Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Bright Star: A Lighting Design, A Study On The Emotional Impact Of Lights, Dean J. Bressler

Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film: Theses, Student Research, and Creative Work

The purpose of this thesis will be to observe, analyze, and evaluate the design process and production for the musical Bright Star Written and composed by Steve Martin and Edie Brickell, Produced by the Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film’s in house production company the Nebraska Repertory Theatre Company in collaboration with the University of Nebraska’s Glen Korff School of Music. Performed in the Howell Memorial Theatre from April 16^th, 2026, to April 26^th, 2026. Bright star was directed by Bobby Pieranunzi, the dance captain for the original Broadway performance of Bright Star in 2016, …

Eurydice | Tigers Be Still: Technical Direction Between Two Studio Sets, Rory G. Galada Brownell

Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film: Theses, Student Research, and Creative Work

This thesis examines the technical direction processes for two studio productions, Eurydice by Sarah Ruhl and Tigers Be Still by Kim Rosenstock, produced during the 2025–2026 season at the Nebraska Repertory Theatre. Through comparative analysis, this document explores how differing design styles—metaphorical and installation-based versus grounded realism—impact the planning, communication, and execution responsibilities of a technical director within a constrained academic production environment. Both productions operated within similar parameters, including limited budgets, student-based labor, and a shared performance space, allowing for a focused evaluation of process rather than resources. The Eurydice production emphasized abstract scenic elements, including large-scale string installations …

Accessible Theatre In The Face Of Transition: A Collaborator's Journey Through Sarah Ruhl's Orlando, Ty R. Robbins

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This thesis discusses the various types of accessibility observed in practice during a production of Orlando by Sarah Ruhl at the University of New Orleans. Throughout

the chapters to come, I will focus on gathering theatrical dramaturgy, my process as a company

actor, the successes and setbacks of accessibility in theatre, and reflections from community

artists on how they view accessibility in the workplace. I will evaluate my findings and those of

fellow theatre makers to outline the strengths and weaknesses of accessibility in relation to

collaboration in theatre, an art form that is continually given a cold shoulder in …

House Of Ill-Fame: A Historical, Cartographic, And Archaeological Study On The Spatial Evolution Of Commercial Sex Work In New Orleans, 1875 – 1925, Austin Roebuck

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This research examines the historic spatiality of commercial sex‑work in New Orleans by analyzing targeted addresses associated with the trade across three census years. Using the establishment and closure of Storyville (1897–1917) as a temporal frame, it compares demographic patterns in dwellings labeled as “houses of ill fame” in 1880, 1900, and 1920 to trace changes in household composition and social identity. Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps, newspapers, and city directories contextualize these patterns within three ten‑year intervals (1875–1885, 1895–1905, 1915–1925), revealing how sex‑work spaces were regulated, represented, and embedded in the urban landscape. The study also incorporates an archaeological assemblage …

Rationalizing The Despicable: Creating Talthybius In Euripides’ The Trojan Women, P Rob Brown

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A reflection on my personal work and development as an actor and performer over the three years of this program, specifically focusing on the work of creating the character of Talthybius in Euripides’ The Trojan Women.

H.A.G.S., Erin Pinkham

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

H.A.G.S (Have A Great Summer) The book transports the reader into a Y2K southern suburban landscape, influenced by Texas Megachurches, the height of the shopping mall era, and the upcoming and ever present loom of the internet. It narrates through this world by diving in and out of a younger and older voice. A voice that remains in the present tense as it searches through the speaker’s understanding and observance of the world around them and the danger looming over their young girl body. This book looks to uncover these moments where we as young girls might better understand why …

Proud To Be Lao: Examining Lao American Identity Through Transnational Music And Performance, Zechary Phouthavong

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

For some time, Lao popular music has not received the same global recognition as other genres emerging out of Asia, such as K-Pop and Bollywood. In recent years, however, Lao-pop artists like Thinlamphone and Zamio P have broken onto the global stage, with music that showcases a unique blend of traditional Lao instrumentation with hip-hop, pop, and R&B styles. This emerging trend is particularly poignant for Lao Americans, as Lao-pop allows for Lao Americans to negotiate their experiences of being both Lao and American, further signifying its importance to constructing identity. This thesis explores the unique process of Lao Americans …

