Browsing by Subject "Ethics"
Now showing 1 - 20 of 45
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item A case for ethical development in co-curricular environments(2010-08) Morton, Craig; Paton, Valerie O.; Lan, William; Taylor, Colette M.Co-curricular experiences can provide a rich context for student learning, but there has been little research on the direct learning contribution they make. This study is designed to explore the impact of various co-curricular experiences on students within different curricular environments to determine how co-curricular experiences contribute to ethical reasoning development. There is no organized theory or framework regarding how co-curricular environments contribute to ethical reasoning development. However, Astin‟s Input-Environment-Output (I-E-O) Model provides a general theoretical foundation for environmental impact on student learning (Astin, 1993). Lawrence Kohlberg‟s preeminent ethical reasoning research gives further direction. It was grounded in Piaget‟s cognitive development stage theory from the 1930‟s (Wright, 1995; Nichols & Day, 1982). Kohlberg‟s work in the 1950‟s eventually expanded Piaget‟s two stage model within the autonomy stage to six stages of moral development: stages one and two at the pre-conventional level, stages three and four at the conventional level, and stages five and six at the post-conventional level (Wright, 1995). This study was conducted at a large research institution in the southwest United States in partnership with an institutional assessment effort to gather information on student learning in ethics courses. The study used the Defining Issues Test (DIT) developed by James Rest (Bebaeu, Rest & Narvaez, 1999), which places individuals in Kohlberg's continuum of ethical reasoning. One hundred eighty-two studentsparticipated in the DIT pretest at the beginning of the semester and the DIT posttest at the end of the semester. The primary treatment variable was exposure to the material in two courses that met institutional criteria for ethics curriculum; the control group consisted of students in a non-Ethics course. See “Ethics” note at end. Supplemental questions were added at the DIT post-test to gather demographics including participation in selected co-curricular environments. The resulting data was analyzed using a linear regression to identify which variables were predictive of improved posttest scores on the Defining Issues Test. The research study findings indicated that students‟ DIT scores increased, but that neither curricular nor co-curricular environments had a statistically significant impact.Item A genealogy of cyborgothic: aesthetics and ethics in the age of posthumanism(2009-05-15) Yi, DongshinThis dissertation considers the future convergence between gothic studies and humanism in the age of posthumanism and proposes ?cyborgothic? as a new literary genre that heralds that future. The convergence under consideration is already in progress in that an encounter between human and non-human consistently inspires the two fields, questioning the nature of humans and the treatment of such non-human beings as cyborgs. Such questioning, often conducted within the boundary of humanities, persistently interprets non-human beings as either representing or helping human shortcomings. Accordingly, answers are human-orientated or even human-centered in many cases, and ?cyborgothic,? generated out of retrospective investigation into gothic studies and prospective formulation of posthumanism, aims to present different, nonanthropocentric ways to view humans and non-humans on equal terms. The retrospective investigation into gothic studies focuses on Ann Radcliffe?s The Mysteries of Udolpho and Edmund Burke?s A Philosophical Enquiry into the Sublime and Beautiful to retrieve a gothic aesthetics of the beautiful, and in the second chapter, examines Mary Shelley?s Frankenstein against Kant?s aesthetics to demonstrate how this gothic aesthetics becomes obsolete in the tradition of the sublime. This dissertation then addresses Bram Stoker?s Dracula along with Bruno Latour?s Science in Action to reveal problems in fabricating scientific knowledge, especially focusing on sacrifices made in the process. In the forth chapter, I examine Sinclair Lewis?s Arrowsmith with William James?s pragmatism, and consider the question of how moral complications inherent in science have been handled in American society. The last chapter proposes Marge Piercy?s He, She and It as a same cyborgothic text, which tries to develop a way to acknowledge the presence of the cyborg?one that is at once aesthetical and ethical?so as to enable humans and cyborgs to relate each other on equal terms. Thus, ?cyborgothic? is being required as a literary attempt to present the age of posthumanism that is no longer anthropocentric.Item A place for moral theory in the argument from evil(2012-08) Reed, Robert P; Webb, Mark O.; Schwartz, JeremyArguments from evil intend to prove that the existence of an all-powerful and morally-perfect being would preclude the existence of evil. Such arguments hold that the absence of evil is a necessary consequence of a morally-perfect and all-powerful being existing. Yet evil does exist and so by modus tollens, God must not. Despite the presence of unmistakably moral terms in these arguments such as “evil” and “morally-perfect”, treatments of the problem of evil in the philosophical