Cultural History Commons^™

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.

Crusading Against Vice In The Progressive Era: American Anti-Profanity Leagues And Their Legacy, Evan J. Christensen

Roland D. Sawyer Scholarship Papers

During the Progressive Era in the United States, the rise of Anti-Profanity Leagues—such as those led by Roland D. Sawyer and Arthur S. Colborne—mirrored a growing national moral sentiment against profanity that aligned with broader ideals of social reform and public virtue. These leagues responded to widespread concerns about the perceived erosion of public decency and sought to promote “clean speech” through grassroots organizing, religious engagement, and civic advocacy. This paper situates the Anti-Profanity Leagues within the larger framework of Progressive Era moral reform movements, including temperance, anti-vice campaigns, and social purity efforts. Drawing on period newspapers, archival materials, and …

Woven By Culture: A Comparative Study Of Traditional Dress Across Regions And The Societal Forces Behind Fashion, James T. Granger

Senior Theses

This study attempts to examine how societal influences that different countries have obtained from years past affect their traditional fashion. By sketching 200 traditional female dresses from every sovereign country in the world, I have taken the time to analyze and create depictions of their sociological and stylistic choices. I have chosen to examine the countries of Cambodia, Republic of Congo, Croatia, Cuba, Finland, Iran, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Panama, and Tonga as they all represent different regions of the globe. Breaking down each of their dresses into their specific garments and accessories is essential to better understand the culture and the …

Research In Indigenous Historiographies: Oral History As Evidence For Federal Recognition Of Indian Tribes, Colette Haworth

Graduate Research Conference (GSIS)

Significant to the field of cultural studies is the identification of cultural artifacts, which enable scholars to analyze the complexities of societies, comprehend cultural dynamics, and investigate the ways in which individuals and communities construct meaning and identity in cultural contexts. Oral history, an intangible cultural artifact, has been an important cultural identifier, particularly for marginalized individuals and communities. The development of critical oral history (COH) methodology has alleviated some of the criticism toward oral history as a valid methodology. In fact, some scholars contend that COH has moved beyond the realm of academic research to “provide a policy relevant …

A Canvas Decolonized: An Exploration Of Haiti’S Colonial History Through Haitian Artists Philemon Obin, Jean Appolon, Sheilby Mecena, Flex Morisseau–Leroy, And Claes Gabriel, Dominique Dempsey

Graduate Research Conference (GSIS)

A Canvas Decolonized examines the complex realities faced by Haiti through the lens of its vibrant artistic heritage, highlighting the role of art in interpreting, preserving, and challenging narratives about the nation's history and identity. By exploring the works of Haitian muralists, photographers, painters, and poets including Jean Appolon, Flex Morisseau Leroy, Claes Gabriel, and Edwidge Danticat this study illuminates how these artists engage with themes of colonization, immigration, generational trauma, and cultural displacement. Grounded in the theoretical frameworks of Frantz Fanon and Benedict Anderson, the paper argues that Haitian art provides a powerful medium to analyze and contextualize 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.

Common Threads In Monsters Across Time And Space, Jade Gladue

CAFE Symposium 2025

Fear is an undeniable human emotion, and monsters have always been a way for human societies to grapple with and explain our fears. In this project, common aspects and groupings of monsters across different indigenous cultures and folklores are discussed and dissected to determine inherent human reactions to fear. The project identifies and analyzes types of monsters and what the hidden meaning behind the existence and endurance of these creatures might be.

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 …

Deuce Redemption: Grindhouse Cinema, Moral Panic, And Urban Renewal, Robert Brenner

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

If you consult standard histories of the “redevelopment” of 42^nd Street between Seventh and Eighth Avenue, AKA “the Deuce,” you will read that it was filled with nothing but criminals and pornographers, that decent people avoided it at all costs, and the only way the block could be “saved” was by seizing it via eminent domain, evicting all the current tenants, and replacing them with Disney and its fellow entertainment corporations.

The purpose of this thesis is to offer a more nuanced alternative to these standard histories. I will argue that the Deuce was a lower-class, multiracial, queer entertainment …

Building A Global Partnership Through A Shared History, Lisa Lacross, Shawn Dillard, Bri Ard, Kern Jackson

International Journal of Transformative Teaching and Learning in Higher Education

Effective global partnerships in higher education promote intercultural awareness (Delong et al., 2011) and influence future study and work abroad experiences by articulating the value of global learning (Lewin, 2009). Seeking to broaden global engagement opportunities for minoritized students, specifically African Americans, one institution developed a virtual exchange program through a global partnership of stakeholders from Ghana, Togo, Benin, Cape Verde, and the United States. Grounded in a shared history of the 2019 discovery of the last reported ship to bring enslaved West Africans to the United States, students from Mobile, Alabama and Cotonou, Benin participated in virtual discussions that …

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 …

Down The Bay Oral History Project Newsletter - Winter 2025, Center For Archaeological Studies, Mccall Library

Down the Bay Oral History Project Newsletter

Public newsletter sharing information about progress and discoveries during the Down The Bay Project.

