Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 2013, Spanish

The Spanish Civil War took place between 1936 and 1939 and exhibited the nations division in terms of class, religion, politics and ideology. Throughout the post-war years of repression and Francoist dictatorship, many people elected to forget about the war or were censured in their attempts to express their memories and stories. A half century later, in response to this forgetting, society has responded through various means: conversations, debates and cultural representations. This study examines a collection of six novels and five films from the post-Franco era that illustrate diverse experiences of the war and the post-war repression. They are analyzed based on the different perspectives taken to recount a specific history as well as the socio-historical moment in which they were produced, as a representation of the society. The novels and films portray the complexity of the war and the ensuing difficulty of investigating its victims. Long before any discussion of Spains 2007 Law of Historical Memory had begun, these authors and directors reveal the challenging but necessary process of recuperating historical memory.

Committee: Nathan Richardson PhD (Advisor); Amy Robinson PhD (Committee Member); Pedro Porbén PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: European History; Foreign Language; History; Literature

Bachelor of Arts, Ohio University, 2020, Political Science

This thesis explores how historical sites impact the collective memory of slavery in the United States.

Committee: Kathleen Sullivan (Advisor) Subjects: African American Studies; American History; Black History; History; Legal Studies; Modern History; Museums; Political Science

Master of Arts (MA), Ohio University, 2010, History (Arts and Sciences)

Selling the Gulf War required the George H. W. Bush administration to depart from its ineffective approach to public communications. The American people initially supported the President‘s response to the invasion of Kuwait, but over time the administration‘s inconsistent arguments caused the case for intervention to be increasingly called into question. By late November the administration perceived a looming crisis in support and moved to solidify domestic approval. Public opinion research informed them that the memory of the Vietnam War was the greatest threat to public support of an American war in the Persian Gulf. Consequently the administration simplified the justifications for war and argued that challenging Saddam Hussein was a moral imperative. After an initial swell of support in the aftermath of victory, the administration became less able to publically justify the war and unable to use it for political ends. The cultural and political consequences of the administration‘s decisions contributed to Bush‘s defeat in the 1992 presidential election.

Committee: Chester Pach (Advisor); Chester Pach (Committee Chair); Paul Milazzo (Committee Member); John Brobst (Committee Member) Subjects: American History; History; International Relations

BA, Oberlin College, 2011, Sociology

The Salvadoran Civil War (1980-1992), fought between the state's military and a leftist guerrilla group (the FMLN) ended in a peace agreement brokered by the United Nations that acknowledged both sides as equal partners in the reconstruction of civil society. As a result, both camps have been able to write their histories, erect their monuments and hold celebrations in honor of their martyrs. This project studies these competing narratives and the forms in which this history is preserved, and presents an analysis of four key figures, two who reflect the continuing fractured state of historical memory (Major Roberto d'Aubuisson and Col. Domingo Monterrosa), and two who offer the hope that someday, a unifying, healing narrative can emerge (Archbishop Oscar Romero and Comandante Schafik Handal). The goal of this project is to explore how the mythologies these icons are understood and expressed, and what it indicates about collective memory in post-war El Salvador.

Committee: Veljko Vujacic (Advisor); Sebastiaan Faber (Advisor) Subjects: History; Latin American Studies; Sociology

Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 0, Musicology

The romance was the preeminent French song form from the mid-eighteenth through the mid-nineteenth centuries. These simple, strophic, often amorous songs permeated the French and French colonial musical scenes, appearing on operatic and concert stages, and in boarding schools, prisons, military barracks, and especially domestic spaces like salons and drawing rooms. The romance was the sonic emblem of French style and identity, a celebrated and central aspect of the French soundworld. Despite its historical significance, however, the genre and its myriad professional and amateur composers, poets, performers, and listeners have been all-but forgotten; the romance has been reduced to an immature foil for the later melodies of Gabriel Faure and Claude Debussy. In this dissertation, I shift focus back to the romance, to the culture with which it interacted, and to the people that produced and treasured it from the Revolution to the Third Republic (1789-1870). I argue that the romance functioned as a kind of melodic pedagogy, a musical means to mold the identities, values, and worldviews of its consumers. Composers, poets, publishers, and performers exploited the genre's emotional powers and inherent catchiness—along with a particularly French method of vocal production—to propagate largely conservative ideas of gender, class, race, history, the body, and the mind in an attempt to define and fix France's place in an increasingly disordered post-revolutionary and imperialist world. Chapter 1 explores the largely-forgotten performance practices that animated the romance, including issues of vocal production, expressive timbres, gesture, and ornamentation. I argue that these practices were heard as uniquely French, and that to understand how the music operated aesthetically, socially, and politically, we must first understand how it was performed. In Chapter 2, I position the romance as a tool of moral pedagogy for girls, focusing on ways in which it was folded i (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Francesca Brittan (Advisor); Susan McClary (Committee Member); Christine Cano (Committee Member); Daniel Goldmark (Committee Member); Peter Bennett (Committee Member) Subjects: Music

