When the United States first joined World War I it had long been without a large standing army, it soon became apparent that there was a need for soldiers and training facilities. To solve this problem, the United States utilized colleges and universities as training camps. Because of its strong military tradition, Louisiana State University (LSU) was mobilized for this purpose. Although this mobilization was a serious turning point in the schools development, not many scholars have written histories of the changes during this time. LSU began as the Seminary of Learning of the State of Louisiana in 1860, but soon changed its name to the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy. The Board of Supervisors pushed for the change because it felt a military system would produce a high level of education and discipline and repay the state by providing military knowledge to its young men. Its first superintendent, William Tecumseh Sherman, and faculty began the long tradition of mixing military discipline with strong academic education. This tradition served LSU well when Congress enacted The National Defense Act of 1916. It standardized military training at colleges and universities through the creation of the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) and later its replacement, the Student Army Training Corps (SATC). LSU experienced an easy transition to a military training facility. Mobilization at LSU changed the campus experience. Because many students left to join the fight, student organizations, athletics, commencement, and other activities were adversely impacted with the decreased enrollment. Additional changes included inclusion of war courses in the curriculum, planting campus war gardens, implementing food conservation, fundraising for the war effort, and assisting the Red Cross. Since WWI was a technical war, the government called on faculty to lend their expertise and knowledge in various ways, such as public speaking to gain support for the war, working in military and government agencies, or answering the call to colors.

In this thesis, entitled The False Idealization of Heteronormativity and the Repression of Queerness, I examine heteronormativity as a social structure that is idealized over, and against, queerness. In the first chapter, I define heteronormativity and queerness. Heteronormativity, here, is simply a set of standards that dictate what one must do with their gender and sexuality, such as having sexual relations with the opposite sex, getting married, or having children. Heteronormativity is visible, validated, and normalized in society. Conversely, queerness refers to the social structures that dictate what one must not do with their gender and sexuality. Thus, queerness is condemned, threatened, and prohibited. Furthermore, I argue that all of us have transgressed the social structure of heteronormativity since no one can consistently maintain all that heteronormativity implies. Therefore, we all have embodied queerness in one way or another. However, we have also been systematically taught to repress queerness within ourselves and others in an attempt to reduce our fear of it. Moreover, the widespread repression and fear of queerness in society supports and justifies a hierarchical capitalistic system. Since queerness is devalued and considered inappropriate, those who hold power over us, such as in the workplace, have the right to control and regulate our gender and sexual expression. In the second chapter of my thesis, I turn my attention to Hegels ethical family where parents are obligated to repress their childrens queerness through the use of discipline. In the third and final chapter, I offer a solution to the problem of the repression of queerness. I argue that, if we can recognize that all of us embody queerness in one way or another and if we can allow ourselves the chance to try to understand each others queerness without the impulse to repress it, we can achieve queer solidarity. We will see that our struggle with gender and sexuality under a heteronormative social structure that is enforced all around us is a collective struggle. Therefore, the recognition of each others queerness without the impulse to condemn it can act as a bridge to help us recognize that we are integrally connected to one another.

When Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ended The Final Problem with Sherlock Holmes apparent death there was a mass outcry of protest from his fans to the point that myths still circulate about how young Victorian men wore black armbands in mourning. There was a reason why the Holmes stories had such a mass appeal: Sherlock Holmes, brilliant, asexual, emotionally reserved and eminently rational detective that he was, was in many ways the archetype of the ideal Victorian man. As such he struck a very deep chord with British society at the time, the extent of which his creator never quite seemed to have grasped. Given that Sherlock Holmes was a bipolar cocaine addict who would occasionally shoot up the walls of his shared apartment as a salute to the Queen while drinking this probably tells you all you need to know about the Victorians. During the 1920s and 1930s a Shanghai writer by the name of Cheng Xiaoqing wrote a series of stories about a Shanghai-based Chinese master detective character called Huo Sang. Cheng Xiaoqing, who had read the Holmes canon and translated it into Chinese, based his character on Holmes, albeit with Chinese characteristics. The stories were extremely popular in Shanghai at the time but received relatively little critical attention due to being seen as lowbrow literature aimed at popular audiences. More specifically he was classified as a Butterfly-Saturday writer: that is, one who was read avidly but not taken seriously and moreover dismissed by more serious writers as a frivolous distraction from the contemporary issues of the day, dominated by pointless love stories and tales of knight-errantry. Cheng Xiaoqing believed that detective literature could be used as a sort of didactic device to teach the public how to think rationally and be good, modern Chinese citizens, and referred to his detective stories in essays as popular science textbooks in disguise. He argued that while art and literature in general could serve to promote morality, law, order, utility, etc detective stories had an additional kind of value. As he put it, The material of detective stories places a particular emphasis on science and can expand the intelligence and rational mind of human beings, cultivate peoples observation, and increase and improve peoples social experience. The stories are intensely moralistic, with the protagonist frequently commenting or passing judgment on contemporary social issues or debunking superstitions and ghost stories. Just as Holmes served as a sort of ideal British citizen, Huo Sang fulfilled a similar role as a model Republican Chinese citizen. Cheng Xiaoqing clearly had a message and an agenda in mind when he wrote these stories. Given that they proved popular enough to be adapted into at least one movie and a readership sufficient to be serialized in various literary journals for over a decade and a half it would seem that quite a few Chinese people found this message agreeable. Because of this it is worth asking why the stories were well-received and by whom. In doing so we can gain new insight into the thinking of Republican Chinese, particularly somewhat educated urbanites or xiaoshimin of Shanghai. This class, comprised of small merchants, various kinds of clerks and secretaries, high school students, housewives and other modestly educated, marginally well-off urbanites, was above the poor but far below the wealthy and outside the rarified academic circles of the true intellectual class. What they were was inextricably tied with the nucleus of the new Chinese state the Guomindang sought to build using cities like Shanghai as their laboratories. While not having the respectability or credentials of academia or holders of public office they were literate enough to be active consumers of the many newspapers and literary journals that competed for the new urban audience. They also had the leisure time and discretionary spending to seek such diversions and the numbers to make their wallets worth catering to. These were the people who read Cheng Xiaoqings stories and who their message was geared toward. As such, by reading the stories and comparing both the overt moral and political messages contained within and the ways in which the main character himself differs from the original Holmes we can use these stories as a window into the thinking of both the author and his readership and thereby gain new appreciation for the modernization and nation-building process in China prior to the Communist victory in 1949. In particular we can learn about how Western ideas regarding such issues as crime, justice and social disorder were received by the somewhat educated urban population at large.

In this thesis, I will discuss the influence of education on the identity formation of African American students. Based on the scholarly literature in education theory, I will argue in Bourdieuan theory education, formal education, fails to accommodate the specific needs of African American students because education influences African American students to develop constructions of whiteness" that education reinforces. As education attempts to uphold the status quo of American society, education simultaneously forces African American students to question the relevance of education. In questioning the relevance of education through high-achieving African American students use of language and pursuit of academic achievement, low-achieving African American students offer a critique of education that characterizes education as a white-dominated system where individuals must embody whiteness in order to achieve social acceptance. As a result, African American students choose to disidentify with education rather than to assimilate into White culture to avoid being identified as white− speaking Standard English, following rules and regulations, and maintaining a high grade point average. This critique of education− though not an anti-intellectual response to education because most African Americans still view education as a means to social mobility− signifies education does not educate African American students but instead produces white African American students in order to reproduce societal norms. I will also propose the incorporation of self-knowledge into critical education will facilitate an awareness of personal history and self-worth among African American students not only to disrupt an educational structure of inequality but also to foster a positive self-concept within these students.

The humanities have always been under attack in the higher education of the United States of America. Corporate culture of the university requires the most money distributed towards research and specialization, while making employability of the graduates the main goal of education. With two thirds of all majors being in business and finance, humanities don’t seem to play a big role in higher education overall. This work makes an attempt in defense of liberal arts education to our students, and the importance of teaching the subjects like English, Literature and Philosophy independent of a student’s major concentration. Even in our age of specialized and corporatized education, these courses are of great importance. These subjects can help young people find their way in this confusing web of life weaved out of pressure, expectations, failures, problems, fears. What other fields of study can teach them about history of cultures and languages, people who made history; who made contribution to the world in art, literature and science; what young people can learn from them. But most importantly, how to raise questions about life in general and search for answers, how to find meaning, how to know what’s important to them. In general, teaching them how to think. I would like to take different approaches in looking at teaching humanities to college students in this country, drawing from my own experiences in both Russia and US, my graduate courses at UVM, as well as works of those in the academia concerned with the same matter. I will look at how corporate culture of the university and research-driven education dictate the curricula in colleges and universities; how multiculturalism and political correctness that saturated higher education these days can influence the way humanities are presented, and explore the influence of humanities in our students’ making meaning of their lives.

