Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Visions For The Viewer: The Influence Of Two Unique Easel Paintings On The Late Murals Of Pierre Puvis De Chavannes, Geoffrey Neil David Thomas

Theses and Dissertations

While certainly not lost to the history of art, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes has never enjoyed the status of the titans of the modern canon who openly expressed their indebtedness to him. Georges Seurat, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, and so many other artists known to the general public the world over paid tribute to the artist once dubbed “The Painter of France” at a banquet held in his honor to coincide with a retrospective exhibition on the occasion of his seventieth birthday.

Interestingly enough, defenders of the old, academic guard, such as William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Alexandre Cabanel, and Jean-Léon Gérôme …

The Popular Education Question In Antebellum South Carolina, 1800-1860, Brian A. Robinson

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation reviews the struggle for popular education in Antebellum South Carolina. It contends that the failure of popular education in South Carolina was not a foregone conclusion nor was it mistake by school administration or state leaders, but instead, the failure to provide education for the white majority was the result of an intended goal. This project concludes that South Carolina remained without a system of public schools for the majority of citizens because those who opposed general education firmly believed popular education held the seeds of revolution while ignorance the better tool to perpetuate the status quo.

Chapter …

The Attitudes And Perceptions Of Undergraduate Non-Keyboard Music Majors Toward The Usage Of Functional Keyboard Harmony In The Group Piano Curriculum At The University Of South Carolina School Of Music, Katherine A. Chandler

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine the attitudes and perceptions of undergraduate non-keyboard music majors toward functional keyboard harmony in the group piano curriculum at the University of South Carolina School of Music. Sixty-five (65) undergraduate music majors who were enrolled in music degrees in the spring 2018 semester at the University of South Carolina School of Music completed the survey, for an 82% completion rate. The questionnaire had six primary focuses: (1) demographic data and general information of undergraduate non-keyboard music students, (2) students‟ previous music education experiences, (3) students‟ previous harmony education experiences and perceived comprehension …

The Effects Of Learning By Rote With La-Based Minor Solmization On Memory Retention For Pre-College Piano Students, Duong Khuc

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to measure the accuracy and memorized outcome of subjects’ performance who learned a piano piece by rote using la-based minor solmization compared to subjects who learned the identical piece using an intervallic reading approach with identified landmark notes. Ten pre-college piano students above nine years of age at the intermediate level and above participated in this quantitative quasi-experimental study. Five subjects, n=5, received the independent treatment (rote with la-based minor solmization), and the other five subjects, n=5, received the dependent treatment (intervallic reading approach with identified landmark notes). During the timespan of a three-week …

Aporetic Rhetoric: The Use Of Uncertainty In Healthcare Contexts, Adam S. Lerner

Theses and Dissertations

This project examines how uncertainty is rhetorically deployed in healthcare contexts. Investigating four major healthcare contexts, I study how different forms of uncertainty produce distinct rhetorical effects and consequences. In Chapter 1, I explore how the haphazard use of Agent Orange during the Vietnam war makes it difficult for veterans to prove their exposure to this deadly chemical. In Chapter 2, I examine the rhetorical strategies of mental illness skeptics and denialists, looking at how each deploys uncertainty in different and related ways. In Chapter 3, I investigate the intersection between design, emotion, and uncertainty as it appears in the …

“Be Of Knightly Countenance”: Masculine Violence And Managing Affect In Late Medieval Alliterative Poetry And Batman: Under The Red Hood, Lisa D. Camp

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is concerned with the legacy of cultural representations of masculine violence as it manifests in late medieval alliterative poetry and contemporary superhero comics, and the ways in which those manifestations are inflected by a particular set of images, motifs, and cultural underpinnings which transcend sociohistorical boundaries and that illuminate the ways culture sanctions certain forms of masculine violence. To understand how, as Patricia Ingham suggests in Sovereign Fantasies: Arthurian Romance and the Making of Britain, imagination infuses history towards particular “regime[s] of truth,” I argue that late fourteenth century Arthurian alliterative poetry and contemporary superhero comics instruct a …

Solo Violin Works Influenced By Romanian Lăutari Music, Essena Liah Setaro

Theses and Dissertations

In Romania, professional Roma (Gypsy) musicians called lăutari developed a colorful and unique musical tradition. This study explores the music of the lăutari and its influence on five works for unaccompanied violin: George Enescu’s recently discovered Airs dans le genre Roumain (1926) and “Le Ménétrier” from his Impressions d’enfance (1940), Eugène Ysaÿe’s Sonata No. 3 “Ballade” (1923), Helen Bowater’s Lautari (2003), and Roxanna Panufnik’s new composition Hora Bessarabia (2016).

