Communication Commons^™

Veni, Vidi, Wiki: Expertise As Knowledge And A Technocratic Generation, Marc A. Ouellette

English Faculty Publications

This project stems from two intersecting strands. The statement, "I can always find out," neatly summarizes the intersection. Not surprisingly, it has two distinct but simultaneous meanings. The first, in which "always" means "every time," considers the ways in which the ability to find knowledge has become synonymous with expertise and examines the elements that have fostered this situation. In this regard, factors such as the range of software and hardware-from Wikipedia and FAQs to cellphones and Ipods-which anticipate or "think" for the user but also require constant updating are both rationale and outcome for their youthful consumers. When combined …

About The (W)Hoopla: A Few Pedagogical Thoughts About The Super Bowl Ritual, Tim Anderson

Communication & Theatre Arts Faculty Publications

In an era of fragmentation it's the only media program left that has any kind of mass ritual component. Which, of course, is not only why so many debate its contents but why and how we, as scholars, should approach the program.

Wire In The Blood, Crime Drama With A British Flair, Leslie Eliason

OUR Journal: ODU Undergraduate Research Journal

Americans love a good murder – as long as it takes place on television and the perpetrator is apprehended within an hour. Crime dramas are one of the most popular genres of programming available today, a trend that shows no sign of waning. Megan Larson of Media Week wrote in 2004 that eight of the top twenty five shows on network television were crime related. She also noted that the series Law and Order was entering its fifteenth year – quite a feat in the here-today-gone tomorrow world of broadcast television. The most recent Nielsen ratings indicated that seven of …

Remember The Titans, Historical Fact Or Fiction?, Amy S. Tate

OUR Journal: ODU Undergraduate Research Journal

In the late 1990s, screen writer Gregory A. Howard wrote a screen play called Remember the Titans, based on the true story of T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria, Virginia. Jerry Bruckheimer and Walt Disney Pictures bought the script based on the fact that it is a true story, but much of the film‟s content is fictional. Gregory Howard admitted to ESPN writer Jeff Merron that “he made some big assumptions when writing his script” (qtd. in Merron 5). Though the film is not entirely historically accurate, it is successful because it appeals to Americans through its intense emotional …

John Cleave's Weekly Police Gazette (1834-6), Francis Place, And The Pragmatics Of The Unstamped Press, Edward Jacobs

English Faculty Publications

John Cleave (c.1790-c.1847) was the editor and publisher of, among other works, Cleaves Weekly Police Gazette (1834-6; hereafter WPG), which was by most accounts the best-selling unstamped newspaper of the so-called "War of the Unstamped Press" in the 1830s, one of the first unstamped papers to adopt a broadsheet format like stamped papers, and one of the first to mix political news with coverage of non-political events like sensational crimes and strange occurrences. As Joel Wiener and Patricia Hollis note, less is known about Cleave than about most of the other major figures in the unstamped movement, like William Carpenter, …

Commodifying Scarcity: Society, Struggle, And Spectacle In World Of Warcraft, Kevin Moberly

English Faculty Publications

Overrun by monsters and tyrants, and ravaged by fanaticism, excess, and greed, World of Warcraft offers players a chance to struggle metaphorically against that which oppresses them: the excesses of late capitalism as they are represented by the game’s spectacular antagonisms. In order to take advantage of this opportunity, however, players must employ the very thing through which their oppression is manifested. Interpellated into the game as fetishized images, players must construct themselves and function in accordance with the limitations imposed upon them by the race and class of their characters. Players, as such, are incorporated into World of Warcraft’s …

Removing The Checks And Balances That Hamper Democracy: Play And The Counter-Hegemonic Contradictions Of Grand Theft Auto Iv, Marc A. Ouellette

English Faculty Publications

Grand Theft Auto IV provides an unparalleled opportunity to consider the outcomes when textual play and game play not only intersect, but operate in concert. Indeed, the two are inextricably linked to each other and to the social commentary which contributes to the game's story, humor, and thematic unity. This article considers the modes of textual play in Grand Theft Auto IV, as well as the locations and situations when players encounter them while playing the game. It also explores the subversive of potential of textual play as it relies on and departs from game play, and attempts to …

The Role Of Guanxi Network In The Corruption-Efficiency Relationship, Shaomin Li

Management Faculty Publications

Why do some countries like China thrive economically despite of corruption? The effect of corruption on economic efficiency is moderated by whether a society has an extensive informal social network such as the guanxi network in China. In societies with a thick, extensive informal social network, bribery- corruption relationship can be easily established and the risk of being reported is low. This relation-based trust makes the dissemination of corruption goods--the sale of government goods for private gains--more market-based. The competition among potential bribers increases the efficiency of corruption (or making corruption less wasteful). In societies that lack such strong informal …

