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Title: Captain John Smith and American Identity: Evolutions of Constructed Narratives and Myths in the 20th and 21st Centuries.
Creator: Corbett, Joseph, Murphree, Daniel, Sacher, John, Larson, Peter, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: Historical narratives and anecdotes concerning Captain John Smith have been told and retold throughout the entire history the United States of America, and they have proved to be sacred, influential, and contested elements in the construction of the individual, sectional, regional, and national identity of many. In this thesis, I first outline some of the history of how narratives and discourses surrounding Captain John Smith were directly connected with the identity of many Americans during...
Show moreHistorical narratives and anecdotes concerning Captain John Smith have been told and retold throughout the entire history the United States of America, and they have proved to be sacred, influential, and contested elements in the construction of the individual, sectional, regional, and national identity of many. In this thesis, I first outline some of the history of how narratives and discourses surrounding Captain John Smith were directly connected with the identity of many Americans during the 18th and 19th century, especially Virginians and Southerners. Then I outline how these narratives and discourses from the 18th and 19th centuries have continued and evolved in the 20th and 21st centuries in American scholarship and popular culture. I demonstrate how Captain John Smith went from being used as a symbol for regional and sectional identity to a symbol for broader national American identity, and how he has anachronistically come to be considered an American. I then show how Captain John Smith has continued to be constructed, to a seemingly larger degree than previous centuries, as a hero of almost mythic proportions. Finally I demonstrate how this constructed American hero is used as a posterchild for various interest groups and ideologies in order to legitimize the places of certain discourses and behavior within constructed and contested American identities.
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Date Issued: 2013
Identifier: CFE0004666, ucf:49892
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004666

Title: Hearing the Voices of the Deserters: Activist Critical Making in Electronic Literature.
Creator: Okkema, Laura, Salter, Anastasia, Beever, Jonathan, Fanfarelli, Joseph, Moulthrop, Stuart, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: Critical making is an approach to scholarship which combines discursive methods with creative practices. The concept has recently gained traction in the digital humanities, where scholars are looking for ways of integrating making into their research in ways that are inclusive and empowering to marginalized populations. This dissertation explores how digital humanists can engage critical making as a form of activism in electronic literature, specifically in the interactive fiction platform...
Show moreCritical making is an approach to scholarship which combines discursive methods with creative practices. The concept has recently gained traction in the digital humanities, where scholars are looking for ways of integrating making into their research in ways that are inclusive and empowering to marginalized populations. This dissertation explores how digital humanists can engage critical making as a form of activism in electronic literature, specifically in the interactive fiction platform Twine. The author analyzes the making process of her own activist Twine game The Deserters and embeds the project within digital humanities discourses on activism and social justice, hypertext, electronic literature, critical making, and hacker culture. The Deserters is a text-based digital game based on the experiences of the author's family as refugees from East Germany. The player's objective in the game is to research a family's history by searching the game-world for authentic documents, including biographical writings, journal entries, photographs, and records, thereby retracing historical events through personal experience. The Deserters aims at inspiring a compassionate and empathetic stance towards immigrants and refugees today. The author reflects on the ethical, narrative, aesthetic, and technical choices she made throughout the creation process of The Deserters to create a critical activist game. The results of the analysis demonstrate that Twine offers a unique environment for composing politically impactful personal narratives. From the project, the author derives best practices for activist critical making, which emphasize the importance for makers to imagine the needs and perspectives of their audience. The work expands digital humanities' theoretical and practical toolkit for critical making.
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Date Issued: 2019
Identifier: CFE0007421, ucf:52701
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007421

Title: The Interspecies Family: Attitudes and Narratives.
Creator: Owens, Nicole, Grauerholz, Liz, Sikorska, Elzbieta, Jasinski, Jana, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: Families are conceptualized and accomplished in increasingly diverse ways in the 21st century. A constructionist framework was utilized to examine a widespread contemporary family form, the interspecies family. This mixed-method approach relied on both quantitative survey data and qualitative interview data. First, survey data from the 2006 Constructing the Family Survey were analyzed to understand who in America counts pets as family. Many social demographics were associated and predicted...
Show moreFamilies are conceptualized and accomplished in increasingly diverse ways in the 21st century. A constructionist framework was utilized to examine a widespread contemporary family form, the interspecies family. This mixed-method approach relied on both quantitative survey data and qualitative interview data. First, survey data from the 2006 Constructing the Family Survey were analyzed to understand who in America counts pets as family. Many social demographics were associated and predicted counting pets as family but gender was one of the strongest associations. However, marital status moderated the relationship between gender and counting pets as family at a statically significant level. Men who are currently or have ever been married are less likely to count pets as family than never married men. Second, I conducted 32 semi-structured, in-depth interviews with 39 people during 2014-2015 in Central Florida to understand how people who count their cats and dogs as family members narrate this process. Narrative strategies documenting exactly how cats and dogs become family members within interspecies family narratives include: time-related narratives, timeless narratives, and patchwork narratives. Additionally, all participants considered their cats and dogs family but only some of them felt like pet-parents. Narratives of childless participants are compared with narratives of parents to examine the impact of family form on the construction of pet parenting narratives. Implications for the family change literature are discussed.
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Date Issued: 2015
Identifier: CFE0005984, ucf:50780
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005984