The institutions that comprise the United States intelligence community have organizational cultures that are unique from other government agencies. These cultures encourage the development and retention of traits that are necessary to mission accomplishment, yet these exclusivities also hamstring organizations and may contribute to significant security failures. This thesis isolates elements of organizational culture that are specific to the United States intelligence community and explores the extent to which the culture is responsible for security and/or counterintelligence shortcomings. The author selected three governmental organizations with intelligence collection and analysis functions; they include the Naval Investigative Service (NIS), Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). These agencies demonstrate the intelligence community includes military (NIS), intelligence (CIA) and law enforcement (FBI) components with shared organizational traits. The author subsequently identified a significant security failure case encountered by each agency and employed a case study approach to determine the extent to which the agencies organizational cultures contributed to the security failures. Internal agency investigations and external assessments of espionage activities reveal cultural factors impede the early detection of security compromises and thwart law enforcement efforts to investigate suspicious behavior. Despite the deleterious effects of national security collapses, the intelligence communitys personnel increasingly recognize the complicity of organizational culture in such security failures. The intelligence community increasingly analyzes the negative aspects of its organizational traits, and there have been substantive strides within the intelligence establishment to minimize the security obstacles that organizational culture imposes on its constituent adherents. The intelligence apparatus must maintain an organizational culture that distinguishes it from other government agencies. Unfortunately, the communitys cultural characteristics also convey increased risks of security compromises. It is possible, however, for the United States intelligence community to maintain its unique organizational culture and simultaneously minimize the possibility of operational or security failure.

On June 6, 1944, Allied soldiers assaulted the beaches of Normandy in France. In preparation for that one day, the Allies assembled millions of tons of supplies, hundreds of thousands of men, and thousands of ships in Great Britain. Allied leaders spent three years preparing plans and training troops. American and British intelligence agencies scoured Europe for information about German troops and fortifications and launched massive deception campaigns designed to keep their German counterparts in the dark about where and when the blow would fall. In the air, bombers rained destruction upon German factories and French railways while their escorts engaged the German defenders. By the end of May 1944, the Allies were ready to invade. Beginning in 1942, the Germans prepared defenses to stop the invasion. The fortifications, named the Atlantic Wall, consisted of massive amounts of concrete, steel and barbed wire and contained millions of mines. The strategy that German leaders pursued to defeat the invasion, a product of rival views within the German High Command, resulted in chaos and ultimately defeat for their armed forces. The commander of Army Group B, defending the likeliest invasion sites, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, planned to meet the invasion at the water line and defeat the Allies before they could gain a foothold. Rommel's immediate superior and commander in the West, Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt, wanted to defeat the invasion further inland; outside of the range of Allied naval guns. Adolf Hitler compromised between the two commanders and created a plan that depended upon his own appreciation of the battle for the release of critical reserves. Added to the problems of strategy were German manpower shortages caused by years of fighting a multi-front war and equipment and supply shortages due to bombing and attrition. By May 1944, the Germans knew the invasion was coming but could not foresee when or where. On D-Day, the Allies dropped three airborne and landed six divisions in the initial assault on the Atlantic Wall. By the end of the day, they had carved a narrow beachhead and were in France to stay.

