The Montgomery Bus Boycott was a social movement. It is often referred to as the first defining movement within the broader context of the Civil Rights Movement. Planned communication can be critical to the success of a social movement. This historical case study analyzed the communication that occurred during the 1955-1956 Montgomery Bus Boycott, a 381-day protest of the segregated bus system in Montgomery. The overall research questions addressed were: How was communication used during the boycott to inform and mobilize the participants? How did news organizations mediate and frame communication? How was the information about the boycott communicated among and between the participants, churches and other networks? Qualitative methods (interviewing, frame analysis and archival analysis) were used to address these questions. Interviews were conducted with former participants to determine how they received their information about the boycott and how they stayed informed during the course of the protest. Content analysis was conducted on Montgomery Advertiser stories published about the boycott between Dec. 1, 1955 (the day Rosa Parks was arrested) and Dec. 21,1956 (the day the first court-ordered integrated buses operated in Montgomery) to determine the frames projected by the newspaper’s coverage. Archival analysis was used to determine the role of churches and networks such as the Montgomery Improvement Association, a group formed specifically during the boycott to help spread information to participants. This study reveals that boycott participants were skeptical of local newspaper coverage, and instead relied heavily on the Montgomery Improvement Association, area churches and other participants for their primary information regarding the boycott. This is important in the study of social movements because it shows how critical communication networks are to a movement’s success.

This study is an investigation into the music group Prussian Blue. The study was conducted by textual analysis of cultural material including novels, Web sites, documentary films, online interviews, music, videos, and magazine articles garnered through theoretical sampling. The textual analysis was conducted following the grounded theory approach to coding qualitative data. The findings reveal various discursive and ideological interconnections between the music group Prussian Blue and the contemporary hate movement. The group has a history of Holocaust denial, celebrates Adolph Hitler as someone with ―a lot of good ideas,‖ and cultivates relationships with some of the most notorious figures within the U.S. hate movement. White power music is being used as a tool to advertise and recruit people to the hate movement. This research also explored the meaning of white power music from the perspective of those of produce it as well as those who consume the music. Describing the meaning to them, fans report enjoying the music, appreciating the pro-white messages, and express the belief that Lynx and Lamb represent good role models. From April Gaede‘s perspective, the mother and manager of Prussian Blue, the music represents a counterhegemonic activity designed to mainstream pro-white messages and make money. April also described that music is a way to showcase her daughters‘ music, while also extending the white power music scene. Finally, April expressed her hope that Prussian Blue music would recruit other youngsters to produce pro-white cultural material. The meaning of Prussian Blue music to band members Lamb and Lynx Gaede represents the most complex and evolving perspective. Earlier narratives from the duo described how making music was a fun process and that the pro-white message of their music was of their own choosing. More recent narratives, however, express a strikingly different perspective. Specifically, the two reject their earlier pro-white music while also expressing regret for making those songs. This transformation has implications for cultural identity and action.

This study applied priming theory to investigate the cognitive effects of cosmetic surgery reality shows. An experimental design was utilized to demonstrate the effects of cosmetic surgery reality shows on viewers‟ perceptions regarding cosmetic surgery, physically unattractive people, and the beliefs of beauty. One experimental group was exposed to cosmetic surgery reality shows and two control groups were exposed to non-cosmetic surgery reality shows. This study found strong and assimilative priming effects. After being primed with cosmetic surgery reality shows, viewers perceived greater benefits of cosmetic surgery in terms of competitiveness, confidence, appearance, happiness, and attractiveness. They also perceived lower surgical risks and perceived good-looking people as more privileged in romantic relationships and in the job market. Meanwhile, physically unattractive people were considered as being disadvantaged in social relations. Habitual makeover show viewing had no effects on the perceived benefits and risks of cosmetic surgery. It had more profound effects on perceptions of physically unattractive people and the power of beauty. Body anxiety, unexpectedly, did not moderate the effects of exposure to cosmetic surgery reality shows.

