Art--Economic aspects--Nigeria; Anatsui, El, 1944-; Nigeria--Foreign economic relations
This paper is specifically concerned with contemporary artist El Anatsui, and his impact upon the region in which he lives and works in Nsukka, Nigeria. El Anatsui's large-scale wall sculptures—created by joining recycled aluminum distillery...
Feminism in art; Art, Mexican; Women in art; Art and society--Mexico
This dissertation outlines a theoretical model for contextualizing contemporary
women's art practice in Mexico within the profound socioeconomic and political events
that have taken place since 1968, characterized by the steady breakdown and...
Identity (Philosophical concept) in art; Museum techniques; Museum exhibits--Social aspects; Museums--Social aspects
This thesis paper expands upon the aspects of identity and power explored in the exhibition that I curated, entitled "Being & Making: Artists Investigating Identity," at the Speed Art Museum. The developments on topics of identity...
This thesis is an historical, theoretical and empirical examination of women's health concepts and health behavior in contemporary consumer-oriented American society. It begins with an historical overview of social health movements to illustrate...
Feminism in literature; Self-perception in literature; Women in literature; Chen, Ran, 1962-; Tan, Amy
With increasing cross-cultural infiltrations and accelerated interflows among people of all nationalities in this globalized world, the focus of comparative literature has experienced a shift from traditional Eurocentric cannons to a broader space...
Jin, Ha, 1956-; Masculinity in literature; Chinese literature--20th century; Sex (Psychology) in literature
This dissertation consists of readings of three selected novels by Ha
Jin-Waiting, The Crazed, and A Free Life. These novels cover three historical
periods of Contemporary China under the rule of the Communist Party in
sequence-the Mao's era...
Phenomenology and art; Art--Philosophy; Philosophy of mind; Husserl, Edmund, 1859-1938; Merleau-Ponty, Maurice, 1908-1961
This dissertation presents the philosophical concepts of Edmund Husserl on phenomenology and image-consciousness and explores the phenomenological project of Maurice Merleau-Ponty as I have sought to render them in my creative artwork. By building...
Southern States--In literature; Southern States--Religion; Wilcox, James; Religion in literature
The following paper is a discussion of religions themes in the novels of James Wilcox, a contemporary Southern author. Through closely examining four of Wilcox's nine novels (along with excerpts from a few others), this project explores the ways in...
This thesis is about graphic representations of violence and subjectivity. Simply stated, the violence in many recent horror films is motivated by a nihilism resulting from frustration with the inadequacy of contemporary subjectivity. I want to...
Visual learning; Animated films--Japan; Motion pictures in education; Audio-visual education
Our contemporary culture is laden with a glut of visual stimuli: advertising, packaging, television, film, the internet, digital-camera-wireless-web-access-mobile-phones. In a world filled with visually rhetorical media, it is imperative that the...
This paper explores issues of identity and difference in art and its institutions through a historiographic study of two landmark exhibitions, "The Other Story: Afro-Asian Artists in Post-War Britain" (1989) and the 1993 Whitney Biennial....
Photography--Psychological aspects; Mourning customs in art; Mourning customs in literature; Phenomenology and art
The creation of liminal spaces has been used for centuries cross-culturally to create sacred or taboo meanings in rituals, people, places, or objects. Liminality is constructed by the overlapping of cultural categories and "ruptures" an...
Paramount Ballroom (Shanghai, China); Architecture--China--Shanghai; Buildings--China--Shanghai; Shanghai (China)--History--20th century; Shanghai (China)--Social life and customs--20th century
The Paramount Ballroom was an innovative urban space that challenged traditional
Chinese values. In doing so it played an important role in Shanghai's modernization.
Traditional Confucian morality set very strict regulations on the social...
Schiller, Friedrich, 1759-1805. Über die ästhetische Erziehung des Menschen in einer Reihe von Briefen; Schiller, Friedrich, 1759-1805--Philosophy; Play (Philosophy)
Friedrich Schiller's psychological theory of play, his hypothesis about human nature, is embedded in the Aesthetic Letters . Its trans-historical value owes much to the committed interest in life in the late Enlightenment, and the theory itself is...
Prints--Kentucky--Louisville--Exhibitions; Painting--Kentucky--Louisville--Exhibitions; Art quilts; Block designs; Screen process printing; Feminism and art
This thesis explores pattern juxtaposition using traditional American quilt block designs as the compositional basis for nine works pieced from screen printed paper. In the 1970s, the quilt was celebrated for its apparent connection to Modernist...
Indians of North America--British Columbia; Literacy--British Columbia--Case studies
This dissertation examines the literacy practices of a group of First Nations women who live in British Columbia and whose jobs entail the production and dissemination of texts which reflect the local, Carrier, culture. In this qualitative study of...
Hurricane Katrina, 2005--Psychological aspects; Writing--Psychological aspects; Psychic trauma in literature; Crisis in literature
The discourses of "trauma" and "post-trauma" have become pervasive in representations of life as it is lived in contemporary globalized culture. As new media technologies make the world more accessible, we become accustomed to...
Spirituality in literature; Religion in literature; Berry, Wendell, 1934---Criticism and interpretation; McCarthy, Cormac, 1933---Criticism and interpretation
This dissertation provides a reading of characters in the novels and short stories of two important contemporary American writers through the lens of spiritual theology. While spirituality has often been understood as necessitating a flight from...
Empathy; Social psychology; Rhetoric--Social aspects; Language and culture
Empathy has been commonly evoked within rhetoric and composition as a way to understand audiences and as a classroom ethic. This dissertation goes further in defining rhetorics of empathy, analyzing the uses of rhetorics of empathy in political and...
Mixed media textiles--Kentucky--Louisville--Exhibitions; Mixed media painting--Kentucky--Louisville--Exhibitions
My work focuses on repurposing historic images and feminine objects to create a contemporary dialogue about the traditions of courtship, marriage and divorce. The use of textiles and feminine objects such as doilies, lace, slips and wallpaper serve...