Sewanee: The University of the South
Sewanee DSpace Repository (The University of the South)Not a member yet
4066 research outputs found
Sort by
Purifying Wastewater for Rural Communities Project Proposal and Final Report
No full textPopulation growth and climate change continue to pose ever-increasing challenges to water treatment facilities. Constructed wetlands, designed and built to mimic natural wetlands, are a more sustainable and cost effective alternative to purify wastewater. The Sewanee Wetlands Project has been collecting data over the past several years to determine the effectiveness of its constructed wetlands, and we are analyzing this data to determine if constructed wetlands function efficiently on a small scale in rural communities. We are also creating a community accessible dashboard which will educate the public further on wetlands and climate change.In 2016, Dr. McGrath, Professor of Biology at Sewanee, lobbied for the construction of three wetland basins at the Sewanee Utility District (SUD) in order to research the efficacy of wetland treatment for a small community setting. For the past few years, water quality measurements have been taken at the SUD's wetlands to better determine the outcomes of wetland treatment in rural communities like Sewanee. Our team's goal was to set up visualizations that allow our community partner, Dr. McGrath, to understand the water quality trends of the wetlands over time to push for sustainable development in the community.Deborah McGrath, Kevin Fouts, Catherine Cavagnar
Language and Hybridity: The Reconstruction of Mapuche Culture in Post-Dictatorship Chile
Get PDFThe Mapuche make up almost 90% of the 700,000 indigenous in Chile. While the Spanish named these people Araucanians and the region Arauco, terms that carry connotations of imperial biases, the vast community calls themselves Mapuche (mapu ‘land’, che ‘people’). Throughout the history of the Mapuche in Chile, significant and ongoing threats to cultural autonomy have persisted for centuries. First with the arrival of the Spanish to colonize the region, and then by the Chilean state, Mapuche have found ways to adapt and reconstruct sociopolitical structures in a way that has preserved their culture within a global arena full of complex power dynamics, such as the dictatorship from 1973-1990, and the consolidation of neoliberal policies. The use of Mapuche poetry, oral traditions, and media outlets through the preservation of their native language, Mapudúngun, have offered ways to reclaim indigenous voices and affirm Mapuche cultural autonomy. Using hybridity in the adoption of Chilean and European language and written traditions, the Mapuche have adapted in a way that ensures cultural continuity through expression. Because much of the content of Mapuche poetry challenges the Chilean nation-state and seeks recognition of their own rights to ancestral lands, its identification as global intellectual history also proves the power of this cultural export in reconstructing Mapuche culture to secure a place in the national and global arenas.
Because of the vast and complex history of Mapuche in Chile, a focus on the post-dictatorship era allows for more in depth analysis of the use of Mapuche cultural expression in creating a space for Mapuche existence within Chilean society. The era following the dictatorship fostered a flourishing of cultural exports, as there was more room for the expression and widespread support of the different identities that were marginalized by the oppressive socio-political system. The complex history of marginalization of Mapuche in Chile has continuously been overcome by indigenous representation in linguistic policies, poetry, and media. While these reconstructions of Mapuche cultural expression have not yet produced a realization of political and cultural sovereignty, they have served to place Mapuche at the forefront of contemporary discussions in Chile.Dr. Emmanuel Asiedu-Aqcuah, Arturo Márquez-Góme
End the Payday Loan Scam
Get PDFPredatory payday, title, and flex loans are a growing affliction in low-income communities that lead people to pay hundreds in interest and fees every month yet never pay down their loans. Our non-profit partner BetterFi offers those borrowers a pathway out of debt traps and toward financial fitness by refinancing their loans at reasonable rates, as well as offering new loans to those who qualify. Using past client data, we will develop predictive models which will create a more efficient and scalable way for BetterFi to service the community and end the cycle of debt.Sam Shaw, Spike Hosch, Huarui Jing, BetterF
The Impact of Casinos on a County's Crime Rates
Get PDFSince the mid-nineties, eighteen states have passed laws that allow traditional casino establishments within specific, if not all, counties. Although several economic benefits are associated with the casino industry, many researchers believe a strong link exists between this business and increasing crime rates. Given the range of crimes that are believed to result from the establishment of casinos, the effect of this industry on surrounding counties and states is often overlooked. This paper addresses this concern and investigates the casino industry’s impact on property, violent, and burglary crime rates in counties that host casinos or are located within a 50-mile radius of one. Results from the analysis indicate no statistically significant effect of the casino industry on crime rates at the county level.Dr. Aaron Elrod
Dr. Katherine Theyso
The Preacher as Fabulist: Fabricating Fables, Allegories, and Parables for Preaching
No full textThis thesis is an exploration of the craft of fabricating figurative stories for preaching. In this paper I assert that story telling is an essential tool in the preacher’s tool kit for sermon preparation. Then I look specifically at the practice of creating fictional stories for use in preaching. I begin by surveying genres of fable, allegory, and parable, with the understanding that such fictional stories have been used for millennia for rhetorical purposes. In doing so I look specifically at the literary building blocks of plot, character, setting, and dialogue noting how these raw materials of story are fabricated into narratives that bring wisdom, ethics, abstract concepts, and imaginative worlds to life for the hearer. This is followed by studying three sermons of modern preachers who employ story fabrication and storytelling in preaching. Finally, I bring all of this together in my own theory of fabricating figurative stories for preaching, using three of my own sermons as examples.William Brosen
