On The Corporeal Exchange: Thai Boxing's Sacrificial Movement

This dissertation is an ethnographic study of Thai boxing (muay Thai) understood as sacrificial exchange, exploring the practice of this martial art in the context of contemporary Thai society. Drawing on two years of apprenticeship and participation research in Northeast Thailand and Bangkok, I consider the fighters’ integration in broader patterns of seasonal labor migration as they move between rural, regional tournaments and Bangkok stadiums. Focusing on the training of one particular boxer, I investigate interactions between trainers, managers, family, patrons and ancestral spirits. The boxers’ embodied actions as they unfold in time represent the sovereign relationship between living and dead, nature and culture, performatively establishing the boundaries between growth and decay. As the living move through a world of animate social relations, accruing debt, the boxer’s embodied patterns of repetition and exhaustion in training, and of destructive action in combat, create a possibility for shifting this balance, accruing merit for those otherwise occupied in handling materials which support the powerful, and transforming the established hierarchical order of everyday life. Against the background of the impermanent, closed, linear, cyclical or progressive temporalities of monasteries, factories, the military and the monarchy, the temporality of the ring remains open, giving fighters the elbow-room to performatively engage crucial symbols of life and death, male and female, human and animal, affording otherwise politically disempowered Northeastern Thai families the opportunity to create meaning and possibility in their lives. Acting as both victim and executioner, fighters accrue credit for the assembled audience, reinvesting each tier of the community with a degree of responsibility for life. I argue that these practices occur within a ‘deathworld’, in which the heightened attentiveness to the limited possibilities for action reaffirm the local position of the individual within the collective. With embodied motion that cuts across local categories of stillness and mobility, the living and the dead, with ever-greater stamina, Thai boxers become increasingly valuable and credit-able, paying the debts, material and spiritual, that their assembled supporters have incurred as they live their kinetically excessive lives, allowing men throughout the community to remain accountable to Kings, Buddha, ancestors, factories and patrons.Doctor of Philosoph

The Spatial-Temporal Model of COVID-19 Tests, Cases, and Deaths in the State of Nebraska

The goal of this project was to illustrate the spread of COVID-19 tests, cases, and deaths within the state of Nebraska and identify non-random clusters using a spatial-temporal model. This project is pertinent and innovative, as few spatial-temporal models in the United States revolving around COVID-19 offer information at the county, let alone, the state level. De-identified data was extracted from the State of Nebraska’s Department of Health and Human Services COVID-19 dashboard, transformed and prepared for analysis using SAS coding language. Clusters were identified though SaTScan software using a space-time permutation model. The model identified 5 different clusters related to cases and deaths, as well as 3 clusters linked to tests. The majority of the identified clusters could be explained by outbreaks in Nebraska meat-packing communities or long-term care facilities. This project offers insight on how COVID-19 impacted Nebraska communities and explains how the pandemic evolved throughout 2020

Assessing the Role of Distance to Level I Trauma Units on ATV Rollovers, Tractor Rollovers, and Machinery Entanglement Outcomes

All-Terrain Vehicle (ATV) rollovers, tractor rollovers, and machinery entanglements cause traumatic injuries to agricultural workers. Response time of first responders combined with travel to trauma units can take a significant amount of time in rural areas, potentially leading to an increased risk of fatal outcomes for those involved in these incidents. The aim of this study is to determine if distance to a level I trauma unit is a factor in the outcomes of these incidents. ATV rollovers, tractor rollovers, and machinery entanglement injuries and fatalities, collected from a 7-state Midwestern region were entered into a GIS system along with locations of level 1 trauma units. Distance from trauma units was compared between victim outcomes (fatality versus injury), as it was hypothesized that increased distance to trauma unit is associated with poorer outcomes. Results demonstrated no statistically significant difference in distance to trauma units between injury incidents versus fatalities. When comparing outcomes between demographic variables, the data demonstrated a significant association with age (p=0.006). The median age for those who were injured was lower at 46.0 years compared to 58.0 years in those who died. Strategies to engage and accommodate aging agricultural workers should be researched and implemented

Improving Testing for English Language Learners

Improving Testing for English Language Learners is a comprehensive book that provides relevant information on testing English language learners (ELLs) from kindergarten through twelfth grade in schools in the United States. The author, Rebecca J. Kopriva, blends her research background and experience with current issues surrounding the testing of ELLs. In selected chapters, she also collaborates with other leading researchers to provide more precise information on the topics covered. Specifically, this book examines test use by focusing on the interaction of the test-taker and content tests, rather than on language proficiency assessments. Kopriva currently works for the Wisconsin Center for Education Research at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, as a visiting researcher. She has also served as a testing director for various states as well as the U.S. Department of Education. This book, in fact, can be viewed as an extension of her previous research. She explains in the preface and chapter 1 that this book is not necessarily meant to be read cover to cover. Rather, each chapter stands alone as a reference on a particular topic. If the reader needs more background on ELLs, he or she can begin with the first chapters. However, if the reader already has established background knowledge, s/he can refer to those chapters which address his or her particular needs or interests