Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Why Renegotiation?: Renewal Of The South Korea-Chile Bilateral Free Trade Agreement, Montserrat Bugueno

International Studies (MA) Theses

This thesis project explores the motivations behind the bilateral free trade agreement (FTA) renegotiation between Chile and South Korea. Existing studies have examined the reasons and outcomes of creating the initial Chile-South Korea FTA, but they have not focused on renegotiations between the two countries. A few investigations on renegotiations have focused on diversifying their exports and expanding their markets in each other's regions. However, most research lacks further exploration of both countries' market security concerns. By analyzing official government documents and conducting three semi-structured interviews with government officials and experts in the field, I argue that the current protectionist …

The Heart Of The Problem: An Art Gallery Installation To Foster Dialogue On Heart Disease And The Privilege Of Prevention, Olivia Eileen Heinecke

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

We are cautioned constantly about various harmful diseases. However, the deadliest disease tends to be overlooked. Heart disease takes the lives of more than half a million people in the United States every year, yet there is a lack of discussion to address the epidemic at hand (Hill). This is largely due to the “blame the victim” stigma surrounding the generally preventable range of complications. While 80% of cardiovascular disease is avoidable, not every individual has the means of achieving a lifestyle necessary in averting the conditions and their symptoms. For this creative art project, I want to encourage education …

Jurgen Comics Contest Newspaper And Artwork - 2022, Alyson Piccione

Jurgen Banned Art Comics Contest

Digital edition of the Jurgen Comics Contest broadsheet newspaper celebrating the 2022 Contest winners. The newspaper design and supplemental artwork was created by contest student editor Alyson Piccione. Supplemental promotional materials include poster, comic, and caricatures of historical figures who played a role in the censorship of James Branch Cabell's work Jurgen: A Comedy of Justice.

The 2022 Jurgen Comics Contest invited VCU students to explore some episode or aspect of the seizure and censorship of James Branch Cabell’s Jurgen: A Comedy of Justice in a single-page, multi-panel comic.

Two Marching Band Directors’ Insights About Their Bands’ Musical Achievement And Satisfaction In The American Deep South: A Qualitative Analysis, John Klee

Honors Theses

High School marching band is an intricate facet of music education that operates in several varieties across the United States. Depending on the style as well as many external and internal factors of a marching band, marching bands can have goals and definitions of musical achievement that can vary drastically. This qualitative study aims to assist those in the world of marching music education to better understand these distinct types of marching bands on a deeper level. The study gathered detailed perspectives of two directors in juxtaposed marching programs to a view of what drives these bands and directors to …

Culture In Disney Films: A Comparative Analysis Of Color, Composition And Rhythm, Megan Paul

Interior Design Undergraduate Honors Theses

As a student of design, I take inspiration from everything around me. The media I consume, the places I visit, and the people I meet.By choice or not, I and my generation are subject to the various forms of pop culture, film is one of them. Film is one of few art forms which combines several methods and elements of design to produce a cohesive result, as opposed to a singular medium. This forms the connection to design thinking and is the foundation for the study.

Another critical component to pop culture is the ability to reach the masses. Due …

The Experiences Of The Transgender And Gender Diverse Community On Coming Out At The University Of Arkansas, Taylor Hubbard

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Researching the experiences of the TGD community can help better understand the unique struggles this community may face, specifically regarding the unique experiences southeastern United States TGD individuals have encountered. We draw on previous studies regarding the entire LGBTQ+ community and the minimal research on the TGD community. There is minimal research looking specifically at the experiences college TGD students have when coming out in different aspects and the perceptions TGD individuals have about themselves as a result of their experiences coming out. We conducted a survey with 37 respondents as well as 4 qualitative interviews. We present interviews conducted …

Racial And Ethnic Composition Among Latinos In The United States (1990-2017), Sebastián Villamizar-Santamaría

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction:

This report examines the socioeconomic trends and differences among not only the four major racial and ethnic groups in the country (non-Hispanic whites, non-Hispanic blacks, Latinos, and Asians) but also within the Latino population from 1990 to 2017.

