Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Teaching Theatre History: Re-Directing An Existing Course, Brian Robert Vrtis

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is written to detail the process and results of the theatre history class that I assisted in teaching during the fall semester of 2005. It details the process of formulating the class structure, how the class proceeded, my lecture process, and finally the responses that the students had to the class. The first chapter of this paper goes into the process of getting the class formulated. When Shaun McCracken and I were asked to take over instruction of THEA 307 for the fall during Dr. Barnes' sabbatical, rather than exactly following the process that the class had previously …

Out Of Body, Alessandra Lee Michelle Torres

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores the evolution of Alessandra Torres's work, from her early performances and installations, to her latest work with surrogate bodies, as she challenges the relationship between artist and their creation, body and object, and audience and art. Examining the work of artists such as Cindy Sherman, Rebecca Horn and Marina Abramovic, Torres explores the transformative capabilities of interactive sculpture and live performance. Join Ms. Torres as she transforms herself into everything from a paintbrush to a serpent, in her ongoing exploration of the body's ability to adapt and evolve.

Investigations Into Social Game Theory, Stephen Bryce Harper

Theses and Dissertations

Investigations into Social Game Theory is a document that describes my two-year exploration of the ritual encapsulated in our societal framework. It discusses the thoughts and processes that accompanied the three bodies of work that led to the creation of my final thesis exhibition.

The Enduring Image, Michelle Lieb

Theses and Dissertations

In my work, I have chosen to pursue the antiquated, experimental, and alternative processes of photography. A digital image, a web page, an e-book all point to the current pace of a society concerned with the beauty it can access in a moment of instant gratification. It often has no regard for a process that requires personal discipline to capture a moment, a place, or an idea. I find little enjoyment in the immediate, when I can instead experience what happens when the combination of chemicals, glass, wood, and the environment turn a potential photograph into an inimitable encounter. It …

The Other Side Of The Fence, Benjamin S. Jones

Theses and Dissertations

I pull from what I see in my urban surroundings. There is always a sense of dread fused with optimism that prevails. Is it beautiful? Fragments of low-riders and tricked-out cars become symbols of desire and the glowing red lens of a stop light becomes a Cyclops poised to defend his garden. Candy-coated, blooming, dripping and seductively slick confronts you with the obvious warning: STOP! You could be next… …The grass really is greener on The Other Side of the Fence. At least until winter comes.

Natural Selection, Jeffrey A. Vick

Theses and Dissertations

My thesis work is about imagination. I use the collaborative efforts of the viewer's mind and my sculptures, or specimens, to make associations of real life animals. I feel this engages the viewer and in turn invites them to inspect the work on closer level. This is my ultimate goal in the work, to take hold of the viewer's curiosity and have them examine the work on a closer level.

Through My Eyes, Candace B. Conklin

Theses and Dissertations

I am the one my friends call the creepy one. My art is not pretty or happy. It is an expression of my inner feelings and thoughts. I don't make pretty pictures because I find them void of true emotional substance. I developed my point of view when I photographed my eyes, which have become a consistent theme in my work. Eyes are the window to the soul and the key to my inner emotions. I have since expanded my work to include other images. I continue to seek ways to help my viewers experience my work both emotionally and …

Dirty Laundry, Mona Mullins Williams

Theses and Dissertations

Making art is cathartic for me. Working in a visual medium allows me to communicate ideas and feelings that I would find difficult to express in words. I use a wide variety of traditional and non-traditional materials as symbolic elements in my work. While the pieces are not always pretty, my goal is that they contain an element of irony and humor which helps us laugh at ourselves.

