In the chapters of my thesis, I explore how "soft" consciousness-raising novels of the first, second and third-waves of feminism practice underground feminism by covertly exposing women's socio-political issues outside of the confines of feminist rhetoric. In moving away from the negative connotations of political language, the authors enable the education of female audiences otherwise out of reach. Working from and extending on various theorists, I construct a theoretical model for what I term underground feminism. Running on the principal of conducting feminist activism without using feminist rhetoric, underground feminism challenges the notion that "subtle" feminism means weak feminism. In illustrating how underground feminism works in novels and in physical activism, I hope to encourage the recognition of the political utility of women's writings that do not fit the strict archetypes of feminist authorship. Analyzing the effectiveness of covert feminist conversion narratives, I discuss one soft consciousness-raising novel for each wave. The novels - Sarah Grand's The Heavenly Twins (1893), Dorothy Bryant's Ella Price's Journal (1972), and Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones's Diary (1996) - accused by scholars of employing weak feminist politics, are investigated as feminist literature that disidentifies with the feminist label with the possibility of facilitating a wide spread conversion process in "would be" feminists. After analyzing how the novels place women's issues at the center of discourse by discussing female education, women's voice, and narrative control, I consider how the underground feminism implicit in the texts extends to activism outside of literature. I also end by arguing that these novels enable a more intricate conversation about women's issues in which the voices of both self-identified and non-identified feminists are recognized.

My thesis studies Hartley Coleridge and Dorothy Wordsworth to redress the unjust neglect of Hartley’s work, and to reach a more positive understanding of Dorothy’s conflicted literary relationship with William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. I provide a complete reassessment of the often narrowly read prose and poetry of these two critically marginalized figures, and also investigate the relationships that affected their lives, literary self-constructions, and reception; in this way, I restore a more accurate account of Hartley and Dorothy as independent and original writers, and also highlight both the inhibiting and cathartic affects of writing from within a familial literary context. My analysis of the writings of Hartley and Dorothy and the dialogues in which they engage with the works of STC and William, argues that both Hartley and Dorothy developed a strong relational poetics in their endeavour to demarcate their independent subjectivities. Furthermore, through a survey of the significance of the sibling bond – literal and figurative – in the texts and lives of all these writers, I demonstrate a theory of influence which recognizes lateral, rather than paternal, kinship as the most influential relationship. I thus conclude that authorial identity is not fundamentally predetermined by, and dependent on, gender or literary inheritance, but is more significantly governed by domestic environment, familial readership, and immediate kinship. My thesis challenges the long-standing misconceptions that Hartley was unable to achieve a strong poetic identity in STC’s shadow, and that Dorothy’s independent authorial endeavour was primarily thwarted by gender. To replace these misreadings, I foreground the successful literary independence of both writers: my approach reinstates Hartley Coleridge’s literary standing as a major poet who bridged Romanticism and Victorian literature, and promotes Dorothy Wordsworth as one of the finest descriptive writers of nature and relationship.

This thesis investigates a neglected sub-genre of women’s writing, which I have termed the literature of the boarding house. Focusing on unmarried women, this is a study of the alternative rooms ‘of one’s own’ that existed in the nineteen thirties: from the boarding house and hotel, to the bed-sitting room or single room as a paying guest in another family’s house. The 1930s is defined by the conflict between women’s emerging social and economic independence and a dominant ideology that placed increased importance on domesticity, the idea of ‘home’ and women’s place within the familial structure. My research highlights the incompatibility between the idealised images of domestic life that dominated the period and the reality for the single woman living in temporary accommodation. The boarding house existed outside conventional notions of female domestic space with its connotations of stability and family life. Women within the boarding house were not only living outside traditional domestic structures; they were placing themselves outside socially and culturally defined domestic roles. The boarding house was both a new space of modernity, symbolising women’s independence, and a continued imitation of the bourgeois home modelled on rituals of middle-class behaviour. Through an examination of novels by Elizabeth Bowen, Lettice Cooper, Stella Gibbons, Storm Jameson, Rosamond Lehmann, Dorothy Richardson, Jean Rhys, Virginia Woolf, and E. H. Young, this study privileges the literary as a way in which to understand the space of the boarding house. Not only does the boarding house blur the boundaries between public and private space, it also challenges the traditional conceptions of the family home as the sole location of private domestic space. I argue that by placing their characters in the in-between space of the boarding house, the authors can reflect on the liminal spaces that existed for women both socially and sexually. In the literature of the boarding house, the novel becomes a site for representing women’s experiences that were usually on the periphery of traditional narratives, as well as a literary medium for articulating the wider social and economic issues affecting the lives of unmarried women.

