Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 2009, English/Literature

Primetime heroine Buffy Summers conquered the hearts of layman and scholars alike.For years audience members have debated about almost everything that happens in Buffy the Vampire Slayer; from opening credits to wardrobes over music choices to gender issues. This thesis focuses on patriarchal power structures inside Buffy the Vampire Slayer. On the surface, BtVS proposes all the ingredients for a truly matriarchal show; it could have been the perfect series to offer a glimpse at what a female-dominated society could look like. Unfortunately, however, the series creator, Joss Whedon, fails to create a female character liberated from patriarchal influences. He not only reintroduces patriarchal figures and apparatuses again and again, but he also constrains his heroine to adopt the same power structures his male characters employ. Despite the fact that almost every member of the patriarchy embodies certain flaws, that make it possible to partially dismantle their authority, Whedon continues to introduce these problematic figures. This thesis illustrates how patriarchal institutions and their members assert power over the female body in BtVS by synthesizing examples from both the television series and the graphic novel series with the critical cultural theories of Michel Foucault, Max Weber, and John Bowlby.

Committee: Maisha Wester PhD (Committee Chair); Piya Pal Lapinski PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: American Studies

Master of Science (MS), Bowling Green State University, 1955, MBA

Committee: Gilbert W. Cooke (Advisor) Subjects: Business Administration

Master of Science (MS), Bowling Green State University, 1955, MBA

Committee: Gilbert W. Cooke (Advisor) Subjects: Business Administration

Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA), Ohio University, 2022, Dance

This creative research project explores how embodied knowledge in dance deals with structures of authority, power, relationship, and collectivity as they manifest in practices of group movement improvisation. Through critical reference, expert interviews, and experimental workshops, the research discusses how "togetherness" is facilitated and negotiated through the lens of group improvisation in dance. The research highlights how elements of group improvisation practices can be used as tools for shifting habitual or traditional ways of structuring authority into new, collective ways of "being in togetherness," using the term "generative practices" to develop these concepts.

Committee: Dr. Tresa Randall (Advisor) Subjects: Dance

Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 2021, Management

Information technology (IT) projects are getting more complex by the day. From piloting to deployment, through different project phases and cycles, the IT field is still experiencing catastrophic failure. Seventy-one percent (71%) of IT projects are either outright failures or remain significantly challenged during the project execution, and most are related to soft-skills inadequacies. The three studies in this dissertation provide empirical evidence through various theoretical lenses that help explain how to avoid such failures. In particular, I focus on IT project managers' influence in forming critical project alignment toward actualizing project benefits and shaping consequent project success. Study 1 researched factors that lead IT projects to fail. I intended to better understand what shapes project outcomes, that is, causes that contribute to failure. Findings revealed, the use/lack of power, authority, and influence shapes project outcome. Study 2 investigated the role of the IT project manager's influence toward actualizing project benefits realization. I developed a model of benefits realization at the project level and analyzed to what extent it is driven by the stakeholders' and business alignment induced by three types of influence (dimensions); behavioral, and informational, and power-based held associated with the project manager's role. Findings revealed information and behavioral-based influence are significant means of impacting stakeholder alignment to realize benefits. Also, my research suggested that power and behavioral-based influence are significant means of impacting business alignment to realize benefits. Study 3 aimed to uncover the influence tactics (success elements) IT project managers enact while creating stakeholders and business alignment. Results revealed that IT project managers use different tactics to achieve the desired results and/or actualize benefits while engaging with business and stakeholders. Nonetheless, this behavior i (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Kalle Lyytinen (Committee Chair); Richard J. Boland, Jr (Committee Member); William Brake (Committee Member); George Vairaktarakis (Committee Member) Subjects: Business Administration; Business Community; Computer Science; Epistemology; Information Systems; Information Technology; Management; Social Research; Social Structure; Sustainability; Systems Design; Technology

MA, University of Cincinnati, 2019, Arts and Sciences: Communication

This study explores the coping mechanisms developed by African American women who hold or have held C-suite executive positions when facing microaggressions in the workplace. In an attempt to understand the barriers these women encounter based upon their racial and gender identitiy, I utilize the Microaggression and Resiliency Theory as the conceptual framework. The significance of this study narrows in on a demographic of women who lack in numbers, translating to a lack of voices and experiences being shared when faced with discrimination and how they are able to `get back up' once they are knocked down. Using this critical interpretative approach, the findings show that African American women C-suite executives are experiencing microaggressions, specifically indirect manifestations verbally and nonverbally. The findings also provide insight on how other women in these powerful positions can develop the needed skills and habits, to be able to push through with their resiliency.

Committee: Ronald Jackson II Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Sonja Feist-Price Ph.D. (Committee Member); Eric Jenkins Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Communication

Master of Arts (MA), Wright State University, 2013, English

The structures of power in the Potter universe are both evident and insidious. Whether one considers the disciplinary influences enforced by Headmaster and mentor Albus Dumbledore; The Ministry of Magic's Fudge, Umbridge, and Scrimgeour; or, the power watching over them all: Voldemort, J.K. Rowling presents a world marked by surveillance and self-policing in her Harry Potter novels. These three levels of the Panoptic Gaze discipline Harry in various ways that ultimately result in producing him as a self-sacrificing hero at the series' close. Rowling depicts an individual completely shaped by the authoritative gazes that inhabit his world; even the freedom he finds from those gazes is possible only because the gazes have created such spaces for him. In a series that seems to promote choice and agency for the day's youth, one finds that in fact the hero has been trapped in his role since the night he received his lightning-bolt shaped scar.

Committee: Andrew Strombeck Ph.D. (Advisor); Barry Milligan Ph.D. (Committee Member); Crystal Lake Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Literature