Raubeaux Scientician, Joe W. Grant Iii

Theses and Dissertations

The works contained in "Raubeaux Scientician" are about a triadic relationship between people, science, and art. The obsessions, of individuals and the apparent change brought about by their physical presence guide my artistic research. I am awestruck at the capabilities of the individual to overcome conventional thought and through creative action yield a new vision. Some of the people I am fascinated by put forth theories and inventions that continue to affect myriad aspects of our world today. Among those at the forefront are, Robert Oppenheimer, and Edward Teller. Their contributions to science and mathematics remain almost unmatched. These and …

Gonna Spread The News All Around: Early, African-American Popular Song As Spoken Newspaper, Randall Lawrence Stamper

Theses and Dissertations

Most research into blues music over the past thirty years has examined either how the blues contribute to or reflect African-American identity, or how blues lyrics may be used as windows into African-American culture, values, and attitudes. Scholars have generally relied on more conventional songs about male-female relationships in this research, largely ignoring the subset of topical blues songs that related information about current events. Given the widespread illiteracy among African Americans during the height of the blues' popularity, these topical songs are particularly compelling. To date, however, no one has coupled topical blues together with their consumers' educational attainment …

From The Edge, Leslie Corder Rousseau

Theses and Dissertations

Paintings and drawings are the physical representations of my dialogue with the world around me. Art is how I connect to what is too large, or too vague, or too personally meaningful to express in any other way. Space and its transformation by light and color have always been central to this dialogue. I am particularly intrigued by spatial ambiguity. Space exists for us only in how it relates to us and so, space changes. One viewpoint or state of mind might make space seem freeing, while another makes the same space feel confining. Barriers are sometimes delineated, sometimes obscured. …

The Assistant Director, Stephanie R. Hanna

Theses and Dissertations

My thesis addresses the role of the assistant director within the realm of today's American theatre. I determine who the assistant director is in today's theatre, what qualities they need to possess, and how a director can use an assistant director most effectively. To come to these conclusions, I analyze my experiences as an assistant director and a director over the last four years, as well as conduct interviews with directors and assistant directors currently working in professional and academic.

Little Paintings, Robert William Land

Theses and Dissertations

Little Paintings is a document that describes the creation, influences and process of two films, "Betty Creek" and "New Berlin". The films are personal responses to my experiences growing-up and living in the Southern United States. The Thesis illustrates the influences of painters such as Jimmie Lee Sudduth and Willie Jinks and how their raw painting methods inspire the development of my films using a tactile approach to filmmaking.

The Huacas Of Machu Picchu: Inca Stations For The Communion Between Humanity And Nature, Lee Anne Hurt

Theses and Dissertations

Sacred stones, or huacas, at the ancient Inca city of Machu Picchu integrated human ritual with the surrounding landscape. I argue that huacas defined the relationship between nature and ritual practice by forcing an esoteric choreography which involved specific postures of the participant in order to visually orient humans to significant natural features of the surrounding environment. Inca stonemasons refined the natural form of the huacas so that they mimic the contours of prominent landscape features such as mountain peaks. This dissertation documents 122 huacas at Machu Picchu using maps of the site to record the exact location of each …

Impressions Of Standard Japanese And Osaka Dialect, Stephen Bumstead

Theses : Honours

In various countries there has been much research involving attitudes to standard and non-standard language (for example Giles, Baker and Fielding 1975, Strongman and Woosley 1967, Cheyne 1970), much of which has found a tendency to ascribe speakers of a standard dialect or accent with higher values in status traits such as intelligence, but lower values in solidarity traits such as sincerity, than speakers of a non-standard dialect or accent. The current research investigated and compared the attitudes towards standard Japanese and the Osaka dialect. The participants were 5 males and females born and raised in Tokyo and 5 males …

East O' The Sun And West O' The Moon: The Construction Of National Identity In Norwegian Fashion Photography, Anne-Britt Kjoensburg

Theses : Honours

This exegesis compliments my photographic project which was to produce a body of work that explores Norwegian identity through fashion using myths and iconography to communicate Norwegian-ness, and depicts the Norwegian lifestyle in a surprising and humorous way. My aim has been to find out if there is any distinctive aesthetic approach/style that constructs, defines and reproduces Norwegian identity, and if Norwegian fashion photography is being influenced by the resurgence of interest in Norwegian style. I have looked at how humans use fashion as a technique to construct various identities rather than a mask that covers the self and how …

