A Portfolio of Compositions Expanding the Role of the Electric Bass Guitar in Contemporary Western Art Music

My original contribution to knowledge is a portfolio of work that, through composition, improvisation and performance, expands the role of the electric bass guitar in contemporary Western art music. More specifically, these works address three areas that were hitherto underexplored in existing repertoire: • Works for solo bass guitar and electronics. • Works for bass guitar and ensemble that incorporate the instrument as an equal and important part of an overall sound. • The use of the bass guitar in sonic arts idioms. This research, as well as challenging the role of the bass guitar, also aims to expand the sonic and technical palette of the instrument whilst demonstrating its potential to be a valued part of the modern composer’s instrumental resource. This project comprises: a compositional portfolio of solo and ensemble works; eight CDs, containing recordings of both improvised and scored works; an accompanying written commentary (original musical scores are included as an appendix in the commentary)

Serpentine Imagery in Nineteenth-Century Prints

This thesis explores images of sea serpents in nineteenth-century print culture that reflect an ongoing effort throughout the century to locate, capture, catalogue, and eventually poeticize the sea serpent. My research centers primarily on the sea serpent craze that occurred within the New England and Mid-Atlantic states between 1845 and 1880 and examines the following three prints: Albert Koch’s Hydrarchos, a fossil skeleton hoax, printed in an 1845 advertisement by Benjamin Owen, a book and job printer; an 1868 Harper’s Weekly illustration titled The Wonderful Fish; and Stephen Alonzo Schoff’s etching, The Sea Serpent from 1880, based on an 1864 painting by Elihu Vedder. By examining the illustrations and eyewitness accounts of sea serpent sightings, it is possible to show how art infused historically specific meaning into the schematized and persistent form of the sea serpent. It is not only that people saw serpents that looked like the ones they had seen in pictures, but that the pictures offered a kind of template on which viewers could inscribe particular historical fears. I catalogue the evolution of serpent imagery during a time of political upheaval, including serious threats to national unity as well as threats to the racial, gender, and social hierarchy that had underpinned the republic’s early order. The sea serpent motif could be adapted to different threats to social stability. I argue that the search to locate a physical or “actual” sea serpent body, founded in such anxieties, shaped the design and meaning of serpent images, all the more so because artists and viewers began with certain schemas, which are reflected in the illustrations that often accompanied sea serpent sightings. Taking into account the booming mass media of the era, changing practices in natural history and science, a burgeoning culture of hoax and publicity stunts, attitudes about war and violence, and concepts of human beauty and sexuality, this thesis explores how the monstrous body of the sea serpent thrived in the nineteenth-century United States. Adviser: Wendy Kat

Pronghorn procurement on the northern plains : a case for small-scale hunting

In general, when an archaeologist addresses the issue of faunal procurement on the Plains, especially the northern Plains, the model used entails the communal hunting of bison. The non-communal procurement of a secondary prey species is frequently overlooked by Plains archaeologists. It is the intent of this thesis to present a pronghorn procurement strategy that aligns itself with the current archaeological evidence, gathered from across the northern Plains. Based on the abundance of Wyoming and Great Basin communal pronghorn procurement features, along with a single northern Plains trapping structure, the procurement of pronghorn is often regarded as a communal undertaking. However, a review of the site literature reveals that archaeological pronghorn remains are present in small quantities in numerous habitation sites situated throughout their prehistoric range. In addition, evidence for pronghorn kill sites on the northern Plains is minimal at present. This leaves one to ponder the question; why are small quantities of pronghorn remains present in campsites across the northern Plains? The first part of this thesis addresses the above question through the examination of the unique behavioural and morphological characteristics of the pronghorn, as well as bow and arrow technology. This is undertaken in order to demonstrate the suitability of both the pronghorn and the aboriginal hunting technology to small-scale procurement. In addition ethnographic, historic and archaeological data concerning pronghorn procurement on the northern Plains are presented in a framework that allows for a revision of prevailing models concerning this activity. In addition, small-scale and communal procurement is analyzed within the theoretical framework of optimal foraging theory. This provides evidence that the small-scale hunting of pronghorn was an efficient hunting strategy and therefore it is reasonable to assume that it was practiced prehistorically. The remainder of this thesis addresses a secondary, yet relevant, question involving the lack of visibility of pronghorn remains in the archaeological record. If pronghorn were an obtainable and useful secondary resource then why are such small quantities of bone present at archaeological sites situated within ideal pronghorn habitat? This question is explored within the context of bone survivorship. With both cultural and non-cultural reasons for the differential preservation of pronghorn remains being outlined. Specifically, carnivore attrition, weathering and trampling are explored as possible non-cultural agents that affect the archaeological visibility of pronghorn assemblages. Cultural processes include primary/secondary butchering and processing strategies as well as carcass transportation decisions are also investigated. In addition, the pronghorn assemblages from EbPi-75 and D1Ou-72 are statistically tested to determine if bone density has any correlation to element frequency. Finally, the two recently excavated northern Plains pronghorn assemblages from EbPi-75 and D1Ou-72 are analyzed and compared to the existing body of archaeological research from the northern Plains, High Plains, and the Wyoming Basin. From this comparison and the thesis research in general, a new model for pronghorn procurement is developed that better suits the northern Plains archaeological record to date

