Theses and Dissertations from UMD
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New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM
More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.
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Item HANDS FOUR AND PASS IT DOWN: GENERATIONAL ENCOUNTERS IN MODERN URBAN CONTRA DANCE(2017) Byrd, Deborah; Rios, Fernando; Music; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Contra dance is a form of folk dance with a heritage dating back hundreds of years. Now, in the early twenty-first century, contra dance is thriving, its participants successfully navigating elements of their multi-faceted lives to bring the living tradition into a relevant and meaningful present. In this dissertation, I examine generational encounters, with both vertical (from one generation to the next within contra dance) and horizontal (between members of the same generation but across genres) flows of ideas, as a means by which contra dance communities and practices are perpetuated. I approach this through a variety of perspectives. Culminating in the recent electronically-infused music crossover trend, which I locate as part of a larger twenty-first century remix phenomenon, this study delineates the younger generation’s contribution to the community while observing the interaction of the community as a whole. I describe contra dance as a community of practice in which participation is a key component for individuals to engage in and contribute to the practices of their communities, and for communities to refine their practice and ensure new generations of members. I analyze contra dance as a participatory practice in which style characteristics of the choreography and the music combine with a spirit of invitation to provide opportunities for people of varying levels of commitment, interests, and skills. This is valuable in bridging states of competence and challenge, and creating the possibility of optimal experience (flow). These practices allow contra dance to evolve with the times. Through this examination, contra dance is seen as a practice that has proven consistently malleable and open to transformation in both social context and in regard to music and dance capable of absorbing aspects of other styles. Contra dance, in all its facets, is not a vestige of the past, nor is it a passive form, but a practice fully in the present.Item The Teacher's Homecoming: Understanding Vocational Identity Development of Military Career Changers(2008-11-11) Fleming, Kimberly; McCaleb, Joseph; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)As increasing numbers of teacher candidates enter the field of education from other careers, teacher educators must consider the complexities of career transition. Insiders' accounts of vocational change can help teacher educators act with tact and authenticity in a way that is sensitive to the experiences of career changers. This study uses philosophical hermeneutics to develop understanding related to the sociocultural process of vocational identity development for two military career changers as they become teachers. The concept of identity is explored, and it is developed both as lived experience in community as well as a sense of self, fashioned through rememberings and imaginings. Two case studies center on Caucasian males with military experience who are transitioning into secondary English teaching positions. Thomas, a 50-year-old Air Force retiree with 24 years of service, is enrolled in a local school system-sponsored alternative preparation program. Rob, a 38-year-old past Verizon employee and current lieutenant in the Army Reserves, is enrolled in a Master of Arts in Teaching program. This study employs a participatory paradigm in which participants serve as co-researchers. The study follows each co-researcher into three communities of practice related to their teacher preparation and/or induction to teaching. Their experiences as persons-in-community are analyzed using a sociocultural perspective. The following constructs are explicated for each community of practice under study: place, social structures, practical tools, conceptual tools, metaphors, narratives, and imagined futures. Each community is shown to promote certain teaching identities while constraining others, although the process of vocational identity development emerges as a negotiation among person and community. In the spirit of Wenger (1998), each individual's nexus of being is then discussed, and vocational identity is explored in relation to coordination and contradiction of multiple communities as well as in mutual constitution with an individual's rememberings and imaginings. A vocational meta-story is told in archetypal language to represent the reverse coming of age which military career changers undergo on their journeys to become and belong as teachers. Finally, a synthesis of understandings related to identity, ways to make meaning, and the needs of military career changers is offered.