Title: The Effects of Narrative and Achievements on Learning in a 2D Platformer Video Game.
Creator: Fanfarelli, Joseph, McDaniel, Rudy, Smith, Peter, Bowers, Clint, Vie, Stephanie, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: Game design is a rigorous practice rife with complexity. The design of learning games is similarly complex to the design of their entertainment-based relatives. This complexity is partially due to the many interacting components that comprise games. The impacts of these individual components are not well understood. Advancing the understanding of how such component parts contribute to the formed game will inform decisions related to their inclusion and subsequent design within games....
Show moreGame design is a rigorous practice rife with complexity. The design of learning games is similarly complex to the design of their entertainment-based relatives. This complexity is partially due to the many interacting components that comprise games. The impacts of these individual components are not well understood. Advancing the understanding of how such component parts contribute to the formed game will inform decisions related to their inclusion and subsequent design within games. Achievements and narrative are two such components. They have been examined within gamified systems, but little research has studied them within the context of a serious game. The interactions between such elements and other game elements could produce results that diverge from the results of their use in isolation of a complete gaming framework. This dissertation selectively incorporates or excludes narrative and achievements within a two-dimensional platformer serious game to understand their impact on learning, flow, engagement, narrative transportation, and intrinsic motivation. Conditions are examined individually as well as in a combined condition. A control condition is maintained for comparison. Results indicate that narrative and achievements were not effective in improving the effectiveness of the game. Potential causes are discussed in tandem with the implications for the design and integration within a gaming framework. While the manipulations did not improve effectiveness, the game was responsible for substantially increased knowledge acquisition, as determined by pre and posttest results.
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Date Issued: 2014
Identifier: CFE0005490, ucf:50341
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005490

Title: EXPLORING TRANSIENT IDENTITIES: DECONSTRUCTING DEPICTIONS OF GENDER AND IMPERIAL IDEOLOGY IN THE ORIENTAL TRAVEL NARRATIVES OF ENGLISHWOMEN, 1831-1915.
Creator: DeLoach, CarrieAnne, Stockdale, Nancy, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: Englishwomen who traveled to the "Orient" in the Victorian era constructed an identity that was British in its bravery, middle-class in its refinement, feminine in appearance and speech and Christian in its intolerance of Oriental heathenism. Studying Victorian female travel narratives that described journeys to the Orient provides an excellent opportunity to reexamine the diaphanous nature of the boundaries of the public/private sphere dichotomy; the relationship between travel, overt...
Show moreEnglishwomen who traveled to the "Orient" in the Victorian era constructed an identity that was British in its bravery, middle-class in its refinement, feminine in appearance and speech and Christian in its intolerance of Oriental heathenism. Studying Victorian female travel narratives that described journeys to the Orient provides an excellent opportunity to reexamine the diaphanous nature of the boundaries of the public/private sphere dichotomy; the relationship between travel, overt nationalism, and gendered constructions of identity, the link between geographic location and self-definition; the power dynamics inherent in information gathering, organization and production. Englishwomen projected gendered identities in their writings, which were both "imperially" masculine and "domestically" feminine, depending on the needs of a particular location and space. The travel narrative itself was also a gendered product that served as both a medium of cultural expression for Victorian women and a tool of restraint, encouraging them to conform to societal expectations to gain limited authority and recognition for their travels even while they embraced the freedom of movement. The terms "imperial masculinity" and "domestic femininity" are employed throughout this analysis to categorize the transient manipulation of character traits associated in Victorian society with middle- and upper-class men abroad in the empire and middle- and upper-class women who remained within their homes in Great Britain. Also stressed is the decision by female travelers to co-assert feminine identities that legitimated their imperial freedom by alluding to equally important components of their transported domestic constructions of self. Contrary to scholarship solely viewing Victorian projections of the feminine ideal as negative, the powers underlining social determinants of gender norms will be treated as "both regulatory and productive." Englishwomen chose to amplify elements of their domestic femininity or newly obtained imperial masculinity depending on the situation encountered during their travels or the message they wished to communicate in their travel narratives. The travel narrative is a valuable tool not only for deconstructing transient constructions of gender, but also for discovering the foundations of race and class ideologies in which the Oriental and the Orient are subjugated to enhance Englishwomen's Orientalist imperial status and position. This thesis is modeled on the structure of the traveling experience. In reviewing first the intellectual expectations preceding travel, the events of travel and finally the emotional reaction to the first two, a metaphoric attempt to better understand meaning through mimicry has been made. Over twenty travel narratives published by Englishwomen of varying social backgrounds, economic classes and motivations for travel between 1830 and World War I were analyzed in conjunction with letters, diaries, fictional works, newspaper articles, advice manuals, travel guides and religious texts in an effort to study the uniquely gendered nature of the Preface in female travel narratives; definitions of "travelers" and "traveling;" the manner in which "new" forms of metaphysical identification formulated what Victorian lady travelers "pre-knew" the "East" to be; the gendered nature in which female travelers portrayed their encounters with the "realities" of travel; and the concept of "disconnect," or the "distance" between a female traveler's expectation and the portrayed "reality" of what she experienced in the Orient.
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Date Issued: 2006
Identifier: CFE0001487, ucf:47101
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0001487

