Throughout the history of the United States, its inhabitants have looked upon their nation as a special place. In some cases, this has exceeded the natural and simple love of home and country and taken a more extreme form. Important to this bent is the tendency to see the nation, its beliefs, and its actions around the world as divinely sanctioned and inspired in some regard. This is a generally necessary component to the idea of American Exceptionalism, which views the United States as a nation with a divinely imposed mission to spread civilization, freedom, and democracy to the ends of the earth. In many ways, the Roman Empire shared these pretentions of being the bearers of civilization to the rest of the world and of being a divinely chosen nation with that vocation. Voices within Christianity, as it developed, provided a potent antithesis to this aspect of Roman imperial ideology, critiquing Roman ideas of their own exceptionalism. By comparing the ideological basis of Roman and American concepts of exceptionalism, this thesis will attempt to apply the critique made by people like Jesus, Paul and Augustine to the United States today.

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The original document does not provide an abstract. McMaster Digitization Centre, 14 March 2019. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

In recent decades, agencies charged with managing historic structures and sites have found dendroarchaeological studies increasingly valuable, given the ability of such studies to verify (or refute) accepted dates of construction. The Ximénez-Fatio House has well-documented historical and cultural significance for the state of Florida, as it is one of St. Augustine’s oldest, best-preserved, and most studied historic properties. According to documentary sources, the two-story coquina-stone main house was reportedly built around 1797–1798, and included a one-story wing of warehouses, giving the house a distinctive ‘‘L’’ shape. Documentary evidence also suggests that a second story was added above the wing sometime between 1830 and 1842. However, after studying the building fabric itself, historical architects now believe the entire wing of the house was remodeled two decades later in the 1850s. Our goals were to: (1) determine the probable construction years for the original house and wing using tree-ring dating techniques, and (2) verify the probable construction year for the remodeling that occurred in the wing section of the house. A total of 74 core samples were extracted from longleaf pine (Pinus palustris P. Miller) timbers used to construct the house. Twenty-six were confidently crossdated both visually and statistically against each other to produce a 185-year floating tree-ring chronology. A statistically significant (p < 0.0001) correlation between our chronology and a longleaf pine chronology from Lake Louise, Georgia, anchors our chronology between 1673 and 1857. No cutting dates were obtained from the main house, but the lack of any tree rings that post-date 1798 supports the 1797 construction date. Furthermore, cutting dates obtained from beams in the first-floor wing revealed that the extensive remodeling of the wing likely occurred in the period 1856 to 1858 soon after the house had been purchased by Louisa Fatio in 1855.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation defines heritage tourism as: "traveling to experience the places and activities that authentically represent the stories and peoples of the past and present. It includes irreplaceable historic, cultural, and natural resources." Heritage tourism is a lucrative industry in the United States. On average, heritage tourists spend $623 per trip compared to $457 for all U.S. travelers. The rise of heritage tourism is inextricably linked with several trends in American society, namely: the historic preservation movement, the desire for a sense of place, and nostalgia. These motivating tendencies often inspire problems of authenticity, commodification, and an unhealthy romanticization of the past.The present study seeks to analyze the heritage tourism industry in Florida. Chapter one offers a brief look at the history and anthropology of tourism. Chapter two provides an explanation of heritage tourism and the human motivations that drive it, as well as an examination of several U.S. locations where it is practiced. Chapter three provides a short history of tourism in Florida, an overview of state organizations and agencies that promote and practice heritage tourism, and a look at several of Florida's unique heritage tourism locations.Chapter four is a case study focusing on the heritage tourism industry in St. Augustine, Florida, the oldest city in the United States. St. Augustine presents the best example of heritage tourism in Florida, and offers a perfect setting in which to examine many of the typical problems of heritage tourism. A popular tourist site since the 1800s, St. Augustine followed the lead of Colonial Williamsburg by extensively renovating its historic district in the 1960s. Tourism is the city's only true industry, but the number of tourists that visit annually pales in comparison to non-historical Florida attractions like Disney World. St. Augustine raises unique questions about the neglect of the Hispanic influence in the history of the United States, the American public's fascination with myth and primacy, and the inherent difficulties of maintaining authenticity in any heritage tourism location.

In this dissertation, I explore issues of cultural exchange and identity among 18th-century Spaniards and Spanish Americans via archaeological remains and documentary evidence. These were years of intense cultural refashioning, on both sides of the Atlantic. In Spain, the advent of the French-based Bourbon dynasty resulted in the spread of French fashions which infiltrated and altered notions of Spanish social identity. Spanish Floridians, already confronting an evolving American identity, had to amalgamate the changes occurring in the homeland. New ceramic forms, technology, and aesthetics reflect how people throughout the Spanish Atlantic remade their lifestyles, partially in each other's image. I examine ceramics from three 18th-century domestic sites: La Calle Corredera in Jerez de la Frontera, Spain, and the Francisco Ponce de León and Juan de Salas households in St. Augustine, Florida. To enable direct comparison between Spain and Florida, I developed a new classification system that encompassed forms found in both places, linked to references in contemporary dictionaries, probate inventories, and cookbooks. This approach revealed almost simultaneous change on both sides of the Atlantic, demonstrating rapid exchange and shared tastes and behaviors. At all three sites, people adopted new culinary styles and table settings to match. The rising popularity of French cuisine led people to use fewer bowls and more flat plates, suggesting a diminished role for traditional stews. In Spain, new cup and saucer forms emerged to accommodate American chocolate. On both sides of the Spanish Atlantic, French- and English-inspired matching sets of dishes and visually distinctive Mexican ceramics reflected changing aesthetics. At the same time, Spaniards and Spanish Americans continued using older vessel forms for cooking as well as personal hygiene, suggesting a degree of cultural continuity in some areas of life. In the 18th century, the Spanish Atlantic was a zone of busy cultural exchange. St. Augustinians followed Spanish fashions to declare their heritage while their Spanish counterparts emphasized their trans-Atlantic reach by incorporating American goods into their own lives. In this dynamic place and time, native Spaniards and Spanish Americans built a common cultural identity by simultaneously maintaining traditions and embracing change. / 2017-05-31T00:00:00Z

