English Language and Literature Commons^™

A Supplication For The Beggars: The Arguments Of Simon Fish And The Cultural Relevance Of His Writing In Sixteenth Century England, Charlotte Mcfaddin

Student Research

No abstract provided.

"Casting Aside That Ficticious Self.": Deciphering Female Identity In The Awakening 2015, Anne L. Dicosimo

Master's Theses

Kate Chopin’s female protagonists have long since fascinated literary critics, raising serious questions concerning the influence of nineteenth-century female gender roles in her writing. Published in 1899, The Awakening demonstrates the changeability of the various representations of woman. In the nineteenth century, the subject of women may be divided into two categories: the True Woman and the New Woman. The former were expected to “cherish and maintain the four cardinal virtues of piety, purity, submissiveness and domesticity” (Khoshnood et al.), while the latter sought to move away from hearth and home in order to focus on education, professions, and political …

The Muslim Mystique: The Use Of Rushdie’S Imaginary Homeland To Combat Prejudice Against Muslim Peoples Explored In Three Semi-Autobiographical Works Of Popular Fiction By Muslim Authors Of An American Immigrant Background, Lauren E. Nadolski

Selected Honors Theses

There is a largely unexplored trend in recent popular fiction that regards the semi-autobiographical work of authors of an immigrant or refugee background. These works seldom fall into the trap exposed by Said’s Orientalism, but instead present the author’s native country and culture through a lens similar what Salman Rushdie described as “imaginary homelands.” This thesis examines three primary texts that fit that description: The Kite Runner by Kahled Hosseni, The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Moshin Hamid, and Habibi by Naomi Shihab Nye for their inclusion of the Islamic faith and their portrayal of America. The texts are analyzed and recommended …

“Inhumanly Beautiful”: The Aesthetics Of The Nineteenth-Century Deathbed Scene, Margo Masur

English Theses

Death today is hidden from our everyday lives so it cannot intermingle with the general public. So when a family member dies, their body becomes an object in need of disposal; no longer can they be recognized as the familiar person they once were. To witness death is to force individuals to confront the truths of human existence, and for most of us seeing such a sight would fill us with an emotion of disgust. Yet during the nineteenth century, the burden of care towards the sick or dying was shared by a community of family, neighbors, and friends; the …

Review Of Marjo Kaartinen, Breast Cancer In The Eighteenth Century, Marie Mulvey-Roberts

ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830

No abstract provided.

Tempering Romance, Katherine R. Larson

Criticism

The Fabulous Dark Cloister: Romance in England after the Reformation by Tiffany Jo Werth. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011. Pp. 248, 8 illustrations. $65.00 cloth.

Chasing Ghosts: A Memoir Of A Father, Gone To War [Table Of Contents], Louise Desalvo

History

When literary biographer and memoirist Louise DeSalvo embarked upon a journey to learn why her father came home from World War II a changed man, she didn’t realize her quest would take ten years, and that it would yield more revelations about the man—and herself—and the effect of his military service upon their family than she’d ever imagined. During his last years, as he told her about his life, DeSalvo began to understand that her obsession with war novels and military history wasn’t merely academic but rooted in her desire to understand this complex father whom she both adored and …

The Beast Inside: Trauma Theory And William Golding's Lord Of The Flies 2015, Emily Paccia

Master's Theses

Following World War II and the horrible devastation in Europe, especially in London, Britain began to rebuild. The country was attempting to come back from war, and the culture reflected a bleak, disheartening feeling. Literature written during this time period, which so often reflects the culture directly, showed that very same bleakness. British novelist, and one who lived through that time, William Golding, writing in the 1960's, recreated the dystopia brought into European countries from living through the destruction of the war. Creating a vision of the future -- one of dysfunction and chaos -- Golding’s characters from Lord of …

'We Are All Greeks:' Sympathy And Proximity In Shelley‘S Hellas, Kyle J. Klausing

Scholarly Horizons: University of Minnesota, Morris Undergraduate Journal

The outbreak of the Greek Revolution of 1821 against the Ottoman Empire animated the radical European intelligentsia in a way unseen since the French Revolution 30 years before. The British Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley joined the chorus of philhellenes (meaning one who loves Greece) by extolling the Greek cause in his epic poem, Hellas. Scholarship has traditionally seen Shelley’s representation of the revolution either as an overly classicized literary indulgence or as a purely polemical defense of a political event. By identifying ways in which Shelley uses the classical past to engage the reader with the subject, I will …

Libraries And The Apocalyptic Imagination, Michael J. Paulus Jr.

