Arts and Humanities Commons^™

The Effects Of Involvement In Religious Practices On Recovering Substance Users., Taylor Currier

Honors Theses

This paper reviews empirical studies focused on spirituality and its effects on those in the recovery process from substance abuse. This paper will look at qualitative studies as well as quantitative research to see which form has derived the best results on how spirituality has affected substance abuse recovery. Prolonged recovery is the goal for those that struggle with substance use. Behavior change is an important in sustaining sobriety with those dealing with addiction. It is predicted that those who engage in spiritual growth within their community have a higher likelihood of prolonged recovery than those that do not believe …

Atlantic Abolition In The Borderlands: The Interesting Narrative Of Mahommah Gardo Baquaqua, Alexandra Bicknell

Honors Theses

In 1854, the Geo. E. Pomeroy & Co. published An Interesting Narrative. Biography of Mahommah G. Baquaqua, a native of Zoogoo, in the interior of Africa (A Convert to Christianity,) with a Description of That Part of the World; including the Manners and Customs of the Inhabitants in Detroit, Michigan. Baquaqua’s narrative did not gain as much attention as others in the genre published around the same time. The narrative only survived in eight copies though it was published by an editor that was able to sell hundreds of thousands of copies of an essay to a similar audience. This …

Memory, Migration, And Family In 1960s And 1970s Northern Ireland, Abigail Parmer

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Formulated Ataxia, Alexandra Renner

Honors Theses

Formulated Ataxia is an athletic and vigorous choreographic work based on the overall theme of recognizing order within chaos. With a cast of eleven dancers, I created a world that depicts the cycle of anxiety and how I seek organization within chaos. Choreographically, I toyed around with aspects of my neurological condition, synesthesia. Synesthesia can be described as a way of organization people and situations with numbers. Part of my research involved delving deep into the theory of chaos, as it mirrors the cyclical nature of my mental and emotional instability. This work invites a thrilling and exhausting experience for …

Graduating Presentations 2020: Six Point Convergence - Inner Workings, Jasmine Clark

Honors Theses

This portfolio serves as the fulfillment of both my honors thesis for the Lee Honors College, and my Department of Dance capstone for DANC 4800: Graduating Presentations. The typical process for DANC 4800 involves producing a concert in collaboration with the rest of the senior B.F.A. class, in which each member presents an original piece of choreography. Unfortunately, due to the COVID-19 crisis and the switch to distance education, our concert was cancelled, and we were forced to abruptly stop rehearsing. In this transition, my project shifted from the creation of a new work to the revisiting of a solo …

Bridging The Gap: An Academic Recital For Solo Voice Featuring The Music Of Underrepresented Female Composers Throughout History, Keiley Vieau

Honors Theses

Keiley Vieau, mezzo-soprano, presented her honors thesis senior academic voice recital on Friday, April 19th, 2019 at 3pm. The performance took place at the Lee Honors College in the lounge. This recital was put on in collaboration with pianist Molly Sanford. Music performed included works by all female composers, such as Barbara Strozzi, Clara Schumann, Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel, Nadia Boulanger, Augusta Holmès, Liza Lehmann, and Amy Beach. This abstract will provide a brief overview of the theme of this recital as well as address the basic musical characteristics of certain pieces from the repertoire programmed.

The recital was based solely …

A Rhapsody Wild, Corey Davis

Honors Theses

This thesis is a fictional novel which explores themes of morality and tragedy within the society of a crime-and-murder-ridden city called Spekender. The mayor, Ev Edison, has become a disgraced recluse as a result of the tragic deaths of his wife and unborn child a year and a half prior to when the story takes place. His remaining children (three boys and a girl named Nimble) are left to navigate their disaster-torn worlds in isolation from their father and from each other. All of this changes one day when Nimble encounters a dangerous supernatural character that seems to know everything …

The Art Of Making Paper, Kristen Theys

Honors Theses

The Art of Paper Making is an exploration into an overlooked field. My goal was to learn not only how to make paper, but how different materials and processes can change the final product. The process was not only for me though. I wanted to create a fun and informative way to document the papermaking process to present to those who aren’t familiar with it.