Methods:

This report uses the American Community Survey PUMS (Public Use Microdata Series) data for all years released by the Census Bureau and reorganized for public use by the Minnesota Population Center, University of Minnesota, IPUMSusa, (https://usa.ipums.org/usa/index.shtml). See Public Use Microdata Series Steven Ruggles, J. Trent Alexander, Katie Genadek, Ronald Goeken, Matthew B. Schroeder, and Matthew Sobek. Integrated Public Use Microdata …

Aliens, Lizbet Cantu Montiel

Theses and Dissertations

Aliens is a collection of poems exploring the concept of alienations though heavy usage of figurative language and rich, dark language. Each poem will portray a variety of issues around the author and the world around the author of the work. Other important issues as underlying themes of the work explore diversity in different means through the concept of alienation, or not belonging, in a certain circumstance. Each poem also uses a variety of literary devices, especially the heavy usage of figurative language in order to portray the issues or themes at hand revolving around the concept of alienation.

Latinx On The Rise Mentoring Program’S Impact On Graduating Student’S Professional Integration Past Undergraduate Studies, Lucero Martinez-Salas

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Mentoring programs are implemented to create a space for skill and information transmission between a mentor and mentee. Mentoring programs are typically implemented in an academic setting with professors or peers acting as a mentor and students as mentees. Based on the under-representation of Latinx students in higher education and further career paths, mentoring with this population could be positively impactful to their student experience. This thesis focuses on the Latinx on the Rise mentoring program and the experience of the mentees with a focus on the Latinx student experience. Implications for implementation of such programs and their impact will …

For The Kingdom, Jack Conway

Marketing Undergraduate Honors Theses

For The Kingdom is a tabletop board game that I have developed for my thesis. In my thesis, I would like to cover three areas that have been crucial to the development of the game- the guidebook created to support and facilitate the board game, the changes made due to player feedback and testing, and the potential paths to getting the game to the market. Before Talking about those three areas, however, I will first describe the games genre and a bit about my approach to developing it.

The Potentials And Challenges Of Zoom Live Theatre During Coronavirus Lockdown: Pandemic Therapy And Corona Chicken (Part Two), Khaled Mostafa Karam

Faculty Scholarship

This study discusses the potentials and challenges of Zoom theatre performances during the lockdown caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. It examines the utilization and applicability of videoconferencing software Zoom, and other streaming software compatible with it, in creating a viable performance option for theatre practitioners and audiences during mandatory social distancing. Such software can be a strategy for social inclusion, alleviating the adverse effects of extended quarantine. The article also discusses the technical and performative aspects of Zoom theatre, pointing out its pros and cons. It uses a critical and analytical approach to performances of two Zoom plays, Pandemic Therapy …

Bibliography For "Beyond Borders And Shores: A Display In Celebration Of Asian And Pacific Islander American (Apia) Art And Heritage", Margaret Puentes

Library Displays and Bibliographies

A bibliography created to accompany a display about Asian and Pacific Islander American (APIA) art and heritage in May 2022 at the Leatherby Libraries at Chapman University.

135th Street Branch: Librarianship And The Passing Fictions Of Regina Anderson Andrews And Nella Larsen, Caitlin Matheis

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

In this thesis, I examine how two writer-librarians that worked in the 135^th Street Branch of the New York Public Library in the 1920's, Regina Anderson Andrews and Nella Larsen, grappled in their fiction writing with questions of classification, information, and knowledge that encompassed their daily work in the library. I begin by contextualizing the branch within the Harlem Renaissance and Arturo A. Schomburg's call for the preservation of Black history and literature at a time when the field of librarianship was being professionalized by implementing library schools and classification standards. I then provide readings of Andrews's one-act play …

An Analysis Of Charging Practices And Their Impact On Battery Degradation In North American Electric Vehicles Built Between 2010-2020, Douglas William Edward Ferrier

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Electric vehicles (EVs) are emerging as a component of the global solution to combat climate change. However, in North America, particularly in the United States and Canada, the transition away from internal combustion engines (ICE) has been slow. North America faces unique challenges due to its geographical size and population in comparison to other continents. The good news is that EV adoption is increasing within North America. Along with increased EV adoption, governments and public companies are constructing charging infrastructure to support increased consumer EV purchases. Despite increased adoption, many future and current owners throughout North American society have concerns …

Preoperative Predictors For 30-Day Postoperative Emergency Department Visit After A Bariatric Surgery, Pawan Bhandari

