Arts and Humanities Commons^™

A Curious Companion: Care, Curiosity, And Companion Species In The Complete Adventures Of Curious George, Charlotte Brooks '26

Honor Scholar Theses

This thesis examines the Curious George series through Donna Haraway’s companion species framework in order to analyze how narratives of care, curiosity, and goodness structure human–animal relationships within the stories. Focusing on the first seven books written and illustrated by H. A. Rey and Margret Rey, as compiled in The Complete Adventures of Curious George (2001), the project uses close textual and visual analysis to examine how George’s curiosity repeatedly generates disruption that is managed through intervention, discipline, and forgiveness by human authority figures, particularly the man with the yellow hat. Drawing on Haraway’s concepts of companion species, naturecultures, and …

Cultivating Empathy Through Exhibit Design To Engage Students In The Ai And Handheld Tech Era - Three Case Studies, Angela R. Whitlock

The Primary Source

This article examines how exhibition environments can foster empathy, participation, and meaningful connection among student visitors within an increasingly digital and technologically mediated cultural landscape. Through a comparative multi-site case study, it analyzes three exhibition environments that engage students through immersive design, participatory technology, and interpretive framing: the African American Military History Museum in Hattiesburg, Mississippi; the Ulysses S. Grant exhibit space within Mitchell Memorial Library at Mississippi State University in Starkville, Mississippi; and the in-progress redesign of the Southern Literary Trail exhibit, also located within Mitchell Memorial Library and scheduled for completion within the next year. While each site …

Collaborative Piano Recital: April 7, 2026, Illinois State University School Of Music

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and forty-fourth program of the 2025-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 7, 2026

Tuesday Evening

7:30 p.m.

Spring 2026 Recital The Slide Collection: April 6, 2026, Illinois State University School Of Music

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and forty-third program of the 2025-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 6, 2026

Monday Evening

7:30 p.m.

Mark Stevens, Mark Stevens

St. Mary's University School of Law

Mark Stevens discusses his time as a law student at St. Mary’s University School of Law as well as his early legal career as a criminal defense attorney. He explains how he helped create the Criminal Justice Clinic and details memorable cases from his time as a supervising attorney there. Mark also discusses his teaching philosophy and how the clinic works with the community.

Performance Forum - April 3, 2026, Betania Canas, Sheng Yuan Kuan, Brooke Gunter, Ana-Maria Uzunova, Charlotte Lohmann, Maria Savelyeva, Diego Suarez, Emma Joyce, Li Yang Liu, Julia Jacobsen, Anttuan Rios Pelaez, Hanting Peng

Performance Forum

No abstract provided.

Lanthorn, Vol. 60, No. 14, April 6, 2026, Grand Valley State University

Volume 60, August 4, 2025 – current

Lanthorn is Grand Valley State's student newspaper, published from 1968 to the present.

Lexical Selection And New Word Formation In Apex Legends, Genevieve Dickerson

SPARK Symposium Presentations

This research observes the use of language within FPS gaming. Data was collected by solo queuing into the battle royale FPS, Apex Legends, and analyzing the way the player group develops different verbiage to meet the communication needs of the game. Four forms of word-formation mechanisms were observed: compounding (hitbox), borrowing (heaven), noun-verb conversion (spawn), and new-word formation (int-ing). This work supports the hypothesis that the lexical formations which are most-opted for within these games result from noun-verb conversion, due to the fact that these formations are typically monosyllabic and thus more efficient within time-sensitive gameplay. This research explores …

Preliminary Sonification Of Enso Using Traditional Javanese Gamelan Scales, Sandy Hs Herho, Rusmawan Suwarman, Nurjanna J. Trilaksono, Iwan P. Anwar, Faiz R. Fajary

Northeast Journal of Complex Systems (NEJCS)

Sonification—the mapping of data to non-speech audio—offers an underexplored channel for representing complex dynamical systems. We treat El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), a canonical example of low-dimensional climate chaos, as a test case for culturally-situated sonification evaluated through complex systems diagnostics. Using parameter-mapping sonification of the Niño 3.4 sea surface temperature anomaly index (1870–2024), we encode ENSO variability into two traditional Javanese gamelan pentatonic systems (pelog and slendro) across four composition strategies, then analyze the resulting audio as trajectories in a two- dimensional acoustic phase space. Recurrence-based diagnostics, convex hull ge- ometry, and coupling analysis reveal that the sonification …

