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Theses/Dissertations

2020

Rhetoric

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Final Master's Portfolio, Quinn Mcadam Dec 2020

Final Master's Portfolio, Quinn Mcadam

Master of Arts in English Plan II Graduate Projects

This portfolio demonstrates exploration of technical communication through the research lenses of the automotive industry and the beauty industry, as well as through direct experience with both technical editing and technical writing. It exemplifies how technical communication contributes to the everyday lives of people worldwide, and how it can constantly be improved moving forward in everyday situations. With two research essays and two practical projects, this portfolio demonstrates the current climate of technical communication: a balance between academics and practitioners. In a time when technical communication is still new, there is much exploration to be done, and this collection of …

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There And Back Again: An Educator's Journey, Chrysta Wilson Dec 2020

There And Back Again: An Educator's Journey, Chrysta Wilson

Master of Arts in English Plan II Graduate Projects

This portfolio includes two research projects, one seminar paper, and one pedagogical project that demonstrate the author's diverse course experiences and growth as a writer and as an educator in the Professional Writing and Rhetoric specialization.

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"Don't Put An 'Or' Where God Puts An 'And'": Constitutive Rhetoric In Queer Appalachia., Brooke Elizabeth Boling Dec 2020

"Don't Put An 'Or' Where God Puts An 'And'": Constitutive Rhetoric In Queer Appalachia., Brooke Elizabeth Boling

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Appalachians who use the word “queer” to specifically refer to being gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and/or asexual, are regularly faced with negotiating how these parts of their identity can exist simultaneously, as many both within and without the region believe it is impossible to be Appalachian and queer at the same time. Despite rampant homophobia in the region and external narratives suggesting that queer Appalachians do not exist, these folkx have carved out spaces for themselves to assert their identities and create community and belonging through rhetorical actions. Many of these spaces are online, taking place through digital …

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A View From The Frontera: A Hispanic-American Raised In Mexico Examines Cultural Perspectives Of Language In America, Perla M. Lauderdale Dec 2020

A View From The Frontera: A Hispanic-American Raised In Mexico Examines Cultural Perspectives Of Language In America, Perla M. Lauderdale

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis seeks to analyze and understand common social and political perspectives with regard to language in the United States at the beginning of the third decade of the new millenium. Providing supporting data points from my research along the way, I share different anecdotes and my interpretation of their significance. I explain how each of them added to my understanding of common American perceptions about language and its proper use in social and political settings. One of the more pertinent anecdotes described is an encounter with a Hispanic woman that openly discriminated against my use of Spanish at a …

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Incel Rhetoric: Origins Of Digital Misogyny, Virginia Sisemore Nov 2020

Incel Rhetoric: Origins Of Digital Misogyny, Virginia Sisemore

Honors College Theses

In this paper I outline the basic ideological beliefs of incels, which provide insight into the community’s violent tendencies. In addition, because I believe incel communities are more directly to blame for digital misogyny than a larger and more broad group of men, I examine posts from within their community and comments under Anita Sarkeesian’s video “Tropes vs. Women in Video Games” in order to demonstrate that the rhetoric in both online locations is from the same source. Finally, I discuss actions that can be taken to mitigate the online violence perpetrated by the incel community, which will, in turn, …

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Beast-Gods, Bandits, And Beggar-Kings: The Traveler In Political Thought, Nader Sadre Sep 2020

Beast-Gods, Bandits, And Beggar-Kings: The Traveler In Political Thought, Nader Sadre

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this dissertation, I use texts by Plato, Locke, Homer, and Gandhi to explore the political dimension of travel. I argue that travel is a proxy for practices and conditions that exceed “normal” politics. In this capacity, travel reveals what normal politics is, or is assumed to be. Travel marks a boundary of the political realm in a double sense: it may conceal or point to a pre-political source of authority; and it may provide an intimation of new political modes and orders. My analyses suggest that there is no single or consistent relationship between travel and politics. Rather, the …

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Communication In The Ruins: Walker Percy And The Art Of Symbolic Mediation, Justin Bonanno Aug 2020

Communication In The Ruins: Walker Percy And The Art Of Symbolic Mediation, Justin Bonanno

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation proposes to explore the mediating function of the symbol through the work of Walker Percy. In the first chapter, I provide the necessary background for undertaking this project. First, I situate Percy in his historical moment and review key events in his life that helped to shape his philosophy of communication. Second, I sketch out some of the primary coordinates in Percy’s thought. Percy’s hermeneutic of the self requires an understanding of the difference between sign and symbol, dyadic and triadic events, environment and world, and immanence and transcendence. Third, I review some of the key intersections with …

