The exhibition, Drink from the River, is the culmination of a creative journey that has run parallel to a very personal process of introspection, confrontation with the negative-self, and, ultimately, catharsis. The catalyst for this journey was my engagement with African art. / acase@tulane.edu

acase@tulane.edu

acase@tulane.edu

acase@tulane.edu

This diachronic study tracks Louisiana French syllable structure and sound patterns over several decades, offering an in-depth, quantitative evaluation of language death and hybridization. Most scholarly inquiry involving this severely endangered language has revolved around morphosyntactic issues. The present work instead considers how a century of contact with English may be influencing Louisiana French phonology. Recordings made in 1977 and 2010 provide speech data from 19 male and 17 female native speakers born between 1888 and 1953. All speakers come from the same town, and none read or write in French. The study evaluates 260 minutes of phonemically transcribed speech, comprising over 70,000 sound segments. The quantitative analysis shows that sociolinguistic variables (age, sex, timeperiod, community identity) still account for variation in pronunciation patterns, and complex, marked segments such as front rounded vowels are not dying out in favor of segments common to both French and English. However, diachronic consonant cluster trends appear to mirror language acquisition patterns. The Optimality Theory analysis takes on questions of phonological hybridity, scrutinizing the behavior of Louisiana French phonemic and phonetic nasal vowels, along with liaison, to understand how French- and English-based processes come together. The analysis highlights the opposing forces of phonetic and phonemic vowel nasality, experiencing challenges precisely where these systems come into conflict. In order to capture the attested surface variation, the formal analysis develops a method of assigning first () and second () place to output candidates. The study concludes that Louisiana French phonology has stayed remarkably resilient over time, and that a first- and second-place evaluation method allows Optimality Theory to better reflect actual language patterns. It underscores the hybrid and complex nature of Louisiana French, which instead of moving to a simplified system of vowel nasality, contains and works to harmonize both phonetic and phonemic nasal vowel patterns. The 2010 interviews and transcriptions also represent the first available Louisiana research point in the international Phonology of Contemporary French project (Phonologie du Français Contemporain, PFC). This diachronic investigation of language death thus makes a substantial contribution to the understanding of language contact and variation. / acase@tulane.edu

Midshaft is the most commonly used site for behavioral and robusticity inferences in cross-sectional studies of the femur. This work tries to revive an alternative location because the midshaft, as much as it is easy to locate, does not necessarily reflect the same adaptive remodeling in every individual. Femoral waist which is defined as the shaft’s mechanically weakest point is reintroduced as an alternative. The aim of this work is to describe waist’s general patterns of distribution along the shaft, to test which morphological characteristics influence its position, to compare its inferential potential with the midshaft, and to evaluate applicability of the concept under the mechanical predictions about stress and strain distribution along the femur. A total of 251 individuals representing four temporal samples spanning the Eneolithics to 19th century were analyzed using CT-derived cross-sectional properties. The results showed that the femoral waist tends to center around the midshaft but with a rather large amount of variation and that the samples do not seem to differ in this respect. General levels of mechanical loading and robusticity may influence its distribution as evidenced from the Early Middle Ages males who were the most robust group (in body size adjusted parameters) and had their waists positioned more proximally. Variables that influence waist’s location are primarily related to strain distribution but not its magnitude. Thus, neck-shaft angle, anteversion angle, femoral inclination, crural index, and femoral curvature proved to be significant predictors (their importance varies between sexes), while body size measures were insignificant. Behavioral and robusticity inferences made from the femoral waist and midshaft are rather incompatible. In closely related populations, results from the two locations would probably lead to different interpretations while in rather distant units (species or genera), this would not be as problematic. Whenever possible, true cross-sectional properties should be used to locate the femoral waist. External methods using subperiosteal contour are more acceptable than methods estimating cross-sectional properties only from external dimensions. Lastly, the femoral waist position can potentially be used for taxonomic purposes in earlier hominins as well as for the reconstruction of other femoral characteristics (e.g., femoral length). / acase@tulane.edu