MARCH, University of Cincinnati, 2022, Design, Architecture, Art and Planning: Architecture

In a developing country as India, there is a vast sociocultural gap between Urban and Rural ecosystems. As per the Census 2021, ‘urbanization is spreading, and rural India will be History' soon (Down to Earth,2019). While this might seem like progress at face value, the phenomenon of a predominantly rural community converting to urban spheres is a sign of alarm to the cultural diversity of India. But more importantly, ‘the immediate concern is whether India's farming population will' ‘migrate to nonfarm occupation', posing an obvious question; will food scarcity become more rampant than it is, or can farming be ‘lucrative enough to provide for the survival of its farmers', and the rural community at large. While 74% of India's population is rural people, architecture has done little to reverse this migration force. The thesis proposes Rural Agro-tourism as a solution to reverse the migration flow from rural to urban areas by providing economic opportunities and retaining socio-cultural fabric through the appropriation of threshold spaces using critical regional theory. A threshold is a structural entity that marks the transition from one region to another which facilitates transition, in-betweenness, and is characterized by ambivalence fosters a mix of conditions, people and creates a dynamic nature of space. The paper focuses on developing a design methodology for the concept of swadeshi thresholds where swadeshi means ‘of one's own country'. Swadeshi Thresholds discuss built identity that evokes a sense of place, through the socio-cultural ethos and climatic appropriation which is ignored in many contemporary constructions due to a fascination with Western glass facades. Thresholds will be deconstructed and reconstructed through Till Boettger's framework of threshold analysis. The lack of vocabulary in the framework for describing the location of place-making elements in the threshold is filled by borrowing Ing Kevin lynches framework of places (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Vincent Sansalone M.Arch. (Committee Member); Joss Kiely Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Architecture

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2020, Leadership and Change

This dissertation illuminates how the experience of growing up during the Chilean dictatorship (1973–1990) affected the individual's sense of self as citizen and the impact on their sense of democratic agency, civic-mindedness, and political engagement in their country's current democracy. To understand that impact, the researcher chose to study her own generation, the “Pinochet-era” generation (Cummings, 2015) and interviewed those who were part of the Chilean middle class, who despite not being explicit victims of perpetrators, were raised in dictatorship and surrounded by abuse of state power including repression, disappearance, and imprisonment. The theoretical frame of the Socio-Political Development Theory (Watt, Williams, & Jagers, 2003) helped to understand the process that participants went through and how they moved from an A-Critical Stage, with a complete absence of awareness and understanding about what was happening in their world at the time of the coup d'Etat, to a stage of critical consciousness surrounded by empathy for those who were suffering human rights violations which were the main drivers to latter participate in a liberation process. This development of a critical consciousness was influenced—among others—by specific family and social context which promoted transgenerational (Uwineza & Brackelaire, 2014) and intergenerational dialogue (Reyes, Cornejo, Cruz, Carrillo, & Caviedes, 2015) processes, where values, heritage, and ways of acting were transmitted. The narrative approach helped to elicit stories about participants' life events from the coup d'Etat to present. Through the exploration of 15 narrative interviews it was also possible to collect participants' memories and observe how they currently manifest their civic commitment and social responsibility. Their collective memory, influenced by a collective grief (Metraux, 2005b), still lingers over 40 years later and helps us to understand their life-long commitment and passion to fight (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Laurien Alexandre PhD (Committee Chair); Elizabeth Holloway PhD (Committee Member); Jean-Luc Brackelaire PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Behavioral Psychology; Behavioral Sciences; Hispanic American Studies; Hispanic Americans; History; International Relations; Latin American History; Latin American Studies; Military History; Military Studies; Modern History; Psychology; Social Psychology; Social Research; Social Structure; Sociology

Artium Baccalaureus (AB), Ohio University, 2020, Political Science

Populist politics has been on the rise for the last decade across the world. In Poland, the far-right populist party, Law and Justice (PiS), has taken power using a blend of nationalism and memory politics. PiS' memory politics focuses on Polish victimhood during the Second World War, the Communist era, and the present day as a member of the European Union. As a result, PiS has taken aggressive measures to institutionalized its memory regime, which has drawn international attention, notably with the 2018 Holocaust Law. This thesis examines PiS' methods compared to previous governments' use of memory politics and how memory and populism intersect.