Professional journalism training in developing countries has been one of the most important elements in the U.S. democracy assistance program since the late 1980s. Numerous organizations were involved with these projects focusing on both journalism and management training. This study looked at the impact of the training from the perspective of training participants. Radio professionals were the subjects for this research because they experienced the training and could describe what they thought about training and how they made use of it in their work. Indonesia was selected because it was one of the countries that received a large amount of funding for training. The purpose of this study was to determine the impact of international media training on radio professionals in Indonesia. The study examined the effectiveness of training organizations in implementing training programs in Indonesia. Diffusion of innovation theory was used as a theoretical framework based on the premise that training has been one of the most common tools used to diffuse new ideas and knowledge other than the formal education setting. A mixed-methodology by combining focus group discussion and survey was used in order to understand the impact of training for Indonesian radio professionals. Finding suggested that most journalists and managers adopted training and diffused the new knowledge and skills to fellow professionals. Some of them continued to adopt while others stopped due to both internal and external challenges. Journalists said management was the main obstacle to for adoption; while managers blamed the market situation. In addition, other factors that occurred in training also played a role in adoption including participant selection, needs assessment, training materials, trainers and the structure of training

This historical dissertation discusses the relationship between cigarette advertising and student publications at colleges and universities across the United States. This study uses The Orange and White at the University of Tennessee as a case study. Cigarette advertisements were printed in student publications from the 1920-1921 academic year to the 1963-1964 academic year and provided a needed source of revenue for student newspapers. This research examines the tactics and strategies that the tobacco industry used to target youth in the absence of federal legislation. This dissertation is divided into five chapters, which explain in detail the relationship between student publications, the tobacco industry, and federal legislators such as the FTC. The chapters also look at the pervasiveness of cigarette advertising in student newspapers on campus.

John Peel holds a unique place in British broadcasting history. During his almost 40-year career as a DJ on the BBC’s Radio One and Radio Four, he not only introduced innovative music—including psychedelia, reggae, punk, hip hop, grunge and electronica—into the British mainstream, but championed hundreds of musicians whose work might otherwise have gone unnoticed. Using Peel as a case study, this research focuses on the role his persona played in three distinct aspects of his success: (1) his ability to attract audiences across several generations; (2) his longevity at the BBC, a bastion of conservative bureaucracy; and (3) his impact on the programming on BBC’s Radio One and on British popular music in general. Drawing on the theories of persona developed by Horton and Wohl (1956) and Goffman (1971, 1981), the study offers a rhetorical analysis of Peel’s broadcast talk to explicate the role of persona in his success. By creating a persona based on selection, omission and emphasis of contradictory traits, Peel presented himself as an Everyman able to pull listeners onto his public platform while placing himself simultaneously in their worlds. Far from the artificial and static persona conceptualized by Horton and Wohl (1956), Peel’s on-air persona was paradoxical and flexible—traits that enhanced his credibility and help explain his unprecedented tenure as a DJ on Radio One and appeal as the host and writer for a talk program on Radio Four. The study ends with a discussion of the conditions required and extent to which it is possible for a single individual such as Peel to have a significant impact on social and cultural change.

This historical study examines the Aristotelian foundations of the Library and Museum of Alexandria for the purpose of (1) understanding how the Library and Museum differed from preceding ancient Near Eastern information institutions (i.e., “protolibraries”) and (2) how Aristotle’s methodologies for producing scientific knowledge were carried out in Alexandria. While protolibraries served as safeguards for maintaining a static cultural/political “stream of tradition” and created, organized, and maintained “library” documents to this end, the Library of Alexandria was a tool for theoretical knowledge creation. The Library materialized Aristotelian pre-scientific theory, specifically dialectic, and served the scholarly community of the Museum in its research. Following the Library, collections of materialized endoxa, or recorded esteemed opinions, became a necessary tool for use by scholarly communities. The Library established the post-Aristotelian paradigm under which academic libraries still operate. Although the Library of Alexandria represented a fundamental shift in the meaning and purpose of collections of recorded documents, a feminist critique of the post-Aristotelian library shows that the academic library, while used in knowledge creation, is rooted in a foundationalist philosophy that validates and maintains the status quo.

