Current Search: Bartkevicius, Jocelyn (x)
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Pages
- Title
- ORDINARY MADNESS.
- Creator
-
Criswell, Jill, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Ordinary Madness: A Memoir is an exploration of the chaotic trials and tribulations of growing up, of the sensitive, overly-imaginative child I was, trying to navigate her way through a world full of people who didn't seem to understand her, including unsympathetic adults, merciless playmates, and confused relatives. Set in the tiny farming town of Palatka, Florida, and spanning from early childhood memories to adolescence, the memoir delves into the realm of tragicomic youthful...
Show moreOrdinary Madness: A Memoir is an exploration of the chaotic trials and tribulations of growing up, of the sensitive, overly-imaginative child I was, trying to navigate her way through a world full of people who didn't seem to understand her, including unsympathetic adults, merciless playmates, and confused relatives. Set in the tiny farming town of Palatka, Florida, and spanning from early childhood memories to adolescence, the memoir delves into the realm of tragicomic youthful experiences with dead pets, bathroom graffiti, mock crucifixions, and other strange mishaps. The prose of Ordinary Madness is inspired by the small-town innocence of Haven Kimmel, with a splash of Mary Karr's savvy wit and witticism. This memoir attempts to capture the essence, both humorous and horrific, of what it feels like to be an outsider in your own life.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2008
- Identifier
- CFE0002123, ucf:47558
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0002123
- Title
- LET THE CHILDREN COME TO ME.
- Creator
-
Ramirez, Andrea, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
My thesis, a collection of personal essays, explores my parents' affinity towards their native Colombia and how this connection to their homeland, through their faith and their customs, affected my definition of self. When I think about my parents' emigration from Colombia to the States, I picture the illustrations in the Bible I had as a child: the couple running from Sodom and Gomorra, running away from the place they had always known and holding on to each other. My parents, like...
Show moreMy thesis, a collection of personal essays, explores my parents' affinity towards their native Colombia and how this connection to their homeland, through their faith and their customs, affected my definition of self. When I think about my parents' emigration from Colombia to the States, I picture the illustrations in the Bible I had as a child: the couple running from Sodom and Gomorra, running away from the place they had always known and holding on to each other. My parents, like the couple in the Bible, were in the middle of nowhere when they first set foot on the cold, concrete streets of New York City. In the Bible, the man knew he was in a better place, the cities left behind him becoming more and more of a distant memory. The next picture showed a statue of salt in the shape of the woman. The woman had turned back. Shortly after they married in Colombia, my mother looked forward to a future in another country. She urged my father to seek a better life for them in the United States. My father was the one who couldn't help but look behind him, despite the consequences. The thesis chapters explore such issues as the consequences of leaving home; the impact of my father's incarceration upon his Catholic faith and upon the family; how travel to Colombia with my parents revealed new aspects of their personalities and beliefs; and my own efforts to understand and meditate upon my multicultural heritage and surroundings.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2007
- Identifier
- CFE0001866, ucf:47415
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0001866
- Title
- JACK KEROUAC DOES NOT LIE.
- Creator
-
Shrader, Kyle, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
"Jack Kerouac Does Not Lie" recounts my pilgrimage in the summer of 2000, from southwest Florida to a canyon beach in California where Jack Kerouac--as I had read in his Big Sur--lost his mind forty years earlier. I was heavily influenced. Kerouac's On the Road showed me what to do with myself. Big Sur showed me where to go. In the twentieth century Americans shifted their notions of the west coast from a means for sustenance to a symbol of post-war freedom. Kerouac seems to embody this...
