Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Telling A Story, Changing The World: California Rural Legal Assistance, Jonathan J. Chavez

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

This capstone project attempts to provide an in-depth view of how stories influence change in our lives as well as in the field of law.

Dream Variations: Fictional Views Of The School To Prison Pipeline, Kierstin R. C. Anderson

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

These two works of fiction will tell the story of the school to prison pipeline taken from the black and white of statistics and numbers into the colors of the individual; their thoughts, feelings, and motivations. Dream Variations is the telling of one instance in the lives of different people, both the Black American youth who go through it and the lawyers who see their cases.

Legal Discrimination, Jeena D. Tanks

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

The War on Drugs campaign was a political movement created in 1971 with the initial goal of eradicating the production, distribution, and use of illegal drugs for the purpose of reducing the illegal drug trade on American soil. In the near fifty years since its initial implementation, the drug war has had disastrous impacts on citizens from the result of shifting the public perspective of drugs from a public health issue to a nationally political one. Polices and laws created during this period with the intent of targeting drug users have instead created an environment of aggressive policing tactics and …

Planned Parenthood: Defend Or Defund?, Jasmine M. Lopez

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

For the last 100 years, the organization Planned Parenthood has been providing women with affordable healthcare. Today, the debate to take away federal funding to this organization is a very controversial topic. My project explores the details of this debate and informs the community about Planned Parenthood in the process. My hope is to learn more about both sides of this debate, to better understand people with differing views. I will learn this by looking at the problem through the lens of a feminist theorist named bell hooks, and a power theorist named Dacher Keltner. Through my research I will …

Life As I Know It: My Story Told Through Poetry, Leah T. Montoya

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

This is a collection of poems and prose pieces, that cover love, loss, and everything in between.

The Drums Throughout Time: Rethinking The Beat, Sal Alamillo

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

This paper will examine a variety of ways that drum makers approach their craft by comparing the processes of distinct forms of drum construction as well as the philosophies and aspirations of these artists. This dissertation will review the various choices of drum makers by: (1) providing a brief history of the drum set, (2) comparing the processes of manufacturers, both prominent and independent, and (3) narrating a firsthand project of making a drum with an independent drum builder while incorporating a handmade drum into original compositions and recordings. The paper will also explain the creative decisions of drum makers …

Creative Outlets Empowering At-Risk Youth: Cultural Expressions Through Recording Technology And Multimedia Productions, Gregory Jeffery

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

At-risk youth are empowered through various creative forms of recorded media. Today's market has a wide range of recording technology products lower-end consumer gear to the high-end commercial gear. These products becomes the tools making music more accessible to the low-income urban communities. At-risk youth are able to participate in ways now that many did before them. The facilities of centers such as RYSE in Richmond, Ca reach out to at-risk youth offering programs for recording technology, multimedia arts, and video production as well as a multitude of resources for educational, career, and health services. Cultural expressions through recording technology …

And The Beat Goes On: The Story Of The Drum Machine, Ismael Medina

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

The drum machine was created to accompany musicians and producers; it has the power to create basic and complex rhythmic patterns and helps musicians. In this paper, extensive research will be used to explain the history and origin of the drum machine. It will also require dissecting several sources such as Beat Box: A Drum Machine Obsession by Joe Mansfield and others. It will also help explain in detail the roles Roger Linn, Dave Rossum and Ikutaro Kakehashi played by revolutionizing the drum machine. The next section will explain how artist and producers who used the drum machine as musical …

The Benefits Of Music In Child Development, Dulce-Paola Ixtupe

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

Music is a subject that does not limit children to simply having fun, although “fun” is an essential component when trying to engage children in learning activities. Music further enhances a series of transferable skills and can help children with their learning experience in other subjects. By being part of a fun activity such as music, children are able to acquire affective, cognitive, and evaluative skills, which will further reinforce a variety of areas of their development. When engaged in an activity where recognition and expression of feelings are required, they learn that having feelings is perfectly normal and that …