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'Would You Say You Had Sex If...' Rhetorical Meaning-Making Within Intimate Encounters And Their Discourses At The Macro, Meso, And Micro Levels, Megan Orcholski Aug 2020

'Would You Say You Had Sex If...' Rhetorical Meaning-Making Within Intimate Encounters And Their Discourses At The Macro, Meso, And Micro Levels, Megan Orcholski

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation advances a deeper understanding of the rhetoric of intimate encounters by analyzing meaning-making practices at the intersections of sex, sexuality, and sexualized violence at the macro, meso, and micro levels. The object of my analysis is discourse about sex, sexuality, and sexualized violence, but this analysis also has implications on understandings of how corporeal rhetorics, or communicative meaning within bodies, are operating in moments of intimate encounters. Throughout my chapters, I interrogate how normative scripts around sex are constructed, disseminated, and perpetuated, how these normative assumptions impact intimate encounters and their connected public discourses, and how these normative …

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Moving Beyond Grades: A Shift In Assessing First-Year Composition, Matthew Goldman Aug 2020

Moving Beyond Grades: A Shift In Assessing First-Year Composition, Matthew Goldman

English (MA) Theses

In Spring 2020, I conducted an I.R.B. approved study with the students in my English 103: Writing About Writing course. I wanted to determine how students felt about the two grading models—a qualitative-grading system vs a modified form of contract grading that I called a participation-based system—at two separate points in the semester. Early on I gave students a survey gathering data about their past experiences with both models. Prior to enrollment in my course, none had experienced a participation-based classroom, but everyone was familiar and comfortable with grading rubrics. The survey had 21 questions and gauged concepts from the …

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A Maker's Perspective Of Materiality: Observing Material Change Through Legacy Craftsmanship, Maker Intent, And Contemporary Manifestation, Adam Swift Aug 2020

A Maker's Perspective Of Materiality: Observing Material Change Through Legacy Craftsmanship, Maker Intent, And Contemporary Manifestation, Adam Swift

Masters Theses

Simple handmade objects have important stories to tell about the hands that made them and the environments they pass through. This project observes the thinking, materials, and process involved in craft work through the lens of materiality. I wrestle with materiality by presenting a personal making project, in front of L.C. King Mfg. Co., a Tennessee workwear company that maintains century-old manufacturing practices and values. With the interactive – and interdisciplinary – perspective of cultural rhetoric as the guiding theoretical framework, this display of both freshly created (the leather bag project) and progressively experienced (the chore coat) material realities aims …

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Reviving Rhetoric Through Conversation: Feminist Rhetorical Pedagogies For A Deliberative Democracy, Sadie Suzanne Carr Jul 2020

Reviving Rhetoric Through Conversation: Feminist Rhetorical Pedagogies For A Deliberative Democracy, Sadie Suzanne Carr

Theses and Dissertations

Scholars have long discussed the possibilities of a deliberative democracy in which the people of the nation engage in public dialogue and discuss the pressing political, social, and economic issues of the day, in order to encourage political participation (Gripsrud et al. xix). This thesis suggests that in order to achieve something resembling a deliberative democracy, there must be an increase in rhetorical education throughout a student’s schooling in order to foster the skills that young people need to participate in public deliberation once they leave the classroom. In order to achieve these educational goals, this thesis also proposes that …

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Political Culture In The Cities Of The Northern Black Sea Region In The "Long Hellenistic Age", Emyr Dakin Jun 2020

Political Culture In The Cities Of The Northern Black Sea Region In The "Long Hellenistic Age", Emyr Dakin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The purpose of this study is to examine the political culture of the Greek North Pontic cities of Olbia and Chersonesos through a rhetorical analysis of the honorary decrees passed by their respective ekklesiai during the Long Hellenistic Age (third century BCE until the mid-third century CE). The study seeks to achieve two main goals: to examine these decrees to understand the political framework of the two cities; and to understand the relationship between the elite recipients of the honors and the demos that awarded them. This investigation employs evidence from early fourth century BCE until the incorporation of the …

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User Experience As A Rhetorical Medium: User At The Intersection Of Audience, Reader And Actor, Áine Doyle May 2020

User Experience As A Rhetorical Medium: User At The Intersection Of Audience, Reader And Actor, Áine Doyle

English Honors Theses

The goal of this project is to demonstrate how digital interfaces are bodies of visual language that can be “close-read” and interpreted critically, just like any other traditional text; digital user interfaces, like poetry and novels, have form and content that complement and shape the meaning and interpretation of the other. It is meant to encourage academic discussions about digital interfaces to go beyond whether social media is “good” or “bad” to how digital interfaces are structured, why they are structured the way they are, and what effects these structures have on the way they communicate information and content to …

