This paper explores the federal governments attempts to build a modern urban center in Tijuana and how these urban renewal efforts were embedded in a broader response to national emergencies. By examining this case study, I posit that modernist urban planning was flexible and could accommodate the states attempts to bolster its legitimacy. The time period studied is between 1960 and 1982. This interlude included the orchestration of a student massacre, a political crisis, a populist response to quell unrest, and finally a devastating economic crisis. In order to craft my argument I have examined blueprints, government memos, property deeds, memoirs, and mortgage information. This paper ultimately argues that national political crises made Tijuanas urban renewal possible. Mexican modernist planning, unlike in other countries, served primarily to defuse national political problems. Contrary to the dominant narrative, this study suggests that the regimes unraveling did not start with the 1968 student massacre. Instead, the traumatic 1982 economic crisis was central to the systems decline. The economic crash halted the efforts to redevelop Tijuana and limited the governments ability to obtain the populations consent through government spending.

This paper explores how the Mexican press depicted foreigners between 1898 and 1921. By examining Mexican periodicals during the period preceding the nations post-revolutionary consolidation, I posit the notion that discursive changes in the depictions and valorization of foreigners paved the way for the nationalist cultural project of the 1920s and 30s. That is particularly true about the representations of Spain and the United States. A disenchantment with American ideals occurred just as an orthodox vision of Mexican liberalism entered decline. Conversely, Spains re-appreciation of Spains role as a mother country became more visible in the Mexican press in the first quarter of the 20th century. Ultimately, these attitudes dominated the press as the country embarked in a nationalist vision of state building.

The following study examines the political, economic, social, and religious lives of a variety of lay Catholic recusants in the context of their relationship with the monarch and royal government. The thrust of this thesis is to explore how this relationship affected both the individuals and the continued existence and form of Catholicism in a Protestant country. The legislation and political maneuverings against English Catholics were not a unique experience for a minority faith during the 16th and 17th centuries. During Elizabeths reign, English Catholics faced inconsistent legislation, outright persecution, and disinterested government action against the practice of the Catholic faith and their persons. Their adaptions to this volatile environment produced what would eventually become the small, aristocratic enclaves of Catholicism in the 17th and 18th centuries. Despite their status, English Catholics did not retreat entirely from public life or give up their economic and political pursuits. These men and women were required to adapt to the new circumstances though. This thesis argues against previous scholars assertions that legal, financial, and religious barriers for English Catholics were simply another hurdle to jump through to attain political or economic aspirations. The numbers of individuals who faced legal and financial ramifications are telling of the extent the Elizabethan government could prosecute Catholics. But, the limitations of early modern bureaucracy are also found in the individuals who discovered ways around land sequestration, fines, and continued to practice Catholicism. Over time, English Catholics were slowly, yet not systematically, removed from public offices and service until by the end of Elizabeths reign only a few remained in positions of influence in either the local or national setting. In most cases, these were aristocratic men.

The case of Czeslaw Miloszs exile is significant because the writer epitomizes a 20th century intellectual torn among different loyalties, threatened by the totalizing claims of the Nazi or communist regimes, finally forced to leave his homeland. In my paper I focus on Miloszs experience of exile in the period immediately following his defection. I argue that the poet in the years 1951-1953 remained in a state of painful transition, a wanderer suspended between multiple worlds. The political character of his exile put him in an uneasy position between the two Cold War blocs. The poet could not be accepted by the West or the East, and remained mentally fixed in a space that hovered somewhere above both these realms, belonging to neither. Not only did Milosz experience a difficult process of cultural adjustment, but he also remained suspended between contradictory states in his private life. Moreover, in this period of emotional homelessness, Milosz experienced geographical displacement as well and explored the possibility of immigration to Canada, Great Britain, or Uruguay. The transition in his professional life was expressed by the shift from poetry toward prose, which gave him a better chance to attract an audience and thus to enter Western intellectual life. Finally, in his interaction with the Polish emigrant community, Milosz was torn between his self-imposed separation and his desire to belong to the Polish community. My research project is the first scholarly study devoted to this crucial period in the life of the recognized Nobel Prize winner.