Title: Real People Acting Out Interpersonal Issues With Paper Representations.
Creator: Dufner, Gary, Poindexter, Carla, Raimundi-Ortiz, Wanda, Price, Mark, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: In this thesis body of work, I have interacted and collaborated with five friends to create images exploring human relationships. The subject matter illustrates my friends and myself acting out interpersonal issues with paper representations of one another. It has been my aim to represent my imagery in a campy thematic way. I include a discussion of the images in my body of work from both my perspective and the perspective of my models. The figurative paper images (")stand in(") as...
Show moreIn this thesis body of work, I have interacted and collaborated with five friends to create images exploring human relationships. The subject matter illustrates my friends and myself acting out interpersonal issues with paper representations of one another. It has been my aim to represent my imagery in a campy thematic way. I include a discussion of the images in my body of work from both my perspective and the perspective of my models. The figurative paper images (")stand in(") as representatives of the genders of their subjects.I have explored multiple points of view, constructing, reconstructing and deconstructing complex compositions; experimenting with a variety of focal points; and I have increased my knowledge of lighting and color effects through digital manipulation.
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Date Issued: 2015
Identifier: CFE0005607, ucf:52868
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005607

Title: The capture of Jefferson Davis.
Creator: Fox, John Adam, Pritchard, Benjamin D.
Description: "The story of the capture of Jefferson Davis as told through the personal papers of Benjamin Pritchard, the Union Officer in charge of the capture." - p. 1. There are 22 pages of pictures, one of Davis, one of Pritchard and the other 20 are of documents pertaining to the capture.
Date Created: 1964
Identifier: DP0012650, E477.98.F6 1964
Format: E-book
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/DP0012650

Title: STORY LINES: MOVING THROUGH THE MULTIPLE IMAGINED COMMUNITIES OF AN ASIAN-/AMERICAN-/FEMINIST BODY.
Creator: Choudhury, Athia, Park, Shelley, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: We all have stories to share, to build, to pass around, to inherit, and to create. This story - the one I piece together now - is about a Thai-/Bengali-/Muslim-/American-/Feminist looking for home, looking to manage the tension and conflict of wanting to belong to her family and to her feminist community. This thesis focuses on the seemingly conflicting obligations to kinship on the one hand and to feminist practice on the other, a conflict where being a good scholar or activist is directly...
Show moreWe all have stories to share, to build, to pass around, to inherit, and to create. This story - the one I piece together now - is about a Thai-/Bengali-/Muslim-/American-/Feminist looking for home, looking to manage the tension and conflict of wanting to belong to her family and to her feminist community. This thesis focuses on the seemingly conflicting obligations to kinship on the one hand and to feminist practice on the other, a conflict where being a good scholar or activist is directly in opposition to being a good Asian daughter. In order to understand how and why these communities appear at odds with one another, I examine how the material spaces and psychological realities inhabited by specific hyphenated, fragmented subjects are represented (and misrepresented) in both popular culture and practical politics, arguing against images of the hybrid body that bracket its lived tensions. I argue that fantasies of home as an unconditional site of belonging and comfort distract us from the multiple communities to which hyphenated subjects must move between. Hyphenated Asian-/American bodies often find ourselves torn between nativism and assimilationism - having to neutralize, forsake, or discard parts of our identities. Thus, I reduce complicated, difficult ideas of being to the size of a thimble, to a question of loyalty between my Asian-/American history and my American-/feminist future, between my familial background and the issues that have become foregrounded for me during college, between the home from which I originate and the new home to which I wish to belong. To move with fluidity, I must - in collaboration with others - invent new stories of identity and belonging.
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Date Issued: 2012
Identifier: CFH0004200, ucf:44974
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFH0004200

