits. They lend ropes, take blame, spit in eyes, and color my streams of consciousness. Furthermore, they manifest personal and social arrays of vexing scenarios. Suffocating hierarchies, the monotony of existence, my paintings aim to offer respite from such malaise.

Ultimately, my paintings are resolving, absolving even, personal and societal grievances.

Unfettered, Doraelia Ruiz

CGU MFA Theses

My life has been built on high wire tensions between the two vastly different worlds I live between. I live somewhere between illusions of minority success and harsh realities of not having a trust-fund in an elite world. I’m neither here nor there. Painting is my one refuge where I can combine the vastly different worlds I exist in and between. My works are the only semblance of a home that doesn’t vanish .

Lili Zhong Artist Statement, Lili Zhong

CGU MFA Theses

Appreciating beauty, the universe’s natural essence, is an innate and indispensable human ability that helps us learn about the world. Everyone has their own definition, even on the degree to which beauty represents something abstract or realistic. It could mean elegance or romance, be from an audio or visual source, pertain to religious wisdom or even human value. Regardless, art always address beauty.

Lei Shen Artist Statement, Lei Shen

CGU MFA Theses

I believe that all things have contradictory side, and development is built on contradictions. In fact, the contradiction is the most frequent thing which is in my CGU’s life. Different culture, different habit of life, different learning styles, different educations. These are all contradictory to me. But also let me have a different way to think. I think it is a good thing for me. Because it makes to understand a thing become more comprehensive. So I want reflect this idea in my work. I want tell people contradictory actually can make progress. I want to say there are tow …

Threshold, Kristin King

CGU MFA Theses

My work explores the nature of interiority and exteriority, the relationship between the centered inner self and the peripheral, the physicality of occupying the inside of a space or viewing that space from the outside.

Lara Salmon, Thesis Statement, Lara Salmon

CGU MFA Theses

My art brings together materials and ideas inspired by personal experience that do not usually exist side by side. My body is the primary mechanism with which I make work, incidentally making me the subject matter of the work. I use my physical self as an instrument to coalesce and transform other materiality. Through live performance and photographic installations I create tension and balance between crude biology and bright, polished formalism. This body of work focuses on Millennial Feminism and the Middle East.

Contact Points, Megan A. Mcgrain

CGU MFA Theses

My practice investigates intimacy and connection over time.

Enekas, Shabnam Yousefian

CGU MFA Theses

My works are all a reflection of my own life, beliefs, experiences and goal. For me art is an oasis of opportunities. It allows me to utilize my innate abilities and imaginations without any obstructions.

I am drawn to painting because of its capacity to reflect the world I live in. My goal is to demonstrate the fact that what is done in life has a reflection on us as well as our surrounding environment. My paintings are abstractions of the real places. Reflection implies clarity; however it is unclear at the same time. To me reflection is clearer than …

My Faith In The Constitution Is Whole: Barbara Jordan Signifies On Scriptures, Robin L. Owens

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation is a critical investigation of the engagements of scriptures in the life and speeches of U.S. Congresswoman Barbara C. Jordan (1936–1996). I engage in a research methodology that utilizes critical historical, auto/biographical, literary, and rhetorical analyses. My research agenda is to explain how scriptures work and are used by Barbara Jordan to illustrate an example of a larger phenomenon of scripturalizing and scripturalization outside of the context of institutional religion. In order to give a fuller context to Barbara Jordan’s rhetorical strategies, as an African American woman, I first consider the lives, speeches and use of scriptures of …

Food Rebellion: Contemporary Food Movements As A Reflection Of Our Agrarian Past, James Gordon

Pomona Senior Theses

This thesis considers the influence of agrarian thought on contemporary food movements.

Women In The Machinery Of War: Gender, Identity & Resistance Within Contemporary Middle Eastern Conflict, Nana-Korantema A. Koranteng

Pomona Senior Theses

This thesis seeks to explore the ways in which gender and identity are imagined in times of war especially in the cases of women who participate in armed struggle within the Middle East. I focus particularly on how US and UK media's framing of these women's lives and experiences distort the ways in which we understand conflict within the contemporary Middle East. Through the case studies of female militants or supports of militancy in Palestine and the Islamic State I seek to highlight women's stories and lived realities in an attempt to understand what drives them to use particular model's …

A Theory Of Form As Temporal Referentiality, Eron F. Smith

Pomona Senior Theses

This study proposes temporal referentiality—roughly defined as the orientation of substance in its temporal medium—as a theoretical and analytical framework for musical form. Operating on the principle of music as a temporally extended entity, this thesis explores the connections that occur between substance across its medium, suggests an additional interpretation of medium connections (temporality) in terms of language tense, and examines substance connections (referentiality) through different types of filtering.

