MCP, University of Cincinnati, 2007, Design, Architecture, Art and Planning : Community Planning

Due to the fragmented structure of Hamilton County, attempts at county-wide efforts have not been viable, despite professional studies that have recommended regionalism for the county. The Community Building Institute has launched the Community Cluster Project (CCP), an initiative that divided the county into eleven meaningful clusters of communities that have shared assets, issues, and interests. The goal is to create collaborative planning among jurisdictions on the cluster and eventually, the county-wide level. This study concluded that the CCP is an effective means to initiating cluster-wide collaboration. The project is successful in persuading jurisdictions that they are an interdependent part of the cluster. Stakeholders felt they would benefit from the collaboration and that it would be more beneficial than individual or larger scale efforts. Most identified with the assets and issues of the cluster, though some were challenged to understand how any one would be common to the entire cluster.

Committee: Dr. David Edelman (Advisor) Subjects: Urban and Regional Planning

MARCH, University of Cincinnati, 2003, Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning : Architecture

While every architect aims at the creation of space, sometimes the result or the creation of place is forgotten in the design process. In the creation of place one can attempt to preserve the local culture necessary and specific to that place by translating and emphasizing these abstract properties of tradition, heritage, and geography into the built form. Through the intense study and understanding of a region, it is possible to take these elements of culture to form a design concept which allows people to experience the differences of a locale, rather than conforming to the homogenous design found everywhere. The building typology chosen to represent this process is a cultural museum center. Not only does this allow for the expression of the translation, but it also acts as a preserver and a learning opportunity for those wanting to experience the region.

Committee: Dr. Aarati Kanekar (Advisor) Subjects: Architecture

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2010, French and Italian

This dissertation is an exploration of regional identity and regional activism, primarily in the context of Brittany. It begins with a background discussion of the Third Republic and opposing political views on the regional languages and cultures of France that emerged during this period. The formation of regional consciousness and the evolution of the Breton language are two issues whose exploration will contribute to an understanding of contemporary Breton regional activism. Analyses of migratory movements, regional stereotypes, and symbolic regional cultural activities will provide a framework by which to explore the formation of regional consciousness. An examination of the vitality, or lack thereof, of the Breton language in France will follow, aided by a comparison of its status with that of other Celtic languages in the United Kingdom and Ireland. A discussion of the ethnic minority group of individuals of North African origins living in France will provide a unique comparison with the regional minority of Brittany. Additionally, an exploration of current political reactions to the immigrant presence in France will reveal that the question of regional identity has resurfaced in an emerging political movement of the extreme right. This dissertation will illustrate that regionalism in France today has a direct impact on the cultural, linguistic, and political landscape of France and that the study of French regionalism provides insight into the preciously guarded values and institutions of the Republic. Broad themes that will guide this analysis will be the effects of nation-building on the peoples of France; the influence of minority groups on French national identity and the tension between Republican “universalism” and minority rights; and the education system as a microcosm of French society regarding these issues.

Committee: Jean-Francois Fourny PhD (Advisor); Judith Mayne PhD (Committee Member); Jennifer Willging PhD (Committee Member) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2024, History

This dissertation examines how reformist (1989-1992) and communist (1994-1997) activist groups—holding diametrically opposing ideological views—made sense of the transition period from the Ukrainian SSR to independent Ukraine in Dnipropetrovsk print media. The main argument of the dissertation is that the two activist groups participated in the formation of a Dnipropetrovsk-specific variety of civic Ukrainian nationalism, by depicting Dnipropetrovsk political elites as an existential threat to Ukraine's sovereignty and deputizing themselves in the threat response. This blend of civic nationalism helps to explain how the Russophone, industrial Dnipropetrovsk in eastern Ukraine became a bulwark of Ukrainian patriotism and resistance to Russia's invasion of Ukraine since 2014. Dnipropetrovsk residents saw Russia's invasion of Ukraine as a threat to their regional identity, which first developed in the transition period based on the presumption that Dnipropetrovsk would play a coequal role to Kyiv in the political trajectory of the Ukrainian state. Source material for the dissertation includes the activists' periodicals, key officials' autobiographies, and other published works. Historians have noted that Dnipropetrovsk served an important supportive role in the official narratives of state prestige in the Tsarist Imperial and Soviet periods. The tumultuousness of the transition period, combined with the political and economic influence of Dnipropetrovsk vis-a-vis Kyiv, emboldened the two activist groups to claim an unprecedented coequal role to the state in shaping the official narrative of national prestige.

