Critical and Cultural Studies Commons^™

“It’S About The Two Selves”: Experiences In Code-Switching Between Home And Academic Environments, Travis Wolven

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative research study is an exploration of how college students navigate code-switching between their home and academic environments. Data were collected from five participants using interview and small group methods. Through the lenses of Coordinated Management of Meaning (CMM) and Memorable Messages (MM) frameworks, the researcher explores how key MMs affect how participants coordinate and manage meaning in communications with others in their home and college environments. Findings were fourfold: 1) participants chose between following established and creating new rules when code-switching; 2) participants shared experiences and strategies regarding knowing when and how to code-switch; 3) preparing audiences for …

Refining The Eden Community’S Pathways For Shaping Regenerative Christian Culture In The Apprenticeship For Regenerative Culture, Laura Callarman

Doctor of Ministry Theses

This Doctor of Ministry thesis presents a project designed to meet a need of the Eden Community, an intentional Christian community, regarding the pathways it uses to shape regenerative Christian culture among college students in its apprenticeship program, ARC. In this thesis, I connect the pragmatic aims of the Eden Community to theological foundations regarding the importance of ecclesial diversity and creative contextualization, features that empower the church to embody a variety of life-giving “alternative stories” with the capacity to present the gospel as truly good news to the entire world.

In this project, a team of nine stakeholders met …

An Inclusive Framework For Ministry: Fostering The Spiritual Formation Of Children In A Multicultural Church, Jennifer Reinsch Schroeder

Doctor of Ministry Theses

This project thesis was designed to foster the spiritual formation of children in a multicultural church. A diverse team was assembled to design a curriculum to be used with volunteers in a children’s ministry context. Through seven two-hour sessions held over eight weeks in the spring of 2022, the curriculum development team first examined what it means to embody a multicultural perspective of the gospel while at the same time investigating the negative impact of a White, Eurocentric expression of Christianity. Next, they collaborated to develop a theological construct that centered around (1) the idea of being created in the …

Strangers Switching Their Identities: Cultural Identity Management And Performance On Social Media A Qualitative Analysis Of International Students’ Intercultural (Ex)Change Processes And Perceptions Regarding Their Stay In The United States And Countries Of Origin, Vivian Kretzschmar

All Theses

In this globalized world, cross-country travel for education has been a prevalent (5.6 million students identified as international students in 2020) and ever-increasing (with a predicted increase of 250% by 2030) trend through the past decades. The sojourn impacts the students’ experience of the new culture and the ensuing shocks and adaptations. The understanding of something as complicated as culture, trying to be integrated into a new culture, and its perception to individuals, of course, have their ways of distinct communication trends through social media.

The struggle of maintaining and changing one’s cultural identity and adaptation across cultures has been …

Amjambo Africa! (December 2022), Kathreen Harrison

Amjambo Africa!

In this Issue

Amjambo Arts ..........................2

Holiday Greetings .................... 3

Education .................................. 4

Domestic Violence ...................5

Editorial .....................................6

Tips & Info ................................7

World Market Basket ...............8

Chance to Advance ..................9

Updates from Africa ..............10

Refugee Camp in Uganda .....11

All about the Workforce ........12

Legislative Update .............13-15

In 7 languages

Election Season..................16-17

Health & Wellness........18-23,25

In 7 languages

Financial Literacy/Cars .........24

Service Org. columns....... 26-27

Ukraine/New Voices ..............28

COCOMaine: New Leader ....29

Black Female Athletes’ Use Of Social Media For Activism: An Intersectional And Cyberfeminist Analysis Of U.S. Hammer-Thrower, Gwen Berry's 2019 And 2021 Podium Protests, Ariel Newell

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Much attention has been paid to Black male athlete activism both historically and in the contemporary movement for black lives. Black female athletes have also made historic contributions as activists, and they continue to do so. However, Black female athlete activism has not always been acknowledged or heard. This is a problem, as Black women in American sports and society face overlapping racial and gender inequities and injustices that distinctly marginalize and oppress them. However, some Black female athlete activists (BFAAs) have begun using social media to challenge media narratives about themselves, to redefine what it means to be a …

Everything’S Gonna Be Kinda Queer: Autistic Gender & Sexuality In Everything’S Gonna Be Okay, Jinx Mylo

Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture

This paper analyzes the representations of autistic characters in the television show Everything’s Gonna Be Okay in relation to gender and sexuality. In contrast to previous screen representations, the four autistic characters provide a variety of gender expressions and sexual orientations, challenging the stereotypes that perpetuate the idea of autism being limited to heterosexual men. Issues explored include attitudes toward autistic sexual consent and agency, sexual experimentation, and the impacts of communication norms on romantic relationships.

