Cultural History Commons^™

Log Cabins, Hard Ciders, And The Misunderstood Campaign Of 1840: Looking At How The Whigs Really Created The First Modern Presidential Campaign Through Effective Storytelling, Eric V. Schesventer

Masters Theses, 2020-current

The Whig party crafted the first ever modern campaign seen in American History during the campaign and subsequent presidential election of 1840. They did this not merely through the use of flashy campaign slogans and festive events as previous historians have discussed. The Whigs created the first ever modern campaign by telling both realistic and symbolic stories through the use of media narratives and physical objects crafted for the campaign. By doing this, this helped mold then candidate and future President William Henry Harrison into a candidate for all Americans, even if he was not in practice.

Orthodoxy, Culture And Language: Alaska In Russia’S Religious Diplomacy Of The 21st Century, Oleksandr Lukyanenko

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article is devoted to the analysis of the religious factor of the Russian foreign diplomacy in the light of Vladimir Putin’s high-profile visit to Alaska n August 15, 2025. The paper studies a special place of Alaska in the historical imagination of Russian political and church discourse. The status of this particular territory in Russian state worldview – the former “Russian America” – is indicative: it refers to the idea of an unfinished imperial legacy. The research doesn’t touch a main event that included a meeting with US President Donald Trump but an off-schedule meeting with Archbishop Alexei (Trader) …

Casar Public Lecture: The Fierce Battle For The 2024 Us Presidency: Race, Gender, And The Power Of Identity Politics, The Prince Alwaleed Center For American Studies And Research Casar

Performances, Events, and Presentations

In light of the upcoming 2024 US Elections, we hosted this lecture on SUNDAY OCTOBER 27TH - 1-2 pm titled: "The Fierce Battle for the 2024 US Presidency: Race, Gender, and the Power of Identity Politics." Speakers: CASAR guest speaker Dr. Sherri McFarland - moderated by CASAR Assistant to Director and Adjunct Faculty Yasmeen El-Ghazaly. Dr. Sherri Lynn McFarland's academic and professional careers demonstrate her passionate desire to contribute to the economic, social, and political progress of African and Middle Eastern North African (MENA) countries and their diasporic communities. Her keen interest in the people of these regions led her …

Review Of God’S Long Summer: Stories Of Faith And Civil Rights, Jenny N. Liang

Armstrong Undergraduate Journal of History

No abstract provided.

[Review Of] The Trial Of A Nazi Doctor: Franz Lucas As Defendant, Opportunist, And Deceiver By Andrew Wisely. New York, Ny: Berghahn Books, 2024. Pp. Xiv+364. Cloth $150.00. Isbn 978-1-80539-530-0., Stefan Cristian Ionescu

History Faculty Articles and Research

"While we know a lot about the general framework of the trials of Nazi perpetrators, including of specific professional groups, the field of Holocaust, mass violence, and perpetrator studies still needs more in-depth studies on the careers, crimes, and the postwar whereabouts of individual midlevel Nazi officials who had power of life and death over thousands of inmates of Nazi camps and whose lives and careers were not thoroughly investigated by scholars. That is why the book authored by Andrew Wisely examining the case of the SS doctor Franz Bernhard Lucas as a long durée historical biography, is a much-needed …

Left Or Right, Loyal Or Disloyal: Ideology, Partisanship, And Empire In The Construction Of Interwar Japanese American Politics, Vivian Yan-Gonzalez

Asian American Studies Faculty Articles and Research

This article examines the first cohort of Japanese American voters in California in the interwar years, in order to explore the construction of racialized parameters on Japanese American political agency. Inter-imperial competition between the United States and Japan over the future of the Pacific, along with the popular and legal linkage of race and citizenship, produced a persistent distrust of Japanese American voters. Although Japanese Americans shaped their political strategies to appease these suspicions, militarized state demands for loyalty after the attack on Pearl Harbor sharply contracted their options from a range of diverse ideologies and partisanship to a narrow …

In The Name Of The Mother, The Nation, And The Race: White Women, The Jim Crow South, & Moralized White Supremacist Feminism, Shayna M. Lawson

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis introduces the concept of moralized white supremacist feminism to examine the central role white women played in constructing, legitimizing, and sustaining racial hierarchies in the Jim Crow South through a network of cultural and political organizing, particularly through the United Daughters of the Confederacy and Women’s Ku Klux Klan. Far from passive observers, white women were strategic agents of segregation, leveraging ideals of purity, motherhood, and moral virtue to enforce anti-Black violence and oppression through educational, civic, legal, and symbolic institutions, as well as extra-legal practices. Drawing from archival materials, oral histories, and critical race theory, this study …

The Commander’S Crusade: Bush’S Campaign For War In Iraq, Aliyah Ramirez

Voces Novae

No abstract provided.

