Theses and Dissertations at Montana State University (MSU)
Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://scholarworks.montana.edu/handle/1/733
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Item Our bodies, our lives, our right to decide? : reproductive freedom, self-directed dying, and women's autonomy(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2017) Baehr, Ninia Leilani; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Mary MurphyStatement of Problem: Autonomy is a key and evolving concept in American identity. As the bioethical concept of patient autonomy develops and the elderly population in the U.S. grows, end-of-life decisions including self-directed dying are increasingly a matter of public debate. This study explores how veterans of the reproductive freedom movement view, and might be inclined to shape, the right-to-die movement. Methods: Similarities between the abortion movement in the 1960s and early 1970s and the right-to-die movement today were very briefly described to ten women who then participated in oral history interviews. Interviewees were 1) of childbearing age before Roe v. Wade, and 2) supportive of women's access to abortion. Women were asked open-ended questions about their own life experiences and their thoughts about self-directed dying. Results: Interviewees described their experiences with the deaths of loved ones, their personal and professional interactions with the health care system, and their opinions about self-directed dying. Conclusions: Women's personal and cultural backgrounds influenced their understanding of autonomy and the role it can, or should, play in individuals' lives. Commitment to women's self-determination was a shared core value for reproductive freedom veterans that informed their thinking about self-directed dying, but they expressed more concerns about the limitations and potential dangers of personal autonomy in relation to decisions about assisted dying than in relation to decisions about abortion. If engaged more fully, such women might emerge as a force not only to support but also to shape the right-to-die movement. Women who consider assisted dying to be a priority issue may be likely to support somewhat expanding the conditions under which individuals can receive aid in dying. Whether or not they regard assisted dying as important or even desirable, however, women interviewed regard related end-of-life issues, such as advance directives and support for care givers, as important concerns. Taken together, interviewees' input suggests that an inclusive right-to-die movement might place the specific issue of assisted dying in the context of a wider end-of-life movement addressing medical and social justice concerns that could increase the ability of all to live and die as they see fit.Item The function of Woman's Week at Montana State University(Montana State University - Bozeman, 1976) Weisenborn, Donna GravesItem The liberation of the feminine : a psychic view(Montana State University - Bozeman, 1979) Leslie, Cynthia JaneItem An aesthetic framework for the question of indigenous feminism, autonomy and leadership : confronting a history of colonial male dominance(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2016) Zeilinger, Lisa Ann; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Kristin T. RuppelThis research study focuses on the question of whether Indigenous women are successfully assuming leadership positions in order to address critical issues impacting their lives, their families and their communities, despite the historical implications of imposed male dominance since European contact. It explores the various avenues women have undertaken to confront the impacts of male dominance and whether they have advanced in their endeavors to alleviate the struggles and demands of their own lives, the lives of their children and families, as well as their tribal nations. Additionally, the question of whether the feminist movement is relevant to Indigenous women is explored. This research involves a multidisciplinary approach, with a focus on Indigenous methodologies, the determinants of which are covered in the text. Oral interviews have also been incorporated as supporting material, thanks to women participants from the reservations of South Dakota. This exploration of avenues Indigenous women have taken in challenging male dominance illustrates that they are utilizing various approaches to advance healing and growth. Despite such challenges as single parenthood, they are making strides to become educated in order to better address obstacles to healthy communities. Additionally, women are developing organizing strategies in order to confront violence, substance abuse, poverty and lack of education. Likewise, through spirituality, activism and the arts, they are finding a voice of resistance. Through this research study, it has been determined that women are also confronting male dominance that has not only been imposed on their communities from without, but has also pervaded their lives through lateral oppression. Their particular methods of confrontation act as foundational steps toward the creation of healthier lives for themselves, their children and families, their communities and their tribal nations, not only in contemporary times, but for the coming generations. This study is based on the image of the star quilt, an art form common among Indigenous women during the last century. Each point of the star illustrates the path that Indigenous women have taken in their quest to confront male dominance and promote healing for present communities and the generations to come.Item The death of 'postfeminism' : Oprah and the Riot Grrrls talk