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Front Matter

The Gettysburg Historical Journal

Front matter of the Gettysburg Historical Journal 2026

Letter From The Editors, Madeleine G. Ulman, Marcella Zimmer

The Gettysburg Historical Journal

We are proud to present the twenty-fifth edition of The Gettysburg Historical Journal. The journal embodies the History Department’s dedication to diverse learning and excellence in academics. Each year, the journal publishes the top student work in a range of topics across the spectrum of academic disciplines with different methodological approaches to the study of history. This year, The Gettysburg Historical Journal received a plethora of submissions from both Gettysburg College students and other students around the country. The works accepted this semester focus on the diverse relationships between individuals and the state throughout history, spanning from the western frontier …

Little Better Than One Of The Savages, Michael J. Aaron

The Gettysburg Historical Journal

Western Pennsylvania was one of the earliest frontiers in US history, but is often overlooked and oversimplified. The frontier just west of the Appalachian Mountains was a complicated place of settler and Native American interaction, varied permanent settlement, and wilderness. The journal and letters of Major Ebenezer Denny show a complicated frontier of danger, wilderness, and chaos that is often not seen within historical views of the region. Through Denny and other Western Pennsylvania settlers, this paper complicates the common view of the Western Pennsylvania as a simply and quickly colonized region by showing the area as an unsettled frontier …

Soviet Sympathies On-Screen: Cinema As A Cultural Apparatus In The Stalinist Era, Anne E. Bolenbaugh

The Gettysburg Historical Journal

The Stalinist era of the Soviet Union (1924-1956) is marked by its incredible pace of forced industrialization, extreme cultural repression, and an atmosphere of immense fear and paranoia, resulting in the Great Terror. Among the various mechanisms to enforce the state program, cinema offers a unique insight into specific state ideologies at key points in Stalin’s regime. By examining the three key phases of the Stalinist era consisting of his initial years, the Second World War, and the years of High Stalinism, it is possible to trace notable shifts in the Soviet authority’s approach to cinema as a propagandistically advantageous …

Certifying Widowhood: Lizzie Booth And The Making Of Black Widow Pension Entitlement During The Civil War, Michael B. Cox Ii

The Gettysburg Historical Journal

This article argues that Mary Elizabeth Wayt Lanning Booth, most commonly known as Lizzie Booth, played a decisive and underrecognized role in securing pension rights for Black widows during the Civil War. In the wake of her husband’s death at the Fort Pillow Massacre in 1864, Booth personally lobbied President Abraham Lincoln and Senator Charles Sumner for pension reform, catalyzing the passage of the Supplemental Pension Act. This reform permitted formerly enslaved women—whose marriages had been deemed extralegal—to prove their unions through eyewitness testimony and access federal benefits. Drawing primarily on pension files, the article demonstrates that while the Act …

Always Green, Ever Living, Anna Plante

Honors Theses

The Creative Honors Thesis, “Always Green, Ever Living," is an experimental essay film that explores the complexities and contradictions of environmental conservation, up against the contemporary climate crisis. The film is centered on Muir Woods National Monument and follows a young girl's relationship with nature. The film reflects on how protected natural spaces are influenced by systems of funding, access, and interpretation, as well as broader environmental pressures. Using a combination of archival footage, original imagery, narration, and ambient sound, the project adopts the essayistic structure that prioritizes reflection over linear storytelling.

Genre Based Analysis Of Sustainability In Contemporary U.S. Film Production: Inception Or Illusion?, Tanner Ennis

Interdisciplinary Studies | Senior Theses

Anthropogenic activity is actively leading to environmental degradation, highlighting the need for large industries to take responsibility for their environmental impact, particularly the film industry. While sustainable practices in the film industry such as virtual production, recycling of set construction materials, or the use of renewable energy present opportunities to improve sustainability, there is still a substantial amount of progress to be made. For example, research has demonstrated that increases in production budget correlate with higher carbon dioxide emissions, with fuel, utilities, and travel acting as the top contributors (Sustainable Entertainment Alliance, 2022). Conversation among the scholarly community is centered …