Creating A Multiracial Lesson Plan, Clayton Davis

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

The purpose of this project is to teach students about multiracial identity issues. Multiracial populations in the U.S. continue to grow and it’s important for educators to address the needs of these students. A 5-E multiracial literature lesson plan was created for second grade that incorporates KWL and Text-to-World teaching strategies. A second grade class were read two children’s picture books, each featuring a biracial protagonist, and were asked to discuss and evaluate the content and commonalities of these stories. Students recorded what they learned in this lesson in their KWL’s. The results reveal that some students understood the problems …

Defining Dartmouth: Inclusion And Exclusion At Dartmouth College 1917-2017, Laura Barrett

Dartmouth Library Staff Publications

Dartmouth College’s demographics have shifted over the past one hundred years, from an almost entirely all male, white, and wealthy student body, to one with gender, racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic diversity. During this time, the College has endeavored to maintain its reputation as an academically exclusive institution for the intellectual elite while simultaneously opening its doors continually wider to a more diverse student population. These aspirations, for broad inclusivity within the bounds of narrow exclusivity, have frequently worked in opposition to one another, and Dartmouth’s administrators have led the College in a delicate balancing act amid shifting alumni demands, student …

Rethinking The Bronx’S ‘Soundview Slums’: The Intersecting Histories Of Large-Scale Waterfront Redevelopment And Community-Scaled Planning In An Era Of Urban Renewal, Kara M. Schlichting

Publications and Research

In the 1910s, the bungalow colony Harding Park developed on marshy Clason Point. Through the 1930s–1950s, Robert Moses sought to modernize this East Bronx waterfront through the Parks Department and the Committee on Slum Clearance. While localism and special legislative treatment enabled Harding Park’s preservation as a co-op in 1981, the abandonment of master planning left neighboring Soundview Park unfinished. The entwined histories of recreation and residency on Clason Point reveal the beneficial and detrimental effects of both urban renewal and community development, while also demonstrating the complicated relationship between localism and largescale planning in postwar New York City.

Gaming For Meaning: Video Games And Evolving Reader Response, Reannon Dykehouse

All NMU Master's Theses

Video games and their communities have something to teach reader response theorists. These theories already recognize readers as creators by acknowledging that their interpretations make meaning; however, these theorists are still struggling to determine the limits of reader interpretation. Norman Holland fears that without text-based constraints on interpretation, differently-reading readers are isolated from each other. Stanley Fish, who sees value in conflicting reader interpretations, limits his examination only to insular scholarly communities. David Bleich observes that students make different meanings out of texts than their teachers, but does not discuss other communal interpretations occurring in the world beyond the classroom. …

Australian Government Information Resources, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Provides an overview of Australian Government information resources. Features content from Australian Government agency websites such as the Department of Environment and Energy, Department of Defence, Australian National Maritime Museum, ANZAC Memorial in Sydney, Department of Immigration & Border Protection, Australian Bureau of Statistics, Australian Dept. of Agriculture and Water Resources, Australian Parliament, Australian Treasury, Australian Transport Safety Board, and Australian Parliamentary Library. Content includes a video excerpt from Australian parliamentary debate.

Black Voices Matter, Shenika Hankerson

Language Arts Journal of Michigan

This article examines the role of voice in the writing of African American students from the African American Language (AAL)-speaking culture. Drawing on data from a qualitative study, this article presents empirical evidence that is likely to inform existing and new initiatives to support the voice and writing practices of AAL-speaking students, and by extension, all culturally and linguistically diverse students. This rarely considered insight, I argue, is important as in recent decades there have been a growing number of calls for instructional material that meets the language and literacy development needs of second language speakers and writers. By generating …

Thomas Jefferson, Slavery, And The Language Of The Textbook: Addressing Problematic Representations Of Race And Power, Sarah L. Thomson

Language Arts Journal of Michigan

This paper uses critical discourse analysis to demonstrate how two written texts about Thomas Jefferson and slavery construct very different representations of the past. The paper suggests methods that teachers can use to help students critique representations of marginalized groups in written texts, and develop a more authentic understanding of the experiences of enslaved African American men and women.

