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This qualitative study examined how culture and community are created in the popular sports video game, NBA 2K. Sports video games are some of the most popular video games, but there has been lack of critical scholarship into these games. By engaging two popular cultural theories, the circuit of culture

This qualitative study examined how culture and community are created in the popular sports video game, NBA 2K. Sports video games are some of the most popular video games, but there has been lack of critical scholarship into these games. By engaging two popular cultural theories, the circuit of culture and the fields of cultural production, this study critically examined how culture shapes online communities in sports video games.By employing a variety of ethnographic methods including thick descriptions of cultural artifacts, an intake questionnaire, interviews with 17 NBA 2K players, and in-game participant observation, this study established cultural patterns, insider language, and other elements of culture within the NBA 2K community. The researcher learned to play NBA 2K, critically examined both physical and virtual cultural artifacts, conducted in-depth semi-structured interviews with game players, and participated in NBA 2K with study participants to contextualize their experiences. This study established NBA 2K as having some of the most advanced functions of any sports video games, including sophisticated multi-user domains (MUDs) and complex avatar (MyPLAYER) creation. NBA 2K offers a unique opportunity to create diverse MyPLAYER representations, setting the bar for sports video games to include people from varied physical identities. Though the game has made strides to include WNBA athletes, the lack of gendered options for the MyPLAYER feature reinforces misogynistic and hegemonic power structures that are common in both sports culture and gaming culture.
ContributorsForbes, Allison (Author) / Gilpin, Dawn (Thesis advisor) / Gray, Kishonna (Committee member) / Reed, Sada (Committee member) / Silcock, Burton (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021
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Description
Personal training is a growing industry as individuals across the U.S. face increasing levels of physical and psychological health issues. Hiring a certified personal trainer (CPT) presents an opportunity to not only become healthier, but also to grow one’s knowledge and abilities; researchers refer to this process as self-expansion. This

Personal training is a growing industry as individuals across the U.S. face increasing levels of physical and psychological health issues. Hiring a certified personal trainer (CPT) presents an opportunity to not only become healthier, but also to grow one’s knowledge and abilities; researchers refer to this process as self-expansion. This research sought to specify a path model of the self-expansion process clients experience while training with their CPT. Secondly, this research described clients’ self-reported disclosure patterns with their CPT. Using Amazon’s Mechanical Turk and ResearchMatch, the study sampled N = 392 U.S. residents who reported training with a CPT. Results from the path analysis indicated poor global fit; however, local fit supported several statistically significant paths. Clients’ level of internal motivation was positively associated with their self-disclosure, self-expansion, and self-pruning. Clients’ self-disclosure was positively associated with perceived closeness with their CPT. Contrary to prediction, clients’ perceived closeness was negatively associated with perceived support from their CPT. However, clients’ perceived closeness and perceived levels of support were both positively associated with their reported levels of self-expansion. Regarding clients’ disclosures, results indicated that clients primarily discuss physical training, diet and nutrition, and health concerns. Thematic analysis of self-reported disclosure examples revealed discussion topics including body dysmorphia, loss and grief, mental health, personal relationships, physical health, professionalism, support seeking, trainer sharing, and trust. Theoretical implications for the self-expansion model include support for additional variables in the self-expansion process, including motivation, self-disclosure, perceived support, and self-pruning. Additionally, practical recommendations for CPTs include an awareness of the type of relationship that clients may desire, as closeness may inhibit perceptions of support with training. Further, CPTs should be aware of the disclosures they may encounter, as clients may share intimate information and seek social support. As such, training programs should include sections on active listening and empathy and require CPTs to be knowledgeable of community resources in the event of a disclosure that presents a serious health risk to the client. Additional research is necessary, particularly to investigate closeness in the self-expansion process, as it did not function as expected within service and professional relationships.
ContributorsShufford, Kevin Nelson (Author) / Adame, Bradley (Thesis advisor) / Randall, Ashley K (Thesis advisor) / Mongeau, Paul (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021
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Description
Since its implementation in 1966, the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) has greatly informed preservation practice in the United States. As a primary text for the professionalization of the field of preservation, it not only acts as a law, but establishes an ideological framework that informs practices which impact

