History Commons^™

The Consumptive Female Ideal: The Case Study Of “Snow White”, Nayla G. Torres Ruiz

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

Tuberculosis (TB), also known as “consumption” or “phthisis,” was one of the most pervasive and culturally significant diseases of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Despite its high mortality rate—claiming more lives than cholera and smallpox combined—TB was widely romanticized in art, literature, and popular culture, particularly as a feminine disease associated with beauty, purity, fragility, and moral virtue. The physical traits of consumption—pale skin, rosy cheeks, red lips, glassy eyes, and a slender, delicate frame—became an ideal of female beauty, one that many women sought to emulate through restrictive diets, toxic cosmetics, and evolving fashion trends, such as increasingly tight …

Domestic Cow Of Plenty: Gender And Womanhood In The Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Harshika Ajay Gupta

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

This thesis examines gender and womanhood in the Bhāgavata Purāṇa (Bhāgavata), a Sanskrit text from the 10th century CE that holds an important theological and cultural position in contemporary Hindu traditions. It decodes the Bhāgavata’s unique perspectives on the following: (1) gender, sex, sexuality, and reproduction, (2) women’s social normativity, and (3) women’s personhood and agency. This thesis argues that the Bhāgavata contains a unique theorization of gender and sex as well as a positive valuation of femininity, and that it imbues its narratives with practical resources and actions to recognize and expand the agentive capacity of women.

For scholars …

Martha Mitchell: Loud Mouth Of The South, Emma Bernice Kolker

History Undergraduate Honors Theses

In this paper, I will argue how Martha‘s Arkansas identity presents itself as a double edge sword, with her personality attracting the attention of the public with the consent of powerful men in the Republican party, while at the same time her comments and actions were the very reason she was blamed and marginalized by the same men who allowed her to speak in the first place.

Romulus As A Rhetorical And Historiographical Tool In Imperial Roman Literature, Jaden M. Perry

History Undergraduate Honors Theses

This study exames the figure of Romulus in imperial Roman literaure as neither a fixed mythological nor historical subject, but as a flexible rhetorical and historiographical tool. Surveying a range of authors from the late first to fourth centuries CE, inlcuding historians such as Florus, Tacitus, Justin, Suetonius, and the Historia Augusta, as well as literary authors like Juvenal, Silius Italicus, Valerius Maximus, and Seneca, the thesis argues that references to Romulus and his deified counterpart Quirinus are deliberately manipulated to serve distinct authorial purposes. Rather than merely recounting Rome’s foundational myth, these writers employ Romulus to construct comparisons, …

Munificence: The History And Legacy Of The Munson Steamship Line, 1865–1955, Nicholas C. Benda

Honors Scholar Theses

This paper provides an overview of the Munson Steamship Line, an American steamship company founded by Captain Walter David Munson. A veteran of the American Civil War, Captain Munson visited Cuba following the war’s conclusion and became involved in Cuba’s oil and sugar industries, gradually becoming involved in the international sugar shipping trade. An 1890 innovation in shipboard technology and its impact on the Cuban American molasses trade was a moment that established a multi-generational maritime empire, officially incorporating the Munson Steamship Line shortly after the American intervention in the Cuban War of Independence and expanding throughout the Atlantic. His …

2026 Commencement Program, Columbia College Chicago

Commencement Programs

The commencement program of the 2026 Columbia College Chicago graduation ceremonies.

American Industry And Soviet Blood: U.S.-U.S.S.R. Collaborations During The Interwar And Wartime Years, Evan Banaszewski

History

This project will examine the connections between American corporations and the Soviet state from the late 1920’s through WWII. In particular, this project will focus on ventures undertaken by said corporations towards the modernization of Soviet industrial might, including, but not limited to, Ford-built automotive plants, Albert Kahn-designed factories, and General Electric-built hydroelectric grids. These ventures not only helped the Soviets transform a historically agricultural society into an industrial one but also enabled the rapid conversion of peacetime infrastructure into hubs of wartime production. The project then situates these private indirect contributions alongside the direct aid provided by the American …

Where Were Women?: Women In The United States Intelligence Organizations From The Office Of Strategic Services To The Central Intelligence Agency, Madison Harris

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

United States intelligence historians have largely neglected the importance of women’s intelligence labor as well as the centralized intelligence organizations that existed from World War II to the early years of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) – including the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), Strategic Service Unit (SSU), and Central Intelligence Group (CIG). While assumptions about women in intelligence work during this period are usually drawn from stereotypical portrayals in popular media, such as books and movies, this thesis utilized statistical data and other agency sources to build a broader understanding of women’s actual labor.