The Administration Of Community College Blogs: Considering Control And Adaptability In Loosely Coupled Systems, Troy A. Swanson

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study using a multiple case study method is (1) to further the understanding of how community college administrators and blog authors strike a balance between organizational control and adaptability when implementing and using blog technologies and (2) to create a model that will help administrators better strike this balance within a loosely coupled system of college units and individuals. The rise of Web 2.0 technologies, which allows for direct publication to the Internet, presents two conundrums for community colleges: the conundrum of control and the conundrum of adaptability. As the oldest implementation of Web 2.0 technologies, …

The Impact Of Task Conflict On Virtual Team Performance And Cohesiveness, Wilawan Onkman, Anil Ustun, Pilar Pazos, Ana Maria Canto

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

This paper examined the impact of task conflict on team performance and cohesiveness. Twelve virtual teams participated in two sessions with two difficulty levels. Each task consisted of a survival simulation. Teams communicated using a text-based communication media (chat). A mixed methods approach combining both quantitative and qualitative data was used. Performance was measured using expert ratings, and cohesiveness was measured using a modified version of Seashore's Cohesiveness Index. Content analysis was utilized to evaluate the level of task conflict on the team. This study provides some initial evidence on the effects task conflict on virtual team performance.

Investigating Connections: Pornography And Violence Against Women, Stacy Gorman

Sociology & Criminal Justice Theses & Dissertations

This thesis is a content analysis of internet pornography websites. Using the most popularly searched adult search terms, Google searches were performed in order to replicate the pornographic website search of an internet pornography user. Videos were then selected and viewed on each site in order to identify themes of domination, exploitation, reciprocity, and autoeroticism. Also coded for were each sex act performed in the video as well as the number of performers, their race and sex. Key words describing each video were recorded in addition to user comments about the videos when available.

The goal of this study was …

Media Exposure And Women's Fear Of Crime, Pamela C. Hooper

Sociology & Criminal Justice Theses & Dissertations

This study examines the relationship between the media portrayal of women and crime on television and fear of crime among female viewers. Data from the National Opinion Survey of Crime and Justice was used. A weak relationship between media exposure and fear of crime was found. Consistent with previous research, a statistically significant gender difference was revealed. Women reported higher levels of fear overall. When television dramas were examined, women who watched these shows had a lower reported fear of crime. An unexpected inverse relationship emerged between women's age and fear of crime. This finding contradicts a majority of the …

The Impact Of Communication Medium On Team Performance Patterns, Pilar Pazos, Mario G. Beruvides

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

The increased impact of globalization and rapidly changing technologies are some of the biggest challenges facing 21st century organizations. Remote teams supported through computer-based systems have been identified as a key lever to help organizations adapt to this turbulent environment. This study sheds some light on how teams perform and adapt by evaluating performance and synergy over time for teams in two different settings: computer supported and face-to-face. Participants in the study were randomly assigned either to a computer-supported or a face-to face group. Each group met over three sessions to perform a series of tasks that were evaluated using …

Exploring Prayer Contexts And Health Outcomes: From The Chair To The Pew, E. James Baesler, Kevin Ladd

Communication & Theatre Arts Faculty Publications

Prayer in personal, interpersonal, small, and large group contexts is described in relationship to physical, psychological, and spiritual health. A sample of college and middle-aged adults (N = 189) completed cross-sectional surveys. Quantitative analyses revealed that prayer in all contexts predicted higher levels of spiritual health, and that the strongest prayer predictors of health were: large group prayer for mental health, and private and large group prayer for spiritual health. Qualitative results revealed that prayers for physical health in close personal relationships, and table blessing prayers among family members, were two of the most common types of prayer. Suggestions for …

Better Living Through Reality Tv: Television And Post-Welfare Citizenship [Book Review], Marc A. Ouellette

English Faculty Publications

The very first thing I can say about Better Living Through Reality TV: Television and Post-Welfare Citizenship is that I cannot wait for the authors to consider adding a Canadian version – more on that later – since they include British reality shows. Admittedly, many of these last shows have been successful enough to lead to Americanized versions. In considering reality television, the Laurie Ouellette (no known relation) and James Hay seem to sacrifice one of the oldest, and currently largely underexamined as such, varieties of the reality television, the game show. This is not to say that "new" game …

The Pursuit Of An Unstamped Newspaper: Interactions Between Prosecution And The Evolving Form, Politics, And Business Practices Of John Cleave's Weekly Police Gazette (1834-36), Edward Jacobs