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

One of US hospitals' widely used critical performance or quality outcome measures is the 30-day emergency department (ED) visit after a surgical procedure. Such ED visits add millions of dollars each year as a cost burden to US healthcare. This study aimed to identify key predictors known before the patient's surgery, contributing to undesirable ED visits within 30 days of a bariatric surgical procedure. The study was conducted in three phases. The first phase of the study engaged a panel of experts to narrow down important preoperative factors for patients undergoing bariatric surgery in the form of a Delphi study. …

My Journey To Create A Space For Young Adults To Grow In Community, Chelsea Simmeth

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

This project focuses on the development of a safe space for young adults to come together, create community and engage in activities. There is a gap in college-age students’ ability to find community outside the university. This project focuses on creating a place where they would be able to meet new people, play sports, and board games, and do arts and crafts. The development of marketing strategies, event planning checklists, and locations for holding events are outlined for the Young Adults (YA)- UNITE (Upbeat, New, and Inviting Transformational Environment) program.

Being Creative: Not An Act But A Habit, Matthew William Smith

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

This project explores what it means to be creative, how to practice creativity, and how a creative practice can be used to bring about the change one wants to see in the world. Many theories and ideas from historical and modern scholars influenced the work. The literature review findings were synthesized to produce a practical and tangible creative practice prototype and a strategic action plan.

The Use Of Native American Literature For Teaching Native American History, Charles Democker

Senior Honors Theses

hite historians, schools, and writers have produced works that teach inaccurate and biased subjects that surround Native American history and culture. While most of this inaccurate and racist writing comes from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Indigenous authors, both past and present, have written works that have the potential to give more historically accurate and thorough representations of their people and culture. This thesis examines three novels written by Indigenous authors to argue for using Native American fiction to correct misrepresentation of Native culture by white writers. In contrast to both novels and histories written by white people, Native American …

Kurt Vonnegut, Modernity, And The Self: A Guide To The Good Life., Josh Simpson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

What are people for? This is a question Kurt Vonnegut raises in his first novel, 1952’s Player Piano. Over five decades later, when he concludes a career with 2005’s A Man Without a Country, he is still asking, “What is life all about?” (66). These are the central questions for Vonnegut, and his novels, short stories, essays, interviews, correspondence, and commencement addresses offer a singular, life-long attempt at an answer. In this dissertation I offer a reading of Vonnegut not just as a writer concerned with philosophical questions, but rather, on a deeper, more personal level, as a …

Re-Localizing Writing Assessment: Sites Of Knowledge Mobilization., Charlotte Asmuth

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

For decades, writing assessment theorists have subscribed to the principle of localism––the belief that assessments should be designed with local contexts in mind and administered by local actors. Although this belief has ensured the validity of assessments in writing programs, it has also led to a tendency to treat assessment as a stable practice that is bound to a particular location, thus ignoring what happens when assessment knowledge and methods developed in one location travel to another distant location (as they do for campus assessment initiatives). To that end, this project traces how assessment knowledge is transformed as it travels …

Western Christianity And The Origins Of Antiblackness, Eurocentrism, And White Supremacist Ideology., John Chenault

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative study investigates the cult(ural) and intellectual history of Western Christianity to address a significant gap in the literature pertaining to the origins of whiteness/antiblackness in the West and its subsequent socialization worldwide. Western Christianity’s seminal role in the social construction of the whiteness/antiblackness dichotomy has been undertheorized, neglected, and ignored. This study finds early Christian theologians categorically imposed conceptual metaphors about Blackness on African people that depicted them as the exemplars of evil to teach Christian doctrine about sin and salvation. It connects these original antiblack discourses directly to the theo-political arguments Western European Christians used centuries later …

As Above, So Below: Magical Poetics And Queer Alchemy & A Planetary Spell.., Robert Eric Shoemaker

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

"Words have power": no more obvious statement has perhaps ever been made in an essay. However, the nature of that power is quite complicated, with a long and contentious history. I think of poetry as magic. Poetry is magical in the sense that it has ineffable qualities to it that enable readers to experience new thoughts and feelings when experiencing poetry, but when I say magic I mean that I think of poetry as actual, practical magic. As I will argue, poetry has magical qualities to it regardless of who is weaving the words, while intentional use of a self-aware …

Definitions And Depictions Of Rhetorical Practice In Medieval English Fürstenspiegel., Joseph Ethan Blaine Sharp

