Ruhlman Conference

Arianna Regalado '18 explores the Jesuit movements in Asia during the 16th century, the challenges they faced, and the transmission of Christianity to Japan that followed into the 20th century.

Pelumi Botti '16 evaluates the methods and policies adopted by postcolonial governments to rid the capitals of Tanzania and Nigeria of harmful colonial legacies and thus decolonize the African urban space.

Rita Marquez '16, Alejandra Cuin Miranda '16, and Andrea Aguilar '16 chose to produce a podcast about ethnic studies classes in high school for their course on the Politics of Inequality.

Hannah Ruebeck '16 examines the implementation and effects of India's school-based iron supplementation program. Iron-deficiency anemia is the most widespread nutritional deficiency in India. More than half of school aged children there are anemic. In 2013, India's federal government instituted the Iron and Folic Acid Supplementation Program. Hannah uses school-level program uptake data to study the variation in implementation of the IFASP.

Gloria Samen '18 looks at how and why human trafficking exists and persists and ways that people and groups can use our economic agency to create meaningful change.

Emily Schultz '15 looks at Catalonia, the wealthiest of Spain’s 17 autonomous communities. It has its own language, a long history, and its own parliament and government. Does this mean it should become an independent nation? Within the past few years the Catalan independence movement has intrigued many, and has become the focus of her senior honors thesis. Emily discusses her research on the many political, historical, cultural, and social roots of Catalan nationalism. She also outlines how has this nationalist sentiment has changed over time in response to Spain’s complicated history of economic crises and political dictatorships.

Sophia Vale '17 and Jessica Yung '17 examine Murakami's work in the context of Japanese and global history, pop culture, and his uniquely scripted personal life. Despite their international popularity, his works remain enigmatic. Murakami’s short stories and novels are wild, surreal journeys that are, at once, entertaining and full of meaning, even if the meanings are difficult to unpack. Sophia and Jessica address how Murakami uses his literature to comment on modernity and westernization in Japan, the role of women in his fiction, as well as the complex, philosophical themes that he captures in his texts.

Seraphina Oney '16 examines Margaret of Anjou, one of England’s most infamous medieval queens. Villified by Shakespeare, Margaret was coined a "she-wolf of France" like one of her predecessors, Isabella of France. Margaret had the unfortunate luck of being married to a king who was unable to rule. In addition to lacking the militaristic qualities that made his father such a famed ruler, Henry VI also inherited a form of schizophrenia through his Valois ancestors, which incapacitated him as a ruler. The next in line to the throne was Margaret’s infant son, Edward. Margaret’s unusual upbringing allowed her to step up to head the Lancastrians without hesitation. Margaret led the Lancastrians on behalf of her son against the Yorks during the Wars of the Roses until the defeat of her son at the Battle of Tewkesbury. Margaret’s power clearly evolved throughout the various stages of womanhood, and the extent of her power was directly linked to the degree to which she was able to lead the Lancastrians in England.

Elaine Tang '15 asks if lower levels of Social Security benefits force retirees to move from high-cost to low-cost locations. We know little about how levels of Social Security benefits influence elderly migration and location choice which may have important implications for the welfare of the elderly, especially if it affects their proximity to their children. A simple comparison of retirees with higher versus lower benefit levels is problematic since the two groups systematically differ in many ways. I shed light on this question by exploiting the natural experiment of the Social Security “notch” to examine the effects of an exogenous change in Social Security benefits on where the elderly live.

Kathleen Zhu '15 looks at Cuba to see if democracy is the key to differential outcomes in the treatment of the global HIV epidemic. There are 35.3 million people living with HIV/AIDS, with 1.6 million deaths from AIDS annually. But the prevalence rate and mortality rate are not evenly distributed internationally, as 95% of HIV infections occur in the developing world. The HIV epidemic varies dramatically from country to country; for instance the estimated HIV prevalence rate in Thailand is 1.1% yet it is as high as 17.9% in South Africa. Some countries respond swiftly to the epidemic, while other countries take many years to initiate a meaningful response. Why does the overall HIV outcome and response vary dramatically from country to country? Although I originally hypothesized that democratic governments face greater pressure from their citizens to address the HIV epidemic, and thus would have a stronger response, I have found that this is often not the case. I have found that autocratic countries can respond highly effectively, while democratic countries struggle.

