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 Dancing the Archive: Rhythms of Change in Post-Volcano Identities on Montserrat, West Indies(2016) Spanos, Kathleen Aurelia; Frederik, Laurie; Theatre; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In this dissertation, I demonstrate how improvisations within the structures of performance during Montserrat’s annual festivals produce “rhythms of change” that contribute to the formation of cultural identities. Montserrat is a small island of 39.5 square miles in the Caribbean’s Leeward Islands, and a volcanic disaster in the 1990s led to the loss of villages, homes, and material possessions. The crisis resulted in mass displacement and emigration, and today’s remaining population of 5,000 is now in a stage of post-volcano redevelopment. The reliability of written archives for establishing cultural knowledge is tenuous, and the community is faced with re-energizing cherished cultural traditions. This ethnographic research traces my embodied search for Montserrat’s history through an archive that is itself intangible and performative. Festivals produce some of the island’s most visible and culturally political events, and music and dance performances prompt on- and off-stage discussions about the island’s multifaceted heritage. The festival cycle provides the structure for ongoing renegotiations of what it means to be “Montserratian.” I focus especially on the island’s often-discussed and debated “triangular” heritage of Irishness, Africanness, and Montserratianness as it is performed during the festivals. Through my meanderings along the winding hilly roads of Montserrat, I explored reconfigurations of cultural memory through the island’s masquerade dance tradition and other festival celebrations. In this work, I introduce a “Cast of Characters,” each of whose scholarly, artistic, and public service work on Montserrat contributes to the shape and transformation of the island’s post-volcano cultural identities today. This dissertation is about the kinesthetic transmission of shared (and sometimes unshared) cultural knowledge, the substance of which echoes in the rhythms of Montserrat’s music and dance practices today.Item Practicing local culture as a vehicle of integration? Creative collaborations and Brussels' Zinneke Parade.(2012) Costanzo, Joseph M.; Brower, Sidney; Martiniello, Marco; Urban and Regional Planning and Design; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Immigrant integration, and socio-economic cohesion more broadly, continue to be top priorities at many levels of governance in Europe and are long-standing fixtures of scholarly, political and public debate across Europe and North America. Although integration and culture have been dominant themes in contemporary European and American social science and humanities literatures, their intersections--particularly involving immigrant participation in local arts and cultural activities--remain understudied. Through the use of mixed-methods research, my doctoral thesis addresses how participating in such creative activities serves as a vehicle for integration. This topic is examined within the context of the European capital city-region of Brussels, and provokes further inquiry into the role of place in integration and identity-making particularly within a context in which there is no universal or normative local identity. With the onsite support of local experts, artistic and cultural actors and the public at large, I examine the `creative collaboration' of Zinneke Parade 2010--a biennial socio-cultural and urban project with origins in the Brussels 2000 European Capital of Culture Programme (ECoC). Though politicians and community organizers frequently cite Zinneke as an exemplary project of the Brussels-Capital Region, to date, no formal study has been conducted neither into its role in bridging many of the city's socio-linguistic, spatial and economic divides nor into its role as a source for building local networks, social, cultural, economic or otherwise. Finally, this work is unique in its treatment of migrant and ethnic minority identity representations in an explicitly non-ethno-cultural event. In its biennial parade, Zinneke purposefully does not re-present separate ethno-cultural pasts, but instead reflects the identities of collective and creative efforts of today's local Bruxellois. Fielded throughout 2010 and early 2011, in-depth interviews, combined with short as well as detailed questionnaires, form the basis of data which I have collected to answer the question: Does practicing local culture facilitate integration?Item Cinema and Architecture: Designing for the Puerto Rico International Film Festival(2011) Fuentes-Figueroa, Merian Lorie; Quiros, Luis D; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Reality and Fiction collide, opposites interact and the local film culture is enhanced with the design of a home for the Puerto Rico International Film Festival. PRIFF is an opportunity to create a formal destination for individuals passionate about film and to establish the basis for a Puerto Rican film culture in a setting where users will interact and exchange ideas while they experience the shift between reality and fiction expressed in the architecture. The project is a hybrid idea that combines Cinemas, Cultural Center and Production Studios. It is a cultural hub that seats at the heart of a new master plan for an undeveloped site at the shore of the San Juan Bay.Item The Palio in Italian Renaissance Art, Thought, and Culture(2005-04-28) Tobey, Elizabeth MacKenzie; Colantuono, Anthony; Art History and Archaeology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: THE PALIO IN ITALIAN RENAISSANCE ART, THOUGHT,AND CULTURE Elizabeth MacKenzie Tobey, Doctor of Philosophy, 2005 Dissertation directed by: Dr. Anthony Colantuono, Associate Professor of Art History. University of Maryland. The palio race commemorates the history of Italian cities as it has done so since the late Middle Ages. Despite its cultural significance, and the popularity of ritual topics in Renaissance scholarship, there exists no comparable art historical study of the palio. In the thirteenth century, the proliferation of feast days in Italian cities coincided with growth in population and commerce. The palio race was the culminating, profane event in a series of sacred offerings and processions, in which representatives of the city's religious and political groups participated. The palio may have descended from the chariot races held in Roman Italy for pagan festivals. The city government organized and paid for the palio. In Siena, the participation of the contrade (neighborhood groups) in the palio helped to preserve the tradition in the face of Florentine rule. Italian cities, including Florence, were highly-regarded for their silk fabrics. Cities commissioned the largest and most opulent palio banners for the patronal feasts. Making the banner was a collaborative effort, involving the craftsmanship of banner-makers, furriers, painters, and even nuns. During religious processions, the banner was paraded through the city on a carro trionfale (triumphal chariot or cart), reminiscent of the vexillum, a cloth military standard used in triumphs of Roman antiquity. The palio banner challenges preconceptions of how Renaissance society valued art objects. The cost of making the banner equaled or exceeded payments for panel paintings or frescoes by well-known artists. Following the feast day, it was worth only the value of its materials, which were recycled or sold. Noble and ruling families competed against each other through their prize horses. These families imported the animals from North Africa and Ottoman Turkey, and gave them as diplomatic gifts. The trade in horses, like the textile trade, was part of an international commerce that brought countries and cultures together. Equestrian culture flowered during the Renaissance, in which horses began to be seen as individuals possessing admirable, even human, qualities. Palio horses achieved a level of fame parallel of the racing champions of the modern era, and were portrayed in paintings, prose, and verse.