Committee: David Hoffmann (Committee Chair); Nicholas Breyfogle (Committee Co-Chair); Serhii Plokhii (Committee Member); Charles Wise (Committee Member) Subjects: East European Studies; European History; History; Modern History; Regional Studies; Slavic Studies

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

M.A. (Master of Arts in English), Ohio Dominican University, 2020, English

This work compares and contrasts the Atticus of Harper Lee's novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, with the Atticus of Lee's later novel, Go Set a Watchman. Although Atticus appears to be a defender of equal rights and justice in one and a staunch segregationist in the other, this work argues that Atticus is essentially the same man in both novels, and supports this perspective with an examination of Atticus' positions on racism, the law and justice. This work also examines Atticus and racism in the South from a regional point of view during the time period of both novels, and asks relevant questions as to the universal moral obligations the characters may have to one another.

Committee: Kelsey Squire Ph.D. (Advisor); Martin Brick Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: African Americans; American History; American Literature; Law; Literature; Regional Studies

M.A. (Master of Arts in English), Ohio Dominican University, 2019, English

Stratton Porter's nature books brought a fresh and anecdotal approach to the science of ornithology and lepidopterology. Her novels were an inspiration to many during the changes that came to the United States from industrialization, increased immigration, growing urbanization, and World War I. Critiques of both her nature books and her novels at the time gave mixed reviews, possibly due to accepted scientific practices and literary tastes. Today, ecocriticism paves the way for new literary study of her naturalist work and its inclusion in her novels. Her core moral values may not entice analysis, but her work and writing as a conservationist may bring this author back to the spotlight. It is the aim of this thesis to review the life and work of Gene Stratton Porter, evaluate the literary and popular acceptance of her work, and to argue the singularity of her contribution to conservation in her novels as demonstrated in "A Girl of the Limberlost" and "The Harvester."

Committee: Kelsey Squire Ph.D. (Advisor); Jeremy Glazier M.F.A. (Other) Subjects: American Literature; Conservation; Regional Studies

MARCH, University of Cincinnati, 2019, Design, Architecture, Art and Planning: Architecture

As the most iconic aspect of a city, high-rise buildings have a responsibility to represent their regions local culture and identity. Mass-communication, mobility, and modern technology have imposed an international culture onto today's urban architecture. The cultural entropy from globalization has spread itself onto skylines around the world. Additionally, as cities become denser, the construction of high-rise buildings will continue to increase. The skyscraper, which was originally an American phenomenon, has been adopted by cities around the world. Regions such as such the Middle East and Asia have grown in population and density at an unprecedented rate. As a result, we have seen an emergence of mega cities that are centered around high-rise developments. Furthermore, the mass migration of people from diverse backgrounds into dense urban environments has led to a cultural evolution that needs to be recognized and expressed. Urban environments will need to respond to their region's evolving ethos or allow their architecture to become homogenized within capitalist demands. Through an adapted critically regionalist attitude, designers can create high-rise architecture that focuses on developing `places' opposed to `spaces'. High-rise buildings will have to implement a reinvigorated theory of critical regionalism to help personify local identities and cultures and express their diversity and character. The current discourse of critical regionalism focuses on low-rise, short span buildings and fails to address the nature of high-rise developments. This thesis is searching to progress the discourse of critical regionalist theory to consider how it can better suit high-rise typologies within dense urban centers. The theory discussed throughout this thesis will be accompanied by a conceptual plan for a critically regionalist skyscraper. I hope that through creating designs for a culturally attuned high-rise building, this thesis will better articulate the principles of (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Michael McInturf M.Arch. (Committee Chair); Aarati Kanekar Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Architecture

