Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Discipline
-
- American Studies (25)
- American Popular Culture (17)
- Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (16)
- Social and Behavioral Sciences (14)
- Communication (11)
-
- Critical and Cultural Studies (10)
- Sociology (9)
- Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies (8)
- American Material Culture (7)
- Race and Ethnicity (7)
- Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies (7)
- Women's Studies (7)
- Other Languages, Societies, and Cultures (6)
- Political Science (3)
- Public Affairs, Public Policy and Public Administration (3)
- Social Influence and Political Communication (3)
- Television (3)
- Urban Studies and Planning (3)
- Economic Policy (2)
- Economics (2)
- Film and Media Studies (2)
- Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Ethnicity in Communication (2)
- Photography (2)
- Religion (2)
- Urban Studies (2)
- Asian Studies (1)
- Broadcast and Video Studies (1)
- Keyword
-
- Feminism (6)
- Hip-hop (4)
- Blacks -- Race identity (3)
- Gender (3)
- Patriarchy (3)
-
- Affect (2)
- Hegemony (2)
- Heteronormativity (2)
- Labor (2)
- Music videos (2)
- Poetry (2)
- Queer (2)
- Queer theory (2)
- Race (2)
- Social media (2)
- Activism (1)
- Advertising (1)
- American Road (1)
- Apocalyptic Literature (1)
- Asians in motion pictures (1)
- Assimilation (1)
- Atomic Weapons (1)
- Awareness Media (1)
- Beat Generation (1)
- Belcalis Almanzar (1)
- Beyoncé (1)
- Binary (1)
- Burning Man (1)
- Capitalism (1)
- Chicago (Ill.) (1)
Articles 1 - 30 of 36
Full-Text Articles in Cultural History
Unraveling Ethos: The Commodification Of Ethical Clothing, Oliva Hanson
Unraveling Ethos: The Commodification Of Ethical Clothing, Oliva Hanson
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
In the last decade there has been a noticeable attempt to subvert traditional modes of clothing production. The recent emergence of “ethical consumption” in the fashion industry is a case in point. This project argues that these new formations and practices around ethical consumption are mere appropriations of anti-corporate politics and sentiments for consumers in the West. Signification of ethical consumption through language and cultural capital give more value to individual articles of clothing and branded entities. This reformation of the clothing industry towards an ethical attitude is a rebranding tactic that avoids the source-issue altogether. Through advertising and normalization …
Everything I Know About Gender I Learned From A Little Golden Book!, Chandler Clifford
Everything I Know About Gender I Learned From A Little Golden Book!, Chandler Clifford
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This feminist cultural intervention examines the power children’s literature has in its ability to interpellate its readers and normalize dominant gendered identities for them. It draws on the work of feminist theorists, such as bell hooks, Judith Butler, and Sandra Bem to interrogate the politics of gender and sexuality in The Little Golden Book series and to examine how the latter has actively worked to create specific cisnormative gender identities for its readers. In this project, Chandler Clifford shows how children’s literature is used as an ideological tool to teach children how gender is performed in the outside world and …
Through The Looking Glass: The Perpetuation Of Homelessness Through Awareness Media, Ashley Lauren Knight
Through The Looking Glass: The Perpetuation Of Homelessness Through Awareness Media, Ashley Lauren Knight
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
The definition of who the homelessness are has historically been defined by media. This project performs a genealogical analysis influenced by the work Foucault has done in Madness and Civilization to contextualize the way different forms of media through the years has constructed the homeless stereotype we live with today. By zeroing in on awareness media that is produced by independent documentarians, it becomes apparent the goal is not to educate on the systemic issue of homelessness, but more so to create an empathy-based connection between the subject and the viewer. This paper argues that an empathy-based production is not …
Looking At People Watching People- A Comparative Approach Of American And British Advertising, Kyle Heger
Looking At People Watching People- A Comparative Approach Of American And British Advertising, Kyle Heger
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Advertising reaches millions of audiences every day, yet some of the most impactful ads only appear once, while other advertisements thrive in a world where audiences are most receptive to what the campaign is feeding to the masses. Spaces like the Super Bowl, ads created for the wonders of television are the bridge between artificial realism and situational experiences that most people can relate or aspire to, but what if one person’s experience is leaning towards misrepresentation? In this paper, I’ll be using media studies to dissect American advertising, through its construction of non-profit advertising and responding to the form …
Collective Political Action And Activism On Twitter: The Merits And Limitations Of The Framing Tactics And Strategies Of The 2018 National Prison Strike, Philip Wasserburg
Collective Political Action And Activism On Twitter: The Merits And Limitations Of The Framing Tactics And Strategies Of The 2018 National Prison Strike, Philip Wasserburg
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
The success of any collective political action relies heavily on public opinion. The leaders of these actions use framing techniques to optimize the reach of their message and convince broader portions of the population to sympathize with their cause. Today, most political conversations and debates about pressing social issues takes on social media platforms such as Twitter, which could be conceptualized as a virtual public sphere, where different individuals meet and discuss political events and issues as equally empowered citizens and active members of society. However, in practice, some individuals remain unable to participate in these discourses and conversations. Philip …
