Narrative and Belonging: The Politics of Ambiguity, The Jewish State, and the Thought of Edward Said and Hannah Arendt

At the core of this thesis, I examine the difficulties of giving an account of oneself in modern associational life. By integrating the theory and political activism of both Edward Said and Hannah Arendt, I follow the Zionist response to European antisemitism and the Palestinian responses to Jewish settler colonialism. Both parties struggle against their ambiguous presence within local and regional hegemonic social taxonomy, and within the world order. Contemporarily, this struggle takes place in the protracted conflict between Israeli and local Arab groups, which has been managed through violence and objectification, as opposed to allowing the dynamism and reconfiguration of political subjectivities. In their later writings, Arendt and Said respond to the violence and resentment that arises from the form of the nation-state by prescribing, and arguably practicing, an understanding of politics where the “other” is constitutive of the “self.” By seeing this relation of alternity as the contemporary heir to diasporic Judaism and Jewish cosmopolitanism, I argue that this project holds the historical traction to reinvigorate the future beyond static and growing violence and dispossession

Falling Like Autumn Leaves: Cutler\u27s Brigade at Gettysburg

The 147th New York\u27s monument stands along Reynolds Avenue, silently (and incorrectly) marking where the regiment bravely fought and fell on that July day in 1863. The monument lists the brigade, division, and corps of the regiment, along with the various other battles that are part of the regiment\u27s story. It also lists the regimental losses as well - out of 380 men that started the fight on July 1, 212 men were killed and wounded. Placed by the veterans themselves, they knew what that monument represented. It represented the entire ordeal of their regiment and its brigade on the first day of Gettysburg. [excerpt

Deafness: Disability or Culture? Best Practices Regarding Controversial Interventions for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students

Background: Many people in the deaf community view deafness as a distinct culture, with its own unique language and history. They reject the use of assistive technologies which can restore hearing for themselves and their children. However, some members of the medical and legal communities consider it unethical to deprive a child of these interventions. Learn more about this emerging conflict, as well as best practices for working with deaf and hard of hearing students in a school environment. Methods: Peer-reviewed journals and popular publications were consulted to gather information about attitudes towards interventions such as the cochlear implant from members of the deaf community, as well the legal and medical communities. Education journals were consulted to gather information about best practices when working with deaf and hard of hearing students. Results: There are strong opinions on both sides of this issue, with various arguments being made both for and against the use of interventions like the cochlear implant. From the perspective of K-12 educators and school counselors, making sure that students feel safe and supported at school. Conclusions: It is not necessary for K-12 educators and school counselors to have opinions on specific assistive technologies. It is important for them to be aware of best practices for working with deaf and hard of hearing students, and to support and respect the decisions of deaf families with regards to their culture.https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/gradposters/1117/thumbnail.jp

Biomimetic and Biophysical Approach to Profile Metastatic Cancer Cell Migration

Honors Research ScholarshipCancer metastasis is a complex process by which cells in a primary tumor acquire an aggressive phenotype, and travel to distant, secondary sites in the body. One aspect of cancer metastasis is cell migration toward the vascular system, called invasion. Multiple modalities of single cell invasion exist, including amoeboid migration and mesenchymal migration. Amoeboid migration is less well understood, and in particular, the forces involved in amoeboid migration have yet to be fully elucidated at a subcellular scale. Cellular traction force microscopy, or CTFM, is one method used to probe migration forces. However, this approach is largely limited to two dimensions, and is limited by the size of the pillars on the substrate. To address these limitations, we developed a system using microfluidics and DNA origami capable of real-time force measurement of cell migration on a subcellular scale with a 10 pN resolution. Microfluidic devices were made using soft lithography and replica molding in our laboratory. DNA origami were made using protocols developed by Michael Hudoba and Dr. Carlos Castro in the Nanoengineering and Biodesign Laboratory. The devices were imaged using TIRF microscopy to study dwell times of the sensors in the open and closed states, and the devices were analyzed with an AFM to determine that they are best suited for measuring shear forces. Further, the presence of streptavidin protein was found to have a significant effect on DOFS binding with a p-value less than 0.05. DOFS concentrations around 1 nM were found to provide the most coverage while minimizing structure aggregation. Thus, our microfluidic devices are able to be functionalized with DNA origami force sensors with a high degree of attachment. This platform is thus capable of measuring cell migration and adhesion forces, and future work should harness this system to create 3D maps of cell migration to gain insight into invasion.Institute for Materials ResearchSecond-Year Transformational Experience Program (STEP)A one-year embargo was granted for this item.Academic Major: Biomedical Engineerin

Auditory Distractors in the Visual Modality: No Evidence for Perceptual Load Hypothesis or Auditory Dominance

Attention is a valuable resource with limited capacity, so knowing what will distract us during important tasks can be crucial in life. There is a lot of support for the Perceptual Load Hypothesis (PLH) when examining visual distractibility; however, less research has examined if PLH can predict auditory distractibility. Participants in the current study completed three experiments using visual selective attention tasks while being presented with auditory and visual distractions under low/high perceptual loads. In Experiment 1, I took the visual selective attention task from Robinson et al. (2018) and shortened the stimulus presentation while adding a no distractor baseline condition. In Experiment 2, I increased auditory distractor effects by requiring participants to periodically respond to the auditory information. In Experiment 3, I added a working memory task to increase cognitive load. Results showed no support for PLH with auditory distractors in Experiments 1 or 2, and instead showed the opposite pattern, with auditory distractors having a larger effect under high perceptual load (Experiment 2). Results from Experiment 3 show that increasing cognitive load had no effect on distractibility, which suggests the results from Experiment 2 were caused by periodically responding to the auditory stimuli. These findings have important implications for our understanding of selective attention and shed light on tasks that require the processing of multisensory information.No embargoAcademic Major: Psycholog