This thesis examines the relationship between portrait photography and rhetorical ethos in nineteenth-century women rhetors. Facing a challenging rhetorical situation in which credible women were relegated to the home, the women featured in this study were able to enter the public sphere by very carefully configuring their ethos. In this project, I examine photographic portraits of some of the nineteenth-century's most illustrious women rhetors in order to argue that not only was ethos constructed visually, but also that photographs specifically served as a means to establish a credible ethos. The nineteenth century was marked by an intense focus on visuality: the new medium of photography was understood as a transparent representation of reality while dominant belief held that an individual's character could be read through external markers. This led to the unique and powerful role of photographic portraiture in the nineteenth century. My analysis builds on the existing scholarship on nineteenth-century women rhetors and then extends this scholarship to examine responses to photographic technologies. I offer close readings of portraits of Lucretia Mott, Sojourner Truth, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Frances E. Willard to identify the ways in which they indicated the three constitutive elements of Aristotelian ethos (phronesis, arête, and eunoia) and visually crafted a deliberate, legitimate ethos. I argue that photographic portraits of these women draw on image vernaculars of the nineteenth century, which enabled audiences to identify specific traits which worked to craft a rhetorical ethos and identity. For these women, whose rhetorical activity was quite constrained, photography was a useful way to construct and communicate the essential rhetorical appeal of ethos. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Summer Semester, 2010. / June 14, 2010. / Nineteenth-Century Photography, Feminist Rhetoric, Nineteenth-Century Rhetoric / Includes bibliographical references. / Kristie Fleckenstein, Professor Directing Thesis; Michael Neal, Committee Member; Kathleen Yancey, Committee Member.

A collection of original poetry which combines the aesthetics of traditional American verse with a character driven study of transvestites, murderers, and Marlin Perkins. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester, 2003. / March 19, 2003. / Original Poetry / Includes bibliographical references. / David Kirby, Professor Directing Dissertation; Juan Carlos Galeano, Outside Committee Member; Anne Rowe, Committee Member; James Kimbrell, Committee Member.

Richard Wright's The Long Dream (1958), James Baldwin's Blues for Mister Charlie (1964), Toni Morrison's Beloved (1987), and John Edgar Wideman's Philadelphia Fire (1990) attempt to expose the mental and physical scars of trauma through an excavation of memorable, historical events that resonate with issues of loss. The focus of this study is on the intersection of the mourning of these losses and the use of writing to represent them for the purposes of recovery and healing for the African American community. As close textual analyses of these texts show, by writing about loss and exploring the ramifications of loss within their narratives, these writers expose a critical dimension of African American literature that confronts the overwhelming presence of death, performing a literary archaeology of the physical and symbolic losses that these events represent. By placing narrative forms, oral and written, which are politically and aesthetically able to recover, commemorate, and "funeralize" actual and symbolic loss, these authors suggest a connection between rituals of mourning, functions of writing, and the modes of witnessing and testifying. In the introduction, I build a theory of textual mourning by considering theories of mourning, memory, trauma, and African American literature studies. In chapter one, I explore the language of loss that powers Beloved and Philadelphia Fire by examining how collective and individual trauma complicates the functions of mourning cultural trauma. In chapter two, I examine two literary considerations of the Emmett Till murder, Blues for Mister Charlie and The Long Dream to understand again how the language of loss influences Wright and Baldwin's narrative strategies in their attempts to confront the sexualized cultural trauma of lynching. Textual mourning continues the functions of mourning by making writing a way to funeralize the dead, present ways of remembrance, and transform loss into politicized literary forms. In the conclusion, I briefly explore the new avenues of inquiry that textual mourning allows in our understanding of how writing, loss, mourning, and melancholia intersect to develop a new language for discussing trauma. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Summer Semester, 2006. / March 20, 2006. / Mourning, Loss, Trauma, African American Literature, Melancholia / Includes bibliographical references. / Darryl Dickson-Carr, Professor Directing Thesis; Dennis Moore, Committee Member; Tomeiko Ashford, Committee Member.

