Browsing by Subject "American West"
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Item Frontier Capitalist: The Economic and Environmental History of William Currie Jones(2014-04-30) Dowdle, Zachary Lynn; Dowdle, Zachary Lynn; Pierce, Jason; Dewar, David; Klingemann, John; Hack, TeresaWilliam Currie Jones, a Tom Green County pioneer, arrived in Texas in 1878 finding a region that verged on being a raw frontier. Jones employed economic flexibility over the course of his career, adapting to the dynamic western market. Due to his early acquisition of land with river frontage and manipulation of the environment, Jones capitalized on his wealth of natural resources by expanding into town building and real estate promotion. As Congress in Washington manipulated tariffs at the expense of western woolgrowers, Jones found opportunity in other industries. Jones evolved along with the county and region, displaying an increasing economic sophistication. By the end of his life, the one-time rancher had turned to the emerging exploration of hydrocarbons, predating the discovery of the Permian Basin oil fields by a decade. Jones embodied the pioneer spirit, which allowed him considerable success during his lifetime.Item Imperial Standard-Bearers: Nineteenth-Century Army Officers' Wives in British India and the American West(2012-07-16) McInnis, VerityThe comparative experiences of the nineteenth-century British and American Army officer's wives add a central dimension to studies of empire. Sharing their husbands' sense of duty and mission, these women transferred, adopted, and adapted national values and customs, to fashion a new imperial sociability, influencing the course of empire by cutting across and restructuring gender, class, and racial borders. Stationed at isolated stations in British India and the American West, many officers' wives experienced homesickness and disorientation. They reimagined military architecture and connected into the military esprit de corps, to sketch a blueprint of female identity and purpose. On the physical journeys to join their husbands, and post arrival, the feminization of formal and informal military practices produced a new social reality and facilitated the development of an empowered sisterhood that sustained imperialist ambitions. This appropriation of symbols, processes, and rankings facilitated roles as social functionaries and ceremonial performers. Additionally, in utilizing dress, and home decor, military spouses drafted and projected an imperial identity that reflected, yet transformed upper and middle-class gender models. An examination of the social processes of calling and domestic rituals confirms the formation of a distinct and influential imperial female identity. The duty of protecting the social gateway to the imperial community, rested with a hostess?s ability to discriminate ? and convincingly reject parvenus. In focusing on the domestic site it becomes clear that the mistress-servant relationship both formulated and reproduced imperial ideologies. Within the home, the most intimate of inter-racial, inter-ethnic, and inter-class contact zones, the physiological trait of a white skin, and the exhibition of national artifacts signaled identity, status, and authority. Military spouses, then, generated social power as arbiters, promoters, and police officers of an imperial class, reaffirming internal confidence within the Anglo communities, and legitimizing external representations of the power and prestige of empire.Item Lost & found(2012-05) Botkin, Erica Lauren; Sutherland, Dan, 1966-; Goodman, MarkI have produced two distinct bodies of work, landscapes and portraits. In both, I investigate my relationship to the subject. My role as the photographer fluctuates between the time I spend by myself and the time I spend with others. The landscape series promotes the act of looking and obscures my presence as photographer. Responding to the saturation of images in the media today, I hope to recalibrate viewers to a slower pace. I look for spaces at the edge of a controlled wilderness that are still accessible to the general public and mimic the identity of my childhood home in Northern California. Both color and black and white photographs sentimentalize manicured nature in ordinary locations. These landscapes facilitate reflection through consideration of similarities and differences. In doing so, these locations lose their specificity and approach a generalized sense of the sacred. The second body of work is a series of photographic collaborations I make with my autistic friend, Will Johns. He selects the subject matter and operates the light meter. His autism informs his methods, which then affects my methods. His idiosyncratic choices force me to photograph subject matter I wouldn’t be drawn to and compose in a new way where I must consider Will as author, subject and subject matter. In these images Will stands with the light meter, his posture gaze and facial expressions explicitly make reference to our relationship and reveal the complexity in separating subject matter from subject and the difficulties artists face with issues of exploitation and authorship.