This thesis demonstrates that women …

Honorata Memoria Prosequar: The Lives Of Republican And Augustan Women As Antecedents For Later Deifications, Megan Fairbanks

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

Emperors and some notable societal figures in the early Roman Empire are known to have practiced apotheosis, a state-sponsored process which confirmed that deceased men, women, and sometimes children had achieved the status of godhood. This process became official during the lifetime of Rome’s first emperor, Augustus, who deified Julius Caesar. As the process developed, it came to involve several formalized elements, including senatorial voting, a public ceremony (consecratio), and the production of commemorative images published through various media such as coins, paintings, and honorific statues. The purpose of this thesis is to determine the possibility of existing precursors for …

Rooted Transformations, Ricardo D. Moctezuma

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

In my ventures through art I realized that I underwent an experience that was tailored to my process of release. As I struggled to share my emotions, I became distant and dissociated, I felt detached from others and even from myself. This process was something I visualized in my art from, the Tears, to Self Destruction, to the Release and onto the Garden. I’ve always felt myself in a state of Release, partly healed and partly damaged. All I knew was that the garden represented a new beginning for me, I just never knew what that Garden was. Time passes …

Girlhood, Interrupted: An Intersectional Feminist History Of Decolonizing And Reclaiming Womanhood, Ayden Kelly

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

In the past few decades, social and political discourse surrounding womanhood and who is considered a "real" woman has led to the execration of transgender women. This work will explore how recent discourse and rhetoric surrounding who is and who is not a “real woman” can be traced to nineteenth century notions of “true womanhood” that excluded women of color. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with westward expansion, settler colonialism, residential schools, slavery, and post-emancipation serving as backdrops, this work will also analyze how ideologies of womanhood have interrupted and suppressed women of color throughout Western American …

Planting The Seeds Of An “Educational Revolution”: The Origins Of Upward Bound, Jack H. Kirby

Department of History

Histories of American higher education tend to suggest that the relationship between the federal government and higher education reached its apex in the 1950s before beginning to decline in the 1960s. How, then, do we understand the creation of federal TRIO programs in the 1960s and their continued growth through the remainder of the twentieth century? TRIO programs are federally funded projects intended to expand college access for non-traditional students. Through the lens of access, this paper argues that the federal government was limited in its ability to influence higher education during the post-war period because of the highly decentralized …

Advertising The Noble Savage: Blackfeet Exploitation And Erasure Through Glacier National Park, The Great Northern Railway, And The Bureau Of Indian Affairs From 1900-1920, Edward D'Angelo

Undergraduate Honors Theses

The Blackfeet Native Americans have lived in and around Glacier National Park and their current reservation boundaries for thousands of years. They previously lived a nomadic lifestyle, but were forced onto a reservation by the American government in the nineteenth century. At the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, the Blackfeet sold more land to the federal government at the same time the Great Northern Railway was building its railroad through the Rocky Mountains. In order to increase travel demands on its railway in the area, the Great Northern Railway lobbied the federal government …

Waring Library Society Newsletter, Spring 2026, Waring Library Society, Waring Historical Library, Medical University Of South Caroilna, Jude Arendall, Joann Livingston Zeise, Brooke Fox

The Waring Library Society Newsletters

In this issue, the Waring Library Society welcomes its new President and shares updates on recent and upcoming renovations to Waring Historical Library. Waring Historical Library's staff reflect on insights gained from a recent sabbatical, and highlight several events and engagements the Waring has been part of this season.

Microcosms & Warscapes, Heather J. Lathers

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This poetry collection features sensory-centered writing and common objects, scenes, and interactions to authentically capture the multi-perspective and nuanced experiences of wartime. Detailed language is critical when poets become mouthpieces for those enduring war's pain. Focusing closely on items such as teacups, boots, bones, mud, rice, and rats creates a kind of intimacy not often found in war writing. Specific conflicts addressed include World War I, Vietnam, and The Cambodian Genocide. The poems here, in various forms and voices, aim to spotlight the lost, marginalized, abused, and forgotten-- the much-needed humanity war stories tend to neglect. Ultimately, these pieces seek …

Rewriting The Boer ‘Slim’: Alice Stopford Green’S Reports On St. Helena’S Prisoner Of War Camp And Her Impact On British Views Of Boer Prisoners, Natasja A. Swanson

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

Alice Stopford Green (1847 – 1929) was a prominent Irish historian and politician, known for her role as a political activist in the Irish Home Rule movement. Her lesser-known legacy is her investigative journalism on prisoner conditions in British prisoner of war camps during the Second Boer War (1899 – 1902). Her reports on Boer conditions in the Deadwood Prisoner of War Camp on the island of St. Helena reflected maltreatment and institutional abuse by the British Government. These discoveries supported the minority English opposition that thought that England was overstepping the rules of civilized warfare. Green was primarily concerned …

Full Issue

The Bridge

No abstract provided.