Boys, Balls, And The Blues: The Erasure Of Genderqueer Bodies, Austin Mcgrath
Boys, Balls, And The Blues: The Erasure Of Genderqueer Bodies, Austin Mcgrath
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
The goal of this essay is to re-explore the concept of gender in its relation to genderqueer and nonbinary identities. Before its examination of the gender reveal party, this essay examines male and female, masculine and feminine, and man and woman, carefully critiquing and distinguishing biological sex from gender expression and gender identity using a Queer theoretical framework to contextualize these distinctions in relation to queer identities. Through a modern contextualization, linguistic analysis, and a critical media examination of gender reveal images and footage, this essay acknowledges and analyzes the heteronormative structures that reinforce gender binaries. It challenges the deployment …
A Man Went Looking For America And Couldn't Find It Anywhere: The Wanderer In On The Road And Easy Rider, Taylor Camara
A Man Went Looking For America And Couldn't Find It Anywhere: The Wanderer In On The Road And Easy Rider, Taylor Camara
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This paper analyzes the archetype of the wanderer as a cultural phenomenon in 1960s America starting with Jack Kerouac's On the Road as an embodiment of the Beat Generation and ending with Dennis Hopper's Easy Rider (1969) as an embodiment of sixties counterculture. Through this progression, On the Road's projection of the wanderer is found within the hobohero as a dissident nomadic figure, and Easy Rider's as a cosmic cowboy- a countercultural twist on an American icon. By analyzing these figures, the contradictory nature between rebellion and tradition meet as hobo-hero and cosmic cowboy reject societal norms in the search …
Theories Of Anzaldua And Fanon: The Battle Of Algiers To Black Lives Matter, Maren Carey
Theories Of Anzaldua And Fanon: The Battle Of Algiers To Black Lives Matter, Maren Carey
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Cultural theorists have analyzed and exposed many elements of culture that were otherwise out of plain sight. Two theorists, Gloria E. Anzaldua and Franz Fanon, that have done exceptional work attempting to shatter the norms of how concepts such as decolonization, violence and activism could truly work to create progress. Fanon discusses concepts of black existentialism in the early 20th century. He explores how difficult it is, primarily for people of color, to express and develop an identity within the structures of inequality embedded globally through colonization. Anzaldua, on the other hand, does similar work but through micro-cultural changes that …
A Scripted Approach To Violent Crime Coverage: How News Media Strikes Fear And Racializes Political Discourse, Mackenzie Crosson
A Scripted Approach To Violent Crime Coverage: How News Media Strikes Fear And Racializes Political Discourse, Mackenzie Crosson
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This project analyzes the consolidation of crime coverage on the Chicago Tribune's digital platform with the aim to question the formulaic tendencies of news media as an institution. Specifically, the study examines the production of violent crime coverage in urban news media as following a particular "crime script" which, through the script's reliance on racial imagery in the form of mug shots, proliferates toxic correlations between the concepts 'black' and 'criminal.' Paired with elements of a political economic analysis, the project argues that this temp lated production of crime news mixed with news corporations' pursuit of profit ultimately works to …
Hip-Hop And Poetry: Listen To The Words, Jordan Dingle
Hip-Hop And Poetry: Listen To The Words, Jordan Dingle
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Hip-hop is a subculture that has become a major part of popular culture and heavily affects contemporary music, clothing, and media. The subculture initially started as a way for the historically oppressed to voice themselves and have a dialogue for social dilemmas that were relevant to them. Maintaining this voice of authenticity will become more difficult the larger and more commercialized Hip-hop becomes, thus it is important to identify mediums that are being used to express authenticity through discussion of social dilemmas in Hip-hop culture. This project identifies poetry as a medium that is used to display authenticity in Hip-hop …
Misrepresenting Climate Change: Deconstructing New Media Discourse Through The Case Study Of Hurricane Irma, Amy Dickens
Misrepresenting Climate Change: Deconstructing New Media Discourse Through The Case Study Of Hurricane Irma, Amy Dickens
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This project uses critical discourse analysis to understand the relationship between U.S. news media coverage on natural disasters like Hurricane Irma and the ideological implications of that coverage. More specifically, in news media discourse, personification of natural disasters alienates humans from their actions, many of which are actively aiding in the advancement of anthropogenic climate change. By taking an in-depth look at how various factors come into play, like the humans vs. nature binary, the polarization of American politics around climate change, and various news media framings, the essay demonstrates that the personification of Irma is both the result of …
Hip-Hop's Influence On Stripper Culture: The Era Of Cardi B'S, Taylor Bell
Hip-Hop's Influence On Stripper Culture: The Era Of Cardi B'S, Taylor Bell
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Twenty years ago the terms 'stripper' or 'exotic dancer' would have made heads turn. However, today feminist politics traditional negative stimga on strip culture is being challenged by the presence of the jhip-hop industry within the strip club space. With the emergence of former stripper Cardi B as well as discussions in American politics around former port star Stormy Daniles, it's clear that the way society thinks and interacts with strip culture is evolving away from the stereotypical negative one. 39 pages.