SPU Works

Books and libraries figure prominently in apocalyptic and related forms of literature. The representations of libraries in these imagined, catastrophic futures reveal important roles libraries have had and continue to have in helping individuals, communities, and cultures find ways forward through time. This paper explores the long history of library eschatologies—including ancient apocalypses of the Dead Sea Scroll Library and the book of Revelation, modern apocalypses from Mary Shelley to Margaret Atwood, and the dystopian anti-libraries of Jorge Luis Borges’s Babel and Tlön—and highlights deep continuities connecting our historical memories, future expectations, and present experiences of libraries. In the apocalyptic …

Literary Note On: Donna Tartt; The Secret History: New York: Vintage, Paperback, 569pp, Nadya Chishty-Mujahid

Business Review

Donna Tartt's postmodern classic gained great fame when published in 1992, and additional, well-merited recognition when its author won the Pulitzer Prize for her more recent novel The Goldfinch in 2014. Originally from Mississippi, Tartt relocated to the East Coast during her college years and struck up friendships with notable literary figures such as Bret Easton Ellis-a move that enabled her to indulge in her passion for writing and bring her undeniable creativity to the public's attention. For sheer twisted machinations, The Secret History has few comparable rivals in postmodern literature, with the exception of great works such as Katherine …

Dialogical Interspecies Ethics: Ataraxia, Desire And Hope In The Post-Human World Of Anne Carson's Pastoral, Thomas Bristow Dr

The Goose

This review essay implicitly revisits human and non-human power relations within a critical animal studies context that understands the affective conjunction between the manipulation of our worlds (action, partly through knowledge) and degrees of involvement with these others that live in our worlds (comportment via emotions). I take Louise Westling’s new study as the platform for an analysis of two book-length poems, The Autobiography of Red (1998) and red doc> (2013), which centre on the life of a shepherd, Geryon. Rather than revisit classical pastoral, these texts extract power-relations that classical myth and pastoral spatialise. In so doing, I argue, …

Mythological Influences On Southern American Authors, Natalie L. Hayden

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

A major influence upon many parts of society is that of Greek and Roman mythology. While there are several interpretations of what myths are, this study will define them as stories from Greek or Roman origins that seek to explain some natural or social phenomena or to provide moral lessons. Myths were especially influential during the Southern Renaissance, a period of literary reinvention in America during the 1920s and 1930s. Authors used myths to give deeper meanings to their works as they struggled with issues of race, religion, and social changes. Myths appeared in plot lines, as major symbols, and …

Capitalism And "Blithedale": Exploring Hawthorne's Response To 19th Century American Capitalism, Kyle G. Phillips

disClosure: A Journal of Social Theory

With the intensive migration of the American public from rural to urban settings in the mid-nineteenth century came many logistical problems. Chief among them was the contention that the city was a place fundamentally void of, or else lax with morals. The examination into these issues explores why Americans felt the city was a catalyst for immorality, specifically examining prostitution and the exploitation of the working poor. It seeks to answer these questions within the framework of the anchor text, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Blithedale Romance”.

English National Identity In English Colonial And Imperial Literature And Undergraduate Publication Research, Megan A. Medeiros

Senior Honors Projects

This project is divided into two parts. The purpose of the first part was to construct, research and write a substantial historical thesis paper on a topic relevant to nationalism and national identity in Modern European history. The purpose of the second part was to research and explore the process of publishing a historical paper in an academic journal.

In reference to the first part of the project, the thesis paper concerns English national identity as represented by several renowned and well-read English authors in their works of literature. In doing so, the paper considers the characteristics, norms, and structures …

Measuring School Accountability: Perceptions From Teachers, Principals, And Superintendents, Keith Thomas Bush

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to identify the multiple factors that are utilized by accountability models and to identify the perceptions of Indiana educators in regard to what these professional educators believe should be utilized to assess school accountability. No Child Left Behind and the Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) accountability model frameworks have had an impact on all public schools in the United States. Under AYP, high stakes testing results are utilized to provide acknowledgement to schools that meet pre-established thresholds, as well as to provide consequences for schools that fail to meet these requirements. This study is significant …

The Performance Of Leadership: All The School’S A Stage And The Teachers And Students Are Merely Players, Christi Anne Fenton