This thesis shows the different ways the tension between the societal ideal of the family (something that is in and of itself a construct) and the constructed family plays out in two 20th century British novels, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit and Wise Children. This tension is brought into focus in part by the form the novel itself takes, that of historiographic metafiction, a sort of self-aware fiction that explores historical personages or the definition of what history really is. The different ways in which the novels play with history (the documented means by which events, which have no meaning, turn into fact, which is ascribed a meaning) is explored as a way of examining adoption within these two novels. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Summer Semester, 2010. / April 23, 2010. / Adoption, Adoption Studies, Linda Hutcheon, Marianne Novy, Margot Gayle Backus, Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit, Wise Children, Angela Carter, Jeanette Winterson, Sexing the Cherry / Includes bibliographical references. / Barry Faulk, Professor Directing Thesis; Maxine Montgomery, Committee Member; Eric Walker, Committee Member.

The Fun house of God tells the story of a young woman's return home to the fundamentalist central Mississippi world of her childhood in order to attend her brother's funeral. Looking into the causes of his death, she learns secrets never before revealed about her family. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester, 2006. / February 27, 2006. / Dyson Spheres / Includes bibliographical references. / Mark Winegardner, Professor Directing Dissertation; Roberto Fernández, Outside Committee Member; Ralph Berry, Committee Member; Elizabeth Stuckey-French, Committee Member; Sheila Ortiz-Taylor, Committee Member.

The three stories contained in this thesis function as an exploration of hybrid identity. The main character, Nomi, is a "k'tina khozeret," a returning adolescent. In legal terms, in Israel, this is a person born in Israel who is removed from the country by her or his parents before her or his 14th birthday. The designation is important because of the slew of rights afforded to immigrants in Israel as a way to encourage Jews to emigrate to the country as well as help those Jews who likely come from disadvantaged backgrounds and were, most likely, persecuted in their home countries. Those born in-country who leave after 14 years of age are considered to have had a choice in the move and do not have much in the way of immigrants' rights. Those who leave before that age have the same rights as new immigrants, but require a different designation because of the complex system of citizen identification in practice in Israel. The status of returning adolescent, however, is not commonly known among citizens of Israel. For Nomi, being a returning adolescent holds far more than the culture shock one expects to see in new immigrants to any country. She must deal with her identity, but she must also deal with her parents' identities—their choices as individuals and as a couple—and her future and what she hopes and plans for as well as who she wishes to become. The stories are not intended to work as parts of a novel, but to stand individually, as stills in the movie of one woman's life. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts. / Spring Semester, 2008. / November 30, 2007. / Short Stories, Identity, Hybrid, Israel, Adolescence / Includes bibliographical references. / Julianna Baggott, Professor Directing Thesis; Virgil Suarez, Committee Member; Elizabeth Stuckey-French, Committee Member.

Because Milton wanted his readers to recognize the theological ideas depicted in Paradise Lost as opportunities to meditate and pray, I will focus on the dramatization, definition, and descriptions of prayer in Paradise Lost. The body of my thesis will align four episodes of prayer with contemporary prayer manuals and meditation guides. The episodes I will discuss are: the angelic hymn in Book III, Adam and Eve's morning prayers before the fall in Book V, Adam and Eve's prayers after the fall in Book X, and the answers to prayer that they receive in Book XI. Throughout the discussion of these episodes, I will identify signs of human fallenness that appear in Adam and Eve's prayers. Spontaneity, unselfconsciousness, and a large portion of praise characterize prelapsarian and angelic prayers. Postlapsarian prayer occurs only because of prevenient grace. After the fall, when God gives grace to Adam and Eve so that they can pray, they are self-conscious, extremely concerned with where to pray, what words to use, and how to convince God to listen. The Introduction will identify specific authors of contemporary prayer manuals and sermons that I will cite and analyze throughout my thesis so that readers will be familiar with them before approaching the in-depth discussion of their writings in connection with Paradise Lost. Chapter 1 will outline the main conflict between Anglicans and Puritans over set forms of prayer. Anglicans embraced and promoted the use of set forms while Puritans looked suspiciously at the practice. I will identify the reasons Anglicans and Puritans held these beliefs about prayer and how this conflict relates to reading Paradise Lost. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 will include a detailed analysis of the prayers in Paradise Lost and their relation to the advice presented in contemporary prayer guides. Chapter 2 will focus on the aspect of praise (as a major component of prayer) in angelic and human hymns. Chapter 3 will develop the stages of prayer found in Adam and Eve's prayers of repentance: praise, thanksgiving, confession, and petition. Chapter 4 will explore God's answers to Adam and Eve's prayers and how manualists instructed devotees to decipher divine replies to their petitions. In the conclusion, I want to offer some ideas about Milton's contribution to the religious literature of his day and highlight what he offered readers in a dramatic poem that the prayer manualists could not. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2005. / April 6, 2005. / Confession, Prayer Manuals, Prayer, Paradise Lost, Repentance, Praise / Includes bibliographical references. / Bruce Boehrer, Professor Directing Thesis; Daniel Vitkus, Committee Member; Nancy Warren, Committee Member.