MARCH, University of Cincinnati, 2018, Design, Architecture, Art and Planning: Architecture

America's national parks demonstrate the shifting and evolving relationship between civilization and wilderness. This thesis investigates that relationship and explores the role that architecture can play in the transitional experience between these two environments within the national parks. The mission of the National Park Service is two-fold: to not only protect and preserve our nation's most valued natural and cultural resources, but to do so for the enjoyment and inspiration of people living today and in the future. As park visitor rates continue to surge as they have throughout the last century, the issue of preservation of our natural resources versus accessibility to those that wish to enjoy them has become a central dilemma in the way we think about the performance of the parks themselves. While accessibility requires encroachment of built environment into the natural landscape, thought must be given as to how that built environment fits into the fabric of each park's ecosystem. This thesis studies architectural precedent throughout the history of the National Park Service from the "rustic" railroad lodges of the early twentieth century, through the mid-century modernist movement of the (then) new visitor center concept, to recent re-interpretations in the twenty-first century. Through this analysis and research into place-sensitive architecture, this thesis proposes a design in the Moraine Park area of Rocky Mountain National Park in northern Colorado. The design re-imagines the visitor center typology to create an experiential and meaningful connection to the adjacent landscape and at the threshold of the wider wilderness.

Committee: Michael McInturf M.Arch. (Committee Chair); Jeffrey Tilman Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Architecture

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2018, Geography

Tourism professionals rely on the uniqueness of place to market and promote destinations in a growing, competitive industry. In many places, urban destinations are co-promoted with natural amenities. In tourism-dependent regions like the Pacific Northwest, such tourism marketing is not limited to individual destinations, but also involves collaboration at larger scales in an intricate network of connections between places. The major question that drove my research was how does destination marketing link places, both cultural and natural, across western Oregon? Through a combination of discourse analysis of travel websites and semi-structured interviews, I gathered information on how tourism professionals situate their own destinations within a wider, regional context and how urban and natural settings are co-promoted for tourism. This organizational structure may hint at evidence of a tourism bioregion, connecting people across the Pacific Northwest through the incorporation of the natural amenities into destination marketing. This research analyzes the geographic context of tourism collaboration, establishing the various scales at which connections in the tourism industry exist.

Committee: Dr. David Prytherch (Advisor); Dr. Damon Scott (Committee Member); Dr. Toops Stanley (Committee Member) Subjects: Geography

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 1977, Graduate School

Committee: Not Provided (Other) Subjects: Political Science

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2016, City and Regional Planning

The planning field has a long history of intersecting with, contributing to and addressing issues of social, racial and geographic equity, from the late 19th century work of Jacob Riis and Jane Addams to contemporary movements such as progressive regionalism and environmental justice. Planning has had a conflicted history in engaging issues of equity and racial or social inclusion, with the profession at times being at the forefront of social justice issues, and at others acting as an accomplice in many of the most discriminatory urban policies in 20th century American history. While planning has often served the needs of marginalized groups, racial discrimination has been interwoven with various aspects of planning practice and policy throughout the 20th century. The model of sustainable development, which has become dominant in planning practice in the past two decades, presents a vision for balancing economic development, environmental protection and social equity, known as the three “e's” of sustainable development. By the late 2000s the principles of sustainability have made their way into the thinking of many federal agencies. The Department of Housing and Urban Development's Sustainable Communities' Initiative (SCI), introduced by the Obama Administration, sought to take these principles and translate them to practice at a scale not previously attempted in the United States. HUD invested more than $200 million in seventy- four regions across the U.S. who received three- year regional sustainable development planning grants. The planning initiatives were intended to better coordinate housing and transportation while supporting more sustainable and equitable land use, infrastructure, and zoning decisions. SCI included a strong equity and fair housing mandate, introduced new equity planning and fair housing tools, and provided extensive support for equity planning in the program. My research examines the experience of forty- five regional planning grantees (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Jennifer Evans-Cowley PhD (Committee Chair); Jill Clark PhD (Committee Member); Rachel Kleit PhD (Committee Member); Bernadette Hanlon PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: African American Studies; Architecture; Area Planning and Development; Black Studies; Environmental Health; Environmental Justice; Environmental Studies; Ethnic Studies; Geography; Legal Studies; Native American Studies; Public Health; Public Policy; Sustainability; Transportation Planning; Urban Planning

