Sociology Commons^™

Beauty Is Not Black And White: A Content Analysis Of Black Women’S Body Image In Television Media, Alexis Hubbard

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

There are few bodies of literature that look at Black women’s body image in television media. When Black women were studied most research (Falconer & Neville, 2000; Jhally & Kilbourne, 2010; Smith, 2014; Shearon-Richardson, 2011;) compared them to White ideals. However, this study did a content analysis of Black women in predominantly Black or ethnically diverse television shows using qualitative studies that suggest a Black ideal. The researcher examined lead character(s) body shapes, comments about their body, hair texture and comments about their hair. This research looked at protective factors (aspects Black life that allow for more body satisfaction) like …

New Flesh Cinema: Japanese Cyberpunk-Body Horror And Cinema As Catharsis In The Age Of Technology, Sarah Henry

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis provides a critical analysis of a specific group of films that combine the subgenres of cyberpunk and body horror which I call New Flesh Cinema. Films of this subgenre counter fears and anxieties of technological advancements by re-imagining the rise of technology and its societal effects as a transitional process through the illustration of literal and visceral depictions of the necessary alterations people will have to undergo in order to transition successfully into the new world. To contradict apocalyptic fears of advancing technology, these films offer a vision of a “New Flesh.” I argue the films share three …

Immigration And Crime In The News, 2014-2018: Do Focusing Events And Policy Windows Affect Framing?, Abigale Rongey

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Although an abundance of literature demonstrates that immigrant populations are less crime-prone than the native-born population, the majority of Americans believe that immigration inherently threatens the security of the United States. Because Americans are not well versed in the complex issues of immigration and crime, public opinion is undoubtedly influenced by media outlets’ crafted narratives that simplify circumstances and events into easily digestible material. The current study examines how media behavior changes and responds to social and political events by examining “frames” utilized in articles that produce narratives about immigration and crime. Using content analysis of over 1,700 articles published …

Hpv Vaccination In Females: The Role Of Primary Health Care And Primary Health Care Providers, Brooke Bouza

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Two reasons for subpar coverage of the Human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine are missed clinical opportunities and nonacceptance of the vaccine upon recommendation from a medical provider. The purpose of study one was to examine factors associated with access and adherence to physician’s recommendations in association with HPV vaccine uptake. Data were obtained from National Health Interview Survey (2017). Variables theoretically related to clinical opportunities and adherence to physician’s recommendations were examined in association with HPV vaccine uptake. Univariate logistic regressions were run to determine the associations between the aforementioned variables and uptake of the HPV vaccine. Multinomial logistic regressions were …

Building Assets For Humanitarian Settings, Women's Refugee Commission, Population Council

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

This document is the Women’s Refugee Commission and the Population Council’s adaptation of the Building Assets Toolkit and its core activity, the Asset Exercise, for use in humanitarian contexts. An asset-building exercise is a thoughtful way to build intentional program content for girls to determine what assets they need in order to survive and thrive. This is particularly important for programs intended to reach the poorest girls in the poorest communities based on sound evidence on the reality of their lives. The Council’s Building Assets Toolkit is rooted in this exercise, helping practitioners, policymakers, and advocates build tailored, meaningful, …

Dinner Table Syndrome: A Phenomenological Study Of Deaf Individuals’ Experiences With Inaccessible Communication, David R. Meek

The Qualitative Report

Conversations at the dinner table typically involve reciprocal and contingent turn-taking. This context typically includes multiple exchanges between family members, providing opportunities for rich conversations and opportunities for incidental learning. Deaf individuals who live in hearing non-signing homes often miss out on these exchanges, as typically hearing individuals use turn-taking rules that differ from those commonly used by deaf individuals. Hearing individuals’ turn-taking rules include use of auditory cues to get a turn and to cue others when a new speaker is beginning a turn. Given these mechanisms, hearing individuals frequently interrupt each other—even if they are signing. When deaf …

Ua94/6/1 My Story: Wku Women's Basketball's Sherry Porter, Sherry Porter

Student/Alumni Personal Papers

My Story is a series of first-person feature articles written by WKU student-athletes. The student-athletes will be telling their own stories in their own words. This article written by women’s basketball senior Sherry Porter. Porter reflects on the state of current events going on nationwide.