Misconceptions: Loss And Melancholia In Poetry Of Miscarriage, Stillbirth And Abortion, Donna Yannakis

Theses : Honours

This thesis argues that cultural and discursive attitudes towards miscarriage, stillbirth and abortion attribute maternal blame to these losses and silence the expression of grief over them. It further argues that, following pregnancy loss, this silence and blame, coupled with the veneration and discursive production of motherhood as a woman's biological and psychical destiny, produce 'symptoms' that, according to Freud, are a sign of a pathological melancholia. I suggest, however, that these symptoms - self-reproach and impoverishment of the ego as responses to pregnancy loss, do not necessarily indicate a woman's pathological failure to resolve loss but reflect the social …

Transforming Messiaen : The Application Of Elements Of The Musical Language Of Olivier Messiaen To The Contemporary Jazz Orchestra, Johannes Luebbers

Theses : Honours

The music of Olivier Messiaen is a unique and interesting contribution to the canon of 20^th Century art music, but one that has received little attention from the jazz world. Through a detailed study of his music, this dissertation aims to gain a deeper understanding of Messiaen's musical language and investigate the possibilities of applying that language within the jazz idiom. In addition to a discussion of Messiaen and his music, a detailed analysis of the author's own composition for pipe organ and jazz orchestra, Auguries of Innocence, will explore the results of this application. The complete scores and …

Application Of Binaural Recording In The Video Game Industry, Max Leong

Theses : Honours

The video game industry is one of entertainment technologies' largest growing industries. There are thousands of games in the market covering a variety of different genres. There is also a high level technical sophistication in current games along with the game console that runs it. Games are realistic with astonishingly life like graphics. The backing audio and music tracks are performed by leading orchestras and written by renowned composers. Great technological strides have been made in the areas of graphic and audio design. The end user expects the very best and the video game industry is constantly improving software and …

Applying Principles Of Information Design To Help Parents Accept Babies With Down Syndrome, Anita Eradla

Theses and Dissertations

My creative project is a system of resource materials designed for parents and expecting parents to promote acceptance of babies with Down syndrome. This project is also a study of information architecture and icon development, and an opportunity to study the universal and emotive qualities of an iconic system.

Healing Interior: Using Eastern Design Principles In Hotel Design, Yunju Lee Koh

Theses and Dissertations

The main goal of this thesis is to explore how interior spaces in hotel designs can provide a less stressful environment and promote health and harmony by using Feng Shui Principles. It will first discuss the principles of Feng Shui and general hotel design, and then move on to demonstrate how the application of Feng Shui principles can be used to create a hotel environment that encourages health and harmony in its occupants. This project will demonstrate principles that not only can be applied to hotel space, but also can be practiced in any other interior space. This thesis, therefore, …

Duchamp And Pragmatics, Kiam Loong Daniel Lai

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

There is a correspondence between the mechanism of visual communication in Duchamp’s art and the principles of pragmatics in linguistics. The process from Duchamp’s intended meaning encoded in his art to the correct interpretation on the part of the addressee is similar to the process in which intended meaning encoded in speech being accurately decoded by the addressee. This is because the correct interpretation in both processes involves inferences. Be it language or art, to fully understand the intended meaning of a statement, an addressee must first understand the natural meaning known as entailment; and subsequently uncover the unnatural, but …

[Introduction To] Poverty And Progress In The U.S. South Since 1920, Suzanne W. Jones, Mark Newman

Bookshelf

Poverty, disease, and illiteracy had long bedeviled the U.S. South, even before the agricultural depression of the 1920s became subsumed within the Great Depression of the 1930s. The essays collected in this volume examine a variety of responses to economic depression and poverty. They recount specific battles for civil, educational, and labor rights, and explore the challenges and alternatives to the corporate South in the post World War II agribusiness era. Scholars from both the U.S. and Europe assess how far the South has come in the last century, what forces (from the Sears Roebuck Catalog to the Civil Rights …

