Communications
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Self-Disclosure of Sexual Desires as a Decision-Making Process
Sexual self-disclosures involve individuals revealing or discussing their beliefs, attitudes, or desires about sexual topics (Byers & Demmons; Harris et al., 2014). To learn more about this process, this dissertation applied ... -
“I Believe All of Us Together Can Raise My Child”: Understanding the Familial Network, Social Support Strategies, and Communication Resilience of Single Black Mothers
Almost a quarter of all U.S. children live in a one-parent household (23%), more than three times the national average of children from any other country worldwide (Livingston, 2018). For decades, this percentage has risen, ... -
Bounded Social Media Places
In this dissertation, I focus on places within social media that facilitate private communication with intended audiences. This includes private messaging, groups and servers within mobile and channel-based messaging ... -
The Dynamics of Contact: Engaging Optimal Intergroup Conditions and Communication Practices to Lead Interracial Conversations about Race
Amidst a U.S. sociopolitical climate of interracial tension and unrest due to systemic inequity between white and Black, Indigenous, and other people of color, social justice organizations bring members of diverse communities ... -
A New Black Aesthetic” and not “A New Blackness”: An Analysis of Spike Lee’s Do The Right Thing
This dissertation examines race, politics, culture, and class in the cinematic representations developed by Spike Lee through the lens of African American aesthetic values. Scholars have classified Spike Lee as the most ... -
The Rise of Digital Misogynoir-Face: Exploitation of Stereotypes for Entertainment and Profit
Digital Blackface is a type of rebranding of the minstrel Blackface. Revisiting the same stereotypes and demeaning nature, digital Blackface has evolved through the usage of memes, GIFs and videos. Through this evolution, ... -
Building Connections, Building Obstacles: The Material Rhetorics of Connection and Disconnection at two US Border Parks
This dissertation analyzes and compares parks at each of the two US borders—Peace Arch Park at the US-Canada border and Friendship Park at the US-Mexico border. I argue that the material elements in each park actively ... -
“I Am a Binary Trans Man and I Love Being Pregnant”: Making Meaning of Pregnancy in Seahorse Dad Narratives
Although there are many ways one can start a family, the culture considers pregnancy one of a woman’s most important life achievements. In other words, the culture privileges biological ties above all else. These cultural ... -
Building a “smart” campus with care: Contradictions and communication in infrastructuring
The concept of a “smart” campus is used broadly to describe initiatives to make all aspects of campus life easier, however, some salient features include ease of data collection and distribution, fast and reliable energy ... -
Between Sovereignty and Coordination: Reevaluating the Treaty of Peace, Harmony, and Mutual Assistance
Written and signed in 1967 by Black and Chicano Power movement leaders in Albuquerque, NM during the fifth annual convention of La Alianza Federal de Mercedes (Federal Land Grant Alliance), the Treaty of Peace, Harmony, ... -
Ecology of Online Communities
How do competitive struggles for resources or symbiotic relationships that support a web ofinterdependent communities shape the evolution of online organizing? Most prior studies of online community success have focused ... -
The Images of Giant Corporations in 21st-Century American Politics
This dissertation uses content analysis to explore the Congressional Record and Congressional Hearings as artifacts providing insight into a specific thematic political discourse in the United States from 2000 to 2020: ... -
Framing and Source Credibility in American Political Discourse About Climate Change
Climate change represents the greatest threat humanity faces. Despite the widely acceptedscientific basis that climate change is human caused, the United States has largely failed to curb its greenhouse gas emissions, ... -
Full-Time Side Hustle: The Position and Production of Fitness Influencer and Creators on Instagram
This dissertation seeks to understand who gets to be a social media Influencer or content creator within the fitness industry, as well as the strategies they use and the content they produce. As new forms of celebrity ... -
Mental Health Challenges and Barriers to Telemedicine for Postpartum Women of Color During COVID-19: Examining the Role of Communication Technology
This research examines mental health in postpartum women of color (WOC) during COVID-19 including risk for development of postpartum depression (PPD). Barriers and challenges to PPD treatment via telemedicine are also ... -
In the Darkroom: International Development Photography and the Naturalistic Enthymeme
This paper compares the darkroom as a transformative space where film photographers developnegative images to international development organizations that aim to bring light to the nearly 1.2 billion people who live without ... -
Ordinary Outsiders: Transnational Content Creation and the Reclamation of Agency by “Foreign” Women in South Korea
This project explores the online content and lived experiences of “foreign” women who create social media content about their lives in South Korea. The commercialization of social media has led to increased pressure to ... -
Resilience in Free/Libre/Open Source Software: Do founder decisions impact development activity after crisis events?
Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) is perhaps the most studied of the information-based communal public goods. In this piece, I conceptualize development resilience and founder decisions as two important characteristics ... -
Identities that divide, identities that unite: News portrayals of intergroup encounters and their effects on outgroup orientations
Media messages help construct and express intergroup perceptions, define boundaries between ingroups and outgroups, and shape a sense of belonging to social groups. Drawing upon social psychology, intergroup and mass ... -
Interpreting Peace Journalism in East Africa: Individual, Organizational, and Professional Influences
Despite rising scholarly attention to peace journalism content and theory in recent decades, journalists’ perceptions of peace journalism are less well understood. This relative disparity matters to the extent that ...
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