Show more"Jack Kerouac Does Not Lie" recounts my pilgrimage in the summer of 2000, from southwest Florida to a canyon beach in California where Jack Kerouac--as I had read in his Big Sur--lost his mind forty years earlier. I was heavily influenced. Kerouac's On the Road showed me what to do with myself. Big Sur showed me where to go. In the twentieth century Americans shifted their notions of the west coast from a means for sustenance to a symbol of post-war freedom. Kerouac seems to embody this momentum; the world and the burning spirit his work describes is a precursor to the sixties. His muse, Neal Cassady, is the common link--appearing as Dean Moriarty in Kerouac's first major work and later as himself in Wolfe's The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. My parents were a part of this westward yearning's last true surge in the early seventies, when they ventured cross-country and stayed out there for a time. They'd caught the tail end of the wave, and told me a bit about it. I was full of stories, mostly fiction. Sweating in my twenty year old conversion van with a big friend, Ben--whose goals were less "literary"--I sought to recreate the legends I had read, the movies I had seen, and the tales my parents had told me. I was on a mission; I wanted my trip to measure up. Ben was on vacation. Our folly is chronicled within; three weeks and four thousand miles of it.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2006
- Identifier
- CFE0001063, ucf:46789
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0001063
- Title
- BLOODLINES.
- Creator
-
toner, Pamela, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
"Bloodlines" is a collection of personal essays that focus on the process of remembering, imagining, and reflecting on the past through the lens of a perpetually shifting present. They consider situations ranging from mental and physical illnesses, from cancer to alcohol addiction, to career changes, to the often dysfunctional and displaced family ties that distance and adulthood have not severed. In "Searching," I write the narrative of the ongoing search for my birthmother, and how the...
Show more"Bloodlines" is a collection of personal essays that focus on the process of remembering, imagining, and reflecting on the past through the lens of a perpetually shifting present. They consider situations ranging from mental and physical illnesses, from cancer to alcohol addiction, to career changes, to the often dysfunctional and displaced family ties that distance and adulthood have not severed. In "Searching," I write the narrative of the ongoing search for my birthmother, and how the search complicates the relationship with my adoptive mother, who always feared she'd lose me. Similarly, "Of Flesh and Blood" recounts and negotiates how hereditary and environmental factors have shaped my identity. Loss and betrayal are weaved throughout "Flight Patterns" when I trace the links between relationships among my family and my pets. In "Signs and Stars" and "Seeing Stars," I search for ways of dealing with my cancer diagnosis and alcoholism, weaving through my past as I fight for recovery. By exploring the subjective nature of memory and circumstance through sensory, expositional, structural, and even written documentation, I have attempted to capture what is, for me, the tenuous hold on intertwined moments in time by creating a palimpsest of perspectives.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2006
- Identifier
- CFE0001053, ucf:46819
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0001053
- Title
- GRIDLOCKS AND PADLOCKS.
- Creator
-
Chapman, Rachel, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
"Gridlocks and Padlocks" is a collection of short fiction and personal essays whose goal is to create characters with depth in both real-world and not-entirely-real-world situations. The strength of nonfiction is the capacity to observe the writer's thinking and motivation. "Ashes to Ashes, Trust to Dust" is a personal essay that explores my struggle with the faith I was raised in, with an emphasis on how friendships and relationships have shaped my perceptions. "The List of Unacceptable...
Show more"Gridlocks and Padlocks" is a collection of short fiction and personal essays whose goal is to create characters with depth in both real-world and not-entirely-real-world situations. The strength of nonfiction is the capacity to observe the writer's thinking and motivation. "Ashes to Ashes, Trust to Dust" is a personal essay that explores my struggle with the faith I was raised in, with an emphasis on how friendships and relationships have shaped my perceptions. "The List of Unacceptable Faults" is a personal essay about unwanted interactions with the opposite sex; it is an examination of men and boys through the lens of naive dissatisfaction. "Sing Me Rebecca" is a personal essay that delves into my relationship with my mentally handicapped sister. While the nonfiction writer focuses on his or her own development and struggles, a fiction writer can investigate the human condition by exploring the depth found in imagined people who face everyday situations and what characteristics and behaviors make them believable and absorbing. "Object of Study" is a short story about a girl named Taylor, who in her formative years stumbles upon a friendship between her sister and a boy she does not trust. This story examines Taylor's quirky, multi-faceted character through the actions she takes to investigate and ultimately end the friendship between a boy and her younger sister. "Crossing Fault Lines" is a work of short short fiction that focuses on three characters-a mother and her two sons-and their strained relationship. Whether writing personal essays or fiction, my goal is to create overarching conflicts that reflect people's struggle with being "stuck" in some situation in life.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2013
- Identifier
- CFH0004351, ucf:44976
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFH0004351
- Title
- HALF-VIRGIN.