MARCH, University of Cincinnati, 2016, Design, Architecture, Art and Planning: Architecture

As modern cities expand in size and density, the question of representing cultural identity and meaning through new construction has been largely sacrificed in favor of a rigid formalistic image. This is largely due to the treatment of architecture as capital and commodity, and the greater economic landscape. Urban context and a sense of place and identity are informally connected, and by foregrounding relevant histories of the physical and existential qualities of architectural context, this thesis aims to promote the design and construction of architecture which enhances the everyday experience of the built environment. This paper draws on literary source material and precedent case studies from architectural critics and practitioners to create an architectural intervention in Odeonsplatz, a public square in Munich, which enhances the modern function and felt-experience of the site. The main themes of this discourse are the poetics of construction as outlined by Kenneth Frampton's writing on tectonic culture, and the existential considerations of place and identity as explored by Heidegger, Tzonis, and Norberg-Schulz. Through the architectural curation of the relationship between new and existing, this thesis will propose a framework for improving the modern experience of the site, with a poetic representation of regional values.

Committee: William Williams M.Arch. (Committee Chair); John Eliot Hancock M.Arch. (Committee Member) Subjects: Architecture

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2016, Arts and Sciences: Classics

The focus of this dissertation is the analysis of a deposit of Neopalatial (1750- 1490 BC) pottery uncovered within a large cistern (Cistern 2) at the site of Myrtos- Pyrgos, Crete. Excavated by Gerald Cadogan under the aegis of the British School at Athens in the early 1970s on the top of a hill (Pyrgos) near the modern town of Myrtos, Myrtos-Pyrgos is one of the most important and long-lived Bronze Age sites on the southeastern coast of Crete. The study of the Neopalatial pottery from Cistern 2 contributes to two inter- related research fields: pottery studies of Minoan (i.e., Bronze Age) Crete and theories of political reconstructions based on pottery analysis. The presentation of the Neopalatial pottery from Cistern 2 contributes to the knowledge of ceramics and ceramic production in Crete: this dissertation presents in detail the Neopalatial pottery assemblage from Myrtos-Pyrgos, providing stylistic analysis and contextualization within the broader ceramic production of Neopalatial Crete; thus, it also improves the current knowledge of southeastern Crete, an area whose ceramics remain poorly known. The stylistic and comparative analysis of the pottery from Cistern 2 suggests that the southeast needs to be considered a ceramic region on its own, a micro-region differentiated from but related to the ceramic production typical of east Crete. Aspects of ceramic regionalism and its significance are explored further in relation to the political role of Myrtos-Pyrgos during the Neopalatial period. In the context of earlier hypotheses of Cretan politics and, in particular those at Myrtos-Pyrgos, this dissertation reconsiders the relationship between material culture and the reconstruction of political dynamics, focusing on the role of pottery and pottery style.Based on my analysis of the pottery from Cistern 2, I demonstrate that pottery alone cannot inform or prove political dynamics and I argue that other types of material culture could be considered better indica (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Eleni Hatzaki Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Gerald Cadogan M.A. (Committee Member); Jack Davis Ph.D. (Committee Member); Alan Sullivan Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Archaeology

