Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Children And The Cold War: Race & Hypocrisy Amid Fear Of Nuclear War, Richard D. Mctaggart Jr.

Theses and Dissertations

During the Cold War, American propaganda centered the wellbeing of the child in its messaging warning of atomic attack at the hands of the Soviet Union. However, despite American claims that all children were valued by the United States, this was proven untrue by its unequal treatment of Black children.

Historical Dissidence: The Temporalities And Radical Possibilities Of American Comics, Jeremy M. Carnes

Theses and Dissertations

Formal criticism of comics has often focused on the importance of sequence and the filling of gutters with causative logics. Practitioner-theorists like Will Eisner and Scott McCloud have focused on “sequentiality” and “closure” to conceive of how readers connect the disparate panels of a given comic. More contemporary scholars of the form have followed Eisner and McCloud, foregrounding the causative logics that create narrative progression in the comics form. Yet, these approaches implicitly rely on dominant, western logics of temporality in the construction of narrative in comics.

This project considers how comics form actually relies on various temporalities and thus …

Complicating The Narrative: Using Jim's Story To Interpret Enslavement, Leasing, And Resistance At Duke Homestead, Jennifer Melton

Theses and Dissertations

In the antebellum South, an enslaved person was more likely to be leased out than to be sold during his or her lifetime. Despite its ubiquity, leasing of enslaved people is rarely interpreted at historic sites and is not widely understood by the general public. In this project, I examine leasing and resistance to slavery in North Carolina through the lens of Jim, an enslaved man leased by Washington Duke at the property that is now Duke Homestead State Historic Site. While Duke is famous in North Carolina as founder of the American Tobacco Company, he was a yeoman tobacco …

Exorcising Power, John Jarzemsky

Theses and Dissertations

This paper theorizes that authors, in an act I have termed “literary exorcism,” project and expunge parts of their identities that are in conflict with the overriding political agenda of their texts, into the figure of the villain. Drawing upon theories of power put forth by Judith Butler, I argue that this sort of projection arises in reaction to dominant ideas and institutions, but that authors find ways to manipulate this process over time. By examining a broad cross-section of English-language literature over several centuries, this phenomenon and its evolution can be observed, as well as the means by which …

Crabgrass Piety: The Rise Of Megachurches And The Suburban Social Religion, 1960-2000, Nathan Joseph Saunders

Theses and Dissertations

Although there were less than twenty megachurches (churches averaging over two thousand in weekly attendance) in the United States before 1960, by 2010 there were approximately fifteen hundred. Megachurches are not a homogenous group, but they exist in all parts of the country and they have enough in common to warrant their identification as part of a coherent trend in American evangelical culture. Specifically, most megachurches appeal to an ethos that emerged in the 1970s and 1980s known as the suburban social religion. The suburban social religion combined to differing degrees the American civil religion described by Robert Bellah, meritocratic …

Utah's Plight: A Passage Through The Great Depression, Joseph F. Darowski

Theses and Dissertations

The Great Depression marked a fateful passage in the annals of the American people. President Roosevelt's New Deal, the nation's signature response, proved to be a determined but erratic reaction. Against the backdrop of a nation deeply mired in an unrelenting international depression, dramatic events played themselves out in the lives of the men and women of Utah. Throughout, fidelity to principles of independence, self-reliance, and self-sufficiency were sorely challenged.

The people of Utah found succor in two almost diametrically opposed responses. The New Deal offered an amalgam of programs and panaceas through which the federal government attempted to deliver …

Island Of Tranquility: Rhetoric And Identification At Brigham Young University During The Vietnam Era, Brian D. Jackson

Theses and Dissertations

The author argues that beyond religious beliefs and conservative politics, rhetorical identification played an important role in the relative calmness of the BYU campus during the turbulent Sixties. Using Bitzer's rhetorical situation theory and Burke's identification theory, the author shows that BYU's calm campus can be explained as a result of communal identification with a conservative ethos. He also shows that apparent epistemological shortcomings of Bitzer's model can be resolved by considering the power of identification to create salience and knowledge in rhetorical situations. During the Sixties, BYU administration developed policies on physical appearance that invited students to take on …

Children On The Mormon Trail, Jill Jacobsen Andros

Theses and Dissertations

Using first person, reminiscent accounts, this thesis examines children's lives on the Mormon Trail. It attempts to shed further light on the story of the Mormon Trail by sharing the perspectives of pioneers who crossed the plains as children. This study focuses on such issues as the children's impressions of the trail, their experiences on it, their duties, their family life, and the influence of religion. This study highlights the symbiotic relationship between children and the trail: children affected trail life and at the same time were affected by their experiences on the trail. Children shouldered responsibilites that were essential …