literature have avoided discussing the related normative and metaethical issues and so have hindered the progress of the debate. Whether or not the attributes of being all-powerful and being morally-perfect do in fact preclude the existence of evil is substantially (if not entirely) determined by the moral or normative structure of the world: the moral truths about good, evil, normativity, right action etc. and any properties and facts about the world needed to ground them (supposing moral truths require such grounding). So the very same truths moral philosophers seek while doing normative ethics will largely determine whether the existence of a morally-perfect and omnipotent being precludes the existence of evil. The truth about God and evil hinges upon the truth about morality. Thus, the question of whether or not God and evil can coexist cannot be answered without committing to the sorts of normative claims at issue in moral philosophy.Item Affecting violence : narratives of Los feminicidios and their ethical and political reception(2012-12) Huerta Moreno, Lydia Cristina; Robbins, Jill, 1962-; Domínguez Ruvalcaba, Héctor, 1962-; Arroyo, Jossianna; Chapelle-Wojciehowski, Hannah; Ravelo-Blancas, Patricia; Pia Lara, MariaIn Mexico there is an increasing lack of engagement of the Mexican government and its citizens towards resolving violence. In the 20th century alone events such as the Revolution of 1910, La Guerra Cristera, La Guerra Sucia, and most recently Los Feminicidios and Calderon’s War on Drugs are representative of an ethos of violence withstood and inflicted by Mexicans towards women, men, youth, and marginalized groups. This dissertation examines Los Feminicidios in Ciudad Juarez and the cultural production surrounding them: chronicles, novels, documentaries and films. In it I draw on Aristotle’s influential Nicomachean Ethics, Victoria Camps’ El gobierno de las emociones (2011), María Pía Lara’s Narrating Evil (2007), Vittorio Gallese’s and other scientists’ research on neuroscience empathy and neurohumanism, and socio-political essays in order to theorize how a pathos-infused understanding of ethos might engage a reading and viewing public in what has become a discourse about violence determined by a sense of fatalism. Specifically, I argue that narrative and its interpretations play a significant role in people’s emotional engagement and subsequent cognitive processes. I stress the importance of creating an approach that considers both pathos and logos as a way of understanding this ethos of violence. I argue that by combining pathos and logos in the analysis of a cultural text, we can break through the theoretical impasse, which thus far has resulted in exceptionalisms and has been limited to categorizing as evil the social and political mechanisms that may cause this violence.Item Appeals to reason : negotiating rhetorical responsibility and dialectical constraints in church-state separation discourse(2014-05) Battistelli, Todd Joseph; Roberts-Miller, Patricia, 1959-This dissertation explores how argumentation theory can supplement models of responsible persuasion in rhetoric and writing studies. In particular, it demonstrates how reasoning as envisioned in the pragma-dialectical approach of argumentation can provide an alternative to exclusionary, unethical operations of reason. Despite longstanding work with models of argument from Aristotle to Stephen Toulmin, rhetoric and writing has paid little attention to the potential uses of dialectical argumentation theory. Such theory deserves greater consideration given its ability to meet the ethical demands voiced by rhetorical critiques of traditional ways of arguing. Critiques of reason demonstrate how the abstractions necessary for logical certainty exist in tension with the inherent ambiguity of human arguments. In attempting to strip away that ambiguity, some discussants unfairly exclude relevant details from others and may exclude entire populations who should be included in a fair deliberation. Goals of understanding and inclusion unite the variety of calls for new ways of arguing made in rhetoric and writing under titles of Rogerian, non-agonistic, listening, and invitational rhetorics. Nevertheless, as Chaïm Perelman and Lucie Olbrechts-Tyteca describe, even as our arguments involve irresolvable ambiguities, they must also function as stable and coherent viewpoints such that our interlocutors can hold us accountable to agreement or disagreement. In this way, we responsibly argue questions of ethics, politics and law. Though no final resolution of ambiguity is possible in such questions, we can reason together for a better understanding of each other's positions and craft pragmatic policies to deal with our disagreements. In order to explore the disciplinary questions about the relationship between rhetoric and argumentation, the dissertation examines a series of case studies drawn from judicial disputes over church-state separation in the United States. In examining problematic rhetoric of these disputes, the dissertation builds an understanding of responsible reason informed by dialectical argumentation and demonstrates its utility for both critical and pedagogical applications.Item Apposition, displacement : an ethics of abstraction in postwar American fiction(2013-05) Heard, Frederick Coye; Kevorkian, Martin, 1968-The decades following two world wars, the European Holocaust