The Construction of Value and Identity in Mobile Games

The Construction of Value and Identity in Mobile Game

Black and White and Read in Profile: The Silhouette as Race Manirhetoric in Flannery O\u27Connor and Kara Walker

ABSTRACT My research project, in fulfillment of the requirements for the dissertation in Rhetorics, Communication, and Information Design, utilizes the schema or trope of the silhouette as a binding metaphor for black/white race relationships in America. Specifically, I argue that there is no better model for examining social interactions between the races than the back- and fore-grounding that is transacted through this primarily visual--but also verbal and oral--technique of profiling and outlining. This is particularly true given its origins in discriminatory practice, dating as far back as the literary iconismos and characterismos used to categorize Greek and Roman slaves, and the ethnic taxonomies perpetuated with Johann Kaspar Lavater\u27s Essays on Physiognomy. In locating the silhouette as a major trope in the discourses on race, I am adding to the rhetorical lexicon by coining the term manirhetorical, and applying it to illustrate the unique and adaptive features of the silhouette--its suitability to operate through various media and to accommodate multiple tasks. Thus, I examine the manirhetorical practices of two artists, one primarily literary--Flannery O\u27Connor--whose principled positioning in the Southern gothic tradition of grotesque literature comports accurately with the sense of privilege and entitlement that is examined in a focused way in the field of Whiteness Studies. The other artist considered in this study--Kara Walker--is primarily a visual rhetorical virtuoso, whose works with the silhouette are used to both develop and demonstrate her racial and feminist ethos. Both artists perform the recuperation and re/appropriation of the silhouette as manirhetorical trope of critique in the \u27signifyin\u27\u27 tradition described by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Both artists make multiple uses of the silhouette as verbal and visual representations for race relations, and for their accordant power dynamics--and in the process perform racial profiling. My study has application for writing and other across-the-curriculum programs, as well as for theme-based and engaged learning models. This work involves multimedia as well as inter- and transdisciplinary content and methodologies

Embedding for Empathy: Helping Journalism Students Become Better Reporters | Journalism 446/846: Mosaic—A Peer Review of Teaching Project Inquiry Portfolio

As part of Nebraska Mosaic, a senior-level journalism capstone course, students are tasked with interviewing, writing and producing stories for and about refugees and immigrants in Nebraska. But students face a steep learning curve in this experiential learning class. Their knowledge about refugees and immigrants is limited, and they have little understanding of the issues refugees and immigrants face in their new country. Students also have little experience interacting with them, much less interviewing them and writing about them. Using an experiential learning assignment that mimics the journalism practice of embedding, students have an opportunity to develop empathy, gain confidence and improve their reporting, interviewing and writing skills. This inquiry portfolio explores the effectiveness of embedding students in refugee agencies in order to prepare them to report on diverse audiences

JOMC: 491/891: Special Topic: News Engagement Lab—A Peer Review of Teaching Project Benchmark Portfolio

This benchmark portfolio analyzes a collaborative elective course offered by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Journalism and Mass Communications in partnership with NET News, the state’s public media organization. The Spring 2016 course offered students hands-on experience creating, implementing and assessing social media content and engagement strategies for NET News. This portfolio showcases the innovative nature of the course while also demonstrating its pedagogical underpinnings. The portfolio provides a broad overview, including course goals and how activities and assignments are aligned with them. Using several assessment strategies, the inquiry focused on the course’s final project, in which students were required to synthesize course concepts and material to develop viable engagement ideas for two NET News projects: a documentary on sex trafficking and coverage of the November 2016 death penalty referendum. In collaboration with UNL’s Office of University Communications, students also were given access to NUVI, a sophisticated social monitoring tool that helped them study prospective audiences. Digital audience engagement is a relatively new concept in the news industry and journalism education, but is gaining importance. The assessment strategies documented in this portfolio may be helpful for journalism educators who are interested in developing similar experiential learning courses in the “teaching hospital” method but desire an effective assessment framework. The portfolio also might serve as a model for journalism educators who want to incorporate audience engagement concepts and practices in new or existing journalism courses to keep up with industry trends and prepare students for new jobs

Combining presleep cognitive training and REM-sleep stimulation in a laboratory morning nap for lucid dream induction.

Previous experiments combining cognitive techniques and sleep disruption have been relatively successful in inducing at-home lucid dreams (LD) over training periods of 1 week or more. Here, we induce LD in a single laboratory nap session by pairing cognitive training with external stimulation. Participants came to the laboratory at 7:30 a.m. or 11:00 a.m. and during polysomnography setup were provided with information about lucid dreaming. For 20 min prior to sleep the experimenter played alternating audio and visual cues at 1-min intervals. Participants were instructed to practice a mental state of critical self-awareness, observing their thoughts and experiences each time they noticed a cue. This procedure associated the cues with the trained mental state. Subsequently, participants were allowed 90 min to nap, and the audio and visual cues were presented during REM sleep to activate self-awareness in dreams and elicit lucidity. A control group followed the same procedure but was not cued during sleep. All participants were instructed to signal their lucidity by looking left and right 4 times (LR signal). Signal-verified lucid dreams (SVLDs) qualified as dreams in which the LR signal was observed and the participant reported becoming lucid. Across the 2 nap times, this protocol induced SVLDs in 50% of cued participants. In the absence of cueing during sleep, participant SVLD rate was 17%. Of note, 3 successful participants had never before experienced a LD, suggesting this protocol may be effective across the general population. Implications of this Targeted Lucidity Reactivation protocol for nightmare treatment are discussed