Complexity Machines: New Histories Of North American Automobile Production, 1900-1950s, Kevin A. Moskowitz

History Dissertations - Archive

This dissertation examines the design and manufacture of the mass-produced automobile in North America from its inception at the start of the twentieth century through the height of production in the late 1950s. This network of producers constituted the single largest industry in North America. The success of this market required producing a product that was desirable to consumers in design, affordable to purchase, and could be built in high enough quantities to justify the realignment of the rest of North American society to serve this new method of transportation. This dissertation is a shift away from demand studies concerned …

A Song Of Soil And Seeds: The Delicious History Of Tunisian Grain Agriculture And Its Solution To Contemporary Food Scarcity., Ella Schonberger

Scripps Senior Theses

“A Song of Soil and Seeds: The Delicious History of Tunisian Cereal Agriculture and Its Solution to Contemporary Food Scarcity” by Ella Schonberger explores the history of Tunisian grain agriculture as a continuous narrative of adaptation, resilience, and colonial disruption. This thesis traces the historical journey of Tunisian grain agriculture, from its indigenous Amazigh roots through successive waves of Roman, Ottoman, and French agro-colonialism, to the environmental and agricultural pressures of the Green Revolution and today’s climate crisis.

Combining archaeological evidence, historical records, agronomic research, oral interviews, and firsthand culinary experimentation, this paper examines how Tunisia’s heirloom grains—sorghum, millet, and …

Silent Testimonies: The Global Evolution Of Grave Marker Art And Meaning, Erik Culley

Bakerman Student Research Awards

Grave markers are more than simple memorials; they are meaningful cultural objects that reflect how societies understand death, identity, belief, class, and community values. The size, material, decoration, and inscriptions of gravestones change over time in response to economic conditions, religious beliefs, social structures, and consumer culture. By studying grave markers across different regions and historical periods—such as early modern Europe, nineteenth-century Germany, and immigrant cemeteries in Australia—archaeologists can trace broader cultural transformations. Research shows that the rise of external grave markers in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was closely tied to increased material consumption and a growing emphasis on …

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 …

Identifying Intangible And Biocultural Heritage Elements Toward Environmental Understanding: Engaging Stakeholders Through Art, Martha B. Lerski

Publications and Research

Grounded in a case study in Barbuda in the Caribbean, this research examines sustainability from the perspective of what arts and heritage can contribute to community engagement and local and broader understandings about the environment. This article documents a growing body of literature recognizing the role of arts and culture, including local knowledge and traditional ecological knowledge (TEK), in climate change endeavors. Art and TEK present expansive world views. Contextual information situates research done on the island of Barbuda pre- and post-Hurricane Irma. Visual arts workshops engaged community members in mixed methods research. Results documented cultural elements, particularly intangible and …

‘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 …

Healing Communities With Police Divestment: Seeking Abolition Through Transformative Reform And Community-Government Collaboration, Jessica E. Gillson

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Concerns about the efficacy and sustainability of the U.S. carceral system have persisted throughout the country’s history, recently fueling renewed activism and bipartisan calls for reform. However, proposed solutions remain divisive. This thesis first defines the current status of our prison systems, then explores collaborative alternatives to incarceration and policing that support communities and break cycles of incarceration.

Focusing on partnerships among local governments, community organizations, justice-involved individuals, and law enforcement, this study examines holistic approaches to crime prevention, reentry, and reintegration. Using an interdisciplinary framework incorporating restorative justice, community resilience, and systems theory, it investigates how community-based strategies can …

Floating Signifiers: Ai, Semiotics, And The Crisis Of Meaning In Music, Kehinde Aruwajoye

Dartmouth College Master’s Theses

This thesis examines how AI-generated music disrupts traditional meaning-making processes in musical expression. Through semiotic analysis (Saussure, Peirce) and cultural theory (Hall), I demonstrate how AI produces technically proficient but culturally hollow compositions, what I term "floating signifiers." Case studies reveal AI's inability to replicate the lived experiences that give music its depth, despite accurate stylistic reproductions. The work identifies three fundamental losses: contextual grounding, authentic hybridity, and historical consciousness. I propose ethical frameworks for human-AI collaboration that preserve music's essential humanity while leveraging algorithmic capabilities. Ultimately, this research shifts the debate from technical possibility "Can AI compose?" to cultural …

