Getting out of the kitchen and into the bedroom: The objectification of women in advertising through the use of design elements Exploring the perception of sexual imagery and objectification in advertising amongst graphic design undergraduates

Sex sells is a common phrase popular in the world of advertising and marketing. More specifically, it is the sexual material plastering the pages of magazines in various forms of advertisements such as cologne or alcohol, selling not only the product itself, but also the women who inhabit it. This thesis gives a brief introduction to the sexual history behind the gaze --the lustful stare man places on a woman, its impact on advertising, and how America\u27s universities are not properly informing their undergraduates of the overtly sexual content. In many regards, painting during the Renaissance paved the way for the explicit use of the female figure and the gaze, which has become an element of how we view her. Painters represented women as objects of desire to the viewer--presumably a man--and this concept is often used in advertisements and designs today. This could lead to a false interpretation of whom a woman should be and how she should act in our society, or it could also lead to body issues within our youth, especially in young girls. Many commercials and print ads today have a misogynist theme, making the woman\u27s role lesser than her male counterpart. Some men have a fear of losing power and status, and support the idea of keeping a woman in her traditional role, thus contributing to the perception that the most important aspect of a woman has become her sexuality (Jhally, 2007). What do these images demonstrate to America\u27s youth? With each overly sexual picture plastered on billboards 45 feet in the air or hidden within magazines, the idealized image of women--according to Jean Kilbourne (1999), an author and speaker on the image of women in advertising--is becoming the norm, influencing how we, especially men, judge real women. This thesis will investigate if undergraduate students in graphic design truly understand why they use stimulating content, or if they are mimicking what they see through promotional ad elements such as imagery, typography and color

Life Knots

This collection of creative nonfiction essays is framed by M.M. Bakhtin’s concept of the chronotope, the concrete juncture of time and space. Chronotopes include technical relationships between those elements, as well as worldviews. Each essay examines a different thing or place as a chronotope, including maps, a well house, boxes, a dining room, periodical cicadas, and a sand dollar. All of the essays, however, share themes, including the search for unity (and for what actually constitutes unity), relationships between ways of knowing, and relationships between the personal, spiritual, environmental, and cultural. The essays span genres, from the personal and academically personal, to memoir and place memoir, to meditation

Becoming: transformation and the body

My intention is to focus on human flesh concentrating both on its imperfections as well as its beauty. Beauty is seen in the marks of age and imperfection as time forms the deepest wrinkle to the darkest mark. Cycles come in and out growing dark to light as cleansing takes place. Veils of material cover and hide inner feelings and thoughts as a shape unfolds itself in my hands. The forms soften and grow from one small stitch to a more complete shape. Successive layers of marks, represent hidden truths and human growth through the passage of time. Memories are fragile and impure and can easily become abstracted. I use layering of material to abstract and distort human forms. Through this exploration I hope to gain a better understanding of the nature and scope of human fragility and the mystery of existence

SERVING AND PROTECTING PEOPLE WITH MENTAL ILLNESS AND/OR DEVELOPMENTAL DISABILITIES: AN EVALUATION OF THE LOS ANGELES SHERIFF DEPARTMENT’S FIELD OPERATIONS CRISIS INTERVENTION SKILLS PROGRAM

ABSTRACT The Los Angeles Sheriff Department’s Field Operations Crisis Intervention Skills (FOCIS) program is a collaborative effort aimed at preparing law enforcement officers for crises that involve individuals with severe mental illness and/or developmental disabilities. That is, the ultimate goal of the program is to train officers to serve, protect, and build connections with the community’s most vulnerable citizens. Embracing a pre-experimental design, this study assessed the effectiveness and applicability of the FOCIS program among 53 law enforcement officers in Los Angeles County. Findings from non-parametric analyses revealed that the FOCIS training increased officers’ knowledge on mental illness and developmental disabilities but did not create or increase empathy toward people experiencing these conditions. In parallel, descriptive statistics demonstrated that the vast majority of study participants (over 80 percent) considered the FOCIS program highly effective and applicable to their field. Taken as a whole, these findings indicated that FOCIS improve LEOs’ preparedness to handle situations involving people who experience mental illness and developmental disabilities. However, there was no evidence that the training improves empathy among the participating officers. The implications of these findings for law enforcement stakeholders are discussed

Vietnamese High School Graduates: What Are Their Needs and Expectations?

The California State University and University of California campuses have recently experienced an increasing number of nonnative speakers who enter their schools underprepared in English. This problem appears also to be common at community colleges. This study examines the personal backgrounds (e.g., age at time of arrival in the United States, number of years in American high schools, number of ESL classes taken in high school) of 54 Vietnamese graduates of American high schools and their perception of how prepared they are in English. The study also looks at what these students expect from ESL teachers and what classroom activities they find beneficial in ESL courses. While offering explanations for this particular group’s underpreparedness in English, the authors conclude that (a) these students value well-organized, prepared teachers and (b) they would greatly benefit from additional focused study in grammar and writing skills

Leveraging Libraries to Support Academic Technology

Through leveraging the relationship between libraries and technology, colleges and universities can make the best use of the skills that librarians bring to the table. At DePaul University, three positions have been created, which report to two campus units: The University Libraries and Instructional Technology Development. The consolidation of both library and instructional technology perspectives to create this first group of blended positions at DePaul has been successful, due in large part to the fact that the primary responsibilities of these positions are in areas of mutual interest: instruction, collection development, and technology support for faculty and students, whether on a consulting basis or at the reference desk. As libraries and librarians become ever more closely and actively aligned with the teaching mission of the university, universities and colleges can transform librarians’ roles within the academy by leveraging their skills to enhance teaching and learning in today’s online environment