One of the biggest things that impacted my studies was the amount of time I would beat the paper pulp. The amount of time the pulp runs through the beater drastically changes the texture of …

Katie Short's Senior Voice Recital, Katherine Short

Honors Theses

For my honors thesis, I used my Senior Voice Recital. When starting the process, I met with my thesis chair, Dr. Karen Kness to discuss which repertoire I wanted to perform for the recital. We focused on picking song selections ranging from the Baroque musical era to the mid- 1900s. As part of my requirement, I needed to select at least thirty-five minutes of music to present and this music needed to be in at least five different languages. Half of my repertoire was selected from my previous semester of Applied Voice lessons and the other half I learned over …

Senior Viola Recital, Kennedy Dixon

Honors Theses

Coming to the end of my Viola Performance Degree at WMU was a milestone that I have been looking forward to since stepping foot on campus, yet a moment that felt so far away. Preparing for my Senior Viola Recital/Honors Thesis was one of the most exciting, difficult, and overall most rewarding experiences that I will never forget. I’ve had the honor of knowing my currently Viola Professor/Thesis chair since my Freshmen Year of Highschool, where I attend a summer music camp here at WMU, and I can say that I have learned so much about music, responsibility, courage, and …

The Intersections Of Art And Activism, Marisa Weller

Honors Theses

No abstract available.

I Know It When I See It, Grace Wellman

Honors Theses

“Free speech empowers creators to entertain and inform, to challenge and inspire. Copyright ensures creators can benefit from their works and protects against piracy. Combined, these fundamental rights enable creators to thrive and bring great stories to global audiences.”

-Motion Picture Association of America

Censorship occurs when work is deemed “obscene” to a certain age group. However, this definition of obscenity is entirely relative. The American film industry uses the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) rating system to assess what age group is allowed to see certain content. Other countries have alternative rating systems that apply to different age …

Senior Recital, Brody Roland

Honors Theses

No abstract available.

Indigenous Healing In New Zealand: An Anthropological Analysis Of "Traditional" And "Modern" Approaches To Well-Being, Lillian T. Brice

Honors Theses

Drawing on contemporary anthropological approaches used by scholars of well-being and medical anthropology (i.e. Michael Jackson and Lisa Stevenson), I explore how indigenous healers in New Zealand blend “traditional” and “modern” elements to establish a creative and inclusive system. Specifically, I explore the use of herbal treatments, ritual chanting, and ceremonies that encapsulate Māori cultural values. I also explore the impact of biomedicine and New-Age wellness approaches on indigenous healing. I argue that Māori healing moves beyond the binary of “tradition” and “modern” as healers merge the past and present and combine the foreign and native. My research is based …

Where Virtue Goes: Stories, Radhika Vu Thanh Vy

Honors Theses

This story is a parallel narrative featuring the life in a fictional remote village in Vietnam some time during the 1800s, as well as the present-day life of a Vietnamese immigrant family in the US. The first narrative explores the efforts of a feminist duo, a matchmaker and a midwife, to help a young pregnant woman get out of an unhappy marriage. In doing so, the duo attempt to unravel traditional gender roles and oppressive social customs, and reweave the village social fabric. The other narrative explores a present-day marriage, one that is as much a disintegrating relationship as one …

The Residential Location Choices Of Chabad Households: An Analysis Of Decision Making With Non-Price Constraints, Chasity A. Mcfadden

Honors Theses

Where an individual chooses to live informs many of their economic decisions and may be the single largest economic decision one makes in their lives. Through understanding the way that people choose their residential locations, we are able to better understand the opportunities available to them. Within the Chabad community, there is a large focus on emissary work, which calls Chabad Jews to move outside of large Jewish communities in order to help secular Jews become more religious. There are also certain religious amenities that are necessary to live a Chabad life, such as a local synagogue. So the question …

Acoso Visual: Staring Back At The State And Gender Conformity, Juan Luna

Honors Theses

A semi-autoethnographic piece that uses a radical transfeminist lens to interrogate hegemonic systems of gender and race in the Dominican Republic through the violence that Trans and Gender Nonconforming people face. While focusing on trans violence, this thesis explicitly turns its gaze away from Trans/Gender Nonconforming people and interrogates the state, cisnormativity, and gender conformity. This thesis explores how acoso visual (visual accosting) is a historically informed process that works to border trans/gender nonconformity out of the idea of Dominicanidad. Ultimately, this text reminds Trans/Gender Nonconforming individuals that they are not the reason for the transphobia that they experience, and …

Comunidad, Antigüedad Y Solidaridad Ser Gay En El Tardofranquismo 1969-1978, Andrew Healy

Honors Theses

En una época de represión e intolerancia en España, los homosexuales todavía existían, pero en una manera clandestina. Esta tesis explora cómo esta comunidad clandestina se expresaba durante el tardofranquismo en los años 1969-1978. Con discusiones de los valores del régimen, las representaciones del hombre en relaciones sexuales y sitios históricos que preservan el legado del franquismo, esta tesis ilumina la historia de un grupo oprimido en España.