Title: School Has a Bad Storyline: Gamification in Educational Environments.
Creator: Pynn, Irene, Brenckle, Martha, Janz, Bruce, Underberg-Goode, Natalie, Hopp, Carolyn, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: School often has low engagement and frustrating or absent options for the kind of agency the Federal Government's 2016 National Education Technology Plan now recommends educators include in their curriculum. Video games offer opportunities for people to participate in critical problem solving through creative projects. From balancing character statistics, to collaborating with other players, to making ethical and tactical decisions that can change the outcome of the story, successful games...
Show moreSchool often has low engagement and frustrating or absent options for the kind of agency the Federal Government's 2016 National Education Technology Plan now recommends educators include in their curriculum. Video games offer opportunities for people to participate in critical problem solving through creative projects. From balancing character statistics, to collaborating with other players, to making ethical and tactical decisions that can change the outcome of the story, successful games draw on the player's interest in learning and analyzing numbers, locations, visual clues, narrative elements, people, and more. One useful example may be found in visual novels (VNs), a medium that pulls from narrative structures found in Choose Your Own Adventure Novels. These interactive narratives are a largely untapped resource (for educational uses) of guided critical thinking. My ongoing research explores the efficacy of implementing VNs into digital pedagogies to encourage the development of (")creatigational skills.(") This term is a response to the problematic wording already in use for skills such as creative thinking and collaborative abilities, skills encouraged by and developed through interactive activities, such as gaming and many of the arts. Current terminology labels them (")soft(") or (")non-cognitive(") skills, which are clear misnomers that passively diminish the importance of creative thought. This research explores how gaming, specifically so-called (")narrative(") gaming, of which VNs are one example, might contribute to the development of creatigational skills in students. Through the creation of VNs for this study, I examine both the ability of this genre to engage and encourage imaginative thought, as well as the practicality of designing and developing VNs for classroom use.
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Date Issued: 2017
Identifier: CFE0006906, ucf:51728
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006906

Title: Recruiting Followers for the Caliphate: A Narrative Analysis of Four Jihadist Magazines.
Creator: Madrazo, Andrea, Matusitz, Jonathan, Malala, John, Sellnow, Timothy, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: This study identifies and compares the methods of recruitment used by three prime jihadist organizations through their online magazines. The successful recruitment efforts and growth as a threat by the Islamic State of Iraq and Sh?m (ISIS), Al-Qaeda, and Al-Shabaab are attributed, in part, to the widespread popularity and accessibility of Dabiq and Rumiyah (published by ISIS), Inspire (published by Al-Qaeda), and Gaidi Mtaani (published by Al-Shabaab). In order to best examine the techniques...
Show moreThis study identifies and compares the methods of recruitment used by three prime jihadist organizations through their online magazines. The successful recruitment efforts and growth as a threat by the Islamic State of Iraq and Sh?m (ISIS), Al-Qaeda, and Al-Shabaab are attributed, in part, to the widespread popularity and accessibility of Dabiq and Rumiyah (published by ISIS), Inspire (published by Al-Qaeda), and Gaidi Mtaani (published by Al-Shabaab). In order to best examine the techniques of persuasion and propaganda to recruit new followers, the theoretical approach of compliance-gaining theory and methodological approach of a narrative analysis are applied. The author analyzed a total of twelve magazine issues to compare how the four magazines use (1) imagery, (2) attrition, (3) intimidation, (4) propaganda, (5) spoiling, (6) outbidding, (7) incitement, and (8) recruitment. To validate each of these themes, the study applies an open-coding instrument to select each label based on specific dimensions. These findings reveal how the same purpose to achieve the Caliphate can be chosen on a similar path by these three different jihadist organizations. This path may take different turns at certain spots, but ultimately the road is based on the same historical context to justify the recruitment process. Overall, this study provides fresh descriptive insights on jihadist organizations' recruitment methods to gain new followers toward the achievement of the Caliphate (i.e., the global Islamic state). The sample reveals that the online jihadist magazines integrate all analyzed themes to portray their messages. The findings show certain issues implement specific themes more than others. Across the sample, the use of persuasion justified and encouraged violence. Persuasion is found in prideful examples of successful terrorist attacks and aftermath scenes of destruction. The distinct difference between the four online jihadist magazines is the persuasion of recruitment.
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Date Issued: 2018
Identifier: CFE0007048, ucf:51984
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007048