and the threat of nuclear annihilation presented American authors with an occupational dilemma: catastrophic histories call out for recognition, but any representation of them risks adding violence to violence by falsifying the account or conflating historical acts of violence with their artificial doubles. This project reimagines the political aesthetics of postmodern American fiction through two major interventions. First, I identify an aesthetic structure of apposition--a parallel relationship between abstract works of art and the everyday world that I take from William Carlos Williams--that allows me to productively resolve a tension in the aesthetics of Hannah Arendt: because representation takes mimesis as a particular end, Arendt disqualifies representational art from politics, which she defines as open-ended action between human beings and not as end-centered state-craft. At the same time, Arendt claims that art is a product of thought, the cognitive activity she associates with political action over and against fabrication. My heterodox reading of Arendt shows that appositional narratives, like political actors, perform their own self-disclosure, beginning the open-ended chain of actions and reactions that Arendt identifies as the substantial form of politics and ethics. Second, I use my revision of Arendt to demonstrate that appositional narratives act politically through the very same metafictional tropes that critics often label as escapist or solipsistic. Rather than copy historical experience, appositional narratives reject illusionary representation and present themselves as actors, inciting their readers to respond with pluralistic, provisional judgment. Taking Vladimir Nabokov, Philip Roth and Toni Morrison--three central but rarely-juxtaposed postmodern novelists--as case studies, I show that we cannot properly assess the political implications of postmodern fiction without understanding the specific mechanisms of narrative apposition. Appositional works stand temporarily and self-consciously in the place of the world, displacing it in the experience of their readers. This narrative strategy provides a political alternative for novelists facing the ethical crises of postmodernity. Appositional narratives displace their readers' settled beliefs and press them to exercise their human capacity for judgment. They embrace their responsibility for the world by refusing to represent it.Item A building that recalls : architecture as/and visual rhetorics(2010-05) Hoag, Trevor Lee; Davis, D. Diane (Debra Diane), 1963-; Faigley, Lester“A Building that Recalls” is a report that offers up the provocation that figures of housing are prevalent throughout histories of rhetorics connected to memory, and are of great ethical significance. One can turn to three key examples to demonstrate this thesis: Martin Heidegger’s Black Forest “Hut,” Michel Foucault’s “Panopticon,” and Lebbeus Woods’ “Scar” and “Scab” architectural designs. Heidegger’s hut reminds its viewers that a place of dwelling can serve both as a lesson in the dangers of nationalist memory-politics, and simultaneously as a model for overcoming fascism in oneself. Foucault’s Panopticon model reveals that the rooting out and “forgetting” of burned in social norms is difficult because subjectivity is a social fabrication. Finally, Lebbeus Wood’s “Scar” and “Scab” designs (accompanied with commentary by Victor Vitanza) show how an affirmative forgetting is possible in the wake of tyranny and trauma.Item Can non-cognitivism account for ethical explanation?(2014-05) Simpson, Christopher Aaron; Bonevac, Daniel A., 1955-; Dancy, JonathanIn this report I argue that a popular account of the nature of ethical thought and talk -- non-cognitivism -- cannot make sense of our attempts to explain why some things are right or wrong, good or bad, just or unjust. After introducing the process by which we attempt to explain these sorts of ethical features (a process I call ethical explanation), I consider how we might test whether non-cognitivism can account for this process. We can test whether non-cognitivism can account for ethical explanation, I argue, by testing whether non-cognitivism can account for the meanings of ethical explanatory sentences, the sentences we use to express explanatory thoughts in ethics. After considering how non-cognitivism might account for ethical explanatory sentences (and so the thoughts these sentences express), I develop a series of problem cases on which, I argue, no plausible non-cognitivist account of these meanings of these sentences is possible. Because non-cognitivism cannot account for the meanings of ethical explanatory sentences, I conclude, non-cognitivism cannot account for ethical explanation.Item Conceptions of human agency: structural relations among motivational traits, personal value priorites, and regulatory focus(2006) Larkam, Peter Howard; Wicker, Frank W.Personal value priorities, motivational traits, and regulatory focus have been studied independently but little is known about how the constructs relate. The Theory of Universals in Human Values (Schwartz, 1992, 1994, 2005) specifies inherent conflicts and compatibilities within a set of ten universally recognized broad values. The values can be viewed as arranged in a circular fashion, like slices of pie, with two orthogonal axes or diameters. One axis represents trade-offs among individual interests (power, achievement) and social interests (universalism, benevolence). The other axis represents trade-offs among opportunity (self-direction, stimulation) and stability (tradition, conformity, security). Achievement motivation researchers (Heggestad & Kanfer, 2000, Helmreich & Spence, 1978) have identified three motivational traits: (1) mastery - striving for excellence based on internal standards, (2) competitiveness - striving for excellence in comparison to others, and (3) anxiety – stemming from attempts to avoid failure. Higgins (1997, 2001) distinguished two strategies for approaching success: with eagerness (promotion focus) or with caution (prevention focus). In this study, the first to incorporate all three constructs, one hundred sixty working adults (111 males and 49 females, ages 26 to 65) from a multi-utility agency in Texas completed the Schwartz Value Survey (SVS-57), the Motivational Trait Questionnaire (MTQ short form), and the Regulatory Focus Questionnaire (RFQ) in counter-balanced order. Pearson correlations and multi-dimensional scaling provide convergent evidence that motivational trait mastery is correlated positively with opportunity value priorities and negatively with stability value priorities. Conversely, trait motivation anxiety is correlated negatively with opportunity value priorities and positively with stability value priorities. Trait competitiveness is positively correlated with individual-focus value priorities. In other words, mastery and anxiety are aligned primarily along the opportunity/stability axis in the Schwartz Value Model and competitiveness is aligned primarily along the orthogonal individual/social axis. Promotion focus is associated primarily with trait mastery and with self-direction and achievement values. Prevention focus primarily accompanies stability value priorities. The study provides initial evidence that guiding principles for action and choice (values), typical actions and attitudes in achievement settings (motivational traits), and strategic means for accomplishment (regulatory focus) form meaningful and consistent patterns both within and between individuals.Item Cultural origin: effect on the relationship between selected human values and clothing values(Texas Tech University, 1998-08) Momcilovic, Ozrenka GThis study examines clothing as a complex category that includes social, psychological, symbolic, and cultural aspects. The research was based on the assumption that human behavior including clothing behavior is the manifestation of an individual's value system. The study particularly addressed the influence of cultural background on the order of importance of both human and clothing values and the relationship between those two values. The research instrument was designed to measure the degree of importance of six clothing values and eleven human values, and to describe the demographic characteristics of the sample. Data for the study were collected by a mail survey in fall 1997 in Lubbock, Texas. A sample of six hundred women was drawn non-randomly from the membership list of a community-based association. Responses from 231 participants (129 Anglo Americans and 102 Hispanic Americans) were usable. Data were analyzed by using descriptive and inferential statistics. T-test, Pearson r correlation, ANOVA, and Tukey post hoc test were employed for statistical analyses. The results of statistical analyses were sufficient to reject the null hypotheses. Results empirically supported the study's basic assumptions that people with different cultural origins differ in how they rate particular human and clothing values and in the patterns of expressing human values through clothing behavior. Information from this study may be beneficial for better understanding clothing as a multidimensional category and as a form of human behavior. Understanding cultural value patterns both in human and in clothing behaviors may help retailers and marketers in creating adequate value appeal strategies toward distinct cultural market segments.Item Cursing Kṛṣṇa : gender, theodicy, and time in the Mahābhārata(2016-05) Wilson, Jeff Scott; Brereton, Joel P., 1948-; Freiberger, OliverIn this paper, I will discuss the doctrines of theodicy and time in the Mahābhārata, with particular attention to the concept of gender in the epic milieu. I argue that the parallel narratives of Draupadī and Gāndhārī play a central role in establishing what Emily T. Hudson refers to as “the aesthetics of suffering.” Draupadī and Gāndhārī’s respective arguments against Kṛṣṇa, especially, raise a number of crucial theodicean questions that ultimately contribute to the overall argument of the text in regards to the necessity of detachment (vairāgya) and the ravages of Time (kāla). As such, this paper endeavors to provide a reading of the text that contextualizes Draupadī and Gāndhārī’s theodicean arguments in terms of Kṛṣṇa’s identification with the epic’s concept of Time, the interplay of gender and ethics that inform these arguments, and finally, a possible answer to these arguments that incorporates the above insights. In the end, I hope to provide a fitting testament to both the moral and theological depth of the epic as a whole.Item Departing From Frankfurt: moral responsibility and alternative possibilities(2009-12) Palmer, David William; Deigh, John; Kane, Robert, 1938-; Fischer, John; Ginet, Carl; White, Stephen; Woodruff, PaulOne of