House Of Ill-Fame: A Historical, Cartographic, And Archaeological Study On The Spatial Evolution Of Commercial Sex Work In New Orleans, 1875 – 1925, Austin Roebuck

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This research examines the historic spatiality of commercial sex‑work in New Orleans by analyzing targeted addresses associated with the trade across three census years. Using the establishment and closure of Storyville (1897–1917) as a temporal frame, it compares demographic patterns in dwellings labeled as “houses of ill fame” in 1880, 1900, and 1920 to trace changes in household composition and social identity. Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps, newspapers, and city directories contextualize these patterns within three ten‑year intervals (1875–1885, 1895–1905, 1915–1925), revealing how sex‑work spaces were regulated, represented, and embedded in the urban landscape. The study also incorporates an archaeological assemblage …

The History And Legacy Of The Monterey Jazz Festival, Ana Mendez

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

The Monterey Jazz Festival holds a strong legacy in the world of jazz. Nestled in the Monterey Bay area, the festival's musical lineups entertain locals and travelers from around the world each year. Topics that are discussed within this paper are the inception of the festival, Monterey before the festival, Monterey Jazz Festival co-founders, Jimmy Lyons and Ralph Gleason, major works of art debuts at the festival including The Real Ambassadors, the international influence at the festival, the educational endeavors of the Monterey Jazz Education Team, and the 2025 rebranding of "Monterey Jazz".

The Geography Of Race: A Spatial Analysis Of Free People Of Color In The City Of Charleston (1790-1861), Alexandra Ullman

All Theses

In Charleston, South Carolina, for all but one year from 1790 to 1860, the enslaved and free Black population outnumbered that of the white. Through manumission, the process of an enslaved person gaining their freedom, the free Black population grew substantially and reached a peak in South Carolina during the nineteenth century. This large community of free people of color (FPOC), shifted the social climate by upsetting the balance of white power, thus increasing racial conflict, tension, and legislation that aimed to control the movement of FPOC.

Despite FPOC comprising a significant portion of the total population of Charleston, there …

The Whaler’S Empire: Industry, Environment, And American Expansion In The Pacific Ocean, Andrew J. Hiner

All Theses

The American whaling industry reached its peak in the mid nineteenth century, numbering over seven hundred vessels and reaching from the South Atlantic to Arctic Oceans. The rise of this maritime trade coincided with the emergence of the nation’s industrial revolution at home, a revolution which employed the product of whaling—namely whale oil—as a lubricant for machinery. Historians have often overlooked the use of this commodity in manufacturing, focusing instead on whale oil’s use as an illuminant. Examining the relation between the whaling and manufacturing industries offers new insights into how ocean environments played a role in domestic production. It …

Demolition By Intent: Evaluating Charleston's Red X Placard Procedures, Enforcement Practices, And Communication Methods In The Loss Of Historic Structures, Jessica Stech

All Theses

This thesis examines whether the procedures, enforcement practices, and communication methods associated with the placement of Red X placards in Charleston, South Carolina, contribute to the demolition-by-intent of historic structures. Red X placards, also known as unsafe placards, are placed on the front façade of structurally unsafe structures by the Charleston Fire Department to inform first responders in the event of a fire or other emergency. Although these placards serve as a life-safety tool, they may influence how vacant structures are perceived by family or developer owners and the public.

Through using a qualitative approach, this thesis analyzes the outcomes …

Women In The Chancery Court Of Maryland From 1669 To 1679, Emily A. Cole

All Theses

This project examines women who appeared in the Chancery Court of Maryland from 1669 to 1679. This thesis used the Archives of Maryland Online and the volume of proceedings of the Chancery Court. Across the three chapters, I argue that historians have largely ignored these proceedings, and that women did not appear in court out of empowerment but rather out of legal duty and requirement. I examined how these women appeared in both their legal status and the types of positions they held. This included the life cycle women typically followed from wife to widow to remarriage. They also appeared …

“Tyranny” As Concept: Semantic Change And The Formation Of Colonial Political Consciousness In The New Hampshire Gazette, 1756–1783, Antonio Worley

All Theses

Historians of the American Revolution have frequently viewed terms such as tyranny as a stable ideological category, associated with corruption and resistance to arbitrary power. This thesis instead reconceptualizes ‘tyranny’ as an evolving and historically contingent Koselleckian concept. Drawing on a comprehensive analysis of the New Hampshire Gazette from 1756 to 1783, this study combines close reading with computational methods, including word frequency analysis and word embeddings, to chart the evolution of the semantic field surrounding “tyranny” over time.