Ultrasound-Guided Intravenous Access as a First-Line Approach by Nurses: A Quality Improvement Project

Background: Up to 9% of patients admitted to EDs (Emergency Departments) have difficult intravenous insertion access issues (DIVA). This creates delays in patient care that includes interruptions for physicians providing medical emergency care. Often the utilization of RNs to perform US (ultrasound) IV insertions is limited related to lack of training and supportive policies. Local Problem: The site for this project was an ED Level 1 Trauma Center associated with a large teaching hospital located in the southeastern U.S. Prior to the implementation of the process improvement project, there was no formal education of RNs in the use of US for difficult insertion IVs, resulting in patient care delays and physician interruptions for IV starts. The purpose of this project was to reduce patient care delays related to patients with difficult IV insertions with the aim to train RNs to perform ultrasound-guided IV insertions. Methods: The Model for Improvement was utilized as a guide for this project. Using the PDSA (plan, do, study, act), which included a review of the literature for best practice, the RN education and ultrasound protocol was developed. Pre- and post-implementation DIVA patients\u27 baseline door-to-IV start and door-to-blood collection times were measured. Interventions: US educational sessions were developed and taught to 15 RNs in the ED. Results: ED increased the number of US proficient RNs to 24. Physician IV starts decreased by 12%. There were no significant differences between pre and post-intervention time to IV (p=0.552) or time to blood draw (p=0.081). Conclusions: The project increased RN availability for US-guided access and reduced physician interruptions. Post-intervention door-to-IV and door-to-blood draw times were not significantly different, possibly relating to ED volume during the time of the project. The project site will continue the RN US education program

How regimes dictate oligarchs & their football clubs: case studies comparison of oligarch foorball club ownership in Dagestan, Romania, & Transnistria from 1990-2014

This thesis examines how oligarch football club investments in Central and Eastern Europe face restrictions based on regime type. Oligarchs gained political and economic control of this region following the collapse of communist regimes in the early 1990s. This region also saw great change when athletic institutions fell and football became an avenue for oligarchs to ensure political capital. Although many similarities exist, I argue that oligarchs use different strategies toward clubs to ensure beneficial forms of political capital based on their respective regimes. As a result, I highlight the structure of oligarchs in neo-authoritarian, oligarchical democracy, and de facto state regimes to assess how regimes influence oligarchs’ use of football clubs. I advance this discussion with three case studies of oligarchs and their ownership of local football clubs. My cases include Suleyman Kerimov and FC Anzhi Dagestan, Gigi Becali and FC Steaua București, and Viktor Gushan and FC Sheriff Transnistria.Master of Art

Developing public disaster communication for volunteer recruitment: understanding volunteer motivations

Understanding spontaneous volunteers Spontaneous volunteers who converge on disaster areas play a critical response role, often being first on the scene and typically trusted by victims (Fulmer, Portelli, Foltin, Zimmerman, Chachkes, and Goldfrank, 2007). The term 'spontaneous volunteers' refers to individuals who provide assistance immediately following a disaster (Lowe and Forthergill, 2003). The sometimes overwhelming number of spontaneous volunteers, from both within and outside the disaster-affected community, poses significant challenges for disaster relief and recovery services (Barraket, Keast, Newton, Walters, and James, 2013). Characteristically, as spontaneous volunteers are seen to hinder relief efforts, government and emergency management agencies resist harnessing this workforce (Drabek and McEntire, 2003). Yet these untrained volunteers are integral to accomplishing many disaster recovery tasks (Barsky, Trainor, Torres, and Aguirre, 2007). Indeed, most response work is carried out by community members who are present or nearby during a disaster (Lowe and Fothergill, 2003). Designing communication that stimulates people to volunteer to assist community recovery efforts in large-scale emergencies is therefore crucial (Palttala and Vos (2011). To most effectively assist recovery efforts, this workforce needs to be instructed on how best to assist and be deployed to areas most needing assistance. In order to effectively recruit and manage this workforce, understanding spontaneous volunteers and their motivations is critical to establishing effective disaster communication plans (Lowe and Fothergill, 2003; Palttala and Vos, 2011). Since disasters often generate powerful emotions and different responses (Beyerlein and Sikkink, 2008), understanding emotions’ role in motivating behavior is important. Although emotion is intensely researched in other domains (e.g., organizational psychology, management, marketing), its influence has received little attention in volunteering and disaster research. In parallel with volunteer convergence onto physical disaster sites, convergence behavior is now evident on-line (Hughes, Palen, Sutton, Liu, and Vieweg, 2008). In the 2011 Brisbane floods, many individuals used social media such as Facebook and Twitter not only to exchange information, but for coordinating relief efforts (Knaus, 2011). The actual and potential use of social media in disasters has generated intense interest evidenced by a small, but burgeoning body of literature (Alexander, 2013). The use of social media as a method of communication and information exchange has been studied in 2011 Brisbane flood research (e.g., Barraket et al., 2013; Cheong and Cheong, 2011), but investigation of social media used by individuals for volunteer recruitment has only recently attracted research attention (e.g., Macias, Hilyard, and Fremuth, 2009; Jones, 2013). The widespread adoption and use of social media by members of the public during disasters (Alexander, 2013) suggest that social media is increasingly critical to future disaster management and relief efforts. Further, with the increasing use of online social networks in disaster volunteering, it is important to understand how – or whether – social media affects the interpersonal bonds known to influence volunteer recruitment. Consequently, this research investigates the factors motivating the spontaneous volunteering behavior of the 'Mud Army' following the 2011 Brisbane floods. As anecdotal evidence suggests that many volunteers used social media to co-ordinate volunteering efforts via the extended friendship network that is Facebook, the research also examines the role of social media in volunteer recruitment. This chapter concludes with implications for disaster communication