The subject of this paper is the experiences and observations of Lt. Edwin Best of the 618th Ordnance Ammunition Company from 1943 until 1946. This includes time in the United States, England and France. The primary sources for this paper include letters home from Lt. Best and an oral history transcript. Secondary sources have been used to place Lt. Best into the overall context of the war. He made keen observations regarding the level of training before D-Day, comparisons of life in England and the US, from the "communications zone" in Normandy, as a temporary Judge Advocate General officer, and finishing the war in Southern France. Though he may not have been on the front line, or in an HQ, his comments are valuable to the historical record.

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This study examines a largely unexplored aspect of Sutherland’s (1974) model of differential association: the interplay of general and crime specific definitions favorable towards crime. Do individuals learn the specific techniques of a type of crime through interactions or do social interactions produce a general disposition towards all types of criminal behavior? Little prior research has been done on the influence of these definitions. Instead studies focus on only one or another, which leaves the details of general/specific definitions unexplored. With the aid of a mixed methodology of statistical and network analysis, this study explores general/specific definitions simultaneously by focusing on relationships between egos and alters. If alters commit similar crimes, it is likely that crime specific definitions are being learned; if crimes are dissimilar then general definitions are more likely. Using police data on a known criminal network located in an urban capital, I test the relationship between the criminal behaviors of egos and alters. The study also compares the centrality of the node to the commonality of crime they commit. This provides an understanding of how key nodes in the network affect the dissemination of criminal definitions. Overall, while variations exist for criminal types, the study finds that crime specific definitions dominate the network and, therefore, have greater influence over respondents’ criminal behavior. Conversely, I found no clear pattern which indicates that high centrality nodes commit more common crimes. This may indicate that high centrality nodes are responsible for disseminating general definitions of crime while most nodes communicate crime specific definition.

The First Month at the Piano by Mana-Zucca, published in 1935, is a pioneering piano method to be taught by rote, supporting sound before sight learning theories, to the pre-school student. It differs from the Suzuki method in that The First Month at the Piano uses short, repetitive patterns, intrinsic to the Edwin Gordon Music Learning Theory. The First Month at the Piano has been compared to educational theories and has been found to follow Lev Vygotsky's theory of scaffolding and Jerome Bruner's principles of structure, readiness for learning, and motivation. The First Month at the Piano has been shown to provide a wide variety of sensory experiences for the pupil and establish a comfort and familiarity with the instrument. After completing the method, the pupil will have a solid aural foundation at the piano and will be fully prepared for primer level notation. It is a highly adaptable method and modified versions were made from the originals which would be of interest to today's teachers of pre-school piano students. Incorporation of interactive MIDI with electronic keyboards would enhance the students' learning experiences and be a direction to follow for future use of this method.

This thesis examines a new genre in Bible publishing: the BibleZine, a combination of the Bible with the formatting and visual elements of a teenage fashion magazine. The first BibleZine, Revolve: The Complete New Testament, appeared in the summer of 2003 and sold all of its 40,000 copies in a matter of months. This success has inspired a new line of Bible products, as several follow-up editions of Revolve and other BibleZines have flooded the marketplace. While the publisher and editors of Revolve claim that their modern creation is meant to inspire young readers to connect with the text of the New Testament, the forceful combining of the two disparate genres has produced an artifact whose form undermines and trivializes biblical content.<p> The significance of the BibleZines message extends beyond its updated magazine format. This thesis uses the theories of Kenneth Burke, George Dillon, Edwin Black, and several other rhetorical critics to reveal and critique the editorial influence found in this updated New Testament. The analysis is divided into three chapters that examine specific elements of the carefully orchestrated BibleZine, from the impact of Revolves prominent magazine-like features to the pseudo-friendships the editors create to influence its young target audience. Revolve does not represent a unique way of interpreting the Bible for a new generation. It may look contemporary in its format, but Revolve masks a materialistic and highly conservative ideology that will negatively influence its young readers in how they approach matters of identity and spirituality. My analysis will reveal the numerous ways the editors of the BibleZine use and manipulate biblical sanction in order to convey a consumeristic ideology.

