Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 2022, Organizational Behavior

The improvement of digital technology and human drive to connect and communicate have made social media an ever-present part of social life and, increasingly, organizational life. By reshaping the ways people interact, organize, take collective action, create and learn, social media both challenges our current understanding of individual and organizational phenomena and lends importance to the exploration of how these phenomena occur through digital-mediation. Despite this, few studies have explored the role of social media in processes of organization creation and emergent identity formation. Of research conducted on social media, more generally, Twitter and Facebook have attracted the most attention, with few studies conducted within the context of Instagram, a visually-rich social networking platform with over a billion users. Responding to increasing calls for the study of social media's implications for organization studies and for more-specific study of the Instagram platform, this dissertation addresses the role that Instagram plays in affording new ways of organizing, the generative nature of user interactions, and responses to social media visual content in collective identity construction. To accomplish these goals, I have elected to organize my dissertation into three papers. An introductory chapter and literature review set the stage for this work, providing both the theoretical framework for this research and justification of its import to organization studies. The first paper employs qualitative content analysis to understand how users of the social networking platform Instagram enact communication affordances in practice and draws on the social and collective concept of entrepreneuring to explain their implications for organization creation. The second paper draws on narrative thematic and visual analysis to examine how user engagement within the visually-rich context of Instagram fosters the development of collective identity, revealing the important (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Ronald Fry (Committee Chair); Philip Cola (Committee Member); Tracey Messer (Committee Member); Peter Whitehouse (Committee Member) Subjects: Entrepreneurship; Information Systems; Organization Theory; Organizational Behavior

Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) in Leadership Studies, Xavier University, 2021, Leadership Studies and Human Resource Development

This correlational analysis study tested the hypothesis and answered the research questions. The theoretical framework revealed the relationship between the predictor and outcome variables through a correlational investigation into how an individual identifies on the leader and follower distinction and if that identity affects adaptive coping responses. The study utilized survey instrumentation, which was distributed to the population of healthcare professionals. The study's findings supported the indication that there is a positive correlation between leader identity and adaptive coping. The finding of a significant, positive correlation between leader identity and adaptive coping does have predictive value. These results indicate that health care workers who score higher in leader identity are predicted to have higher levels of adaptive coping. The data did not support the prediction of a negative correlation between follower identity and adaptive coping. No correlation was found between follower identity and adaptive coping in this study. Variations in adaptive coping do not co-vary with follower identity. Therefore, higher levels of follower identity do not predict lower levels of adaptive coping. Additionally, the research revealed no significant interaction effect between leader and follower identity and adaptive coping responses.

Committee: Gail F. Latta Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Saul Schneider J.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Behavioral Sciences; Health Care

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2013, EDU Policy and Leadership

The purpose of this constructivist narrative study was to explore how Asian American student leaders of ethnic student organizations (ESOs) experience their ethnic and racial identities in the context of their ESO and the classroom. The primary research questions guiding this study were: (a) How do Asian American student leaders of ESOs experience and make sense of their ethnic and racial identities within the context of their involvement with their ESO; (b) How do Asian American student leaders of ESOs experience and make sense of their ethnic and racial identities within the classroom? Data collection included semi-structured interviews with six participants. Data was analyzed through Clandinin and Connelly's (2000) three dimensional narrative inquiry space for elements of interaction, continuity, and situation. Restories of each participants' narrative were presented. Findings from this study include: (1) Complex and varied understandings and negotiations of ethnic and racial identities within the ESO context; and (2) Salience of ethnic and racial identity in the classroom associated with negative, challenging, and positive experiences.

Committee: Susan Jones (Advisor); Tatiana Suspitsyna (Committee Member) Subjects: Asian American Studies; Education; Higher Education; Higher Education Administration

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2007, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2022, Educational Studies

Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSI) have largely been defined by outcomes rather than a university's organizational identity (OI) (Garcia, 2019a). The University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) is a unique case as it is known for its HSI identity. Four broad research questions guided this multidisciplinary comparative case study. First, this study investigated how the historical racialization and narratives of Latinx people in Borderlands Texas influenced UTEP's OI and contemporary organizational decision-making. While there was no evidence that the UTEP's high-ranking organizational members considered UTEP's historical narrative of serving racially minoritized groups, it was evident that organizational members expected the U.T. Regents to honor that history. Secondly, this study explored how UTEP and its organizational members were racialized by the local community, the state of Texas, and the nation at large during the hiring of a new president. UTEP was racialized by both insiders and outsiders in all contexts. The further away from the organization (i.e., state and national context), the more likely UTEP's OI as an HSI was minimized to the Hispanic student enrollment. Yet, the closer to the organization (i.e., organizational members and local context), the more likely discourse emphasized the culture, history, and sociopolitical environment of UTEP that was all connected to its racialization. Thirdly, this study analyzed organizational members' reactions to the hiring of Dr. Heather Wilson as UTEP's new President. Organizational members saw a disconnect between UTEP's OI and the decision to hire Dr. Wilson as the next President of UTEP. UTEP's OI went far beyond simply enrolling Hispanic students. UTEP focused on improving the lives of the majority Mexican American population and working alongside Mexico to be a binational organization that serviced the region. Therefore, organizational members had expectations for high-ranking social actors when making organizat (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Marc Johnston-Guerrero (Committee Chair); Tatiana Suspitsyna (Committee Member); Penny Pasque (Committee Member) Subjects: Higher Education

MA, University of Cincinnati, 2010, Arts and Sciences : Communication

In August 2009, Sister Louise Akers was banned from teaching in the archdiocese of Cincinnati after refusing to denounce her support of women's ordination as priests. This thesis combines several theoretical frameworks to perform a unique discursive, feminist analysis of Sister Akers' experience of conflict within the Roman Catholic Church. This thesis is grounded in the foundational assumptions of the feminist communicology (Ashcraft and Mumby, 2004) and discursive psychology (Potter and Wetherell, 1987) perspectives, and focuses on membership categorization (Jayusi, 1984), and positioning work (Harre and van Langenhove, 1999) as resources utilized by Sister Akers to create space of action when constructing her identity and maneuvering within competing Discourses. Through the use of “The Listening Guide,” a feminist, narrative method (Brown and Gilligan, 1992), this thesis illuminates the aforementioned theoretical concepts within Sister Akers' narrative of plurality and resistance.

Committee: Gail Fairhurst PhD (Committee Chair); Heather Zoller PhD (Committee Member); Suzanne Boys PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Communication

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2008, French and Italian

The quest for identity is becoming one of the most politically charged issues at the start of the third millennium. The transformative processes that are occurring as a result of globalization, as well as the mass population migrations that took place in the twentieth century, explain why the question of identity has become so central a political driving force to both the well-established democracies of the West and the post-colonial societies as they evolve in their quest toward modernization. In reaction to the dehumanization and alienation brought about by the post-industrial economies, new dissident and “deviant” identities are being forged. The concept of French citizenship, a universal abstraction as conceived by the Enlightenment, is being challenged by specific forces relating to gender, culture, sexual orientation but especially those tied to ethnicity and religion, once considered as belonging to the past. New identities are being forged around sub-cultures associated with consumer habits and leisure time activities such as soccer and Rai music. Others seek refuge and legitimacy searching for roots in mythical pasts and imaginary ancestry, or in transnational movements and causes. Facing simultaneously the pressures of assimilation and exclusion within the society, ethnicity and religion become alternative choices to new immigrants who also become victims of the socio-economic vagaries of globalization. The struggle for the recognition of a dissident identity is a fight for power. Representative democracies gradually absorb dissident currents into their mainstream, Islam, however, represents a particular challenge as it has become an ideological opponent to the Western rationalism. The sheer number of followers and the size of its territory appear menacing to the West, making the migrants of Muslim descent doubly undesirable, both as poor neighbors and as suspected radicals. The uprisings of the marginalized suburbs are a symptom of this crisis. The 200 (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Karlis Racevskis (Advisor); Danielle Marx-Scouras (Committee Member); Jennifer Willging (Committee Member) Subjects:

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2003, History

This thesis examines farmers' changing identity and rhetoric in response to the shifting structure of American agriculture in the mid to late 20th century and places the development of the American Agriculture Movement in historical context. Faced with increasingly competitive markets as a result of rising production, farmers turned to large-scale production for survival. A rapidly declining farm population with growing consumer political power led to concerns that the agrarian way of life—what many believed to be a vital part of America—was quickly dying and that farmers could do little to stop the process. These trends led to transformations in farm identity reflected in changes in farm protest group strategy and rhetoric of the National Farmers Organization of the 1960s to that of the AAM of the late 1970s. Non-farmers, while believing in the agrarian myth, did not see modern farmers as representative of old agrarian values.

Committee: Allan Winkler (Advisor) Subjects: History, United States