Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, Dept. of Art History, August 2001. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (M.A.)--Georgia State University, 2006. / Title from title screen. Ted Friedman, committee chair; Angelo Restivo, Kathy Fuller-Seeley, committee members. Electronic text (125 p.). Description based on contents viewed May 2, 2007. Includes bibliographical references (p. 121-125).

No description available.

Thesis (M.F.A.) / Note: The author, Logan Ann (Lumm) Taylor, can be reached at logananntaylor@gmail.com. / The bombshell figure is nothing new— she has been a historical site of feminist discourse, both applauded and vilified for her position and influence within celebrity culture. In the post-feminist era in which we may now live, the bombshell has been reimagined in reaction to the ideologies of the post-feminist movement. She emphasizes the problematic aspects of this movement, but also finds agency and power within its confines. This study provides two examples of the modern day bombshell figure, Sofia Vergara and Angelina Jolie, and explores the facets of these women’s brand identity that further women’s advancement toward true equality as well as those facets that inhibit women’s ability to rise above objectification and limited perspectives of equality and feminist success. This study explores the complicated relationship between celebrities, their fans, and the societal constructs in which they operate, ultimately revealing two women who have updated previous models of femininity with an agency and empowered sensibility that could well be the future of feminist action and choice.

No description available.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, 1997. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 241-256). Also available on the Internet.

Reality television programming chronicling the daily workings of multiple birth families within American culture has gained notoriety in recent years. Such programs, especially Discovery Health and TLC's 17, 18 Kids and Counting and TLC's Jon and Kate Plus Ei8ht, film, edit and broadcast the "everyday" life of these families. This research study focuses attention on hegemonic ideologies surrounding family values, motherhood, gender roles and religious faith, illuminated through textual and audience analysis. Working from an interdisciplinary approach combining feminist media and cultural studies, this study finds that hegemonic notions of family values, gender representations, religious faith and conceptions of motherhood are evident to varying degrees in the television texts and accepted by fans who negotiate their meanings online. / by Emily M. CIttadino. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2010. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2010. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

M.A. (Communication Studies) / This dissertation will concentrate on the manner in which the signification system of popular culture in advertising texts operate within the context of changing South African or post apartheid society. Social and political changes have taken place virtually overnight and it is therefore not surprising that the effects of these transformations have not yet filtered through to all layers of society. Furthermore, such quick changes cannot take place without causing at least some ripples of dissent and upheaval within certain sectors of society which may include cultural groups or even business. The author will consequently examine the effect which social changes have had on the perceptions of advertisers in the marketplace and the manner in which their brands are portrayed within advertising texts. More specifically, an investigation will be undertaken into the manner in which Popular Culture, whiph is inherently South African, has been incorporated within the contents of those texts. Popular Culture, it will be argued, has moved away from being a term used by classical Marxists to describe a so-called mass culture. In fact, within the context of a postmodern society, in other words, one which is essentially multi-faceted, the . concept Popular Culture-encapsulates that which is used within the day-to-day living experience to make a statement of dissent with the mainstream. Therefore the task set by this dissertation is manifold. the first instance we will place the South African market within a historic, cultural and economic context. In other words, we will attempt to trace the life-world of the South

This dissertation examines the relationship between the growth and popularization of psychology in American life in the postwar period and Americans’ belief that theirs is a “classless,” or overwhelmingly middle-class, society. I argue that psychology has, until recently, inadvertently naturalized middle-class norms of self-perception, communication, aspirations, and subjectivity. From the 1950s on, the United States has been what observers call a “therapeutic culture.” Psychological ideas have infused the major arenas of American life, including the educational, judicial, commercial, political, personal, and interpersonal realms. This project examines the origins and development of psychological professionals’ views of class, highlighting the professional, economic, disciplinary, and cultural factors that combined to form those views. I analyze a small but persistent thread of dialogue in the professional literature of the period that questioned mainstream psychological assumptions about class, and I explore how that impulse developed into major mental health policy initiatives in the 1960s, then was undermined by political and social conflicts. I also develop a case history of one mental health project that attempted to transcend psychology’s class biases, only to be contained by structural and disciplinary factors. After examining psychological professionals’ views of various publics, this project investigates a series of publics’ views of psychological practitioners. I draw on popular portrayals of postwar psychological practitioners across various media, including one particular working-class medium, postwar men’s adventure magazines, and employ classic cultural studies readings to analyze the significant differences in the portrayals. / text

While Black women are more visible in media and popular culture today, the range of their visibility remains narrow and in continuation within the dominant ideology concerning Black women within the U.S. The images that are presented discourage a full understanding of the conditions of the Black female experience and the ways these women are socially constituted within it (Newton & Rosenfelt 1985). This paper examines how the images of Black women are contradictory to the depressed socioeconomic status of Black women, how the show Girlfriends works to move beyond these images by expressing moments of the lived experience of Black women, and how Black women recognize their position within the oppressive institutional forces of the U.S. by negotiating their representations. / text