- Creator
-
Pollack, Alexander, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Half-Virgin is a cross-genre collection of essays, short stories, and poems about the humor, pain, and occasional glory of journeying into adulthood but not quite getting there. The works in this collection seek to create a definition of a term, "half-virgin," that I coined in the process of writing this thesis. Among the possibilities explored are: an individual who embarks upon sexual activity for the first time and does not achieve orgasm; an individual who has reached orgasm through...
Show moreHalf-Virgin is a cross-genre collection of essays, short stories, and poems about the humor, pain, and occasional glory of journeying into adulthood but not quite getting there. The works in this collection seek to create a definition of a term, "half-virgin," that I coined in the process of writing this thesis. Among the possibilities explored are: an individual who embarks upon sexual activity for the first time and does not achieve orgasm; an individual who has reached orgasm through consensual sexual activity, but has remained uncertain about what he or she is doing; and the curious sensation of being half-child, half-adult. Ultimately, I believe, a "half-virgin" possesses all of these traits. One of the goals of the collection is to scramble the prototypical coming-of-age story into bits and parts and halves. Among the approaches included are earnest memoir (the real and metaphorical costumes a young couple wears on Halloween), character-driven fiction (the life story of Marlow, a college track star who ends up the unwitting inspiration for Super Mario Brothers), and narrative experiments (a tongue-in-cheek creative writing syllabus and a bullet pointed resume of sexual conquests). By exploring the untidy fragments in love, lust, and human connection in these works, Half-Virgin aspires to find wholeness through the jagged adventures of growing up.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- Identifier
- CFE0003591, ucf:48921
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0003591
- Title
- THE FLATS OF PARADISE.
- Creator
-
Baker, Pamela, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
The Flats of Paradise is a collection of personal essays exploring the interconnectivity between humans, land, identity, and belonging. Through the perspective of my experience as a nurse, these essays probe the friction created when borders rub up against each and the comforts gained through connections both spiritual and physical. "Avoiding the Stepladder," for example, examines a near lightning strike on a mountain in relation to the potential pain caused by the human need for touch. "The...
Show moreThe Flats of Paradise is a collection of personal essays exploring the interconnectivity between humans, land, identity, and belonging. Through the perspective of my experience as a nurse, these essays probe the friction created when borders rub up against each and the comforts gained through connections both spiritual and physical. "Avoiding the Stepladder," for example, examines a near lightning strike on a mountain in relation to the potential pain caused by the human need for touch. "The Dust Trail," a meditation upon various traditions for disposing of the placenta (burning vs. burying), also looks at the problem of finding home when relationships with the land are broken. Other essays in the collection juxtapose memories of people and nature to reflect upon the artificial constructs people erect that separate them from each other and from the land. In "When Nothing Takes Notice," for example, explores similarities between a father's love of the sound of crickets and a child's long wait in line to register for swimming lessons. These and other essays record the search for a sense of place, while also exploring the nature of memory, change, death, and a restless refusal to settle.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- Identifier
- CFE0002582, ucf:48256
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0002582
- Title
- BIRTH OF A MOTHER.
- Creator
-
Curran, Ashley, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Birth of a Mother is a memoir that tells the story of how my unplanned pregnancy helps me to transform from a damaged adolescent into an empowered mother. Using a first person, present tense narrative, I relive the nine months leading up to the unmedicated home birth of my first child, exploring the conflicts I faced over my obesity, over having no job and no place to call home, and over developing a relationship with a man who was not the baby's father. Weaving in past tense vignettes, I...
