Matching Items (30)
Filtering by
- All Subjects: Culture
- All Subjects: Memory
- Creators: School of International Letters and Cultures
- Member of: Theses and Dissertations
- Resource Type: Text
- Status: Published
Description
Since Dylan Roof, a white supremacist, shot and killed nine members of a black church in Charleston on June 17, 2015, Confederate symbols have stood at the center of much controversy across the United States. Although the Confederate battle flag remains the most obvious example, the debate took a particular form in Tennessee, centering on the image of General Nathan Bedford Forrest. Born in 1822 to a poor family, he left school early to work. Although his work in the slave trade made him a millionaire, his later participation in the massacre of over 300 black soldiers at Fort Pillow in 1864 during the Civil War and association with the Ku Klux Klan cemented his reputation as a violent racist. Yet, many white Tennesseans praised him as a hero and memorialized him. This thesis examines Nathan Bedford Forrest State Park in Benton County and Forrest Park, now Health Sciences Park, in Memphis to examine what characteristics denote a controversial memorial. Specifically, I focus on the physical form, the location, and the demographics of the area, investigating how these components work together to give rise to controversy or acceptance of the memorial's image. Physical representations greatly impact the ideas associated with the memorial while racial demographics affect whether or not Forrest's representation as a hero speaks true to modern interpretations and opinions.
ContributorsFish, Caroline Rose (Author) / Longley, Rodney (Thesis director) / Suk, Mina (Committee member) / School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
DescriptionThe city of Siena is picturesque as an almost perfectly preserved medieval fortress in the heart of Tuscany. But the true beauty stems from its unique, family-oriented culture.
ContributorsPrice, Tea Francesca (Author) / Silcock, Bill (Thesis director) / Dell'Anna, Antonella (Committee member) / Dodge, Nancie (Committee member) / Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
Inspired by my own experiences, I began this study to examine students' cultural engagement while studying abroad. Students' motivations to study abroad vastly vary and no two experiences are the same, due to the multitude of factors involved. Study abroad program providers and organizations frequently cite intercultural competence as a vital skill in the 21st century for all young professionals to build, and is often a goal of students to develop through their study abroad experiences. Before departure, some students may have a romanticized, grand vision of integrating themselves in a foreign culture and learning the language. Upon arrival, reality may prove to be quite different and students can get swept up in the novelty of living in a new environment and traveling with their new American friends from the same program. The vision of intercultural competence and foreign language acquisition gradually fades when realizing just how difficult they both are to achieve, especially in such a short time period. My hope is that this study can highlight issues that returned students of study abroad programs faced while abroad and can provide valuable insight for future study abroad participants into how to become more immersed in their host culture. By creating awareness of the merits of intercultural competence and the methods to develop it through study abroad, future students can become better equipped to have a more enriching experience. https://cultureasustudyabroad.wordpress.com/
ContributorsThoesen, Raquel Nathania (Author) / Scott Lynch, Jacquelyn (Thesis director) / Herrera Niesen, Carrie (Committee member) / W. P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
Arizona State University experienced some of its most explosive growth in the 1960s—doubling its enrollment in just seven years, expanding many programs and adding a college of law, and significantly augmenting its physical plant. This work examines the architectural and planning development of ASU in this decade and the surrounding years, coinciding with the presidency of Dr. G. Homer Durham, in various facets. Topics covered include the pedestrianization of the university campus, land acquisition and street realignment; the construction of newer and taller buildings to accommodate and expanded student population and educational program; and efforts to improve the university’s prestige through the use of modern architecture. ASU’s physical and human growth is compared to selected peer institutions. The legacy of the 1960s at ASU is also discussed within a historic preservation context.
ContributorsHumbert, Raymond Eugene (Author) / Zygas, K. Paul (Thesis director) / Spindler, Robert (Committee member) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
In Arizona, people flock the streets of Tombstone in droves, chatting in period costume while gunshots ring down the street. Others in Bisbee walk in the Queen Mine, listening to the tour guide discuss how the miners extracted ore. Still others drive up the precarious road to Jerome, passing through the famed Grand Hotel. As former Arizona mining towns, Tombstone, Jerome and Bisbee have a shared identity as former mining boomtowns, all of which experienced subsequent economic and population decline. Left with the need to reinvent themselves in order to survive, the past takes on a different role in each city. In Jerome, visitors seem content to "kill a day" against the backdrop of the historic town. In Bisbee, time seems stuck in the 1970s, the focus having shifted from the mining to the "hippies" who are considered to have resuscitated the town from near-extinction. Tombstone seem to inspire devotion, rooted in the influence of the 1993 film titled after the town. By memorializing portions of their past, these three towns have carved out new lives for themselves in the twenty-first century. As visitors are informed by the narrative of the "Old West," as shaped by the Western movie and television genre, they in turn impact how the towns present themselves in order to attract tourists. In all these sites, the past is present and like a kaleidoscope, continually recreated into new formations. While the designation of Jerome, Bisbee and Tombstone as "ghost towns" is disputed by individuals in each site, these stories of visitors and residents reveal the intricate ways in which these towns have acquired new life.
