Within the context of ongoing social and demographic transformation, including the trend towards globalization, changing patterns of longevity and increasing ethnic diversity, this thesis examines the lives older Asian-Indian immigrants in the United States. To date, much of what little research exists on this group of elders focuses on acculturation and related stress, but there is limited research on the daily life experiences of these older adults, particularly as they pertain to family life, the practice of filial piety, and informal support exchange within their households, as well as their social lives more generally. Informed by two theoretical approaches, Life Course and Symbolic Interactionism, this research examines older immigrants’ social and family lives. The study employs a qualitative approach and involves in-depth semi-structured interviews with 10 older Asian-Indians living in the Atlanta area. To varying degrees, their lives are family-centered. Traditional Indian practices such as filial piety are individualized according to the intersection of American and Indian cultures and family (e.g., structure and history) and personal (e.g., personal resources) influences. Similar influences operate to shape their family and social lives more generally. These findings enhance existing understandings of older immigrants’ lives and illustrate similarities and differences. In doing so, the research provides valuable information that can promote cultural competence for those working with and designing policies and programs for adults in a rapidly aging and increasingly diverse society.

The Night Nativity by Geertgen tot Sint Jans depicts the birth of Christ in a manner that emphasizes the role of the Virgin as mother and Christ as the enlightener of the world. In this paper, I will argue that the Night Nativity was directed primarily toward meeting the devotional needs and interests of the nuns of the Convent of Our Lady of the Visitation near Haarlem. This convent is of particular interest because it is associated with the Windesheim Congregation of the Modern Devotion, which was a religious movement that privileged certain forms of lay spirituality. In particular, the adherents of the Modern Devotion seemed to have preferred various forms of affective devotion often associated with “women’s spirituality.” Geertgen’s image, I believe, appealed to the women in the convent because it focuses on the role of the Virgin and, in doing so, activated well-known tropes of female spirituality.

The thesis concludes that because the cult-centred approach has been so concerned with the cultic functions of the psalms, it has failed to appreciate the personal contributions of the psalmists, and in so doing has often misinterpreted the primary purpose of a psalm. A life-centred reading of the Psalter is therefore a vital component in correcting this imbalance in psalmic studies today.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Pennsylvania State University, 1993. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 65-70).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Columbia University, 1935. / Vita. Bibliography: p. [157].

Thesis (M.A.)--Georgia State University, 2005. / Gregory Jurkovic, committee chair; Julia Perilla, Gabriel Kuperminc, committee members. Electronic text (51 p.) : digital, PDF file. Description based on contents viewed Aug.14, 2007. Includes bibliographical references (p. 45-51).

abstract: This dissertation explores the history of ancestral rituals and the related political controversy in the Song China (960-1279). Considering the pivotal role played by ancestral rites in shaping Chinese identity and consciousness, this study contributes to a better understanding of how ancestral ritual has been politicized in Chinese history as a specific cultural apparatus to manipulate politics through theatrical performance and liturgical discussion. Through a contextual analysis of a variety of Song scholar-officials and their ritual writings, including memorials, private letters, and commentaries on the ritual Classics, this study demonstrates that Song ritual debates over the zhaomu 昭穆 sequence--that is, the positioning of ancestral temples and spirit tablets in ancestral temples with preparation for alternation or removal--differentiated scholar-officials into separate factions of revivalists, conventionalists and centrists. From a new perspective of ritual politics, this study reveals the discursiveness of the New Learning (xinxue新學) community and its profound influence on the Learning of the Way (Daoxue 道學) fellowship of the Southern Song (1127-1279). It examines the evolution of the New Learning fellowship as a dynamic process that involved internal tension and differentiation. Daoxue ritualism was a continuation of this process in partaking in the revivalist approach of ritual that was initiated by the New Learning circle. Nowadays, the proliferation of ritual and Classical studies crystallizes the revitalization of Confucianism and Confucian rituals in China. Taking zhaomu as a point of departure, this project provides a lens through which modern scholars can explore the persistent tension between knowledge and power by rethinking the modernization of ritual and ritual politics in contemporary China. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation History 2015

