Dissertations by Year
The following dissertations were completed toward the attainment of the Doctor of
Philosophy degree in the Department of Communication.
2013
Allison Weidhaas. An analysis of how female business owners construct and communicate identity.
2012
David Steinweg. Improvisational Music Performance: On-Stage Communication of Power Relationships.
Rachel Anne Binns Terrill. Inside NFL Marriages: A seven year ethnographic study of love and marriage in professional football .
Carly Giesler. Performances of Gender and Sexuality in Extreme Sports Culture.
Steve Schoen. The Rhetoric of Evidence in Recent Documentary Film and Video.
Sarah T. McGhee. Masculinity, Sexuality, and Soccer: An Exploration of Three Sport-for-Social-Change Programs in South Africa.
J. Jacob Jenkins. Community as Metaphor: Dialectical Tensions of a Racially Diverse Organization.
2011
Beverly McClay Borawski, The Construction of Adversarial Growth in the Wake of a HurricaneConstructing
Brian Johnston, Alternative Christian Identities: An Ethnography of Jesus People USA’s Cornerstone Festival
Emily Ryalls, The Culture of Mean: Gender, Race, and Class in Mediated Images of Girls’ Bullying
Julia Barnhill, Giving Meaning to Grief: The Role of Rituals and Stories in Coping with Sudden Family Loss
2010
Rachel Silverman. Coming Out, Becoming, Being and Doing: A Spectrum of Jewish Female Identity in Contemporary Culture and A Call to Action for the Jewish Community.
Daniel Blaeuer. An Ecology of Performance: Gregory Bateson’s Cybernetic Performance.
Matthew Johnson. An Ethnography of the Bay Area Renaissance Festival: Performing Community and Reconfiguring Gender
Elizabeth Edgecomb. Looking Good and Taking Care: Consumer Culture, Identity, and Poor, Minority, Urban Tweens
Sara Dykins Callahan. Where Christ Dies Daily: Performances of Faith at Orlando's Holy Land Experience
2009
Gregory V. Smith. Rhetorics of Fear, Deployment of Identity, and Metal Music Cultures.
Robin Boylorn. Southern Black Women: Their Lived Realities
Jillian Tullis Owen. Communicating Spirituality, Dying and a Good
Death at the End-of-Life: The Role of Hospice Interdisciplinary Team Members
Bouziane Zaid. Public Service Television Policy and National Development
in Morocco
2008
Robert Gonzales. The Drama of Collaborative Creativity: A Rhetorical
Analysis of Hollywood Film Making-of Documentaries
Mary Poole. The Class of '65: Boomers at Sixty Recall Turning Points
That Shaped Their Lives
Angie Day. Family Business Daughters: The Ties that Bind and Divide
Kendall Smith-Sullivan. The Autoethnographic Call: Current Considerations
and Possible Futures
Andrew Herrmann. Socialization and Transitional Academic Identity:
Sensemaking Narratives of the New Communication Faculty
Tony Adams. Learning, Living, and Leaving the Closet: Making Gay
Identity Relational
Gary Carson. Time Bending: Temporal Malleability and Organizational
Response in Crisis Situations
Linda Levitt. Hollywood Forever: Culture, Celebrity, and the Cemetery
Jeanine Minge, Cob Building: Movements and Moments of Survival
2007
Cara Mackie. Achieving Sobriety: A Narrative Investigation of Women,
Identity, and Relationships.
Matt Brooks. Friendships Between Men: Masculinity as as Relational
Experience.
Beth Eschenfelder. Interagency Collaboration and Communication:
Funders and Service Providers Working Together to Create a Management Service Organization.
Patrick Cannon. Communication for Planetary Transformation and
the Drag of Public Conversations: The Case of Landmark Education Corporation.
Shirlan Williams. Graduate Students/Mothers Negotiating Academia
and Family Life: Discourses, Experiences, and Alternatives.
Sandy Cooper. Making Sense of Complex Failure: The Case of 9/11.
Adi Thelen. Narrative Efforts at Social Redemption by People with
AIDS/HIV.
2006
Wang, Zhong (June). Inside and Outside Multinational Corporations:
Evolutional Identities of Researcher and Researched.
Vangelis, Linda. Communicating Change: An Ethnography of Women's
Sensemaking on Hormone Replacement Therapies, Menopause, and the Women's Health
Initiative.
2005
Malcolm, Nigel. One More River to Cross: The Therapeutic Rhetoric
of Race and the Post-Civil Rights Era.
Moreman, Shane. Performativity and the Latina/o-White Hybrid Identity:
Performing the Textual Self.
Davis, Christine. A Future With Hope: The Social Construction of
Hope, Help, and Dialogic Reconciliation in a Community Children’s Mental Health
System of Care.
Gao, Hongmei. The Invisible Handshake: Interpreting the Job-Seeking
Communication of Foreign-Born Chinese in the U.S.