A través del uso de diferentes fuentes académicas, incluso documentales, películas y artículos, esta tesis discute cómo los homosexuales se comportaban en el franquismo, y su tratamiento bajo un régimen opresivo. Unos …

Québécois, Malgré Nous : Naissance Et Évolution D’Une Identité Québécoise Dans Trois Romans De Réjean Ducharme, Serrat David

Honors Theses

This honors thesis focuses on moments in Réjean Ducharme’s L’Avalée des avalés, L’Hiver de force et Va savoir that are indicative of historical and social questions in Quebec. These novels span a 30 year period of critical developments for Quebec. This analysis, consequently, examines the relationship between Ducharme’s universe and the world in which he lived. It argues that Ducharme’s texts indirectly respond to social questions and discourses, and moreover, that they elaborate a new vision for Quebec and its people.

Le présent mémoire porte sur des instances révélatrices de questions historiques et sociales au Québec dans L’Avalée des …

The “Humanitarian Mystique:” Tracing The Rhetoric And Politics Of Aid In Southeast Asia From The Age Of The Civilizing Mission To The Present, Elizabeth M. Holland

Honors Theses

In contemporary Western popular culture, humanitarian action often serves as the ultimate expression of altruism, compassion, and moral obligation. This research historicizes humanitarianism to understand the assumptions that underlie its affective appeal. Oversimplified narratives of aid work frequently fail to acknowledge the historical and geopolitical context in which this work occurs. I argue that humanitarianism, as both a discursive tool and code of practice, makes visible some legacies of the ‘civilizing mission’ – the ideology used to justify colonialism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. An exercise in comparative history, this research consists of three spatially and temporally …

Propaganda Y Progreso: El Rol Paradójico De La Magia En La España Premoderna, Alexander K. Rhodes

Honors Theses

La magia tiene varios roles diferentes en la literatura española premoderna. A causa de las connotaciones pecaminosas de la magia, frecuentemente se usa para discriminar contra un grupo subalterno, como en la obra de teatro El niño inocente de La Guardia de Lope de Vega. Se ve que esta forma de discriminación difunde y apoya la anxiety of sameness definida por Christina Lee. La anxiety of sameness es el temor de los nobles de ser infiltrados por los no nobles, incluyendo a los judíos, los moriscos y los de la clase baja. Pero, como se ve en esta tesis, la …

Give Me A Choice: Perceptions Of Freedom And The Anti-Vax Movement In Maine, Louisa Goldman

Honors Theses

While vaccination has proven to be an incredibly effective method of disease prevention, the growing ‘anti-vax’ movement threatens the population-level benefits conferred by widespread immunization. Recent findings indicate that anti-vax beliefs are not, as had been previously assumed, necessarily the result of scientific illiteracy but rather, are likely produced by intertwining social and situational contexts. With these considerations in mind, the goal of this study was to identify potential motivations underlying anti-vax behavior by performing a deep examination of anti-vax rhetoric, coupled with demographic and situational analyses. I focused specifically on the anti-vax community in Maine, with a special interest …

"They Shall Be A Kosmos:" Alexander Von Humboldt And The Ecopoetics Of Walt Whitman, Benjamin Theyerl

Honors Theses

Places the naturalist Alexander Von Humboldt's proto-ecological ideas in conversation with Walt Whitman's poetry to show how the poet developed an ecopoetics in conversation with the natural sciences of his time, with specific attention to Von Humboldt's theory of the "kosmos" - by which Whitman's poetic persona self-identified. These recognitions are combined with how Whitman's idealized version of the American poet as a “kosmos” creates a political ecology in Whitman’s work, placing his ecopoetics into environmental discourses that resonate from their origin in the nineteenth century to our present ecological moment today.

Abraham Lincoln, The United States, And Mexico: The Implications Of Memory In A Continental History, Emilie E. Ginn

Honors Theses

This thesis examines the malleability of memory through an analysis of both domestic and international memories of Abraham Lincoln. With a particular focus on the American Civil War Era in a North American continental context, key individuals are identified and their contributions are illuminated. While Abraham Lincoln is remembered for all that he accomplished during this time, others such as Matías Romero, Ulysses S. Grant, and Plácido Vega, also greatly contributed to the development of the relationship between the United States and Mexico.