Death, Violence, And Condemnation: The News Media Coverage Of The 1981 Prisoners’ Hunger Strike In Northern Ireland In The United Kingdom And Ireland, Tyler Coker

Voces Novae

No abstract provided.

Where's The Dim Sum? Art, Oral History, And The Chinese American Diaspora In Portland, Or, Rayli Dornan

University Honors Theses

This thesis examines the history, transformation, and contemporary significance of Portland's Chinatown through an oral history framework, emphasizing the voices of Chinese American artists. Beginning with a comprehensive historical overview from the mid-nineteenth-century Gold Rush migrations and railroad labor to twentieth-century exclusion, dispossession under urban renewal, and the late-twentieth-century dispersal into suburbs, the thesis traces how structural racism and policy shaped both the physical landscape and communal life of Oregon's Chinese diaspora. Through in-depth interviews with local artists, this research aims to illuminate how individual experiences of identity, belonging, and creative expression navigate the tensions between heritage and adaptation.

Drawing …

Embodied Archives, Emerging Futures, Xuân-Lam Nguyen

Masters Theses

Fifty years after the end of the U.S.–Vietnam War, this thesis reflects on the entangled relationship between the two nations, inspiring hope while challenging dominant representations of trauma and tragedy. Drawing from autobiography, family history, folk art traditions, colonial photographs, hierarchies within art history, archives of student activism, and key geopolitical events, the work explores the complex intersections of queer identity and glitchy historical narratives. Combining research-based inquiry with time- and labor-intensive processes, it reimagines historical materials to construct alternate possibilities for the future.

From Essential To Expendable – Montagnards, Kurds, And U.S. Army Special Forces In Vietnam And Northern Iraq, Jake Brooks

Masters Theses, 2020-current

In the Vietnam and Iraqi conflicts, the U.S. Army Special Forces teamed up with indigenous ethnic monitories to bring the fight to all corners of the battle space, and to take advantage of their immense local knowledge and strategic locations. The Montagnards of Central Indochina and the Kurds in Northern Iraq allied with the Special Forces for a number of reasons: protection from their ruling governments, recognition for their movements for autonomy, increased access to better medicine and equipment, and the opportunity to strike back at their historical enemies. The Montagnards and Kurds taught the Green Berets how to better …

Beyond The Binary: Amazigh Ethnicity And Transformational Resistance, Nour Sidhoum

Journal of Amazigh Studies

This article explores Amazigh activism in Algeria, focusing on the role of language, memory, and political mobilisation in reshaping national identity. It critically examines the reductive Arab/Berber binary, arguing that such oppositions, rooted in French colonial logic, provide the vocabulary through which Amazigh identity claims are confined within minority paradigms. The aim is to reconceptualise Amazigh ethnic identity as a form of transformational resistance that challenges dominant power structures rather than merely seeking accommodation within them. Drawing on a diverse range of primary and secondary sources—including memoirs of key figures in Algerian nationalism such as Hocine Aït Ahmed and Sadek …

"Troublesome Medicine Man": Representations Of The Sword Bearer Incident In Newspaper Coverage, Cara Sue Swaim

History Undergraduate Honors Theses

Newspaper coverage of Native Americans during the nineteenth century had an “artistic bias,” or a tendency to emphasize action, danger, and treachery as a part of the “Indian formula.” This meant that vast amounts of journalistic zeal was spent on instances of conflict and tension between tribes, within tribes, between tribes and white settlers, or between tribes and the U.S. military, while times of peace and instances of cooperation received miniscule amounts of attention. This was largely motivated by a desire to justify American western expansion and the need to “civilize” Native groups. This “Indian formula” was also applied in …

Dekonstruktion Der Afd: Eine Analyse Der Rechtspopulistischen Deutschen Partei Der„Alternative Für Deutschland”, Elizabeth A. Breckenridge, Elizabeth Breckenridge

Departmental Honors & Graduate Capstone Projects

Die Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) ist eine rechtsextreme populistische Partei, die innerhalb eines Jahrzehnts rasch an Macht gewonnen hat, insbesondere in den ostdeutschen Bundesländern, aufgrund ihrer Betonung der Nationalisierung, ihrer populistischen Rhetorik und ihrer Anziehungskraft auf Wähler, die Ängste vor Einwanderung und kulturellem Wandel hegen. Die AfD hat es innerhalb von fünf Jahren geschafft, eine starke Wählerschaft zu mobilisieren, 2017 Sitze im Bundestag zu erringen und gilt nun als wichtigste Oppositionspartei zu den etablierten Parteien. Die AfD ist die erste rechte Partei seit 1945, die aufgrund des Aufstiegs rechtspolitischer Ideologien bedeutende Wahlerfolge erzielen konnte. Aufgrund des reaktionären Pendelschwungs nach dem …