Drawing from written sources, audio and video recordings, and transcriptions, this study first investigates the history, influences, and unique characteristics of the lăutari tradition and approach to violin playing. After discussing …

Writing With Risk: Dangerous Discourses And Event-Based Pedagogies, Ben Harley

Theses and Dissertations

“Writing with Risk: Dangerous Discourses and Event-Based Pedagogies,” responds to the pedagogical work of scholars such as Susan Wells, Nancy Welch, and Linda Flower by arguing that the risks associated with public writing pedagogies stem from the transformative nature of the rhetorical event that implicates and rearticulates actors through co-production, subverting their assumed autonomy. I argue that each of the three primary vantages of publics scholarship is particularly vulnerable to a certain type of risk aligned to a specific element of the rhetorical situation: idealist scholarship to unintended consequences in which the meaning of the text transforms, activist scholarship to …

A Complete History Of Rico Reeds, Neal Postma

Theses and Dissertations

Rico is a household name among saxophonists and clarinetists around the world. Since the company’s inception, they have moved from importing several hundred reeds for Frank di Michele to sell to his friends to being among the largest manufacturers in the industry. This document traces the history of the company from its inception in 1928 to the date of its purchase by J. D’Addario & Co. in 2004. Through interviews, document reviews, and data gathering, this document explores the history of the company, the owners and managers, the products, and the events that led to D’Addario’s acquisition.

Translating Slavery As Told To My Daughter, Victoria L.A. Carvelli

Theses and Dissertations

I am translating an excerpt of the work L’esclavage raconté à ma fille, by the French Guianese politician Christiane Taubira. A former Minister of Justice of France, Taubira is famous for her legislative work in recognizing slavery as a crime against humanity and instituting national educational efforts on the subject. The book is an exposition of the history of slavery, set in a storytelling, question-and-answer style, which has the merit of bringing a conversational and accessible aspect to a difficult topic.

I chose this work at the recommendation of one of my professors, and when I was unable to find …

A Conductor’S Guide To Camille Saint-Saëns’S Messe De Requiem Op. 54, Thomas R. Matrone

Theses and Dissertations

Described as the French Mendelssohn, Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921) was acclaimed as the epitome of French genius. He played a unique role in transforming French musical taste from grand opera to the classical symphony and led the charge as the first composer to blend resources of French folk song and music from the Arab world into the classical tradition. However, many of Saint-Saëns’s choral works have been lost in obscurity. One such composition has emerged, the Messe de Requiem. The Messe de Requiem represents Saint-Saëns’s deep integrity and commitment to composition through traditional form and style. This study evaluates the composer’s …

Bodies In Play: Female Athleticism In Nineteenth-Century Literature, Jillian Weber

Theses and Dissertations

My dissertation explores depictions of athletic female characters in nineteenth-century American literature. I argue that there is a rich literary tradition of athletic women, whose origin I date to the 1840s, that has not been explored. To date, scholars have considered athletic women in literature anomalies, a case of a gender-bending female found in a single text, but not part of a longer genealogy of this character type. By examining athletic women over a period of decades and across several genres of American literature we see how this character type has been shaped by authors and culture alike. I illustrate …

The Imagination In Reason: Reframing The Systematic Core Of Idealism In Kant And Hegel, Gerad Gentry

Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, I argue that the point of transition between Kant and the Idealists is most aptly identified and comprehended when we bring into view a careful understanding of Kant’s principle of the free lawfulness of the Imagination. I argue that for Hegel, it was this principle that constituted Kant’s “greatest service to philosophy.” I contend that we are right to agree with Hegel that this principle is fundamental to Kant’s critical Idealism and is an important theoretical principle in its own right. More than this, though, Hegel adopts, modifies, and expands this notion and thereby turns it into …

A Divisive Community: Race, Nation, And Loyalty In Santo Domingo, 1822 – 1844, Antony Wayne Keane-Dawes

Theses and Dissertations

On 8 February 1822, Haitian President Jean-Pierre Boyer entered Santo Domingo and ended the short-lived experiment of a moderate republic and the triumph of a popular and radical vision of nationhood. For the next two decades, this unified Haitian Republic faced the scrutiny of Spanish, French, and British slave empires, fueled by the accounts and reports of those Dominicans who rejected this change in events. Using government correspondences, reports, pamphlets, and proclamations, this study argues that the Haitian Unification affected Dominican political allegiances and drove white elites to support Spanish monarchy in contrast to those in Santo Domingo who supported …

Memorias Impensables: La Violencia, La Censura Y Las Verdades De Lurgio Gavilán En Memorias De Un Soldado Desconocido, Fritz Stefan Culp