A Drawing A Day Keeps The Pandemic Away: Vol 9, University Of Nevada, Las Vegas

A Drawing a Day Keeps the Pandemic Away

The project is called A Drawing a Day Keeps the Pandemic Away. We created it on March 17th, which was the day when we realized that we weren’t going to be able to go back into the museum and continue installing the exhibitions we had been planning to open on March 27th. People were asking us what we, as an art museum, were going to do to reach out to the community during the pandemic shutdown and honestly we were wondering that ourselves, so we had an online brainstorming session and came up with the idea of posting a daily …

On The Banality Of Transnational Film, Ian Reyes, Justin Wyatt

Markets, Globalization & Development Review

“Breakthrough” global blockbusters like Black Panther (2018) and Crazy Rich Asians (2018) create disturbances among critics and firms forced to wonder if such ripples of diversity will become waves of new cinema wiping out the hegemony of Hollywood and the global West. In this essay, we establish the context for this phenomenon in terms of film’s historical relationship to marketing. Through this context, we theorize a transnational aesthetic for global blockbusters, one that may serve to limit ripples of diversity, breaking waves of change against the rocks of a banal cinema of Americanized nothingness.

Ua3/10/2 We Are One Wku, Wku President's Office - Caboni

WKU Administration Documents

Email from WKU president Timothy Caboni to WKU Alumni and friends. An identical email was sent to the WKU Community.

The Subaltern Magazine, Rebecca Fox, Riese Nichols

Social Sciences

The Subaltern intends to reach Cal Poly students who do not feel as if their voices are heard and allow them the platform to share their stories. Our focus is on unheard stories from our campus - whether this involves race, class, gender identity, mental health, ethnicity, culture, or any unique part of one’s identity or experience. We hope that these stories will begin to shed light on what we usually consider “taboo” topics and allow students to feel as if they aren’t alone.

Being a very homogeneous campus, it is important for us to realize that privileged voices are …

Spatial Politics And Literacy: An Analysis Of Little Free Libraries And Neighborhood Distribution Of Book-Sharing Depositories In Portland, Oregon And Detroit, Michigan, Desiree Wilson

Book Publishing Final Research Papers

The purpose of this research is to interrogate whether Free Little Libraries (LFL), the largest branded book-sharing movement in the world, continues to uphold its currently stated mission to provide book access to communities where book accessibility is low (determined by how many estimated books are in each household). Though the Little Free Library nonprofit has flourished in the decade since it was founded, indicating a fondness and appreciation for the Little Library as an idea and neighborhood ornament alike, critics of the organization have raised multiple concerns about whether the library boxes provide service to those who need them. …

A Screenplay For Bystander Intervention For Sexual Harassment Scenarios For College Students, Shanti Herzog

Journalism

This project was developed to describe the drafting of a screenplay for an interactive, virtual reality sexual harassment training module for students of the California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo. The research began with the examination of the prevalent and persisting issue of sexual harassment within college campus communities, and how to present college students with the tools to intervene as bystanders, thus encouraging them to intervene when encountering sexual harassment scenarios. The resulting screenplay was written to provide college students at Cal Poly with strategies to identify and take action when encountering sexual harassment, especially in small group gatherings …

When To Make The Sensory Social: Registering In Face-To-Face Openings, Danielle M. Pillet-Shore

Faculty Publications

This article analyzes naturally occurring video-recorded openings during which participants make the sensory social through the action of registering—calling joint attention to a selected, publicly perceiv- able referent so others shift their sensory attention to it. It examines sequence-initial actions that register referents for which a participant is regarded as responsible. Findings demonstrate a systematic preference organization which observably guides when and how people initiate registering sequences sensitive to ownership of, and displayed stance toward, the target referent. Analysis shows how registering an owned referent achieves intersubjectivity and puts involved participants’ face, affiliation, and social relationship on the line. A …

Going Viral: Youth And Sexual Assault In The Digital Age, Anna Gjika

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines the growing phenomenon of using digital media technologies to capture and perpetuate sexual abuse. Focusing on instances of high-profile juvenile sexual assault, I use case studies, interviews, focus groups, and thematic media analysis to investigate (a) how crime, gender, status and technology intersect for young people growing up digital, and (b) the ways technology intersections with sexual abuse to create new forms of crime, new ways to victimize and perpetuate harm, as well as new opportunities to investigate and address sexual violence both through the criminal justice system and in the public. I argue that young people …

“I’M Real I Thought I Told Ya”: Developing Critical Media Literacy Through U.S. Latinx Digital Media Representations, Solange T. Castellar