I like simple things. More precisely I like taking complex things and distilling them to their simplest elements, those things that define their nature. Art and technology are two very different subjects. Simple and complex. Intuitive and analytical. Combining art and technology to deliver educational material with simple navigation, a child-friendly environment and playful, imaginative sounds that enhance rather than complicate the learning process, is the objective of my project. An interactive, educational CD for young children is the product of this thesis. Art has always been used to communicate ideas, thoughts and emotions; it expedites the delivery of the message. The visual language is a universal one. Seeing is believing. Believing is understanding. Understanding is learning. Blending art and technology for a practical purpose intrigues me. I enjoy childrens books and have collected them for many years. Childrens picture books rely heavily on images to support the story and ultimately to teach. Because a child uses all of the senses to learn, interactive multimedia is the perfect vehicle to deliver educational content to young children. Technology allows us to depart from traditional methods of delivering educational content, like books, and produce materials enriched with images, sounds and interactivity. The possibilities for creating unique educational experiences have greatly increased. The goal of this project is to create a fun, learning environment, encouraging interactivity by the target audience, young children ages three to six. The product of this thesis, the Character Critters Storytime CD, includes three animated stories about Cindy the Citizen Crab, Fran the Fair Frog and Roy the Responsible Rabbit, written by LSU AgCenter Family and Consumer Sciences specialists Dr. Rebecca White and Leslie Cooper Parsons. The copyrighted stories are used with permission from the LSU AgCenter. Through sight, sound and touch, with parent/teacher participation, children are invited to hear stories and play games that teach positive character traits. Each story includes an interactive game that reinforces the character concepts taught in the stories. Macromedia Flash, an interactive multimedia software, is used to develop the CD.

The process of professionalization initiated by the Peruvian army in 1896 under French influence did not withdraw the military from political involvement. On the contrary, as the process of professionalization advanced, the army developed a professional militarism, that is, military political participation for reasons based on the institutions professional ethos. The Peruvian army had traditionally claimed a broad military jurisdiction including extra-military roles. French instructors reinforced such claimed incorporating a broad military jurisdiction into the armys professional ethos, which justified military coups during the twentieth-century as well as the Revolutionary Government of the Armed Forces (1968-1980). Historians Frederick M. Nunn and Daniel M. Masterson do not take sufficiently into account the impact of nineteenth-century militarism on Peruvian military thought. These scholars argued that Peruvian officers were aping their French mentors when twentieth-century military magazines claimed nation building as a defense prerequisite or when Francophile officers declared a civilizing and social mission for the army. However, in 1888, over 120 Peruvian officers established the Centro Militar del Perú and published the Revista Militar y Naval, which systematized the military mind born from the centurys military experience. The articles in the Revista demonstrate that before the process of professionalization initiated in 1896, the Peruvian military mind consisted of attitudes and perspectives stressing the necessity of a strong military, the supremacy of society over the individual, the destructiveness of civilian partisan politics, and a broad military jurisdiction, which included administrative, nation-building, civilizing, and constitutional guardian functions. Consequently, this thesis focuses on nineteenth-century militarism and political culture arguing that by late 1880s the essential elements of the Peruvian military mind behind twentieth-century professional militarism had already come together.

Counterinsurgency is one of the most difficult forms of conflict an army can face. After defeating Spanish forces in Manila during the Spanish-American War, a well-developed insurrection, led by Emilio Aguinaldo, challenged the United States Army for nearly four years. Although the army in 1898 was unprepared for a large-scale, two-front war, it conducted an extremely effective counterinsurgency campaign 7000 miles from home in inhospitable terrain. Despite lacking a formal, written counterinsurgency doctrine, the frontier experiences of the army, orally passed on from one generation of soldiers to the next, provided invaluable lessons that could be applied in the Philippines. This was only of limited benefit, however, since the vast majority of soldiers who fought in the Philippines were volunteers, with limited military experience. The army's senior leaders, many veterans of the Civil War and Indian campaigns, were able to apply their experiences and develop effective strategies to counter the insurrection. General Elwell S. Otis immediately realized that a military solution alone would not end the insurgency. By implementing President William McKinley's policy of benevolent assimilation, Otis attempted drive a wedge between the Philippine people and the guerrillas. The insurgents countered this tactic by resorting to a campaign of terror to insure continued support from the people. Otis' subordinates, realizing policy of attraction had failed, then developed and implemented a strategy designed to isolate the guerillas from their base of support, the village, and then defeat the guerrillas militarily. This strategy, belatedly endorsed by General Arthur MacArthur, eventually caused the collapse of the insurrection in many areas of the Philippines. In the final stages of the conflict, the army adopted more repressive measures, which stiffened resistance. Only when the Americans employed the policies of conciliation and repression in the correct proportion were they able to end the insurrection.