S7e8: What Is The Legacy And Future Of The Climate Change Institute?, Ron Lisnet, Paul A. Mayewski, Daniel Sandweiss, Cynthia Isenhour

The Maine Question

The nation’s first multi- and inter-disciplinary research institute to study Earth’s recent and long-term climate variability was founded in 1972 at the University of Maine. That institute, now known as the Climate Change Institute, is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, a milestone that honors the many groundbreaking discoveries its scientists have made in the field of climate science.

CCI have scientists first mapped the difference between climate during the Ice Age and today in the 1970s; discovered the importance of marine-based ice sheets in the 1980s; connected acid rain to human causes in the mid-1980s; uncovered the concept of …

“I Live A Model Life, Now I’M Ready To Be A Top Wife”: Stereotypical Representations Of Black Women In Reality Television, Joy C. Enyinnaya

Wagadu: A Journal of Transnational Women's & Gender Studies

Stereotypical representations of Black women have endured throughout various forms of media for decades, with one of the most recent platforms being reality television programming. The theory of encoding and decoding posit dominant stereotypes are key in television encoding. Using critical discourse analysis, this paper demonstrates that the dominant ideologies in the eleventh season of The Real Housewives of Atlanta are social class norms and negative depictions of Black women. I present evidence that RHOA continues to reinforce upper-class ideologies while perpetuating the Jezebel, Sapphire and the Strong Black woman stereotypes. I also identify a correlation with the strong Black …

Congregational Music As Phatic Communication: Affect, Atmosphere, And Relational Ways Of Listening And Being, Anna E. Nekola

Yale Journal of Music & Religion

Much of the scholarship of congregational music focuses on participatory music in organized corporate worship. This article draws on theories of communication and affect to examine the secondary, background music that happens alongside other events in a worship service or in places other than the space of the sanctuary. Instead of understanding affects as an individual emotion, this article argues that music is made meaningful through a socio-cultural and relational affective process. This in turn enables one to understand how musics, particularly secondary non-participatory musics, work beyond language and representation in phatic ways that can engender powerful feelings of human …

The Intrepid One: Fascism & The Death Of Antonio Ascari, Paul Baxa

Journal of Motorsport Culture & History

No abstract provided.

S7e7: How Can Business Savvy Help Maine Farmers Succeed?, Ron Lisnet, Erin Percival Carter

The Maine Question

Like opening any business, starting and operating a farm can be challenging without any in-depth entrepreneurial knowledge or skills. To help strengthen support for farmers’ business skills, University of Maine faculty members Erin Percival Carter and Stephanie Welcomer established the Business, Agriculture, and Rural Development (BARD) technical assistance training program in the Maine Business School.

The BARD program trains UMaine students to serve as consultants for farmers and operators of other small-scale and sustainable agricultural businesses. These students can assist agribusinesses with various aspects of commerce, such as data-management, price-setting, marketing, financial and strategic forecasting, market segmentation, product development, market …

Amjambo Africa! (November 2022), Kathreen Harrison

Amjambo Africa!

In this Issue

Nigerian Community .............. 2

Amjambo Arts.......................... 3

Moonglade .............................4-5

Education ..................................6

Publisher’s editorial ..................7

Financial literacy ..........8-13, 19

In 7 languages

World Market Basket ......14-15

Election special .................16-17

All about the Workforce ........18

Community Happenings ...... 20

News from Africa. .............22-23

Health&Wellness. ..............24-31

Topic: Loneliness

In 7 languages

Community columns .......32-33

New Voices ........................34-35

Tips & Info ........................36-37

Afghan Adjustment Act ........ 38

The Comedy Of Cancel Culture In A Post-Carlin United States: On The Politics Of Cultural Interpretation, Bryant W. Sculos

Class, Race and Corporate Power

Taking the form of a critical review of the HBO documentary George Carlin's American Dream, this essay explores the character of George Carlin's political and cultural criticism, its implications for contemporary debates about so-called "cancel culture," and the broader political significance of cultural interpretation.

S7e6: What Is Living On A College Campus Like In 2022?, Ron Lisnet, Benjamin Evans, Lauri Sidelki

The Maine Question

There are about 3,500 students living on the University of Maine campus, many of whom have spent much of their high school or early college years learning remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, the transition to in-person learning and socializing has been daunting to some first-year and returning students.