Picture a historical library and a historical art museum coming together to challenge the interaction between each other to help experience, explore, and discover the past within the present. While it sounds like a good idea, it is rare to see a library and museum under one roof. With the increasing population of tourists looking to visit places and buildings that reconnect with history, there is a higher demand for places to be able to 're-live the past' through art and literature. People enjoy visiting places where history was made and where it becomes part of a city's identity. With modern developments taking over, historical buildings are beginning to disappear. Designing a library and museum partnership is a solution to creating two institutions under one roof while preserving the space usually needed for both institutions if built separately. In order to challenge the idea of a hybrid building within a historical city, there needs to be an element of culture and historical remembrance that creates a shield against that city's potential loss of identity. Memory has become a key element in our true identity, becoming a form of support against erasure. It is that sense of culture and historical remembrance that will create recognition of things past. In order to address Florida's historical culture, the proposed site will be located in St. John's County, which includes America's oldest city St. Augustine. There are many different historical periods in St. Augustine that create its current cultural atmosphere. It is important to choose an environment where historical events took place because it allows the memory process of a place to create past experiences to be shared with new experiences. Through a methodology of the historical culture and conditions of the site, this thesis project will honor St. Augustine's culture by integrating the past with the present and creating a modern hybrid institution for the city. Furthermore, integrating the past with the present will allow users to enjoy St. Augustine as it used to be and as it currently is today.

The fast growth of the urban population affects city life by degrading natural and social resources. Urban developments modify resources such as forest, land, and water, but also modify the intimate relationship of people with the landscape. Many times, the damage of those resources is irreversible, and provokes dramatic changes in the natural landscape and the uniqueness of the place is missing. Despite the intense discussion that landscape architects and scientists worldwide hold about social and environmental aspects in urban environments, many questions about how to support natural and cultural landscapes, or why to keep them are not answered in the existing waterfronts and re-developments at the water's edge. For this reason, the recovering of urban waterfronts is an opportunity to promote ecologically healthy environments, address sense of place, support human gatherings, and encourage economic revitalization. This thesis and its research analyzes the components of the natural regional landscape in recovering waterfronts in order to avoid the loss of the uniqueness of a place. A section of beachfront in St. Augustine Beach, Florida that has suffered beach erosion and development pressures was chosen for the study. The result is an alternative proposal to costly dredging and beach reclamation that includes a series of tools, interventions, and landscape modifications of this threatened site. This proposal aims to return the site to a balanced and friendly landscape. Waterfronts in cities are an opportunity to reconnect communities with their cultural and geographic landscape. / Master of Landscape Architecture

This thesis provides an interpretative study of Augustine of Hippo’s City of God, book 14. The introduction explains how the thesis demonstrates that Augustine only partially endorses a model of emotional control through reason, and asserts that the key to his emotions doctrine is not to be found in an affections-passions dichotomy. It also addresses Augustine’s engagement with Platonism in the text, and, using work by Volker Drecoll, explains how the commentary-style project is able to situate City 14 within the Pelagian controversy ca. A.D. 419. The following seven chapters proceed uninterruptedly through City 14, clarifying Augustine’s argumentative aims and making use of secondary scholarship and philological tools to investigate points of fine detail. Chapter 1 explores City 14.1, his recapitulation of City 11-13 and his setting out of the initial two-cities dichotomy. Chapter 2 explores City 14.2-5, in which Augustine critiques Manichean or Platonist positions that the body is bad or evil. Chapter 3 explores City 14.6-9, and Augustine’s explication of the Biblical doctrine of emotions. Chapter 4 explores City 14.10-15, and the theme of the primal Fall and the will being ‘spontaneous’. Chapter 5 explores City 14.16-20, and Augustine’s exploration of the disobedience of the genitals in all forms of sex, including married life. Chapter 6 explores City 14.21-25, in which Augustine discusses the workings of Adam and Eve’s hypothetical sexual experience in the Pre-Fall Paradise. Chapter 7 explores City 14.26-28, in which Augustine recapitulates City 14.10-25, and comments on the workings of Providence, before hurtling towards the final dichotomy about the two cities being separated by their ‘loves’. A conclusion reviews the main points of the thesis. The thesis makes extensive use of German and French scholarship, of the CCL 48 Latin text, and the tools of the CAG 3 Augustine database; it occasionally contests the chapter divisions found in modern editions.