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 Screening Diversity: Women & Work in Twenty-First-Century Popular Culture(2016) Brunner, Laura; Bolles, A. Lynn; Women's Studies; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Screening Diversity: Women and Work in Twenty-first Century Popular Culture explores contemporary representations of diverse professional women on screen. Audiences are offered successful women with limited concerns for feminism, anti-racism, or economic justice. I introduce the term viewsers to describe a group of movie and television viewers in the context of the online review platform Internet Movie Database (IMDb) and the social media platforms Twitter and Facebook. Screening Diversity follows their engagement in a representative sample of professional women on film and television produced between 2007 and 2015. The sample includes the television shows, Scandal, Homeland, VEEP, Parks and Recreation, and The Good Wife, as well as the movies, Zero Dark Thirty, The Proposal, The Heat, The Other Woman, I Don’t Know How She Does It, and Temptation. Viewsers appreciated female characters like Olivia (Scandal), and Maya (Zero Dark Thiry) who treated their work as a quasi-religious moral imperative. Producers and viewsers shared the belief that unlimited time commitment and personal identification were vital components of professionalism. However, powerful women, like The Proposal’s Margaret and VEEP’s Selina, were often called bitches. Some viewsers embraced bitch-positive politics in recognition of the struggles of women in power. Women’s disproportionate responsibility for reproductive labor, often compromises their ability to live up to moral standards of work. Unlike producers, viewsers celebrated and valued that labor. However, texts that included serious consideration of women as workers were frequently labelled chick flicks or soap operas. The label suggested that women’s labor issues were not important enough that they could be a topic of quality television or prestigious film, which bolstered the idea that workplace equality for women is not a problem in which the general public is implicated. Emerging discussions of racial injustice on television offered hope that these formations are beginning to shift.Item "The other side of the picture": Social History, Popular Culture, and the Idea of the Sand Creek Massacre(2015) Tanner, Kerry; Bell, Richard; History; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Competing schools of thought regarding American imperialism, American constructions of race, Native American experiences, and white settlers’ place within the American West can be seen in non-fiction and fictional accounts of the 1864 Sand Creek massacre in what is now eastern Colorado. Due to a range of factors including the emergence of social history methodology and Cold War politics, a shift in both American historiography and fictional representations of Native Americans and the West can be observed in certain scholarly works and Western films and novels during the period 1945-1970. Debates over the meaning of Sand Creek, often inspired by film representations, also reveal Coloradans’ and Americans’ attempts to reckon with shameful and embarrassing events of the past by contesting notions of race and imperialism presented by Western fiction.Item Pleated(2014) Miracle, Stephanie Danielle; Pearson, Sara; Dance; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Pleated, rich in technicolor, full of imagination and wistfulness woven together with sincere characters, raw relationships, and a rock-n-roll soundtrack, is a piece about family, memory, and place. Pleated reverses the Dance Theatre of the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center and inhabits this odd space by dancing in front, inside, and on top of this tall vertical wall of folded red, purple, and gray theatre seats. Costumes in crayon box colors react sharply against the strange backdrop. The clashing gives off a vibrant burst of energy, reminiscent of a messy, adolescent bedroom. A non-linear narrative unfolds slowly, following three sisters as they revisit moments of their past together. The dance shifts seamlessly through a series of vignettes, which culminate in an emotionally volatile scene of accusation and forgiveness.Item Archfilm: Cinema and the Architectural Promenade(2011) Aello, Dominic Michael; Noonan, Peter; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Archfilm: Cinema and the Architectural Promenade, engages and addresses the complex and interwoven relationship between the virtual world of cinema and the built environment. The thesis questions whether the architectural promenade, enhanced by the cinematic use of sequence and montage, can create an enhanced and holistic experience for the users of a building and its accompanying site. This enhanced experience will aid in re-sensitizing the visitor to their surroundings within the realities of both the natural and man-made worlds. In creating a cinematically inspired architecture the program of the visual arts and film are shown to enrich, heighten, and embed meaning within the audience's experience as they interact with the project. These ideas will be examined through the program of a movie theater and film school for the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) located in Baltimore, MD.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 Development of an Experiment for Measuring Film Cooling Performance in Supersonic Flows(2011) Maqbool, Daanish; Cadou, Christopher P; Aerospace Engineering; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This thesis describes the development of an experiment for acquiring supersonic film cooling performance data in canonical configurations suitable for code validation. A methodology for selecting appropriate experimental conditions is developed and used to select test conditions in the UMD atmospheric pressure wind tunnel that are relevant to film cooling conditions encountered in the J-2X rocket engine. A new technique for inferring wall heat flux with 10% uncertainty from temperature-time histories of embedded sensors is developed and implemented. Preliminary heat flux measurements on the uncooled upper wall and on the lower wall with the film cooling flow turned off suggest that RANS solvers using Menter's SST model are able to predict heat flux within 15% in the far-field (> 10 injection slot heights) but are very inaccurate in the near-field. However, more experiments are needed to confirm this finding. Preliminary Schlieren images showing the shear layer growth rate are also presented.Item Beyond Racial Stereotypes: Subversive Subtexts in Cabin in the Sky(2008-09-02) Weber, Kate Marie; King, Richard; Music; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The 1943 film Cabin in the Sky holds an important place in cinematic history as one of the first "all-Negro" pictures produced by a major Hollywood studio. The movie musical reflects a transitional period in American racial politics and popular culture, when long-established stereotypes