Committee: Myra Waterbury (Advisor) Subjects: East European Studies; Political Science

Doctor of Philosophy, University of Toledo, 2019, History

“The Sinews of Memory:' The Forging of Civil War Memory and Reconciliation, 1865 – 1940,” explores the creation of historical memory of the American Civil War and, its byproduct, reconciliation. Stakeholders in the historical memory formation of the war and reconciliation were varied and many. “The Sinews of Memory” argues reconciliation blossomed from the 1880s well into the twentieth-century due to myriad of historical forces in the United States starting with the end of the war leading up to World War II. The crafters of the war's memory and reconciliation – veterans, women's groups, public history institutions, governmental agents, and civic boosters – arrived at a collective memory of the war predicated on notions of race, manliness, nationalism, and patriotism. In forging a specific memory of the Civil War, the aforementioned stakeholders in the process utilized veterans' fraternal organizations, joint encampments of veterans, physical space, pilgrimages to sites of memory, and cultural products such as cinema to bind the former belligerent regions, both North and South, together. Out of the effort at reconciliation, a White, predominately middle-class, memory of the war emerged.

Committee: Kim Nielsen (Committee Chair); Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch (Committee Member); Bruce Way (Committee Member); Neil Reid (Committee Member) Subjects: American History; History; Military History; Museums

MA, University of Cincinnati, 2018, Arts and Sciences: Spanish

In his book Novela historica en Colombia, 1988-2008: entre la pompa y el fracaso (2009), Pablo Montoya Campuzano demonstrates that historical novels have enriched contemporary Colombian literature. Among those Colombian historical novels relating the Spanish conquest, there is Muy caribe esta (1999) by Mario Escobar Velasquez, which narrates the encounter between Spaniards and Caribs, a South American indigenous tribe, in the area of Uraba, located on the northern coast of Colombia, at the beginning of the 16th century. My research question consists on identifying the literary and historical value of this novel. To this aim, I examine the presence of anachronisms in the book, caused by the dialogue between the author's present and the remote past that he writes about. My study starts with the following premise: the main character, who incarnates the novel's narrative voice, is anachronistic because his point of view of the conflict that he witnesses and in which he participates does not coincide with his own era. My hypothesis states that the literary value of the novel is defined by its narrative verisimilitude and vitality, which are based on the confluence between the extensive documentary knowledge of the history it deals with and the deep empirical knowledge of the environment where it occurs, Uraba. On the other hand, its historical value is defined by the modern anthropological judgment offered by the narrative voice, since it reconsiders the past, proposing new perspectives on it. In this M.A. Thesis, I firstly contextualize Muy caribe esta within the group of works that the author wrote specifically on Uraba. Secondly, I analyze Muy caribe esta from the traditional historical novel's perspective, presenting why it does not belong to this genre, since it does not respect the criteria. Thirdly, I analyze Muy caribe esta according to the perspective of Latin American's new historical novel, showing to what extent it does respect the criteria, designated by Sey (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Patricia Valladares-Ruiz Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Andrés Pérez-Simón Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Latin American Literature

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2017, History

This thesis is an examination of the development of public history in the Chinese city of Xi'an since the 1990s in conjunction with the development of Xi'an's regional tourism industry. The importance of tourism to the production of public historical space has led to a diverse array of acts of reconstruction, museum representation, and narrative production influenced by the desire to build Shaanxi Province's tourism industry. First, this thesis examines the act of reconstruction at historical sites and the role of tourism in the variety of acts of historical site conservation. Then, it examines three archaeological site museums and the way in which an increasingly regionalized and privatized China allows multiple narratives of premodern history to coexist within a single city. Finally, this thesis considers the role of the tour guide and the nature of the tour guiding profession in the production of public historical narratives given the importance of the tour guide as a conduit through which knowledge is transmitted to the tourist. This research suggests that public history serves in part as a tool for developing regional tourism, and that knowing the processes by which public history is made available to visitors can help both professionals and the public alike better understand Xi'an's past within its larger Chinese context.