I also propose a means for visual and literary interpretation of temporal referentiality, depicting a network of substance relationships established over a piece’s timespace. Analysis of this type assumes a listener’s …

Defending The Social Good Theory Of Punishment, Sydney R. Scott

Pomona Senior Theses

This paper attempts to justify punishment on the grounds that it is a benefit to the person being punished. I accept the basic premise of a previous theory of punishment, the Moral Good Theory (MGT), which states that we cannot harm anyone. Thus, punishment can only be justified if it is not a harm. The MGT claims that punishment is beneficial in that it provides a moral education to the offender. I reject the idea that punishment is morally educational and instead propose a new theory which revises and strengthens the MGT, accounting for its flaws. This new theory, the …

Women Surrealists: Muses Or Seekers?, Noor A. Asif

Scripps Senior Theses

Surrealism has often been labeled as a misogynistic movement that sought to provide man with an avenue into a higher reality at the expense of the humanity of women. By perceiving the opposite sex as their muses, Surrealist men rendered women as mysterious sources of the marvelous, the name given to the higher realm, which they desired to attain. I propose that Surrealist women were empowered by the fact that ‘woman’, as an abstract concept, and femininity were synonymous with the marvelous. This entailed that Surrealist women had the advantage of being “sources of revelation, as provokers of wonder, dreams, …

Playing The Fool: Feste And Twelfth Night, Brooklyn D. Robinson

Scripps Senior Theses

Twelfth Night does not end with the acceptance and consummation of these “alternative couples.” Instead, the reveal of the twins has a clarifying effect and the characters are returned to the partner who is considered socially acceptable. The final relationships are heterosexual matches that do not stray from class or any other societal confines. Indeed, the story serves to reinforce common standards equating alternative love with madness and proper love with lucidity. Standing outside of the couplings are only bachelor men: Antonio, Sir Andrew, Feste and Orsino’s pages. In effect, these men are desexualized without romantic counterparts. While they are …

Autonomy And Distributive Justice At The End Of Life, Corinna Fukushima

Scripps Senior Theses

Discussions of autonomy at the end of life in health care contexts is no new phenomenon. However, what seems to have changed in issues of autonomy is cases where patients want to refuse a treatment to cases where patients are demanding more treatment when medical professionals may not agree or be able to provide them with the medical treatment. Some key competing interests impacting patient autonomy include beneficence-doing what is in the best interests of the health or well-being of the patient- and resource limitations. Here, I will explore distributive justice theories that impact the end of life and how …

The Non-Identity Problem: Finding A Narrow-Person-Affecting Solution To A Narrow-Person-Affecting Problem, Maura Duffey

Scripps Senior Theses

The non-identity problem attempts to explain the moral permissibility of certain procreative acts that determine a future individual’s existence. If we accept that this individual’s life is worth living, than we must also accept that these procreative acts are permissible. However, this is not the case. In this paper, I will argue against the permissibility of these acts and explain why our intuition, that these acts are morally wrong, is in fact correct. Because the non-identity problem affects particular persons, those whose existence is brought about, I argue in favor of a solution that explains that moral impermissibility in terms …

Economic Assimilation For Immigrants In Chile: An Employment Convergence Analysis, Emily C. Long

Scripps Senior Theses

Blending migration studies and labor economics, this thesis explores the economic implications of immigrant assimilation in Chile by using probit models to test for employment convergence and labor market convergence between immigrant groups and native Chileans. Using census data from 1992 and 2002, we find significant differences in the employment and labor force participation rates for these demographic groups, affected by the immigrants’ gender, decade of arrival, and country of origin. We see evidence of the nascent care industry in Chile, as well as the implications of the Chilean visa system and employment contracts. Additionally, we see employment probabilities fall …

The Philosophy Of Mathematics: A Study Of Indispensability And Inconsistency, Hannah C. Thornhill

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis examines possible philosophies to account for the practice of mathematics, exploring the metaphysical, ontological, and epistemological outcomes of each possible theory. Through a study of the two most probable ideas, mathematical platonism and fictionalism, I focus on the compelling argument for platonism given by an appeal to the sciences. The Indispensability Argument establishes the power of explanation seen in the relationship between mathematics and empirical science. Cases of this explanatory power illustrate how we might have reason to believe in the existence of mathematical entities present within our best scientific theories. The second half of this discussion surveys …

Beefing Up The Beefcake: Male Objectification, Boy Bands, And The Socialized Female Gaze, Dorie Bailey

Scripps Senior Theses

In the traditionally patriarchal Hollywood industry, the heterosexual man’s “male gaze,” as coined by feminist film theorist Laura Mulvey, is the dominant viewing model for cinematic audiences, leaving little room for a negotiated reading of how visual images are created, presented, and internalized by male and female audiences alike. However, as Hollywood’s shifting feminist landscape becomes increasingly prevalent in the mainstream media, content incorporating the oppositional “female gaze” have become the new norm in both the film and television mediums. Through an extended analysis of the gaze as socialized through gendered learning in children, the “safe space” afforded through the …

Unreliable Narrators, Rebekah Manikowski

Scripps Senior Theses

Unreliable Narrators is a record of the process to create a mixed media installation about how and why we tell stories, and how we as an audience discern the truth of those stories. The installation tells three different perspectives of the same story. Part documentary and part detective search, this project has viewers following the subject as she pieces together her story and ultimately has them deciding for themselves what to believe.