Walker, Deborah. Motive and Identity in the Narratives of Community
Service Volunteers.
Curry, Elizabeth. Communicating Collaboration and Empowerment:
A Research Novel of Relationships with Domestic Violence Workers.
Reffue, John. A Rhetoric of Sports Talk Radio.
2004
Asmuth, Margaret (Vi). Developing and Sustaining Interpersonal
Relationships Between Certified Nursing Assistants and Residents in Long-Term Care
Facilities.
Kodish, Slavica. Trust Unbound: The Meaning of
Trusting Organizational Relationships.
Shouse, Eric. Outlaw heroes and road warriors: Standup comedy and
the quest for fame.
2003
Baglia, William J. Building masculinity: Viagra and the performance
of sexual health.
Bean, Cynthia. Framing and sensemaking in organizational change:
The experience of nomadic work.
George, Joan. Flat chests and crossed eyes: Scrutinizing minor
bodily stigma through the lens of cosmetic surgery.
Hemmat, Allen. Transformation aspects of culturally distant mystical
and religious texts.
Kreisher, Robert. Developing organizational development: Alienation
and organizing in the age of information.
Leoutsakas, Dennis. The orphan tales: Real and imagined stories
of parental loss.
2002
Arrington, Michael. Recreating ourselves: Stigma, identity changes,
and narrative reconstruction among prostate cancer survivors.
Foster, Elissa. Intimate strangers: Relational communication between
hospice volunteers and patients.
Goodier, Bethany. Sustaining the spirit: Creating a sanctuary for
living, working, and healing.
Kohl, Virginia. From arm-chair philosophy to social agency: A case
study in participatory action research with the humanities of Florida.
Ostrenko, Margaret. Learning conversations at a marine science
center.
2001
Cox, Dennis E. "Smile honey, our church is watching": Identity
and role conflict in the pastoral marriage.
Ellingson, Laura J. Communicating across disciplines: A feminist
ethnography collaboration on a geriatric oncology team.
Frame, Melissa J. Blind spots: The stigmatizing experiences of
being invisibly visually impaired.
Golombisky, Kimberly D. Unexcused absences: Education discourses
on women's sport, student-on-student sexual harassment, and gender equity advocacy.
Gregory, Kimberly Weller. Don't sweat the small stuff: Employee
identity in the new economy.
Hirschmann, Krista. Fidelity and fecundity: The performance of
sex communication between parents and children and patients and physicians.
Makagon, Daniel. When the ball drops: Disrupting Times Square's
fantasy.
Perry, Judith L. Sibling relationships and care of parents: Deconstructing
memoirs and personal narratives.
Singh, G'han. Romancing the tar baby: Performance, representation
and the emotional economy of cross-racial sex.
Strauman, Elena. The doctor's stories: A narrative analysis of
physicians in the news.
Woodward, Thomas. Aroused from dogmatic slumber: A rhetorical history
of the intelligent design movement.
2000
Andrews-Crotwell, Linda. The Hillsborough River Greenways Task
Force: An ethnographic study of collaboration for the love of a river.
Berger, Leigh. Messianic Judaism: Searching the spirit.
Rand, Honey. In the public interest: A story of conflict, communication,
and change in Tampa Bay's water wars.
1999
Laine-Timmerman, Linda E. Living the mystery: The emotional experience
of floor nursing.
Winn, John Emmett. Negotiating class through contemporary Hollywood
cinema.
1998
Austin, Deborah. Understanding close relationships among African
Americans in the context of the Million Man March.
French, Daniel B. Through the eyes of the comic mask: An ethnographic
exploration of the identity of a stand-up comedian.
Jago, Barbara J. Ambivalence and agency: Women's narratives of
father-absence.
Jones, Janna. The downtown picture palace: The significance of
place, memory and cinema.
Murphy, Alexandra G. Managing "nowhere": The changing organizational
performance of air travel.
Pupchek, Leanne. Home and native land: Imagining "Canada" in the
style of indigenous art.
Tillman-Healy, Lisa. Life projects: A narrative ethnography of
gay-straight friendship.
1997
Cherry, Keith P. Ain't no grave deep enough: An ethnographic study
of a residential facility for homeless people with AIDS.
Grant, Charles Henry III. Physician-patient communication in accrual
to trial interviews.
Sells, Laura. Toward a feminist critical rhetoric: Subjectivity,
performance, and the body in feminist public address.
1996
Olive, Tonja E. Cultural and collective stories of health and illness:
An analysis of women's stories and media representations of breast cancer.
Simpson, Timothy A. Contesting community: Memory, place, and culture
in Ybor City, Florida.
1995
Kiesinger, Christine. Anorexic and bulimic lives: Making sense
of food and eating.
Moberg, Virgil B. Foreign correspondent films: A form for knowing.
Peterson, Lori W. The influence of sharing a semantic link on social
support in work relationships at a hospital.