Speaking Within Subalternity: A Critical Analysis Of Performance Artist Guillermo Gomez-Pena And The Use Of Strategic Essentialism, Paola Martell
Speaking Within Subalternity: A Critical Analysis Of Performance Artist Guillermo Gomez-Pena And The Use Of Strategic Essentialism, Paola Martell
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This project investigates the work of performance artist Guillermo Gomez-Pefia through a postcolonial discourse. This project will be looking at three of the artist's pieces and proposes that though seen as an abstract or avant-garde performer, Gomez-Pefia's these pieces provide a platform for the oppressed who cannot speak for themselves due to hegemony - the subaltern. In the context of Gomez-Pefia's performance art, this theory provides a postcolonial discourse on notions such as hybridity, borders, transculturalism, and other elements of identities found in lafrontera. Ultimately, this project finds that though the subaltern cannot speak, it is through Gomez-Pefia's use of …
Nonbinary Identities And The Self: A Contemporary Analysis Of Hedwig And The Angry Inch, Gender Identity, And Existentialism, Emily "Soren" Hodshire
Nonbinary Identities And The Self: A Contemporary Analysis Of Hedwig And The Angry Inch, Gender Identity, And Existentialism, Emily "Soren" Hodshire
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Although there has been extensive discourse about gender and the performativity of gender from scholars, there is little room for the language and existence for Non-binary identities in the material world. Through a reading and discourse analysis informed by both queer theory and existentialism, this project demonstrates that the film, Hedwig and The Angry Inch (2001) goes beyond disrupting gender binaries to giving up on gender binaries altogether, postulating the existence of a creative identity beyond male and female. This film is used as a case study to analyze and deconstruct gender on screen and how people read gender non-conforming …
At Risk Youths: Schools, Juvenile Delinquency, And The Prison Industrial Complex, Ashantia M. Day
At Risk Youths: Schools, Juvenile Delinquency, And The Prison Industrial Complex, Ashantia M. Day
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Juvenile delinquency has been a social issue for many decades. While much research has studied the deviant behaviors of the adolescent, little focus has been placed on the degree to which the school environment plays on delinquent behavior. The purpose of this project is to use schools as the subject to contextualize the !ink bet\"Jeen racia!ized criminalization and the disproportionate rate at which black youths are in contact with the Juvenile Justice System. This work will apply labeling theory, theories of academic tracking/grouping, use of analytic autobiography, critical race theory and a Marxist critique of capitalism to investigate the significant …
The Question Of Journalism In A Post-Fact Trump World: Objectivity Is A Lie And The Teen Girl Can Lead A Revolution, Leeann Penz
The Question Of Journalism In A Post-Fact Trump World: Objectivity Is A Lie And The Teen Girl Can Lead A Revolution, Leeann Penz
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
No abstract provided.