Entiscum Yrfe Ealdniflunga: Meter And Poetic Style In Tolkien’S Old English Attila, Galen Miller-Atkins

Journal of Tolkien Research

Tolkien famously wrote several poems in Old English and Gothic; however, these remain understudied for their philological and poetic qualities relative to his modern English poetic corpus. In the Old English Poem of Attila Tolkien adapts the Old Norse poem Atlakviða into Old English. This essay analyzes the meter and poetic techniques in Old English Poem of Attila, especially in relation to the closely related, Eddic poem Atlakviða. The Old English Poem of Attila exhibits verse patterns and vocabulary from the Old Norse original, but it is firmly rooted in the Old English poetic tradition. Tolkien deliberately blends …

Global Sounds, Department Of Music, University Of Richmond

Music Department Concert Programs

No abstract provided.

Senior Recital: Carson Mullins, Oboe; April 4, 2026, Carson Mullins, Lu Witzig

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and thirty-eighth program of the 2025-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 4, 2026

Saturday Afternoon

12:30 p.m.

Senior Recital: Ya'natika Morgan, Soprano; April 4, 2026, Ya'natika Morgan, Olesia Pupina

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and forty-second program of the 2025-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 4, 2026

Saturday Evening

9:00 p.m.

Bass Studio Recital: April 4, 2026, Illinois State University School Of Music

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and sixty-fifth program of the 2025-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 4, 2026

Saturday Afternoon

12:00 p.m.

Sophomore Recital: Thomas Jamero, Clarinet; April 4, 2026, Thomas Jamero, Momoko Gresham

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and forty-first program of the 2025-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 4, 2026

Saturday Evening

7:30 p.m.

The Banjo: A Dive Into The Creation And Rise Of Bluegrass’S Favorite Instrument, Hans E. Deaton

SACAD: Scholarly Activities

This study examines the creation and development of the banjo and its cultural transformation from its West African origins to its role in modern American music. The banjo originated from instruments native to West Africa and was brought to the Americas through the transatlantic slave trade, where it evolved within enslaved African communities. It was later performed by 19th-century American minstrels, leading to its widespread adoption by the Appalachian South. In the 20th century, the banjo became a defining instrument in bluegrass music, shaped by performers such as Bill Monroe and Earl Scruggs. Today, the banjo maintains a lasting influence …

Entwurzelt, Melanie Fischer

Theses and Dissertations

Entwurzelt (Uprooted) is an installation that explores the emotional landscape of displacement-trauma, grief, and the search for belonging in the aftermath of war and unrest. The vessels in this installation evoke the presence of a forest--each one a symbolic tree, rooted in memory and shaped by personal and collective histories. Being torn from the familiar means leaving behind everything except memories and carrying a void that may never be fully filled. Yet, in unfamiliar places, fragments of comfort can be found--echoes of what once was. For me, the forest is more than a memory--it is a bridge between past and …

Opium Of The Masses: An Analysis Of Archeobotanical Research In The City Of Tábor, Czechia And How It Potentially Influenced Forms Of Radical Hussism, Sasha Gladding

Undergraduate University Honors Capstones

Opium of the Masses performs in depth analysis of the Hussite Wars–a time period lasting from 1419 to 1436, Jan Hus, Hussite factionalism, and archeobotany. This analysis proposes that there are numerous possible contributing factors to the development of the radical Hussite teachings and ways of life. The instability of the Catholic hierarchy and the dissenting teachings of Jan Hus also likely were contributors to the development of the unique sociopolitical and spiritual practices of the radical Hussites. It is also possible that the Hussite factions residing in the Czech (then Bohemian) town of Tábor utilized opium as an entheogen …

Convocation Recital: April 3, 2026, Illinois State University School Of Music

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and thirty-fourth program of the 225-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 3, 2026

Friday Afternoon

1:00 p.m.