Since its implementation in 1966, the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) has greatly informed preservation practice in the United States. As a primary text for the professionalization of the field of preservation, it not only acts as a law, but establishes an ideological framework that informs practices which impact public memory in the US by determining what places remain, how they are transformed (or not), and whose stories they tell. The objective of this study is to explore the communicative dimensions of the NHPA to better understand how its rhetoric informs practice, and thus, informs public memory in the US. This study employs a meta-method of crystallization which engages a range of analysis methods. First, I conducted a close rhetorical analysis of the NHPA’s text which provided insight into ideologies within the law, opportunities for practice, and limitations on practice through the law’s definitive conceptualization of public memory. Next, I completed a qualitative case study of a preservation organization. I participated in extended field observation, conducted interviews with organizational staff, and engaged in walking methods in the city. The analysis offered insight into local discourses (everyday talk) which built into Discourses (ideologies) and demonstrated how the NHPA informs d/Discourses of preservation, even when it is not required. Although local practice was informed by the NHPA, the analysis also revealed methods for challenging and resisting the NHPA. Finally, I engaged in arts-based methods to examine how National Register listings (products of the NHPA) provide aesthetic and narrative precedents for determining ‘significance’ and worth in preservation practice. Through a poetic exhibition entitled Mythed Places, I artistically analyzed the NRHP, arguing that by giving historic sites the quality of myths, the NHPA attempts to arrest multiple unfolding narratives of places in service of a national myth. This project demonstrates that the NHPA communicatively constructs US preservation practice through its ambiguity, implied morality, and formation of a mythic national community. Although the current structure requires preservationists, even those not legally bound to the NHPA, to work within its framework, this study showcases ways to disrupt the discursive boundaries and practice preservation more critically.
ContributorsWheeler, Ashley (Author) / Brouwer, Daniel C (Thesis advisor) / Zanin, Alaina C (Committee member) / McHugh, Kevin E (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021
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Description
Modernity has become a goal for every nation in this time of a globalized and connected world. Nevertheless, in the 21st century, modernity is inherently reflexive as nations have the sources and technologies to adopt their own identity and act upon it. Global media is a mirror of their national

Modernity has become a goal for every nation in this time of a globalized and connected world. Nevertheless, in the 21st century, modernity is inherently reflexive as nations have the sources and technologies to adopt their own identity and act upon it. Global media is a mirror of their national identity and social structure. Thus, this dissertation sets the scope to explore how global news media frames national identity in the context of reflexive modernity.This study examines the ways that global online news channels frame the Saudi transition to modernization, epitomizing Saudi Vision 2030. Guided by framing theory, this study explores how global online news channels (i.e., Al Arabiya, Al Jazeera, RT, BBC, and CNN) have positioned the Saudi identity (i.e., avowal and ascription) and framed the structure of the Saudi identity (i.e., indulgence, restraint, certainty, uncertainty, thriving governance, and doomed governance). The study utilized a mixed-method content analysis of news articles (N = 584) that include paragraphs (N = 7846) from three years, April 25, 2016, to April 25, 2019. The study results indicated that global online news channels framed the Saudi cultural identity and political identity heterogeneously, but the Saudi economic identity was framed homogenously. The study’s findings revealed that the English online news channels positioned the Saudi cultural identity different from the Arabic online news channels. The Study also found that Al Jazeera-Arabic framed the Saudi national identity across all contexts differently compared to Al Arabiya-Arabic. The study also showed that uncertainty and restraint were used to frame the Saudi cultural and political identity, while human rights issues were the central theme for the framing process. The study concluded that, in reflexive modernity, global online news channels frame the national identity through three cues: Deviation (glocalization), Domination (interpretive community), and Hybridization (humanization). This study contributes to the literature on framing by providing a new measurable and replicable model—the national identity frame model. The study advances the literature on media framing by providing conceptual and operational definitions to bridge the gap between the micro and macro levels in the context of modernization and global identities.
ContributorsSahly, Abdulsamad H (Author) / Silcock, B. William (Thesis advisor) / Gilpin, Dawn (Committee member) / Gallab, Abdullahi (Committee member) / Kwon, K. Hazel (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021
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Description
Chronic illness can be a stressful experience that requires coping and support. In the last twenty years, Shared Medical Appointments (SMAs) were developed in U.S. healthcare as a response to the rising rates and challenges of chronic disease management. Due to the infancy of the SMA model, however, little is