In the early 1990s, the Russian intelligentsia encountered multiple new incentives in all realms: an ongoing democratic project with its opportunities for an open political activism, capitalism which mesmerized with easy gain, and finally, new intellectual and cultural trends of the Western world. What was missing was the all-encompassing state umbrella. In this essay, I argue that the new principles of pluralism and free choice that emerged in all areas of life, undermined the intelligentsia's identify, revealed its multiple flaws, as well as forced the intelligentsia to re-define its role. In this paper, I first reflect on the question of the intelligentsia's identity, and analyze how the traditional meaning of the term "intelligentsia" was transformed in the new reality. Then, I examine the condition of contemporary Russian intelligentsia by pointing outs its major vices, which have been revealed over the period of transformation. Finally, I pose the key question about future of the intelligentsia, and discuss its role in the new political, social and cultural reality. There is no doubt that the principle of pluralism and the multiple opportunities that emerged left the intelligentsia in search of a firm identity and a new role, one that would correspond to the new manifold reality, and that would also offer the intelligentsia reliable points of reference.

Economic, political, and social landscapes changed for white men in Louisiana after the Civil War. Suffering displacement, business interruption, property confiscation, and lower social and political standing vis-à-vis the former slaves, white mens standing in every realm seemed diminished, including their core identity as men. It was important to them and to their families for white men to regain a sense of competence as men. Using letters, diaries, and court cases involving white people with strong connections to Louisiana during the Reconstruction era, this dissertation analyzes the gendered problems that white men and their families sought to resolve. Newspaper articles, literature, and public entertainment are examined to suggest some of the ways which gendered anxieties made themselves known. While some men and women yearned for a return of the dominant, conventionally successful men who had epitomized the antebellum ideal, many white men and women were pragmatic about mens more limited potential in the postbellum environment. Some traditional concepts of masculinity remained unshaken, but weaknesses emerged in other areas where masculine vulnerabilities were uncovered.

Booker T. Washington and the Historians analyzes the past century of scholarly writings on Booker T. Washington and seeks to describe the major paradigms used to explain his life and work. Between 1915 and 2010 four major paradigms emerged. The hagiographic paradigm, which offered an uncritical and triumphal account, dominated Washington scholarship from 1915 to 1950. In the 1950s the critical paradigm became widely accepted among historians; Washington was viewed as a compromiser with white supremacists and Northern industrialists. In the 1990s and 2000s the educational paradigm, which focused on Washingtons pedagogy and educational achievements, developed as an alternative to the critical paradigm. In the 2000s, the contextual paradigm challenged the critical paradigm, presenting Washingtons activities in the context of the virulent white supremacy of his era. Historians writing within a particular paradigm shared common assumptions about race relations, economics, and education. When these views shifted, new paradigms materialized.

During the 18th century, various slave revolts erupted in the British Empire. These revolts demonstrate differing patterns of punishment that emerged in reaction to these rebellions, and these patterns raise questions on the interpretations and purposes of punishment for slave revolts. This paper utilizes two case studies of British Empire slave uprisings in early 18th century: Antigua in 1736 and Stono, South Carolina in 1739. This paper seeks to explore possible answers to why different patterns of punishment developed, why the punishments meanings are important to analyze, and how successful the punishments were in deterring future rebellions. Examination of these questions occurs by analyzing how social standing, the perpetration of violence against whites, cultural perceptions, and the colonial authorities need to command power played a role in how people involved in these cases viewed and reacted to punishments.

This paper explores the activities and experiences of a small group of American missionaries, Southern Baptists, who went to Rhodesia to spread their faith, but often found themselves caught between the movement for majority rule and white resistance. Southern Baptist missionaries spent thirty years spreading their faith in white-ruled Rhodesia. Throughout this period the mission successfully avoided confrontation with the Rhodesian government and converted Africans to their faith and their denominational work. In balancing their commitments to evangelism, law and order, and racial equality, the thirty year history consistently points to evangelism and conversion as the primary concern of Baptist missionaries. Only when Rhodesian law threatened this commitment did the Baptist Mission protest against white authorities. Rarely did the missionaries challenge the racist policies of the Rhodesian government. By placing their commitment to law and order above racial equality, Baptists applied an evangelistic pragmatism that allowed them freedom to live in Rhodesia and witness to the majority African population.

During the Great Depression, leaders in the Southern Baptist Convention interacted with the idea and the problem of leisure in indirect and subtle ways. The SBC sought to avoid problematic uses of leisure through its organized system of denominational activities and organizations. These organizations, such as the Baptist Training Union, the Baptist Brotherhood, and the Women's Missionary Union, were aimed at encouraging religious orthodoxy and social conservatism. Throughout the Depression the Southern Baptist Convention effectively preserved its orthodoxy and evangelistic zeal, but the growth of leisure called for new recreational methods to attain the expressed spiritual ends. Southern Baptist organization and adaptation during the thirties allowed the Convention to experience numerical growth throughout the fiscal constraints of the Depression, and also sowed the seeds for the growth of the SBC in the latter half of the twentieth century.