Leadership And Creative Placemaking In Central Appalachia: Morehead, Kentucky, Toni C. Hobbs

Theses and Dissertations--Arts Administration

In rural Appalachia, longstanding patterns of extractive economic development, coupled with limited public investment and uneven institutional support, have contributed to persistent economic stagnation and a diminished sense of pride among residents. These conditions reflect deeper structural challenges, including economies shaped by resource extraction and external control. Addressing these conditions is critical to fostering economic growth, promoting cultural heritage, and enhancing overall well-being in the region. By cultivating resilient communities, leaders can create environments in which both the economy and local pride can thrive, contributing to a more prosperous and unified Appalachian region.

This study investigates the organizational and leadership …

Opera Houses In Aberdeen, Huron, And Watertown, Sd: 1880-1910s, Janet M. Meyer

Dissertations and Theses

In the 1880s, many newcomers arrived in Dakota Territory for a new start in Aberdeen, Huron, and Watertown. Their arrival coincided with the popularity of opera houses, so it was not surprising that entrepreneurs built opera houses in these new towns. The early opera houses included several benefits. They provided important gathering places for growing communities to hold meetings and social functions. The settler-colonial society included people from foreign countries and eastern states. Opera houses were also beneficial by providing familiar shows and concerts, perhaps some shows the residents previously enjoyed in their homes back east. Knowing that an entertainment …

Between The Past And The Future: Operation Castaña–The Urgency Of Oral History For Tejanos, Manuel F. Medrano

History Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Not For A Profit., Taylor Wiens

Master's Theses or Doctor of Nursing Practice

My body of artwork explores the deep-rooted traditions and emotional resonance of life on a three-generation family farm. By merging my expertise in graphic design, ceramics, printmaking, and glaze research, I have developed a unique method of printing on clay with underglazes, creating layered and nostalgic imagery that tells the heartfelt stories of my farm family. My inventive forms—tiles, architectural structures reminiscent of farm buildings, portraits, and figures—capture the overlooked yet essential aspects of rural life, portraying both the relentless challenges farmers face and the profound sense of belonging and tradition inherent in farm life.

Earth toned clay represents the …

Historically Black, Immensely Beautiful, Leonard A. Slade, Jr.

The Griot - Southern Conference on African American Studies, Inc.

No abstract provided.

I Could Not Sleep, Leonard A. Slade, Jr.

The Griot - Southern Conference on African American Studies, Inc.

No abstract provided.

Holiday Prayer Poem, Leonard A. Slade, Jr.

The Griot - Southern Conference on African American Studies, Inc.

No abstract provided.

To Jasmine, Leonard A. Slade, Jr.

The Griot - Southern Conference on African American Studies, Inc.

No abstract provided.

Disrupting Power Dynamics In The Archives: The Digital Pv Panther Project, Gatekeeping, And The Texas Black Cooperative Extension & Home Demonstration Collection, T. Dewayne Moore, Evelyn Todd

The Griot - Southern Conference on African American Studies, Inc.

This article examines the Texas Black Cooperative Extension & Home Demonstration Collection at Prairie View A&M University as both a major recovery of twentieth-century Black rural history and a contemporary intervention into archival power. Funded by a National Endowment for the Humanities grant, the Digital PV Panther Project employed undergraduate and graduate students to process sixty-three county-level finding aids, 163 archival boxes, and more than 3,200 folders documenting segregated Black Extension work from 1923 to 1963. Beyond preservation, the project challenges long-standing regimes of archival gatekeeping. Drawing on critical archival studies and Black Digital Humanities scholarship, the authors argue that …

Revisiting Bandura’S Self-Efficacy Performance Accomplishments In Pwi And Hbcu Students: A Sign Of Persistence, Britine Perkins, Douglas M. Butler, Jerrel Moore

The Griot - Southern Conference on African American Studies, Inc.

