Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons^™

Social Media Through A Binary Lens: The Impact On College Students & Their Mental Health, Piper Mallchok

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

It is important to first understand how individuals use social media so that we can then understand how and why their use will change the individual impact social media will have. Some students experience a decline in their mental health when their social media use changes. There is an abundance of research on college students and social media, respectively, that also addresses gender as a variable. In this review, the research will be studied to further understand the voices of those who are not commonly included in research that operates under a gendered framework. Additionally, these ideas will be compared …

Lilly Reich: La Mente Detrás Del Mobiliario Moderno Que La Historia Olvidó, Noa Llanas Angrill

GDI. Revista de investigación de Género, Diseño e Innovación

La historia ha sido escrita desde una perspectiva que se ha invisibilizado las contribuciones femeninas en su desarrollo. Este artículo se centra en Lilly Reich (1885-1947), figura clave del diseño moderno, cuya autoría ha sido eclipsada por la de su colaborador Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. La investigación evidencia que la diseñadora no solo contribuyó al diseño de mobiliario moderno y de espacios expositivos, sino que lideró proyectos clave y que su trabajo ha impactado en el diseño expositivo, textil y mobiliario moderno.

Sexual And Gender-Based Violence Against Women In Sports: Prevalence, Impact, And Interventions In East Africa, Hesbon Hansen Owilla, Nancy Achieng' Booker, George Nyabuga, Tulinagwe Mwampanga, Samantha Agasha, Liz Awino, Ella Smith

Graduate School of Media and Communications

This study investigated the prevalence, causes, and impact of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) against women in sports across Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania. Employing a mixed-methods approach, the study combined quantitative surveys with qualitative interviews to explore the scale of SGBV, its root causes, and the lived experiences of female athletes. A cross-sectional descriptive design was adopted, with data collected from athletes, coaches, administrators, and sports officials from federations and associations in the three countries. Stratified and purposive sampling techniques at the federations, clubs and within the clubs was used and this ensured representation at multiple levels of the sports …

Poor Little Woman And Sybil Of The Rhine: Code Switching In Hildegard Of Bingen’S Writing, Bridgett Meskis

Undergraduate Theses, Professional Papers, and Capstone Artifacts

Hildegard of Bingen (1098- 1179) was a twelfth century German Benedictine abbess, mystic, author, composer, and theologian. Despite the heavily patriarchal and restrictive culture of her day, Hildegard managed to gain autonomy and authority within her community. She benefited from a boom in popularity in the mid-1990s, which saw a broadening of research subjects, including focus on the gender dynamics at play in Hildegard’s life. This scholarship has died down significantly since. Given the breadth and depth of her work, Hildegard of Bingen’s work deserves to be revisited through more recent theoretical lenses that can provide significant insights into her …

Challenging Motherhood And Analysing Cultural Differences: A Review Of The Film Mrs. Chatterjee Vs Norway (2023), Sana Hashmi

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.

Feeling Foreign / Foreign Feeling: Affect In Southeast Asian Diasporic Short Story Collections, Francys Aerin Fortes

Theses and Dissertations

Affect studies have long been saturated with scholarship investigating the fluidity of emotions, though a larger turn in the field now prioritizes the felt experiences of marginalized peoples. Sianne Ngai’s work is one part of this turn that seeks to unpack the effects of oppressive systemic forces on Black, Brown, and queer bodies. Sianne Ngai reexamined the nature of emotions in her seminal text Ugly Feelings (2005), particularly concerned with how negative feelings are disproportionately felt by marginalized bodies as a result of conditions of obstructed agency, systems of power, and wage labor capitalism. Drawing from Ngai’s writing, this thesis …

Voicing The Violence: Carmen Maria Machado's Contribution To A Queer Archive, Audrey C. Bryant

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This project analyzes In the Dream House (2019) alongside “The Husband Stitch” and “Eight Bites” from the collection Her Body and Other Parties (2017) by Carmen Maria Machado. The first, a memoir, details Machado’s personal experience with domestic abuse between partners who share a female gender identity; the latter is a collection of short stories outlining everyday violations made against women. Scholars have discussed these works with specifications including female domestic horror, Machado’s use of retellings, and domestic violence and abuse. This project fills a gap in the discourse by intersecting and connecting queer theory with archival studies to support …

Barbie Vlogger As Teen Influencer For Little Girls, Brilynn A. Janckila

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Mattel’s YouTube Barbie Vlogs series (2015-2022) targets 6–11-year-old girls with short narratives and prosocial messages addressing their prevalent interests and everyday experiences. While the vlog is clearly an attempt by Mattel to appeal to a market sector that includes both little girls and their Millennial parents, this analysis examines Barbie Vlogger as a social media influencer in order to explore how little girls learn to become older girls through the performance of teenage girlhood as enacted in the Barbie Vlogs. What is Barbie doing in the vlogs to show little girls who a teen girl is and what she …