Show moreBirth of a Mother is a memoir that tells the story of how my unplanned pregnancy helps me to transform from a damaged adolescent into an empowered mother. Using a first person, present tense narrative, I relive the nine months leading up to the unmedicated home birth of my first child, exploring the conflicts I faced over my obesity, over having no job and no place to call home, and over developing a relationship with a man who was not the baby's father. Weaving in past tense vignettes, I attempt to show how I prepared myself for impending motherhood by reflecting on my mother's short, violent life and the abuse I suffered at her hands; the effect of losing my mother at the age of twelve and my quest to find someone to fill her role throughout my adolescence; my experiences with faith, from Christianity, to Buddhism, to Atheism, to Paganism; and by struggling to heal the emotional scars left over from suffering childhood abuse, and multiple rapes as a teenager. As I uncover parallels between my mother's life and my own, I come to a new understanding of the mental illness that seems prevalent in my family, of the causes and triggers of my personal flaws, and of methods that I can use to become for my child the mother I always wanted for myself.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- Identifier
- CFE0003996, ucf:48667
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0003996
- Title
- Red Tide and Other Stories.
- Creator
-
Vazquez, Heather, Peynado, Brenda, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, Pugh, William, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Red Tide and Other Stories is a fictional collection of eleven short stories in which characters react to their struggles with loss, frustration, regret, loneliness, and love. Each story presents a strong sense of place and moment, while examining how characters are influenced by these elements. While individual stories present new characters and scenarios, they are connected by elements of water and include aspects of coasts and shorelines in the setting of the real world. The commonality of...
Show moreRed Tide and Other Stories is a fictional collection of eleven short stories in which characters react to their struggles with loss, frustration, regret, loneliness, and love. Each story presents a strong sense of place and moment, while examining how characters are influenced by these elements. While individual stories present new characters and scenarios, they are connected by elements of water and include aspects of coasts and shorelines in the setting of the real world. The commonality of water in the stories works to demonstrate a connectivity between all people and cultures because water is shared and linked between continents without regard to socioeconomics or political boundaries drawn throughout the world. Regardless of these drawn boundaries, we all share grief and disappointment, just as we share water.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2018
- Identifier
- CFE0007110, ucf:51968
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007110
- Title
- Jindo On Becoming Shaman.
- Creator
-
Jo, Iljeen, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, Milanes, Cecilia, Holic, Nathan, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Jindo is a novel that incorporates drawings, photos, symbols, and comic panels in collaboration with visual artists, Minna Moon and Myungee Jo. In addition to the drawings, the novel integrates Korean folktales and family mythology into the narrative. The hybrid work also weaves elements of speculative fiction, fantasy, realism, horror, and comedy game theory. The novel is told in the first person voice of Korean American, Jindo Cho.In the wake of a nationally televised humiliation, Jindo Cho...
Show moreJindo is a novel that incorporates drawings, photos, symbols, and comic panels in collaboration with visual artists, Minna Moon and Myungee Jo. In addition to the drawings, the novel integrates Korean folktales and family mythology into the narrative. The hybrid work also weaves elements of speculative fiction, fantasy, realism, horror, and comedy game theory. The novel is told in the first person voice of Korean American, Jindo Cho.In the wake of a nationally televised humiliation, Jindo Cho leaves the world of competitive figure skating to attend state college. When, at the beginning of the semester, his childhood best friend abandons him to join a whites-only fraternity, Delta Kappa, Jindo is left to fend for himself in a surprisingly racist campus. At a party he isn't invited to, Jindo rebels against his past, present, and future, and consumes an unnamed psychedelic compound. After ingesting the unknown compound, he gets thrown into a terrifying trip that he does not remember. Once the trip ends, Jindo relapses in strange ways. Visions show him scenes from the past, present, future, and (")other places(") as he fights to reconcile reality and meaning in the universe.The novel focuses on how Jindo comes to terms with his past, his dreams, and a traumatic memory he can't quite grasp, all the while exploring the genre of the novel itself, how novels may think, breathe, and evolve in form, and how an experiment in form itself can expose the pressures a character struggles against, in Jindo's case, racial stereotypes, gender norms, and the toxic expectations of a masculinity that encourages detachment and violence. This novel seeks to dismantle stereotypes while also providing readers a wildly entertaining time.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2018
- Identifier
- CFE0007020, ucf:52036
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007020
- Title
- Golden Years.