Additionally, institutional and collective memories of Abraham Lincoln invoke present-day examples of intentional manipulation of these memories …

Le Prix Pour Devenir Médecin Une Analyse Comparative Des Frais De Scolarité Actuels Associés À La Formation Des Médecins En Suisse Et Aux États-Unis, Jack Dillon Scheutzow

Honors Theses

Pour commencer ce travail, nous devons attirer l'attention sur ce qui se passe actuellement dans le monde et qui a bouleversé tant nos vies : l'épidémie meurtrière du coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19). Ce virus, en quelques mois seulement, a provoqué la peur, la panique, et la souffrance des communautés partout dans le monde. Il nous a également montrés que nos systèmes de santé présentent certains défauts, notamment le manque de médecins et de ressources médicales disponibles pour les patients malades. En Suisse et aux États-Unis, spécifiquement, il y a une grave pénurie de médecins, ce qui rend plus difficile pour leurs …

A Twisted Skein Of Desire: Confession, Gaze, And Time In Andre Aciman’S Call Me By Your Name, Anthony Isenhour

Honors Theses

In interacting with others, and particularly in intimate relationships with others, desire becomes a complex emotion entangled with the specific identifications of each person. These complications are also often shaped by social conventions, internal thoughts, and the ability to communicate. In all its narrative structures, themes, and plot points, Andre Aciman’s Call Me by Your Name is framed by one question on this topic, stated in a time of deep conflict by the narrator: “Are ‘being’ and ‘having’ thoroughly accurate verbs in the twisted skein of desire, where having someone’s body to touch and being that someone we’re longing to …

“Smile For Me, Sweetie!”: An Analysis Of Contemporary Gender Based Violence And Discrimination In The Bahamas, Jennifer Munnings

Honors Theses

Women in the Bahamas face various forms of pervasive sexist discrimination and high rates of gender-based violence. However, recent governmental initiatives aimed at addressing gender inequality have not proven effective. The narrow focus on individual reforms like anti-crime measures to curb structural violence highlights a lack of understanding of gender inequality as embedded within social institutions. To interrogate the institutionalized nature of gender inequality in the Bahamas, the present study draws on in-depth interviews with seven Bahamian women’s rights activists to explore the social, cultural, and political explanations for the persistence of gender-based violence and discrimination. Three major themes emerged …

The Long Arm Of Medicine: Creation Of The Turkish Medical Infrastructure, Legitimacy, Governmentality, And The Rockefeller Foundation, Eric Bossert

Honors Theses

During the early Turkish Republic, a goal of the new government was to set up systems that would help develop the country. One of these systems was their medical infrastructure which included medical education, public health, and hospitals. Ever suspicious of foreign investment since the events leading to the decline of the Ottoman Empire, the Turkish government decided to employ the help of the American aid organization, the Rockefeller Foundation because of their seeming lack of imperialistic goals. Turkish government and the Rockefeller Foundation sought to further their aims through cooperation. The Turkish government sought to gain legitimacy for its …

From Libertine To Incel: How The "Manosphere" Has Fostered The Continuation Of Gender Violence In Western Culture, Lauren Ziolkowski

Honors Theses

In this thesis, I examine the similarities between the ideologies of the Restoration libertine and the present-day beta-male, the social and cultural forces that shape those ideologies, and the practices of flirtation and seduction shared by the libertine and beta-male. This thesis addresses the expansion of female agency and power in the mid-eighteenth century and twenty-first century, as well as how this expansion of power threatens the social, cultural, and economic privilege held by the Restoration libertine and beta-male respectively. In the eighteenth century, this expansion of power manifests in the emergence of the bourgeoisie class and the development of …

The Power Of Language: An Analysis Of Language Use And Attitudes In Moroccan Universities, Mikaela K. Thomas

Honors Theses

This study examines the connections between language use and attitudes in Moroccan universities. Morocco is a North African country that is historically multilingual, with communities speaking Moroccan Arabic (Darija), indigenous Amazigh, French, and English, in addition to the Standard Arabic used in government and by the Muslim community. The French Protectorate from 1912 to 1956 ushered in colonial language policies and imposed the French education system that enforced linguistic hierarchies. While the subsequent Arabization period attempted to reestablish the importance of Standard Arabic in Morocco, the policies failed to promote true multilingualism by ignoring the Amazigh and Darija languages. Today, …