Naming What Bothers Us: Measuring Moral Rhetoric In The 2016 Presidential Debates, Skyler James Meeks

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

For centuries, Aristotle’s ethos has been a crucial component of persuasive rhetoric, with flagrant violations of character extinguishing the credibility of speakers and rendering their messages ineffective. However, the 2016 US presidential election challenged the rhetorical value of good character and left voters unable to articulate feelings about perceived moral transgressions. In some ways, this inability to express what bothered many is tied to the various constraints of the first-year writing classroom, where instructors often oversimplify definitions of ethos in a way that removes a facet known as aretê—a concept defined as moral virtue and one especially beneficial for …

Window Dressing: Isolation In Cornell Woolrich's Short Fiction, Annika R. P. Deutsch

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Cornell Woolrich was a prolific American noir detective fiction writer. Though recognized by some as the father of noir fiction, he is often overshadowed by other writers of his era, such as Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and James M. Cain. Many of the themes found in Woolrich’s writing, particularly isolation and the associated fear and anxiety, are as palpable today as they were in the times he was writing. In this thesis, I argue that Woolrich’s continued relevance is the result of his unique portrayal of American city life. Woolrich utilizes recognizable themes from the noir, mystery, and thriller genres …

Jornaleros Engaged In A Multidimensional Struggle: A Critical Ethnography With Day Laborers In Las Vegas, Jorge Adrian Castrejon

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Day labor work has spread across the entire Unite States as part of the secondary labor market, or as Cherrie Moraga describes it- survival work. Day laborers in Las Vegas, Nevada have become a significant part of this trend in the Southwest, where the highest rate of day laborers work, and for which little community and scholarly work has been produced. The National Day Labor Survey, the most comprehensive study with day laborers, reports that the day labor market is rife with abuse and violations of worker rights. But, the exploitation of this predominantly migrant workforce would not be possible …

Learning To Adapt, Kelly Elcock

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Learning to Adapt is a novel of slow-motion disaster. It tells the story of one-hit-wonder songwriter Sim Henrie, who has gone into hiding to gradually go broke, but then takes a job with a paint crew. It’s a meditation on celebrity, paranoia, and surveillance, but it’s also a gripping construction-worker drama.

If we were to analyze it the way one analyzes a dream, we would soon notice the whole thing fairly trembles with sexual undertones. Examples are too numerous to even begin to elucidate, but simply open the thing to any page and see if it isn’t true.

In addition …

Etudes For The Bassoon: An Annotated Bibliography And Pedagogical Guide, Eric Joaquin Fassbender

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

There are well over one hundred published methods and etude collections written for the bassoon. However, many bassoon teachers and students are only familiar with a few of them, primarily those composed by Julius Weissenborn and Ludwig Milde. This is evidenced by the frequent mentions of these etudes in writings about bassoon literature, repertoire surveys, university syllabi, articles in the journal of the International Double Reed Society, and more. While these specific studies remain an invaluable part of the bassoonist’s repertoire, there are several aspects of bassoon playing they do not address, particularly where post-Romantic musical styles are concerned. When …

John Philip Sousa And The Wagner Overture: A New Transcription Of The Overture To Der Fliegende Holländer For Wind Orchestra, Stephen H. Goldeck

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This research examines John Philip Sousa’s 1893 wind band transcription of Richard Wagner’s overture to Der fliegende Holländer, and focuses specifically on how Sousa reconceived orchestral sonorities and solved particular problems posed by Wagner’s complex orchestrational textures. Findings include that, while appropriate for the era and instrumentation of Sousa’s band, his transcription contains certain limitations for the twenty-first-century wind orchestra. Due to the fact that Sousa’s compositions, arrangements, and transcriptions were written to accommodate frequent outdoor performances, Sousa’s transcription uses more doubled voicings than would be necessary in an indoor concert hall setting. Further, while Sousa’s instrumentation approximates that of …

Belt Of Pearls, Danielle Lee Henry

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Belt of Pearls is a collection of poems concerned with the idea of home in both places and in

people. The speaker wrestles with dissatisfaction with home as a place of origin. The ties of

family, familiar landmarks, and old relationships are outgrown; the feeling of belonging becomes

associated with a lover instead. The poems attempt to locate relationships in geographical scenes

largely through the language of weather and flora. Images of light and the way it strikes a scene

are particularly important. Influences of the collection include Robert Hass, Tracy K. Smith, and

Deborah Landau.