- Creator
-
Malik, Sienna, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, Stanfill, Mel, Thaxton, Terry, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Golden Years is the culmination of the author's studies in Creative Nonfiction writing, with attention to hybrid forms of the genre, combined with her professional background in screenwriting, and research interests in nostalgia and cultural preservation in the modern age. In the collection of essays, the author blends established forms of Creative Nonfiction, such as the braided essay, with literary conventions borrowed from other forms of written communication, such as the screenplay (("...
Show moreGolden Years is the culmination of the author's studies in Creative Nonfiction writing, with attention to hybrid forms of the genre, combined with her professional background in screenwriting, and research interests in nostalgia and cultural preservation in the modern age. In the collection of essays, the author blends established forms of Creative Nonfiction, such as the braided essay, with literary conventions borrowed from other forms of written communication, such as the screenplay ((")You Must Remember This,(") (")Driver's Seat(")), the cookbook ((")Tip of my Tongue(")), a travel guide ((")A Trolley Runs Through It(")) and fabulist fiction ((")Selkie on the Shore(")). Through these hybrid forms, Golden Years explores the narrator's fascinations with music, cinema, and fashions of the past, with crafting the perfect pot of vegetarian chili, and with marine mammals. Through the blending of personal essay with cultural criticism, the author explores how these loves have shaped her relationship with the world around her.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2018
- Identifier
- CFE0007344, ucf:52128
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0007344
- Title
- Evidence of Lives.
- Creator
-
Cummings, John, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, Rushin, Patrick, Neal, Mary, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Evidence of Lives is a novel that deals with themes of childhood abuse, mental illness, and alienated families. The book opens with the main character, forty-two-year-old Mark Barr, who has returned home from New York to West Virginia after eleven years for his older brother Steve's funeral. Steve, having died of a heart attack at forty-six, was mentally ill most of his adult life, though Mark has always questioned what was (")mentally ill(") and what was the result of their father's verbal...
Show moreEvidence of Lives is a novel that deals with themes of childhood abuse, mental illness, and alienated families. The book opens with the main character, forty-two-year-old Mark Barr, who has returned home from New York to West Virginia after eleven years for his older brother Steve's funeral. Steve, having died of a heart attack at forty-six, was mentally ill most of his adult life, though Mark has always questioned what was (")mentally ill(") and what was the result of their father's verbal and physical abuse during their childhood. When Mark discovers that there is to be no funeral, but a cremation without service, he calls his girlfriend, an attorney back in New York, who tells him he has a (")legal responsibility(") to voice his brother's oral will. Just nights before his death, Steve called Mark and conveyed his last wishes to be buried, not cremated. The book unfolds into an odyssey for Mark to discover love for his brother posthumously in a loveless family. Evidence of Lives is a portrait of an oldest brother's supposed mental illness and unfulfilled life, as well as a redeeming tale of a youngest brother's alienation from his family and his guilt for abandoning them.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- Identifier
- CFE0004530, ucf:49248
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004530
- Title
- The Boys' Republic.
- Creator
-
Mueller, Jonas, Hubbard, Susan, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, Neal, Mary, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
The young men in The Boys' Republic live in a world that is continually falling apart. Their houses collapse into sinkholes, forest fires carve out chunks of their towns, plague spreads through their communes, the money runs out on the construction project where they work. This decay mirrors their own collapsing identities, as they are forced to question their mastery of nature, their nostalgia for their youth, their relationships with others, and the value of masculinity itself. Drawing on...