“Raise Your Keffiyeh:” Headdress As A Lens For Understanding The Arab Revolt In Mandatory Palestine, 1936-1939, Kathryn Kf Butler

All Theses

In the fall of 1938, approaching the apex of the most intensive period of violence during the Arab Revolt against the British government in Mandatory Palestine (1936-1939), a seemingly unassuming change occurred for Arab men in cities throughout the region: they donned a new headdress. Sartorial shifts in the early post-Ottoman period were not unique to Palestine. During the Interwar period, changes in male headgear occurred throughout the greater Middle East in Turkey, Afghanistan, Iran, Syria and Iraq, to name a few. These transformations of dress signaled a shift in something either societal or political and oftentimes both. I argue …

Deconstructing The Afd: An Analysis Of The German Right-Wing Populist Political Party, The Alternative For Germany (Vchc Poster), Elizabeth A. Breckenridge

Research and Creativity Symposium

The Alternativ für Deutschland (Alternative for Germany) (AfD) is a far-right populist party that has quickly grown in power within the past decade, particularly in Eastern German states, due to its emphasis on nationalization, populist rhetoric, and attraction to voters’ fears about immigration and cultural change. The AfD has managed to mobilize strong voting support within five years, gaining parliamentary seats in the Bundestag (Federal Parliament) in 2017, and is now considered the main opposition party to the established parties. The AfD is the first right-wing party to gain significant voting attention since 1945, capitalizing on the rise of right-wing …

Resilience Against Neglect

The Civil Rights Movement (HIS/BLS 347) Zine Project

No abstract provided.

Res Historica, Volume 4, Lynneth Miller Renberg Phd, Alpha Rho Epsilon Phi Alpha Theta

Res Historica

The 2025 journal of historical research by Anderson University students, Res Historica.

The editorial team for this edition of Res Historica was Dr. Lynneth Miller Renberg, Samuel Sanders, and Julia Ackerman. The cover art for this volume is an open access image.

Anarcho-Syndicalism In The Negaunee Branch Of The Finnish Socialist Association, Michael P. Selwa

HS 390 Primary Research Papers

Socialism reached a prominence as a movement in the United States during the early 20th century. Fueled by the machinations of industrial capitalism and labor reform, many workers, immigrants, and other individuals would arrive to the precepts of socialism, a political movement avowing to shirk the constraints of capitalism on the proletariat. Specifically, the question of why and how labor unions should function in a socialist society was a central tenet of debate within the faction of the American Socialist Party. The central question of this article is to examine why anarcho-syndicalists argued against traditional socialist reformist arguments in the …

Public Memory Through Memorialization, Sophie A. O'Brien

SPARK Symposium Presentations

This research project aims to contextualize the story surrounding various Nashville monuments that memorialize civil rights leaders. This project will explore the history of monuments and road names in Nashville. The history will span from the Confederacy to the civil rights movement and examine how public memory has evolved and changed with the removal of some statues and the changing of road names. It aims to show who we choose to memorialize and why, and how the civil rights leaders we choose to remember reflects public sentiment of the civil rights era.

“These Are Not Ordinary Criminals!” The First War Crimes Trial At The People's Tribunal And Its Implications In Post-Holocaust Romania, Stefan Cristian Ionescu

History Faculty Articles and Research

This article examines the neglected war crimes trials of Holocaust perpetrators that took place at the People's Tribunal in early postwar Romania, focusing especially on the first trial (the “Macici group”). The article shows that in spite of the political interferences by the new pro-communist regime and the USSR, the Macici group trial in particular, and the first war crimes trials in general, were not Stalinist show trials or fake trials and they sentenced real war criminals and accurately captured Romania's participation in the Holocaust. Unlike the Antonescu group trial – that indicted the former pro-Nazi dictator and his closest …

Weeding Out Dishonesty: Rhetoric And Information Literacy For The Age Of Disinformation, Victoria M. Tischio

Georgia International Conference on Information Literacy

We live in what some call a post-fact world where what is presented as true becomes true and circulates widely. Politicians lie because they have calculated that they gain more than they lose, and media outlets repeat those lies because they profit from them (Adair 2024). Fear and suspicion make individuals vulnerable to these lies (Young 2017). Like an invasive species, it is nearly impossible to eradicate these lies once released into the media ecosystem. While fake news is not new (think P.T. Barnum and 17th-century canards), its virulence has reached epidemic proportions, infiltrating all aspects of society. This constitutes …