Writing Through The Plague: Memory, Trauma, And Survival In Arabic And English Narrative, Zainab Abbood Jawhar Aldaoseri

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines how Arabic and English literary and intellectual traditions responded to the Black Death as a shared yet differently articulated experience of collective trauma. Drawing on trauma theory, particularly the work of Cathy Caruth and Dominick LaCapra, it analyzes how plague narratives function as cultural mechanisms for processing mass suffering. Through a comparative study of Arabic historiographical, theological, medical, and poetic texts alongside English allegorical, mystical, autobiographical, and satirical writings, this project argues that both traditions developed distinct narrative strategies to render the trauma of plague intelligible. Arabic plague literature, represented by figures such as Ibn Khaldūn, Ibn …

Where Doubts Fade And Stars Glow: A Costume Designer’S Journey In Silent Sky By Lauren Gunderson, Randy Tabiliran Olarte

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study employs a practice-based design methodology grounded in historical research, visual analysis, material experimentation, and collaborative production processes. This thesis, Where Doubts and Stars Glow: A Costume Designer’s Journey for Silent Sky by Lauren Gunderson, explores the process of design and creation of costumes for the production of Silent Sky at the University of Arkansas. Silent Sky portrays an astronomer whose work in the early 1900s profoundly impacted the study of photographic plates for mapping stars. Specifically, the astronomer closely analyzes Cepheid variable stars, discovering that their consistent brightness fluctuations aid in determining stellar distances and the universe's size. …

Hitler's Foreign Legions: Non-German Recruitment And Formations In The Waffen Ss, Jacob O'Bannon

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

During the Nazi regime, the armed bodyguard of the National Socialist Party the, the SS grew rapidly and eventually recruited foreign manpower. This thesis analyzes the rapid expansion of the SS as an armed military force and traces their forays into non-German states to recruit as the demands of World War II increased. The SS fielded thirty-eight divisions by the end of the war with hundreds of thousands of members not being from Germany. This rapid expansion, undertaken with soldiers from a variety of backgrounds, created a series of fractures between the ideological tenets of the SS and their practices. …

Silent Sky: Exploring The Universe Of Theatre Through A Directorial Lens, Sarah Behrend-Wilcox

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis documents the directorial process of a production of Lauren Gunderson’s Silent Sky, produced by the University of Arkansas Department of Theatre. This document follows the director’s journey from initial script analysis through closing night, with an emphasis on the successes and challenges found in mounting this fully realized, artistically unified production. The central argument of this thesis is that through careful documentation of a single production, it is possible to identify both successful strategies and areas for growth in the collaborative process. This thesis is organized in four chapters: The Big Bang, The Matter, The Dark Matter, and …

Performing The American Dream: Passing And Identity In The Great Gatsby (1925) And Passing (1929), Olivia O'Sullivan

Master's Theses

In this thesis, I explore how Jay Gatsby, protagonist in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, and Clare Kendry, protagonist in Nella Larsen’s Passing, pass in order to achieve their American Dream. Both characters rely on carefully crafted identities to gain social mobility and access to worlds that would otherwise be out of their reach through the people they surround themselves with, their clothing, their mannerism, and even their intimate relationships. Throughout my close reading and analysis, I determine that Jay Gatsby and Clare Kendry’s attempts to pass to achieve the American Dream are futile, which demonstrates the idea that …

Maa’: An Analysis From The May Weber Ethnographic Study Collection, Claire T. Chilla

Department of Anthropology

An analysis of Maa’ textiles from Sulawesi Indonesia. Discusses both the artistic symbolism, possible physical creation, and the spiritual connection of the textile for the Torajans. Informs through the lens of globalization, colonization, and funerary practices from the country of origin.