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A Rhetoric And Philosophy Of Gifts, Mary Eberhardinger May 2020

A Rhetoric And Philosophy Of Gifts, Mary Eberhardinger

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This project synthesizes a selected scope of rhetorical and philosophical perspectives of the gift. The research question is what the relationship between gifts and rhetoric might be. In order to approach this question, this project offers a review of related literature on the topic of gifts. It then provides analysis and discussion that contextualize the question. The project finally concludes by offering implications. The implications address why the question concerning the relationship between gifts and rhetoric matters for the larger landscape of international relations.

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Friendship In The Digital Age: Implications From A Philosophy Of Communication Approach, Tiffany Petricini May 2020

Friendship In The Digital Age: Implications From A Philosophy Of Communication Approach, Tiffany Petricini

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Friendship is a central relationship-style that grounds us. Much of the literature on the effects of technology on our relationships, especially friendship, has taken a skeptical approach. The notion of friendship is historically-situated, thus, it requires attention in each era and has prompted questions throughout human history. Our time is no exception. Changing cultures and redefinitions of basic human institutions have led us to our current moment, in which we are experiencing a loud and continuing debate on the effect of technology on our lives. Advancements in science have allowed us to understand our past and present in new ways. …

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Reconciling With Slavery In The United States: An Evolving Narrative, Jamie Phlegar May 2020

Reconciling With Slavery In The United States: An Evolving Narrative, Jamie Phlegar

Masters Theses, 2020-current

This project addresses two strands of inquiry that spring from this issue of evolving race relations in the U.S. First, I examine how Americans talk about the history of slavery in the U.S. What rhetorical strategies are employed when slavery is discussed and/or debated in public history contexts and beyond? Second, I examine talk about the future of race relations in the context of the legacy of slavery. Specifically, I am interested in exploring what rhetorical strategies are employed when discussing the potential for reparations in mainstream arenas.

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Thomas Kent's Paralogic Rhetoric As A Framework For Analyzing Corporate Social Responsibility Discourse, Donald E. Penner May 2020

Thomas Kent's Paralogic Rhetoric As A Framework For Analyzing Corporate Social Responsibility Discourse, Donald E. Penner

English Department Theses

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) scholarship increasingly uses rhetorical theory as a method for analyzing contested meaning between communicants. However, the classical and social constructivist rhetorical theories typically used for analysis do not address the primary cause of contested meaning – relativism. Conversely, such theories often contribute to a dualistic worldview by utilizing internally imagined conceptual schemes for analyzing texts. This thesis proposes Thomas Kent’s paralogic rhetorical theory as an alternative method of analyzing CSR texts, and focuses on three common areas typically utilized in rhetorical analyses of CSR texts: text reception, the rhetorical situation, and genre. Where paradigmatic rhetorical theories …

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The Vietnam Syndrome And Its Effects On The U.S. Public And Foreign And Domestic Policy Decisions During The Post-Vietnam Era Between 1975-1991, Kyle Giovannini May 2020

The Vietnam Syndrome And Its Effects On The U.S. Public And Foreign And Domestic Policy Decisions During The Post-Vietnam Era Between 1975-1991, Kyle Giovannini

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

First, the Vietnam Syndrome had a significant cultural impact on the American public which altered the U.S. public’s collective cultural view of war from an interventionist to an anti-interventionist stance. Naturally, this shift in public perception influenced U.S. presidents’ foreign and domestic policy decisions from President Gerald Ford to President George H.W. Bush. Second, the Vietnam Syndrome’s anti-interventionist effect challenged the established security of containment policy through military intervention, forcing presidents and their administrations to implement different rhetorical approaches and messages to unshackle, in their view, America from the anti-interventionist effects of the Vietnam Syndrome on foreign policy decisions. Third, …

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Emotional Appeals In Nonprofit Advertising: A Rhetorical Analysis Of Print Ads By The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation And The American Cancer Society, Dominique N. A. Harrison May 2020

Emotional Appeals In Nonprofit Advertising: A Rhetorical Analysis Of Print Ads By The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation And The American Cancer Society, Dominique N. A. Harrison

