Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Attempt At An Open Letter To The Bronx, Christopher Valdivia

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Open letter to and interrogation of the Bronx, in the form of autoethnographic writing.

¿Quién me encontrará a mí, en la noche, en el Bronx, a mis 22 años?

History, Ritualization, And The Rhetoric Of Legitimacy In Decem Libri Historiarum And Wei Shu, Bo Wen (Kent) Zheng

Senior Projects Spring 2022

Historical scholarship since the Second World War has, in general, successfully challenged the nationalist notion that ethnic identities are essential and stable markers of self-hood. One of the most influential entries from this bibliography is Benedict Anderson’s seminal study on the “horizontal” affect of the nation-state, Imagined Communities(1983), wherein the author identifies print capitalism and mass literacy as key contributors to the birth of “national communities” in the modern parlance. Less well defined in Anderson’s story of the nation, however, is the potential effect of pre-modern historical experiences on trajectories of modern state-formation. In response, this thesis explores the …

The Leatherman And Other Short Stories, Sophia Joy Slezak

Senior Projects Spring 2022

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

“Nappy Hair, Don’T Care”: Storytelling Through Strands, Sasha D. Onyango

Senior Projects Spring 2022

There is a Kiswahili phrase that goes “intelligence/the mind is like hair, everyone has their own’. Following that logic, how Kenyan women relate to their hair is unique to the individual yet there remains collective and shared experiences. The questions that I raise throughout the paper explore: 1) how images and narratives of hair throughout Kenyan history have influenced the way women today understand how they interact with their hair, 2) the ways Kenyan women are taught about hair grooming and the journey of learning to care for their hair, and 3) Kenyan women’s understanding of their hair and how …

Identities Of Armor: The Function Of Armor In Homer's Iliad, Eli Rosenthal

Senior Projects Spring 2022

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

I Went Back To Sit In The Sun, Alice Flannery Fall

Senior Projects Spring 2022

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Arts of Bard College.

Andres Polytropoi: Conceptions Of Identity In Homer And Lucian, Ruby Alling Ostrow

Senior Projects Fall 2021

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

I Can Speak For You, Tchad Kayla Ross

Senior Projects Fall 2021

This novella is about a queer Caribbean- American young woman named Nessa struggling with her relationship with her mother. A death occurs that leads Nessa to discover her mother may not be who she previously thought she was. This coming of age story confronts the delayed state of self actualization that occurs when Caribbean culture meets queer identity.

Conditional Whites: An Analysis Of Identity Formation Patterns Among Second Generation Arab American Muslims Today, Najwa Jamal

Senior Projects Spring 2021

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

Health In The Musical Profession: A Human Rights Investigation At The Intersections Of Identity, Reputation, And Resources, Jillian P. Reed

Senior Projects Spring 2020

This project investigates the effects of illness, injury, and disability on professional musicians. Issues of the musician’s identity, importance of reputation, and disability stigma are explored through firsthand accounts of 15 musicians who faced health challenges during their careers. My original research also includes the data from 200 responses to my musicians’ health survey. The patchwork of resources available to these musicians is examined through the lenses of human rights claiming and humanitarian charity, with a focus on healthcare, interpersonal accommodations, and the currently insufficient legal protections for this population.

On a micro scale, this paper is about the experiences …

Beyond Their Homeland: Understanding The Experiences Of Black Women In Japan, Bernadette Tisha Benjamin

Senior Projects Spring 2020

Understanding how Black women conceptualize the role their racial and gender identities play within their experience in Japan.

At The Border: Examining Identity In Peter Schneider’S The Wall Jumper And Eva Hoffman’S Lost In Translation, Alexandra Lilliana Willcox

Senior Projects Spring 2020

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

Exploring The Acculturation Preferences Of Bangladeshi-Muslim Second-Generation American Immigrants In New York City., Jakir Hossain

Senior Projects Fall 2019

The purpose of this study is to apply previous frameworks of acculturation to evaluate the acculturation preferences of the Bangladeshi-Muslim second-generation American immigrant population in New York City. This thesis attempts to understand the acculturation preferences of the aforementioned population by analyzing how they view their Bangladeshi ethnic identity and their Islamic religious identity in relation to their American immigrant upbringing. To do this, participants have been organized into acculturation preference tracks based on John Berry’s acculturation preference model. This thesis will then explore possible explanations for why differences between these acculturation preferences exist and why certain individuals found themselves …

