Chapter 1 is the introduction, which proposes that Thomas Treadwell Eaton achieved great influence in the Southern Baptist Convention and utilized that influence to effect political change in the relationship between Southern Baptist churches and the denomination. Chapter 2 traces the influences of Eaton’s formative years among Tennessee Baptists. Eaton became an avid supporter of denomination institutions for higher education and was an active participant in state convention meetings, where he led the Baptists in the state to unify for the purpose of supporting a university. Chapter 3 follows Eaton to Virginia where he pastored between 1875 and 1881, and became intimately familiar with the political influence of denominational newspapers. As a pastor and leader in denominational causes, he was immensely successful in raising associational support for foreign missions and religious education. Chapter 4 surveys Eaton’s first decade as a Baptist pastor in Louisville. Particular emphasis is given to his growing denominational leadership in the Long Run Baptist Association and his contributions to the surge of denominational giving towards missionary causes and Southern Baptist ministries. Chapter 5 demonstrates how Eaton worked to promote his vision for Baptist identity through literature dissemination and denominational leadership. Eaton used the advantage of the denominational press to promote the distinctive doctrines of Baptists and to oppose heterodox theology. Most importantly, Eaton became a leading proponent in the development of the Southern Baptist Convention’s denominational consciousness through his support of the Sunday School Board and the 1894 Fortress Monroe Comity. Chapter 6 introduces the Whitsitt controversy and demonstrates Eaton’s efforts to oppose Whitsitt for undermining Baptist identity. Emphasis is given to the Western Recorder editorial strategies, the publishing output of the Baptist Book Concern, and the denominational parliamentary meetings that collectively pressured Whitsitt to resign from the seminary presidency. Chapter 7 examines Eaton’s career after the Whitsitt controversy; though perceived by many as a divisive force, he continued to defend Baptist principles against the creeping influence of liberal theology and kept pressure upon the Southern Seminary faculty to respect denominational interests. Eaton remained actively involved in denominational causes. Chapter 8 is the conclusion.

It is my belief that theatre is the telling of stories, and that playwrighting is the creation of those stories. Regardless of the underlying motives (to make the audience think, to make them feel, to offend them or to draw them in,) the core of the theatre world is the storyline. Some critics write of the importance of audience effect and audience reception; after all, a performance can only be so named if at least one person is there to witness it. So much of audience effect is based the storyline itself - that structure of which is created by the power characters have over others. Theatre generalists learn of Aristotle's well-made play structure. Playwrights quickly learn to distinguish between protagonists and antagonists. Actors are routinely taught physicalizations of creating "status" onstage. A plotline is driven by the power that people, circumstances, and even fate exercise over protagonists. Most audience members naturally sympathize with the underdog or victim in a given storyline, and so the submissive or oppressed character becomes (largely) the most integral. By what process, then, is this sense of oppression created in a play? How can oppression/victimization be analyzed with regard to character development? With emerging criticism suggesting that the concept of character is dying, what portrayals of victim have we seen in the late 20th century? What framework can we use to fully understand this complex concept? What are we to see in the future, and how will the concept evolve? In my attempt to answer these questions, I first analyze the definition of "victim" and what categories of victimization exist - the victim of a crime, for example, or the victim of psychological oppression. "Victim" is a word with an extraordinarily complex definition, and so for the purposes of this study, I focus entirely on social victimization - that is, oppression or harm inflicted on a character by their peers or society. I focus on three major elements of this sort of victimization: harm inflicted on a character by another (not by their own actions), harm inflicted despite struggle or protest, and a power or authority endowed on the victimizer by the victim. After defining these elements, I analyze the literary methods by which playwrights can represent or create victimization - blurred lines of authority, expressive text, and the creation of emotion through visual and auditory means. Once the concept of victim is defined and a framework established for viewing it in the theatre, I analyze the victimization of one of American theatre's most famous sufferers - Eugene O'Neill's Yank in The Hairy Ape. To best contextualize this character, I explore the theories of theatre in this time period - reflections of social struggles, the concept of hierarchy, and clearly drawn class lines. I also position The Hairy Ape in its immediate historical and theoretical time period, to understand if O'Neill created a reflection on or of his contemporaries. Finally, I look at the concept of victim through the nonrealistic and nonlinear plays of the 20th century - how it has changed, evolved, or even (as Eleanor Fuchs may suggest) died. I found that my previously established framework for "making victim" has change dramatically to apply to contemporary nonlinear theatre pieces. Through this study, I have found that the lines of victimization and authority are as blurred today in nonrealistic and nonlinear theatre as they were in the seemingly "black and white" dramas of the 1920s and 30s. In my research, I have found the very beginnings of an extraordinarily complex definition of "victim".