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  Cultural Rhetorics within the Field of Composition

  Adrianna Aviles

  Adrianna Aviles, Writing & Business Administration
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Michele Ninacs, English
  
  The American educational system has held that particular vernaculars are valueless and indicate lack of intellect. Strict adherence to Standard American English practices purposefully disenfranchises minority individuals and communities: the languages minorities use have historically been deemed inferior because SAE is deeply intertwined with racial dominance. How can we expect minorities to feel equal, to find value in their voice, and know or find their worth when the very language they grow up learning and speaking, English, isn’t recognized as legitimate? The field of Composition and Rhetoric has the power to drastically change how language is perceived and taught. This study examined the role of cultural rhetorics and its association with writing pedagogy by analyzing the responses of scholars in the field to a series of questions that asked them to consider the position of cultural rhetorics in relation to composition studies and pedagogies.

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  Confronting the Sins of Our Fathers: Black Women's Speculative Fiction

  Nicholas Boyer

  Nicholas Boyer, Philosophy & English
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Lorna Perez, English
  
  This project explores Afrofuturism and Speculative Black Fiction, genres that use the conventions of sci-fi and speculative fiction to speak to the social conditions of Afro-diasporic peoples. While there is wide variety in the genre, conventions like time travel, magic, and the supernatural all function within this fiction to create a commentary on the continued oppression of Afro-diasporic peoples. My project specifically examines two novels—Octavia Butler’s Kindred and Nalo Hopkinson’s Brown Girl in the Ring—each of which use the conventions of the genre in very different ways. While Butler’s text uses the convention of time travel to point to the ways that we are never free of the past, and its traumas are written on our bodies even centuries later, Hopkinson uses the conventions of a future dystopia to point to the ways that drawing on a vibrant and resistant African past can allow the narrator to overcome evil and violence and imagine a different future. In the midst of this, the characters use the powers of spirituality, rooted in African diasporic experiences, to resist and survive in an urban wasteland. In both, young black female protagonists are forced to confront, literally and figuratively, the violence of their forefathers, and conquer them in order to ensure their own survival. My research examines these battles with the past, and with the patriarchal figures in the novel, using thinkers like Franz Fanon, Toni Morrison, Ytasha L. Womack, Reynaldo Anderson and Charles E. Jones, and André M. Carrington, among others.

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  Improving America’s Prison System: Using Rwanda as a Template

  Victoria Dee Carattini, Jazmine Holloman, and Joshua Knickerbocker

  Victoria Dee Carattini, Jazmine Holloman and Joshua Knickerbocker, CWP 102: Argumentation and Research
  Faculty Mentors: Professor Susan Mary Paige, Academic Success Program and Professor Jane E. Sullivan, College Writing Program

  
  The United States penal system has one of the highest recidivism rates in the world. Despite having the largest economy in the world, the US is struggling with the cost of thousands of convicts returning to prison while other countries do not. The reality is that other countries do not have the same approach to the incarceration of convicts. This circumstance suggests recidivism is not tied to the amount of money spent on a prisoner, but instead on prisoner treatment/rehabilitation. Rwanda is a country with a lower recidivism rate. Rwanda is still recovering from the 1994 genocide, which took millions of lives. Rwanda’s approach towards prisoner treatment is completely different from the United States and focuses on perpetrators and victims coming together for reconciliation. Rwanda’s treatment of prisoners is more humane because it treats the source of the crime, rather than the expensive “time out” the United States government sentences prisoners to who have committed lesser crimes than genocide. Does Rwanda's approach to incarceration affect rates of recidivism? Could the United States replicate this approach? With prior IRB approval, we interviewed faculty and students from an urban, public, four-year college who have first-hand experience with Rwanda’s prison system. We use these data, along with the information gathered in a comprehensive literature review, to compare the prison system and offer recommendations for reform.

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  The Virtue of Stoic Torturers: Ancient Stoicism & Modern Military Torture

  Thomas Carr

  Thomas Carr, PHI 401: Problems in Philosophy Seminar-Happiness
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Kimberly Blessing, Philosophy