Show moreThe young men in The Boys' Republic live in a world that is continually falling apart. Their houses collapse into sinkholes, forest fires carve out chunks of their towns, plague spreads through their communes, the money runs out on the construction project where they work. This decay mirrors their own collapsing identities, as they are forced to question their mastery of nature, their nostalgia for their youth, their relationships with others, and the value of masculinity itself. Drawing on the work of writers like Dennis Cooper, Flannery O'Connor, and Benjamin Percy, The Boys' Republic depicts men in the midst of both an economic and an emotional recession. Some, like Carson in Hotel or Zachary in Ignus Fatuus, are trapped in their decaying suburbs by youth, poverty, or habit. Others, like Jared in Corona Radiata or Nick in The Boy's Republic, have fled or been ejected from them. Either way, they are haunted by them, and by the selfish, insecure, destructive behavior that they learned there. The Boys' Republic is about boys confronting their own selfishness, and each other's, in a world that can no longer accommodate it but offers no easy replacement.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- Identifier
- CFE0004578, ucf:49222
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004578
- Title
- Young Thinkers.
- Creator
-
Elgeness, Jaclyn, Neal, Mary, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, Rushin, Patrick, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Young Thinkers is a collection of short fiction dealing with what it means to earn wisdom in the twenty-first century. When our phones can remember everything for us, and we're plagued by a sense that everything has already been said and digitally cataloged, insight becomes even more important, particularly to the thoughtful characters explored throughout the collection. The prolonged American adolescence facilitated by the economic crisis, as well as the societal acceptance of marrying and...
Show moreYoung Thinkers is a collection of short fiction dealing with what it means to earn wisdom in the twenty-first century. When our phones can remember everything for us, and we're plagued by a sense that everything has already been said and digitally cataloged, insight becomes even more important, particularly to the thoughtful characters explored throughout the collection. The prolonged American adolescence facilitated by the economic crisis, as well as the societal acceptance of marrying and having children much later in life, creates an atmosphere of intense self-doubt. A young man working at a gas station after college witnesses a high school boy die in a hit and run, and he longs to comfort others at the vigil. Another young man decides he would rather rob houses than return to community college while wondering at ways to extend his lifespan. Young women struggle to feel important and independent, but find themselves assuaging their fears with cigarettes and alcohol. These characters yearn for the insight and experience that would make them decidedly and authoritatively adult.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- Identifier
- CFE0004106, ucf:49097
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004106
- Title
- Waiving Miranda.
- Creator
-
Voyles, Vance, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, Roney, Lisa, Rushin, Patrick, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
Waiving Miranda is a nonfiction collection that explores my career in law enforcement with a special emphasis on how the day-to-day association with others can lure a person into self-observation. The essays include my experiences as a road-patrol deputy, sex-crimes detective, and homicide detective in one of the largest county law enforcement agencies in the nation. Instead of the TV version of law enforcement(-)anecdotes of police chases and shoot outs(-)this thesis examines people on both...
Show moreWaiving Miranda is a nonfiction collection that explores my career in law enforcement with a special emphasis on how the day-to-day association with others can lure a person into self-observation. The essays include my experiences as a road-patrol deputy, sex-crimes detective, and homicide detective in one of the largest county law enforcement agencies in the nation. Instead of the TV version of law enforcement(-)anecdotes of police chases and shoot outs(-)this thesis examines people on both sides of the yellow crimes scene tape as they face their own mortality and the gruesome truth of people's unabashed cruelty towards one another.These essays wrestle with such issues as the following: confronting my own perceived inadequacies while encountering the expectations of those whose ideas of police work come from shows such as SWAT, Law and Order, and NYPD Blue; balancing career and parenting in the aftermath of divorce and a loss of purpose; pursuing a career in law enforcement with the idea of serving the community; discovering that policing in real life is a direct contradiction to the celluloid heroes I grew up watching on television; staging an internal war and ultimately resolving to move past resentment and move forward with a new purpose.Unlike most true crime dramas, this collection does not promise a happily ever after. Instead, it's a detailed account of the men and women in the law enforcement community today, and how, as much as they guard the public against criminals at large, so must they guard themselves against the emotional toll that this knowledge carries with it.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- Identifier
- CFE0004490, ucf:49277
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004490
- Title
- Please Don't Interrupt Me While I'm Ignoring You.