English Faculty Publications

John Cleave's Weekly Police Gazette (1834-36) [hereafter cited as WPG] was by most accounts the best-selling unstamped newspaper of the so-called 'War of the Unstamped Press' in the 1830s, one of the first unstamped papers to adopt a broadsheet format similar to those of the stamped newspapers, and one of the first to mix political news with coverage of non-political events, such as sensational crimes and strange occurrences.² Perhaps because WPG's circulation reached around 40,000-well beyond that of most other newspapers of the 1830s, whether stamped or unstamped - it was also the most frequently prosecuted of the unstamped …

“I Hope You Never See Another Day Like This”: Pedagogy & Allegory In “Post 9/11” Video Games, Marc A. Ouellette

English Faculty Publications

Although critics and scholars have considered the extent to which the terror attacks of 11 Sept. 2001 influenced subsequent media productions, video games comprise a largely unexamined form. This oversight also applies to related forms of media production and among those who study video games is in part attributable to the ongoing debate regarding the relationship(s) between narrative and play. Even so, as early as 1997, JC Herz was investigating the role of video games in the military-entertainment complex. That said, the focus of this paper will not be the obvious games which draw settings and plots directly from the …

Martin Luther: Perceptions Of The Reformer In Popular Culture And Historical Scholarship, Kathryn R. Cross

History Theses & Dissertations

Martin Luther's remarkable life, his impressive body of written work, his dynamic and charismatic personality, and his impact on the world have long been a source of interest in the world of academia and of popular culture. This thesis examines the affect of the scholarly historical research of the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries regarding Luther and its affect on perception of the reformer in popular culture as presented by the media.

The opening section of the thesis presents an examination and evaluation of Lutheran scholarship and how historical trends have affected the reformer's image in the academic world. Documents …

A Social Relational Model For Firm-Hosted Virtual Communities: The Role Of Firm Support, Tung Duy Cu

Theses and Dissertations in Business Administration

Since the ease of participation and the usefulness of information provided by online groups continue to proliferate in the World Wide Web, people increasingly participate in different forms of virtual community (i.e. online forums, bulletin boards, message boards, chat rooms) for their purposes, such as solving problems, building social relationships, sharing passions, developing professionals.

Accordingly, an increasing number of companies are now attempting to exploit this phenomenon by hosting and supporting their own online community for commercial and non-commercial purposes, such as building relationships with their customers, getting their feedback, strengthening the brand, and reducing customer service costs by enabling …

Chavs, Neds, Neets And Yobs: The Anti-Social Underclass Of The United Kingdom, Alexander Michael Marra

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

This work is the result of the first look by an American into anti-social and yobbish behavior in the UK, and who's responsible for it. The delinquent subculture whose members are alternately either known as chavs or neds will be analyzed in detail. In addition, the NEET, the British government's designation for those who are not in employment, education, or training, will also be analyzed for the roots and reasons behind what may come to be known as the NEET generation in the UK in the years to come. For now they are sometimes called the ASBO generation because of …

Art Therapy With Native American Cancer Survivors: An Observation Of Nonverbal Communication Styles, Kathryn Dengler

EVMS School of Health Professions Theses & Dissertations

There is a high morbidity rate among Native American women with breast cancer. Research suggests that traditional beliefs in addition to miscommunication within the healthcare setting may affect the treatment Natives receive. This study observed the nonverbal communication patterns of ten Native American cancer survivors participating in an art psychoeducational workshop. Mapping techniques and situational analysis were used to observe nonverbal communication patterns during the workshop. It was hypothesized that Native Americans would use nonverbal cues more readily than verbal communication.

The results of the study supported the hypothesis. Nonverbal cues were the primary means of communication throughout the workshop. …

The Simpsons: A Reflection Of Violence, Theodore S. Huptich

Sociology & Criminal Justice Theses & Dissertations

Violence in the media has always been a concern to many people. There have been numerous studies that have reviewed the effect that violent television programming has had on the people that have viewed; most of these studies have shown an increase in aggression in the people that viewed the violent programming. However, there have been very few, if any, studies that have examined the amount and type of violence that exists in television programs. This study uses the television program "The Simpsons", due to its popularity and longevity, to examine the amount and type of violence that exists. This …

Exploring Interdisciplinary Prayer Research In A Health Context, E. James Baesler

Communication & Theatre Arts Faculty Publications

Communication, Psychology, and Sociology are three leading academic disciplines engaged in the social scientific study of prayer, the spiritual communication between a believer(s) and God, but rarely do these disciplines collaborate in interdisciplinary prayer scholarship. Possibilities for interdisciplinary prayer research in a health context are explored through a review of the literature and academic interviews. Interdisciplinary linkages in the prayer-health context are organized in an integral "all-quadrant" theoretical model, and an assessment of the viability of interdisciplinary prayer-health research is considered.

