Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Speak For Yourself: Examining Subjectivity And Trauma In American Literary Journalism, Nathaniel Poole

Honors College

Due to their relevance and emotional draw for readers, stories of tragedy and suffering are a nearly inescapable aspect of journalism. However, the routine reporting and formulaic styles associated with coverage of these events has contributed to audience compassion fatigue. Studies have been done on the success of some journalists who have historically pushed the boundaries of style and deployed literary strategies to elicit emotion and subvert compassion fatigue in their reporting. However, there is more room in the scholarship on this subject for studies of the specific strategies that contemporary literary journalism writers use and how they adapt them …

“Things Are Going To Get A Lot Worse Before They Get Worse”: Humor In The Face Of Disaster, Politics, And Pain, Sierra Semmel

Honors College

From the Holocaust and slavery victims to medical professionals to firefighters, coping humor has been used throughout history even in the darkest of times. While it is common among victims of unfavorable situations, it is also utilized by late-night television shows to package the news of the day in a format that both addresses the issues and eases the emotions surrounding them. This thesis critically analyzes selected clips from late night shows and sketch comedy surrounding three different news events: Brett Kavanaugh’s Senate Confirmation Hearings, the Boston Marathon bombing, and Hurricane Sandy. By studying a political event, a domestic terrorist …

Women’S Mental Health In The 19th Century: An Analysis Of Sociocultural Factors Contributing To Oppression Of Women As Communicated By Influential Female Authors Of The Time, Jamie Lovley

Honors College

The purpose of this thesis was to investigate the impact of sociocultural factors of 19th century domestic gender roles, as they affected women’s mental health specifically in the area of depressive disorders. Using modern psychological research on gender-influenced proclivity toward depression as a lens through which to understand 19th century mental health diagnoses, this thesis investigates how these gender-biased diagnoses and treatments compounded the mental health struggles women faced. This thesis employed the use of literary review to examine the lives of women as expressed by female authors during the 19th century through their writing, information about their lives as …

Declining Journalistic Freedom In Turkey, Aliya Uteuova

Honors College

Currently, Turkey is the country with the most jailed journalists. According to the Journalists Union of Turkey, 145 journalists and media workers are in prison as of February 2018. In the decades that press freedom was monitored in Turkey, the suppression of press and violations of the free expression rights under the regime of Recep Tayyip Erdogan is unprecedented. Turkey once had a potential of emerging as the first modern democracy in a Muslim majority nation. However, if Turkey's current state is not soon reversed, the country will be left with with a media landscape where the voices of pro-government …

Dropping The Gloves: Fighting For Varsity Status Under Title Ix— The Rise Of Women’S Ice Hockey At The University Of Maine, Emily K. Mcnair

Honors College

Ice hockey at the University of Maine is a culture, of sorts. The university has a long tradition of supporting and growing a large fan base around its Division 1 varsity men’s ice hockey team. On the opposite end of that, the university’s female counterpart, the varsity women’s ice hockey team appears to get lost in the fray when discussing the hockey culture at the school. The purpose of this thesis is to tell the story of UMaine’s women’s ice hockey team. From the creation of the team as a club in the late 1970s, the organization battled through a …

Extra! Extra! This Just Thin: Identifying And Evaluating Framing Of Obesity-Related News Coverage In Maine, Alan D. Bennett

Honors College

Obesity is an important health issue, and understanding both its origins and its remedies is critical. More than 78 million people in the United States — more than one- third the nation’s population — are obese, making obesity one of the most newsworthy health concerns of the time. The first step in addressing public health issues is to inform the public, for which news media act as the primary source. However, news media overwhelmingly frame obesity reports through a lens of individual responsibility, which blames people for their eating habits while ignoring systemic factors of obesity such as food industry …

Ideologies Of Empire: Perpetuating Imperial Culture Through Definitive British Literature Of The Congo, Shelby Lynne Hartin

Honors College

The Congo reform campaign in Britain was the largest humanitarian movement in British Imperial politics during the late 1800s and early 1900s. The texts used in this analysis emerged from the conflict and attempted to make sense of the atrocities committed against the people of the Congo Free State.

This analysis examines the impact of imperial ideology on the subjects of empire. It uses the texts of three authors, Arthur Conan Doyle, Joseph Conrad, and E.D. Morel, analyzing the literary underpinnings of imperial culture. It utilizes theoretical frameworks through which this literature can be understood and considers three manifestations of …

How Journalism Influenced American Public Opinion During The Vietnam War: A Case Study Of The Battle Of Ap Bac, The Gulf Of Tonkin Incident, The Tet Offensive, And The My Lai Massacre, Kyle Hadyniak

Honors College

The Vietnam War was a hallmark in journalism history. Not only was newspaper reporting placed in a prominent role, both on the front lines and at home, but for the first time television was also utilized to bring the horrors of war into the living room. Vietnam may have been in Southeast Asia, but half the fighting occurred in the United States because journalists in Vietnam brought a different, pragmatic view to the American public than what the government was providing. The latter’s misleading optimism and, in some cases, outright deception soon ignited an anti-war movement previously unseen on American …

Objecting To Objectivity, Elizabeth R. Kevit

Honors College

This study was designed to gauge how hyperlinks are used by four news organizations in order to provide suggestions about using hyperlinks to attain a more transparent style of journalism. The idea for the study grew out of discussion about the shortcomings of the traditional ideal of journalistic objectivity, such as a reliance on “he said/she said” reporting in order to avoid accusations of bias by not giving the sides of an argument equal play in an article. I propose that news organizations can better inform their readers if they eschew the idea of objectivity and, more specifically, the idea …