The starting point for this work is the exigency of community in the contemporary world. A number of British novels and films written and produced during Margaret Thatcher's term in office illustrate the deep social and economic divisions in Britain and the crippling effects of a society dedicated to possessive individualism rather than to altruism and community. The novels and films of this study present Britain as a nation whose social network has already collapsed, and individuals are left to fend for themselves. Those who cannot are suffering, and they reach out to one another for assistance. Community development becomes the natural response to combating the careless society created by the individualist ethos. The communities developed in Penelope Fitzgerald's Offshore, Nick Hornby's About a Boy, Hanif Kureishi's The Black Album, and Mike Leigh's film High Hopes are very different from previous considerations of community. Traditional communities tend to suppress differences. The communities that develop in these works, however, conceive of social organization in a way that collapses the binary between individualism and community and allows both to exist simultaneously. These communities are also significant because they are anything but homogeneous in terms of social rank, political leanings, or ethnicity. The only common ground between the members of each group represented is rather simple—none can survive on their own. Caring for one another supersedes any consideration of differences. These works suggest, however, that communities are only effective when their members allow for an interplay of difference between one another. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester, 2005. / August 18, 2005. / Film, Penelope Fitzgerald, Nick Hornby, Hanif Kureishi, Mike Leigh, British Literature, Community / Includes bibliographical references. / William Cloonan, Outside Committee Member; Barry Faulk, Committee Member.

In this thesis I argue that Dos Passos's politics, at least as they are manifested in his writing, do not follow any one party line, and that producing novels which suggested a strict adherence to any single political group would be anathema to the goal of his writing. Dos Passos's writing, I argue, is grounded in certain ideologies that remain constant—ideologies that were grounded in the rights of individuals who struggled against corrupt systems—and it is only his belief about which political philosophy best upholds these ideologies that changes. I begin by reevaluating and defining Dos Passos's politics within the U.S.A. trilogy so that they can be compared to his stance following the trilogy, after his much-lamented shift in political loyalties. In my first chapter I show that Dos Passos's politics are driven more by a concern for the individual worker than they are by adherence to any particular doctrine. In fact, Dos Passos distrusted institutions, especially hierarchical institutions, since he felt that they all essentially exploit individuals and force them to live within an artificial, mechanical framework. In my second chapter, I explore Dos Passos's concern with the growing mechanization of society, both the literal mechanization which is the product of modernity and innovation and the political mechanization which seeks to optimize citizens for production by weakening their human response. I argue that Dos Passos's politics are driven by a desire to help the individual worker escape the political machine while taking control over his physical machinery. In my third chapter I analyze Midcentury, the final novel of Dos Passos's published during his lifetime, as a continuation of the themes and political motivations of the U.S.A. trilogy. My intention is to show that Dos Passos's detractors who have criticized his later work as right-wing propaganda have failed to read his final novel closely; in fact the critical preoccupation with Dos Passos's "swing," I argue, has focused almost exclusively on Dos Passos's personal life rather than his writing. Critics have read Dos Passos's novels through the lens of his political affiliations and in doing so have portrayed the author as a polarizing figure, when in fact the texts themselves are politically moderate. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Fall Semester, 2007. / July 25, 2007. / Technophobia, Radical Politics, Sacco and Vanzetti, Dos Passos / Includes bibliographical references. / John Fenstermaker, Professor Directing Thesis; Andrew Epstein, Committee Member; Christopher Shinn, Committee Member.

The following is a collection of memoir-based essays that detail the author's life and experiences with her brother throughout their childhood together. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2004. / March 15, 2004. / Non-fiction, Creative, Memoir / Includes bibliographical references. / Elizabeth Stuckey-French, Professor Directing Thesis; Robert Olen Butler, Committee Member; John Fenstermaker, Committee Member.