Blogging About Feminist Lnterdisciplinarity In The Study Of Communication, Language, And Gender, Cynthia Berryman-Fink, Janet Bing, Deborah Cameron, Amy Sheldon, Anita Taylor

English Faculty Publications

This article provides information about several blog posts discussed during a round-table discussion on feminist interdisciplinary studies in relation to communication, language, and gender. Topics under discussion include the nature of interdisciplinarity and its relevance to feminist studies, intercultural communication, and the study and teaching of gender in women's studies programs in higher education.

The Politicization Of Everyday Life In Cleave's Weekly Police Gazette (1834-36), Edward Jacobs

English Faculty Publications

With circulation as high as 40,000, Cleave's Weekly Police Gazette, published 1834–36, was one of the first and most popular unstamped newspapers to mix political news with coverage of non-political events like sensational crimes, strange occurrences, and excerpts from popular fiction. Scholars have differed widely in their interpretations of the fact that the paper's mixture of radical politics and "entertainment" outsold unstamped papers that offered undiluted political news, such as Hetherington's Poor Man's Guardian (1831–35), whose circulation peaked at around 16,000. Some, like Louis James and Virginia Berridge, argue that Cleave's helped to co-opt legitimate working-class political discourse by …

Revolutionary Industry And Digital Colonialism, Dylan E. Wittkower

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Copyright-based industries have become revolutionary. That is, the machinery of production of digital wares has itself taken on the role of the revolutionary class within the political economy of digital production. The progress of capitalist production in this industry has undermined the conditions of its own possibility, not because it has driven the proletariat to rise against an oppressive system, but because the means of production, through digital media, have simultaneously made communist production possible, and the continued separation of the means of production from the laborer impracticable.

Differences In The Performance Of Knowledge Transfer Across Projects: A Study Of Gender And Role Of Key Project Stakeholders, Rafael E. Landaeta, Catherine Vergopia, Rey N. Diaz

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

This investigation contributes empirical results of differences identified in key project stakeholders with respect to their use of knowledge transferred across projects. Gender and role were the two individual characteristics investigated. Project managers and members of project teams were the key stakeholders analyzed. Data was collected from 71 closed projects using a survey composed of closed-ended questions. The data collected was cross tabulated and statistically analyzed using Friedman's test and Spearman's correlation. The results provide evidence of the association of the performance of knowledge transfer across projects with (a) the individual factors of gender and role of key project stakeholders …

The Jazz Critic As Flâneur, Peter Schulman

World Languages and Cultures Faculty Publications

“I love to watch you play,” a reporter once said to Duke Ellington during a television interview. As Ellington gracefully moved up and down the keyboard, he replied, grinning wistfully, “Playing? I’m not playing . . . I’m dreaming!”1 For the poet Jacques Réda, whose most famous works such as Les ruines de Paris (1977) and Amen (1988) chronicle his experiences as a modern flâneur in a Paris which is sometimes overtaken by what Marc Augé has labeled surmodernité,2 or an anaesthetizing over-abundance of technology and empty modern spaces, Réda has also led another life as a jazz critic, …

Female Sport Role Models: A Content Analysis Of Espn.Com, Michelle Lou Redmond

Human Movement Studies & Special Education Theses & Dissertations

Opportunities for girls to participate in sports are growing by the minute. However, adolescent girls are dropping out from participating in athletics with many possible explanations. One explanation is the limited and sometimes controversial media attention female athletes receive. How are girls to know there is a sporting world out there for them if they are unable to see positive female athletic role models to emulate?

This study investigated ESPN.com to discover the trends of college basketball reporting during the 2007 NCAA Men's and Women's basketball tournaments. A content analysis was performed on ESPN .com to see if the media …

Channel Management In Heterogeneous Cellular Networks, Mohammad Hadi Arbabi

Computer Science Theses & Dissertations

Motivated by the need to increase system capacity in the face of tight FCC regulations, modem cellular systems are under constant pressure to increase the sharing of the frequency spectrum among the users of the network.

Key to increasing system capacity is an efficient channel management strategy that provides higher capacity for the system while, at the same time, providing the users with Quality of Service guarantees. Not surprisingly, dynamic channel management has become a high profile topic in wireless communications. Consider a highly populated urban area, where mobile traffic loads are increased due to highway backups or sporting events. …