My Body, Your Choice: Exploring Reproductive Abuse Among Undergraduate Women In A Post-Roe America, Riley H. Alvero

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson decision in June 2022 overruled Roe v. Wade (1973) and held that abortion access is not a constitutionally protected right. The overturn of Roe v. Wade has had notable impacts on women’s overall sexual behavior and reproductive choices, and it highlights a macro-level infringement on women’s reproductive agency. Coercive condom use resistance violates reproductive autonomy on a micro-level, but can have equally harsh effects. Previous literature has studied these occurrences singularly; this research investigates connections between them. This study recruited 14 undergraduate women with a history of reproductive coercion, in the form of …

One Man Show/ Who Am I, Devin Baker

Dance (MFA) Theses

Historically, stereotypes of ideal masculine physiques and attributed qualities have led to discriminatory and exclusionary practices that adversely affect black queer men and how they show up in various performance and social spaces. As a result, black male bodies in these spaces have employed the alter ego as a tool to imagine themselves inside/outside these constructed masculinities. How can the alter ego aid in transcending dated notions of race and gender, beholden to black male bodies within concert dance? Through the intertwining of personal narrative and research rooted in psychology and gender studies, this work examines the alter ego as …

The Overlooked Dynamics Of Sibling Violence: Sociological Perspectives And Intervention Strategies, Rowland Edet

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Sibling violence (SV) represents a pervasive yet underexplored dimension of family violence, encompassing physical, emotional, and psychological abuse. This paper critically examines the intersection of gender dynamics, societal norms, and family structures in shaping SV behaviors. Using social learning theory (SLT) as a foundational framework, the analysis explores how gendered expectations and traditional roles influence the prevalence and forms of aggression, with boys more likely to exhibit overt physical aggression and girls engaging in relational aggression. The paper critiques the deterministic tendencies of SLT, highlighting the agency of individuals in rejecting modeled behaviors, and incorporates intersectionality to address the interplay …

A Feminist Narrative Shaped By Bangladesh’S Threads, Salma Akter

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

This thesis explores the intersection of feminist theory and artistic practice, examining how materiality and abstraction reflect gender norms within the socio-political, religious, and colonial context of Bangladesh. It is grounded in four key theoretical frameworks: judith butler’s gender performativity, bell hooks’ intersectional feminism, julia kristeva’s abjection and systems theory. Together, these frameworks provide a comprehensive lens for analyzing how gender inequality is constructed, maintained, and resisted within the socio-political, religious, and colonial context of Bangladesh. Textile-based media serve as a means to engage with these layered systems, drawing from traditional nakshi kantha embroidery to explore patterns of labor, domesticity, …

Rompiendo La Cultura Del Machismo A Través De La Música: Bad Bunny Y La Nueva Era Del Reggaetón, Bianca Rodriguez

CMC Senior Theses

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how Benito “Bad Bunny” Antonio Martnez Ocasio, a groundbreaking artist in the reggaetón and Latin music industry, uses his music to challenge machismo norms in Latinx culture. Historically, reggaeton has perpetuated hypermasculine ideals, emphasizing dominance, aggression, and rigid gender roles. In contrast, Bad Bunny disrupts these conventional stereotypes of machismo behavior by embracing vulnerability, advocating for gender equality, and rejecting toxic masculinity. Through his lyrics in “La Canción” y “Haciendo que me amas”, Bad Bunny normalizes emotional expression and critiques societal expectations of men. Additionally, in tracks such as “Yo Perreo Sola” …

A Guide To Creating Trans And Gender Variant Inclusive Film Sets: For Directors And Department Heads On Non-Union/Low Budget Film Sets, Perce Alvarez

CMC Senior Theses

The following thesis explores transgender and gender-variant inclusivity practices in film production. It conducts an overview of information on lgbtq+ and transgender populations, discrimination, and filmmaking practices. From there, a baseline of definitions for terms and worldviews adopted by transgender and gender-variant communities is established. Primarily, this thesis focuses on establishing reasoning for and presenting practical applications of transgender inclusivity that can be implemented throughout the film production process. It accomplishes this by focusing on specific parts of the production process and how the leaders of those subprocesses can put these inclusivity practices into action.