Chronic illness can be a stressful experience that requires coping and support. In the last twenty years, Shared Medical Appointments (SMAs) were developed in U.S. healthcare as a response to the rising rates and challenges of chronic disease management. Due to the infancy of the SMA model, however, little is known or understood about the benefits of group medical care for patients. To date, scholars have not explored or systematically observed the communicative aspects of the SMA model. Communal coping, a theoretical framework that foregrounds group interaction and communication, offers a pragmatic lens for exploring how patients collectively cope with the stressors of chronic illness in the context of SMAs. Using qualitative methods, I conducted participant observation of SMAs at a Veterans Affairs hospital to analyze the communicative, transactional nature of communal coping as it unfolded among heart failure patients, family members, and providers in context. I also conducted interviews with SMA attendees. Analysis is based on 56 hours of fieldwork and 14 hours of interviews. Findings of this dissertation revealed group members who attended heart failure SMAs engaged in communal coping to manage the stressors of chronic illness. Group members moved through four primary phases of the communal coping process: (1) establish a communal coping orientation; (2) discuss shared stressors; (3) engage in cooperative action; and (4) practice communal reflexivity. Findings suggest patients become empowered by group interaction during SMAs as they move through each phase of the communal coping process. This dissertation also highlights various communicative strategies providers' use during SMAs to facilitate communal coping and group interaction. Theoretically, this dissertation expands upon existing knowledge of communal coping by exploring how individuals embody and socially construct the communal coping process. Specifically, this dissertation extends past models of communal coping with the addition of the communal reflexivity phase and through conceptualizing communal coping as a facilitated process of empowerment. Pragmatically, this research also offers insight to the benefits patients derive from attending SMAs, such as reduced feelings of stigma and isolation and improved motivation.
ContributorsHoffman, Trisha K (Author) / Miller, Katherine I (Thesis advisor) / Tracy, Sarah J. (Thesis advisor) / Lederman, Linda C (Committee member) / Dev, Sandesh (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
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Description
This dissertation presents a new tool for analysis of the way difficult experiences

or phenomena influence the process for constructing self-identity in the performance of everyday life. This concept, refraction, emerged as part of a grounded theory methods analysis of ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Itacaré, Bahia, Brazil from January to July

This dissertation presents a new tool for analysis of the way difficult experiences

or phenomena influence the process for constructing self-identity in the performance of everyday life. This concept, refraction, emerged as part of a grounded theory methods analysis of ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Itacaré, Bahia, Brazil from January to July 2014. The work here contributes to the field of performance studies as a possibility for examining how affective responses to difficult experiences contribute to a shift in perspective and subsequently shifts in the performance of self in everyday life. This research was conducted with critical and reflexive autoethnographic methods in order to hold the research accountable for the ways subject position influences the research. In this case the most salient theme that emerged from these autoethnographic methods was an unpacking of unacknowledged tourist privilege in this setting. The resulting work-in-progress

performance will offer ways for spectators to question their own assumptions

regarding tourist privilege in Brazil, and in so-called developing countries in similar

tropical climates. An additional contribution to the field of performance-based research that resulted from this dissertation is the articulation of a dynamic locus of creativity wherein rigorous established qualitative research methods complement creative practices in conjunction with a spectrum of tacit knowledge and theoretical sensitivities. This juncture becomes the theoretical space where creativity in research can be articulated in ways that are legible to both artists and researchers.
ContributorsPorter, Laurelann (Author) / de la Garza, Sarah Amira (Thesis advisor) / Underiner, Tamara (Thesis advisor) / Mcelroy, Isis (Committee member) / Gomez, Alan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
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Description
Black male students experience a number of issues related to identity during the persistence process, which have potential to deter them from graduating. Some of these issues include feeling isolated and lack of access to resources due to their ethnic and/or racial identities. Recent statistics indicate that though there is

Black male students experience a number of issues related to identity during the persistence process, which have potential to deter them from graduating. Some of these issues include feeling isolated and lack of access to resources due to their ethnic and/or racial identities. Recent statistics indicate that though there is an increase in college enrollment for Black students, the graduation rate is disproportionate to their enrollment. Using critical race theory, co-cultural theory, and communication theory of identity, this study investigated the role of identity in the persistence of Black male students’ graduation rates. Specifically, the central question was ‘What role, if any, do identity processes play in Black male students' decisions to continue or depart from a Predominantly White Institution?’ In order to answer this question, fifteen first-generation Black male college students were interviewed in order to understand the specific experiences that impacted them in relation to graduation. The study sample included a subset of Black male athletes who were found to have distinct differences in college experiences based solely on their athlete status. The overall results indicate that Black male students have expectations of the persistence process and that their personal identity also plays a significant role in the persistence process. In order to maintain their identities and continue with coursework, Black males enacted persistence strategies that were consistent with an overall goal of graduating. Research findings suggest that Black males must maintain a strong personal identity in order to maintain their personal commitment to graduation and college institutions can support them in this endeavor. Research outcomes also suggest that Black males should have a plan of persistence upon entering college, which is constantly reinforced as a graduation motivator.
ContributorsRobinson, Jennifer Christine (Author) / Martin, Judith (Thesis advisor) / Alberts, Jess (Committee member) / Jimenez-Castellanos, Oscar (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
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Description
This dissertation examines compassion in healthcare organizations through a lens of structuration theory. The purpose of this study is to identify structures that healthcare workers describe as enabling and/or constraining compassion, and the ways that healthcare workers (re)produce and transform these structures. Through qualitative, semi-structured interviews with healthcare workers, this