Theses and Dissertations

The present investigation embarks in previous and current battles for power to control narratives that influence individual and collective memory. As it considers the content of Lurgio Gavilán Sanchez’s autobiography Memorias de un soldado desconocido (When rains became flood), it reviews the methods used to silence counter hegemonic narratives and the formulation of official narratives which determine discourse on political violence – especially, which events are consigned to memory and which are pushed towards oblivion. Both memoirs and physical places of memory are placed in dialog with Michel de Certeau’s theory of historiography and anthropologist Michel-Rolph Trouillot’s ideas regarding the …

Tertian Relationships In Three Choral Selections By Dan Forrest: A Conductor’S Analysis, Lindsey Cope

Theses and Dissertations

Dan Forrest is a composer who has gained attention in the choral world. His compositions like Venite Adoremus, Abide, and arrangements like A Mighty Fortress is Our God exhibit representative characteristics of his compositional voice. This document will serve choral conductors as a resource for understanding the compositional aspects of Forrest’s music and application for rehearsing his music. By examining three of his compositions of contrasting styles, this study will illuminate a variety of his compositional traits and examine their use in the three selections. Tertian relationships are pervasive in Forrest’s music in the formal designs, harmonic structure, and key …

The Tie That Binds: The History, Conductors, And Music Of The Mystic Area Ecumenical Choir Festival, Mark Daniel Merritt

Theses and Dissertations

The Mystic Area Ecumenical Choir Festival, which began in 1968, is now in its 50th year. The festival is sponsored each year by the Mystic Area Ecumenical Council. The festival combines multi-generational choirs from numerous churches in and around the coastal villages of Noank and Mystic in Connecticut. Numerous nationally recognized choral directors, composers, and clinicians have been invited to guest conduct the choirs of the festival. For festival milestones, new choral pieces are commissioned.

This research project explores the history of church choirs in New England, beginning with mandated singing of metrical psalms, the singing schools which started in …

Re-Evaluating “Authenticity” In Holocaust Literature – Memory And Trauma In Recent Holocaust Fiction, Christos Giantsidis

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis provides a structural and para-textual analysis of recent Holocaust fiction. Challenging the assumption of the superiority of “authentic” representations of the psychological effects of this historic event, I will highlight the cultural and pedagogical effects of fictionalized accounts of the Holocaust. A short analysis of the terms “memory,” “trauma,” and “history” as understood in the research field of Holocaust studies, will be substantial in debunking the failures of memory as perfect ways to recreate historical “truths.” Theories about trauma and memory by scholars such as Cathy Caruth and Dominick LaCapra will serve as reference points in the validation …

The Religious And Ideological Freedom Of Teachers In The English Legal Framework: Is The Balance Between Collective And Individual Rights Appropriate?, Javier Garcia Oliva, Diana Ginn

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

How does the current legal framework safeguard the rights of teachers to religious and ideological freedom, whilst at the same time protecting the collective rights of school communities to provide an educational context aligned to identified values and principles? How does the law seek to find a resolution or accommodation where there is a clear conflict?

Simple Goodness And Ethical Theory, Sarah Marie Babbitt

Dissertations

This work is an examination of the concept of simple goodness and its role in ethicaltheory. I argue on pragmatic and epistemic grounds that simple goodness (SG), commonly referred to as "good simpliciter," is problematic for ethical theory and for ethical discourse generally. I begin by defining SG, focusing on the original account developed by G.E. Moore, and I argue that it is an intrinsic value in several senses. I review the arguments of prominent critics of SG, namely Peter Geach, Judith Jarvis Thomson, and Richard Kraut, who focus on the logical and metaphysical puzzles inherent to the concept of …

Hannah Arendt's Political Action: A Dialectic Of Expression And Deliberation, Paul Richard Leisen

Dissertations

Commentators disagree about what Hannah Arendt means by political action. One interpretation emphasizes that political action is rational deliberation, another interpretation identifies political action with expressiveness or the performative expression of personal virtuosity and greatness. Both interpretations fall short. The deliberative model captures the aspect of constituting political power through collective agreement based on reason-giving (combining a plurality into a polity). The expressive model captures the aspect of natality, originality, spontaneity, and freedom from conventional ways of reasoning. The deliberative and expressive models of Hannah Arendt's political action can be reconciled contrary to a claim that her theory is incoherent. …

Hic Rhodus, Hic Salta! Three Conceptions Of The Modern Inequality Paradox, Nicoletta Christina Montaner

Dissertations

The modern epoch is characterized by a paradoxical form of social inequality in which poverty expands alongside the unprecedented growth in socially-produced wealth. Any one conception of this dynamic stakes a claim within the classical liberal problematic, in which the central political challenge is the negotiation of individual interests with those of the social whole. Part one of this work analyzes three influential conceptions of the inequality paradox in the history of social thought, those of G.W.F. Hegel, Karl Marx, and John Maynard Keynes, each encompassing a perspective on the nation-state and its relationship to the institutions of economic intercourse. …

