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Basic Communication Course Annual

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Basic Communication Course Annual Vol. 24

Basic Communication Course Annual

Full issue (298 pages, 12.1 MB)

“All Girls Are Barbies”: A Feminist Critique Of Nicki Minaj’S Barbie Persona, Camellia Sarmadi

Communication Studies

No abstract provided.

Getting The Message Across: Message Dissemination Through The Social Media Platform As A Public Relation Tool As A Media Richness Perspective, Ana Isabel Gonzalez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Prior studies that evaluated social media recommended the use of social media in PR efforts. But they lacked the theoretical framework to fully evaluate the richness of the communication medium. Through Media Richness Theory, the investigator assessed the perceptions of 162 PR professionals to shed light on the richness of social media as a communication tool and, most importantly, as an effective tool for the purposes of PR. While this study revealed that social media is not a fully "rich" communication outlet, there are components that provide value to PR professionals. This study suggests that social media not simply be …

An Examination Of Privacy Rules For Academic Advisors And College Student-Athletes: A Communication Privacy Management Perspective, Jason Thompson, Sandra Petronio, Dawn O. Braithwaite

Department of Communication Studies: Faculty Publications

This study explored how academic advisors managed revealed private information from college student-athletes. The 37 academic advisors were interviewed to address: What criteria advisors use to judge privacy rules regulating access or protection of shared private information from student-athletes, and how privacy-rule choices function in this context? Academic advisors interviewed represented 21 different institutions of the four NCAA division levels and 10 separate athletic conferences. Using Communication Privacy Management theory as a framework, findings indicated there were two main criteria: motivations and risk-benefit ratios used to develop privacy rules managing revealing and concealing the student-athlete’s private information.

Measuring Classroom Engagement By Comparing Instructor Expectations With Students’ Perceptions, Paul Savory, Amy Goodburn, Jody Koenig Kellas

Department of Communication Studies: Faculty Publications

Even instructors who can demonstrate student success in their courses can be challenged to document which practices are most effective in engaging student learning. National surveys designed to assess student engagement do not provide individual faculty with information that can help them assess their individual teaching efforts. This paper highlights a survey designed to help individual faculty members learn about their students and provides a comparison of instructors’ expectations with students’ perceptions. This paper illustrates the value of such a survey through an extended example of the insights that an instructor gained by using it in her course.

Genesis In Hyperreality: Legitimizing Disingenuous Controversy At The Creation Museum, Casey Ryan Kelly, Kristen E. Hoerl

Department of Communication Studies: Faculty Publications

This essay analyzes the argumentative structure of the “Answers in Genesis” ministry’s Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky. Founded by a $27 million grant, the 70,000-square-foot museum appropriates the stylistic and authoritative signifiers of natural history museums, complete with technically proficient hyperreal displays and modern curatorial techniques. In this essay, we argue that the museum provides a culturally authoritative space in which Young Earth Creationists can visually craft the appearance that there is an ongoing scientific controversy over matters long settled in the scientific community (evolution), or what scholars call a disingenuous or manufactured controversy. We analyze the displays and layout …

From Strangers To Siblings: An Ethnography Of The Appalachia Service Project Summer Staffers, Rachel Elizabeth Tish

Honors Program Theses

Communication research has typically focused on relationship development in fairly regular, true-to-life settings; there is a lack of focus on friendships that grow out of situations in which people have no relational alternatives. This ethnographic study of the Appalachia Service Project (ASP) offers a contrast: observations, interviews, cultural artifacts, and researcher memories shed light on the friendship processes within various groups of four college-aged individuals who are assigned as work teams for 12 weeks. Together the members of these teams repair homes, oversee volunteers, and typically form relationships that reach a deeper level than most friendships. The study of how …

Family Matters: Influential Factors Of Choice Regarding The Family-Career Dichotomy For The Next Generation Of Mothers, Beth Lindberg

Honors Program Theses

This study was performed for an undergraduate thesis project for a university honor's program. The thesis project sought to discover female college students' viewpoints on stay-at-home mothering and various influences on said viewpoints through the administration of a survey to college women. Various statistical tests, such as t-test, chi-square, correlation, and regression tests, were completed to analyze the data. From this data, it was found that most participants in the study had positive, socially constructed, stereotypical viewpoints of stay-at-home mothers. Three influences were found to be unique predictors for the choice to plan to be a full-time stay-at-home mother: number …

Requirements Specification For Dsic: Distribution System For Information And Collaboration, Alex Abrahamian

Computer Science and Software Engineering

There seems to exist an invisible barrier between people that should be connected but for whatever reasons (don't hang out in the same circles, don't go to the same meetings, or are geographically separated) haven't met each other yet.

Normally these people will only meet when others bring them together or they are thrown together on a project. DSIC aims to preempt the person discovery process by allowing a way for people to post ideas, events, and other collaborations in a single place that can then be searched by other users.

