<i>Walden</i> queers its readers. While many have investigated Thoreaus queerness, there has been little notice of <i>Walden</i>s queerness. This project begins with a situational analysis that identifies the melancholic antecedents of <i>Walden</i> in Thoreaus life and his choices that led to the illumination of his melancholia. Thoreau had already been experimenting with what Branka Arsić identified as literalization. Nevertheless, a period of crisis, detailed by Robert Milder, made him aware of what Nicolas Abraham and Maria Torok have referred to as the melancholics blind skill of demetaphorization. I suggest that Thoreau exploited this skill to produce <i>Walden</i>s unique ability to feed on and, as Henry Abelove and Henry Golemba have suggested, awaken its readers desires. I combine a close reading of <i>Walden</i> with selective study of the texts reception. <i>Walden</i> delivers on Thoreaus theory of friendship from his first book, <i>A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers</i>. <i>Walden</i>s friendship with its reader is the agency that accomplishes what Henry Golemba and Lawrence Buell have noted as a blurring of the boundary between reader and text. To investigate this friendship and <i>Walden</i>s accommodations of faux friendship, I construct a Burkean perspective by incongruity using research in the nature-writing and rhetoric disciplines that intersect with Thoreauvian studies. This incongruity is analyzed using not only Burkes theories of literary form and literature as equipment for living, but also Deleuzes process philosophy and Deleuze and Guattaris analyses of the war machine and their spatial analysis. This project complexifies Erin Rands research on polemics, using Deleuzes multiplicity not only to explain why polemics are unpredictable, but also to address what Sarah Hallenbeck has referred to as the crisis of agency. I suggest an expansion of José Esteban Muñozs research. The question of how one actually transitions from melancholia to disidentification cannot be adequately answered with terms like Stuart Halls oppositional reading or Deleuze and Guattaris de/reterritorialization. I also suggest that queer utopian thinking and poststructuralism are more compatible than previously argued. This dissertation is itself a polemic, straining the possibilities of friendship in the service of queerness.

While small and large technological miracles have undoubtedly made our lives easier, they have potentially also made a significant part of our daily social routine obsolete. People live in the same space but rarely spend quality time together, interacting and bonding. One of the solutions to diminishing family relationships may lie in the technology itselfvideo games. Previous research having shown the sociability of video games, and in this study, we examined their potential in creating closer family relationships, especially among different generations. Participants (n = 183), mainly grandparents and grandchildren, were asked to play video games together over a period of six weeks. Participants completed a modified version of the self-other overlap, self-disclosure, and relationship closeness inventories before and after the treatment and responded to a series of open-ended questions post-treatment. Results indicate a significant increase in the inclusion of other in the self, as well as an increase in breadth and depth of self-disclosure for both younger and older adults. A comparison group (n = 88), comprising also mostly grandparents and grandchildren, was tasked with having conversations either face-to-face or in a mediated setting. The comparison group completed the same questionnaires, with results indicating a significantly smaller increase in the inclusion of other in the self and depth of self-disclosure, while breadth of self-disclosure experienced the same increase as in the gaming group. The findings suggest that video games can provide a platform for family communication, resulting in the rejuvenation and maintenance of intergenerational relationships. Gathering around a novel shared activity, both younger and older adults found new ways of connecting to their family members, whether through more frequent conversations, broader selection of topics, shared subjects, or pure entertainment.

The objective of this study is to determine if the types of unanticipated questions asked during an interview affect deception detection accuracy rates. Both spatial (environment, surroundings, placement) and temporal (time, sequence of events) question types were used. Participant interviews (n= 30) were videotaped and later viewed by a separate group of participants (n=30). The observer group was comprised of both deception detection experts (n=15) and nonexperts (n=15). Observers made veracity judgments based on only the information provided during the interviews. Of the thirty interviews conducted, eight were selected for viewing by expert and nonexpert groups. Experts obtained 65% mean accuracy (Mdn=62.5%, mode= 75%). Nonexperts obtained 60.8% mean accuracy (Mdn=62.5%, mode= 50%). The total deception-detection accuracy for both groups combined was 62.9%, which is above meta-analysis levels. These data suggests that improved accuracy is possible when individuals are asked unanticipated questions that are spatial and temporal.

In times of stress, humans secrete a type of sweat (apocrine sweat) that they do not secrete at any other time. This sweat has been previously shown to influence others who are exposed to it. The current project seeks to explore how apocrine sweat influences the people who are exposed to it. Using the framework of Emotional Contagion Theory, two studies were conducted to assess the effects of stress-induced apocrine sweat on human perceptions and interactions. Study 1 saw participants exposed to either thermoregulatory sweat or apocrine sweat before watching a short, fear-inducing video. Participants then reported their levels of psychological fear, physical fear, and how afraid they thought others would be in response to the video. Results indicate that exposure to apocrine sweat increases the level of fear reported, and that this effect is stronger for women than it is for men. The effect is consistent regardless of how susceptible one is to other forms of emotional contagion. Study 2 saw a romantic couple exposed to either thermoregulatory sweat or apocrine sweat before engaging in a conflict discussion. Participants then reported on their levels of anger and their partners levels of anger as compared to their typical discussion about the topic. Results indicate that exposure to apocrine sweat is associated with a reduction in the couples levels of anger. This effect was equally strong for men and women, and was not influenced by susceptibility to other forms of emotional contagion. Overall, results indicate that apocrine sweat has discernable effects on human perceptions and interactions.