Committee: Yihong Pan (Advisor); Steven Conn (Committee Member); Stanley Toops (Committee Member) Subjects: Asian Studies; History; Modern History; Museum Studies

MA, Kent State University, 2017, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of History

This M.A. thesis examines the public rhetoric of American president Ronald Reagan and focuses specifically on the different ways he appropriated the legacy and memory of Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln's name appears seemingly everywhere in Reagan's speeches, from comedic monologues to scathing diatribes. Rather than just an interesting anecdote in Reagan history however, his appropriation of Lincoln was ideologically saturated and helps define Reagan's world view. Reagan's use of Lincoln also disseminated positive portrayals of the 16th president over a bevy of negative portrayals introduced by some academics during the time period. In Reagan's attempts to appeal to religious groups, he often brought up Lincoln and implied the acceptance of faith and God for both men. He also argued that Lincoln was correct in his reading of Thomas Jefferson's Declaration of Independence; all men truly were free and equal. Reagan, unlike many conservatives in the 1980s, saw no problem with Lincoln's elevation of those principles to constitutional status. In these different ways, Reagan had a hand in preserving Americans belief in a pious Lincoln truly devoted to human equality and should be recognized as one of the most prolific "Lincoln appropriators" of the 20th century.

Committee: Leonne Hudson (Advisor); Kevin Adams (Committee Member); Brian Hayashi (Committee Member) Subjects: History

BA, Oberlin College, 2016, History

In 1960, during a resurgence of anti-Semitism, the Munich government initiated a program to invite Jewish former residents of Munich (who left during the 1930s and early 1940s due to the Nazis) back to their hometown for two-week visits. This program offered the participants a chance to reminisce about their childhoods, reconnect with their heritage, and visit their former communities. For the government, this program provided a crucial connection between the old prewar Munich and the new Munich of the 1960s, between Munich as the birthplace of National Socialism and Munich as a newly rebuilt city, ready to move forward from the Holocaust. This thesis relies primarily on correspondence between program participants and the Munich government from the Munich City Archive, oral interviews with individuals involved with the program, and secondary sources about postwar Munich and historical memory.

Committee: Annemarie Sammartino (Advisor) Subjects: European History; European Studies; Foreign Language; Germanic Literature; History; Holocaust Studies; Judaic Studies; Language; Modern History; Modern Language; Religion; Religious History

Master of Arts (MA), Wright State University, 2016, International and Comparative Politics

Every population maintains collective memories which provide meaning and identity for members (Langenbache, 2003). Elites have exerted influence on what is being remembered and the interpretation of the remembrances for specific objects, through the concept of historical memory. Wang (2012) has shown that authoritarian governments leverage historical memory to increase legitimacy. Similarly, Bernhard and Kubik (2014) have demonstrated that transitioning democracies also benefit from elite use of historical memory for consolidation. The lack of studies concerning consolidated democracies' use of historical memory raises many questions, including whether consolidated democracies manipulate historical memory for the purpose of legitimacy? I contend that, similar to Wang's findings, elites within consolidated democracies manipulate historical memory for the purpose of enhancing party legitimacy and that the concept of historical memory is a tool that continues to be utilized by elites after consolidation. Japan and South Korea constitute the case studies for this examination.

Committee: Laura Luehrmann Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Pramod Kantha Ph.D. (Committee Member); Kathryn Meyer Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Political Science

BA, Oberlin College, 2015, Hispanic Studies

Este ensayo enfoca en una variedad de obras espanoles de cine y literatura contemporanea, incluidos novelas, documentales, peliculas y una novela grafica, que narran las historias de espanoles que experimentaron la epoca de la Guerra Civil Espanola, la represion nacionalista durante la dictadura de Francisco Franco y el proceso de transmitir los recuerdos de aquellas epocas a una generacion mas joven que no las vivio. Investiga los papeles que desempenan estas obras en el proyecto de narrativizar eventos centrales de la memoria historica de una epoca que sigue siendo importante en el presente.

Committee: Sebastiaan Faber (Advisor); Patrick O'Connor (Committee Member) Subjects: Comparative Literature; Film Studies; Foreign Language; Hispanic American Studies; Literature; Modern Literature

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2007, Educational Theory and Practice

Middle school students are expected to use higher-level literacy strategies in order to read history texts interpretively and critically. However, history and social studies textbooks are typically written in an anonymous, authoritative style that is based on schematic narrative templates, which reflect a society's static collective memory, rather than a history open to interpretation. In this way, textbooks serve as an impediment to the development of higher-level historical thinking. There is evidence that students' historical understandings are shaped by the mastery or the appropriation of specific narratives of historical events. Two interrelated teacher-research studies indicated that the middle school students (both sixth graders and eighth graders) have a strong positive bias toward anonymous authoritative texts as the most valid means for writing about the past. However, the study also revealed that the students are capable, with instructional support, of recognizing the author's role in interpreting a historical event. These results suggest that middle school students, with classroom instruction, can learn to take a more critical stance toward historical narratives as a means to developing deeper historical understandings.

