Thesis (PH. D)--University of Pennsylvania, 1921. / "Reprint from Proceedings of the Delaware County institute of science, vol. IX, no. 3, Media, Pa." "Partial list of works consulted": p. 47-48.

The furry subculture (also known as the anthropomorphic fandom) creates identity through anthropomorphism and therianthropy. Anthropomorphism is the giving of human traits to the non-human. Therianthropy is the giving of animal traits to the human. Through play and creating art, these individuals of the furry subculture take on an anthropomorphic identity (what furries call a fursona) while bridging local and global groups through communication technologies. For this folklore project I conducted ethnographic field works interviews with the Bowling Green, Kentucky fur group. I also build off of the interviews project with an online furry role-play group as well as a Manhattan, Kansas fur group. This thesis explores furry folklore: how members of the furry fandom create, relate to, and express their fursonas. This was done by looking at people’s narrative of joining the fandom and stories of their fursona creation, furry art, fursuits, and fursuit performance. At the same time it covers the complexities of furries as a network and how they mitigate stigma and identity.

Ce mémoire de maîtrise en arts visuels porte sur la création d'une structure malléable tenant lieu de paysage scénographique mis en scène par la présence de mon corps habité par la danse butô. Balbutiement ... de fil en aiguille témoigne également de la laborieuse aventure de création d'une structure : de sa fabrication artisanale à sa mise en espace et à sa mise en mouvement. Il est l'occasion de relier mes trois champs d'expertise : les arts visuels, les arts textiles et la danse. Cette recherche tente de répondre à la question suivante : est-ce que je fabrique des objets pour mon corps ou est-ce que j'utilise mon corps pour créer des objets? J'en arrive à la conclusion que plus que jamais ma pratique est intrinsèquement liée à ces trois domaines artistiques et que l'un ne peut pas exister sans l'autre.

Scholarly attention to late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century French art has focused on the importance that Johann Joachim Winckelmann attributed to the male nude figure in his definition of ideal beauty, and the impact of his work on debates over the 'beau idéal' in French art and art criticism. In contrast, Winckelmann's extensive interest in the detail of ancient costume, the folds of drapery, and the teleological and aesthetic significance that he ascribed to them, has been underplayed. The role played by costume and drapery as components of the 'beau idéal' in French art and aesthetics has also not been fully explored. This thesis examines the way in which costume and drapery formed an important component and embodiment of ideal beauty in the work of Winckelmann and in late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century French artistic circles, providing new insights into the arguments over the meanings of Truth, Beauty and Nature in this period. The thesis proposes that ideal beauty in late eighteenth- and early nineteenth- century France was conveyed in works of art through the accurate rendering of costume and the expressive qualities of drapery in combination with the perfect form and contour of the nude body. The first part of the thesis sets up a proposition that costume and drapery formed part of the definition of ideal beauty in the work of Winckelmann. Highlighting the significance of Winckelmann's work on costume and drapery in French art theory, it demonstrates how the definition of ideal beauty in France also incorporated the accurate rendering of costume and the aesthetic impact of drapery. In demonstrating the significance of costume and drapery to both Winckelmann and French theorists it is proposed that the application of a meta-historical approach of costume and drapery to French art theory can provide new understandings and readings of the definition of ideal beauty, the hierarchy of the genres and the broader aesthetic concerns of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth- century French art. The second part of the thesis applies the proposed hermeneutic of costume and drapery to a small selection of theoretical work on the nature of ideal beauty and on a significant collection of Salon criticism. With this approach to the primary material this thesis demonstrates how French artists were able to express the 'beau idéal' within the traditional academic conventions and hierarchies, and negotiate the sense of public unease over the use of nudity in contemporary art.