Culture impacts the ways people evaluate and respond to health and illness. As a result, Mexican-American culture plays a part in how women take care of their heath and react toward the threat of breast cancer. Using previously identified dominant cultural factors that may influence the health of Mexican-American women as a foundation, this qualitative study describes how Mexican-American women define and maintain health, particularly breast health. Hispanics are the fastest growing minority group in the United States. As a result, it is important to better understand how Mexican-American women define health and take care of themselves. Doing so will not only provide richer insights into the health behaviors of women but provide insights into family health behaviors. This study is important because it adds to the current body of knowledge by investigating the cultural beliefs of Mexican-American women, a sub-group within the larger Hispanic ethnic category. While several researchers have studied the cultural beliefs of Hispanics, it is imperative that scholars begin to further investigate the cultural beliefs of the sub-groups within the larger Hispanic ethnic category. In addition, previous studies have primarily been conducted in states that border Mexico, thus providing an opportunity for this study to contribute to the current body of literature by giving a voice to Mexican-American women in the southeast. Using a grounded theory approach, ten in-depth interviews were conducted with Mexican-American women in the southeast. The main theme that emerged from the data was: The Maintenance of Health through Traditional Practices in a Non-native Environment. Two thematic constructs that participants engage in helped to describe how the women in the study maintain health in a traditional manner when they live in a nonnative environment: (1) the belief that health is a combination of the body and mind and (2) the belief that health care is a Mexican woman’s responsibility.

Localism has long been a key goal of broadcast regulatory policy. In recent years, members of the FCC have echoed the often-repeated claims of community activists that lowpower radio stations, being inherently more “local”, not only serve the public interest more effectively but also function as an antidote to what many consider the negative effects of nationally consolidated, corporate ownership of increasing numbers of radio stations. However, such a claim hinges on the assumption that small, low-power and/or community radio stations are able to compete effectively for at least some of the same listeners big corporate stations pursue. Furthermore, there is an assumption in much literature on the subject that localism itself – both in terms of ownership and programming origination – is a quality that listeners find attractive. The purpose of this study was to test these assumptions empirically. The researcher created a series of experimental conditions, delivered in the form of an online survey with embedded audio files, in which subjects heard radio program excerpts manipulated to test the variables of ownership and locality of origination, answering questions after each excerpt. Dependent variables were affective response, medium credibility and source credibility. A total of 331 respondents in Knoxville, Tennessee heard excerpts of a legal-advice program, a newscast, and a religious music show, each manipulated to sound either locally originated or nationally syndicated, on stations identified as owned by companies ranging from non-profit low-power FMs to national groups such as Clear Channel Worldwide and Infinity-Viacom. Results showed slight, statistically significant preferences for local origination of the legal advice show, on the measure of medium credibility, and for the newscast, measured in terms of affective response. Other manipulations and measures pertaining to locality of origination revealed no significant differences, and there were no significant differences resulting from ownership manipulations. After the experimental portion of the study was completed, subjects responded to Likert-type questions self reporting their radio listening and localism preferences, indicating that they considered radio an important source of information but had only moderate preferences for local origination. A majority registered low levels of concern about broadcast ownership.

College student health scholarship indicates a stark contrast between health impediments college students identify and the health information their respective campuses provide; campus health promotions often lacking personal relevance for college students, and health programs that utilize control-based strategies to compel behavior change. College student health scholarship also indicates a heavily positivistic research slant with little consideration given to humanistic, student-centric approaches. The purpose of this dissertation was to explore college student perspectives about health messages to enhance college student health communications, thus bridging the disciplines of public relations and college student health. Findings revealed that female undergraduates are proactive and perceptive regarding health messages when they need information for a specific issue or concern. Findings also indicated that female undergraduates are initially dismissive but eventually receptive of health messages they involuntarily encounter. Findings additionally revealed that female undergraduates usually disregard health messages they encounter on campus. Findings also indicated that female undergraduates are differentially responsive to health messages from interpersonal sources. In addition, findings revealed that female undergraduates are grudgingly tolerant of societal health messages—especially those concerning unrealistic body standards. The researcher discovered dissertation findings through conducting in-depth interviews with 16 female undergraduates at a research-intensive university based in the southeastern United States. Specifically, she explored what health messages participants encountered, the sources of those health messages, and how participants responded to the health messages they encountered. The researcher applied thematic analysis to the interview transcripts to uncover female undergraduates‘ perspectives about health messages. She validated dissertation findings by clarifying bias through self-reflexivity, reaching information redundancy, and writing and reviewing self-memos. Dissertation findings revealed implications and insights for public relations and college student health scholarship and practice. Public relations scholars could extend dissertation findings by investigating how students decide which sources to trust. Public relations practitioners could develop message strategies to enhance campus coverage of issues that matter to students. College student health practitioners could create and consult with ―college student councils‖ before developing and disseminating health messages. Student health practitioners could train the individuals college students already trust as peer educators to facilitate healthful behaviors.