  
  Stoicism, a philosophical movement of the Hellenistic period, encourages emotional detachment and self-control. Stoicism has been embraced by the modern military, which encourages mental toughness and fortitude in the face of danger. In particular, when it comes to torture, the emotional control that Stoicism teaches can be especially relevant for the torturer who is looking to extract information from a prisoner of war. If we consider the long list of war crimes and moral transgressions coming out of the United States’ conflict in the Middle East, the adoption of Stoic principles by torturers could suggest a more humane approach towards torture. On the other hand, critics of this view argue that emotional detachment has the potential to breed inhumane torturers who are incapable of noticing moral breeches in their conduct. Thus, adopting Stoic practices could encourage immoral actions and practices. I will argue against this view, showing that it arises from a misunderstanding of Stoic philosophy. Stoicism does not encourage the complete abandonment of emotion. Instead Stoicism teaches one to repress harmful emotions, and instead, seek to cultivate positive ones. Looking at relevant ancient texts, I shall demonstrate that a well-trained Stoic soldier is not incapable of feeling compassion or respect towards an enemy or prisoner. Thus, adherence to Stoicism can actually help prevent atrocities and war crimes that were all too common in the United States’ military conflicts of the early 2000s.

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  The Ethics of Relationships

  Elizabeth Evans

  Elizabeth Evans, Undeclared
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Jason Grinnell, Philosophy

  
  Adoption or abortion: Which choice is correct? Depending on one's political stance, this question could have an easy answer, but with politics aside and morals at the front of the discussion, the issue of harm comes forward. With childhood mapping the way for future success and happiness, such a decision must be made with careful consideration. Some claim that abortion is morally wrong because it is the murdering of a person, yet "personhood" is itself more complicated than it appears. Furthermore, adoptive children's relationships with their new parents may be suspect, as may be the criteria for parenthood. Many perfectly adequate and loving people are denied the opportunity to adopt for reasons of class, gender, or sexual orientation. Allowing a child to be born and then immediately separated from their biological parents may produce an avoidable harm by leading to an identity crisis for that child. If children are entitled to loving parents, how can that be accomplished? Forcing an unfit woman into motherhood and forcing an innocent child unto unfit parents are not ideal options. Is there an ideal option? An analysis of the work of several ethicists will produce more thorough and defensible responses regarding the value trade-offs involved in adoption and abortion, and in relationships and parenting more generally.

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  The Future of Designing Babies

  Kimberlin Gomez

  Kimberlin Gomez, CWP 102: Argumentation and Research
  Faculty Mentors: Professor Jane E. Sullivan, College Writing Program and Professor Susan Mary Paige, Academic Success Program

  
  Genetic modification or “gene editing” is the manipulation of genomes with the use of molecular engineering techniques. The two types of genetic modifications are somatic and germline, which are very different from one another. With this process, the unborn child's parents and doctors can decide traits such as eye color, hair color, skin color, etc. This process is likely to become very popular because parents are being given the chance to create the perfect baby, the baby of their dreams. This process is also risky, as there are not too many cases of this process and its long-term effects, if any. There is the possibility that it could have detrimental effects on the embryo, including, but not limited to, deformities such as extra fingers, blindness, and vitiligo. This is assuming that the mother is even able to carry the fetus to term. The issues also debate the ethics of the doctor versus abuse of medical technology. It sparks the debate: is one reason for genetic modification of a human being more ethical than another? It may seem more ethical to modify the genetic information of an embryo to try to save the life of another child, but does it seem ethical to modify the genetic information just for the fun of it? With prior IRB approval, we collected data by replicating a study done by Dr. Bob Edwards, et al., substituting their participants with a sample group of convenience made up of first=year college students from an urban four-year public college. We find that our sample participants considered the idea of designing babies to be ethically unjust.

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  Does Race Play a Role in Sentencing?

  Ashlea Green

  Ashlea Green, HON 400: All College Honors Colloquium
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Andrea Guiati, Modern and Classical Language

  
  For this research project, I am exploring systemic racism and the impact of racism within the criminal justice system; more specifically, I am researching the role that race plays on sentencing. It is common for the term “systemic racism” to be interpreted as an accusation that everyone in the system is racist, but I intend to explain and prove that it should be interpreted as our nation having systems and institutions that produce racially disparate outcomes. This should be a topic on which all citizens are informed, because our criminal justice system was built and established during the “Jim Crow” era, which specifically enforced racial segregation. The racism faced during that period is still clearly reflected into today’s society through the racially disparate sentencing lengths on convicted minorities. This is a problem that can lead to an explanation as to why there is such overcrowding of minorities in our prisons and why social movements like Black Lives Matter are so prevalent. African Americans are more likely than white Americans to be arrested; once arrested, they are more likely to be convicted; and once convicted, they are more likely to experience lengthy prison sentences. Truly meaningful reforms to the criminal justice system cannot be accomplished without acknowledgement of racial and ethnic disparities in the system, especially when it has an impact on the sentencing of minority individuals.