In this project I examine the performative nature of the ghost bike memorial. Ghost bikes, flat-white painted immobile bicycles created by cycling communities and loved ones of victims, are installed roadside to mark the locations of cycling related deaths. Using critical performance ethnography and critical-cultural analysis as methods, I analyze how the ghost bike performs as an artifact of mourning and inspires co-incident performances of grief, activism, and community building and maintenance. As a memorial object used worldwide to represent cycling culture, the ghost bike acts as a social network link that connects a multitude of diverse cycling communities. I present five case studies of ghost bikes in New York City, Durham, North Carolina, Baton Rouge, New Orleans, and Lafayette, Louisiana in order to dissect what the polysemic ghost bike communicates to public audiences. My analysis led to the discovery that ghost bikes are not only used as memorials. They also perform as metonyms for the absent, ruined bodies of cyclists; as markers of racial identity for victims; and as tools to reframe the narratives told about cycling-related deaths. I describe how the differing interpretations of the memorial are adapted to create and alter performances of identity, and I argue for the potential for these performances to influence perceptions about cycling safety, cycling-based legislation, and road infrastructure.

This study turns to the annual Burning Man Festival held in Black Rock City, Nevada as a site of cultural performance where participants negotiate health meanings. I adopt a culture-centered approach to health communication and utilize critical performance ethnography and narrative performativity as methodological and theoretical frameworks to investigate the specific communication practices that bring about health meanings at the festival. Analysis revealed the significance of everyday life practices performed through narrative for understanding how Burning Man participants understand, reinforce, and counter various health meanings with implications for the field of health communication and performance studies.

This qualitative study uncovered the identity construction of occupational therapists located in two regions of the United States. In utilizing an organizational communication studies lens, it was discovered that occupational therapists possess multiple, conflicting, and intersecting identities. The four central categories that emerged from the data were: Therapist as catalyst of functional activity, Therapist as envoy of profession, Therapist as navigator of bureaucracy, and Therapist as member of interdisciplinary team. Therapist as catalyst of functional activity proves to be the preferred identity of occupational therapists and the subsequent identities work to support or interfere with occupational therapists ability to see themselves as a catalyst of functional activity for their patients. This study further problematizes the notion that individuals have preferred identities and the effects this has on identity construction. The examination also provides useful insights for the development of Occupational Therapy as a profession.

Despite a recent plateau in the number of international students coming to the U.S., international students still make up a significant portion of the student body at institutes of higher education. Along with attendance at schools, many international students live in campus housing, such as residence halls, and are often placed with a U.S. roommate. Previous research has shown that international and U.S. students may have cultural conflicts, particularly when living together. Since many younger students may not be interculturally competent, it is left to the staff of Residence Life offices, such as resident assistants, to counsel students through their issues; yet many resident assistants do not receive any type of intercultural competence training. A needs analysis was conducted with the current Resident Assistants at The University of Montana, and the results were used to develop intercultural communication competence training for the incoming Resident Assistants in Fall 2009.Body of paper begins here.

To assist Opportunity Resources, Inc. (ORI) in lowering its turnover rate, an assimilation program was designed to be implemented within the ogranization to enhance communication difficulties and training deficiencies. Information was collected from 17 current and former employees (management and staff) of Missoula, MT's ORI. Based from the results, a Job Rotation Position (JRP) Assimilation Program was developed and tailored using Myers and Oetzel's (2003) interactive assimilation model.

Founded in 1961, with 1.5 million people from around the world attending meetings every week today, Weight Watchers has become a socially and economically significant weight loss organization with the potential to affect the lives of many people. With that in mind, this study describes and analyzes the rhetorical strategies of Weight Watchers. More specifically, this study depicts the metaphors used by Weight Watchers to describe its 2009 program, the Momentum Program. Which metaphors are used, how those metaphors function to create a reality for dieters, how those metaphors produce and filter meaning, and the actions those metaphors encourage and discourage are discussed. Additionally, the ways in which metaphors are embedded with Western cultures assumptions about obesity and weight loss is discussed. The implications of Weight Watchers use of metaphors to describe the Momentum program are discussed as a rhetorical device that reinforces notions of the docile body, mind/body duality, normalization of the ideal body, and the care of the self. Finally, the implications of the use of mixed or multiple metaphors are discussed as being neither contradictory nor complimentary.