Invisible No More: Looking And Listening Locally To Build Conflict-Related Sexual Violence Resilience, Anjali Thakore

CMC Senior Theses

The ubiquity of sexual violence, with its devastating physical and psychological consequences, has rendered conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV) one of the most effective and enduring “invisible crimes” of war. Despite receiving growing attention across academic, political, and activist circles, wartime sexual violence remains pervasive in contemporary conflict zones. Against the backdrop of these frequent and recurring violations, this thesis explores the dissonance between high-level rhetorical commitments to preventing and punishing CRSV and on-the-ground realities. What soon emerges is a troubling pattern in which gendered violence—and women’s lived experiences more generally—while increasingly visible in theory, remains marginalised in practice. By investigating …

Essential Caretaking For Artists With Disabilities: Exploring The Overlooked Histories Of Hazel Knapp And Grandma Moses, Bryan P. Martin

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis explores the intersection of disability studies and art history, addressing the underrepresentation of disability in scholarship, especially concerning medical sociology and caretaking. Focusing on two early-twentieth-century self-taught American artists, Hazel Knapp (1908–95), who fell into obscurity, and Anna Mary Robertson Moses (1860–1961), best known as Grandma Moses, this is a comparative analysis of how disability influenced their artistic practices and shaped their divergent career outcomes. Knapp was born with Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, a neurodegenerative disorder, and fell into obscurity due to a lack of support for her condition, but experienced a promising start to her career that included patronage …

Dystopian Fiction As Liberatory Practice: Dystopian Theory In The Classroom, Hailey C. Bowen

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

Dystopian Fiction as Liberatory Practice, a title inspired by bell hooks’ “Theory as Liberatory Practice,” is a proposal for an English 2090 course that focuses on dystopian theory. This class is centered on The Nine Symptoms of Dystopian Theory, which I developed using multiple theoretical models including Afrofuturist Reading Practices, Marxist theory, and feminist, gender, and sexuality theories in conjunction with my own observations about the genre. Dystopian theory is a nine-step reading process that I have developed to reframe any text as dystopian. It is possible to argue that any text is dystopian using this process because, in any …

The Romanticization Of Human-Vampire Relationships: How 'Twilight' And 'The Vampire Diaries' May Prime Young Women To Accept Dating Violence, Natalie M. Bowen

Undergraduate Research Posters

The first literary vampire can be traced back to 18th century Germany, with Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s poem “Die Braut von Korinth,” but the stereotypical features of a vampire are traditionally accredited to Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Modern vampires, such as Edward Cullen and Stefan Salvatore of the Twilight and The Vampire Diaries series respectively, have managed to win the hearts of teenage girls all across America with their sex appeal and charismatic nature. According to Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory, individuals learn new behaviors by modeling and imitating the actions of those around them. This comprehensive literature review investigates the connection …

Courtly And Queer: Deconstruction, Desire, And Medieval French Literature, By Charlie Samuelson, Anna Klosowska

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

No abstract provided.

Theatre As Sanctuary: Queer Identity, Religious Trauma, And The Path To Healing, Casey Worley

Theses and Dissertations

Growing up as a queer individual in a deeply religious Southern Baptist community, I learned early that faith and identity could feel like irreconcilable forces. I sat in the pews, surrounded by voices that preached love but often excluded people like me. For years, I struggled with the question: Can I be both queer and faithful? This tension—between belief and belonging, between the church I was raised in and the identity I could no longer deny—became the foundation of my journey, my artistic practice, and this thesis.

Through this research, I explore the intersections of queer identity, religious trauma, and …

Queer-Keying: Performing Video Processes As [Trans]Gressive Resistance, Wren Tiffany

Theses and Dissertations

As part of the 2025 VCUarts MFA Thesis Exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU), I transformed the 'Sponge' gallery on the top floor of The Anderson, VCU’s historic thesis exhibition home, into The Green Room, a neon green, immersive video and performance space featuring mirrors, disco lights, a foam tile dance floor, makeup stations, and a functioning green-screen editing suite. This hybrid drag rehearsal and ‘Chroma-key’ green video production room deepened both my understandings of Queer performance art and process-based art making during the Spring of 2025, through two public performance activation …

“Some Vague Utopia”: Searching For Urania, Moira L. Neve

Theses and Dissertations

Despite the global pendulum swing of gender trouble marked by the United States’ President’s declaration that there are only two sexes, activists have been rejecting assimilation (ie. defining equality as gay marriage or queer people in the military) within queer studies long before 2025. In the first half of the 20th century, a journal by the name of Urania (1916-1940), privately published and circulated to their home base in the United Kingdom and beyond, five editors (Esther Roper, Eva Gore-Booth, Jessey Wade, Dorothy Cornish, and Irene Clyde/Thomas Baty), challenged the gender binary and the resulting assumptions of heterosexual marriage. This …

Liner Notes On Black Trans Girlhood: Afrofuturist Affect & Black Popular Music As A Praxis Of Self-Fashioning, Shawn J. Williams