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  Mindfulness and Consumer Culture

  Teddi Hastreiter

  Teddi Hastreiter, COM 450: Communication and Society
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Michael Niman, Communication

  
  This paper examines the positive effects mindfulness has on balancing the negative and stressful effects of consumer culture. My work argues that it provides an alternative to the wants and desires associated with obsessions with products and acts of consumption, giving consumers the power to think for themselves and the agency that freedom creates. Predominantly privatistic, consumerism places the individual before the community. This paper analyzes the role consumerism plays in our society, and how mindfulness can make us aware of our purchasing behaviors and their consequences. Mindfulness not only promotes awareness towards one's actions, but shows us the realities of consumerism--good and bad. It enables us to open our eyes and become aware of the manipulative nature of branding and advertisements. In other words, mindful consumption gives us a choice: to buy or not to buy. No longer led simply by impulse, consumers are free to think about the products they consume, where these products come from, and why we are purchasing them. My methodology includes conducting a literature search regarding both mindfulness and consumerism, and using material examined in COM450 and other critical thinking classes to synthesize my analysis.

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  Furthering a Distinctive Definition for Afrocentricity and Pan-Afro Thought

  Kenneth Kelly

  Kenneth Kelly, English
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Macy Todd, English
  
  When furthering a definition of Afrocentricity and Pan-Afro thought, it is important to note that both have years-long histories of transitional definitions. The importance of furthering the definition is to add vital supplemental material and information that both honors those histories while making the terms usable and relevant in current times. Over the last decade, interest in issues related to Afrocentricity and Pan-Afro thought has increased significantly within social media, digital news outlets, and broader popular entertainment. This increase in interest provides for an opportunity to challenge the institutions that have been set in place within society for years, whilst allowing for further agency to demographics of people and cultures that are underrepresented. Research in literature, history, and folklore allows for a consideration of how an Afrocentrist approach to community engagement can be articulated for a digital generation. My presentation will suggest means of utilizing Afrocentric thought—dating back to pre-industrial communities—in order to create a more fulfilling social sphere for underrepresented peoples today.

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  The Media's Role in Public Panic

  McKenzie Locker

  McKenzie Locker, HON 400: All College Honors Colloquium
  Faculty Mentors: Professor Therese Fuerst, Communication and Professor Michael Johnson, Modern and Classical Languages

  
  The media has become an essential part of everyday life. The role of media has expanded greatly over the years, and the ways that one can stay up-to-date have increased. Whether it be print, television, social media, or radio, the media is where most people get their information. The media is there to inform; however, is it helping or hurting public panic in the process? The way that the media presents information to the public, especially in times of turmoil, influences the public’s reaction to a situation. The media has the ability to either calm people’s worries or instill fear. Through the methodology of literature review, this study attempts to define the media’s role and impact on public panic, looking specifically at larger-scale issues that have faced the United States. This study reviews 9/11, the Ebola outbreak, the Boston Marathon bombing, and the Coronavirus. Our study findings are presented in poster form.

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  Rawls & Racial Injustice

  Marisa Marinelli

  Marisa Marinelli, English and Philosophy
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Jason Grinnell, Philosophy
  
  The disparity of sentencing between black and white Americans in jail is the result of an unjust institution with racially unjust policies and the racially biased application of these policies. Thus, the American criminal justice system needs fundamental changes. The type of institution we currently have in the United States cannot be reasonably justified on utilitarian grounds, as it is the type of system which disproportionately affects certain members for reasons that are not under their control. There is no way to justify a system full of injustice in terms of overall utility for all persons. Not only, though, do fundamental aspects of the US criminal justice system need to change, but the application of these rules must also be monitored more closely to ensure that they are not applied in an unjust manner. John Rawls’ view is applicable here, because it allows us to hold persons accountable for their actions on retributive grounds, but also allows us to look at the bigger picture and determine the goals of our institutions.

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  My Culture is Not for Your Fun

  Brandon Rivera, Imani Ashmore, Julia Skierszynask, and Kayla Lammerts

  Brandon Rivera, Imani Ashmore, Julia Skierszynask and Kayla Lammerts, CWP 102: Argumentation and Research
  Faculty Mentors: Professor Jane E. Sullivan, English and Professor Susan Mary Paige, Student Academic Success

  
  Cultural appropriation is the act of taking things from a culture and either claiming them as your own, or not giving credit to the culture you took from. Cultural appropriation is not new in media; it has been going on for decades. The only difference today is that we have social media highlighting acts of cultural appropriation that used to be ignored or go unnoticed. The question of how one can know whether they are truly appropriating or appreciating is discussed regularly. With prior IRB approval, we surveyed students at a public four-year urban college, as a sample of convenience. We asked study participants to respond to intentional and unintentional situations of cultural appropriation in the media, asking them if they deemed the scenarios presented as acceptable or unacceptable. We believe our study supports the idea that cultural appropriation in media and advertising isn’t as unintentional as people like to pretend it is, and that study participants can identify when cultural appropriation is occurring.

