Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Tenacity, Angela Stevenson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Creating my exhibition, Tenacity, was a labor of love that took place over the year and a half that I was a student in Stephen F. Austin State University of Texas’s Graduate Program. I explored new processes in painting, including the use of transfers, and did extensive research into the lives of female historical figures. This exhibition was born of a wish to share knowledge with others as well as to remind society that anyone can elicit change.

Contextualizing Filipina/O Experiences Through The Life And Lens Of Virgil Duyungan, Benjamin Huff

History Undergraduate Theses

This paper serves a dual purpose: to examine the world of Filipina/o immigrants and Filipina/o Americans during the 1930s in the Puget Sound region, as well as look at the life and death of Filipina/o labor leader Virgil S. Duyungan. Incorporating these two different aspects into one paper reveals how Duyungan’s experiences contextualize and highlight key issues of the greater Filipina/o community in the region at the time, such as racial identity and tensions, labor rights, corruption and exploitation, and socio-economic conditions. By utilizing a body of primary and secondary sources, such as books, journal articles, government documents, images and …

Challenging The Architecture: A Critical History Of The Wisconsin Prison System, Jacob Glicklich

Theses and Dissertations

In my dissertation I explore the history of the Wisconsin prison system, with an emphasis on 1970 to 2019, Waupun Correctional Institution and Taycheedah Correctional Institution. From this study, I explore the nature of the Wisconsin system and how it has developed. Across this work I argue that the core priority for the WI Department of Corrections has been to maintain and expand its bureaucratic infrastructure, imposing limited recourse on prisoners, and maximizing its own disciplinary flexibility. There have been significant human costs to this system, and my work helps to document these costs, contextualize why they happened, and look …

Making The Case For The Use Of The Ksu Archives And Special Collections Through Interpretive Videos, Helen Thomas

Graduate Scholarly Works

One of the challenges faced by Kennesaw State University’s Museums, Archives and Rare Books Department is a lack of awareness of both the existence of our collections and the many potential research applications that archives and rare books provide. This series of short videos makes the case to potential users as to why we collect these materials and how they are useful and relevant to a variety of research interests. Each video pairs an item or collection from the KSU Archives and Special Collections (including the Bentley Rare Book Museum) with expert interpretation provided by a KSU faculty member in …

Negotiating The Intersection Of Arabic And Anglo-American Literary Journalism: Exploring Possibilities, Challenging Canons, Samah Gomaa Abou Marzouk

Dissertations

Literary journalism is an art form that combines storytelling techniques with the verifiability of standard journalism. Research in the field is recent and predominantly Western. Unlike Anglo-American literary journalism, there are no studies on Arabic literary journalism as a stand-alone art form in Arabic and only one in English, which examines the reasons for its scarcity. This study aims to prove otherwise. The objective of this research is to combine history and criticism in exploring Arabic literary journalism; examine it is predecessors, characteristics, motives and how it relates to its Anglo-American counterpart; and determine whether the two are fundamentally different …

Returning To Nature: Environmental History's Posthuman Direction, William H. Smith Iii

Theses and Dissertations

The purposes of this thesis were to (A) determine a new historiographical direction for environmental history through analyzing posthuman environmental change, (B) to present a new historical analysis of posthumanity, reinforced by scholarly accomplishes with the anthropocene, that allows the historian to discuss environmental history with humanity as a secondary character, and (C) to show how both the historiography of environmental history, as well as specific case studies of climate, infestations, and natural disasters, are able to present this new direction for environmental history. What has been the end result is that humanity will always improve their condition of sustainability, …

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 …

Sanaugavut: Art From Kinngait, Nakasuk Alariaq

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

“Sanaugavut: Art from Kinngait” explores 20^th century Inuit art from an Inuk’s perspective to highlight the work Inuit participants contributed to in the development of commercialized art production in the North. The author Nakasuk Alariaq is from Kinngait (Cape Dorset) and is the first Inuk graduate student at Western University to be offered space within the university’s formal settings to curate an Inuit art exhibition. This exhibition and thesis go hand in hand and are therefore very important to advocates of Indigenous self-representation in academia and in galleries. The exhibition “Sanaugavut: Art from Kinngait” was …