Theses and Dissertations

Liner Notes on Black Trans Girlhood: Afrofuturist Affect & Black Popular Music as a Praxis of Self-Fashioning interprets Black musical performance in identity-making, with a focus on how music and Black trans identity intersect and informs Black trans girlhood. As such, Black trans girls render ourselves legible, i.e. understood without shame or judgment, by constructing our identities through the music by Black women we listen and dance to, or watch and sing. These musical connections affirm the possibilities of Black femme expression. This expression of Black femininity is due to what I call an Afrofuturist affect, by which I refer …

China, Feminism, And The Legacy Of Confucius, Sor-Hoon Tan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

As the double burden of paid work and family demands leads Chinese women to think twice about marriage and children, we can rush to blame Confucianism’s sexism. But this is a mistake, writes Sor-hoon Tan. We need to separate Confucian philosophy from the oppressive patriarchal norms of its time. Confucian values of care and cultivation can enrich today’s feminism and support equal opportunities for all.

Temporary Marriage In Iraq: Views And Perceptions, Zena Al Safar

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

In July 2024, the Shia Muslim Parliament members proposed an amendment to the Personal Status Law. This amendment was passed on February 11, 2025. Per the amendment, the Shia Ja’afari School of Islamic jurisprudence has four months from the time the amendment was passed to submit a Personal Status Code for approval. It is speculated that this new Code will legalize mut’ah marriage, which is a type of temporary marriage. Temporary marriage within Islam is a heterosexual marriage that does not convey long-term commitment and usually has an end date. While scholarly written work in this field exists in other …

A Feminist Evaluation Of The Joint Programme: Assessing The Cultural Sensitivity Of Unicef And Unfpa's Strategies On Female Genital Cutting/Circumcision In Senegal And Nigeria, Coumba Soumare

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Female Genital Cutting/Circumcision (FGC) encompasses procedures involving the partial or total removal of female external genitalia or other genital injuries, performed for non-medical reasons. Typically carried out on young girls, often between infancy and age 15, FGC is widely condemned in global discourse as a harmful and barbaric practice. However, within certain cultures, it is viewed as a rite of passage or a necessary tradition. I argue that to effectively address FGC, organizations must adopt a culturally sensitive approach. This research examines the United Nations Children’s Fund’s (UNICEF) and the United Nations Population Fund’s (UNFPA) initiatives in Senegal and Nigeria. …

No More Pinkwashing At The Pink Pony Club: A Feminist Media Analysis Of The Potential Shift In Queer Popular Culture To Decenter Homonationalism And Pinkwashing, Taylor G. Maki

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Previous research on queer popular culture highlights the influence popular culture has had on the United States’ legal and political protections for queer people—specifically cisgender gay men and cisgender lesbians with the legalization of same-sex marriage and the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” However, some scholars and queer activists critique the homonationalist and pinkwashing agendas deployed by LGBTQ popular culture activists. This research examines whether or not there has been a shift in dominant queer popular culture that decenters homonationalism and pinkwashing. Using a feminist media analysis, this research examines contemporary queer musicians’ activism against the United States’ involvement …

Wavering Masculinities, Riley Rist

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Wavering Masculinities is a compilation of anthropological research, exploration of self-identity/belonging, and deep dive into the cultural expectations of heterosexuality (as it relates to gender expression). The works convey a physical connection to my anthropological research to produce imagery about masculine behaviors and appearances, and the deviations of those appearances and behaviors. This exhibition looks at the line between masculine and feminine expression from the male-identifying perspective to inquire about the amount of feminine traits that can be possessed until sexuality is questioned/assumed (and why does being feminine have to be a bad thing?! )

Feminine Felons: Violent Offenders' Intersectional Experiences In Twentieth-Century Montana, Cassidy Ann Vander Voort

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This paper explores the treatment of violent female offenders in Montana in both the media and prison system from 1900-1960. Women of all races faced gender discrimination from both the carceral system and popular media. Local newspapers sensationalized crimes committed by female offenders, portraying them as women who lived outside of the expectations of womanhood in the twentieth century. Newspapers and courts placed women into two categories: “mad/sad” female offenders, who received forgiveness for their crimes; or unforgivable, “bad” offenders. Crime did not determine these categorizations; instead, gender expectations of the white middle class shaped female criminals’ treatment. If these …

The Filament, Elena Skibicki

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The Filament weaves together the results of a neurodivergent person exploring their universe, in all its harrowing beauty and familiar tragedy. The speaker traverses oceans and thunderstorms, wades through the swampy shallows of their high school, participates in a pharmaceutical supply chain and its subsequent ransacking, floats through altered mental states, and retells legends, spanning many styles while still using the lyric “I”. Scrying into a nebulous future, the speaker returns with stories of the planet and its people, and the kind of world they want to build.

The speaker exposes their ghosts throughout the collection, hoping that the adage, …