Art And The Ordinary: Literary And Visual Constructs Of The Mundane, Jenessa Kenway

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

My research has shown that it is typical of the mundane to be overlooked. The mundane spools out continuously before us unheeded in the form of tasks accomplished almost without our notice. In moment of pause, we look and are overwhelmed with a level of detail and experience which, relieved of the typical haze of inattention, is practically foreign to us. As a student of literature, I’ve discovered the rich exchange between the depiction and the description of mundane objects even though the two are more often treated separately. My observations and arguments below seek to bridge that division by …

An Analysis And Band Transcription Of Eric Whitacre's The River Cam, Charles Amon Maguire

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Orchestral transcriptions for wind band have been historically vital to the expansion and success of the medium. As original compositions have increased in number, string solos accompanied by wind band continue to represent an under-utilized area of the literature. The “Wind Repertory Project” has documented twenty-three compositions that fall within this area of wind band music. A transcription of Eric Whitacre’s The River Cam for solo cello and string orchestra expands the contemporary area of the repertoire by contributing to the list of works written for solo string instruments and band. Comparative and harmonic analyses provide correlative evidence as to …

Launching Conservative Resistance: A Rhetorical Criticism Of The Young Americans For Freedom, Tyler John Snelling

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

At the end of the 1940s, conservatives faced internal divisions, an elitist image, and people supporting government post Great Depression. Liberalism seemed entrenched throughout society. Yet, the Young Americans for Freedom (YAF), the first national, conservative movement, formed in 1960. This thesis investigates YAF’s earliest “publicity” in National Review, an influential magazine, to understand part of what preceded conservatism’s evolution. Publishing “The Ivory Tower: Young Americans for Freedom” by William F. Buckley and the “Sharon Statement,” YAF’s manifesto, side-by-side formed a new identity—young conservative—that empowered activists. From Maurice Charland’s “constitutive rhetoric,” chapter two investigates Buckley’s telling of the past as …

Prosaic (Dis)Appearance, Waller H. Austin

Graduate School of Art Theses

This thesis focuses on issues uncovered in my pursuit of acceptance as a visual artist. Through consolidating beliefs and ideals of art and juxtaposing historic themes and current trends with personal life experiences, I resolve to construct artworks as dizzying, thought-provoking environments. Recollections of memory are largely anachronistic and profound memories are typically associated with trauma or paradigm change within an abrogated system of faith or other conviction. I question the framework of conditioned vocabularies that inform judgment about any explicit perception.

Considering processes of thinking and the experiential re-engineering mechanisms that establish long-term memory, I endeavor to create works …

The Significance That Cause And Effect Might Have, Sara Fleenor

Graduate School of Art Theses

Growing up in Dayton, Ohio in the 90’s, I witnessed the withdrawal of manufacturing giant, General Motors, and was witness to the cascading evisceration of manufacturing in the Midwest. This creation of the rust belt not only littered the landscape with the ruins of empty manufacturing facilities, but the collapsed economy also created a dearth of aspiration that gave traction to a rising heroin epidemic.

In my work, I depict middle America not with the bucolic sunlight of a mythical heartland, but with the illumination of industrial collapse.

Meaning In Perception: Metaphor In Figurative Sculpture, Tommy Riefe

Graduate School of Art Theses

The body is the intermediary between the immaterial and material world and allows for the expression of one’s psychological and physical identity. The perception of the body and mind within space and time provides opportunities for change. Representation through figurative sculpture is a common thread over historical time. Works from Greek Classicism, like Kritios Boy, exemplify how a body’s physical condition is directly contingent on an individual’s psychological state. Alberto Giacometti and Antony Gormley further expand upon this as they present the body as a channel between the mind and the surrounding enviroment. Each artist creates alterations in scale, …

The Record In Question, Kari Varner

Graduate School of Art Theses

This thesis is an archive composed of text and image that catalogs the perpetual distance between the photograph and its subject. In my practice the fluidity of representation is examined through the frame of the photographic archive, while the notion of what constitutes a photographic archive is redefined. While seeking to describe the mutability of encounters with landscapes and past memories the materiality of the photograph is emphasized, the image and its substrate destabilized, and both experience and photograph are fleeting. In many cases water acts as the alchemical substance for transformation, leading the photographs closer to a state of …