Although community colleges offer opportunities for diverse students to achieve their educational goals, African American males continue to rank at the bottom of most academic success measures such as semester-to-semester retention and degree completion. Research shows that factors associated with teaching excellence (how well a faculty member exhibits enthusiasm, clarity, preparation/organization, stimulation, and love of knowledge) should encourage student engagement. The following research questions are proposed for this study: 1. How do faculty discuss teaching excellence relative to the academic engagement of African American males? 2. How do African American male students discuss the importance of faculty members’ race in relationship to their academic engagement? 3. How, if at all, does the age of an African American male student impact his academic engagement? 4. How do first-generation and second-generation collegiate African American male college students differ, if at all, in academic engagement? To conduct this research, a mixed method paradigm will be used. A quantitative instrument will be utilized to identify highly engaged African American male students and those who teach them. Qualitative analysis will lead to discovery of how teaching excellence affects the engagement of the target population of students. This research will add to current literature by examining the impact of the criteria of teaching excellence on African American male students in predominately white community colleges. / text

Government / This report aims to broaden the horizon of research questions in international relations by encouraging a greater appreciation for the complexity of individual and collective motivations. More specifically, the report focuses on why the honor motive is ignored in the discipline and why it deserves more attention. / text

This work expands the understanding of the "culture of honor" that social psychologists maintain exists in the American South. Social psychologists attribute the higher incidence of violent crimes, especially murder committed by white men in the South as compared to Northern white men, to this "culture of honor." While social psychologists have restricted their work to white men, this work explores how this distinct culture has impacted the Southern black community while uncovering deeper ways in which the culture has affected the Southern white community. Using historically-based literature and film by African Americans, the work provides a more comprehensive look at the Southern "culture of honor." In the "culture of honor" notions of honor involve the entire community, with the family as the central unit of honor. Male and female family members possess significant responsibilities in regards to carrying and protecting family honor. Once familial honor is compromised or lost, a violent retaliation occurs. Legal and social institutions support the culture by assuming an apathetic attitude towards violent acts committed in defense of honor. The four works selected for this study allow for an insightful look into the Southern "culture of honor." While each work presents various aspects of the "culture of honor," they all contribute to a unique understanding of the culture. In Your Blues Ain't Like Mine, Bebe Moore Campbell illustrates the damaging affects the culture has on black and white families in the South. Ernest Gaines's A Gathering of Old Men depicts how Southern black men who, for decades, have been victims of violence at the hands of white men choose to assert their own toughness. The film Rosewood by John Singleton represents the film industry's contemporary depiction of strong, black male figures in the South. Finally, Michael Schultz's made for television film For Us, The Living celebrates the passion behind black men like Civil Rights' champion Medgar Evers, who refused to accept the violent "rule of retaliation" adhered to by Southern white men. From this study, the Southern "culture of honor" emerges as a much more complex institution than originally presented by social psychologists.

The purpose of this dissertation is to identify the semantics of honor and shame in the Hebrew Bible and to demonstrate how these social values intersect with Israel's fundamental social organizing principle, covenant. Though many scholars have claimed that honor and shame are pivotal values for biblical Israel and that covenant is fundamental to her conception of the divine-human relationship, no work attempting to explore the juncture of these two important social phenomena has appeared. Thus, our study has two major goals: (1) establish the semantics of honor and shame in the Hebrew Bible; and (2) demonstrate that honor and shame, however conceived in context, are pivotal to biblical Israel's understanding of her covenantal relationship with YHWH in Deuteronomy 28 and 2 Samuel 7. With regard to Deuteronomy 28, which defines Israel’s understanding of covenantal fidelity, we show that honor is depicted as pre-eminent military and economic status among the nations and as a major goal of the covenantal blessings and designed to motivate Israel to greater loyalty (vv. 1, 13). Shame, however, is not just the loss of pre-eminent status (vv. 44, 48), but also the loss of social existence (v. 68). The explicit covenantal formulation of both values appears unique to Israel, despite her adoption of other ancient Near Eastern covenantal forms.With regard to the 2 Samuel 7, we argue YHWH honors David and Zadok with eternal royal and priestly positions because Saul and Eli failed to honor YHWH (e.g., 1 Sam 2:30), but also because David and Zadok would be loyal (e.g., 2:35). As a result, David will be given “a name like the name of all of the great ones of the earth” (2 Sam 7:9), denoting David’s military superiority (8:13). Moreover, we show that from a Deuteronomistic prespective, the discipline of the Davidides in 2 Samuel 7:14–15, entails royal shaming (1 Kgs 11:31). Thus, we prove that, while honor and shame are variously conceived in both covenants, they are pivotal to our understanding of the divine-human relationship in the Hebrew Bible. / Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations

Young men who come to serve in National Defence service every year are physically weaker. Soldier physical training program has to improve their physical qualification necessary for their military-professional activities. Goal of the work. Analyze contents of physical training program of Lithuanian Army MBP “Gelezinis Vilkas” Guard of Honor Company at the time of the service and by means of pedagogical experiment survey its efficiency. 160 mandatory military service soldiers have been surveyed. Physical qualification and physical development were surveyed at the beginning of the service and at the end. It was established that the content of soldier physical training program covering the following sports (track and field athletics, gymnastics, swimming, skiing, combatant self-defence training various motory skills), results of main physical qualities’ improved. At the time of the service soldiers’ results in 100 m. jogging, 3000 m. jogging, bending-stretching hand in lying position, waist bending in seated position improved. Soldiers’ physical development results during time of service did not significantly change. Results of questionnaire survey showed that majority of the soldiers understand the importance of physical training program for their professional military activities and health.