“We Aren’T Dying Yet, But We’Re On The Hospital Bed.” An Analysis Of Scottish Culture And Desire For Independence, Emma Walker

Honors Papers and Posters

Scottish culture has long often been associated with barbaric clans and whiskey; however, there is much more to this culture than meets the eye. After centuries of oppression and pushback on expressing cultural aspects of Scottish identity post the Union of the Crowns in 1603, Scotland has now emerged as a leader in re-establishing its culture and protecting it as well. This paper will aim to analyze how Scotland's cultural pride over time has changed and how this uptick in pride has also led to a political movement for independence. I argue that the aftermath of the Battle of Culloden, …

Love Is Dead In The Restless West: Hippies, Manson, And California Culture, 1966-1970, Rebecca Allen

Scripps Senior Theses

Though an extreme aberration from most of the hippie counterculture of the 1960s, Charles Manson’s ultimately murderous cult arguably represents something particular about American culture in the late sixties, in which youthful hostility towards the status quo sometimes grew radical, and in the case of the Manson Family cult, extremely violent. By the mid-sixties, more and more young people began to feel alienated by a culture they felt no longer embodied their larger aspirations, and as a result, were drawn to the emerging counterculture that embraced alternative lifestyles that frequently clashed with the traditional sensibilities of their parents’ generation. After …

From Conscientious French Canadian To Enterprising American: Making Memory & Measuring Social Mobility Of French Canadians 1880-1940, Brooke S. Schwaderer

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

This thesis studies the social mobility of French-Canadian immigrants to the Keweenaw Peninsula 1880-1940 and memory among their descendants to explain how French-Canadian culture in the Keweenaw faded over time. Oral histories were conducted to gain an understanding of the current French-Canadian culture in the Keweenaw, understand how the current generation perceives changes in culture over time, and provide possible explanations for why French-Canadians thrived in the Keweenaw. Tax records from the Michigan Technological University Archives and social mobility scores, mother tongue, and homeownership information from the United States census was analyzed to measure language loss, and the social mobility …

Workable Seams, Jackson Mills Smith

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

In Jackson Mills Smith’s Workable Seams, readers encounter the stories, landscapes, and lives of rural Knox County, Indiana, from the oscillating vantage of a Hoosier boy raised with a Cajun sensibility. After relocating from Louisiana to the river bottoms of the crossroad state at a young age, the speaker gradually uncovers a local history only previously understood in fragmentary shards and fading glimpses.

Alternating between semi-lyrical embodied experiences and memories, documentary pieces in conversation with the state’s historical archive, and the retelling of exaggerated local yarns, poetry is a means of inquiry in Workable Seams. Topics range from …

A Multiple Perspective Analysis On Urban Poverty In Developing Nations: A Case Study On Nigeria, Colonial Implications, And Modern-Day Outcomes, Julian Rivera-Williams

CMC Senior Theses

This paper will dissect urbanization and poverty in Nigeria as a case study of the challenges of underdevelopment and the lingering effects of colonialism in Africa. To draw a complete understanding of challenges faced by developing nations facing systemic underdevelopment, high poverty, and low productivity– nations like Nigeria, my research will uncover colonial impacts and post-colonial policies that initiated urban poverty and underdevelopment outcomes we see today. The purpose of my thesis is to encompass existing fragmented academia on the causes and consequences of underdevelopment and connect historical implications to current impacts of global development today including the influence of …

Re-Indigenizing And Collaboratively Tending Urban Greenspaces, Divinity Nnenne Adewale

University Honors Theses

This work details the active process of land tending with the intention of re-Indigenization in the Pacific Northwest at several Portland sites; The Native American Student Community Center, PSU Oak Savanna, and the Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. Land tending is an intuitive process, one rooted in love and respect for life of all forms as well as becoming the perpetual student; land tending is not a skill to be mastered, only practiced. Unlike environmental management, tending cannot be done separate from the earth, in a classroom or otherwise. Connections are what tending is built on top of: the foundation; effort …

On The Occasion Of The Launch Of Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire And Dorothy Cashman, Eds. Irish Food History: A Companion, Michael Cronin

European Journal of Food Drink and Society

No abstract provided.

Great Irish Households: Inventories From The Long Eighteenth Century, William Derham

European Journal of Food Drink and Society

No abstract provided.