The system utilizes postings, user profiles, and a tagging …

The University Of Nebraska At Omaha's Criss Library Mobile Resources: A Study Of User's Preferences, Teonne A. Wright

College of Journalism and Mass Communications: Theses

In March of 2010 the University of Nebraska at Omaha Dr. C.C. and Mabel L. Criss Library launched mCriss, the library mobile website to support the educational objectives of on-campus and distance students as well as the research goals of UNO faculty and staff. The study investigators conducted an online survey of UNO students, faculty, staff, alumni and UNO Library Friends ages 19 and older. The purpose of this study was to collect data on UNO community member use of mobile devices and UNO Criss Library mobile services, to determine if participants: are aware of the different aspects of the …

Pragmatism And Meaning: Assessing The Message Of Star Trek: The Original Series, Anne Collins Smith, Owen M. Smith

Faculty Publications

The original Star Trek television series purported to depict a future in which such evils as sexism and racism do not exist, and intelligent beings from numerous planets live in a condition of peace and mutual benefit. As many scholars have observed, from a standpoint of contemporary theoretical analysis, Star Trek: The Original Series contains many elements that are inimical to the utopia it claims to depict and thus undermine its supposed message. A different perspective may be gained by drawing on the American pragmatist movement, in which the value of an idea is judged by its effectiveness, how it …

A Foreigner’S Gaze On The Micro-Culture Of The Car-Rapide—Senegalese Values Vs. Monetary Lust, Merrill Pierce

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

The vibrant, chaotic, and interactive Car Rapide, a poignant micro-culture in Dakar, is a visually communicative entity and social space in Senegal’s transportation system. From an outsider’s gaze, this project addresses the history, artistic and religious significance, inner-workings of the system of employees, and present day implications of the car-rapide. The car-rapide emerges as the embodiment of both valuable and challenging aspects of Senegalese culture.

Blood-Speak: Ward Churchill And The Racialization Of American Indian Identity, Casey Ryan Kelly

Department of Communication Studies: Faculty Publications

After publishing a controversial essay on 9/11, Professor Ward Churchill’s scholarship and personal identity were subjected to a hostile public investigation. Evidence that Churchill had invented his American Indian identity created vehemence among many professors and tribal leaders who dismissed Churchill because he was not a “real Indian.” This essay examines the discourses of racial authenticity employed to distance Churchill from tribal communities and American Indian scholarship. Responses to Churchill’s academic and ethnic self-identification have retrenched a racialized definition of tribal identity defined by a narrow concept of blood. Employing what I term blood-speak, Churchill’s opponents harness a biological concept …

Navigating Socio-Spatial Difference, Constructing Counter-Space: Insights From Transnational Feminist Praxis, Sarah E. Dempsey, Patricia S. Parker, Kathleen J. Krone

Department of Communication Studies: Faculty Publications

In recent years, feminist activists have increasingly transnationalized their struggle against local forms of oppression. Our study explores the contentious nature of feminist transnationalism, asking how transnational feminist networks (TFNs) navigate socio-spatial inequalities within their own practices and as a wider social movement. We argue that: (1) TFNs make socio-spatial differences meaningful in part through their constructions of regional, international, and trans-local imaginaries; and (2) TFNs construct resistant feminist counter-spaces through dialogue and strategies aimed at destabilizing dominant structures. Our findings highlight the central role of spatial praxis within transnational feminism.

Preaching Styles: Honey & Vinegar, Logan Tavelli

Communication Studies

A look into different preaching styles.

A Day With The Mustangs, Gracie Elise Flint, Christina Beverly Fromson

Communication Studies

No abstract provided.

Conflict Management Education In Medicine: Considerations For Curriculum Designers, Jeffery Kaufman

Online Journal for Workforce Education and Development

It is important to address conflict in the medical field for a variety of reasons ranging from reducing turnover to increasing the quality of care received by patients. One way to assist with the management of medical conflict is by teaching resolution techniques to medical personnel. There is an opportunity for conflict management curriculum to address many of the issues facing physicians, administrators, staff and patients, however, it is also necessary for those developing that curriculum to understand the nature of the environment and appropriate conflict management tools to be used in that environment as part of the design process. …

Social Media For Social Good: A Guide To New Media For College Activists, Charles Harris

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

In a world of Tweets and status updates, how do we take all those hours perusing social networks and put them to good use? In my thesis project, Social Media for Social Good: A Guide to New Media For College Activists, I explore the uses of these networks to activate people towards building positive social change. It is my opinion that college is the best time to be an activist. How do college students communicate? Social Media. From the campus to the global scale, social media can be effectively used to mobilize people to take action on a wide array …

The Creative Coach: Exploring The Synergies Between Creative Problem Solving: Thinking Skills Model And Non-Directive Coaching, Trevor J. Mcalpine

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

This project looks at the similarities and differences between the most recent version of Creative Problem Solving called Creative Problem Solving: Thinking Skills Model and the approach to coaching known as Non-Directive Coaching. Creativity practitioners are challenged to find opportunities of engaging in formal full-blown, group-based Creative Problem Solving sessions. There is a need to find other, less formal ways of helping people use their creativity. The Thinking Skills Model’s design allows it to mesh with the creative process in other content areas by making the basic concepts of Creative Problem Solving transferable to those other contexts. Non-Directive Coaching …