In recent years, the Division of Student Life has retooled and doubled down on their services to help students adjust to college life during the pandemic and preserve a sense of community on campus. According to the division, participation in on-campus activities has significantly increased this fall compared …

S7e5: How Can Studying The Humanities Benefit Society?, Ron Lisnet, Beth Wiemann

The Maine Question

For 10 years, the McGillicuddy Humanities Center has bolstered student and faculty creative works and research in history, geography, language, social sciences and the arts. It funds and supports fellowships, lectures, symposia, panels, performances and exhibitions.

In this week’s episode of “The Maine Question,” Center director Beth Wiemann, discusses her team’s work and the benefits humanities scholarship provides to society.

Emerald Fennell's Promising Young Woman (2020): A Psychoanalytic Review Of Masculinity And Rape Culture, Marjorie A. Briones

Access*: Interdisciplinary Journal of Student Research and Scholarship

TW: mentions of sexual violence and rape

When it comes to the subject of sexual violence, there are systemic and cultural effects that prevents assaulters from being properly prosecuted. In the U.S., perpetrators of sexual violence largely consists of heterosexual, white men (RAINN, 2022). So, we begin to question the ways in which sexual violence and masculinity are interconnected. By conducting a psychoanalytic analysis of Emerald Fennell’s 2020 film Promising Young Woman, the ideas of toxic masculinity and “rape culture” will be deconstructed in regard to Cassie’s–the protagonist–story. Theories by Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung will be connected to real-life …

Journal Of Communication Pedagogy, Complete Volume 6, 2022

Journal of Communication Pedagogy

No abstract provided.

Countering The Service-Learning Privilege Problem Through Critical Communication Pedagogy And Critical Assessment, David H. Kahl Jr., Ahmet Atay, Najla G. Amundson

Journal of Communication Pedagogy

Because the communication discipline values action, civility, and service, it has placed emphasis on the integration of service-learning in its courses. Service-learning has the potential to bridge the gap between the classroom and the community by employing social justice pedagogy–activism that takes critical learning to sites of hegemony. However, service-learning can also promote the unintended side effect of entrenching beliefs about privilege. Therefore, we advocate for a critical service-learning to be facilitated through a critical communication pedagogy (CCP) framework, which emphasizes the recognition and response to hegemony that students encounter. Such an approach employs critical assessment, a means by which …

Pursuing Inclusion And Justice While Affirming The Mental Health Of Marginalized Students, Tyshee E. Sonnier, Claire J. Stevenson, Joshua H. Miller

Journal of Communication Pedagogy

This article provides best practices that instructors can use to affirm and support marginalized students’ mental health with a specific focus on students of color. Recently, campuses have witnessed renewed calls for diversity and inclusion in the wake of anti-Black violence. Advocates have called for needed structural changes. To build upon these calls for change, this article provides instructors with tools they can use in the interim to navigate questions of diversity, inclusion, and justice in the classroom. The essay centers the mental health needs of students from marginalized populations to hedge against the possibility that efforts to foster inclusion, …

Sounds About White: Critiquing The Nca Standards For Public Speaking Competency, Adam Key

Journal of Communication Pedagogy

Using critical discourse analysis, I critically examined the National Communication Association’s (NCA) standards for public speaking competency to determine what type of ideal speaker the standards would produce. Highlighting NCA’s emphasis on “suitable” and “appropriate” forms of communication and the use of Standard American English, I argue that the ideal competent speaker in our classrooms sounds White. I complete the essay by reimagining the basic course using methods of Africana Study to explore ways that the standards for public speaking might be decolonized and made more inclusive to students of all backgrounds.

Reinventing Child Labour: A Contemporary Analysis Of Children's Participation In The Digital Labour Economy, Bayan Kojok

Major Papers

This major research paper explores the historical shifts in labour and childhood, highlighting children’s ongoing implication in the capitalist market. My focus is influencer marketing, the newest form of digital work. The onset of social media and the introduction of the “influencer” is a cultural and political-economic shift that has expanded the definition of labour, whether this form of labour is widely recognized or not. The Instamom has emerged from this redefinition of labour; these individuals have curated influencer status by advertising their life as a mom on social media, particularly Instagram. This becomes problematic as children are inherently involved …