the most significant questions in ethics is this: under what conditions are people morally responsible for what they do? Assuming that people can only be praised or blamed for actions they perform of their own free will, the particular question that interests me is how we should understand the nature of this freedom – with what kind of freedom must people act, if they are to be morally responsible for what they do? A natural answer to this question – and the one I think is correct – is to point to the freedom to do otherwise. This is encapsulated in the principle of alternative possibilities (PAP), the principle that a person is morally responsible for what he has done only if he could have done otherwise. PAP has led many to believe that the freedom required for moral responsibility must be incompatible with determinism or the existence of God because it is plausible to argue that if determinism is true or if God exists, then people would lack genuine freedom of choice and hence could not be morally responsible for their behavior. In the light of two important articles by Harry Frankfurt almost four decades ago, which challenged the claim that moral responsibility requires the freedom to do otherwise, compatibilism – the opposing view that the freedom for moral responsibility is compatible with determinism – has experienced a resurgence. Inspired by Frankfurt’s work, those wanting to reject PAP – typically compatibilists – attack the principle on two main grounds: directly and indirectly. First, they have argued directly that PAP is false by developing alleged counterexamples to it. Second, they have challenged PAP indirectly by arguing that there are alternative conceptions of freedom from freedom of choice that, it is claimed, are not reliant on alternative possibilities but are sufficient to capture the freedom required for moral responsibility. My dissertation evaluates these two lines of attack on PAP. In particular, I attempt to defend the truth of PAP against both kinds of challenge.Item Divinity and humanity in Aristotle's ethics(2016-08) Green, Jerry, Jr. Dwayne; White, Stephen A. (Stephen Augustus); Dancy, Jonathan; Evans, Mathew; Hankinson, Robert J; Woodruff, Paul; Moss, JessicaAristotle wrote two major ethical works, the Nicomachean Ethics (NE) and Eudemian Ethics (EE), and the relationship between the two has long been a matter of scholarly controversy. To further complicate things, three chapters are printed verbatim in the middle of both works: NE V-VII = EE IV-VI. Without knowing where these so-called ‘Common Books’ properly belong, we cannot know even what constitutes the text of the NE or EE, let alone the relationships between them. The nearly universal consensus is that the Common Books were written as part of the early EE, then revised or replaced for the later NE, at which point the later version supplanted the EE originals even in the EE manuscripts. I argue here that this is likely incorrect: the Common Books do not belong in the NE at all. The NE defends a view where persons are identified with a single part of the soul that (i) is the seat of both theoretical and practical wisdom, and (ii) is divine in a way that makes human happiness the same kind of activity as the gods’ activity. The Common Books reject both these positions, as does the EE. This suggests that the Common Books are philosophically inconsistent with the NE; it is therefore probable the Common Books were neither written as a part of the NE nor revised for inclusion in it. I conclude by defending the results and methodology of this project from various objections, and show how the undisputed NE can still form a complete treatise even without the Common Books.Item Does rationalism rest upon reason alone?(2005) Tubert, Ariela; Sosa, DavidItem Dusting off dirty hands(2013-05) Murphy, Hart Hamilton; Tulis, JeffreyThis paper revisits one of the more frequented stops at the crossroads of politics and morality in contemporary ethical theory, Michael Walzer’s essay “Political Action: The Problem of Dirty Hands.” The aim is to provide a fresh assessment of Walzer’s project, and to evaluate the tenability of its core notion of “dirty hands.” In pursuit of this aim, the effort is made to reopen the paths which take Walzer to his celebrated impasse, from two directions. The first of these resituates Walzer’s analysis in the context of the debate within Anglo-American ethical theory in which it is originally expounded. The second route seeks to recapture the trail of thinkers who guide Walzer to his conclusions from more remote locations in intellectual history, in order to determine the reliability of his intriguing constellation of Machiavelli, Weber and Camus as lodestars. Writing thirty years later, one of Walzer’s friendliest interpreters, Jean Elshtain, in the midst of her enthusiasm for ‘dirty hands,’ renews doubts about his recommendation of “casuistry.” Hints from throughout Walzer’s essay, incompletely elaborated there, are parceled together into closing suggestions as to an alternative approach to so-called ‘dirty hands’ situations.Item Ethical Desire: Betrayal in Contemporary British Fiction(2011-08-08) Kim, Soo YeonThis dissertation investigates representations of betrayal in works by Hanif Kureishi, Salman Rushdie, Irvine Welsh, and Alan Hollinghurst. In rethinking "bad" acts of betrayal as embodying an ethical desire not for the good but for "the better," this