- Creator
-
Harrington, Sherard, Poissant, David, Uttich, Laurie, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
-
A collection of short stories and personal essays, "Please Don't Interrupt Me While I'm Ignoring You" weaves a lame of humor and private desperation on the page. An actor in one story craves career gratification, while a United Nations coordinator in another finds herself attracted to a nervous NGO. A housewife attempts to convince her husband to commit an infidelity, while an architect finds that his new pet companion isn't helping him to get over his ex-girlfriend. Having a difficult time...
Show moreA collection of short stories and personal essays, "Please Don't Interrupt Me While I'm Ignoring You" weaves a lame of humor and private desperation on the page. An actor in one story craves career gratification, while a United Nations coordinator in another finds herself attracted to a nervous NGO. A housewife attempts to convince her husband to commit an infidelity, while an architect finds that his new pet companion isn't helping him to get over his ex-girlfriend. Having a difficult time relating, these characters often find themselves stuck in a miscommunication loop, and their journey to get what they want is subtle. These stories are followed with essays about the author's own experiences while he was stuck in a miscommunication loop. Driven by his obscene fear of conflict, the author chronicles what happens when conflict is inevitable. Travel and self-loathing abound in these narratives depicted with sensitivity and sarcasm-bitterness and love. Together they leave a lasting impression of the impermeability of worldly citizens, and the internalizations they have to combat to get there.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- Identifier
- CFE0004319, ucf:49480
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004319
- Title
- The Many Pedagogies of Memoir: A Study of the Promise of Teaching Memoir in College Composition.
- Creator
-
Lee, Melissa, Wallace, David, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, Marinara, Martha, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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This thesis examines the promise and problems of memoir in the pedagogy and practices of teaching memoir in college composition. I interviewed three University of Central Florida instructors who value memoir in composition, and who at the time of this study, were mandated to teach memoir in their composition courses. The interviews focus on three main points of interest: (1) the instructors' motivations behind their teaching of memoir, (2) how these instructors see memoir functioning in their...
Show moreThis thesis examines the promise and problems of memoir in the pedagogy and practices of teaching memoir in college composition. I interviewed three University of Central Florida instructors who value memoir in composition, and who at the time of this study, were mandated to teach memoir in their composition courses. The interviews focus on three main points of interest: (1) the instructors' motivations behind their teaching of memoir, (2) how these instructors see memoir functioning in their classes, and (3) what these instructors hope their students will gain in the process of writing the memoir essay. By analyzing these interviews, I was better able to understand the three instructors' pedagogical choices and rationales for teaching memoir in their classes. I have also collected data and research from scholarly journal articles, books, and from my experiences teaching memoir in the composition classroom. This thesis challenges the widely accepted notion that memoir and the personal in composition scholarship, pedagogy, and teaching practices are (")'touchy-feely,' 'soft,' 'unrigorous,' 'mystical,' 'therapeutic,' and 'Mickey Mouse'(") ways of meaning-making and teaching writing (Tompkins 214). My findings show that memoir in the classroom is richer and far more complex than it might appear at first, and that the teaching of memoir in composition can, in fact, be greater than the memoir essay itself. Even though each instructor I interviewed values the personal and believes memoir belongs in composition curriculum, it turns out that none of these instructors' core reasons for teaching memoir was so his or her students could master writing the memoir essay, although this was important; rather the memoir essay ultimately served in the instructors' classrooms as a conduit through which they ultimately could teach more diverse writing skills and techniques as well as intellectual concepts that truly inspired them. Since the teaching of memoir seems to be even more dynamic and versatile in process and pedagogy than many of the other essay genres traditionally taught in college composition, this thesis makes recommendations for how memoir needs to be viewed, written about, and taught in order to harness the promise of this essay genre more consistently in the discussion of composition pedagogy and in the teaching of memoir to our students in the composition classroom.Thompkins, Jane. A Life in School: What the Teacher Learned. Reading: Addison-Wesley. 1996. Print.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- Identifier
- CFE0004293, ucf:49469
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004293
- Title
- Natural Disasters.
