Ariana-Bree Stamper-Gimbar
A double major in Linguistics and Native American Studies, Bree will study the social stratification of American Indian English, a single dialect of English that is shared by Native Americans of very different backgrounds across the United States and Canada. Indian English shows parallels to Ebonics, but has been poorly researched by comparison. Bree proposes to investigate the sociolinguistic variation of American Indian English among Wintun and Kumeyaay tribal members within the tribally owned casinos of Cache Creek, Sycuan and Viejas in California, in order to investigate how speech communities […]
Martín Olea
This project, which will be Martín’s senior honors thesis for Interdisciplinary Studies, will explore the process through which a small town, populated mostly by farmworkers, approved the construction of carceral facilities that are detrimental to a significant portion of its population. Prisons today are of significant importance to the communities of the California Central Valley, yet rigorous debate persists as to whether this is a positive trend. This research, which will draw from key informant interviews and archival research, will try to illustrate why it is important to comprehend the […]
Daniel Faltz
Between 1965 and 1979, action heroines appeared in over twelve different programs — five of these with both black and white heroines — a period of popularity not seen since. I am interested in the evolution of these early heroines, and their similarities and differences in character, story, and physical display of womens bodies. I suggest that these programs include complex and flawed but still important examples of female characters with strength, independence and agency. What does it mean that Batgirl and Wonder Woman pretend to be bookish women during […]
Nicholas Riggle
What is a concept? What philosophical and explanatory power should we expect from a theory of concepts? Logician, mathematician and philosopher Gottlob Frege tried to demonstrate the logicist thesis that all arithmetical theorems are purely logical consequences of the basic laws of logic and the logically defined axioms of arithmetic. During the evolution of his project, Frege developed his technical notion of a concepta notion seemingly very far removed from contemporary theories of concepts. Nicholas proposes to work out an account of the development of Freges theory paying close attention […]
Javier Aros
America 2020, a creative vision of the political and social realities of the United States in the year 2020, will be an artistic presentation of Javier Aros. Utilizing room sculpture, six large silkscreen poster prints and assorted smaller prints, two wall paintings, ceramic busts, original flags and interactive historical documents and presentations, Javier will carefully design and create a future museum dedicated to the revolutionary and evolutionary events of the teen years of the 21st century. By thoroughly investigating and evaluating revolutionary methodology and methods — from independence from non-renewable […]
Jacqueline Vela
Jacqueline Vela’s research project will focus on the writings of contemporary poets of the 2010s that have emerged and performed their pieces via the Internet. Closely following this new genre of e-literature, Vela will observe both the bodies of work and digital platforms of poets such as Yesika Salgado, Danez Smith, Olivia Gatwood, and Ocean Vuong among others so to explore how the rapid explosion of technology and the phenomenons of online culture have influenced the form, style, and themes of these so-called insta-poets. With special attention to diverse narratives […]
Rieson Blumer
In 1542, a short religious text from about the year 1400 was made into a single surviving edition by a relatively unknown publisher, Richard Lant. Though his particular attempt at revitalization was modest, the religious turmoil of his period caused others like him to reproduce an array of religious texts from the Middle Ages, revising their language into new editions for Early Modern English. What do these changes in language mean for a new religious context and system of interpretation? Working to catch hold of some of the threads of […]
Arina Stadnyk
Arina’s project will examine how Margaret Atwoods short fiction collection, Dancing Girls, uses the elements of landscape and the shadow self as sites of ideological conflict between traditional Gothic tropes and ecofeminist ideology. While scholarly literature has addressed, separately, ecofeminism and the Gothic convention in Atwood’s fiction, there has yet to be discourse on the dialogic that is formed through their interaction. Due to the stories lack of closure, the thematic effect of this dialogic is still unclear, as the tension between these vying ideologies remains unresolved in each story. […]
Clint Terrell
There has been a great deal of research on autobiographical literature that feature Native American captivity narratives, and African American slave narratives, but there is a lack of scholarly work that discusses contemporary prison narratives. Clint will analyze autobiographies, specifically prison, slave, and captivity narratives for their themes of literacy as a faculty of redemption and endurance. These autobiographical texts not only narrate the process of recovery, but serves as part of the restoration process. In addition to research, Clint will produce a creative product consisting of his own autobiographical […]
Calvin Nguyen
The San Francisco cityscape is changing rapidly, with large influxes of residents, buildings, and communities. This change must be understood with more than soaring rents or other quantified data; it’s evident between Salesforce Transit Center and Embarcadero, banners advertising the East Cut and Yerba Buena, the trash that’s picked up and the trash left behind. Increasingly, San Franciscos neighborhoods have become spectacularly stratified stages of narrative-making, much like Disney’s lands distinct experiential worlds creating a storied landscape for themselves and the city. Through interviews, theoretical research, and fieldwork at these […]