Year: 2024, 2024
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>Crutzen and Stoermer's (2000) announcement of the Anthropocene draws attention to the agentic nature of the nonhuman world as it appears to be striking back against human intervention through an environmental crisis that is threatening humans and nonhumans alike. Their narrative reveals complex relationalities where humans are now revealed to beinseparable from the nonhuman world… more Year: 2024, 2024
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>This dissertation focuses on the intersectionality between images posted on social media and social rules in the lives of young people. The findings are based on thirty-four qualitative interviews with young social media users where photo-based methodologies were employed. From these interviews, three key themes emerged: 1) Posting and sharing images are connected to identity exploration… more Year: 2024, 2024
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Name(s): Creator (cre): Bailey, Tanya Ann, Thesis advisor (ths): Epp, Michael, Degree committee member (dgc): Pendleton Jiminez, Karleen, Degree committee member (dgc): Bellamy, Brent, Degree committee member (dgc): Anastakis, Dimitry, Degree committee member (dgc): McGuire, Kelly, Degree granting institution (dgg): Trent University Abstract: <p>An interesting question arises upon viewing the 1939 film, The Wizard of Oz (MGM). The main character Dorothy Gale faces a long arduous journey on foot. Why did she not have a car? Women had formed strong associations with the automobile in its early years, yet they appeared to have weaker associations with the automobile a few decades later. A look back to three other "Dorothies… more Year: 2023, 2023
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Name(s): Creator (cre): Majer, Tyler, Thesis advisor (ths): Brown, Stephen, Degree committee member (dgc): Epp, Michael, Degree committee member (dgc): Hodges, Hugh, Degree committee member (dgc): Loeb, Andrew, Degree granting institution (dgg): Trent University Abstract: <p>This thesis presents a critical history of stand-up comedy alongside rhetorical analyses of specific stand-up routines and performances to argue for stand-up's efficacy as a therapeutic artform. Through analysis of the history, function, and content of satire, this thesis presents stand-up comedy as an artform utilized for more than just simple laughter. Stand-up comedy, as a form… more Year: 2023, 2023
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>For the Road is a study of the modes of transmission of ideas within the Counterculture in its different forms. It is a genealogy of movements that define themselves "against" what is established as "Culture". The philosophy of the Beat Generation does not come out of nowhere and in turn, many recent movements are indebted to the Beat Generation. The goal of this… more Year: 2022, 2022
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Name(s): Creator (cre): van Vliet, Elizabeth, Thesis advisor (ths): Epp, Michael, Thesis advisor (ths): Synenko, Joshua, Degree committee member (dgc): Epp, Michael, Degree committee member (dgc): Synenko, Joshua, Degree committee member (dgc): Pendleton-Jiménez, Karleen, Degree committee member (dgc): Mitchell, Liam, Degree granting institution (dgg): Trent University Abstract: <p>This thesis examines the ways in which body image is discussed in online settings. There are three different communities discussed: body positivity, proED (pro-eating disorder), and body neutrality. Both body positivity and proED content are fairly popular online, and both have found significant support and followers on various social medias. In this thesis, I argue that both of these… more Year: 2022, 2022
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>This thesis examines the impact that digital labour and work from home have across different populations. This work is framed with regards to Marxist-feminism and particularly examines the impact of work from home across different genders. To demonstrate the depth and breadth of the impact that work from home has on worker agency, four unique industries are analyzed: office jobs, gig… more Year: 2022, 2022
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Name(s): Creator (cre): Cousins, Richard James, Thesis advisor (ths): Epp, Michael, Degree committee member (dgc): McLachlan, Ian, Degree committee member (dgc): Mroz, Daniel, Degree committee member (dgc): Manning, Paul, Degree committee member (dgc): McGowan, David, Degree granting institution (dgg): Trent University Abstract: <p>Why show things that aren't people acting like people? In the field of animation, it's a surprisingly big "why?", because it's a "why?" that doesn't lead to any sort of doctrine of ontology, of inevitability, of manifest destiny, or of anything like that. But it does lead to another "why?"—"why did anthropomorphic depictions of… more Year: 2021, 2021
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>The following thesis problematizes different theories of subject formation in relation to morality, accountability, and consciousness raising. Focusing on the conditions subjects emerge in, I argue that socially transformative subjectivities emerge in movement through spaces. The theoretical discussion departs from the premise that morally accountable subjectivities drive social change.… more Year: 2021, 2021
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>The objective of this dissertation is to measure the influence of the contemporary influx of women's involvement in the horror genre in three dimensional capacities: female representation in horror films, female representation as active, participatory spectators and female representation in the industrial production of horror. Through the combined approach of theoretical and… more Year: 2021, 2021