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2015, History of Art

As the Chinese Communist Party sought to redefine socialism in the Chinese context and position itself in shifting international currents during the first decade of the newly founded People's Republic of China (1949–1959), the country's art establishment rejected Western modernism in favor of academic styles and selective forms of traditional Chinese practices. State-employed artists, tasked with visualizing party policies, placed themselves at the juncture of historical narratives and social discourses that defined the first decade and a half of the PRC. This dissertation examines a particular group of artists, based in the northwestern provincial capital of Xi'an, who reformulated the traditional practice of ink and color painting (guohua) as a modern artistic medium through their unorthodox brushwork and subject matter. Led by the Yan'an printmaker-turned-painter Shi Lu (1919–1982) and the former Dagongbao sketch journalist Zhao Wangyun (1906–1977), the six ink painters the Chinese Artists Association-Xi'an Branch employed garnered national acclaim for exhibiting their xizuo (“studies”) in a series of well-publicized exhibitions that began in October 1961 in Beijing. Praised for their integration of artistic style with the “character” of the northwestern region based on their firsthand observations, Shi, Zhao and their colleagues — He Haixia (1908–1998), Fang Jizhong (1923–1987), Kang Shiyao (1921–1985) and Li Zisheng (1919–1987) earned a collective name: the Chang'an School (Chang'an huapai). The “success” of the Xi'an ink painters as a modern, regional ink painting “school” was considered not merely a local or personal achievement but a national one. Through five thematic chapters that focus on the school's structural and theoretical foundations, this study suggests the Xi'an artists gained momentum through their ability to function effectively as a work unit (danwei), as content providers for the mass media and as interpreters of the broad concepts o (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Julia Andrews (Advisor); Myroslava Mudrak (Committee Member); Kris Paulsen (Committee Member); Christopher Reed (Committee Member) Subjects: Art History

Master of Fine Arts (MFA), Bowling Green State University, 2015, Creative Writing/Fiction

Pig Iron is a study of Appalachia, of the land and the people. The land comes first, because it is a place where the environment so heavily informs the attitudes and behaviors of its occupants. Appalachia is a land that was settled by escaped slaves, convicts, and other societal outcasts. These were rough and unlearned frontiersman and their families who scraped a meager living from a harsh world and were grateful because it meant being free from a society that did not want or value them. That rebel spirit survives in these stories. In my fiction I've attempted to synthesize the essentials of this unique terrain and the people who call it home. These characters are ugly and flawed. Morality is a luxury they cannot afford to indulge. My stories deal with many themes common to literary fiction—death, violence, loss, shame, and pride—but it focuses these themes through an Appalachian lens.

Committee: Wendell Mayo PhD (Advisor); Lawrence Coates PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Fine Arts

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2015, English

Appalachian studies scholars, Appalachian activists and advocates, and government agencies like the Appalachian Regional Commission have sought a solution to the "Appalachian problem," which is typically portrayed as a matrix of poverty, low educational attainment, poor health, environmental destruction, and cultural deficiencies, as long as this problem has been perceived to exist in the late nineteenth century. Through a rhetorical analysis of ethnographic and archival research on three different types of Appalachian activist campaigns and advocacy organizations, the Kentucky Moonlight Schools of the early twentieth century, The Urban Appalachian Council and Appalachian Community Development Fund of the late twentieth century, and Create West Virginia of the early twenty-first century, I determine how each engages with three common topoi on solving the "Appalachian problem." The first topoi, assimilation, requires Appalachia be assimilated into modern, urban cultural, economic, and technological systems; the second, preservation, acknowledges the distinctiveness and difference of the culture and recommends it be preserved it as an isolated, monolithic, homogeneous entity; and the third, abandonment, proposes allowing nature to take over the region as the people are relocated to urban and suburban areas. By exploring specific instances in which these three topoi are rhetorical deployed, complicated, or opposed by the Kentucky Moonlight Schools, the Urban Appalachian Council and the Appalachian Community Development Association, and Create West Virginia, I have determined what detrimental assumptions these claims rely on, how they position Appalachian culture and identity, and how they limit or facilitate successful resolutions to the "Appalachian problem." I then develop a new regional rhetoric to guide the policies of a variety of groups, including but no limited to nonprofit organizations, government agencies, and educational instituti (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Beverly Moss J. (Committee Chair); Nancy Johnson (Committee Member); Amy Shuman (Committee Member) Subjects: Folklore; Literacy; Rhetoric

Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 2015, Art History

Paul Starrett Sample (1896–1974) was an artist of the American Scene movement who worked primarily in Los Angeles, California, and Hanover, New Hampshire. He produced paintings that were revered in his lifetime but mostly forgotten in later art-historical scholarship. Sample's body of work offers considerable insight into the art of the 1930s and 1940s, since he was involved in nearly every facet of American art. He showed paintings in prominent exhibitions, connected with Regionalist and California School artists, created murals for businesses and New Deal programs, produced illustrations for leading magazines, taught at the University of Southern California, served at Dartmouth as one of the first artist-in-residents in the United States, and worked as an artist-correspondent for LIFE magazine during World War II. Sample's artwork is part of a larger discourse on masculinity. During the Great Depression and World War II, he continually represented scenes of male camaraderie, which seems to have had a powerful personal resonance for him. Sample was a gifted athlete who led an active life as an undergraduate at Dartmouth College but later had to abandon physical activity due to illness. Shortly after graduation he and his younger brother Donald were diagnosed with tuberculosis; they spent over four years together in a rest cure at a sanatorium, but Donald died of the disease. This emotional trauma influenced the way Sample would depict men in his American scenes. Unlike most other painters and muralists of the 1930s who portrayed American men as muscular, heroic figures, Sample represented them as downtrodden, frustrated, or idling. Sample's paintings offer a different view of masculinity—a definition that is rooted in listlessness and leisure rather than in physicality and work. Sample produced his most notable paintings during the 1930s when he lived in Southern California. This dissertation revisits those paintings and reconsider (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Henry Adams (Advisor); Holly Witchey (Committee Member); Catherine Scallen (Committee Member); William Marling (Committee Member) Subjects: Art History

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2015, African-American and African Studies

East Africa has a long history of regional cooperation and after independence, in 1967, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda came together to create the East African Community (EAC). In 1977, the EAC disbanded and, under entirely different circumstances, reconstituted in 1999. The core aim of this research is to analyze the processes and rationale underpinning the constitution of the EAC and its re-establishment in the new millennium. It will discuss how the second EAC of the late 1990s questions ideas of sovereignty in East African nation-states, the role that regionalism plays in shaping supra-national notions of governance and how member governments regard a regional governance as more conducive to economic development and political authority. It will finally, raise questions which are mostly left for further research, on how the EAC shapes the formation of a regional identity. The conclusions drawn from this research illuminate how the EAC displays both the uses and limits of idealism in the development of a regional organization as well as demonstrate the factors that hinder the practicality of an East African federation.

Committee: Franco Barchiesi (Advisor); Sarah Van Beurden (Committee Member); Monika Brodnicka (Committee Member) Subjects: African History; African Studies

MARCH, University of Cincinnati, 2014, Design, Architecture, Art and Planning: Architecture

In an era of specialized industrialization, America's relationship with food no longer represents a cultural institution, but rather has dissolved into a milieu of blind consumerism. This separation of people and culture creates a community of transient placelessness, de-emphasizing human relationships to established cultural roots, architectural landscapes, and supportive agricultural systems. This thesis offers a response to the extinction of holistic gastronomic understanding. Historically, gastronomic traditions are born from the land; a strong relationship between land and people establishes a local vernacular corresponding with its inhabitants it. This thesis promotes the need for an architectural understanding of Over-the-Rhine's local microculture and its dependence on gastronomy as a cornerstone of identity. The design of a locavore hub is proposed, adjacent to Over-the-Rhine's Findlay Market. . Utilizing theories of critical regionalism viewed through the lens of the Slow Food movement helps to shape the qualities which ultimately define Cincinnati's terroir. Several cultural themes emerge (imported cultures, landscape, rebirth, tactile experience, and narrative) which will stimulate criteria from which the locavore hub's design of an architectural terroir can be derived. The design melds these themes to create a tectonic architectural experience transcending nostalgia. An evocative and intimate engagement with the process of making evokes intuitive bonds of people, food, experience, and place as a resistance to cultural homogeneity.

Committee: John Eliot Hancock M.Arch. (Committee Chair); Michael McInturf M.Arch. (Committee Member) Subjects: Architecture