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Emotional appeals are frequently employed in strategic messaging by nonprofit organizations. In this study, I identify instances of emotional appeals in select print adverts of the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation and the American Cancer Society, and use rhetorical analysis to explore how each organization’s tactics are strategic in their appeal to target audiences’ emotions. In doing so, I identify several reoccurring emotional themes—including hope, love, and unity—that engage their target audiences and persuade them to respond to diverse calls-to-action. In order to make these appeals to audience emotion, the adverts employ rhetorical devices such as personification, metaphor, repetition, …

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Sustainable Hope: An Analysis Of The Rhetorical Process Of The Forward Through Ferguson Commission Report, Nicole Ramer Apr 2020

Sustainable Hope: An Analysis Of The Rhetorical Process Of The Forward Through Ferguson Commission Report, Nicole Ramer

Theses

This project focuses on the Forward through Ferguson Report, a commission report written by appointed commissioners after the protests of the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO. While the first chapter of my thesis focuses on the report itself and commission reports as a genre, the second chapter analyzes the most recent report, the State of Police Reform, from an ecological lens. Throughout the project, I kept returning to the question Susan Wells posed in a recent interview with Composition Forum, revisiting one she first asked in her oft-cited 1996 essay: what do we want from public rhetoric …

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Plato's Ban: Why The Poets Are Exiled, Seth J. Gerberding Apr 2020

Plato's Ban: Why The Poets Are Exiled, Seth J. Gerberding

Honors Thesis

This thesis examines Plato’s ban of poetry in the Republic. In particular, I draw a link between Plato’s method for finding the truth, dialectic, and his banishment of the poets. There are three parts to this thesis. First, I analyze dialectic as a process, understanding what the science searches for and how it does so. Second, I analyze poetry and its metaphysical standing and how that influences psychology. Finally, I argue that the design of dialectic has an inherent weakness, a weakness that allows poets and rhetoricians to corrupt former students of dialectic. In Plato’s perfect state, there is no …

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Leveraging Maternal Rhetoric, Space, And Experience: La Leche League's Emergence As A Counterpublic, Jenny Lynn Moore Apr 2020

Leveraging Maternal Rhetoric, Space, And Experience: La Leche League's Emergence As A Counterpublic, Jenny Lynn Moore

English Theses & Dissertations

For over six decades, the international, mother-to-mother breastfeeding support organization La Leche League (LLL) has been helping women breastfeed successfully. LLL was formed at a time when the dominant ideology of scientific motherhood framed mothers as obedient adherents to physicians’ strict guidelines, which encouraged bottle-feeding and discouraged close mother-child bonds. LLL has been credited with challenging scientific motherhood, transforming medical discourse and practices surrounding infant feeding, and prompting the medical professional to accept mothers’ active involvement in decision-making; yet, paradoxically, it has also constrained mothers by reducing women to their maternal biology, discouraging mothers from participating in the public sphere, …

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9/11 Then And Now: How The Performance Of Memorial Rhetoric By Presidents Changes To Construct Heroes, Kristen M. Grafton Mar 2020

9/11 Then And Now: How The Performance Of Memorial Rhetoric By Presidents Changes To Construct Heroes, Kristen M. Grafton

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study is concerned with American presidential rhetoric at the cross-section of hero rhetoric and memorial address. It analyzes presidential memorialization of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. 9/11 is arguably the most significant tragedy in recent American history. The purpose of this study is to identify the type of hero each president since 9/11 has attempted to construct of himself for the public and discuss the rationale behind that hero construction. To complete this objective, I analyze the second 9/11 memorial speech from the presidencies of Bush, Obama, and Trump for hero construction. A close reading examining the …

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Instrumentalization Theory: An Analytical Heuristic For A Heightened Social Awareness Of Machine Learning Algorithms In Social Media, Andrew R. Miller Mar 2020

Instrumentalization Theory: An Analytical Heuristic For A Heightened Social Awareness Of Machine Learning Algorithms In Social Media, Andrew R. Miller

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

New innovations in information management and communication technologies have produced technological assemblages which have radically altered the way people socialize and interact with the world. The most significant and ubiquitous of these technologies is what is colloquially referred to as ‘machine learning.’ Like most, if not all, technologies, machine learning models are neither wholly good nor bad. Their functional ethics are largely determined by the context in which they are employed. However, their ubiquity demands that we develop a heightened social consciousness of the way machine learning simultaneous constrains, manipulates and democratizes social processes. In order to develop better social …

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"The Fiery Furnaces Of Hell": Rhetorical Dynamism In Youngstown, Oh, Joshua M. Rea Mar 2020

"The Fiery Furnaces Of Hell": Rhetorical Dynamism In Youngstown, Oh, Joshua M. Rea