Staging English Affairs In Early Modern Italy: History, Politics, Drama, Fabio Battista

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation looks at the creation and dissemination of alternative versions of English history through the means of dramatic fiction, and contextualizes them in the panorama of the intellectual debates of seventeenth-century Italy. Staging English Affairs in Early Modern Italy studies the ways in which the reinvention of Tudor and Stuart affairs in dramatic literature mirrored the ambitions, fears, and fantasies of a century in disquieting transformation. This research documents how news and information from England entered the Italian states, how they were perceived, and what their repurposing can reveal about the potentialities of intercultural exchange. Anglo-inspired drama became a …

What Rome Really Adopted From Ancient Greece, Christian J. Vella

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The Roman conquest of the Greek city-states and the appropriation of many aspects of its culture, especially architecture and art, is well known. But what of the many great philosophies that began in the various city-states of Ancient Greece? This piece is made in attempt to answer this question. The scope of these sources will start with the beginning of the Western Philosophical Tradition, with Thales of Miletus and the Milesian, all the way up to, but not including, the foundation of the Christian Philosophical Tradition. After the year 146 BC if a philosopher is born in a Greek-City state, …

Broken Households: Black And White Baptists And Methodists In Transition In Post-Emancipation Texas, Timothy "Ashton" Reynolds

History Theses and Dissertations

The end of slavery in Texas and the South undercut more than just the economic, labor, and social foundations in Texas. It undercut doctrinal certainty for white Baptists and Methodists and called into question two of their most valued beliefs: the biblical legitimacy of slavery and the divine appointment of white (and male) supremacy. This thesis asks and attempts to answer the question of how white Baptists and Methodists reacted when they were no longer able to practice slavery as a legally sanctioned religiously underpinned institution. By examining denominational documents, church minute books, writings by influential Baptist and Methodist figures, …

Racial Conflict In Early Utah: Mormon, Native American And Federal Relations, Raelyn M. Embleton

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This website is for teachers to gain information and sources about Utah history during the early territorial period, specifically relating to conflicts between Mormon settlers, Native Americans, and federal officials. The content and site were designed with the C3 curriculum in mind, as such, at the bottom of this page you can find a downloadable Inquiry Design Model Blueprint. As you teach students this information, the compelling question to have students focus on is: “Does culture and the interaction of cultures shape the development of place?” Each event highlighted on this website is related to the other and demonstrates how …

‘The Healing Hand Laid On A Great Wound:’ The Elberfeld System And The Transformation Of Poverty In Germany, Britain, And The United States, Rebekah O'Zell Mcmillan

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation employs a transnational analysis to focus on historical perceptions of poverty and the development of private and public welfare in the modern era. This research places the emergence of early poverty relief schemes within a broader transatlantic context by studying the relationships among social reformers in Germany, Great Britain, and the United States. This work has two primary objectives. First, it focuses on the Elberfeld Poor Relief System a nineteenth and early twentieth century German innovation emphasizing local poor relief and community responsibility, which transformed poor relief into an efficient structure. Second, the Elberfeld System was instrumental in …

The Myths That Make Us: An Examination Of Canadian National Identity, Shannon Lodoen

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis uses Barthes’ Mythologies as a framework to examine the ways in which the Canadian nation has been mythologized, exploring how this mythologization affects our sense of national identity. Because, as Barthes says, the ultimate goal of myth is to transform history into nature, it is necessary to delve into Canada’s past in order to understand when, why, and how it has become the nation it is today. This will involve tracing some key aspects of Canadian history, society, and pop culture from Canada’s earliest days to current times to uncover the “true origins” of the naturalized, taken-for-granted elements …

Philosophical Archeology In Theoretical And Artistic Practice, Ido Govrin

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The aim of this thesis is to examine philosophical archeology and the feasibility of knowledge that derives from researching it simultaneously through theoretical and artistic practice.

Philosophical archeology essentially embodies one’s relation to history and historiographic research—a research methodology at the core of which lies a “historical a priori”, that which a priori conditions the historical development of a phenomenon. However, this research conceives of philosophical archeology more broadly, as a multifaceted term that traverses the discourse of the humanities at large.