[Introduction To] Epic Revisionism: Russian History And Literature As Stalinist Propaganda, David Brandenberger, Kevin M. F. Platt

Bookshelf

Focusing on a number of historical and literary personalities who were regarded with disdain in the aftermath of the 1917 revolution - figures such as Peter the Great, Ivan the Terrible, Alexander Pushkin, Leo Tolstoy, and Mikhail Lermontov - "Epic Revisionism" tells the fascinating story of these individuals' return to canonical status during the darkest days of the Stalin era. An inherently interdisciplinary project, "Epic Revisionism" features pieces on literary and cultural history, film, opera, and theater. It pairs scholarly essays with selections from Stalin-era primary sources - newspaper articles, unpublished archival documents, short stories - to provide students and …

[Introduction To] Meat Matters: Butchers, Politics, And Market Culture In Eighteenth-Century Paris, Sydney Watts

Bookshelf

In eighteenth century Paris, municipal authorities, guild officers, merchant butchers, stall workers, and tripe dealers pledged to provide a steady supply of healthful meat to urban elites and the working poor. Meat Matters considers the formation of the butcher guild and family firms, debates over royal policy and regulation, and the burgeoning role of consumerism and public health. The production and consumption of meat becomes a window on important aspects of eighteenth-century culture, society, and politics, on class relations, and on economic change. Watts's examination of eighteenth-century market culture reveals why meat mattered to Parisians, as onetime subjects became citizens. …

[Introduction To] Her Best Shot: Women And Guns In America, Laura Browder

Bookshelf

The gun-toting woman holds enormous symbolic significance in American culture. For over two centuries, women who pick up guns have disrupted the popular association of guns and masculinity, spurring debates about women's capabilities for violence as well as their capacity for full citizenship. In Her Best Shot, Laura Browder examines the relationship between women and guns and the ways in which the figure of the armed woman has served as a lightning rod for cultural issues.

Utilizing autobiographies, advertising, journalism, novels, and political tracts, among other sources, Browder traces appearances of the armed woman across a chronological spectrum from …

[Introduction To] Crucible Of The Civil War: Virginia From Secession To Commemoration, Edward L. Ayers, Gary W. Gallagher, Andrew J. Torget

Bookshelf

Crucible of the Civil War offers an illuminating portrait of the state’s wartime economic, political, and social institutions. Weighing in on contentious issues within established scholarship while also breaking ground in areas long neglected by scholars, the contributors examine such concerns as the war’s effect on slavery in the state, the wartime intersection of race and religion, and the development of Confederate social networks. They also shed light on topics long disputed by historians, such as Virginia’s decision to secede from the Union, the development of Confederate nationalism, and how Virginians chose to remember the war after its close.

Chw Productions: A Study To Determine Market Potential For Missionary Videos, Shalayne Packer, Francisco Pascual, Jed Lloyd

Student Works

At the request of the CHW Productions, Shalayne Packer, Jed Lloyd, and Francisco Pascual, students of the Marriott School of Management located at Brigham Young University, were commissioned to determine the market potential for LDS missionary videos. PPL Consulting is comprised of Shalayne Packer, Francisco Pascual and Jed Lloyd.

Pilgrimage Of Dignity : Pope John Paul Ii's June 1979 Visit To Poland, Przemyslaw P. Polaski

Honors Theses

Pope John Paul II's first visit to Poland took place in June of 1979. The pilgrimage was arguably one of the most important trips of his pontificate. Within a matter of days the Pope was able to transform Polish society, inspire hope, and ignite a sense of collective dignity. Through a series of rhetorically powerful speeches the pilgrim awakened the oppressed nation and questioned the foundations of Communist authority to rule. Talking about the inalienable rights of man, the Pope stirred up a longing for freedom that matured with the birth of the Solidarity Movement in 1980. His epical journey …

Crum Creek Spirituality: Earth As A Living Sacrament, Mark I. Wallace

Religion Faculty Works

No abstract provided.