Middle Tennessee State University: Journals@MTSU
Not a member yet
1268 research outputs found
Sort by
THE COLOR OF SELF-INTEREST
Full text linkEngaging undergraduate students in economics courses relies increasingly more on using classroom games or experiments. In this paper we propose a linear form of a popular game-theoretic simulation, and then we suggest multiple applications in a variety of contexts. Playing our game in the classroom, students can see for themselves whether their individual choices, guided by self-interest, tend to lead to nearly optimal group outcomes. With little to no change in the setup of our experiment, we show how any instructor can extend the analysis to exemplify inefficient pure-strategy Nash equilibria, the equality/efficiency trade-off and the issue of who “deserves” more, government redistribution versus private charity to the poor, the free-rider problem, and the tragedy of the commons
EXTREME PRICING GOES VIRAL: LESSONS FOR TEACHING PRICE CONTROLS
Full text linkPrice controls are a popular topic among students. However, the effects of implementing price controls are not as straightforward as students typically expect, especially the unintended consequences that students tend to overlook. This paper provides three teaching guides designed to teach price controls which can be easily implemented in an introductory-level economics course. We build on the work of Geerling et al. (2023c) by using short-form viral videos from popular platforms such as YouTube and TikTok, which match the streaming and content medium of choice for Gen Z. The use of celebrities and social media influencers make abstract teaching moments more relatable to students. As such, this paper offers a unique opportunity for creatively teaching economics to a new generation of students
What Else Is Out There? American Women’s Progressive Era Utopian Societies in Outer
Full text linkUtopian and dystopian texts typically fall under the larger umbrella of science fiction and fantasy, as they create alternative worlds that could include various governmental structures, environmental situations, technological advancements, and more. Many American utopian texts written in the Progressive Era explore a revision of current or future American culture, a remote society on Earth, a depiction of the afterlife, or a discovered society on another planet. For Progressive Era women writers, revisions to gendered norms in their utopian literary works were common as many fought for greater equality with men in their own world. Setting the society on another planet can interestingly pose gender equality as an otherworldly, alien phenomenon; however, outside of not only American but potentially also human constructs, this framework allows authors to imagine entirely new systems that promote gender equality. When the setting is on another planet, authors are not bound by any cultural, legal, or religious boundaries, other than those that permeate their minds while constructing these new worlds
Williams, Christy. Mapping Fairy-Tale Space: Pastiche and Metafiction in Borderless Tales. Detroit: Wayne State UP, 2021
Full text linkChristy Williams explores fairy-tale structures in an innovative way by using a geographic metaphor to trace the history and interconnections of the fairy-tale genre. The map and web concepts are effective for explaining how these stories intersect across time and space and for decentering the European fairy-tale tradition by expanding beyond that canon. The main focus of Williams’s book is to use the notion of mapping to analyze twenty-first century fairy tales, and she does so by organizing her study into two parts with two chapters in each that cover a range of examples from both television and written texts. At the core of this analysis lies an exploration of the ways in which familiar, well-known fairy tales are reconfigured and made relevant for modern audiences
FEMALE INFLUENCERS: THE ECONOMICS BEHIND THE MILLIONS
Full text linkWhile women comprise nearly 60% of all undergraduate students in the United States (Causey et al., 2023), they account for less than one-third of economics majors (Buckles, 2019). There are few female role models in economics textbooks. To help address this lack of diversity and engage female students, we present teaching guides based on three of the most popular female influencers among Gen Z students. Each guide highlights an influencer\u27s backstory and business acumen. This paper builds on the work of Geerling et al. (2024a and 2024b) who use viral YouTube and TikTok videos to engage Gen Z students on their social media platforms of choice. This paper offers a unique opportunity for educators to teach foundation-level economics concepts in a creative way while helping stimulate engagement among all students
THE ECONOMIC MAJOR: WHO OFFERS IT AND WHAT IS REQUIRED OF STUDENTS?