- Creator
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Cobb, Rebecca, Milanes, Cecilia, Poissant, David, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Natural Disasters is a collection of twelve short stories that feature a variety of narrators as they interact with the ones they love. In these stories, characters experience puberty, friendship, love, loss, trauma, and the everyday magic of living as they fight to master their own failings. Those lucky enough find solace in the forgiving beauty of nature, while others succumb to the untamable power of its disasters. This thesis is useful, important, and unique as it focuses on the stories...
Show moreNatural Disasters is a collection of twelve short stories that feature a variety of narrators as they interact with the ones they love. In these stories, characters experience puberty, friendship, love, loss, trauma, and the everyday magic of living as they fight to master their own failings. Those lucky enough find solace in the forgiving beauty of nature, while others succumb to the untamable power of its disasters. This thesis is useful, important, and unique as it focuses on the stories of a variety of characters, mostly women and children, and displays the beauty and fearsome power of nature as the characters strive to achieve their goals. In today's political and social climate, women, children, and nature are often taken for granted, underestimated, and even forgotten about. Here, they are anything but forgotten. Women join together to fight trauma, children stand together and face some of today's worst natural disasters, and nature is portrayed as a source of magic. This thesis gives these characters a voice and shines a spotlight on their importance to the world and society as a whole.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2017
- Identifier
- CFE0006867, ucf:51741
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006867
- Title
- Baby Bird (&) the Electronic Abyss.
- Creator
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Senior, Alexis, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, Thaxton, Terry, Roney, Lisa, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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What is a real life? A well-lived life? And how do we define either? Baby Bird (&) the Electronic Abyss is a collection of personal essays that questions and explores escapism and existentialism as experienced at music festivals and campsites around the United States. Within this collection, festivals are illustrated as more than just spectacular stages and bright lights(-)they're depicted as fascinating, budding utopias that encourage creativity, generosity, and positivity from attendees who...
Show moreWhat is a real life? A well-lived life? And how do we define either? Baby Bird (&) the Electronic Abyss is a collection of personal essays that questions and explores escapism and existentialism as experienced at music festivals and campsites around the United States. Within this collection, festivals are illustrated as more than just spectacular stages and bright lights(-)they're depicted as fascinating, budding utopias that encourage creativity, generosity, and positivity from attendees who abandon inhibitions, and oftentimes logic, in the name of fleeting freedom from the routine of their (")real(") lives. The narrator strives to live a fulfilled life(-)what many might call a well-lived life, if not a privileged life(-)but she struggles to identify her life as meaningful as she works to disentangle the falsities of her (")real(") life as typically defined by society, a corporate, desk life in between festivals, and her electric life, an actualized but less publicly-accepted life at festivals. She repeatedly contemplates her relationship with art, and whether or not art offers a sort of immortality to those who pursue it. As a festival-goer, she finds that the art of music takes her away from her own art, writing, but her writing is about the festivals, so a love/hate relationship grows with the festivals over time. Many of these essays, such as (")In a Tent, a Home,(") (")Rebecca,(") (")We Left Town,(") and (")I Don't Wanna Wear No Shoes,(") ruminate on how dislocation and travel can be fulfilling occasions for further ontological inquiry. Other essays, including (")They Call Me Baby Bird,(") (")Monterey, Babe,(") and (")When the Fire Dancers Come Alive at Night,(") focus on music and entertainment, and a kind of resulting debauchery that compels the narrator to reflect on her moral incontinence, inability to identify reality, and jaded self-appraisal.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2016
- Identifier
- CFE0006501, ucf:51397
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006501
- Title
- Heavy Hit Me.
- Creator
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Basques, Shauna, Roney, Lisa, Thaxton, Terry, Bartkevicius, Jocelyn, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Heavy Hit Me is a memoir series linking obesity to sexual desire and its corresponding fear, linking fantasy to the lived loneliness of a girl too distrusting of her own body and attractions to live outside her own head. Told through essay, found letters, and shifting points of view, Heavy Hit Me explores the breadth of its protagonist's chosen isolation. It shows how the many itches of insecurity craft a young woman never challenged to really know and love herself(-)until now.
- Date Issued
- 2017
- Identifier
- CFE0006932, ucf:51678
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006932