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis explores how audiences engage with U.S. Latinx media representations through the practice of critical media literacy. I interrogate how media consumers construct critical media literacy through interacting with U.S. Latinx figures on digital media platforms, particularly on the social-media app, Twitter, and the user-generated video content platform, YouTube. Throughout this thesis, I argue that users on these platforms who engage with U.S. Latinx pop culture figures, like Jennifer Lopez and Belcalis Almanzar (Cardi B), read, digest, and comprehend a variety of multimedia images, texts, or videos, and that this engagement becomes an accessible form of critical media literacy, …

Developing An Online Health Community For Autoimmune Disease Patients Through Self-Managed Diet, Rachel Greene

Critical and Creative Thinking Capstones Collection

Part I, Autoimmune Disease Management and the Need for Intervention, discusses current and standard Autoimmune Disease- (AI/AID) management and the shortcomings within. Typical AID-management led by healthcare professionals lacks a holistic, symptom-based approach, thus further contributing to the daily chronic pain of the afflicted. This analysis indicates the need to connect those suffering with AID’s to scientific research that has determined strict dieting can significantly reduce symptoms associated with AID’s. Part II, Synthesizing A Model For Online Health Community Engagement, examines the website prototype of Greenebean, which is an online community developed via user-centric design, in a theoretical, physical, and …

Reviewing Family Communication Scholarship: Toward A Framework For Conceptualizing A Communicative Perspective On Family Identity, Kaitlin E. Phillips, Jordan Soliz

Languages, Philosophy, and Communication Studies Faculty Publications

In this manuscript we review multiple approaches to family communication research, and provide directions for future research as they relate to family culture. Specifically, we review family communication research that is either explicitly or implicitly tied to family culture. Given the importance of families and understanding the first social group that individuals often belong to, it is necessary to synthesize programs of research related to family culture. Thus, in order to further the progression of family research we provide an overview of where current research on family communication converges, present additional factors for family scholars to include in their work, …

Ua94/6/1 My Story: Wku Basketball's Kenny Cooper, Kenny Cooper

Student/Alumni Personal Papers

My Story is a series of first-person feature articles written by WKU student-athletes. The student-athletes will be telling their own stories in their own words. This article written by basketball senior guard Kenny Cooper, who redshirted as a transfer in 2019-20 but will play his final college season this upcoming year.

Ua94/6/1 My Story: Wku Football's Malik Staples, Malik Staples

Student/Alumni Personal Papers

My Story is a series of first-person feature articles written by WKU student-athletes. The student-athletes will be telling their own stories in their own words. This article written by football graduate senior Malik Staples, who – along with his teammates – has navigated through a different type of Spring Ball over the past two months.

Religious Nationalism And The Coronavirus Pandemic: Soul-Sucking Evangelicals And Branch Covidians Make America Sick Again, Peter Mclaren

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This article investigates the response to the coronavirus crisis by Evangelical Christian nationalists in the USA. The article outlines the curious mediaverse of religious nationalism—its post-truth and fake news aspects in particular—links religious nationalism to American exceptionalism, and analyzes conflicts between secular and religious authorities. Drawing upon some lessons from the past, the article addresses the wider implications of Christian nationalism on American politics, and capitalist ideology, as it has been played out virally in the corporate media. The article shows that the ideological underpinnings of evangelical Christianity prevent its proponents from understanding the virus in an historical and materialist …

Understanding Elements Involved In Active Racial And Ethnic Minority Recruitment Practices For Biopharmaceutical-Sponsored Clinical Trials: A Socio-Ecological Qualitative Inquiry, Rebecca Rae Johnson

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Inequitable participation in clinical trials continues to be a problem, and trial populations do not always reflect the demographics of the population that the investigational product will ultimately be treating. Because genetic differences between racial and ethnic groups affect the safety and efficacy of new treatments, it is important that standard of care decisions are made based on a representative population. The purpose of this study is to understand the socio-ecological elements that are involved in the active implementation of racial and ethnic minority recruitment practices for biopharmaceutical-funded trials in the United States. This general qualitative study was both descriptive …

Hollywood Media And The Model Minority Myth: The Representation Of Asian American Masculinity And Its Effects, Khanhlinh Le

Master's Projects and Capstones

Asian Americans are becoming one of the largest growing minority groups in the United States, almost surpassing the Latinx community. Asian Americans, however, are rarely ever represented in Hollywood films and are limited to stereotypical roles. Asian American actors have a difficult time finding roles playing characters that are three-dimensional and complex. While both Asian American men and women face this challenge, it seems that in Hollywood films and television shows, Asian American males are even less represented than females and are typically portrayed as the quiet nerd, sexy doctor, martial arts expert, or the villain. These media stereotypes impact …

