American Studies Commons^™

Distinguishing Patterns Of Utopia And Dystopia, East And West, Huai-Hsuan Huang

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Before Sir Thomas More published Utopia and defined his ideal world with this fictional land, humans had been looking for their ideal society for centuries based on various religions and cultures. Yet, there are a few studies focusing on Utopia and Dystopia in cross-cultural contexts. This thesis will explore the two main questions: 1) can Utopia and Dystopia be separated? and 2) how does the utopian concept in the West involve in Eastern culture during the postwar period in postcolonial perspective?

Phoenix in Japan and THX 1138 in U.S. are two well-known works during the post-World War II period via …

Measuring Up: Standardized Testing And The Making Of Postwar American Identities, 1940-2001, Keegan J. Shepherd

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Standardized testing is a defining feature of contemporary American society. It not only governs how people are channeled through their schooling; it amplifies existing social disparities. Nonetheless, standardized testing endures, namely because it has served as a vital tool for the post-1945 American state. The postwar state prioritized, on the one hand, the cultivation of intellects resilient enough to sustain American geopolitical supremacy through scientific discovery and technological innovation and, on the other hand, the maintenance of an obedient population that would not disrupt existing social hierarchies. Standardized testing helped the postwar state solve this mind-body dilemma. As a function …

Con Su Propia Voz: Un Estudio De Cinco Mujeres Mexicanas, Matthew Steven Wilkinson

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Este estudio se centra en las vidas de cinco mujeres mexicanas—Malintzin, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Leona Vicario, Rosario Castellanos y Julieta Venegas—de cinco etapas históricas diferentes de México—la Conquista, el Virreinato de Nueva España, la lucha por la independencia, la modernidad y lo contemporáneo—al estudiar el uso que cada figura hace de su “Voz” según la época. Empieza presentando y descomponiendo el concepto de “malinchismo” revisando los detalles reconocidos de la vida de Malintzin/doña Marina/la Malinche. Después, continúa con un resumen de ciertos aspectos interesantes de las vidas de cada figura, empezando con Sor Juana y concluyendo con …

Get Ye A Copper Kettle: Appalachia, Moonshine, And A Postcolonial World, Christopher David Adkins

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

For little over a century, the American region of Appalachia was an internal mineral colony of the United States. This internal colonization produced innumerable negative environmental and economic effects, as well as – most insidious of all – the constructed stereotype of the Hillbilly that even in the Twenty-First Century refuses to die. Yet part and parcel of that same stereotype is something found all over Appalachia, representing a freedom, an identity, and an heritage so long denied to Appalachia and the Appalachian people on its own terms: moonshine, the colorless, unaged corn whiskey long produced both in Appalachia …