Segregaytion: The Exclusion Of Black Bodies In Gay (Cyber) Spaces, Kelvin James Stallings
Segregaytion: The Exclusion Of Black Bodies In Gay (Cyber) Spaces, Kelvin James Stallings
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Gay spaces such as bars, clubs, and cruising locations are intended for the socialization of gay men, providing a historical role in shaping LGBTQ communities. These spaces are thought to be protective against various kinds of discrimination from the outside world, however the maintaining racial segregation revealed. My project first contextualizes these historically gay spaces through historical accounts, and some personal narratives, by addressing issues of both racial segregation and sexuality of black homosexuals. The project moves from the historical gay space to contemporary spaces focusing on the social networking app, Grindr, which similarly maintains the white normative presence in …
Bringing The State Home: Neoliberalism In Global Models Of Public Housing, Nicholas Alfino
Bringing The State Home: Neoliberalism In Global Models Of Public Housing, Nicholas Alfino
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Global public housing authorities in state versus market capitalism take different approaches to provide housing for multicultural demographics. This capstone project looks at that of New York City and Singapore as case studies of ideologies of welfare, multicultural national identity and public policies representative of their political economies. With special attention paid the spatial relations of ethnic enclaves in both urban environments, focus is placed on a social, lived experience shaped by both 'productivist' versus 'cynical' ideology and privatization versus state authoritarianism. Each political economic system of welfare reaches from larger concepts of national and global economy to the local …
Cameras As Weapons Of Resistance: Refugees Disrupting The Colonial Narrative Through Photography, Shannon Elder
Cameras As Weapons Of Resistance: Refugees Disrupting The Colonial Narrative Through Photography, Shannon Elder
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This project analyzes the photography project “#RefugeeCameras”, where German photojournalist Kevin McElvaney gave disposable cameras to refugees to document their own experiences. The project includes close examination of the photography collection and considers the photographic depiction of landless people by other landless people in juxtaposition to the concept of the refugee as a ‘terrorist’. The examination of these images will reveal how photographs become a tool that can disrupt ideological stances that harm innocent people such as Islamophobia and fear mongering towards refugees that are deemed a threat by the Trump administration’s Executive Order, “Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist …
Bodies As Living, Twirling Sacrifices: Performing Black Girlhood, Liturgical Dance, And The Black Church Tradition, Brianna Heath
Bodies As Living, Twirling Sacrifices: Performing Black Girlhood, Liturgical Dance, And The Black Church Tradition, Brianna Heath
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
The purpose of this study is to investigate liturgical dance in the black church tradition as a gendered space. I argue that black girls perform their sexuality as ascribed to hetero-patriarchal ideology—as preached within the black church—through liturgical dance. This ideology akin to politics of respectability separates the sacred from the secular which causes a tension. This tension shows up in the hyper-ness of liturgical dancing. This study discusses this by contextualizing liturgical dance within a history of black concert dance and embodied practices of resistance. This study frames liturgical dance within the black dance tradition, black feminist studies, and …
Yellow Tokens: From Racist Depictions To Token Minorities, Debra Kates
Yellow Tokens: From Racist Depictions To Token Minorities, Debra Kates
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
The project argues that the misrepresentation of Asians in film is a direct result of white supremacy. It researches the presentation of East Asian Americans in films as a result of the hegemonic ideology of whiteness, focusing on the standard of movie star perfection as a form of white supremacy, and includes films that have white men and women cast in lead roles, even when the story is uniquely Asian. Using the theoretical lens of whiteness studies the project analyzes examples from the American film industry from the past fifteen years.
Who Benefits From Blackness? The White Compulsion For Capital, Akira Milligan
Who Benefits From Blackness? The White Compulsion For Capital, Akira Milligan
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This project will examine the change in representations of blackness and black character in commercially successful hip hop music through music videos directed by Hype Williams from 1995 to 2005. This research will use a womanist approach to address the significant historical influence of storytelling in the black narrative and how the emerging concepts of hypermasculinity and the degradation of the black body have seemingly become the new normal. These concepts largely contribute to the negative stereotypical perceptions of black identity that keeps black bodies marginalized because there is little diversity in the public representations of blackness while there exists …
Where The Ladies At? Examining The Visibility Of Black Women In Hip Hop An How It Reflects A Larger Understanding Of Black Womanhood, Danielle Wallace
Where The Ladies At? Examining The Visibility Of Black Women In Hip Hop An How It Reflects A Larger Understanding Of Black Womanhood, Danielle Wallace
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
No abstract provided.
My Black Is Radical And Sensual: White Privilege And The Policing Of Black Women’S Body On Instagram, Alexis M. Franklin
My Black Is Radical And Sensual: White Privilege And The Policing Of Black Women’S Body On Instagram, Alexis M. Franklin
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This project argues that the overarching idea of white supremacy as well as Black pleasure politics disportionately alienates Black women from having the same freedom online as white women. In particular, this project analyzes the public commentary on two parallel sets of Instagram images, one of Beyonce and another of Kim Kardashian, as well as those of white women using the slutwalk hashtag and images of Black women who do not use the hashtag.