Investigation Of The "Cultural Appropriation" Of Yoga, Olivia Bartholomew

Honors Projects

With our world becoming increasingly globalized and cosmopolitan, practices that were once very traditional and spiritual are much different when they confront Western societies. Many yoga instructors and practitioners around the world are concerned about the issue of cultural appropriation within their practice. The researcher defines cultural appropriation to mean the process of a dominant culture manipulating aspects of a marginalized culture for its benefit. Traditionally, yoga comes from India, but it has become popularized throughout the world in our recent human history. Through interviews with nine yoga instructors, each from different yogic traditions, who teach in a variety of …

An Exploration Of Student Athletes Perception On The Athletic Trainer/Coach Relationship, Nikki Owens

Masters Theses, 2020-current

The goal of this study was to explore how the athletic trainer and coach relationship impacts the social support provided to Division I intercollegiate student—athletes. Through a qualitative-case study design, eleven participants were recruited and interviewed for the study. Criterion for inclusion included all NCAA sports at the university. This included males and females in various years of school and sport. After the completion of data analysis, four main themes were developed. These themes included social support, positive impact, negative impact, and unforeseen findings. Seven of the eleven student—athletes reported feeling that there was a direct relationship between the athletic …

The (In)Visible Woman: A Performative Autoethnographic Exploration Of Queer Femme-Ininity And Queer Isolation, Bri Ozalas

Masters Theses, 2020-current

This thesis is a performative autoethnographic exploration of my experiences existing betwixt-and-between the intersection of queer femme-ininity and isolation. Through a creative, affective rendition of my experiences, I detail and connect the nuances of queerness, femme-ininity, and queer isolation to provide a closer look at understanding queer identity with an absence of connection to the queer community. First, I provide an overview of the main theoretical and methodological approaches, and main concepts I utilize throughout my project. I then provide the intricacies of queer theory, queer intersectionality, and affect theory to provide theoretical explanations of my approach to queer isolation. …

Health Care Access For Children In Latinx Immigrant Families In The Greater Philadelphia Area, Sophia King

Politics Honors Papers

This work examines the gap that exists in access to health care in the Greater Philadelphia Region for children of Latinx immigrant families in comparison to other children in the nation. It provides a critical analysis of the gap in access to coverage, noting that this exists despite wide support for a human right to health. This study draws on existing scholarly research as well as interviews with staff at two health clinics and one community outreach center that are located in Greater Philadelphia. It demonstrates that Latinx immigrant families are less likely to have health insurance and get primary …

The Mental Health Of Black Men: Stabilizing Trauma With Emotional Intelligence, Davis Brandford

School of Professional Studies

The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between the impact of historical trauma and barriers on African-American males and the effects of emotional intelligence in reducing traumatic experiences. This research study is based on previous research and studies that explores the historical review of African- American oppression, trauma in black males, and mental health in the African American community. This study will utilize the historical trauma and emotional intelligence theories to explore barriers that African Americans have experienced over time and the role emotional intelligence can play to reduce trauma. It also explores the relevance of historical …

Crisis Communication And Executive Leadership: Ethical Shortcomings In Government, Daniel Davidoff

School of Professional Studies

This research thesis project is an analysis of how and why governments fail in their attempts at crisis communication. The hypotheses tested are: there exists a negative correlation between unethical leadership and successful crisis communication practices. And governments are more likely to experience these failures due to ethical disconnects in modern politics. Research includes a review of relevant academic literature regarding crisis communication theory, as well as the ethical framework that can be applied to that theory. Cases considered are Hurricane Katrina, the choking death of Eric Garner, and the COVID-19 global pandemic. The research project concludes with a recommendation …

Becoming A Trauma Informed Care Organization, Katie Robery

School of Professional Studies

The Brockton Area Mutli Services Inc or BAMSI is a private, non-profit human services organization providing services to adults and children with developmental disabilities, mental illness, behavioral health, and public health needs. Founded in 1975, BAMSI is in the business of “bringing people and services together.” BAMSI transforms lives by building the capacity of individuals, families, organizations, and communities to learn, thrive, and achieve their goals. BAMSI services promote the recovery, resiliency, and self-determination of the people we serve. As a human services leader, we strive to be the provider of choice. (Duffy, 2019) With an emphasis on respect and …