Iris Lin '15 and Marika Psyhojos '15 examine the factors behind the drastic decrease in the rate of non-urgent care sought by ER patients in the last 20 years. They debunk the myth that non-urgent patients alone cause EDs to be overpriced, over-packed, and overused. As a result of a number of health economic trends and forces, only 8-12% of patients in the ED today seek non-urgent care (NHAMCS, 2011). Certainly, there is room to reduce health care spending due to non-urgent ED visits (and we discuss the current efforts to do so), but many current economic calculations of average and marginal costs grossly overestimate the potential for savings.

Isabella Dougherty '15 examines the Veterans Affairs Disability Compensation (VADC) program, which provides cash benefits for qualifying disabled veterans. It has been growing rapidly since 2001. The drivers of the program’s growth are not well understood with worsening health as one possible driver, but recent liberalizations of medical eligibility criteria may also play a role. This study deconstructs the recent growth in the VADC program into the share due to worsening veteran health and the share due to other factors. She uses NHIS data to estimate the relationship between health and receipt of VADC benefits in the late 1990s, and then use those estimates with the actual health of recent veterans to project the share of today’s veterans that would be on the program if eligibility criteria had not changed. Findings may help policy makers as they consider how to balance the needs of wounded veterans against rapidly rising program expenditures.

Zoe Magid '15 and Elena Scott-Kakures '15 examine whether Tea Partiers are actually ideologically distinct from Republicans. What causes such an anticipated gap will allow them to further explore the Tea Party, its relationship to the GOP, and their futures in American politics. They are interested in resolving these questions, and learning about the ideological composition of Tea Party members. Though some existing literature has predicted a swift end to the Tea Party, much as with the Occupy movement, the Tea Party is still strong today. Zoe and Elena explore just how this movement has adapted over time, and through this, predict what could be in store for their future position in politics.

Oset Babur '15 pinpoints the influences of eurosceptic parties in the European Union, by focusing on the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) and the Danish People’s Party (DPP). Euroscepticism will be broken down into ’hard’ and ’soft’ branches, based on the kinds of impacts suggested by each parties; a ’soft’ influence over the concern of state sovereignty might be a party’s decision to support discourse that is skeptical of a united Europe, while a ’hard’ influence may be proposing legislative motions to leave the EU on grounds of a lack of accountability between EU institutions and member governments. The talk will conclude by looking forward at the future of Eurosceptic parties, and hypothesizing about their continued impact on EU enlargement and integration, as well as the impacts they will have on their local political systems.

Abigail L. Golden '15 relates her experience in the Calderwood Seminar on Environmental Communication and Synthesis, taught by Jay Tuner. Bee pollination is required to produce over 35 percent of world food crops and, since 2004, honeybees have been mysteriously dying at alarming rates. In order to learn more about the status of local bees, Abigail attended a meeting of the Norfolk County Beekeeper’s Association (NCBA), where she met and interviewed Tony Lulek. Lulek is the former president and current Bee School Director for the NCBA. He also owns and operates Little Beehive Farm in Holliston, Massachusetts.

Tiffany K. Chan '15 describes her Calderwood interview with Wellesley biologist Yui Suzuki. Suzuki is an evolutionary-developmental biologist who focuses his research on insect metamorphosis and regeneration. By conducting embryonic studies on several different insect species, he studies the change and control of developmental processes both throughout an individual’s lifetime but also in the evolutionary context of a species. Tiffany interviewed Suzuki as the final assignment for my Calderwood Seminar: Biology in the News. She not only introduces an emerging field of Biology but also showcases Suzuki’s path into the sciences.

Two Wellesley students describe their experiences in the inaugural year for the Calderwood Seminars in Public Writing. Seminar goals include empowering students’ voices; engaging in public writing; and having students respond to their peers. Most seminars required students to conduct an interview with professional in their field as final assignment — the capstone of a capstone course. Jody interviewed Gina Maranto, a prize-winning science writer. Dania interviewed Biology professor Heather Mattila.

Lauren Chen '14 looks at Argo, North by Northwest, and Friends with Benefits as examples of filmic self-reflexivity. Film is a medium in which realistic representation not only combines but also collides with fantasy, where these two contradictory elements of storytelling both intertwine and coalesce to create new perspectives. Film is a marriage of the real and the fake, the building and breaking down of illusion that helps to create cinematic perspective.

Katherine Leung '14 looks at 5 landmark Supreme Court cases which forever altered the landscape of American privacy law and the permissibility of Americans’ decisions about how to construct their families. She explores the legal, social and cultural ramifications of legislating the American family ideal. These cases were decided by nine men, and influenced by the men and women who challenged antimiscegenation laws, birth control bans and abortion restrictions. This talk explores the development of these cases -- notably McLaughlin v. Florida and Griswold v Connecticut -- and how they shaped the American family.