This dissertation examines compassion in healthcare organizations through a lens of structuration theory. The purpose of this study is to identify structures that healthcare workers describe as enabling and/or constraining compassion, and the ways that healthcare workers (re)produce and transform these structures. Through qualitative, semi-structured interviews with healthcare workers, this study reveals that multiple structures in healthcare constrain compassion at different stages of the compassion process (i.e., recognizing, relating, and (re)acting). Findings also illuminate how healthcare workers engage in individual and collective compassion to support coworkers, which can (re)produce or challenge the status quo of compassion in organizations. This study extends compassion scholarship by: (a) delineating the differences between individual compassion, group compassion, and organizational compassion, (b) highlighting how structurational divergence in healthcare stunts compassion, (c) examining the limits and consequences of emphasizing compassion in healthcare, and (d) offering insight on the varied success of compassion programs.
ContributorsLeach, Rebecca Brin (Author) / Zanin, Alaina C (Thesis advisor) / Tracy, Sarah J (Thesis advisor) / Adame, Elissa A (Committee member) / Canary, Heather E (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022
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Description
Employee voicing facilitates positive changes and experiences for organizations and employees. However, despite a plethora of research on voice in different disciplines, our understanding of the process of employee voicing is still limited. This study seeks to (a) identify the phases that characterize the voicing process and (b) uncover the

Employee voicing facilitates positive changes and experiences for organizations and employees. However, despite a plethora of research on voice in different disciplines, our understanding of the process of employee voicing is still limited. This study seeks to (a) identify the phases that characterize the voicing process and (b) uncover the communicative strategies that characterize the different phases of the voicing process in the renewable energy industry in Kenya. The study utilized a qualitative approach. Namely, semi-structured interviews were conducted with twenty-three renewable energy workers in Kenya who reported to have engaged in voicing. Data were analyzed using a grounded theory approach. The findings revealed five core phases that characterize voicing: idea formation, planning, initial enactment, reflexive enactment, and outcome. Further, the findings uncovered a variety of communicative strategies that are used in the different phases of voicing. These strategies emerged from the perspectives of different actors such as voicers, voicers’ peers, and recipients and their peers who are involved in the voicing process. The findings of this study advance voice theory by reconceptualizing voicing as a process that is highly interactive. Additionally, the findings extend voice theory in three other ways. First, the results demonstrate that power and status disparities in organizations produce hierarchies that inhibit voicing, especially among low power and status employees. Participants discussed how they communicatively navigate these disparities. Second, the results shed light on the ways voicers navigate different risks associated with voicing such as idea stealing and retributions. Third, the findings illustrate the specific ways that positive communicative relationships between peers, and between supervisors and subordinates facilitate voicing. Both supervisors and peers are highly involved in all phases of the voicing process and thus, contribute to the development and enactment of the ideas. Finally, the findings offer practical ways for cultivating and fostering voicing to voicers, voicers’ peers, voice recipients, and organizations in the renewable energy industry.
ContributorsKiura, Mary (Author) / Kim, Heewon (Thesis advisor) / Mongeau, Paul (Committee member) / Waldron, Vincent (Committee member) / Bisel, Ryan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022
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The focus of this study was to explore the socialization process of aerial acrobats to pain and how these workers (re)produce traditional Circus d/Discourses through occupational identity enactment. The two research questions posed in this study were answered through semi-structured interviews with 27 professional acrobats and the arts-based elicitation method

The focus of this study was to explore the socialization process of aerial acrobats to pain and how these workers (re)produce traditional Circus d/Discourses through occupational identity enactment. The two research questions posed in this study were answered through semi-structured interviews with 27 professional acrobats and the arts-based elicitation method of Photovoice. A phronetic iterative analysis revealed a subcategory of body work—pain work. Pain workers are those employees who are required to sustain, endure, and manage embodied pain to enact their occupational role. This study introduced a four-phase cyclical socialization process model through which pain work is enacted: (a) experience, (b) tolerate, (c) embrace, and (d) proselytize. Using a dramaturgical analysis framework, the findings of this study revealed aerial acrobats engage three front stage and three backstage identity enactment strategies that (re)produce institutional d/Discourses: (a) masking pain, (b) performing-despite-risk, (c) artistic sacrifice, (d) body-work double bind, (e) complicit anonymity, and (f) self-deprecation. The findings of this study carry theoretical and methodological implications for organizational communication literature in the areas of socialization, identification, and body work, as well as embodiment in qualitative research. Importantly, this study demonstrates how discourse simultaneously changes collective embodied experiences and social realities by portraying the vivid, tangible consequences on members. Limitations of the study and future directions of research are discussed.
ContributorsMartinez, Laura Victoria (Author) / Tracy, Sara J (Thesis advisor) / Zanin, Alaina C (Thesis advisor) / Brummans, Boris HJM (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022