This thesis explores how the works of three contemporary women writers “write back” to the silences in the dominant historical narratives--made at various stages of Michel-Rolph Trouillot’s notion of the production of history and in varying ways--surrounding the sexual lives of women of color in the Caribbean and how, in turn, each offers an alternative narrative of women’s history. Chapter 1 focuses on Edwidge Danticat’s novel, Breath, Eyes, Memory (1994), a realist antiromance set in Haiti and the United States during the final years of the dictatorship of Jean-Claude Duvalier (Baby Doc) in the 1980s. Chapter 2 examines Rosario Ferré’s novel, The House on the Lagoon (1995), an example of the genre of Latin American feminist historical fiction that follows the history of a Puerto Rican family on the island beginning with the transition from Spanish to U.S. occupation to the textual present (1898-1980s). Chapter 3 situates Andrea Levy’s novel, The Long Song (2010), a neo-slave narrative set in Jamaica in the years leading up to and following emancipation (1807-1898), alongside an original slave narrative, The History of Mary Prince (1831), that recounts Prince’s experiences as an enslaved woman in Bermuda and Antigua in the same era. Enlisting different literary genres, representing regions that are culturally and linguistically distinct, and narrating histories that are centuries apart, these novels certainly share as many differences as commonalities. Yet these differences, when read next to each other, further reveal a transnational interest among contemporary women writers, in the Caribbean and its diasporas, to contest dominant representations and silences of women’s sexuality in Caribbean history and to use fiction to offer an alternative version that spotlights the sexual lives of women. ​ / acase@tulane.edu

acase@tulane.edu

Civil-military relations theory stresses the importance of civilian control of the military and clearly defined roles for the military in democratic societies. There are two distinct perspectives regarding military roles. Traditionalist thinkers argue that the military should be restricted solely to its traditional role of national defense. On the other hand, some scholars propose additional, diverse, non-traditional roles for the military such as humanitarian assistance, law enforcement activities, peace-keeping operations, and disaster management, as “new military roles.†Guatemala serves as a case study where a military institution has received much criticism for past political involvement and lack of respect for civil authority. The 1996 Peace Accords stipulated a reduction and new mission for the Guatemalan military, which put new emphasis on disaster management, and serves as the research starting point. This study describes Guatemalan military involvement in disaster management during 1997-2002. In order to determine the nature of Guatemalan military involvement in disaster management, three indicators are examined: 1) organization, 2) training, and 3) participation in disaster response. Analysis of military compliance with Peace Accord directives, and the three indicators, is conducted to assess how well the Guatemalan military respected civil authority during the study period. This dissertation argues that the post-1996 Guatemalan military was involved in disaster management yet stayed within the bounds of civilian control of the military. The implications of these findings will add to the existing literature concerning civil-military relations, disaster management, and the controversial topic of non-traditional roles for the military. / acase@tulane.edu

While researchers have long recognized the disproportionate impact of natural disasters on racial and ethnic communities, research remains incomplete in examining the plight of Gulf Coast Vietnamese residents after Hurricane Katrina and the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. This study presents a comprehensive, qualitative investigation of three different Vietnamese communities located in New Orleans, Biloxi, and Bayou La Batre and details how residents established and maintained nonprofit community based organizations in a region that previously saw little or no formal mobilization among Vietnamese residents. Existing studies tend to isolate the extent to which variables such as language, culture, social networks, and religious institutions, influence recovery outcomes. In contrast, this study, by drawing upon multiple avenues of data collection, including 54 in-depth interviews, fieldwork, and participant observation, provides an ethnographic analysis of immigrant community building via the unique circumstances of post-crisis community rebuilding. Findings reveal that despite the differences among by the study sites, one overarching theme emerges: new Gulf South Vietnamese organizations struggled to bridge gaps and build relationships as they sought to transition the community of inexperienced, naive, or complacent Vietnamese locals from loose, informal networks to structured organizational forms. This work examines the challenges faced by organizations as they become established and the strategies by which they grow and become sustainable. Suggestions for how ethnic organizations may better serve and perform outreach into Vietnamese enclaves are presented in the form of lessons learned. Ultimately, this study extends the established literature on the Vietnamese experience in the United States and contributes to the overall canon of research regarding Hurricane Katrina and the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. / acase@tulane.edu