and themes associated with blackness were still prevalent, but were shifting to reflect more progressive attitudes. On the surface, Cabin seems to reinforce reductive and conventional notions. It presents a folkloric story of Southern blacks, the corrupting influence of modern urbanity, and the redemptive power of marital devotion and religious piety--replete with the entire pantheon of Negro caricatures. Upon careful analysis, however, the film's stereotypical topics are rendered superficial by subversive undercurrents. In addition, Ethel Waters' appearance as herself exposes the story and characters as fictional constructs, and paves the way for a more liberal image of blackness to emerge.Item Constructions of Violent Jamaican Masculinity in Film and Literature(2008-07-28) Harewood, Gia; Collins, Merle; English Language and Literature; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Greg Dimitriadis and Cameron McCarthy sketch out what they see as an emergent postcolonial aesthetic percolating in the postcolonial artist's imagination. According to their analysis, postcolonial artists make meaning in their work through three critical motifs that help shape this aesthetic: "counterhegemonic representation, double or triple coding, and emancipatory or utopic visions" (19, italics in original). Counterhegemonic representation "rework[s] the center-versus-periphery distinction . . . to look beyond its strictures to new histories, new discourses, new ways of being" (24). Double coding combines "two or more fields of reference or idiom in any given work" pulling images from places such as "the East and the West, the first world and the Third, the colonial master and the slave" (26). And utopic visions are about "imagining possibility even when faced with impossible barriers" (30). My project is fundamentally interested in constructing healthy (masculine) identities and its arguments are ultimately guided by their first and third motifs. Using feminist theory, masculinity studies, cultural studies and postcolonial theory, I focus on the representation of black Jamaican men as violent criminal beings in three films (The Harder They Come, Third World Cop and Shottas), two novels (The Harder They Come and For Nothing at All) and one ethnographic travelogue (Born Fi' Dead). I argue that "real/reel" Jamaican masculinity is ultimately connected to gun violence and the most popular films out of Jamaica over the past thirty years only perpetuate this image. While not the only source for role models, visual images play a significant role in the lives of young men (and women) who are trying to live up to social standards of masculinity. With limited access to social mobility, they often emulate the shotta (gangster) glory that they see sparkling on the screen. Through close readings of these texts, I show how hegemonic masculinity is reinforced and reveal that non-violent models of masculinity do exist, despite being overshadowed by violent "heroes." I call for that "utopic vision," to excavate the vulnerable and intervene on behalf of peace to help young men and boys find alternative models of masculinity and ultimately create sustainable communities.Item Reel Black Masculinities: Using Film and Media Literacy to Provide Opportunities for White Female Future Teachers to See Black Males Through a Culturally Responsive Lens(2008-07-11) Young, Regina Allison; Wiseman, Donna L; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The purpose of this study was to document how popular film was used to provide opportunities for future teachers to explore their perceptions of Black masculinities and the lived experiences of young Black men. A case study design was used and data was gathered through a perceptions survey, interviews, observations, a focus group, and analysis of written reflections and computer-mediated communication (Merriam, 1998). Purposeful sampling was used to select two instructors from a large, public university in the North East and they were observed and interviewed. Boyz N the Hood and Finding Forrester were used in a diversity course, secondary English methods course and an adolescent literature course. A third instructor from a private university in the North East was interviewed regarding Stand and Deliver in a course on culturally relevant math strategies. Fifty-eight future teachers also participated in the study. The majority of participants were White females and therefore representative of the current teacher workforce (Swartz, 2003; National Center for Educational Statistics, 2003). The interpretational analysis of the data used a culturally responsive lens (Gay & Kirkland, 2003; Kea, Campbell-Whatley & Richards 2004) and a media literacy framework (Kellner & Share, 2005). Analysis of the data from the three instructors indicated that each instructor used film in different ways. Film was used (1) to inspire and encourage new teachers to teach by providing a model of a successfully implemented, culturally relevant, math lesson, (2) primarily as literature providing an opportunity for critical analysis of a non-print text and a discussion of Black male masculinities and (3) to educate students about stereotypes and their perceptions of young Black men. The data from the students indicated that (1) future teachers felt safe from criticism when they were allowed to reflect online; (2) without guidance from the instructor or critical literacy questions students were able to avoid discussions of race; (3) film provided a multi-layered image that impacted the students and; (4) cultural critical consciousness was difficult to assess and measure. Finally, a framework for using film emerged from exploring the teaching strategies used in this study.Item "HUNGRY TO SEE OURSELVES REFLECTED": IDENTITY, REPRESENTATION AND BLACK FEMALE SPECTATORSHIP(2004-10-12) George, Eva Marie; Parks, Sheri L; American Studies; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)While much has been written about the portrayals of Black women in popular culture, scholars have observed that little attention is paid to the experiences of Black women as cultural consumers. This analysis of Black female spectatorship examines theories related to this experience and the various relationships individuals may have with media. This study sheds light on the ways Black women's spectatorship is shaped by gender, race, class and sexual orientation. Through qualitative methods, we hear the voices of Black women in the Washington, D.C. area reflecting on various forms of popular culture, particularly film. Some of the media women responded to in this study include Waiting to Exhale, The Best Man, Jungle Fever, among others. Responses from a focus group, on-on-one interviews and questionnaires provide evidence of the ways in which Black women engage in multiple relationships with images they see in the media. Ultimately, many of the African American women in this study disregard negative images of Black women and purposely choose types of media that sustain their sense of self and help them maintain a positive identity.