'Honour', an undefined notion in a patriarchal society like Pakistan, is used as a tool to justify the crime of murder. Violence in the name of honour is not a new phenomenon. Historically, it has been justified in the name of culture but the scope of this tradition has broadened with time and there is an enormous increase in the number of its victims. This cultural notion is interpreted in a way to control women's sexuality and to keep women subordinate to men. Honour killing is not legally sanctioned but the judiciary, the administration and the society often condone it one way or the other. In the tribal areas of Pakistan where such murder is not considered a crime, honour killing is a punishment for those who contravene against the traditional honour code. / The wide acceptance of honour killing has made women suffer as a whole against their basic rights; human, constitutional and Islamic. This thesis focuses on the judicial redress against the crime of honour killings, which could be achieved by proper administration of justice. It contests that to control the crime in the patriarchal society of Pakistan, legislative measures are not enough. There is a dire need to eliminate the inadequacies of the administration of justice. The State could build a judicial framework to eliminate the inequality and discrimination against women. The judiciary could play an important role in bringing justice to the victims and in curbing this heinous crime.

This dissertation explores the representation of dueling and honor in five theatrical works in order to answer one central question: How does the Golden Age concept of honor transform in the age of Enlightenment? This question may be broken down into specific inquiries, such as: 1) How is honor filtered through sentiment? 2) How did eighteenth-century ilustrados use theater to attempt to resolve the conflict between using violence to defend one’s honor and the Enlightenment ideal of avoiding excess? and 3) How did honor affect the private citizen and his relationship to the state in plays? During the eighteenth century, the age of sensibility rewrote the duel, transforming it from a ritual connected with the aristocracy into an act tied to individual, often middle-class lives. This project begins with an early play by José de Cañizares, Por acrisolar su honor (1711) and then examines sentimental comedies published and performed toward the end of the century: Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos’ El delincuente honrado (1773), Luciano Francisco Comella’s La Jacoba (1789), Antonio Valladares de Sotomayor’s El vinatero de Madrid (1784) and Gaspar Zavala y Zamora’s El amante generoso (1791). Sentimental comedies use sensibility to focus on individuals’ honor conflicts. An analysis of the representation of dueling offers a glimpse of the complex intermingling of multiple definitions of Spanish culture, where neither a lone enlightened model nor an identity based primarily on Spain’s Baroque past prevails. While sentimental comedies present conclusions that ostensibly exalt honor as virtue and rely on a belief in humanity’s goodness to resolve their conflicts, their representations of dueling point to a tense coexistence of multiple definitions of Spanish identity in the eighteenth century. Virtue is never enough to override the accusation that someone is a coward for not accepting a dueling challenge. The inclusion of extra elements that cater to social prejudices of the time also undermines the notion of honor-as-virtue. The contradictions revealed by sympathetic representations of dueling may point to the failure of sensibility as a cohesive model for resolving dramatic conflicts in a society with such diverse definitions of honor and citizenship.

The present study investigates the verbal strategies of self-presentation that humanist scholars employed in contests of honor during the early fifteenth century. The focus of this study is George of Trebizond (1395-1472/3), a Cretan scholar who emigrated to Italy in 1416, taught in Venice, Vicenza, and elsewhere, served as an apostolic secretary in Rome, and composed the first major humanist treatise on rhetoric, his Rhetoricorum libri quinque, in 1433/34. Trebizond feuded with many prominent humanists during his career, including Guarino of Verona (1374-1460) and Poggio Bracciolini (1380-1459). His quarrels with both men illustrate how humanist conflicts were the sites upon which Quattrocento scholars won or lost honor via literary activities designed to appeal to a public audience of peers and patrons. Humanists wrote to denigrate publicly their competitors, casting them as ignorant and morally corrupt, and to praise themselves as eloquent and virtuous. Although Renaissance scholarship has long acknowledged the humanist pursuit of glory, the linguistic means by which humanists contested honor remains understudied. The present study contends that Quattrocento contests of honor were conducted using standard sets of oppositional categories, themes, and literary models. Additionally, I argue that an analysis of the linguistic strategies of self-presentation provides a more complex and complete picture of Quattrocento humanism and of individual humanists as historical figures. Following an introductory discussion of George of Trebizond and Quattrocento humanism in Chapter One, the next three chapters of this dissertation address individual themes evident in Trebizond’s correspondence. Chapter Two examines the anti-Greek language that dominated Trebizond’s dispute with Guarino in 1437. Chapter Three explores the language of restraint and rational self-control in Trebizond’s feud with Poggio between 1452 and 1453. Chapter Four evaluates humanist concepts of masculinity in Trebizond’s feuds with both men. Chapter Five steps back from a deep thematic reading of Trebizond’s correspondence to consider invective as a literary genre that was a preferred vehicle for humanist self-presentation. This final chapter studies two additional feuds, between Guarino and Niccolò Niccoli, and Poggio and Lorenzo Valla, to understand better Trebizond’s experiences as a reflection of the broader culture of which he was a part.

Access to abstract permanently restricted to Ball State community only. / A brief summary of wartime service -- To a man, fighting like heroes -- We are all made by the same God -- Prosecuted for honor. / Access to thesis permanently restricted to Ball State community only. / Department of History

Thesis (MA(Semitic Languages))--University of Pretoria, 2001. / Summary in English. Includes bibliographical references.