By pursuing this doctoral research, my original contribution to knowledge is twofold: (1) I historicize philosophical archeology—a …

The Gay Commute: On The Development Of Queer Community And Identity In The Windsor-Detroit Borderlands, 1945-1980, Graeme Sylvio Sylvestre

Major Papers

The development of queer community and identity has always necessitated the delineation of queer-friendly spaces as a locus for socialisation, sexual expression, and freedom from animosity and hostility towards queer sexuality. Within the urban area of post-war Windsor-Detroit, the threat of exposure and possible arrest affected the everyday lives of queer individuals, which necessitated a quest for private locales that were amenable to the expression of queer sexuality and gender identity. What is here referred to as “the gay commute” was a defining characteristic of the lived experiences of the white middle-class gay residents in the Windsor-Detroit borderlands through the …

Middle Waters: A Visual Historical Fiction Of The Osage Nation, Tori H. Forster

Honors Projects

The following project is in two parts: A series of concept art and illustration pieces surrounding the history of the Osage Nation, and a research paper detailing that history and exploring the process of creating the aforementioned visual pieces. The artworks are designed around an original story set during the 1920s on the Osage reservation, and explore past history of the Osage people as a part of that. The paper also discusses the author’s personal response to the research, and explores themes of ignorance and social justice as the project draws to a close.

Cartel Practices And Policies In The World War Ii Era, Caleb Yoken

Honors Theses

The goal of this thesis is to examine cartels in the World War II era: how and why they operated, why they existed, and any assistance they may or may not have received from their respective governments. This thesis, in particular, will focus on three countries, the United States, Germany, and Britain. Cartels are typically defined through the lens of monopolized business activity that can deal with anything from petroleum and steel to pharmaceuticals, and take actions to restrict output and raise prices to eliminate their competition. The research finds that cartels that operated in Europe during this era were …

Une Étude Comparative De La Restauration Scolaire Des Primaires Au Lycée En France Et Aux États Unis Au Xxie Siècle, Brianna Cummings

Honors Theses

In recent years, there has been much debate surrounding national school lunch programs around the world. During the second half of the nineteenth century, the first school lunch programs were introduced on a school to school basis in both France and the United States. However national school lunch programs were not established until the middle of the following century. Since their establishment, national laws towards the school lunch program have greatly changed, sparked by major concern from citizens. By examining lunch programs in France and the United States, clear differences, as well as points of similarity, have been highlighted. These …

To The Peaches, Jazmine Hayes

Theses and Dissertations

My work focuses on erased histories and the ways these histories are preserved through cultural traditions. I explore histories across the African diaspora with specificity on African American culture and black female subjectivity.

“Of Nobler Song Than Mine”: Social Justice In The Life, Times, And Writings Of Fitz-James O'Brien, John P. Irish

Graduate Liberal Studies Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation will be a detailed study of the life, times, and writings of a mid-nineteenth century Irish-American writer, Fitz-James O’Brien. This will be the first full length study of O’Brien’s thought and writings. O’Brien was known, during his day, for two different types of writing: fiction of the supernatural and his writings on social justice, written in the emerging style of literary realism. It is his writings on social justice which this dissertation will explore. O’Brien’s writings on social justice covered three main topics: children, women, and animals. I look at how the historical context, O’Brien’s life, and his …

Zitrone, Chase Roy Young

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this thesis paper is to describe the elements and narrative associated with the exhibition, Zitrone, as well as the conceptual and theoretical ideas influencing the work. The exhibition is centered around an invented singular historical object in the form of a vehicle, and a museum display of artifacts, documents, and recreations intended to validate the existence of the central subject. Drawing on the work of artists Marcel Broodthaers, Damien Hirst, and David Wilson in conjunction with theoretical writings of Dave Hickey and Lewis Hyde, the exhibition seeks to address the perception and presentation of history as absolute …

Seeing Through Feeling, Christopher Mitchell Rodgers

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this paper is to describe both the inherent formal qualities and conceptual framework that are addressed within the exhibition, Seeing Through Feeling. The exhibition is centered around the methodology of making, collection, and display all through the one singular positioning, the object. The objects within the exhibition are either handmade or collected fragments that weave together around the singular position of craft and history under the pretense of how our understanding of time may not always be true. The thesis breaks down key components through specific themes into the categories of the hand, eye, symbol, object, value, …

