<p> The literature suggests that identifying with a particular place can promote a sense of ethnic identity. This study focused on eight Italian American community members&rsquo; perceptions of San Diego&rsquo;s Little Italy as both a container and creator of ethnic identity. </p><p> The study addressed a) how the participants define and convey their Italian American ethnic identity and b) how the participants perceive the role of San Diego&rsquo;s Little Italy pre-redevelopment and post-redevelopment in creating and shaping their sense of being Italian American. The study employed a case-study design. Ethnohistoric accounts of life experiences were gathered from participants selected through convenience and maximum variation sampling procedures. Polkinghorne&rsquo;s narrative analysis process was used to organize and display the individual accounts, and a cross-case analysis was conducted to identify emergent themes. </p><p> Three overarching themes emerged from the narratives: a) Elements and Manifestations of Social Capital, b) Cultural Characteristics and Dynamics, and c) Evolving Purpose of Place. Each theme in turn comprised four subthemes that helped to illuminate each theme&rsquo;s dynamics. </p><p> Overall, a sense of community ownership was evident in the narratives from both former and current residents. For some participants, Little Italy was less about ethnicity and more about an upscale urban lifestyle enhanced somewhat by an Italian American cultural sensibility. For others, Little Italy in its current manifestation holds little meaning; instead, these participants look to the former neighborhood and its characteristics to maintain an emotional connection to place and their cultural heritage. A noteworthy subgroup comprises participants who grew up in San Diego&rsquo;s Italian neighborhood and are now an integral part of Little Italy&rsquo;s rebranding. For them, a measure of tension exists: They are focused on continued progress in Little Italy but also lament the community&rsquo;s changing cultural climate along with the disappearance of its historical assets. </p><p> Further studies could illuminate dynamics of Little Italy&rsquo;s managing organization and its role in shaping an updated Italian American culture. Studies of Italian Americans with no connection to a designated Italian American place also would provide opportunities to better understand the role of place in the development and maintenance of ethnic identity.</p>

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Oregon, 2008. / Typescript. Includes vita and abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 81-97). Also available online in Scholars' Bank; and in ProQuest, free to University of Oregon users.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2008. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Modern Freemasonry emerged in the early eighteenth-century as part of European Enlightenment culture and gradually spread to the American continent. Masonry immediately aroused suspicion and continues to evoke controversy today. This study documents the development and maturation of lodge principles during the eighteenth century and then moves to specific periods of conflict between masons and antimasons in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It is a comparative history of Freemasonry and antimasonry in the Russian Empire just after the Revolution of 1905, in France during the early decades of the Third French Republic, and in Massachusetts, 1826-1832. During each of these periods, in each area, antimasons coalesced to close lodge doors. Antimasons achieved temporary successes in two of the three cases. This study explains why antimasonry emerged as a political phenomena common to early constitutional states in the context of expanding male, suffrage rights, and an emerging market economy. It frames a dialogue between masons and antimasons concerning politics, religion, science, economics and morality, through an analysis of masonic and masonic presses and published works. Debate between masons and antimasons centered around new definitions of the public sphere, the separation of Church and state, the role of the press, and proper public morality in an elective order.

This study examines British-Indian relations in the Great Lakes and Upper Canada between 1783 and 1812 and focuses on intercultural frontier relations and Native responses to Britain's actions and imperial Indian policies as Native Americans explored ways to preserve their lands and cultures while simultaneously attempting to redefine their relationship with their former British allies. Specifically, the project compares British-Indian interaction and diplomacy in three regions throughout Upper Canada and the Old Northwest. These three locales correspond roughly to the areas served by Britain's three principal Indian agencies in Upper Canada at the time—namely Fort St. Joseph, Fort Amherstburg, and Fort George. The Natives of each of these three areas developed unique relationships with the British, and as a result, Britain could not establish a single Indian policy that applied everywhere in its North American borderlands. Government leaders and Indian agents in Canada and the Great Lakes were forced to adapt Whitehall's policies to conditions and circumstances that were prevalent in each of the sectors in which British agents and leaders dealt with indigenous peoples. Several factors affected the evolution of British-Indian relations from region to region. These included the fur trade, Indian relations and warfare with the United States, geographical position, the influence of British-Indian agents, intertribal relations between various Native groups, the degree of Indian acculturation with whites, Native cultural revitalization, and the constitutional issues of Native sovereignty and legal status. As a result, Britain was unable to preserve the unity among its confederated tribal allies that it had enjoyed during the American Revolution, and by the War of 1812, the old “Chain of Friendship” had devolved into a collection of smaller alliances.

This dissertation examines the behavioral recommendations of courtship advice literature published in Britain and in British North America during the seventeenth, eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. These recommendations gave white middling class women and, increasingly during the eighteenth century, their male counterparts models of appropriate courtship behavior and ideal partners. I argue that shifts of opinion that began to emerge in these two areas during the eighteenth century, in large measure a consequence of the impact of the Enlightenment, the American Revolution and the growth of a more mobile urban society, involved a change in the cultural understanding of the power and autonomy of women in courtship. Middling white women's greater control in courtship dynamics also reflected a decline in parental control over courtship, women's better access to education and a changing societal understanding of women's roles as mothers, citizens and wives. I further discuss how British courtship advice literature heavily influenced North American authors and how after the American Revolution North American authors often struggled to distance themselves from their British counterparts in creating an uniquely American system of courtship. I contend that the advice contained in a diverse group of sources, ranging from sermons and short newspaper articles on breach of the marriage promise suits to extensive courtship advice manuals and novels, documents the efforts of authors of courtship advice literature to modify the traditional patriarchal system of courtship without completely overthrowing long held notions of gender inequality and coverture.

No description available.

Thesis (doctoral)--Universität Trier, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 183-188).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 1994. / Permission to use letters at end of volume 2. Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 462-595). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 1994. / Permission to use letters at end of volume 2. Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 462-595). Also available on the Internet.