Restitution Of Jewish Property In Northern Transylvania During The Early Postwar Years, Stefan Cristian Ionescu

History Faculty Articles and Research

The restitution of Jewish property in the multiethnic region of Northern Transylvania faced numerous challenges during the first post-Holocaust years as a result of the complicated wartime history, postwar demographics, legal status, interethnic dynamics, and occasional violence. Having the lowest rate of survival among all Jewish communities in Romania, most of the region’s Jews died during the deportation and did not return to their native places to claim their properties. This impacted the extent of restitution of individual private property. Some of the Aryanized property was restituted to the Jewish survivors or their heirs because the wartime beneficiaries fled the …

The Growing Rift Between Holocaust Scholars Over Israel/Palestine, Shira Klein

History Faculty Articles and Research

"A chasm has formed between Holocaust scholars concerning Israel/Palestine, deepening immeasurably since 7 October 2023. Unlike previous controversies in the field, the divide is not just historical or methodological; it revolves around academics’ role in the world today, particularly the public stand they choose to take on Palestine/Israel and Zionism. Two main camps have formed. Put reductively, one camp defends Israel, while the other defends Palestinians, although differences between individual scholars within each camp make for more of a spectrum than a clear-cut divide. How, despite a diversity of ideas and foci within each camp, did two academic-political antipodes solidify …

A Comparative Analysis Of The Past Three Fifa World Cups: Nations’ Regulations, Policies, And Global Impact, Arturo Flores

History and Political Science | Senior Theses

The current study investigates the relationship between alcohol and sports marketing. Throughout this research paper, the primary focus is to look at the three previous World Cups and their hosting Countries: Brazil, Russia, and Qatar. To do this, the methods that are used to analyze the three countries will consist of a collection of digital archives consisting of YouTube ads, alcohol policies of the countries hosting the World Cup, and the effects of the World Cup on the hosts overall. In addition, the study goes into how the alcohol policies of each country have shifted before, during, and after being …

Iii.A.2 Displacement & Barriers To Home Ownership, Kim Rostan, Bria Harper, Jim Neighbors, Mark Byrnes

Crafting Democratic Futures

This document explains how systemic racism and discriminatory policies from the Civil War & Reconstruction period through the 20th century prevented African Americans in Spartanburg from building wealth through land ownership and home equity. It details barriers such as Black Codes, sharecropping, convict leasing, exclusion from New Deal programs, discriminatory housing policies, and urban renewal projects that displaced Black neighborhoods without providing equitable opportunities for economic advancement.

‘An Intriguing But Ambiguous Privilege’: Adventures In Franco-Irish Relations Through The Prism Of The Diplomatic Meal, Elaine Mahon

Books/Book Chapters

This essay discusses the welcome banquet held in February 1945 in honour of the newly appointed French diplomatic envoy to Ireland, Jean Rivière, hosted by Éamon de Valera at Iveagh House, the headquarters of the Irish Department of External Affairs. The banquet took place at a moment when ‘an intriguing but ambiguous privilege’ had been granted by Charles de Gaulle’s Provisional Government to Ireland as the only country permitted to retain its diplomatic representative to France in the post-liberation period. Following the fall of the Vichy regime and the liberation of France in August 1944, de Gaulle’s government de- manded …

Asian American Navigation In Higher Education: Do We Belong At Colby College?, Amanda Rose Alpert

Honors Theses

This thesis explores how Asian American students navigate their belonging at Predominantly White Institutions (PWI), specifically a case study at the higher educational institution Colby College. In understanding how Asian American students navigate the spaces around them, this thesis dives into the history of Asian immigration to the U.S., the Asian American politicized label, and the different diasporas and cultural nuances Asian Americans experience that make up the complicated, diverse, and misunderstood label. Through exploring global racializations of Asian bodies and legacies of Western imperialism and colonialism, this gives a basis of how Asian Americans understand themselves as persons living …

Establishing The Narrative – A Comparative Analysis Of Nashville Newspaper Reporting During The Civil Rights Era, Katherine E. Cannon

SPARK Symposium Presentations

Public memory serves as the collective public consciousness – how a group of people remember a historical narrative and thus how they interpret and interact with their current environment. Journalism and news reporting plays a pivotal role in the creation of public memory. This study will analyze the differences in reporting between two Nashville-based newspapers, The Nashville Banner and The Tennessean, and how their reporting shaped public memory in Nashville. These publications are crucial to the Nashville community and how the public is informed. To properly conduct this research with narrow enough scope to get accurate results, this study will …