The Concept Of Matter In Kant's Transcendental Idealism, Kyoungnam Park

Dissertations

I argue that in addition to having a constitutive conception of matter which can be determinately represented in terms of our spatiotemporal intuitions, Kant has a regulative conception of matter which cannot be perceived as having a spatiotemporal magnitude. Although Kant restricts the scope of our knowledge to empirical objects which can be determinately represented in terms of spatiotemporal magnitudes, he also implicitly introduces a regulative conception of matter as a metaphysical principle which grounds the material features of the empirical world. I investigate this metaphysical conception of matter which is operating in Kant's transcendental idealism in terms of how …

Theology And The City In Africa: The Significance Of Contemporary African Urban Experience For Theological Reflection, Dominic Fungai Tomuseni

Dissertations

In African theology, experience is the leading source for theological reflection, ahead of scripture and Tradition. Since the last quarter of the 19th Century, colonialism has shaped African experience such that today, it is a major factor in theological reflections and other intellectual enterprises from the continent. Much African theology understands contemporary African experience as one of disruption of a "true" or pre-colonial African experience by European colonial forces. Hence, Contemporary African Theology has been about recognition and recovery of pre-colonial African experience or rehabilitation of Africa from effects of colonialism. However, such a view of colonial experience excludes and …

Ecospatial Orientation And American Literature, Lowell Wyse

Dissertations

Place is complex, and it undergirds and influences our fictional and nonfictional narratives in ways we often fail to recognize. In this dissertation, Lowell Wyse argues for a more holistic understanding of place's role in literature while asking what it means to read environmentally€”spatially, ecologically, and historically. Drawing from ecocriticism, which emphasizes the biological world, and geocriticism, which privileges the spatial, Wyse proposes a hybrid "ecospatial" criticism, with a particular emphasis on the role of maps in reading for place. With individual chapters on the nonfiction of William Least Heat-Moon, John Steinbeck's Salinas Valley fiction, Richard Wright's Native Son, and …

New Day Films: Collective Aesthetics And The Collection, Elizabeth Coffman, Erica Stein

School of Communication: Faculty Publications and Other Works

New Day Films was founded in 1972 - on the cusp of sweeping changes in documentary and feminist filmmaking practice - by four documentarists who were unable to gain distribution in the bottleneck of the New York nonfic­tion filmmaking scene (Figure 1). Despite these challenges, their films abot1t the everyday texture of women's lives were in demand with audiences as the women's movement grew across the country.' Today, New Day is one of the most financially stable nontheatrical distribution collectives in North America, boasting more than 165 members and $1rn in yearly revenues.2 Films distrib­uted by the collective have been …

Paul Ibell: Tennessee Williams, Verna Foster

Department of Fine & Performing Arts: Faculty Publications and Other Works

A review of Paul Ibell's Tennessee Williams, written by Verna Foster.

The Gender Politics Of Spectacle In Staging Sarah Ruhl's Adaptation Of Virginia Woolf's Orlando And Athe 2018: Theatres Of Revolution, Ann M. Shanahan

Department of Fine & Performing Arts: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Latina/O Conversion And Miracle-Seeking At A Buddhist Temple, Stephen M. Cherry, Kemal Budak, Aida I. Ramos

Faculty Publications - Department of Sociology

The growing diversification of the US Latino religious’ experiences calls for scholarly attention beyond Protestant or Catholic categories. This study begins to answer this call. Using interview data with 26 Latinos collected over 2 years of observation at the True Lama Meditation Center (TLMC) in Houston, Texas, we describe how Latinos who convert to Buddhism or actively attend the temple while also continuing to attend Christian services (both Catholic and Protestant) see themselves and understand their religious identities and practices. We then explore the reasons for their conversion or changes in religious identities and practices through various theoretical lens. Although …

Anthony Bukoski - An Outpost Of Polishness, John A. Merchant

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Isolated both geographically and psychologically, the Polish American writer Anthony Bukoski in his five collections of stories, Twelve Below Zero (1986, 2008), Children of Strangers (1993), Polonaise (1999), Time Between Trains (2003), and North of the Port (2008), as well as a collection of reissued stories Head of the Lakes (2018), assumes a variety of interrelated roles - chronicler, cultural archeologist, coastal guardsman, and spokesman - for the dwindling Polish community in his hometown of Superior , Wisconsin. Bukoski's stories capture the distinct relationship between people and place in Superior, situated as it is the periphery of American life in …