The Unveiling Of Us, Alexis Parra

Senior Projects Spring 2018

The Unveiling of Us is an affirmation by, of and for wom^n of color. In this collaboration, we - subject and photographer - seek to reclaim the performance, production and beauty of individual identities that are informed by collective pasts. Everyday acts of performance are emphasized in these images through objects and gestures that reference the day to day practices of black and brown wom^n based on our histories, our cultures and our senses of self. This is our space to claim: the viewer looks, but the subjects hold the gaze as they declare power through a notion of beauty. …

Black And Grey: An Audio-Visual Tribute To The Undefined, Jewel Evans

Senior Projects Spring 2018

The Process:

My project was originally called Seven Stages of “Griffe.” The term “griffe” was a racial category describing people who are three quarters black and one quarter white, which is my actual genetic makeup. My original plan was to analyze the history of the term and reference it in seven songs representing the seven stages of grief, and create a long music video to open up dialogue about the racial definitions we ascribe ourselves to. The project changed when I reached an impasse in my historical research, given that the term was obsolete by the 18th century and had …

Reporting Identity: Social And Political Implications Of Adding A Mena Category To The U.S. Census, Mehgan Rose Abdel-Moneim

Senior Projects Spring 2018

The Census Bureau has been testing a new category called MENA for the 2020 census that would better describe the Middle Eastern and North African population in the United States, but in January of 2018, the agency announced that the category requires further research. In this work, I connect the development of a MENA identity category to historical events, sociological theory, current politics and public concerns related to the following questions: What are the social and political implications of including a MENA category on the U.S. census? What does the movement to add a MENA identifier to the census tell …

Free Running Brown Legs, Jada E. Smiley

Senior Projects Spring 2018

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

Does That Look Gay? Framing Queer Identity In Extended Sensibilities: Homosexual Presence In Contemporary Art, Sarah Peskin

Senior Projects Spring 2018

This Senior Project questions the usefulness of identity, specifically queer identity, as an organizing principle for an art exhibition. I explore this topic in relation to the curatorial method for the exhibition at the New Museum in New York in 1982, entitled Extended Sensibilities: Homosexual Presence in Contemporary Art. I argue that identity was a useful category for Extended Sensibilities by analyzing the art as Camp. By doing so, I hope to prove that the curator, Dan Cameron, chose a collection of art that opposed an essentialist perspective of queer identity. Furthermore, I compare Extended Sensibilities to a more …

Nation, Self, And Foreign Space: Exploring The Expatriation Of James Baldwin, Henry James, And Edith Wharton, Emily Monroe Weisman

Senior Projects Spring 2018

This project explores the expatriation of James Baldwin, Henry James, and Edith Wharton. Through their fiction and personal journeys abroad, Baldwin, James and Wharton seek to answer the question of what it means to be an American. This trio of writers chose to leave America at some point or another in order to find both literary and personal freedom from the confinement that was brought upon them by the space of America.

Baldwin, James, and Wharton explore the effects of race, class, and gender on an individual in the space of America versus the space of Europe. The novels that …

Xx Openings, Jackson Siegal

Senior Projects Spring 2018

XX Openings represents my dual sculpture and photography practice. The title comes from a 70’s domestic frame, with 20 openings of varying sizes for family pictures. Half of the slots were filled with stock pictures of smiling family scenes, while the others just had measurements for the openings themselves. The object struck me as alienating, and oppressive. I didn’t see any scene within those openings I felt connected to.

The frame came to symbolize varying perspectives, ways of seeing, and ways of being. As my sculpture practice has weighed more heavily on my work as a photographer, I feel tensions …

Blasian And Proud: Examining Racialized Experiences Amongst Half Black And Half Japanese Youth In Japan, Helen Itsel Aracena

Senior Projects Spring 2017

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

Image Of Yoga: Instagram, Identity, And Western Imagination, Brigid Nell Boll

Senior Projects Spring 2017

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

Low Fidelity, Drew Mccoy Robinson

Senior Projects Fall 2017

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Arts of Bard College.

Spaces Of Reality: Tsai Ming Liang And Re-Thinking Identity, Kyra G. Middeleer

Senior Projects Fall 2016

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

Walls Have Ears But They Also Speak –A Comparative Study Of Two Playgrounds, Anna Hirson-Sagalyn

Senior Projects Spring 2015

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Arts of Bard College.