This study revisits Bandura’s theory of self-efficacy by examining performance accomplishments among students attending a predominantly White institution (PWI) and a historically Black college or university (HBCU). While academic self-efficacy has long been linked to college success, much of the existing research centers on students at PWIs and often overlooks the cultural contexts shaping students’ beliefs about their academic abilities. Using the Academic Self-Efficacy Scale (ASES), the authors compare self-efficacy perceptions across institutional type and explore how performance accomplishments influence persistence. Findings highlight the importance of culturally responsive frameworks when assessing self-efficacy, particularly for minoritized and first-generation students. By incorporating …

Not Like Us: Afro-Germans And The Myth Of The "Germanness", Kahron Gaul Blakley

CISLA Senior Integrative Projects

No abstract provided.

From Progressive Politics To Media Censorship: Analyzing The Trajectory Of Lgbt Rights In Taiwan And China, Sabrina Malec

CISLA Senior Integrative Projects

No abstract provided.

‘Signature Gestures’: Anchoring The Black Diasporic Feminist Praxis In English Studies, Sonia Adams

Theses and Dissertations

My dissertation study explores how the Black Diasporic Feminist Praxis (BDFP) serves as a methodology for theorizing, critiquing, and teaching literature by women writers of the Black Diaspora. In order to position the BDFP, I theorize ‘Blackness’ and ‘Indigeneity’ as modes of identity formation and the Black Diaspora (BD) as a fluid, inclusive racialized geographical space. Black Diasporic Feminism (BDF) is an epistemology that validates Black and Black Indigenous identity and life experiences across geography, race, gender, and class. I use the BDFP to examine how Black women writers from England, Australia, Canada, and the United States create a ‘Collage …

Film In Illiberal Times: Poland’S Public Memory And The European Union, Frances Tanzer

History

This article is about the recent transformation of two powerful, paradoxical, and inseparable narratives of progress that developed in the postwar period: aesthetic autonomy and Holocaust remembrance. As far-right and illiberal parties have gained power across Europe, they adapted these foundational narratives of the liberal-democratic West to assert their own legitimacy and to reimagine the cultural inclinations of the European Union. This article examines how this process has taken place in the reception of Jonathan Glazer's Zone of Interest (2023) and Agnieszka Holland's Green Border (2023)—both international co-productions produced during the repressive eight-year reign of the Law and Justice Party …

Closest Yet Farthest: Zhou Li And The Boundaries Of Contemporary Chinese Art, Langcheng Zhou

Pomona Senior Theses

The global visibility of contemporary Chinese art has been formed by politically legible or culturally identifiable styles, which often explicitly reference social critique, political history, or traditional Chinese visual elements and media. Because of the rapid expansion of the global art market, these visual identifiers quickly became the most effortless and efficient determinants for an artwork’s representativeness of the contemporary Chinese art scene. This framing undeniably helped international audiences to establish a recognizable narrative, but has also narrowed the range of practices that define the field. This thesis argues that Zhou Li’s abstract practice expands the boundaries of what contemporary …

Prodigal Daughters: The Crisis Facing Generation Z Women, Kristin Brouwer

Doctor of Ministry

Why are Generation Z women (born approximately between 1997 and 2012), increasingly leaving organized Christian religion in the United States? This question became personal in my office at a Christian liberal arts college, where national statistics took on the faces and stories of students I teach and mentor. For the first time in American history, young men are now more religious than young women, and nearly four in ten Gen Z women identify as religiously unaffiliated. Yet their departure is not primarily a rejection of God; it is a rejection of distorted representations of God, faith, and church.

Drawing on …

The Importance Of Mental Health Education In The Black Church: Exploring Mental Health And Trauma Through A Biblical Lens, Navita Kj Johnson-Belcher

Doctor of Ministry

The Black church has historically served as a cornerstone for African American spiritual and communal life yet faces significant challenges in addressing mental health needs rooted in generational trauma and systemic oppression. This dissertation explores the crisis of silence surrounding mental health in Black church contexts, where stigma, pastoral limitations, and historical mistrust of institutional systems create barriers to healing. Through examination of biblical perspectives on suffering, church-based mental health programs, and emerging digital ministry models, this study demonstrates that online platforms can effectively integrate trauma-informed care with theological education.