The three novels examined in this thesis do not deal with the subject of slavery directly; however, I argue that, much like slave narratives, they all depict oppressive master/slave relationships and feature protagonists who fight for freedom through literacy and/or education. This thesis outlines three contemporary novels that take place during or after the Civil Rights Movement, what I call "freedom narratives," that not only signify on, but pay tribute to, the slave and neo-slave narrative tradition. These novels borrow from the tradition, not only in terms of structure, but also in terms of plot, point of view, theme, and resolution. Additionally, through the novels, one can see how the trauma of slavery in America permeates contemporary American homes, both White and Black. This thesis focuses on PUSH by Sapphire, The Darkest Child by Delores Phillips, and Bastard Out of Carolina by Dorothy Allison to illustrate the significance and the impact of the traditional slave narrative and the trauma of slavery on contemporary novels and American people. / by Samantha Messinger. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2012. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2012. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

Dorothy Allison's Two or Three Things I Know for Sure, Mary Karr's The Liars' Club, and Barbara Robinette Moss's Change Me into Zeus's Daughter are memoirs published in the 1990s of girlhoods in the late 1950s and early 1960s. This dissertation uses and expands upon the approaches of the multi-disciplinary Girls' Studies in analyzing how these memoirists theorize their own girlhoods. Each memoirist represents her experience in a culture that attempts to marginalize, silence, and define her. An application of the foundational work on girlhood in developmental psychology provides for an analysis of each memoirist's depiction of girlhood as a time of authentic insight and developing agency. Referencing feminist literary criticism allows for an interpretation of how the girls at the center of these works develop agency through growing awareness of the circumstances of their marginalization. And a semiotic literary interpretation adds to the analysis of these works as creative autobiogra phical writing in affording a close reading of how the memoirists portray younger selves learning to read the signs and texts of a culture and becoming aware of their status as girls in working-class families. Each memoirist uses a dual vocal presentation as both the adult memoirist and a younger self give shape to the narrative. Each memoirist represents a distinct southern space intersecting with specifics of the era to form a cultural moment. Social Construction Theory makes available a basis for considering how the memoirists narrate their increasing understanding of race and gender within these specific contexts as well as their resistive voicing of these insights. / Through a Cultural Studies focus this dissertation examines how each memoirist represents a younger self's negotiations with cultural products of the era that work to construct girlhood. Adding to this unpacking of how the memoirists study their own girlhoods, the tools of Postco for an analysis of how the memoirists theorize their own girlhoods in ways that parallel these approaches. This dissertation adds to the evolving field of Girls' Studies in using contemporary theoretical frameworks to interpret how girlhood is constructed, represented, and negotiated with in these memoirs. / by Regina Dilgen. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2011. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2011. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