Committee: Peter Paul (Advisor) Subjects: Education, Reading

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Ohio University, 2010, History (Arts and Sciences)

This project examines the origins, drafting, and effects of Ronald Reagan's Evil Empire speech. My dissertation introduces this important address by exploring Reagan's political ideology during his pre-presidential years. His ideological polemics coexisted with his pragmatic governing style. I subsequently explain how ending the foreign policy of detente with the Soviet Union led to the rise of the Nuclear Freeze movement, a broad-based, bipartisan, interfaith, international peace group. The dissertation centers on the reaction by peace activists, evangelical Christians, the Kremlin, and the mainstream news media to rhetorical rearmament, Reagan's Manichean and moralistic characterization of his foreign policy ideology. My project concludes by studying the political phenomenon of “evil empire” over the past quarter century. The importance of the study derives from the political mobilization of the White House against this incarnation of the peace movement among religious voters, in the news media, and from the bully pulpit. My dissertation examines the varying levels of support the Nuclear Freeze movement received from peace activists, the mainstream news media, and religious organizations. The president needed to counteract the movement's popularity by creating a favorable national discourse on behalf of his military rearmament. Instead, Reagan's oratory exacerbated the Cold War tensions by deeming the Soviet Union “an evil empire” and “the focus of evil in the modern world.” The president found himself caught between his desire for nuclear arms reductions and his unyielding belief in the inherent evil of Soviet Communism. Throughout his presidency, Reagan alternated between ideological and pragmatic approaches toward the Soviet Union. The Evil Empire speech was the height of ideology. Yet, soon after the address the president came to favor pragmatism than ideology. He embraced Mikhail Gorbachev and created the conditions necessary to end the Cold War. Rhetorical (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Chester Pach Jr. (Committee Chair); Kevin Mattson (Committee Member); Alonzo Hamby (Committee Member); Maria Fanis (Committee Member) Subjects: History

BA, Oberlin College, 2012, History

Four American presidents have been assassinated: Abraham Lincoln in 1865, James Garfield in 1881, William McKinley in 1901, and John F. Kennedy in 1963. As a traumatic event, presidential assassination has caused Americans to be introspective and reflect on their nation's political past, present, and future. These reflections, which are aggregated and perpetuated by the mass media, reveal a great deal about American political culture. This thesis looks at the New York Times coverage of each assassination. In doing so, it explores the changing discourse about republicanism between 1865 and 1963, how each assassination was mobilized to serve distinct political goals, and how Americans imagined the legacy of each assassinated president.

Committee: Renee Romano PhD (Advisor); Gary Kornblith PhD (Committee Member); Steven Volk PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: American History

BA, Oberlin College, 2012, History

"Little House on the Prairie" has remained popular since the release of the first book in 1932, and has enjoyed particular moments of resonance in the 1930s, 1970s, and late 1990s. This study explores why "Little House" has endured through multiple generations, looking at this phenomenon through the lens of historical memory. Through its placement within one of America's foundational myths, the frontier myth, and its subsequent democratization of that myth in moments of social and political change, "Little House" has celebrated America's ability to become more inclusive yet retain its most essential qualities. This thesis uses changing portrayals of gender and race in various incarnations of "Little House" as case studies to examine this process of democratization.

Committee: Renee Romano PhD (Advisor) Subjects: American History; American Studies; History

BA, Oberlin College, 2009, History

Writing a national history of the period between the coup of 1973 and 1990 when Augusto Pinochet's seventeen-year dictatorship finally came to a close looms large in present day Chile. Over the past eighteen years, historians, scholars, journalists, and other social actors—all with different political projects and historical interpretations—have struggled to engrave their particular narrative of Pinochet's dictatorship as Chile's official national history. Through a close analysis of Chile's most important newspaper, this thesis examines the narrative construction of the Chilean Right as it built and revised its story of the past after Pinochet left Chile's presidential palace. This project explores the construction of a conservative historical narrative as it seeks to define Chile's past in the present and for the future.

Committee: Steven S. Volk PhD (Advisor) Subjects: Latin American History