The research presents a digital, trauma-informed, biblically-based, mental health education …

Significant Women: From Spiritual Narratives To Modern Advocacy, Mary Melissa Henderson

Doctor of Ministry

Significant Women addresses the need for congregational advocates who support and empower women in ministry. This advocacy is rooted in a renewed perspective on women’s roles within both Scripture and the modern church.

Research reveals that tradition, rather than theology, is the primary catalyst for gender limitations in the Church—often driven by a fear of disrupting established operations. Another key insight is that Jesus acts as the "antithesis of patriarchy," intentionally elevating and empowering women to carry the Gospel. While academic resources are plentiful, a significant "white space" exists for non-academic resources designed for laypeople and everyday churchgoers. Stakeholders most …

Good Grief: Implementing Solace And Support Of Bereavement Ministry Within A Resource-Constrained Church In Chicago, Illinois, Celeste Haynes

Doctor of Ministry

Grief is a universal human experience that occurs at some point in everyone's life. This body of work explores the various benefits of implementing a bereavement support ministry in a resource-constrained church in Chicago, Illinois. The research will outline how a bereavement ministry can offer emotional support, spiritual guidance, and provide educational resources, community building, outline a budget proposal, and a grant opportunities, partnership with local agencies, training for volunteers, and practical help to bereaved members in a church, as well as the bereaved community.

Bereavement is an inevitable part of the human experience, and churches have historically served as …

Visual Word Recognition And The Role Of Diacritics: Evidence From Arabic Vowelization., Maram Alharbi

Linguistics & TESOL Dissertations

This dissertation investigates the role of vowelization diacritics in Arabic visual word recognition and their contribution to early stages of lexical processing. Across writing systems, diacritical marks differ in their functional role and in whether they are part of letter identity, raising fundamental questions about how such features are encoded during word recognition. Arabic provides a particularly informative testing ground for these questions: vowelization diacritics in this language carry rich phonological information yet are systematically absent from the texts that skilled readers encounter daily. This interaction between the linguistic value of vowelization and its near-total omission in naturalistic reading positions …

Everyone's Table: Growing Polycultural Leadership Through Mutually Facilitated Peer Learning, Joel Bert Zantingh

Doctor of Leadership

Despite multiculturalism being an official policy in Canada since 1971, significant challenges remain in achieving genuine belonging among immigrant communities, particularly within leadership structures. This project responds to the marginalization of diasporic and newer-to-Canada leaders within evangelically aligned Canadian organizations, focusing specifically on leadership culture.

Grounded in biblical and theological scholarship that advocates for unity amid cultural diversity, this project articulates a normative and interpretive framework rooted in the Christian theological tradition. It also integrates insights from sociological and organizational studies that examine power, ethnocentrism, and the psychological experiences of visible minorities within dominant cultural contexts. I found how implicit …

Women In Leadership Seminar Series, An Integrated Approach, Diane B. Tuttle

Doctor of Leadership

Need Problem Opportunity (NPO) Statement

Women of faith aspiring to leadership positions in the nonprofit sector need to be strategically equipped with specialized knowledge, experience, and interpersonal awareness.

Key Insights That Emerged From Research

When this journey began, I envisioned my project focusing on executive leadership transitions in nonprofit organizations. However, through interactive discovery in this doctoral program, I realized that the scope was too narrow. Women at different career levels wanted to learn, grow, and have opportunities to connect with other women. This led me to develop a seminar series intended for women interested in personal and professional growth. …

Sabbath For Everyone: A Guidebook For Practicing Rest, Ryan Thorson

Doctor of Leadership

While Sabbath practices are central to God’s design for human flourishing, Compassion Church currently lacks a shared, accessible formation pathway that supports individuals and households in practicing Sabbath in sustainable, life-stage–appropriate ways within the demands of contemporary life and ministry.

This doctoral project responds to that need by developing and testing a Sabbath formation guidebook designed to help individuals and communities engage Sabbath as a gift through the practices of stopping, resting, praying, and playing. A key insight emerging from the research is that Sabbath is not merely a discipline to be mastered but a relational space in which God …