Prior to the Stamp Act of 1765, ‘tyranny’ was used primarily in a religious and moral framework which was shaped by …

Disney's Illusion Of Inclusion, Marissa Davis

All Theses

Walt Disney’s films were not simply entertainment, but a use of racial stereotypes as a profit strategy. Even scholarship that explores these tactics and critically analyzes his most problematic misrepresentations do not to consider the role of Walt Disney, as a man, in creating and promoting these narratives. These depictions, while somewhat in line with the culture when he first entered the business, failed to evolve as society changed. Rather, they were deliberate choices to attract white audiences and increase revenue.

Over time, these tropes became socially unacceptable, yet Disney maintained them for public consumption. While Disney and his company …

Elizabeth Blackwell And Her Heirs: America And Great Britain’S First Female Physicians, Charleigh E. Sprawls

All Theses

This thesis seeks to explore the varying historical themes surrounding America and Great Britain’s first female physicians. Studying 1849-1894 allows for the exploration of not only the nineteenth century, but also the Gilded Age and Progressive Eras of American History. Professionalization played a crucial role in the lives of these women, as it drastically altered the makeup of the medical career, making it more difficult to enter and become qualified as a licensed physician. There were significant barriers to entering the medical profession for these women, including elements like race, class, and most importantly, gender. This thesis argues that while …

Understanding Roma Oppression In Europe Through Humantarian Forensic Analysis, Christal L. Quinn

Department of Anthropology: Theses and Student Research

This thesis examines the marginalization of Roma people in Europe, and how humanitarian forensic practices may help Roma communities in their quest for justice and recognition. The study draws exclusively on secondary information to examine the social, political, and legal issues affecting the Roma communities, who have endured centuries of institutional discrimination, marginalization, and violence. This thesis identifies ways in which systematic oppression continues to limit Roma communities’ access to education, housing, healthcare, and legal protection through a review of relevant literature and applicable theoretical frameworks. The study also examines the relevance of forensic science, particularly its humanitarian applications, in …

The Harvey Pittel Saxophone Quartet: Its History And Legacy In American Saxophone Quartet Performance, James M. Lawhn

Glenn Korff School of Music: Dissertations, Theses, Student Creative Work, and Performances

The saxophone quartet has emerged as a legitimate chamber ensemble in the United States through the sustained efforts of a small number of pioneering professional groups. Despite the central role these ensembles have played in shaping repertoire, performance standards, and public perception, their histories have often gone undocumented. Among the most influential of these groups is the Harvey Pittel Saxophone Quartet, an ensemble that maintained an unusually active national and international touring career for nearly four decades and helped establish the saxophone quartet as a viable professional model.

This document addresses a significant gap in the scholarly literature by presenting …

No Color Line In The Coal Mine: The Role Of Black Coal Miners In The Umwa Strikes Of 1893 And 1899 In Southeast Kansas, Brent Mcdowell

Electronic Theses & Dissertations

In 1890 the United Mine Workers of America was established as a national union for coal miners in the United States. One of the prominent founding principles of the UMWA was to not discriminate against coal miners wanting to join and participate in the union regardless of their race, or ethnicity. Throughout the first decade of its existence, the UMWA was tested several times by the actions of coal mine operators using Black coal miners as strikebreakers, and in some scenarios, the UMWA failed to uphold their own declarations of nondiscrimination. Twice, in 1893 and 1899 the coal miners of …

The Unwritten Legacy: Native Americans, Slaves, And Women In The Life Of Thomas Jefferson, Anthony C. Hudson

Electronic Theses & Dissertations

This thesis examines the influence of Native Americans, slaves, and women on the Founding Fathers and provides a way of study for future historians of early American history. By using Thomas Jefferson as the case study, this thesis will show how these three people groups shaped the culture and political decisions of America’s Founding Fathers. Though many historians have looked at this relationship in the past, there are two main things that set this thesis apart from the work of previous historians. First, this thesis attempts to separate itself from the moral questions surrounding the placement of Native Americans, slaves, …