dissertation challenges the simplistic good/bad binary as mandated by neo-imperialist, late capitalist, and heteronormative society. In doing so, my project intervenes in the current paradigm of ethical literary criticism, whose focus on the canon and the universal Good gained from it runs a risk of underwriting moral majoritarianism and judgmentalism. I argue that some contemporary narratives of betrayal open up onto a new ethic, insofar as they reveal the unethical totalization assumed in ethical literary criticism's pursuit of the normative Good. The first full chapter analyzes how Kureishi's Intimacy portrays an ethical adultery as it breaks away from the tenacious authority of monogamy in portraying adult intimacy in literature, what I call the narrative of "coupledom." Instead, Intimacy imagines a new narrative of "singledom" unconstrained by the marriage/adultery dyad. In the next chapter on Fury, a novel about Manhattan's celebrity culture, I interrogate the current discourse of cosmopolitanism and propose that Rushdie's novel exposes how both cosmopolitanism and nationalism are turned into political commodities by mediafrenzied and celebrity-obsessed metropolitan cultural politics. In a world where an ethical choice between cosmopolitanism and nationalism is impossible to make, Fury achieves an ethical act of treason against both. The next chapter scrutinizes Mark Renton's "ripping off" of his best mates and his critique of capitalism in Trainspotting and Porno. If Renton betrays his friends in order to leave the plan(e) of capitalism in the original novel, he satirizes the trustworthiness of trust in Porno by crushing his best mate's blind trust in business "ethics" and by ripping him off again. The last full chapter updates the link between aesthetics and ethics in post-AIDS contexts in Hollinghurst's The Line of Beauty. In portraying without judgment beautiful, dark-skinned, dying homosexual bodies, Hollinghurst's novel "fleshes out" the traditional sphere of aesthetics that denies the low and impure pleasures frequently paired with gay sex.Item Ethics in local government : cultivating a robust ethical environment(2015-05) Dory, Mary Christine; Wilson, Robert Hines; Evans, AngelaThis professional report identifies best practices for building and sustaining an ethical environment within local government. A healthy ethical environment benefits governments and citizens alike by safeguarding the public trust and by protecting resources from loss due to fraud, waste or abuse. Ethics are particularly important -- and apparent -- within local government, due to the direct presence of local services in many citizens' lives. The first half of this report applies leadership and development theory to create an ideal operational framework for an ethical environment at the local government level. Specifically, the report finds that strong organizational values, postconventional reasoning, and adaptive leadership should be incorporated into the basic ethical framework of every local government. The second half of this report addresses the sustainability of ethical environments by analyzing the root cause of recurring ethical risk factors within local government. In particular, the report addresses risk factors involving internal controls, conflicts of interest, the limits of managerial discretion, and data transparency. With respect to each of these vulnerabilities, the report provides a set of policy recommendations tailored to the level of local government. The report concludes that while each local government must ultimately adopt the ethics structure that best suits that particular entity’s needs and resources, the following best practices emerge for building and sustaining an ethical environment within local government: respect for the public trust, strong organizational culture that empowers ethical leadership at all levels, regular risk assessment and risk mitigation activities, appreciation of the power of public perception, and commitment to transparency regarding ethical successes and failures.Item Ethics in structural design and mechanical design for live entertainment scenery(2014-05) Vieira, David Vincent; Dawson, Kathryn; Cloyes, Rusty; Dawson, Kathryn M.; Cloyes, RustyScenic construction requires a strong understanding of a range of principles related to construction including: materials strength properties, mechanical components, electrical motor systems, fluid power systems, and finishing techniques. A manager of scenic construction, or a Technical Director (TD), is required to take artistic designs and ideas and create magical elements on stage that are safe for performers, installers, operators, and audiences. In order to create these onstage spectacles, a great deal of planning, engineering, and careful fabrication must take place. There are several ways for a Technical Director to gain the knowledge required to effectively work at any level of entertainment production. This mixed-methods research study asks: what are the ethical standards that guide how a TD’s work is completed? The thesis begins with a review of the job of the Technical Director in Live Entertainment and data from a survey conducted of professionals in scenic technology. Results from the survey were analyzed to provide both quantitative data, in the form of statistics, and qualitative response data. Additional discussion addresses a sample of the resources for