Dutiful Wife, Grieving Mother: Examining Medieval Joban Allusion Through A Matricentric Affective Lens, Morgan Lee

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis uses concepts of matricentrism and affect to examine the legacy of Job and its frequent medieval allusions in stories featuring grieving mothers. It specifically analyzes how, in order to be considered noble, steadfast sufferers, women were expected to relinquish their maternal grief and adopt a stoic affect. This was often to the benefit of or in the direct service of their husbands. The analysis covers three women in particular: Job’s wife (who is examined through the medieval commentary written about her), Prudence from Chaucer’s "Tale of Melibee," and Griselda from Chaucer’s "Clerk’s Tale." This thesis utilizes medieval conduct …

Wildflower Season: A Semi-Somnolescent Retrospective, Connor Johnson

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

I came to graduate school under the impression that I would be working on my own. I believed the process of playwriting to be an individualistic pursuit, where my plays came from my mind and my mind alone. Instead, through the process of writing my thesis play, Wildflower Season, and its subsequent production as part of the ArkType New Play Festival, I discovered that writing a play was a collective endeavor, and that one of the great pleasures the theatre has to offer is creating it with a group of other people.

Let The Mystery Be: Meditations On Process, Wildness, And Collaboration In The Creation Of The Play Camp Wyldwood, Basilton Parnell

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is a mix of personal reflection and examination of my time in graduate school and the creation, development, and subsequent production of my full-length play, Camp Wyldwood. Camp Wyldwood was performed as a part of the spring 2026 ArkType New Works Festival at the University of Arkansas.

Reframing Little Women: Renovating A Classic For Modern Audiences, Claire Wewers

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis serves as the documentation of the director’s process in creating a production of Little Women: The Broadway Musical for the Main Stage season at the University of Arkansas in the fall semester of 2025. This thesis will serve as in-depth record from the initial reading of the script through the opening of the project using the metaphor of the building of a house. In Chapter 1 “Introduction,” the document will provide context for the thesis. It presents several of the materials used in the creation of the thesis, discusses the methodology of the study which is mostly historical …

Volume Cxlv, Number 20, May 1, 2026, Lawrence University

The Lawrentian

No abstract provided.

The Oncoming Light: An Experiential Approach To Psychological Exposition Through Dialogue-Driven Narrative, Benjamin G. Dewitt

Honors Theses

Narrative is a lens through which we understand ourselves, our histories, our futures, and our ties to those around us. Narrative form has undergone vast transformations over time, and in the case of “postmodern” literature, pushes the boundaries of form into the experimental, questioning the truth of knowledge itself. While these experimental works can give rise to uniquely powerful emotional experiences, some components of narrative, when abandoned, may only hinder the immersion of the reader. This thesis evaluates several experimental, dialogue-driven narrative works against these components: linguistic, literal, emotional, and intellectual significance, in a hierarchy of importance as proposed by …

“Who Are We?”: Exploring Adolescent Identity And Community Through Collaborative Mural Art, Rachel E. Stacy

Honors Theses

This thesis explores how participation in a high school mural club influences students’ sense of personal identity and community. By creating and leading a mural club, I guided students in designing and painting murals around their school and extending this work into the local community, all focused on how students defined themselves within the context of the school’s motto: “A Star is Rising”. I used qualitative methods including surveys, observational notes, artist statements, and visual documentation to examine and analyze how students experienced identity and collaboration throughout the process. The findings show that the creation of these murals provided students …

Creative Nonfiction Essays, Colby S. Langley

Honors Theses

To write about the present with any authority requires a keen eye for the past. To write from our lives into meaningful creative nonfiction requires a firm understanding that experience is the composite of life experience blending into the current moment. The writing is then drawn irreversibly towards emotion: indulgent and oppressive. The extremity of emotion dictates the difficulty of transcribing the experience onto the page, and violence is a source of both extreme emotion and experience. It is important to note that I am primarily considering personal violence for this essay, while societal and institutional violence have their own …

Emotional Detachment In A Second Language: Exploring Emotional Expression In Bilingual Adults, Daniela Salas Lopez

Honors Theses

This qualitative study explored how bilingual and multilingual adults experience emotional detachment when using a second language and how language shapes emotional expression. This study aimed to examine how bilingual individuals personally experience these emotional differences in everyday life. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with six bilingual or multilingual adults from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds. Data were analyzed using thematic analysis. Findings revealed five major themes: emotional detachment in a second language, reduced emotional intensity and meaning, increased cognitive effort and emotional fatigue, authenticity and emotional comfort in the first language, and identity and personality shifts across languages. Participants consistently …