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation seeks to define the theory of rhetorical dynamism and illustrate how this theory can be applied to studies of rhetoric and place. The study builds on current rhetorical scholarship and adds to it with the four characteristics of rhetorical dynamism: that places are rhetorically invented, that they hold rhetorical tensions, that they are fluid and constantly evolving, and that they are active participants in a reciprocal rhetorical process. Rhetorical dynamism is illustrated in two places, Westlake Terrace and Idora Park, each in Youngstown, OH. By building a rhetorical history of each site, the study shows how each place …

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Feminist Theology And The Fantastic In Jewish Poetics And Children's Literature (1960s–Present), Meira S. Levinson Feb 2020

Feminist Theology And The Fantastic In Jewish Poetics And Children's Literature (1960s–Present), Meira S. Levinson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation traces the development of Jewish fantasy rhetoric in post-WWII British and American literature, focusing on three genres: kabbalistic Beat poetry, children’s fantasy, and graphic novels/comics. Despite increasing scholarly attention to all these areas, little work has focused on fantasy rhetoric or issues of gender and sexuality within non-canonical Jewish literature, or on interplays of religion and fantasy in children’s literature. Jewish kabbalistic poetry and children’s fantasy speak to each other in their mutual engagements with the otherworldly, mystical and monstrous, interrogations of gender, and complex portrayals of feminist theological potentialities. I identify and analyze Jewish-hermeneutic themes and methodologies …

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Friends, Barbarians, Future Countrymen: Clientela And Caesar’S De Bello Gallico, J.T. Godfrey Jan 2020

Friends, Barbarians, Future Countrymen: Clientela And Caesar’S De Bello Gallico, J.T. Godfrey

Honors Papers

Imagine a Roman citizen of the 50s BCE unrolling Caesar’s Commentarii de Bello Gallico. They might expect a dramatic tale of barbarians rushing naked against Roman shields with faces painted blue, blonde mustaches adorning their faces, their hair like horses’ manes flowing in the wind. Our Roman would probably believe Gallic society to be even more mysterious than their battle tactics; after all, they counsel with druids, they count by nights, and they believe in a never-ending cycle of life and death. Although some Romans possibly read Posidonius’ account of Gallic society (which dispels some of these prejudices), most would …

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Virtual Agency: A Hermeneutic Examination Of The Network And Actors Within The Composition Classroom, Ronald Dean Straight Jan 2020

Virtual Agency: A Hermeneutic Examination Of The Network And Actors Within The Composition Classroom, Ronald Dean Straight

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Dissertation explores the visible and invisible rhetorical choices made in, around, and through the composition classroom and its community of practice, students, faculty, technologies, staff, and other undiscovered actors, through Actor Network Theory and Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. The discoveries will better situate the impact of identities and actancy within composed, hybrid worlds. Students, society, the world is now collectively connected and able to communicate, acquire knowledge, and interact on a virtual world stage. The exigence for this dissertation's exploration is that Moore, et al. (2016) concluded that students did not make a connection between the technology they have access …

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The Revealing Love Of God: A Systematic, Hermeneutic, And Phenomenological Approach To Thinking Well About The Love Of God, Daniel L. Nelson Jan 2020

The Revealing Love Of God: A Systematic, Hermeneutic, And Phenomenological Approach To Thinking Well About The Love Of God, Daniel L. Nelson

CGU Theses & Dissertations

“The medium is the message:” theological reflections on the idea that God is love. I am proposing that the idea of the self-revelational nature of God’s being functions, among other ways, rhetorically, such that the content of revelation (God’s love) determines the rhetorical mode of its communication (giving orders, inviting, begging, etc.). The three aspects of rhetoric that Kenneth Burke emphasizes in A Rhetoric of Motives—the use of identification, that it is addressed and, as such, is convincing (persuasive)—are examined in terms of revelation. Chapter one seeks to clear the way for what is commonly understood as special revelation by …

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God Of War: Masculinity And Fatherhood Through Procedural Rhetoric, Andrew A. Morgan Jan 2020

God Of War: Masculinity And Fatherhood Through Procedural Rhetoric, Andrew A. Morgan

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

Video games and academia have a long history with one another. Academic researchers have continued to debate the extent to which video games can materialize real world effects. In this thesis, I employ procedural rhetoric and feminist scholarship to analyze the rhetorical power of God of War. I focus on the game’s immersive procedures and the performances of masculinity from Kratos, Atreus, and Baldur. These three characters all perform different masculinities, and their interactions with one another inform the game’s portrayal of masculinity and fatherhood. By engaging in violence and depicting nuanced performances of masculinity, God of War positions the …

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