Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Colonial Contacts And Individual Burials: Structure, Agency, And Identity In 19th Century Wisconsin, Sarah Elizabeth Smith

Theses and Dissertations

Individual burials are always representative of both individuals and collective actors. The physical remains, material culture, and represented practices in burials can be used in concert to study identities and social personas amongst individual and collective actors. These identities and social personas are the result of the interaction between agency and structure, where both individuals and groups act to change and reproduce social structures.

The three burials upon which this study is based are currently held in the collections of the Milwaukee Public Museum. They are all indigenous burials created in Wisconsin in the 19th century. Biological sex, stature, age, …

Recommitting To The Car? The Politics Of Multimodal Transportation In Wisconsin, Gregg Nathan Culver

Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation research, I investigate two cases which exemplify a larger politics of multimodal transportation in Wisconsin: the 2010 Wisconsin high-speed rail (HSR) debate; and the 2011 debate over whether to add a bike path to Milwaukee's Hoan Bridge during its redecking. In both case studies, I trace the politics of these projects, and investigate how the decisions not to pursue these projects came to be legitimized. I approach these case studies using a transportation-focused politics of mobility framework, located at the intersection of transportation geography and new mobilities paradigm scholarship. Employing a range of qualitative methods, I find …

The (Rail)Road Not Traveled: The Failure Of The Krm Commuter Rail Proposal In Greater Milwaukee, Wi, Neal A. Johnson

Theses and Dissertations

The Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee commuter rail (KRM) proposal was one of many passenger rail proposals studied for the greater Milwaukee area over the past few decades. The proposed line would have connected the cities of Kenosha, Racine and Milwaukee, as well as communities in northern Illinois, along already existing rail lines. An analysis of archival information, newspaper coverage, and interviews with key stakeholders were conducted to explore the influence of an auto-dominated culture, the role of politics, local and regional expectations, funding issues, and the legacy of earlier local debates to determine why the KRM commuter rail proposal failed. In the beginning, …