Mastering the physical aspect of piano technique has long been a topic of great interest and importance to pianists. This is borne out in the numerous pedagogical approaches on the topic of piano technique. Despite the many contributions from pedagogues and scholars in developing an understanding of piano technique, many conflicting approaches often cause more confusion than clarity. After reviewing the literature on pedagogical approaches to piano technique, this study determined that problematic language might lie at the root of the confusion. Core concepts identified in the review of literature as recurring areas of misunderstanding were tension, relaxation, co-contraction, arm weight, and hand and finger shape. The purpose of this study is to seek where issues of language exist in contemporary piano pedagogical approaches and to show how these problems may contribute to the systemic confusion in piano technique. To do this, the language that is used to describe and define the core concepts identified in the review of literature is analyzed in five modern pedagogical approaches. Five authors who have developed approaches that reflect current trends in piano technique have been selected for this study: Barbara Lister-Sink; Dorothy Taubman; Thomas Mark; Fred Karpoff; and Alan Fraser. The first step of this study entails collecting data from each of the five pedagogical approaches. The data is then analyzed for consistency and accuracy. Problems in language that contribute to the inconsistencies and inaccuracies are examined and illustrated with material from the data collection. This study concludes by identifying the main sources of confusion in the use of language: inconsistent and inaccurate use of terms; wavering between scientific, common, and invented language; challenges in describing opposing qualities that come from tension and relaxation; and failing to discern between the individual subjective experience and the mechanics of movement. By recognizing where the problems in language exist, this study represents an important first step for the pedagogical community to reach a common understanding of the language used to describe the physical aspect of piano technique.

Elderly patients in the Emergency Department (ED) receive a different level of care than younger patients. The ED disproportionately deploys resources to serve the needs of the younger patient population, a decision that appears to be mediated by the acuity of the patient’s condition as defined by the institution. This study will seek to examine the institutional work processes by which this disparity in care is created. By looking at the needs of the elderly as ED patients and based on what they identify as important to them, this ethnographic study will examine the work organization of the nurses, physicians, and administrators in the ED. The goal of the research is, through the examination of the organization of work and the texts that mediate it, to explain the ruling relations through which elderly patients are subjugated as patients in the ED.

Elderly patients in the Emergency Department (ED) receive a different level of care than younger patients. The ED disproportionately deploys resources to serve the needs of the younger patient population, a decision that appears to be mediated by the acuity of the patient’s condition as defined by the institution. This study will seek to examine the institutional work processes by which this disparity in care is created. By looking at the needs of the elderly as ED patients and based on what they identify as important to them, this ethnographic study will examine the work organization of the nurses, physicians, and administrators in the ED. The goal of the research is, through the examination of the organization of work and the texts that mediate it, to explain the ruling relations through which elderly patients are subjugated as patients in the ED.

Mastering the physical aspect of piano technique has long been a topic of great interest and importance to pianists. This is borne out in the numerous pedagogical approaches on the topic of piano technique. Despite the many contributions from pedagogues and scholars in developing an understanding of piano technique, many conflicting approaches often cause more confusion than clarity. After reviewing the literature on pedagogical approaches to piano technique, this study determined that problematic language might lie at the root of the confusion. Core concepts identified in the review of literature as recurring areas of misunderstanding were tension, relaxation, co-contraction, arm weight, and hand and finger shape. The purpose of this study is to seek where issues of language exist in contemporary piano pedagogical approaches and to show how these problems may contribute to the systemic confusion in piano technique. To do this, the language that is used to describe and define the core concepts identified in the review of literature is analyzed in five modern pedagogical approaches. Five authors who have developed approaches that reflect current trends in piano technique have been selected for this study: Barbara Lister-Sink; Dorothy Taubman; Thomas Mark; Fred Karpoff; and Alan Fraser. The first step of this study entails collecting data from each of the five pedagogical approaches. The data is then analyzed for consistency and accuracy. Problems in language that contribute to the inconsistencies and inaccuracies are examined and illustrated with material from the data collection. This study concludes by identifying the main sources of confusion in the use of language: inconsistent and inaccurate use of terms; wavering between scientific, common, and invented language; challenges in describing opposing qualities that come from tension and relaxation; and failing to discern between the individual subjective experience and the mechanics of movement. By recognizing where the problems in language exist, this study represents an important first step for the pedagogical community to reach a common understanding of the language used to describe the physical aspect of piano technique.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Memorial University of Newfoundland, 2001. / Bibliography: leaves 451-468.