Emma Rackstraw '14 captures some of the longer-term effects (up to a decade later) for the recipients of the Honduran Conditional Cash Transfer program, PRAF. The simplicity of giving money to the poor for a specific and pre-approved purpose appeals to many stakeholders in the field of development, from policymakers to economists. In education policy, conditional cash transfers have been found effective in improving school attendance/ enrollment and short-term learning, as well as lowering child labor supply; however, the effects have only been studied after a relatively short time period after the transfer. The ultimate goal of investment in education to get some return to that investment through an improvement in children’s long-term well-being. The results of Emma's thesis not only help answer questions about the effectiveness of PRAF in the context of Honduras, but will also begin to fill a substantial void in our knowledge of long-term poverty alleviation strategies.

Michelle Lam '14 discusses the impact of China's stimulus package known as "Appliances to the Countryside. The 2008 financial crisis sent shock waves throughout the world and spurred incredible reactions, one of which was China’s $4 trillion RMB stimulus. In addition to stimulating the economy in the short run, the package also aimed to increase living standards of those in rural areas and to jumpstart a culture of consumption. Starting with pilots run in 2007, the Chinese government paid a 13% subsidy to rural households who purchased qualifying domestically-produced household electric appliances. This program was eventually implemented nationwide in 2009. My research seeks to evaluate the effect on purchases of home electric appliances and other outcomes of interest.

Emily Weddle '14 shows how patronesses like the Princesse de Polignac and Coco Chanel contributed greatly to the Ballet Russes. The troupe dominated the avant-garde world of early twentieth century Paris with ballets that brought together the greatest artistic and musical minds of the time. Their ascent into stardom was realized through the hard work of figures like Igor Stravinsky, Erik Satie, Pablo Picasso, and their founder Serge Diaghilev. Very few scholars have recognized these women for their significant contributions to the musical, artistic, and financial aspects of the Ballets Russes. Their involvement included work on productions such as Parade, Les Noces and Le Train Bleu, and these women’s roles greatly affected the legacy of the Ballets Russes. (Research supported by the Jerome A. Schiff Fellowship)

Lauren Richmond '14 describes the role of the Whitney Museum in defining the character, canon, and history of American art in its opening years (1931- 1937). In the early twentieth-century United States, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney became one of the most important patrons of American art. Her efforts to promote American artists, whom she believed did not have enough support in the art market, eventually culminated in the founding of the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. It was one of the first institutions in the country focusing exclusively on American art. The story it was crafting was often at odds with the one being shaped just blocks away at the Museum of Modern Art.

Talia Schwartz ' 14 looks at preschool peer pairs, examining whether preschool children understood the differences in peer relationships. She used a story that featured characters that had a range of relationship levels with the protagonist. Subsequently, children were interviewed about relationships with real peers. Talia hypothesized that children would distinguish between playmates and friends, that real friends would be associated with emotional support, and that playmates would provide companionship more than non-friends.

Frances G. Leeson '14 describes how Jackie "Moms" Mabley directly contributed to the civil rights movement while assuaging the difficult process of achieving consensus within activist movements. Although women are often excluded in the popular memory of both the civil rights movement and black comics in the United States, the most financially successful, and arguably influential, black comedian of the 1960s was Jackie “Moms” Mabley. She appeared on stage as a bedraggled, grandmother figure that boldly asserted her sexual desires while slyly critiquing segregation, the United States government, and incongruous behavior within majority and minority populations. Through a study of Jackie Mabley and the communities she created around her comedy, Frances found justification to broaden our definitions for political action and activism.

Priscilla Gutierrez '13 looks at the acquisition and experience of privilege among female students on elite liberal arts college campuses, both single-sex and co-educational. Researcher Shamus Khan understands “privilege” as the ability to be at ease in a multitude of social situations and to function facilely within these situations. While it is a skill proven to be desirable in both school and the job market, only certain lifestyles and institutions, such as elite boarding schools, have traditionally fostered its development. Using longitudinal data from the New England Consortium on Assessment and Student Learning (NECASL), I compare the ways in which female students of different races/ethnicities and socioeconomic statuses experience and acquire privilege. Ultimately, I seek to determine whether this type of embodied cultural capital becomes a tool of social mobility or social reproduction in the lives of college students. (Research supported by a Schiff Fellowship)

Danielle Callendar '13 examines the gains black students make during their undergraduate careers. This study focuses on black students at five highly ranked, highly selective liberal arts colleges. It will offer a view of how these students navigate their college campuses and develop their professional and academic goals during and after college. Essentially, the study aims to provide a more nuanced perspective on the influence of race and class on college student academic decisions.

