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 DELINEATING DEMOGRAPHIC PATTERNS: ANALYZING PARTICIPATION IN PRISON MISCONDUCT AND EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS(2024) Shepherd, Gwynne Laurel; Tahamont, Sarah; Stewart, Robert; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)While it is acclaimed that participation in educational programming reduces the likelihood of an individual engaging in misconduct, the body of literature describing prison misconduct and educational programming participation largely treats the two as isolated processes. However, the contexts of how prison education and misconduct intersect are obscured in the limited scholarship. Using the Bureau of Justice Statistics’ Survey of Prison Inmates collected in 2016, individuals were categorized into four groups (1) “Rule Breakers” who only participated in misconduct, (2) “Students” who participated in only educational programming, (3) “None” who participated in neither, and (4) “Both” for those who participated in both. Weighted cross-tabulations of each group were conducted across multiple demographic characteristics to determine the demographic distribution within each group. The findings of this analysis demonstrate that the characteristics of race, level of prior educational attainment, and age all show disproportional distributions depending on group participation. Additionally, this analysis could inform prison policy, emphasizing the importance of providing educational opportunities even for those who engage in misconduct. Such policies could offer broader societal benefits, reducing recidivism and aiding reintegration.Item Black Racial Grievance, Black American Identity, and Black Political Participation(2024) St Sume, Jennifer; Laird, Chryl; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation explores the relationship among Black racial grievance, Black American identity, and Black political participation. Black racial grievance is defined as the extent to which Black individuals believe their racial group is mistreated in the United States. This study is divided into three articles. The first article explores the link between Black racial grievance and Black American identity. Political science research has found that racial discrimination makes Black people feel less American (Huddy and Khatib 2007; Kam and Ramos 2008; Theiss-Morse 2009; Levundusky 2017). However, the consequences of discrimination and how they shape what it means to be a Black American remain underexplored. This paper addresses this critical gap, arguing that Black Americans consider their racial group’s treatment and the consequences of this treatment in their self-conception as Americans. I propose a new six-item measure of Black racial grievance, capturing Black perceptions of unfair treatment regarding their racial group, the current significance of racial grievance, and their awareness of these grievances across social, political, and economic domains. Using two national samples, I find that Black people who score higher on the racial grievance measure—indicative of a belief that the mistreatment of their racial group is a problem to be addressed across American society —feel less American. These findings underscore the importance of institutional inequality in Black politics. The second article examines the relationship between Black racial grievance and Black political participation. Previous research has employed measures such as relative deprivation, group consciousness, politicized collective identity, and linked fate to predict Black political participation. However, these measures fail to explain how individuals define their personal Black racial grievance, overlooking how these grievances shape Black participation. These shortcomings are driven by the assumption that little variation exists in Black political behavior. Accordingly, I argue that Black Americans rely on specific evaluations of racial grievance to determine whether to participate in politics. I develop a refined measure of Black racial grievance that captures the extent to which an individual perceives their racial group as being treated unfairly across various domains. I validate this measure through factor analysis and assess its robustness by comparing it to previous measures. As a proof of concept, I find that Black people who score higher on the racial grievance scale—those who feel their group is treated unfairly in more domains of society—and feel strongly attached to their racial group are more likely to participate in politics. The third article investigates the causal links among Black racial grievance, Black American identity, and Black political participation. Current research suggests that Black participation is motivated by perceptions of discrimination (Klandermans, 2014). To date, scant research has explored the interplay among Black racial grievance, Black American identity, and Black political participation. Therefore, this study addresses this gap by evaluating how Black racial grievance shapes political behavior among Black Americans. Using data from a national survey of 505 Black adults, I introduce a new measure of Black racial grievance and explore its impact on political engagement. The findings reveal that while experiencing racial discrimination increases racial grievance, it also complicates the relationship with political participation. Specifically, elevated levels of racial grievance correlate with decreased political participation in contexts where individuals feel disillusioned with the prospect of systemic changes. Thus, Black people with high Black racial grievance may choose not to vote or engage in political campaigns if they believe these actions will not lead to meaningful change. This article illustrates how Black racial grievance can sometimes hinder political action. Overall, this dissertation offers three significant contributions to the study of Black political behavior. First, it provides a novel framework to explain how Black people process racial mistreatment. Second, it highlights the intricate interplay among racial grievance, identity, and political action. Third, it lays the groundwork for future research on policy interventions tailored to the unique challenges faced by Black Americans. Ultimately, this work enhances the understanding of systemic marginalization