Unraveling The Modernist Grid: An Exploration Of Femininity And Containment In Design History, Riley Hayes

Honors Theses

This paper examines the Swiss grid as both a foundational tool of modernist graphic design and a cultural system embedded with ideological assumptions about order, neutrality, and authority. While the Swiss design tradition is widely celebrated for its clarity, rationality, and universality, this study argues that such principles are not neutral but historically situated, shaping how postwar Western visual culture organizes information, bodies, and value systems. Focusing on the circulation of Swiss design principles through editorial and advertising media, the paper situates the grid as a structuring logic that extends beyond layout into the framing of identity and gender. This …

Examining Dimensions And Patterns Of Arts Participation In Relation To Positive Youth Development Outcomes Across Socioeconomic Contexts, Yasmine Perry

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Grounded in the Phenomenological Variant of Ecological Systems Theory and the Positive Youth Development framework, the purpose of the current study was to examine how dimensions of arts participation, specifically breadth, intensity, and duration, relate to Positive Youth Development (PYD) outcomes and whether socioeconomic status (SES) moderates these associations over time. Data were drawn from three waves of the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development. The analytic sample included 747 adolescents aged 12 to 18, capturing a developmental period marked by identity exploration and increased engagement in organized activities. A combination of longitudinal, person-centered, and moderation analyses was used to …

Understanding Roma Oppression In Europe Through Humantarian Forensic Analysis, Christal L. Quinn

Department of Anthropology: Theses and Student Research

This thesis examines the marginalization of Roma people in Europe, and how humanitarian forensic practices may help Roma communities in their quest for justice and recognition. The study draws exclusively on secondary information to examine the social, political, and legal issues affecting the Roma communities, who have endured centuries of institutional discrimination, marginalization, and violence. This thesis identifies ways in which systematic oppression continues to limit Roma communities’ access to education, housing, healthcare, and legal protection through a review of relevant literature and applicable theoretical frameworks. The study also examines the relevance of forensic science, particularly its humanitarian applications, in …

City, Janina Butz

Theses and Dissertations

Janina Butz observes the improvised support structures holding New York City together at its edges. Looking at the found, cheap materials, spray painted, rusty, drilled, sawed, and haphazardly welded together on the sidewalk. The hard clashes of cheap material and expensive real estate lead Butz to draw a bigger picture of the fraud seams our society is tied together with.

In Spite Of And Because, Katherine Raudenbush

Theses and Dissertations

Photography collects in the home, in frames, photo albums, lockets, held up by magnets on the fridge, propped up on the desk. This thesis and accompanying photography and textile work addresses this accumulation of story and family connection, specifically multigenerational relationships between mothers and daughters.

Ephemeral System, Shibo Chan

Theses and Dissertations

Ephemeral System examines systems, feedback, repetition, and material fragility through a kinetic wax sculpture repeatedly dragged across a wooden ramp. Drawing from cybernetics, absurdist waiting, and personal mourning, the work explores how bodies and systems wear themselves down through continuous operation.

Tracings, Masie Sophia Love

Theses and Dissertations

In this paper, the artist wonders what it means to remember a time and place that she has not experienced- what would this look like visualized in a painting? Love studies the histories and similarities between cartography and quilting using the two as a kind of channel to understand, record, and remember land. She explores inherited memory and the clues left behind in the form of quilts made by ancestors to create abstracted landscapes and maps of Tennessee where they lived for generations.

“Before Your Honour?”: Divine Morality And Women Reclaiming Power In Ben Jonson’S Volpone And William Shakespeare’S Measure For Measure, Delilah G. Fleming

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores how the female protagonists in Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure and Jonson’s Volpone navigate and combat corrupting patriarchal forces through moral religious speech. In both plays, the male characters have allowed false gods and hypocrisy to dictate and justify their corrupt behavior. By engaging with the historical significance of early modern female rhetoric this thesis examines Jonson’s Celia and Shakespeare’s Isabella, and how they operate in the interest of godly virtue rather than blind obedience to patriarchal figure heads.  Volpone’s Celia is a character largely neglected in the canon, and whose speech emphasizes the relationship between female agency …