Mormons And Germany, 1914-1933: A History Of The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter-Day Saints In Germany And Its Relationship With The German Governments From World War I To The Rise Of Hitler, Jeffery L. Anderson

Theses and Dissertations

This paper focuses on the Church's struggle in establishing itself in Germany with cultural, social, political and religious problems. The cultural and social problems focus primarily on the interaction between Mormon-American missionaries and leaders who preached Mormonism in a society somewhat different from their own. The political problems concern historical events such as the first world war, the inflation of 1923 in Germany, and the rise of Hitler, while the religious problems focus on the Church's interaction with other faiths who generally opposed it and the struggle of missionaries to establish congregations.

Concepts In American Local History: Community In Winder, Idaho, Lorine S. Goodwin

Theses and Dissertations

Recently the need for a more clearly defined structural basis for American local history has become acute. Concepts used in national history often fall short of the needs of local history. As a result, both professionals and amateurs are producing a rash of community histories without the benefit of adequate guidelines.

This thesis draws together a number of concepts useful in the development of American local history as a viable academic field of study. It tests these concepts in presenting the history of community in Winder, a small, rural population set in southeastern Idaho.

History Of The Upper Snake River Area To 1840, Louis J. Clements

Theses and Dissertations

The Upper Snake River area was a center of much fur trade activity during the first half of the 1800's. It has many streams and they had abundant quantities of the furs that were being sought by the large parties of men who came into the country.
The early explorers of the Pacific coast hastened the exploration and development of the interior. As they moved along the shores they recorded the possibilities of the riches that were there and helped to form the opinions in each country of how valuable it would be to own the Northwest. This desire to …

A History Of The Latter-Day Saint Settlement Of Oakley, Idaho, Wayne R. Boothe

Theses and Dissertations

Oakley is located in southern Idaho in the Goose Creek Valley, an area traversed by trappers and explorers who named the streams and left accounts of their experiences and travels. It was a rendezvous for Indians who went there to gather pine nuts and get wild game for their winter's meat.

An emigration trail was located south of Oakley, where thousands wended their way to California. Emigrants going to Oregon from the East branched off this trail at the City of Rocks and came down Birch Creek to the Rock Creek Stage Station, southeast of the present town of Twin …

William Clayton: Missionary, Pioneer, And Public Servant, Paul E. Dahl

Theses and Dissertations

This work is a biography of William Clayton, an early missionary of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and a pioneer to the Great Basin. He was also a prominent individual in the political and economic development in the State of Deseret and the Territory of Utah. The purpose of the study is to write an account of Clayton's life and to show his contributions to both religious and profane history.

A Study Of Early Utah-Montana Trade, Transportation, And Communication, 1847-1881, L. Kay Edrington

Theses and Dissertations

Only a few hardy men had ventured into America's intermountain west prior to the year 1847. Arriving in this year, the Mormons, under Brigham Young, slowly conquered parts of the Great Basin and within a few years had produced a self-sustaining agricultural economy. production of a surplus in farm products awaited only the emergence of a "foreign" market. This market was soon forthcoming.

The developing process of Utah-Montana relations from 1847 through 1881 was a natural occurance. From the very first, men from Utah traveled northward. The Mormon experiment at Ft. Lemhi during the late 1850's was a prime example …

A History Of The Federal And Territorial Court Conflicts In Utah, 1851-1874, Clair T. Kilts

Theses and Dissertations

In 1847 the Mormon pioneers arrived in the Salt Lake valley, bringing with them their own court system, which was to be their main resource for litigation for the next two years. The Church courts which were set up after 1847 proved insufficient, and in 1849 a need was felt for civil courts which could be used in the litigation with Gentile emigrants that were passing through the valley. To solve this problem, the State of Deseret was formed on March 12, 1849, giving the valley a civil authority. This was to last less than two years, for on September …

A Historical Study Of The Exploration Of Utah Valley And The Story Of Fort Utah, Ray C. Colton

Theses and Dissertations

The exploration of Utah Valley and the history of Fort Utah is the story of the conquest and colonization of the American frontier. Discovered in the days of Western expansion, the Valley was identified with the principal factors in the development of the Intermountain West. It heard the chant of the gray robed Franciscan priests, became a favorite haunt of the trail blazing fur trapper and trader, was the site of the ancient rendezvous of the Indian, saw the gold seekers trudge wearily on to California, and with the founding of Fort Utah served as the springboard of Southern Utah …