Full Issue, Winthrop Mcnair Research Bulletin

The Winthrop McNair Research Bulletin

Winthrop McNair Research Bulletin Volume 5, Full Issue

Familial And Community Influences On The Sports Socialization Of Black Boys: A Case Study, Timothy Smith

The Winthrop McNair Research Bulletin

From an early age, many children are engaged in or connected to various sporting activities. In a recent study, the Aspen Institute (2018) reported that 61.1% of males between the ages of six and 12 had played a team sport at least one day in 2016. Statistical data on racial differences and child involvement in sport activities is sparse. However, while the research on Black sports socialization is limited, Stodolska, Shinew, Floyd, and Walker (2014) were able to link Black sport involvement to cultural and gendered forms of socialization, which is often perpetuated through interpersonal relationships and interactions. Despite the …

S7e4: How Can We Eliminate Pfas?, Ron Lisnet, Onur Apul

The Maine Question

In recent years, communities across Maine and the U.S. have discovered the presence of toxic chemicals called per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, in their land and water. Also known as forever chemicals because they are difficult to destroy, PFAS have been incorporated in various products, including food containers, clothing, rugs, teflon pans, fabrics and dental floss, for decades. Emerging research, however, has linked PFAS to several health issues, including weakened immune systems, increased risk of obesity and multiple cancers, developmental problems in children and harm to negative effects on reproduction.

Onur Apul, assistant professor of environmental engineering at the …

Respawning Jihadist: Isis Recruiting Through Online Gaming Communities, Alexander J. Ham-Kucharski

Student Work

The purpose of my research is to educate and bring awareness of ISIS’s (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) recruiting programs through social media and video games. As stated by Lakomy (2019): “Cyber jihadis nowadays rightly perceived as a rising threat to international security” (2019, p. 383). ISIS targets individuals as young as teenagers through games such as Call of Duty, Far Cry, Halo, ARMA3, and Grand Theft Auto as to recruit those from the Western world for their Jihad. ISIS Recruiters use these platforms to attract initiates via the gaming world through imagery that …

Amjambo Africa! (October 2022), Kathreen Harrison

Amjambo Africa!

In this Issue

Election special .....................2-3

Moonglade .............................4-5

Amjambo Arts.......................... 6

Credential equivalencies ....8-10

In 7 languages

Ask the doctor ........................11

In 7 languages

Housing update ......................12

Editorial ...................................13

Market Basket ................... 14-15

Beautiful Blackbird .......... 16-17

All about the Workforce ........18

Community Happenings..20-21

News from Africa ..............22-23

Health & Wellness .............24-31

In 7 languages

Community columns .............32

Financial literacy ....................33

New Voices columns ........34-35

Tips & Info ........................36-37

Deconstructing The University: Contemporary Dei, Neoliberal Rationalities, And The Abolition Of The Administrative Apparatus, Jonah Henkle

Media and Cultural Studies Honors Projects

The following chapters attempt to develop some working theories to combat capitalist exploitation and racist and gendered oppression in the university, culminating in a call for the abolition of the university’s administrative apparatus. The project is divided broadly into two parts, which are referential to each other, but maintain slightly different areas of focus. Part 1 details a preliminary critique of the political-economy of the contemporary neoliberal university, drawing influence from Marxian economics and structuralist theories of ideology, critiquing contemporary discourses of diversity, equity and inclusivity (DEI). Part 2 focuses more directly on issues pertaining to oppression and difference, maintaining …

Religious Hegemony And "Muslim" Horror Movies, Shaheed N. Mohammed

Journal of Religion & Film

The present paper examines horror films originating in Muslim contexts and available on U.S. streaming services. Using Gramsci's concept of hegemony, the paper examines how such films negotiate and articulate with the dominant Hollywood mainstream horror genre with particular attention to the hegemonic power of the mainstream with its Christian iconography and assumptions.

S7e3: What’S It Like To Be An Archaeologist?, Ron Lisnet, Daniel Sandweiss

The Maine Question

Daniel Sandweiss’s archaelogy career doesn’t mirror depictions of those in movies like “Indiana Jones,” but for him, it’s been equally as exciting. Over the years, Sandweiss, a University of Maine professor in the Anthropology Department and Climate Change Institute, has uncovered extensive evidence into how ancient civilization dealt with natural disasters, such as climate change, and how they adapted to living in a desert environment next to a rich fishery. His passion, coupled with a commitment to student success, inspired many who took his classes to advance their studies and pursue careers in archaeology.

In this week’s episode of “The …