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to identify and better understand the performance qualities that are prevalent in successful principals. Specifically, acting and leadership tools previously identified and compared by Dunklee (2000) were used to gain a better understanding of the interview process utilized to hire K-12 principals in school districts with more than 10,000 students in the state of Indiana. Arguably, the roles of the principal are much like those of an actor who must think on his or her feet in multiple situations. It is hoped that this study contributes new knowledge to assist in the …

Effective Practices For Student Success In Algebra, Michelle M. Ginkins

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this quantitative study was to better understand the instructional strategies of Algebra I teachers and leadership characteristics of administrators among secondary public schools with high and low performance on Algebra I End-of-Course Assessments (ECAs). The impact of poverty on student achievement was also investigated in relation to first-time test taker Algebra 1 ECA passing rates. The study south to determine if schools’ free and reduced lunch rates, teacher characteristics, and/or principal characteristics were significant predictors of first-time test taker Algebra 1 ECA passing rates. Whether there were significant differences in implementation of Marzano, Pickering, and Pollock’s (2001) …

Factors Contributing To The Academic Success Of Low-Ses Students, Lynn Kathryn Daanen

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to identify factors that may contribute to the success of some students of poverty to complete high school through graduation. The research examined if positive teacher–student relationship behaviors, the use of learning strategies, school locality or enrollment, years of experience as a principal, and years of teaching prior to becoming a principal had an impact on the non-waivered graduation rate of some Indiana poverty high schools. The study tested for a statistically significant difference between graduation rates or types of school locales on the relationship score and the learning style score. The study also …

“The Bedroom And The Barnyard: Zoomorphic Lust Through Territory, Procedure, And Shelter In ‘The Miller’S Tale’” & Haunchebones, Danielle N. Byington

Undergraduate Honors Theses

“The Bedroom and the Barnyard: Zoomorphic Lust Through Territory, Procedure, and Shelter in ‘The Miller’s Tale’” is an academic endeavor that takes Chaucer’s zoomorphic metaphors and similes and analyzes them in a sense that reveals the chaos of what is human and what is animal tendency. The academic work is expressed in the adjunct creative project, Haunchebones, a 10-minute drama that echoes the tale and its zoomorphic influences, while presenting the content in a stylized play influenced by Theatre of the Absurd and artwork from the medieval and early renaissance period.

Generic Organizational Strategy Integration Impacts On Profit Margin Ratio And Inventory Turnover In Publically Traded Oklahoma Manufacturing Organizations, Christopher Bell

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study sought to determine if and to what extent strategy integration was related to the financial indicators profit margin ratio and inventory turnover for publically traded manufacturing organizations in Oklahoma. Current strategy theory states that the more thoroughly an organization adopts a given strategy the greater the effect will be on these financial indicators. Hence the need to more fully understand the extent and rates at which strategy integration effects these indicators. This study looked at perceived strategy integration scores for publically traded Oklahoma manufacturing organizations taken from June to August 2014 and financial indicators from 2012 and 2013. …

Myers-Briggs Type Inventory And Alternative School Educators, Heidi Lynn Gutwein

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine if a dominant MBTI preference in Indiana alternative school teachers predicted overall school quality within their respective schools. This study examined all four dichotomies: Extraversion-Introversion (EI), Sensing-Intuition (SN), Thinking-Feeling (TF), and Judgment-Perception (JP) as predictors of school quality. Factors that determine the quality of the alternative school are based on the average score of three areas of state-collected, outcome-based data specific to Indiana alternative schools (students who made adequate progress, students who obtained a high school diploma, and students who attained their individual service plan goals). Each participating Indiana alternative school …

The Ecology, Biogeochemistry And Phylogeny Of Methane Seep And Non-Seep Benthic Foraminifera From The Pacific Margin, Ashley M. Burkett

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In an effort to understand the relationships between active methane seep and adjacent non-seep (inactive) populations of the deep-sea foraminifera Cibicidoides wuellerstorfi, a common paleo-indicator species, from methane seeps in the Pacific were analyzed and compared to one another for genetic similarities of small subunit rDNA (SSU rDNA) sequences. Pacific Ocean C. wuellerstorfi were also compared to those collected from other localities around the world (based on 18S gene available on Genbank, e.g., Schweizer et al., 2009). Results from this study revealed that C. wuellerstorfi living in seeps near Costa Rica and Hydrate Ridge are genetically similar to one another …

