Critical and Cultural Studies Commons^™

My Friendship Story: Tanzanians’ Tales Of Friendship Analyzed Through Knapp’S Relational Model, Dorcus Nakalembe

Masters Theses

From both theoretical and practical considerations, there is a critical need to study friendship development processes within different sociocultural worlds, because today’s world has become a crossroads for a diversity of cultures. To date, research in friendship development mainly addresses cognitive and psychological implications to the process and rarely gives attention to the stages/ processes individuals of different sociocultural backgrounds experience as they build friendship. The present study aimed at comparing friendship development in a non-Westernized group to the stages of relational development suggested by a Western psychological theoretical framework. Tanzanian friendship experiences were analyzed through Knapp’s Relational Model to …

Informational Efficiency And The Reaction To Terrorism: A Financial Perspective, Nicholas Roland

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The purpose of this study is to measure the message terror organizations hope to convey using the financial markets as a proxy of measurement to determine patterns within the marketplace and the effects on the terrorists’ ability to deliver a desired message due to the increased use of digital devices and access to instantaneous news, seen over the past decade. Using death count, geographic location, and event type, this study identified 109 attacks between 1985 and 2015 to be analyzed against 5 market indices and 5 securities. Measuring the effects within a 10-day sample window from the time of the …

Binge-Reviews? The Shifting Temporalities Of Contemporary Tv Criticism, Myles Mcnutt

Communication & Theatre Arts Faculty Publications

The article explores the object of the film theory and the practice of Third Cinema whose contributions are seen as a theoretical inquiry into the subject of Film Studies. Topics include the unfortunate dead-end at which the theory of third cinema has arrived, the orientation of third cinema towards openness and action in a political project, and the continued evaluation of third cinema while its status in the academy remains unchanged.

Social Grief: A Grounded Theory Of Utilizing Status Updates On Facebook As A Contemporary Ritual, Celese Catania-Opris

Department of Family Therapy Dissertations and Applied Clinical Projects

The popular Social Networking Site, Facebook, offers its users the ability tocommunicate with others from all over the globe. Individuals can create a virtual identity for themselves enabling members to call, message, and locate others in a matter of seconds. The number of Facebook users appears to increase; yet, the number of members who die daily is not normally accounted. Facebook now permits the memorialization ofthe deceased’s profile. This allows members to continue commenting, sharing photos and videos, and visiting the deceased’s Facebook page. This trend led to the central question of this study, “What benefits, if any, are individuals …

¡Tigre Blanco, Héroe Del Barrio!: Living And Dying Latina/O In A Superhero World, Luis Saenz De Viguera Erkiaga

World Languages and Cultural Studies Faculty Publications

In a world where the superheroic characters from Marvel Comics and DC Comics, the two major comic book publishers in the United States, are taking over mainstream media via film, TV shows, and video-games, it seems more relevant than ever to look at the way in which these comic book fantasies deal with diversity and the representation of minorities.

Culture For Sale: The Appropriation Of Japanese Style Tattoos Through Transculturation, Evan Lohmann

Masters Theses

Japanese style tattoos onto the bodies of celebrities in the United States articulate a lack of awareness towards this ancient art form through their appropriation of historically inaccurate images. The prominence of these celebrities in magazines circulated within the United States act as powerful mediums which may lead to the commodification of certain Japanese symbols in capitalistic societies like the United States. I use post-colonialism, Orientalism, transnationalism and hyper identification as the theoretical framework and semiotics as the methodology in order to examine fourteen magazine covers that showcase celebrities in the United States sporting noticeable Japanese style tattoos. The overall …

Do Black Lives Matter In American Mainstream News Media? Two Case Studies Of Police-Involved Shootings Of Black Men Explaining A Racist Media Environment, Alfred J. Cotton Iii

Theses and Dissertations--Communication

This dissertation examines two cases of fatal police-involved shootings of Black men in order to expose the power structures perpetuated through racist media narratives assuming the officers’ behavior was justified and the unarmed men the officers killed somehow were complicit in their death. In reporting on police-involved shootings, mainstream media practices that privilege elites and officials as primary sources of information may produce a dominant media narrative that masks the marginalization and mistreatment of minorities at the hands of these officials and their institutions. The two cases under consideration here examine the “floating signifier” of race in media coverage of …

Mitt Romney In Denver: “Obamacare” As Ideological Enthymeme, Justin Ward Kirk

Department of Communication Studies: Faculty Publications

This paper argues that surface-level analysis of political argument fails to explain the effectiveness of ideological enthymemes, particularly within the context of presidential debates. This paper uses the first presidential debate of the 2012 election as a case study for the use of “Obamacare” as an ideological enthymeme. The choice of a terminological system limits and shapes the argumentative choices afforded the candidate. Presidential debates provide a unique context within which to examine the interaction of ideological constraints and argument due to their relatively committed and ideologically homogenous audiences.