Michelle Cho' 13 suggests that Disney has become a dominant storyteller for children all over the world, and has proven to be very influential in fostering belief systems based on race and gender. The Disney Princess Franchise has attracted many young girls and has created a consumer culture. Despite Disney's wholesome image, its “Princess Phenomenon” must be examined in order to question the gender roles that are being propagated. The Disney Princess products are more than entertainment, as the products are encoded with messages, which aid children in making sense of their world. What are the gender roles that Disney fosters through the Disney Princess franchise? What messages is it sending to young girls and what are the consequences? (Research supported by the 2012 Summer Research Program in Social Sciences at Wellesley College)

Katie Smiley '14 notes that openness to new experiences tends to decrease in late life. But is this a foregone conclusion, or can openness increase? In a recent study, researchers explored the effect of internal control (i.e., the perception that the outcome of an event depends on their behavior) on the trajectory of openness in late life. Participants in the study were enrolled in a volunteer training program or were simply part of a volunteer discussion group. After the training program had been concluded, researchers found that individuals who were trained and had high internal control actually increased in openness. Additionally, this trend of increasing openness was found to have not only continued, but also shown the most significant change one year after the study had been completed. Join us as we use a nationally representative sample to explore whether higher internal control really is the key to increasing openness in late life.

Elizabeth Brown '13 considers the economic valuation of slaves in the decade prior to the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade in 1808. This project reconstructs the narrative of African women within the slave markets of New Orleans: the largest slave trading site in North America. Female bodies were subjected to a persistent economic and ideological valuation by the varied actors who participated in the market – slave, trader and planter – who commodified and attempted to dehumanize the slave, necessarily and intentionally reducing enslaved women “to the simplicity of a pure form: a person with a price.” By considering the valuation and ownership of productive and reproductive labors as the abolition of the trade loomed imminent, this project considers the ways in which enslaved women countered this process, shaping their sense of self and exercising personal agency within the confines of the market.

Kathleen Sprague' 13 describes her research on the efficacy of the Intenational Criminal Tribunal of the Former Yugoslavia. Her fieldwork was conducted in Sanski Most, a small town in northwestern Bosnia.

Kelsey Ridge '13 explores Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, Othello, and Cymbeline. One senses a common thread: men who falsely suspect that their female partners of sexually infidelity. However, despite the similarity of their original offense, each man is punished differently, and these plays reach startlingly different outcomes and falls into a different genre. Scholars have long wondered why. Examining the plays reveals important dissimilarities between these men, their partners, and their relationships, and as the plot and the characters unfold, the couples are driven towards diverse endings. Claudio, barely punished, gets a happy ending. Othello, though, is brutally punished. Finally, Posthumus, also roughly punished, finally understands how to redeem himself and save his marriage. By rewarding some actions and choices with happy endings and condemning others to sorrow and death, Shakespeare paints a picture about the importance of a certain kind of love and bond in a healthy and strong relationship.

Sara Simon '13 describes how in his late teens and early twenties, Ernest Hemingway began his professional writing career with newspaper articles for the Kansas City Star and the Toronto Star. These were no minor jobs; for the Toronto Star alone, Hemingway wrote 172 pieces. For decades, scholars have identified this early work in journalism as a significant training experience that influenced Hemingway’s creative writing. Her thesis project takes this point an important step further. Through a collection of close readings, she argues that Hemingway’s early short stories and novels can only be fully appreciated and understood through a detailed examination of his journalism.

Megan Turchi '13 analyzes how cafés in Boston represent more than just places where one quickly stops to get his or her morning coffee. The diversity seen through Boston's many distinct neighborhoods is portrayed through the atmosphere and ambiance witnessed in cafés. Through the observation of the type of coffee and food sold, customers, physical layout, employees, and ambiance, cafés seem to create an atmosphere of familiarity and comfort for their customers. After observing Crema Café in Harvard Square, Trident Books in Back Bay, and Caffe dello Sport in the North End, it appears that these cafés establish neighborhood specific cultural codes, in order to turn an otherwise public space into a more private setting pertaining to the customers' needs. City dwellers use these cultural codes to feel a sense of belonging in their own neighborhood, so they can better relate to Boston as a whole.