Factors That Impact End-Of-Course Assessments In Indiana Public, Non-Charter High Schools, Donald Edward Harman

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine whether a relationship exists between Indiana End-of-Course Assessments (ECA) in English 10 and Algebra I and the following indicators at the high school level: (a) socioeconomic status, (b) instructional expenditures per student, (c) attendance rate, (d) school size, (e) percentage of ELLs, (f) mobility rate, (g) minority rate, and (h) percentage of special education students. This study examined which indicators had the greatest effect on English 10 ECA scores and Algebra I ECA scores in Indiana. To expand the purpose of this study to a specific variable, the study also examined if …

"So Vexed Me The Þouȝtful Maladie": Public Presentation Of The Private Self In Hoccleve's My Compleinte And The Conpleynte Paramont, Lauren M. Silverio

Honors Scholar Theses

The scholarship surrounding the life and work of Thomas Hoccleve is relatively young and lean compared to the tomes of knowledge that have been circulated about the slightly older and vastly more popular Geoffrey Chaucer. Up until the second half of the 20th century, Hoccleve came through history with the unfortunate moniker of the "lesser Chaucer." What this insult neglects, however, is that Hoccleve was more than just a lowly clerk who spent his days admiring and emulating the so-called Father of English Literature. Thomas Hoccleve deserves recognition for conceiving and creating works that are impressive both in their form …

Marriage And Gender: A History Through Letters, Victoria Kern

Senior Honors Projects

Research on the evolution of marriage can be found quite easily, but the opportunity to see into the lives of married couples from the past is rare. Through the analysis of letters between my parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents, I provide a glimpse of what being married has meant throughout the 20^th Century for heterosexual couples. Societal ideas about what makes a marriage ideal have changed over time, but they have always been closely linked with gender expectations (Berk, 2013), so a feminist approach to the analysis of the evolution of marriage is used with my family’s letters as a …

A Qualitative Historiographical Case Study Of The Educative Properties Of Eugene V. Debs And John Dewey: 21st Century Implications For Education, Bradley Countermine

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study aimed to shed light on the current state of educational reform rhetoric through an analysis of previous attempts to shape public education for the benefit of all. Analyzing Eugene V. Debs’s and John Dewey’s views on democracy and education during the Progressive Era promotes a version and vision of education that inspires people to think critically, to navigate contemporary society, and to acknowledge current issues within public education and United States society at large. Because education both reflects society and has the power to transform it, the struggle for fair, equitable, and enlightening education is paramount to the …

Teacher Involvement In Implementing State Personal Finance Mandates, Deanna Franklin

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examined strategies teachers are implementing for personal finance instruction in answer to the state financial-literacy mandates in Central Texas. One-on-one interviews, focus groups, and document analysis found that teachers are relying on personal experience, community resources, and Internet resources to instruct in personal finance in absence of personal finance curricula. No data emerged that school districts were providing resources; however, administrators are willing to provide resources if they were available. Teachers are using a variety of creative methods to enhance personal financial literacy in the classroom. Sporadic in-service/professional-development opportunities were available to train teachers in personal financial-literacy instruction; …

The Anti-Crusade Voice Of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, Malek Jamal Zuraikat

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study reads some Middle English poetry in terms of crusading, and it argues that the most prominent English poets, namely Geoffrey Chaucer, William Langland, and John Gower, were against the later crusades regardless of their target. However, since the anti-crusade voice of Gower and Langland has been discussed by many other scholars, this study focuses on Chaucer's poems and their implicit opposition of crusading. I argue that despite Chaucer's apparent neutrality to crusading as well as other sociopolitical and cultural matters of England, his poetry can hardly be read but as an indirect critique of war in general and …

‘I Am Not Your Justification For Existence:’ Mourning, Fascism, Feminism And The Amputation Of Mothers And Daughters In Atwood, Ziervogel, And Ozick, Mitchell C. Hobza

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This thesis examines the complexities of mother-daughter relationships in twentieth-century women’s literature that includes themes about fascism and totalitarianism. Of central concern is how mothers and daughters are separated, both physically and psychically, in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, Meike Ziervogel’s Magda and Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl. Adrienne Rich’s Of Woman Born provides the theoretical framework for considering maternity and the institution of motherhood. These separations occur through two modes: physical separation by political force; and psychical separation through ideological difference and what Rich terms as “Matrophobia.” The physical separation is analyzed through a synthesis of Rich’s theory …