abstract: This dissertation aims to explore the diverse ways in which piety is conceptualized and cultivated by highly-educated Muslim women in Turkey. These women hold active positions within the secular-public sphere while trying to keep their aim of becoming pious in their own way, in relation to their subjective understanding of piety. After a detailed analysis of the formation of the secular modern public sphere in Turkey, in relation to the questions of modernity, nation-building, secularism, Islamism, and the gender relations, it gives an account of the individual routes taken by the highly educated professional women to particular aspirations of piety. The individual stories are designed to show the arbitrariness of many modern binary oppositions such as modern vs. traditional, secular vs. religious, liberated vs. oppressed, individual vs. communal, and etc. These individual routes are also analyzed within a collective framework through an analysis of the activities of two women's NGO's addressing at their attempt of building a collective attitude toward the secular-liberal conception of gender and sexuality. Finally the dissertation argues that Turkey has the capacity to deconstruct the aforementioned binary categories with its macro-level sociopolitical experience, and the micro-level everyday life experiences of ordinary people. It also reveals that piety cannot be measured with outward expressions, or thought as a sociopolitical categorization. Because just like secularism, piety has also the capacity to penetrate into the everyday lives of people from diverse sociopolitical backgrounds, which opens up possibilities of rethinking the religious-secular divide, and all the other binaries that come with it. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Religious Studies 2012

L’homme a toujours su s’assurer de sa propre importance, en se prenant pour le maître souverain au milieu de tout ce qui se meut. L’expression de l’art, le dévoilement de la science, la cogitation philosophique et la réflexion théologique ont hérité et continuent de promouvoir sa conviction anthropocentrique. Mise en question de cette position connaissait une sévère réfutation. Les expériences du béhaviorisme radical en psychologie et d’une formulation théocentrique dans la théologie protestante en sont des exemples marquants dans la deuxième moitié du XXe siècle. La présente étude s’attache à restituer aux faits leur place initiale. Autour des deux protagonistes - le théologien James Gustafson et le psychologue B.F. Skinner - il devient démontré comment dans la ‘circulation d’entrecroisement’ les notions de liberté et de conditionnement peuvent se corriger mutuellement et s’enrichir réciproquement. / Man has at all times sensed his self-importance, reaffirming his own sovereign dominion over the rest that surrounds him. Expressions of arts, unveilings of sciences, musings of philosophy, and reflections in theology announced, maintained and transmitted anthropocentric conception. Any serious attempt to question it would meet a stern reprimand. The experiences of the radical behaviorism in psychology and in a protestant realm of a theocentric theology in the second half of 20th century can attest to its effect. The present study aims to restate the facts as they were originally intended. Largely, around two main protagonists, James Gustafson in theology and B.F. Skinner in psychology, it is shown how in the crossroad circulation the inherently porous notions of free will and of conditioning can convey a mutual correction with a reciprocal enhancement.

Collegiate churches were founded for two essential aims: the augmentation of divine worship, and the salvation of souls. This thesis brings to light just how important material and aesthetic enrichments were in regards to these functions. The vast majority of collegiate churches in Scotland were substantially augmented around the time of their foundation. Patrons undertook significant building programmes and provided a variety of furnishings and ornaments to facilitate and enrich the services their body of clergy performed. Precise statutes were laid down in order to ensure that clergy were skilled singers and organists. Many founders also made provision for their burial within their collegiate churches so that they could garner the maximum spiritual benefit from the organisations that they had founded. To the author's knowledge, this is the first in-depth account of the art and architecture of Scottish medieval colleges. This thesis looks closely at the architecture, furnishings, rituals, music, imagery, and commemorative functions of the forty-nine collegiate churches founded in Scotland. A close concentration on this institutional form has meant that buildings, artworks, and practices which have hitherto not received significant scholarly attention have been carefully scrutinised. Furthermore, by looking at so many aspects of collegiate churches, the present study enriches an understanding of these institutions by providing a more holistic picture of their functions and significance. Ultimately this thesis examines why physical and aesthetic enrichment went hand in hand with the founding of a college, and what role this material culture had in regards to how collegiate churches functioned.