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  The Resurgence of Romantic Comedies

  Devyani Sawant

  Devyani Sawant, Public Relations & Advertising
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Macy Todd, English

  
  The genre of the romantic comedy flourished from the 1980s to the early 2000s. Romantic comedies–or rom-coms, as they are informally known–opened a new market for Hollywood and thrust actors like Kate Hudson, Meg Ryan, John Cusack, and Patrick Swayze into stardom. However, film studios accustomed to releasing multiple films in this genre every year turned their focus away from rom-coms in the decade following the millennium. Recently, the release of the 2018 film Set It Up has reignited interest in romantic comedies, leading to a new sub-genre I have named “resurgence” rom-coms. This paper compares the cinematic techniques, themes, and character development from the Golden Age of the romantic comedy to resurgence rom-coms, in an effort to observe how the new genre evolved. The films from the resurgence studied include Crazy Rich Asians, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, and Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again. The paper will compare these films to popular romantic comedies of the past, such as She’s All That, Mamma Mia!, Love Actually, and My Big Fat Greek Wedding. These films are considered iconic within the Golden Age of the rom-com, and my comparison reveals how and why the genre has developed its resurgence.

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  The Lyceum Project

  Taylor Seymour

  Taylor Seymour, Philosophy
  Faculty Mentor: Professor John Torrey, Philosophy
  
  The purpose of this project was to determine the potential benefits of pre-college philosophy and examine a method of teaching called the “learner-centered” approach. Over the course of my research project, a group of students were taught the basics of various elements of philosophy through a week-long philosophy summer camp designed to expose them to different tools, problems, and concepts in philosophy. For example, Day Two of the week-long philosophy summer camp was dedicated to ethics and friendship. The purpose of exposing the students to different views on ethics is to help them form their own beliefs and have a better understanding of others. These sessions use different techniques, such as reading aloud and visual representations, as described by the learner-centered approach. The students were given an activity to demonstrate their understanding of what they learned previously. At the beginning of the week, the students took a preliminary survey about their future goals and their justification for these goals. At the end of the week, the same survey was given to see whether their choices changed and if their justification for these choices changed as well. By the end of the week, students seemed more confident in their decision making and the answers they gave during discussion using the tools given to them earlier in the week. My project presents the effects the program seemed to have on the students, as well as the benefits and issues with the learner-centered approach.

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  People Hurt People: The Terror and Torture Within Human Trafficking

  Jay Tracey, Michaela Reimers, and Jason Rivera

  Jay Tracey, Michaela Reimers and Jason Rivera, CWP 102: Argumentation and Research
  Faculty Mentors: Professor Jane E. Sullivan, College Writing Program and Professor Susan Mary Paige, Student Academic Programs

  
  Human trafficking is an issue that is ubiquitous in human history. The matter of forced prostitution, sexual slavery, and exploitation have been exposed in the news, both in public and on the dark web, for years. Human trafficking, at its root, is a form of enslavement used to capture young women, children, and occasionally men. The traffickers do it simply to make money. They use the individuals they have enslaved in a variety of nefarious activities including, but not limited to, forced sexual activity, forced organ donation, and forced cheap or free labor. Though this is not a new problem in society, it remains a major issue. The realities reported by victims of human trafficking are both alarming and shocking. One problem in the war against human trafficking is the lack of awareness people have of the issue despite it occurring in their own backyards. Our research project investigates the level of awareness people in our community have. With prior IRB approval, we conducted surveys within a four-year urban public college asking a sample of convenience group, specifically those who are of legal voting age, how aware they are of the proximity and severity of the issue that is human trafficking. From our collected data, we can provide evidence that better education on the issue is needed as a first step to battling this atrocity.