The final chapter of Spinoza’s Ethics has elicited numerous interpretations, and in this work, I discuss Jonathan Bennett’s and Harry Wolfson’s. Bennett claims that the doctrine of blessedness is unintelligible, while Wolfson claims that Spinoza’s account of blessedness actually defends traditional, medieval views of the immortality of the soul. I find neither of these acceptable accounts for the reasons presented below, and I have a simple alternative explanation for this doctrine. Essentially, I argue that by ‘blessedness’ Spinoza means being happy with being virtuous. In my reading of the Ethics, Spinoza first offers the account that we should help others in order to help ourselves, and then he explains that we should enjoy doing so, and he writes that being happy with this is called ‘blessedness.’

The final chapter of Spinoza’s Ethics has elicited numerous interpretations, and in this work, I discuss Jonathan Bennett’s and Harry Wolfson’s. Bennett claims that the doctrine of blessedness is unintelligible, while Wolfson claims that Spinoza’s account of blessedness actually defends traditional, medieval views of the immortality of the soul. I find neither of these acceptable accounts for the reasons presented below, and I have a simple alternative explanation for this doctrine. Essentially, I argue that by ‘blessedness’ Spinoza means being happy with being virtuous. In my reading of the Ethics, Spinoza first offers the account that we should help others in order to help ourselves, and then he explains that we should enjoy doing so, and he writes that being happy with this is called ‘blessedness.’

This thesis examines a new genre in Bible publishing: the BibleZine, a combination of the Bible with the formatting and visual elements of a teenage fashion magazine. The first BibleZine, Revolve: The Complete New Testament, appeared in the summer of 2003 and sold all of its 40,000 copies in a matter of months. This success has inspired a new line of Bible products, as several follow-up editions of Revolve and other BibleZines have flooded the marketplace. While the publisher and editors of Revolve claim that their modern creation is meant to inspire young readers to connect with the text of the New Testament, the forceful combining of the two disparate genres has produced an artifact whose form undermines and trivializes biblical content.<p> The significance of the BibleZines message extends beyond its updated magazine format. This thesis uses the theories of Kenneth Burke, George Dillon, Edwin Black, and several other rhetorical critics to reveal and critique the editorial influence found in this updated New Testament. The analysis is divided into three chapters that examine specific elements of the carefully orchestrated BibleZine, from the impact of Revolves prominent magazine-like features to the pseudo-friendships the editors create to influence its young target audience. Revolve does not represent a unique way of interpreting the Bible for a new generation. It may look contemporary in its format, but Revolve masks a materialistic and highly conservative ideology that will negatively influence its young readers in how they approach matters of identity and spirituality. My analysis will reveal the numerous ways the editors of the BibleZine use and manipulate biblical sanction in order to convey a consumeristic ideology.

In this dissertation, I provide three studies of artistic practice in the era of the Great Depression. In each chapter, I write about a different set of artists working in the southeastern United States: I write about Walker Evans and the artistic and literary community located in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Louisiana (1926-1941); Edwin and Elise Harleston and their portrait studio in Charleston, South Carolina (1922-1931); and Bill Traylor and the artists who founded the New South Gallery and Art School in Montgomery, Alabama (1939-1940). Drawing from public and private archival collections, I consider how these artists made works that represented the South while they also made connections with artists and visual communities elsewhere; these connections placed them in dialogue with artists of the Harlem Renaissance, of American Regionalism, and of the Mexican Mural Movement. Although the artists in each chapter were from different Southern cities, they shared similar interests in the importance of developing and participating in artistic community. I situate each study in this dissertation in relation to a type of artistic practice. These types of artistic practice—documentary, portraiture, and exhibition—served as loci for Southern artists’ ideas about time and place. Southern studies have been haunted by the idea that the South always looks backward, to the past. In these three studies, I consider how Southern artists and their contemporaries in other places took different approaches to referencing the past and imagining a future for the South. The works made by these Southern artists—which are linked by their complicated relationships to race, history, and place—are largely absent from histories of American and 20th century art. Their absence tells us much about the stakes behind history writing. By bringing these studies into dialogue with other, existing, art historical contexts and communities, I trace how historical absence is constructed and why such absences are important to consider. The works in this dissertation are also linked by their difference from a kind of Modernism; in their multiple and discrepant modernisms, the artists in this dissertation made work which was both modern and not-modern, which looked backward while pushing forward. / text

Thesis (M.A.)--Brigham Young University, Dept. of Art. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-115).