structural design support available currently to the field, as well as challenges that some professionals confront in their typical practice. The thesis concludes a review of literature around engineering ethics and liability in engineering practice and recommendations for the incorporation of new ethical standards in live entertainment scenic production.Item I give you my word : the ethics of oral history and digital video interpretation at Texas historic sites(2012-05) Cherian, Antony, 1974-; Roy, Loriene; Norkunas, Martha K.; Galloway, Patricia; Doty, Philip; Seriff, SuzanneThis dissertation examines the process of using oral history and digital video to revise interpretation and represent more inclusive histories at three rural Texas historic sites—-Washington-on-the-Brazos State Historic Site, the Lyndon Baines Johnson State Park, and Varner-Hogg Plantation—-21st century sites that, to varying degrees, have persisted to interpret a Texas master narrative that is no longer socially tolerable in its silencing of marginalized Texas voices. In particular, the dissertation focuses on complicated and rarely discussed ethical issues that surfaced during my work from 2001 to 2006 shooting, editing, and situating interpretive documentary videos at the each of the three sites. Historic sites in Texas, like others across the United States and worldwide, have been receiving increasing pressure from scholars and community groups to represent women, racial minorities, and other marginalized groups more prominently in the narratives they interpret. Oral history and digital media have played key roles in this ongoing movement. Oral history has widely been touted as a tool to democratize history, and advocates of digital video interpretation cite its affordability, relative ease of use, and its ability to “say so much in so little time.” These factors are all the more compelling for local, regional, and state-wide historic sites that are chronically under-funded, under-staffed, and that must often interpret multiple, complicated narratives with very little time or space in which to present them. However, little has been done to explore the unique and complicated ethical issues that arise from using oral history and digital video at historic sites. This dissertation takes a case study approach and uses as its intellectual framework ideas of reflective practice, part of the contemporary discourse among public history practitioners. Each case study introduces the site through a critical analysis of the images and texts produced by the site; presents the central historical silence at each site; describes the solution that oral history and digital video interpretation was expected to provide; and then uses the project’s process-generated video footage and records to examine key situations that led me to raise ethical questions about the individual projects and the overall enterprise.Item Identifying a developmental pattern of the moral reasoning processes prior to Kohlberg's stage one(Texas Tech University, 1988-08) Glover, Rebecca JuneWhile moral reasoning may require an integration of several concepts, no method of examining the development of this apparent "complete" morality prior to the individual's ability to make a Stage 1 moral decision as assessed by Kohlberg (Colby & Kohlberg, 1987) has been developed. This study initiates description of the individual's moral reasoning prior to an ability to make a Stage 1 Kohlbergian judgment and serves as initial identification of a developmental pattern of the integration of skills necessary for understanding issues contained within a Kohlbergian moral dilemma. Young children appear unable to resolve all the concepts/issues contained in Kohlberg's Heinz dilemma. An accurate estimation of early moral reasoning ability might be obtained through delineation of concepts as dilemma resolution occurs. This study's examination of the development of moral reasoning processes attempted to serialize the issues contained within Kohlberg's dilemma through the utilization of Kurt Fischer's (1980) model for skill-building. This study hypothesized that the issues of life and those of law--the underlying issues of the Heinz dilemma-- are scalable as substages within the task domains of Familial Relationships, Sickness/Death, Laws/Rules, and Fairness. Guttman scale analysis was utilized to determine the scalability of the items hypothesized by the investigator to be in each task domain as well as those of higher order skill domains of Care/Life and Justice/Law. Interviews were conducted with 80 subjects--20 subjects in each of these age groups: (1) four years, (2) seven to eight years, (3) nine to ten years, and (4) eleven to twelve years. Guttman scale analyses revealed coefficients sufficient to validate the task domain scales of Laws/Rules and Fairness. While coefficients of the other scales did not reach high,validity levels, these statistics approached values necessary for validation. Comparisons of consistent progression of correct responses across chronological age and mental age, as well as qualitative analyses of the interview transcripts, indicated developmental trends in the issues. The investigator concluded that scaling these issues in order to analyze their progressive development toward Kohlberg's Stage 1 can be accomplished. A revised scale is proposed for future examination of varied populations.
- «
- 1 (current)
- 2
- 3
- »