Full text linkThis paper econometrically investigates what variables impact the probability a college/university offers an undergraduate major in economics, multiple tracks within the major, or economics minor. Data is collected from four-year, comprehensive institutions, with control variables accounting for whether the school is public, year founded, enrollment, if the school offers a business degree, and selectivity measures. In addition, data is collected on the requirements of economics majors across institutions. Regression is used to determine what institutional variables influence specific track requirements, such as math/statistics, econometrics, capstone course, and internship. Given the unique data set that has been created, this paper offers new information and several conclusions about the economics major
LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION! RECORDING CLASSROOM LECTURES – A SIMPLE AND AFFORDABLE APPROACH
Full text linkWhile the demand for online courses has increased, many students also still want to be educated in a traditional face-to-face environment. Lecture capture offers a way for faculty to teach a class both face-to-face and online simultaneously, making the course accessible to both types of students. By using a camera to record the instructor and the whiteboard along with a screen capture and video editing program such as Camtasia 2000 or OBS Studio, instructors can record their in-person lectures and create high-quality videos that can be posted online. These videos can be used by students who are taking the course in an online format or who were unable to attend class as well as by students who attended the in-person lecture and would like to use the lecture video as a study aid. This paper describes a comparatively low-cost method for recording, editing, and producing online content using lecture capture. The features of two video recording software packages, Camtasia and OBS Studio, are compared, and step-by-step instructions are provided for using both software packages to record classroom lectures
Anna Neill’s Human Evolution and Fantastic Victorian Fiction
No full textSituating itself amidst a legacy of titles that have made significant contributions to the field of Darwinism in literature, spanning across classics like Gillian Beer’s Darwin’s Plots (1983) as well as Stephen Jay Gould’s Ever Since Darwin (1977) and The Panda’s Thumb (1980), Anna Neill’s latest publication explores the intersectionalities between nineteenth-century British sf and the racist temporalities of Victorian evolutionary anthropology. In her interpretations of “fantastic” Victorian and Edwardian fictions, Neill analyzes anthropological ideas about race, culture, and species difference through her reading of a variety of literary forms: utopia, dystopia, nonsense, Gothic horror, and the peculiar hybrid forms of the modern fairy tale or children’s fable. Strange twists of plot in such tales determine evolutionary fortunes or imaginatively manipulate deep antiquity as well as the distant future
Representation in Raya and the Last Dragon: Examining the Progression of Gender, Sexuality, and Race in the Disney Princess Franchise
Full text linkThe Disney animated film Raya and the Last Dragon was released in March2021 to great acclaim, becoming the third-highest streamed movie of 2021(Hayes). The Disney Princess franchise has long been criticized for culturalappropriation and privileging traditional gender and heterosexual norms. IfRaya is canonized into the Disney Princess franchise, she will be the secondAsian Princess and the first Southeast Asian Princess.1In contrast to historicalDisney Princess films, Raya has garnered praise for the film’s pro-feministideals, nuanced homosexuality, and careful representation of Southeast Asianculture. This essay analyzes the representations of race, gender, and sexualityin Raya and the Last Dragon in relationship to other Disney Princess animatedfeature films, especially the 1998 animated film Mulan. Raya reflects an almostone-hundred-year progression in the franchise and represents a significantadvancement by Disney in terms of feminist and racial representation, but, atthe same time, falls short in the area of queer representation
Integration and Education: The Search for Identity Post-Civil War
Full text linkPrior to the Civil War, American identity was grounded in community, hardwork, and a connection to the land. One woke up, did what one had to do, andkissed one’s family before bed. Within literature, life was simple and idealistic—full of romanticization of the land and of its people. Following the Civil War,everything began to change. Between mass industrialization and urbanization,to an increase in immigration and the assimilation of former slaves into society,the world was different, and the definition of what it meant to be an Americanhad to adjust. Through an examination of the literature of the late nineteenthcentury and early twentieth century, such as Constance Fenimore Woolson’s“Rodman the Keeper” and W.E.B. DuBois’s rhetorical The Souls of Black Folk, thedefinition of American identity shifted to represent New England perspectiveson traumatized Southern lands as well as proposed solutions to postemancipation integration. Writers of fiction and non-fiction alike examinedthe ways in which the trauma of the Civil War and slavery impacted nationalidentity, often in problematic ways that erased disadvantaged or traumatizedperspectives in favor of elitist, privileged views