Title: Physiological Reactions to Uncanny Stimuli: Substantiation of Self-Assessment and Individual Perception in User Enjoyment and Comfort.
Creator: Ballion, Tatiana, Sims, Valerie, Chin, Matthew, Jones, Donald, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: There is abundant anecdotal evidence substantiating Mori's initial observation of the "uncanny valley", a point at which human response to non-human entities drops sharply with respect to comfort (Mori, 1970), and the construct itself has a long-standing history in both Robotics and Psychology. Currently, many fields such as design, training, entertainment, and education make use of heuristic approaches to accommodate the anticipated needs of the user/consumer/audience in certain important...
Show moreThere is abundant anecdotal evidence substantiating Mori's initial observation of the "uncanny valley", a point at which human response to non-human entities drops sharply with respect to comfort (Mori, 1970), and the construct itself has a long-standing history in both Robotics and Psychology. Currently, many fields such as design, training, entertainment, and education make use of heuristic approaches to accommodate the anticipated needs of the user/consumer/audience in certain important aspects. This is due to the lack of empirical substantiation or, in some cases, the impossibility of rigorous quantification; one such area is with respect to the user's experience of uncanniness, a feeling of "eeriness" or "wrongness" when interacting with artefacts or environments. Uncanniness, however, continues to be defined and measured in a largely subjective way, and often after the fact; an experience or product's uncanny features are pointed out after the item has been markedly avoided or complained about by the general public. These studies are among the first seeking to determine a constellation of personality traits and physiological responses that incline the user to have a more frequent or profound (")uncanny" reaction when presented with stimuli meeting the criteria for a level of "eeriness". In study 1, 395 adults were asked to categorize 200 images as uncanny, neutral, pleasant, or other. In Study 2, physiological and eye-tracking data was collected from twenty two adults as they viewed uncanny, neutral and pleasant images culled from study 1. This research identifies components of the uncanny valley related to subjective assessment, personality factors (using the HEXACO and Anthropomorphic Tendencies Scale), and biophysical measures, and found that traits unique to Emotionality on the HEXACO inventory, compounded with a form of anthropomorphism demonstrates a level of relationship to the subjective experience of uncanny stimuli. There is evidence that HEXACO type and forms of anthropomorphic perception mediates the biophysical expression and the subjective perception of the stimuli. In keeping with psychological hypotheses, stimuli to which the participants had greatest response centered on death, the threat of death, or mismatched/absent facial features.
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Date Issued: 2012
Identifier: CFE0004354, ucf:49454
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004354

Title: Secondary World: The Limits of Ludonarrative.
Creator: Dannelly, David, Adams, JoAnne, Price, Mark, Poindexter, Carla, Kovach, Keith, University of Central Florida
Abstract / Description: Secondary World: The Limits of Ludonarrative is a series of short narrative animations that are a theoretical treatise on the limitations of western storytelling in video games. The series covers specific topics relating to film theory, game design and art theory: specifically those associated with Gilles Deleuze, Jean Baudrillard, Jay Bolter, Richard Grusin and Andy Clark. The use of imagery, editing and presentation is intended to physically represent an extension of myself and my thinking...
Show moreSecondary World: The Limits of Ludonarrative is a series of short narrative animations that are a theoretical treatise on the limitations of western storytelling in video games. The series covers specific topics relating to film theory, game design and art theory: specifically those associated with Gilles Deleuze, Jean Baudrillard, Jay Bolter, Richard Grusin and Andy Clark. The use of imagery, editing and presentation is intended to physically represent an extension of myself and my thinking process and which are united through the common thread of my personal feelings, thoughts and experiences in the digital age.
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Date Issued: 2014
Identifier: CFE0005155, ucf:50704
Format: Document (PDF)
PURL: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005155

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