ContributorsLemme, Nicole Lee (Author) / de la Garza, Amira (Thesis director) / Paulesc, Marie Louise (Committee member) / Department of English (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Hugh Downs School of Human Communication (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
The purpose of this paper is to explore different aspects of participating in a study abroad program with a focus on the 2013 Critical Language Scholarship Program in Himeji, Japan. I had always wanted to study in Japan and was finally able to when I was selected for the CLS Program. The eight weeks I spent studying in Japan had a significant impact on my life, and I wondered if studying abroad has as much of an influence on other students too. The key questions in this research are: 1. What do students gain from studying abroad in Japan? What are the biggest benefits? 2. For what reasons do students decide to study in Japan? 3. What qualities make for a successful and beneficial language-learning program? The research was conducted through a fixed group who participated in in-depth qualitative interviews. The purposeful sample consisted of nine participants in the CLS Program (Japan 2013 institute) and several ASU faculty members. This paper also examines previous research that has been conducted relating to study abroad.
ContributorsPrang, Meiti (Author) / Silcock, Bill (Thesis director) / Wong, Elizabeth (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
A longing to revisit the people, places, and moments of my past has followed me for years, sometimes affecting me to the extent that the past seems to intrude on my present. In this piece, I wish to turn a critical eye on these feelings of nostalgia and examine how strong emotion can emerge from nothing more than fractured, faded memories. Using footage of moments I had recorded over six months of living in Europe, I seek to sculpt these images from my past into a form that rejects the daze of nostalgia for the fragmented truth of memory. My background is in more traditional narrative filmmaking, and so I was excited to work in this experimental three-screen format, in which I could explore the concept of memory in a manner that felt truer to how I actually experience it. I tested various combinations of imagery in my videos to build the progression of the piece, which I hoped would play out in an associational style that mimicked the process of my own memory. I hope that this will cause people to walk away from the piece thinking about how memory can fuel emotion and even to investigate their own relationship to the past.
ContributorsPowell, Matthew Rhys (Author) / Bradley, Christopher (Thesis director) / Brye, Anne (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Film, Dance and Theatre (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
Women. War. What is the relationship between women and war? As evidenced by movies, popular memoirs and journals, there is a definite relationship between men and war. However, this definite relationship has created a problematic and a complex relationship between women and war. The two historical events that are considered as the ‘turning points’ for women are the French Revolution and World War I are compared in this thesis. The popular perception of women’s legacy of the French Revolution is that the Revolution cultivated the ideas of Republican Motherhood and the Cult of Domesticity while World War I catapulted women to the public sphere. These two contrasting legacies are compared to see if French women’s lived experiences, memories, and writings verify these popular perceptions. Or, do the writings of the French women present a different argument? The thesis compares the writings and the lived experiences of the French women through three different themes: the argument for political rights, victimization and agency, and gendered connections (the development of sisterhood for the Revolution) or gendered divides (women’s role on the home and war front). In addition, these three themes come together to show how it is difficult to come up with a collective, public memory.
ContributorsYu, Heajin (Author) / Thompson, Victoria (Thesis director) / Hopkins, Richard (Committee member) / Fuchs, Rachel (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
The Soviet Union suffered immensely as a result of World War II. When the dust settled and Soviet citizens began to rebuild their lives, the memory of the social, economic, and human costs of the war still remained. The Soviet state sought to frame the conflict in a way that provided meaning to the chaos that so drastically shaped the lives of its citizens. Film was one such way. Film, heavily censored until the Gorbachev period, provided the state with an easily malleable and distributable means of sharing official history and official memory. However, as time went on, film began to blur the lines between official memory and real history, providing opportunities for directors to create stories that challenged the regime's official war mythology. This project examines seven Soviet war films (The Fall of Berlin (1949), The Cranes are Flying (1957), Ballad of a Soldier (1959), Ivan's Childhood (1962), Liberation (1970-1971), The Ascent (1977), and Come and See (1985)) in the context of the regimes under which they were released. I examine the themes present within these films, comparing and contrasting them across multiple generations of Soviet post-war memory.
ContributorsScribner, Quinton Donald (Author) / Benkert, Volker (Thesis director) / Von Hagen, Mark (Committee member) / Manchester, Laurie (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
The Soviet Union suffered immensely as a result of World War II. When the dust settled and Soviet citizens began to rebuild their lives, the memory of the social, economic, and human costs of the war still remained. The Soviet state sought to frame the conflict in a way that provided meaning to the chaos that so drastically shaped the lives of its citizens. Film was one such way. Film, heavily censored until the Gorbachev period, provided the state with an easily malleable and distributable means of sharing official history and official memory. However, as time went on, film began to blur the lines between official memory and real history, providing opportunities for directors to create stories that challenged the regime's official war mythology. This project examines seven Soviet war films (The Fall of Berlin (1949), The Cranes are Flying (1957), Ballad of a Soldier (1959), Ivan's Childhood (1962), Liberation (1970-1971), The Ascent (1977), and Come and See (1985)) in the context of the regimes under which they were released. I examine the themes present within these films, comparing and contrasting them across multiple generations of Soviet post-war memory.
ContributorsScribner, Quinton Donald (Author) / Benkert, Volker (Thesis director) / Von Hagen, Mark (Committee member) / Manchester, Laurie (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies (Contributor)
Created2014-05