Recognizing the Parallels Between Fashion and Art: The Designs of Elsa Schiaparelli, Yves Saint Laurent and Rei Kawakubo

My project explores the parallels and overlaps between the worlds of fashion and art through surveying the designs of Elsa Schiaparelli, Yves Saint Laurent and Rei Kawakubo

Reading Aloud Expository Text to First- and Second-Graders A Comparison of the Effects on Comprehension of During- and After-Reading Questioning

The purpose of this study was to compare the effects of questioning during a read-aloud and questioning after a read-aloud, using science-related informational tradebooks with first-and second-graders. Three thematically-related tradebooks were used, each portraying a scientist involved in authentic investigation. Students in two first/second grade classrooms were engaged in three read-aloud sessions. One group was engaged in discussion of text ideas during reading, while the other group engaged in discussion only at the conclusion of the read-alouds. After-story posttest results revealed minimal differences in scores between groups. However, students in the during-reading group demonstrated statistically significant differences in their pretest/posttest gain scores. This suggests that the cumulative effect of exposing students to multiple texts focusing on the work scientists do did affect students' building a robust representation of text ideas. Furthermore, these results suggest that pairing thematically-related texts with discussion during the read-aloud, cuing students to important ideas and encouraging text-to-text connections as they are encountered, was more beneficial than engaging students in similar discussion after reading

Sins Against Our Soles: The Morality and Hygiene of Nineteenth-Century Women\u27s Shoes

Our understanding of the Victorian woman has long centered around the idea of the “Angel in the House,” made famous by Coventry Patmore’s 1854 poem. This mythical ideal to which a middle-class woman should endeavor can be found in endless numbers of nineteenth-century texts and has become an oft-referenced concept in modern historiography. Representations of the attributes of the ideal woman circulated widely in society, pictured in etiquette books, medical journals, and especially advertisements. They were an ever-present reminder to women of the social norms governing their roles and life trajectories. As consumers, women were responsible for the presentation of themselves and their family, and the purchases they made reflected their adherence to these societal rules. In following fashion they walked a thin line between expectations and excess. While existing scholarship addresses discourse and representations of the ideal woman trope, explorations of how actual nineteenth-century women navigated these norms are lacking. Women’s writings and thoughts are often left unpublished and lost to history. However, that does not mean that they had no voice or power. This thesis addresses the issues of stereotyping and submission that often surround our understanding of women in the nineteenth century by examining the material and documentary evidence they left behind. In addition to the published prescriptive literature, research into the extensive personal documents of Sarah Bradlee Codman provides an opportunity to see how the social framework that surrounding one woman manifested in everyday life. Additionally, artifact analysis and reconstruction of a surviving pair of Codman’s boots will critically examine how an object can inform our understanding of historical discourse. This project illuminates the experience of women in the nineteenth century and foregrounds their voices in relation to fashionable objects. Advisor: Claire Nichola

Volume 31, Number 12 (December 1913)

Jenny Lind, Artist and Woman How to Count Time How They Protected Aged Musicians in the Seventeenth Century Thoroughness in Music Study (interview with Camille Saint-Saëns) Let Your Music Taste Reveal Your Character Independent Finger Action How Tunes are Made European Musical Topics Saving Indian Music from Oblivion Helps in Scale Playing Mendelssohn\u27s Happy Christmas Spirit We can Learn from Other Things Our Humble Beginnigs in Music Secret of Good Staccato Playing Avoid Unnecessary Excitement at Pupils\u27 Recitals Should the Average Pupil Study Pianoforte Playing How Chopin Played Chopin: Interesting Opinions of Modern Critics and Famous Contemporaries Home for Retired Music Teaachers: An Interesting Description of rthe New Building Now Being Erected for the Preser Home for Retired Music Teachers in Germantown, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Etude Master Study Page—The Real Bach Mendelssohn\u27s Rondo Capriccioso: An Analytical Piano Lesson Well Known Composers of To-day—Charles Whitney Coombshttps://digitalcommons.gardner-webb.edu/etude/1031/thumbnail.jp