and improves the ability to foster a more inclusive and equitable democracy.Item Living a Participatory Life: Reformatting Rhetoric for Demanding, Digital Times(2023) Salzano, Matthew; Pfister, Damien S; Communication; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Living a Participatory Life explores how people navigate demanding, digital times where social movements and digital media meet, in the context of what media scholars refer to as the participatory condition. The participatory condition describes how participation is an inherent, inescapable condition of digitality with its always-on and always-prompting media; it is distinctly different from the participatory cultures theorized of the blogosphere and Web 2.0. In the participatory condition, the digital is demanding, and our demands are digitized. What does it mean to live a participatory life in the participatory condition? How should we practice rhetoric (as a productive and critical art) during demanding, digital times? To aid in answering these questions, this dissertation offers a format theory of participation. I theorize four key concepts—parameters, imperatives, trans-situations, and sensibilities—to define participation as a formatted rhetorical practice that modulates affect and sensibilities within a formatted ecology. In the following three chapters, I locate three participatory sensibilities from advocates for social change across intersectional issues: Disparticipants, offering participatory dissent at the Women’s March; Fictocritics, generating criticism of the YouTube manosphere; and Installectuals, transforming Instagram during the Summer 2020 resurgence of Black Lives Matter activism. Each illustrates the ramifications of the participatory condition and how advocates for social change navigate it. The dissertation concludes with a provocation to learn from these sensibilities and begin reformatting our own participatory lives.Item Designing to Engage Users in Sustainable Buildings(2015) Grzywa, Ashley; Draper, Powel; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This thesis is an investigation of how buildings can be designed to encourage pro-environmental behavior by engaging users in a sustainable built environment. By engaging users in sustainability building design can reestablish a cultural understanding of humanity’s interdependence with the natural environment. The basis for investigation is a brief analysis of how cultural perceptions of the natural environment have changed over time and an understanding of what motivates pro-environmental behavior. Understanding of the types of work done and spaces used by building occupants throughout a work day informs opportunities for user engagement in the production, consumption, recycling and monitoring of energy, water and waste. Insights revealed through this research culminate in a design proposal for an office building that integrates user engagement with sustainable building performance and puts us on a path toward cultural transition to sustainable behavior and symbiosis with the natural environment.Item To bid or not to bid: An investigation into economic incentives underling auction participation(2012) DePiper, Geret Sean; Lipton, Douglas W; Agricultural and Resource Economics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation investigates the individual characteristics correlated with auction participation decisions using data from two commercial fishing license buybacks. I use the joint empirical analysis of stated and revealed preferences, with two major findings emerging. First, the results of my analysis suggest that individuals with relatively low willingness to accept values and low engagement in the fishery faced problems with the participation decision which prevented them from tendering bids in the auction. This has serious policy implications given that the efficiency of reverse auctions relies on buying goods back from individuals who value them the least. The low participation rate suggests that the licenses bought back represent between 47 - 64 percent of the maximum achievable with the same funds under a first best outcome. Second, fishermen are frequently modeled as strict profit maximizers and harvest histories are often assumed to serve as a good proxy for expected future profits in many circumstances. I find evidence against both of these assumptions. Indicators for bequest and enjoyment values are associated with an increased bid equivalent to that of a $6,500 - $20,000 increase in annual profits. Indicators of bequest and enjoyment values are also significantly correlated with the decision of whether to tender a bid at all. Expected future usage patterns are an important consideration in the participation decisions, and the expected usage can differ significantly from past usage patterns. These results suggest that market experience plays an important role in auction participation decisions, and the problems which develop from inexperience should be addressed explicitly through the auction design.Item CREATIVE REBELLION FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY: THE REINVIGORATION OF AMERICAN POLITICAL LIFE THROUGH PUBLIC ART(2010) Boros, Diana Zsuzsanna; Glass, James M.; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Drawing on the work of Tocqueville, Nietzsche, Camus, and Marcuse, this work argues that there is an urgent political and societal need for greater support of public art projects and better access to these sources of funding. More art in public spaces would revive and animate communal environments, create new relationships between the individual and the public, strengthen feelings of community, and foster the desire to participate in the public. All art creates participatory desire and behavior, but visionary art is how political progress through individual rebellion can be best accessed and articulated. This work defines visionary artistic creation as the union of instinctual creative energies and rational reflection. Mainstream art, despite its aesthetic rearrangements, fails to connect the viewer with questions that will engage them over time. Visionary art, especially the public and social, is needed to seek out and materialize the newest, alternative possibilities for our individual lives, for our societies, and for the political systems under which they abide.