Selling Childhood: How The Middle Class Used Children In The Anti-Tuberculosis Movement (1930s-1940s), Hannah Fisher

Senior Theses

During the anti-tuberculosis movement of the 1930s and 1940s, children were chosen as focal points, with their roles shaped by society’s changing view of childhood, the emergence of the middle class, and the socioeconomic and political climate. Children were used by middle-class reformers as conduits through which to disseminate information and enact controls on the working class. Health education in schools had two main goals: (1) for educated children to become educated adults, and (2) for educated children to transform the behaviors of adults around them. Although researchers have studied middle-class interventions into children’s health, few have analyzed the role …

Art And War: Republican Propaganda Of The Spanish Civil War, Jason Manrique

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis focuses on propaganda used by the Republican side of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) to gain support for their cause and win the war. It focuses on three forms of media: cinema, posters and photography, and it is divided into an introduction, three separate chapters, and a conclusion. In them I provide a historical context on the II Republic and the Civil War and analyze the effectiveness of concrete artworks to propagate the Republican message.

Desde El Margen: Teatro Alterno Y Comunidades Hispanas De Nueva York, 1997–2017, Pablo D. García Gámez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Esta disertación analiza ocho textos de los autores Tere Martínez, Jorge Merced, Marco Antonio Rodríguez, Eva Cristina Vásquez y cuatro performances en la calle. La misma explora las relaciones entre los cuatro dramaturgos y las comunidades hispanas de Nueva York. Indaga en el proceso de cómo la memoria de estas comunidades se refleja en un repertorio teatral. Por otro lado, revisa la organización del performance cultural en las comunidades.

La hipótesis de esta investigación es que en el teatro hispano alterno hay obras que son reflejo y reflexión sobre los grupos periféricos y que el performance es una herramienta social. …

Automation In Graphic Design, Robert M. Doehling

Honors College Theses

Advances in technology have had dramatic impacts throughout history on a myriad of industries outside of the technology industry itself. These changes are showcased through a brief examination of the changes within the graphic design industry since the recorded birth of the graphic. With the advent of popularized artificial intelligence seen in the modern day, many are predicting the end of graphic design. Through an analysis of current automated design products within the consumer market and a dive into the research alongside design automation professional Peter O’Donovan, it is evident that the role of the graphic designer will most likely …

An Example Of Reinterpretation In American Historic House Museums, Victoria Vanzomeren

Senior Theses

Despite their past importance, historic house museums have lost struggle to remain interesting to the general public because of the refusal to tell stories beyond those of wealthy, white men. In their 2018 restoration project on the Hampton-Preston Mansion, the Historic Columbia Foundation demonstrate how historic house museums can update their narratives to include the stories of marginalized people through the reinterpretation of their two Edward Troye paintings. This reinterpretation allowed Historic Columbia to tell a story that is not often told and represents the shift in new expectations for historic house museums in order to provide something meaningful to …

The Home As An Object: Material Culture In The Age Of Ikea, Maxwell Harling Fertik

Senior Theses and Projects

The curiosity of everyday objects looms large in every human’s life. And naturally, these objects are almost as diverse in character as the person who bought them. This variation can be in style, period, shape, origin but also in the arrangement it is given in relation to other objects or persons in a space. On one level, the objects we surround ourselves with are meaningless, purely functional, utilitarian and banal. Especially on a budget, one may not consider aesthetic or design issues at all and purely buy a toaster because they want toast. Why would one buy a SMEG+Dolce and …

Reworking The White-Masculine Ideal, Steven H. Gonzalez

Art Theses and Dissertations

This text functions as an exploration of self through artistic practice, a designated space for reflection on contemporary Queer experience. In looking specifically at the permeation of the idealized-white-masculine figure as found within Western visual culture, social media and gay pornography become isolated as sites where these figures are commonly found. This line of inquiry defines how the ideal is reified through these differing digital platforms and the social implications the homogenized male form has on raced individuals. In addition to determining the image of the perfect masculine physique through research, this text expands on how its' imaged representation becomes …