Previous research suggests that women of African descent have relatively healthy attitudes about their appearance – especially those with a strong racial identity. This study was designed to be a quantitative assessment of the body image concerns of college-aged women. The current inquiry builds on a previous study that explored body image in other ethnic/cultural populations. For purposes of this study, I focused on students of African descent. Surveys were administered to participants about aspects of their body esteem. Preliminary findings, using SPSS for statistical analysis, indicate that women of African descent are particularly happy with their ethnically-salient features, such as noses or lips. Possible explanations for how women of African descent form body esteem in a western context will be discussed.

Jane Qu '14, took Literature and Medicine, a course that intersects the power of medicine with the power of words. Inspired from her experiences volunteering on the Biography Project at a nursing home, her final project focused on the elderly population and combined creative writing and research. Greater involvement in elderly well-being has become crucial given the projected increase of this age group in our population. Her talk highlights the stories and thoughts of nursing home residents across different countries, delving not only into their past experiences and memories, but also into the physical and emotional concerns that come with aging.

Shelby Robertson, a Mellon Mays fellow, discusses how Japanese writer Junichiro Tanizaki (b. 1886–d.1965) explores the theme of man's desire for self destruction and self torture through his heroes' masochistic pursuit of beautiful but cruel women. Tanizaki’s protagonists deliberately draw out the wicked nature of the objects of their desire, molding them into femme fatales who eventually sadistically persecute their creator. The usually detached protagonists make a distorted attempt at correcting their feelings of alienation from society through the sense of purpose and passion provided by their pursuit of an unattainable feminine beauty.

Katie Hargreaves '13 examines the three faces of the narcissism construct – covert, overt, and adaptive -- and explores how each of these relates to aspects of body image in a sample of 175 Wellesley students. Previous research found that overt and covert narcissism correlate in opposite directions with body esteem. The present study expands upon the previous research by assessing all three types of narcissism and using a wider range of body image measures including body surveillance, control, shame, and exhibitionism.

Danielle Milagre Pimenta's research focuses on the Escondidinho favela (shantytown) that houses almost 6,000 people in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. As with most favelas in Rio, Escondidinho residents have lived under the power of brutal drug factions for decades. The government implemented the Pacification Program in 2008 to combat the growing power of drug factions in preparation for the hosting of the 2014 Soccer World Cup and the 2016 Summer Olympics. The program is considered to be human centered and so successful that it has been implemented in other cities and also abroad. Using a feminist security approach that seeks to highlight often unheard voices and narratives, I interviewed Escondidinho residents to uncover how the police occupation of their community has impacted their human security. I concluded that the program falls short at providing residents with the human security that residents desire.

Few people know that the iconic garçonne, or flapper, style of the 1920s emerged during the years 1908–1914: in this era, women began shedding their cumbersome skirts and corsets in favor of flexible foundations and a youthful, slim silhouette. Because World War I is usually considered the catalyst for garçonne fashions, however, the crucial transitional period of the Belle Epoque is frequently overlooked. During the Belle Epoque, attitudes towards the female body became more positive as pleasure during sexual intimacy became more acceptable and as seductive lingerie came into fashion. Exercise for women also became popular, challenging the ideal of the delicate female body; sportswear did not disguise and constrict the female body to the same degree as everyday fashions. Both of these cultural developments reinforced changing attitudes towards women’s bodies, leading to 1910s fashions that idealized a natural, modern female body shape.

This study explored two factors, perceived sociocultural and maternal pressures relating to a thin body type, and their effect on ’126 female college students’ body image satisfaction and maladaptive eating behaviors.  Using regression analyses, these two factors were explored to determine which was the better predictor of poor body image and eating problems in women.  Results showed that higher levels of both perceived sociocultural and maternal pressures relating to a thin body type were strong independent predictors of poorer body image.  However, as for maladaptive eating behaviors, once perceived sociocultural pressures were controlled for, maternal pressures no longer significantly predicted maladaptive eating behaviors. Implications, including the role of informational and normative social influence, are discussed.