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines how medieval authors defined rhetoric and depicted rhetorical practice in medieval English Fürstenspiegel. It begins by analyzing how the field of medieval rhetorical historiography has overlooked the Fürstenspiegel as a rhetorical genre due to its overt reliance on meta-rhetorical handbook genres as the objects of its analysis. This dissertation challenges traditional narratives that positions medieval rhetoric as a primarily academic discipline divorced from political practice by engaging in horizontal reading practices that examine the broader culture of medieval rhetorical practice alongside the definitions of rhetoric found in medieval English Fürstenspiegel. In so doing, this dissertation …

"Death Can't Touch Them Now": Aids Response And Memorialization In Louisville, Kentucky, 1982-1992., Olivia A. Beutel

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis aims to address the role of the queer community in Louisville, Kentucky during the AIDS epidemic. Beginning with the first reported AIDS death in the city in 1983 throughout the 1980s, dialogue focused on those living with AIDS, specifically on education for prevention and aid to those afflicted by the disease. Individuals in the queer community—gay men, lesbians, bisexual men and women, transgender men and women, and others—created resources that were not being provided by the larger city government. Then, in the 1990s, national attention to the AIDS Memorial Quilt encouraged people to participate in rituals of commemoration, …

The Reading Of Sir Toby Belch: A Queer And Black Exploration Of William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night., Jahi E Bogard

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This MFA thesis explores queer, black representation in William Shakespeare’s drama and in the University of Louisville’s Department of Theatre Arts Fall 2021 production of an adaption of Twelfth Night (1601). Directed by Jennifer Pennington, the repurposed script and non-traditional casting targeted a modern audience. Cast as Olivia’s drunk uncle, Sir Toby Belch, I aimed to discover if my identify as a black, queer, cis man could be incorporated into Shakespeare’s text. Sir Toby Belch’s raucous, heterosexual, and sometimes violent, traits are often imagined today as innately masculine. I argue that Shakespeare’s plays can be appropriated by queer, black actors …

Betwixt & Between., Xuanyi Wang

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In this thesis, I will discuss the process of learning, borrowing, and exploring the fusion between styles that emerged from the exchange of Eastern and Western civilizations. I will also use the process of transformation and merging of motifs to evoke my thoughts on the identity of immigrants. In addition, the essay will also discuss the similarities between traditional Chinese and Western designs metaphorically. This thesis will also explain why I use IUDs for pattern creation and provide views on the body ownership of women in the East and West. I will also consider the evolution and reflection of the …

Transformation., Jingshuo Yang

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

My works mainly show my perception of life and my change of thought. The world is full of changes, and the pandemic has disrupted our lives. Many people, including me, are confused about the world. Philosophy and my observation and thinking about the world helped me to have a clearer understanding of the world. My paintings Licia, Butterfly Woman, and Live with Covid reflect my understanding of German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer's theory of empathy. Within my art, I also use another German Philosopher Theodor W. Adorno's theory of the culture industry to deepen my understanding of some social phenomena. My …

Maria On The Moon: A Chamber Opera., Tanner Jones

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

After receiving news that his mother’s cancer has taken a turn for the worse, Brian must face the inevitability of her passing. He refuses to let her go without a fight, however, and attempts to buy time with rituals and strange objects from his eccentric, late family. But dark and mysterious things begin to lurk around their home, and Brian sees what comes of attempting to ward off death. An encounter with a strange figure forces Brian to face his inability to let go of what he cannot control. This work is adapted by the composer from Travis Brown’s short …

Meat The Future., Xin Chen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This research focuses on the subtle relationship between human life, the environment, and other animals that we live among every day. Under the mainstream social background of capitalism and a commodity economy, animals are the victims of constant consumption and exploitation. However, meat is a basic substance for human nourishment, especially in certain cultures. As a result, meat becomes an important part of the commodity economy in capitalist societies, wherein the supply must be filled to accommodate society’s demand. This research formed an exhibition using glass and ceramic artwork using a playfully satirical tone to offer a crucial alternative: how …

On The Subject Of Loneliness., Isaac Raymond Smith

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Loneliness has been experienced since ancient times, but all were made acutely aware of the need for social interaction during the long periods of lockdown during 2020 and 2021. on the subject of loneliness draws inspiration from a variety of texts which examine the complex effects of loneliness from emotional, scientific, and spiritual viewpoints. Redactions and rearrangements of these texts form a new narrative which does not always follow a linear form or work toward a clear goal. The speaker’s internal dialogue formed from the disparate texts reflects the impact of loneliness on the music itself; only in retrospect do …