Paradoxes Of Violence: A Post-Colonial 'Gaze' On Chicago's Segregation, Zackary Rupp
Paradoxes Of Violence: A Post-Colonial 'Gaze' On Chicago's Segregation, Zackary Rupp
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Although post-colonial theory was developed to examine the legacy of colonial powers, this project proposes that post-colonial theory can nonetheless fruitfully be used for a literary analysis of the Fair Housing Act to account for the typically non-colonial legacy of US segregation. Even though Chicago is not a city in the colonial context, the post-colonial discourse of violence, territorialization, and citizenship are useful tools for understanding the language in legislation that shaped American systemic segregation. Through a post-colonial lens, the research shifts the individual attention away from the marginalized offender and focuses on systemic othering that has shaped spaces suffering …
Apocalypse & Affect: Political Passivity In Film And Television Representations Of Nuclear Holocaust, W W. Rooks
Apocalypse & Affect: Political Passivity In Film And Television Representations Of Nuclear Holocaust, W W. Rooks
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Within the expanding canon of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic film and television, this project studies the subgenre that makes use of nuclear holocaust as a narrative device or setting in order to understand how, rather than engaging audiences with the dire off-screen politics that inform such films, it imposes a sense of political passivity on its characters. Similarly imparted is an assumption of that same sense for the audience. In this way, the framing of modern apocalyptic narratives meet an “affective limitation,” which is a concept steeped in the examination of media as a potential tool to motivate political action (Massumi …
Patriarchy, Empire, And Ping Pong Shows: The Political Economy Of Sex Tourism In Thailand, Kristen Kelley
Patriarchy, Empire, And Ping Pong Shows: The Political Economy Of Sex Tourism In Thailand, Kristen Kelley
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This project provides a postcolonial feminist analysis of the prosperity and reputation of the sex tourism industry in Thailand. It examines the ways in which Western imperialism created the space for the globalization of sex work, as well as providing a postcolonial analysis of the hegemonic structures which have existed throughout Thailand's history that enable the sex tourism industry to thrive today. This project also explores how policy making and enforcement in Thailand affects the sex tourism industry, as well as the ways in which activism works to change or support these policies, and how this affects individuals who are …
Ruin Porn And Urban Representation In Photography: The Aesthetic And Politics Of Appropriation In "The Ruins Of Detroit", Elyse Remenapp
Ruin Porn And Urban Representation In Photography: The Aesthetic And Politics Of Appropriation In "The Ruins Of Detroit", Elyse Remenapp
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This project examines the politics of representation in The Ruins of Detroit, a book of photography by Yves Marchand and Romaine Meffre in order to understand Detroit as a privileged site of ruins photography, critically referred to as ruin porn. Examining the book as a representation of Detroit's decay reveals an implicit power dynamic which neglects Detroit's complex history and the lived experience of its residents. Paying particular attention to the dialectic of race and labor under capitalism, this project traces the urban history of Detroit in order to contextualize and reframe the state of ruin presented in the …
Whovians And Directioners: Challenging The Fangirl Identity, Brianna Vancant
Whovians And Directioners: Challenging The Fangirl Identity, Brianna Vancant
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
Using notions from fan blogs and fan theory, this project analyzes the inconsistencies surrounding the phenomenon of so-called fangirls in the Doctor Who and One Direction worlds. The term fangirl is usually defined as an irrational adolescent female who is only a fan of very specific types of entertainment because of factors that are perceived by other fans as superficial and irrelevant. In contemporary music and television fandom, these fangirls are often criticized and policed by other fans, many times disregarded as not ‘true’ fans. The project studies this distorted perception and how it leads to misconceptions about the wider …
A Divine Inequality: Contextualizing Gender And Authority In Contemporary Mormon Feminism, Taylee Robinson Pardi
A Divine Inequality: Contextualizing Gender And Authority In Contemporary Mormon Feminism, Taylee Robinson Pardi
Cultural Studies Capstone Papers
This project traces the decline of authority for Mormon women coupled with the rise of defined gender roles within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in order to contextualize contemporary Mormon feminism. Using a radical feminist analysis, this project will explore how contemporary Mormon women relate to their early Mormon sisters and the ways in which the culture and doctrine of Mormonism often converge, lending itself to a unique feminist perspective. This project argues that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, as currently practiced, is not just inherently patriarchal, but un-egalitarian, and that contemporary …