Tenzin Dongchung ’13, Peace and Justice Studies Advisor: Catia Confortini, Peace and Justice Studies History is a testament to the fact that apart from few separate cases, the Tibetan struggle has consistently adhered to nonviolent means, whether it is in the government’s attempt at negotiation or ordinary Tibetans’ participation in protests around the world. However, the recent series of self-immolations erupting inside Tibet questions both the prospects and sustenance of a nonviolent Tibetan movement. I analyze three successful nonviolent movements; India’s struggle for independence, America’s civil rights movement and Egypt’s revolution. Drawing from an evaluation of features that made these movements successful, the two central questions that arise are: how can we use the lessons of other movements to strengthen or reflect differently on the Tibetan struggle?  What does this process reveal to us about the unique challenges and limitations that the Tibetan struggle faces.

So, You Want to Invent a Language? (panel discussion) Pendleton Hall West 212 Taylor Bass ’13, Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences, Rachel Haberman ’12, Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences, Crystal Luttrell ’13, Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences , Alexandra Ostolaza ’13, Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences, and Ariel Robinson ’13, Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences Advisor: Angela Carpenter, Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences While invented languages have been around for centuries, they have become more visible in recent years through movies such as Avatar’s Na’vi, video games, and other media. What does it take to invent a linguistically-sound language? Members of LING 315 tackled that challenge with exciting results. Come along with us as we discuss the process, the problems and the end-result of building a language from the ground up. Each of us has a completely different language with its accompanying culture. We will share with you how we created the culture and built the sounds, the words and the syntax of our languages. We hope you will be inspired by the possibilities!

"Time Zones" is a collection of original poems by Hallie Santo. The collection, which will be presented in three parts, will consist of about twenty free-verse poems, one of which is a longer poem cycle. The poems deal with problems arising from the passage of time - among them death, aging, estrangements, and uneasy reunions - while others meditate on the paradoxes associated with time in the abstract. Several of the poems are autobiographical, in keeping with the tradition of confessional poetry espoused by the likes of Allen Ginsberg, Sylvia Plath, and Robert Lowell.

The Volunteer's Dilemma is a social dilemma or public goods "game" in which players "volunteer" to contribute in order to produce a public good. Volunteering is costly, and only one volunteer is needed for all players to enjoy the full benefit of the public good. I use the tools of evolutionary game theory to explore the nature of equilibria that arise in this game. Do the players who consistently choose not to contribute tend to be evolutionarily strongest? Are volunteers typically be those who have the lowest cost of contribution? How does the size of the group effect these tendencies? The answers to these questions help us characterize the game and make predictions about the characteristics and settings that are likely to be associated with volunteerism. I then use the predictions to motivate a laboratory experiment designed to study the empirical determinants of volunteerism.

We seek to understand electrostatic determinants of protein binding. Electrostatics are both commonly manipulated in design and relevant to protein recognition. This project aims to map out electrostatic contributions to protein-protein binding as they relate to structural components of proteins. By systematically using a continuum electrostatics model on a large set of protein complexes, we quantify the electrostatic contributions of protein structural elements including distal and local regions of proteins and backbone and side chain residue contributions. This study will also address whether protein specificity and promiscuity correlate to electrostatic component contribution and whether trends exist among proteins when correlated to monopole, fold, or size. By using many protein structures, statistically significant trends may be elucidated.

In 2000, the Nisga’a Final Agreement came into force and created an unprecedented form of aboriginal self-government in Canada. The Nisga’a nation’s experiment with a “third order” government is an example of Canada’s liberal commitment to accommodating the minority group needs of its multicultural citizenry. A debate centers on whether sovereign aboriginal nations can be born from aboriginal treaty rights protected in the Canadian Constitution, and highlights the threat of the Nisga’a Constitution upon the Canadian Constitution’s supremacy.

Thomas Mann stayed in the closet his entire life. He used his work, such as Death in Venice, to explore his secret desires. Vladimir Nabokov was a homophobe who hated Mann’s “topical trash.” His novel Pale Fire seems, at first, to correlate with his public aversion to homosexuality. Both authors, however, had more complex attitudes toward queer sexuality. These can be uncovered by examining the way they form their narratives. My work looks at how narrative strategy is used to shape the reader’s relationship with queer desire and, in doing so, uncovers the hidden affinities between these two complicated men.

In Spenser’s epic poem The Faerie Queene (1590/96), the imaginary country of Fairy Land contains moveable kingdoms and an elastic time-space continuum. Many critics believe that Fairy Land is a pure allegorical construct, not to be understood as a physical place, or the haphazard result of poor poetic planning. But what if Spenser had another influence? This project seeks to link Spenser’s work with that of the German cosmographer Sebastian Münster. More than mapmaking, cosmography sought to create a unified description of the entire world with little regard for accuracy.