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  Influences of Teen Pregnancy Portrayed in the Media on Teen Pregnancy Rates

  Elizabeth Truesdale and Jasmine McKinney

  Elizabeth Truesdale and Jasmine McKinney, CWP 102: Argumentation and Research
  Faculty Mentors: Professor Jane E. Sullivan, College Writing Program and Professor Susan Mary Paige, Academic Success Program

  
  The influence of social media on teens has reached great levels, and there is now evidence that it may be having a significant effect on the increase in teen pregnancy rates. In recent years, prior to the widespread use of social media by teens, teen pregnancy rates had been dropping from their all-time highest rates. With an influx of teens using social media, pregnancy rates have started to increase once again. Is social media really to blame? We complete a comprehensive literature review and collect data on teen pregnancy through interviews. We interview expecting (baby) and non-expecting sexually active teens between the ages of 14 and 18 years, and question them about their level of knowledge on teen pregnancy. We also ask them to track their media exposure, specifically looking at the influence of the media about pregnancy on teens. With these interviews, we expect to find a correlation between media exposure and increased teen pregnancy rates.

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  Critically Analyzing Betsy DeVos as a Propagandist Undermining Public Education

  Amanda Vazquez

  Amanda Vazquez, SPC 309: Persuasion and Propaganda
  Faculty Mentor: Professor Michael Niman, Communication

  
  My work argues that the United States Department of Education secretary Betsy DeVos currently employs a propaganda campaign, creating disinformation to undermine her agency's goals. The U.S. Department of Education’s goals are to ensure equal access to education and promote student achievement and competitiveness on a global scale. DOE is a federal government agency that provides educational support and aid to schools around the country. Their objectives, however, do not coincide with DeVos’s personal educational agenda. While the DOE promotes equality and affordable education to all students, DeVos promotes private school funding at the cost of public schools. In addition, DeVos claims to support at-risk children, yet these families cannot afford private school tuition. The research methods I utilize examine a combination of data analysis and case studies. I identify propaganda techniques and categories of propaganda being used. My work involves an analysis of DeVos’s statements and actions to demonstrate how she is a propagandist. DeVos imposes disinformation, and her actions often conflict with her public statements. As a society, we must open our eyes to the propaganda that is being displayed on mass media platforms. We must understand the true intentions of Betsy DeVos because her decisions are affecting children’s education nationwide.

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  We Were Always Here: How Poetry Aligns with the Timeline of LGBTQ+ Visibility

  Olivea Wiggins

  Olivea Wiggins, HON 400: All College Honors Colloquium
  Faculty Mentors: Professor Jennifer D. Ryan-Bryant, English and Professor Michael Johnson, Modern and Classical Languages

  
  Throughout literary history, there have been lovers of all forms, yet it’s only the heteronormative stories that are encouraged to be told worldwide. When did the existence of the LGBTQ+ community really become accepted by the literary world? Adrienne Rich’s essay “Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence” and John D’Emilio’s essay “Capitalism and Gay Identity” present two sturdy claims as to when LGBTQ+ existence was accepted. After taking even the slightest glance at poetry both past and modern, however, it is evident that this history extends even earlier than the LGBTQ+ theory trailblazers had envisioned. A thorough look through Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine, Gertrude Stein, and Allen Ginsberg will prove that the literary scene has always represented “not-heterosexual” love. In addition, Blythe Baird, a contemporary poet published and well-known through Button Poetry, weighs in on how these poets and many others inspired her art to grow to its present status.

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  The Hidden Truth of Objectification in the Media

  Alexis Williams, Avienne Golden, and Katarina Flaig

  Alexis Williams, Avienne Golden and Katarina Flaig, CWP 102: Argumentation and Research
  Faculty Mentors: Professor Jane E. Sullivan, English and Professor Susan Mary Paige, Academic Success Program

  
  In the 21st century, it is humiliating to see how mainstream media in the United States of America has continued to corrupt the image of women. One may think that we, as a first-world progressive society, would have placed stronger value and respect on individuals by now; however, that is not the case. Public networks are meant to be about expression and communication, but they have slowly turned into a conduit of continued stereotypes of how women are meant to “behave” and “look.” We are still living in the past; the only thing that has changed is the saturated use of media in an effort to make money. Sexism is discreetly installed everywhere around us. In this research project, we focus solely on the music industry and how sexism is used with the intent of earning profit. Society has been programmed by the music industry to be accustomed to the objectification of women. Younger generations are especially prone to the continued message that this type of objectification is acceptable. Throughout this presentation, we demonstrate how adolescents are affected by what they see in music videos, and why women may be continuing to allow objectification to occur. To do this, we conducted a replication of the research study done by Denise Herd in “Conflicting Paradigms on Gender and Sexuality in Rap Music: A Systematic Review.” We used college students from a four-year urban college, taking the focus away from only rap music, and looked instead at multiple genres of the music industry. We find that these students may have been impacted by what they see and hear in the music industry, and that our results are correlated to the research we found throughout our literature review.