Cracking the Code to Student Flourishing Team Photos
No full textA college is a place of growth and transformation where young adults are prepared both intellectually and socially for professional and adult life. However, over the last 10 years, the prevalence of mental health problems has risen steadily among college students with a particularly notable increase in symptom prevalence over the last 5 years. What is this down to? What are some key determinants of student flourishing and well-being? How do factors such as race and gender influence well-being? Using Healthy Mind’s Survey data that examines mental health, service utilization, and related issues among undergraduate and graduate students, our team of researchers at Sewanee DataLab is seeking to understand the well-being of students, and where to target resources to improve student flourishing, specifically at Sewanee: The University of The South. This report serves as an exploration of prior research on the topic of student flourishing, well-being, mental health, service utilization, and help-seeking behavior specifically in the college setting.Sylvia Gray, Nicole Noffsinger-Frazie
IN DEFENSE OF PREACHING IN THE SPIRIT
No full textThis project defends the practice of preaching in the Spirit by first examining the connotations and hesitations around preaching in the Spirit. It then articulates the dearth of academic discussion of preaching in the Spirit from Anglican/Episcopal sources. Considering the lack of discussion from Anglican/Episcopal sources, scholars from the African American Christian Tradition, also known as the Black Church, are reviewed. An argument is made that while there are a variety of ways to preach in the Spirit, the fruit of preaching in the Spirit is an alternative community marked by shared leadership, diversity, and equality. An analysis of scripture shows how Spirit led speech in scripture cultivates this fruit. Following the scripture analysis two preachers of contrasting styles are profiled and selected sermons analyzed to show methods of preaching in the Spirit. Finally, sermon examples and reflections are presented to demonstrate how I have incorporated this research in my preaching.David M. Star
Too Tall to Be a Hobbit, Too Short to Be an Elf
No full textWhat follows is a memoir of obsession, escapism, and the Lord of the Rings.
For the first two decades of my life, I was fanatically religious. My interests, opinions, and desires were all determined by the fundamentalist evangelical belief system that ordered my rural town in Alabama—until, when I was seventeen, my best friend died suddenly in her sleep. When no theological framework could support a tragedy of this scale, the foundation of my faith began to crack. Shortly afterward, I began a bachelor’s degree in biblical studies and theology, and as the pressures of formal study were applied over the next three years, my worldview eventually collapsed. Debilitated by grief and depression, I grasped for the thing that had been my most reliable source of escape since childhood: the Lord of the Rings. A film adaptation of The Hobbit was already in the works in New Zealand, so I dropped out of college, sold my car, used the money to buy a plane ticket, and moved 8,000 miles away to be a part of it. I arrived in Auckland deflated. For the first time in four years, I had enough free time to absorb the shock of everything I had endured—my friend’s mysterious death when I was seventeen; my parents’ divorce that same weekend; my family’s alcoholism and drug abuse; the dissolution of my faith. As I navigated life in a new country, forming new friendships, learning the ropes of a new culture, I also began to grasp the extent of the harm I’d suffered under a certain kind of Pentecostal Christianity. I was told I could heal sick people. I believed I could perform miracles. I alienated all manner of people who cared about me in my pursuit of radical separateness, which I called holiness. Of course, I experienced more than just grief during the year I spent in New Zealand. I also experienced deep care from people who barely knew me. I learned to accept help from others and, for the first time, felt the therapeutic effects of interdependence. And as I leaned head-first into my lifelong obsession with the Lord of the Rings, I had fun—making pilgrimages to filming sites, following the start-and-stop news of The Hobbit’s production, combing the internet for casting calls so that I could audition to be an extra. The first six chapters of this memoir are included here, and they alternate in time between my life before college and my year in New Zealand. The chapters from before college chart my friendship with Brittany, my childhood best friend and accomplice in religious extremism. After her mysterious death the summer before our senior year of high school, I spent the next three days plotting a way to raise her from the dead. In the chapters that take place in New Zealand, I chase my dream of being an extra in The Hobbit while navigating the difficulties of life in a new country, trying to find a job, and coping with the cargo of trauma I’d carried with me across the Pacific Ocean.
The Lord of the Rings is a lifeline throughout. My obsession with J.R.R. Tolkien’s books and Peter Jackson’s movies developed when I was thirteen, and it sustained me through some genuine horrors in my life, both as a child in survival mode and a twenty-one-year-old who lost her grip on reality and tried to disappear into a world of fantasy. But despite my considerable efforts, I was not ultimately cast as an extra in The Hobbit. I was too tall to be a hobbit and too short to be an elf—the very picture of a woman straddling two extremes