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>This thesis explores access to feminist zine culture and community, specifically if, and how, access has been altered in the age of digital technologies and increased access to digital spaces. Results from a questionnaire completed by 8 young feminist zine-makers and readers of marginalized genders indicated that though the modern boundaries of what a zine is has been expanded to include… more Year: 2021, 2021
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>Two dominant narratives emerging throughout the war were the national narrative––that is, the narrative of the war as articulated by the British nation via texts such as political speeches, recruitment posters, and popular music–– and the poetic narrative––that is, the narrative of the war emerging from poets, specifically battlefront poets for the sake of this thesis. One hundred years… more Year: 2020, 2020
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>My analysis of twentieth century Mars science and fiction outlines how the ongoing dialogic between Mars science and fiction publics influences the American frontier dialectic and how Mars serves as the arena where this debate comes to life. It examines connections between myth, science, and fiction by tracing the evolution of historical and literary representations of the American… more Year: 2019, 2019
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>The central scholarly contribution of this dissertation develops through bringing the theories of Michel Foucault to bear in a sociolegal study of rave culture's criminalization by the United Kingdom's 1994 Criminal Justice and Public Order Act. My methodology develops rave as a cultural keyword. This keyword navigates through a quasi-materialist definition of rave as a… more Year: 2019, 2019
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>This thesis explores the work of Black queer authors who write and reproduce cities in their texts. James Baldwin and Dionne Brand create knowable and readable spaces of the cities in which they write. By studying the work of these two authors, this thesis seeks to understand how Black queer people navigate city spaces, and how Black queer authors create a literary imaginary about the… more Year: 2019, 2019
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>The university newspaper is a vital aspect of the university public, as it provides a platform for students to voice their opinions on topics pertaining to the culture of their university and gives students critical information about what is happening on campus. This thesis uses the University of Regina's The Carillon as a case study to evaluate how university newspapers interact… more Year: 2018, 2018
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>Independent music venues are important hubs of social activity and cultural</p><p>production around which local punk scenes are both physically and conceptually</p><p>organized. Through interactions with participants over extended periods of time, these</p><p>spaces become meaningful places that are imbued with the energy, history and memories</p… more Year: 2015, 2015
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>This thesis examines a specific figure that appears throughout contemporary Japanese detective fiction (across different media), which I have termed the Shaman detective. A liminal figure that combines Japanese folk cosmologies with contemporary detective work, the Shaman detective is at once similar to, yet separate from, western postmodernist detective fiction. Invested in narratives… more Year: 2015, 2015
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>This three-part history explores Web 2.0's ability to make music products a collaborative, ongoing creative process that is reflective of early twentieth century live-music publics, where the realization of a performance was actualized by performers together with their audience in a shared physical space. By extension, I follow the changing dynamic of the producer/consumer… more Year: 2015, 2015
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>Game texts present unique and dynamic opportunities for lability: how readers can make choices while reading that alter the narrative's nature or outcome. Labile decisions are neither simply correct nor incorrect--the reader renders judgement to produce a desired outcome. When encountering labile challenges, players employ an interpretive strategy to resolve them. Many game texts… more Year: 2014, 2014
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Name(s): Creator (cre): Gallagher, Sara S., Thesis advisor (ths): Epp, Michael, Thesis advisor (ths): Macleod, Lewis, Degree committee member (dgc): Dunaway, Finis, Degree committee member (dgc): Popham, Beth, Degree granting institution (dgg): Trent University Abstract: <p>The Beat Generation shaped, and was shaped by, the post-WWII containment culture that arose in 1950s America. This so-called cultural containment reflected the social, political, and economic factors that were unique to the post-WWII period and are often </p><p>considered concurrent to post-war McCarthyism, which promoted a national ideology of exclusionism that was foremost… more Year: 2014, 2014
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>This dissertation seeks to explore and understand how autism, asperger and the autistic spectrum is represented in Canadian culture. Acknowledging the role of films, television, literature and print media in the construction of autism in the consciousness of the Canadian public, this project seeks to critique representations of autism on the grounds that these representations have an… more Year: 2014, 2014
Member of: Trent University Graduate Thesis Collection
Abstract: <p>ABSTRACT</p><p>There is a growing number of juvenile novels and picture books that mean to educate the reader about synaesthesia. The synaesthete in these texts for young readers desires to be a social agent, yet sh/e also considers synaesthesia to be a healing power and a deeply personal psychedelic form of escapism; I argue that the synaesthete in these texts `uses'… more