No More Mind Games: Content Analysis Of In-Game Commentary Of The National Football League’S Concussion Problem, Jeffrey Parker

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

American (gridiron) football played at the professional level in the National Football League (NFL) is an inherently physical spectator sport, in which players frequently engage in significant contact to the head and upper body. Until recently, the long-term health consequences associated with on the field head trauma were not fully disclosed to players or the public, potentially misrepresenting the dangers involved in gameplay. Crucial to the dissemination of this information to the public are in-game televised commentators of NFL games, regarded as the primary conduits for mediating in-game narratives to the viewing audience. Using a social constructionist theoretical lens, this …

Course Syllabus (W16 Online) Coli 331: "Pulp Fiction And Quentin Tarantino", Christopher Southward

Comparative Literature Faculty and Student Scholarship

Course Objectives and Expected Learning Outcomes:

Rejecting the standpoint of the passively entertained consumer, our shared objectives in this course will be (1) to bring our selected cinematic and written texts into interaction in such ways as to produce high-quality scholarly writing. It is hoped that, by the end of the semester, each student’s active engagement with our course material should have enabled him/her, (2) to deepen and broaden his/her knowledge base concerning the social problematics we will have treated in such ways as to inform and encourage constructive social action.

We will view Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction, Reservoir …

Towards A Requirement Framework For Online Participation Platforms, Astrid Hellsmanns, Claudia Niemeyer, Margeret A. Hall, Tom Zentek, Christof Weinhardt

Interdisciplinary Informatics Faculty Proceedings & Presentations

Online participation platforms (OPPs) are frequently used by public institutions to involve citizens in political opinion forming and decision making. A literature re-view reveals different approaches to evaluate these OPPs. These approaches focus only on partial requirements of participation processes. In this research in progress, we develop and pretest an interdisciplinary literature-based requirement frame-work. It includes the categories usability, security, information, transparency, inte-gration, and mobilisation. Our aim is to close the research gap of a context-specific analysis and evaluation of OPPs.

Rural Reality: How Reality Television Portrayals Of Appalachian People Impact Their View Of Their Culture, Ivy Jude Elise Brashear

Theses and Dissertations--Community & Leadership Development

Appalachian people have faced stereotyping of their culture and region in popular culture, news media, and art for generations. For more than 150 years, images of the region have been extracted by outside media makers and disseminated widely, solidifying the “hillbilly” stereotype in the national lexicon. This study focuses on such images in reality television shows about Appalachia, and seeks to determine whether or not those images, and the proliferation of them, has an impact on the ways in which Appalachian people understand and accept their own culture.

In His Image: A Content Analysis Of Evangelical Youth Books For Their Representation Of Gender Roles And Ideals, Taryn Renee Vis

Honors Projects

This content analysis discusses the results of the analysis of twelve major Evangelical books for young adults and their representation of gender roles and gender ideals. The background of the Evangelical church’s handling of gender, particularly in relation to media beginning in the 1970s is established and discussed at length in order to situate this analysis amongst previous discussion of Evangelical gender roles. This analysis found that each of the books discussed four main themes of gender roles and relations: biological essentialism, complementarianism, counter-cultural branding of gender, and sexual purity (especially for young women).

Be Your Own Guru: Authoritarianism And The Problem Of The Guru In Conscious Evolution, Mcauley, Charles E.

Journal of Conscious Evolution

This paper is an exploration of the problematic nature of the guru/disciple relationship, specifically, in Western Society. It begins with a discussion of the nature of spirituality and the spiritual quest. To contextualize the process, I also discuss my own spiritual path based in Roman Catholicism, Taoism, Buddhism and my thoughts on the philosophy of Krishnamurti. I explore the topic of the authoritarian follower in some depth. Its connection is symbiotic to the existence of the authoritarian leader. This connection is demonstrated within this paper as well. Additionally, I look at the flaws in some well-known guru figures and how …

Northside, Jesse L. Houk

Theses and Dissertations--English

The Northside of Lexington, Kentucky is an area with its own culture, community and art. While living in this community I was able to learn, grow and develop alongside this newly renovated area. The people and their lives intersect in such a way that creates a tension at times. However, many social awareness advocates vie for the success of this neighborhood for many years to come. The objective of studying such an area as the Northside in Lexington is to focus on the similarites rather than the differences in culture, community and artistic endeavor. With a collection of essays and …

Mapuche Resilience: Environmental Justice In Chile, Hannah N. Lussier

ENV 434 Environmental Justice

This paper presents a close analysis of the Mapuche Conflict and its implications from an Environmental Justice perspective. It serves to outline the plight of the Mapuche, a South American indigenous group, in their continued struggle to gain the rights to autonomic control over their ancestral territory from the Chilean government. By utilizing a holistic approach to research, this paper serves to provide a background on the conflict as well as to incorporate claims to justice. It chronicles the depth and breadth of media attention on the issue by incorporating perspectives from scholarly articles, news sources and social media platforms. …

The Heritage Journal Winter 2016

The Heritage Journal

No abstract provided.

Letter From The Editor, Victor Terry

The Heritage Journal

No abstract provided.

On The Whiteness Of Biracial Folk, Jordan Mann

The Heritage Journal

No abstract provided.

Understanding The Black Male's Quest For Identity As Illustrated Through Native Son, Martez Files

The Heritage Journal

No abstract provided.