Senior Recital: Stacy Schroeder, Clarinet; April 3, 2026, Stacy Schroeder, Thaddeus Spencer, Ryan Rubio, Kaden Filson, Momoko Gresham

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and thirty-seventh program of the 2025-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 3, 2026

Friday Evening

9:00 p.m.

Senior Recital: Charlie Machamer, Jazz Piano; April 3, 2026, Charlie Machamer, Darius Botley, Diego Martinez, Jameel Stephens

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and thirty-sixth program of the 2025-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 3, 2026

Friday Evening

7:30 p.m.

Senior Recital: Brandon Campos, Cello; April 3, 2026, Brandon Campos, Zeph Mussman

School of Music Programs

This is the one hundred and thirty-fifth program of the 2025-2026 season.

Kemp Recital Hall

April 3, 2026

Friday Evening

6:00 p.m.

The Two Lives Of Chuck Norris, Ben Pettis

Rhetoric and Communication Studies Faculty Publications

“Chuck Norris doesn’t do push-ups. He simply pushes the world down.”

“Chuck Norris counted to infinity – twice.”

“Chuck Norris once strangled someone – with a cordless phone”

In the late 2000s and early 2010s, Chuck Norris, the 1980s action star, became a tongue-in-cheek model of toughness and masculinity in viral internet memes known as “Chuck Norris Facts.”

Fallow Ground, Eli Kerns

Theses and Dissertations

Fallow Ground refers to the agricultural practice of intentionally leaving a field unseeded for a year or more in order to restore fertility and interrupt cycles of depletion. Although fallowing is a beneficial and necessary practice, the term has also come to signify waste or a lack of productivity. This double meaning is central to the work, reflecting a central contradiction: that withdrawal can be as vital as effort, and that rest, like labor, can function as a deliberate and sustaining act. The question I explore in this work is how to organize, understand, and live with these contradictions. Through …

The International And Comparative Aspects Of United States V. Skrmetti: The Detrimental Rise Of Anti-Trans Sentiment In The United States, Julia Parrey

Immigration and Human Rights Law Review

In recent years, anti-trans sentiment has significantly increased in the United States. This Article examines the legal advocacy by the LGBTQ+ community that laid key legal groundwork for basic protections through landmark US Supreme Court decisions like Lawrence v. Texas and Obergefell v. Hodges and analyzes how recent judicial and legislative actions signal a dangerous reversal of that progress.

The central analysis focuses on the consequences of United States v. Skrmetti, where the Supreme Court upheld Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors by applying rational-basis review, concluding that the law classified based on age or medical diagnosis, rather …

Review Of Canadian Pentecostal Reader: The First Generation Of Pentecostal Voices In Canada (1907-1925). By Martin W. Mittelstadt And Caleb Howard Courtney., Susan J. Tam

Spiritus: ORU Journal of Theology

Review of Canadian Pentecostal Reader: The First Generation of Pentecostal Voices in Canada (1907-1925). By Martin W. Mittelstadt and Caleb Howard Courtney. Cleveland, TN: CPT Press. 519 pp.

Review Of Christian Conversion And Mission: A Brief Cultural History. By Andrew F. Walls., Misael Cornelio

Spiritus: ORU Journal of Theology

A review of Christian Conversion and Mission: A Brief Cultural History. By Andrew F. Walls.

Review Of The Kaleidoscopic City: Hong Kong, Mission, And The Evolution Of Global Pentecostalism. By Alex R. Mayfield, Jue Wang

Spiritus: ORU Journal of Theology

A review of The Kaleidoscopic City: Hong Kong, Mission, and the Evolution of Global Pentecostalism. By Alex R. Mayfield

Review Of Trauma And Renewal: Toward Spiritual, Communal, And Holistic Transformation. By Aizaiah G. Yong, Pamela F. Engelbert

Spiritus: ORU Journal of Theology

A review of Trauma and Renewal: Toward Spiritual, Communal, and Holistic Transformation, by Aizaiah G. Yong with contributing authors Amos Yong and Alma Yong.

Review Of A Pentecostal Commentary On Romans By Glen W. Menzies, Jeffrey S. Lamp

Spiritus: ORU Journal of Theology

A review of

A Pentecostal Commentary on Romans: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary. By Glen W. Menzies. Wipf and Stock, 2025. 514 pp.