back(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2002) Copenhagen, Cathy SueThis paper addresses the ways feminism operates in two female literary communities: the televised Oprah Winfrey talk show and book club and the Riot Grrrl zine movement. Both communities are analyzed as ideological responses of women and girls to consumerism, media conglomeration, mainstream appropriation of movements, and postmodern "postfeminist" cultural fragmentation. The far-reaching "Oprah" effect on modem publishing is critiqued, as well as the controversies and contradictions of the effect. Oprah is analyzed as a divided text operating in a late capitalist culture with third wave feminist tactics. The Riot Grrrl movement is discussed as the potential beginning of a fourth wave of feminism. The Grrrls redefine feminism and femininity in their music and writings in zines. The two sites are important to study as they are mainly populated by under represented segments of "postfeminist" society: middle aged women and young girls.Item The effects of the culture wars : debating political ideologies in the university(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2003) Crookston, Beth AnneItem Attitudes toward feminism and their correlates among Montana women(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 1973) Faulkner, Lee G.Item Competing discourses : early strategies for women's rights(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 1999) Fosdick, April Dawn; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Billy G. SmithThe American War for Independence established a sovereign American nation based upon the ideas of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Yet, most Americans were excluded from this discourse. Northern, white, middle-class women were among those denied actual economic, legal, and social independence after the Revolution, remaining under the common law of coveture (or legal dependence on their husband or father). Liberty, independence, and freedom became the basis for defining the American nation as well as masculinity. Thus, many women struggled to form a positive identity within a self-proclaimed “free” nation that kept them subordinate. This study examines the “gendered” construction of the American nation. It also demonstrates how two main groups of white, middle-class women identified with the dominant discourse of white, colonial men. Attention is placed upon the changing (male) rhetoric of the Revolution, the domestic ideology of Catharine Beecher, and the linguistic strategies of the early women’s rights reformers. Ultimately, the excluding definitions that emerged from the Revolution shaped the way many women were able to identify with the new nation. As frustrations among many women increased, strategies among influential middle-class women developed. Two dominant groups of women developed distinct approaches in forming a positive identity for female identity. The domestic reformers, such as Beecher, stressed the female superiority of women and argued that women exclusively should shape the values of America. Women’s rights activists, on the other hand, began developing a rights-based argument that called for an equal and legal footing with men. After the Civil War, women’s rights activists realized that their natural-rights language would not work to break down national and masculine definitions and gain them legal rights. It would take a less threatening rhetoric such as Beecher’s; and thus many suffragists began arguing that women could bring a moralizing influence to politics. In effect, the “competing discourses” of middle-class reformers in antebellum America demonstrate the way white women eventually obtained the vote based upon their female moral abilities.Item An ecofeminist model for wildlife film(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2005) Graziano, Tracy Ann; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Ronald Tobias.The most dominant form of wildlife film for broadcast currently upholds a dangerous separation between culture and nature with production practices, editing and film subtext. If wildlife films are to change and incorporate science, they must also relate that science to other discourses to present the subjectαs greater reality. Wildlife films have a duty to represent their subject fairly, and in that fairness propose a preservation ethic that will serve for many as a stepping-stone to environmental salvation. A look into ecofeminist discourse provides a new methodology for producing wildlife films.Item Bouguereau's 'Nymphs and satyr' : a new interpretation(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Arts & Architecture, 2011) Anderson, Erin Walsh; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Todd LarkinWilliam-Adolphe Bouguereau's sensual painting 'Nymphs and Satyr' (1873) has long stood as a sign of bourgeois frivolity, and an anti-avant garde work often dismissed by artists and critics alike. The subject matter is often incorrectly labeled as being in ideological conflict with Modern works of the period, which were steeped in honest visual representations of daily life. Recent scholars have interpreted the nude female figures in this painting as evidence of nineteenth century female economical and sexual emancipation. No painting can escape polyvalency throughout its lifetime, and therefore will encounter multiple interpretations within the changing cultures it inhabits. This thesis uses theoretical paradigms introduced by psychoanalysis and feminist art historians to seek the truth in the plurality of meanings assigned by cultural determinants. Viewers, regardless of period, are inescapably bound by their own experiences and thus, no singular construction holds universal meaning.