A Feminist Affective Turn for Public Relations: Mothers, Passionate Publics, and the Childhood Vaccine Debate

This project proposes a feminist intervention in how affect and publics are theorized in public relations research. Drawing from extant literature, I argue that public relations theories of affect and publics have been apolitical and lack depth and context (Leitch & Motion, 2010a). Using the context of the online childhood vaccine debate, I illustrate several theories and concepts of the new feminist affective turn, as well as postmodern theories of affect, relevant to public relations research: (a) Public Feelings, “ugly” feelings, agency, and community (Cvetkovich, 2012; Ngai, 2007); (b) passionate politics (Mouffe, 2014); (c) postmodern assemblages, biopower, and body politics (Deleuze & Guattari, 1988; Foucault, 1984); (d) affective facts and logics of future threats (Massumi, 2010); and (e) affective ethics (Bertleson & Murphie, 2010). Scholarship in the areas of public relations, risk, feminist and postmodern affect theory, and the vaccine debate provided theoretical grounding for this project. My research questions asked: How is feminist affect theory embodied by mothers in the vaccine debate? How do mothers understand risks as affective facts in the vaccine debate (if at all)? What affective logics are used by mothers in the vaccine debate (if any)? And, What are sources of knowledge for mothers in the vaccine debate? Multi-sited online ethnographic methods were used to explore how feminist affect theory contributes to public relations research, including 29 one-on-one in-depth interviews with mothers of young children and participant observation of 15 online discussions about vaccines on parenting websites BabyCenter.com, TheBump.com, and WhatToExpect.com. I used snowball sampling to recruit interview participants and grounded theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) to analyze interview and online data. Results show that feminist affect theory contributes to theoretical and practical knowledge in public relations by politicizing and contextualizing understandings of publics and elucidating how affective facts and logics inform publics’ knowledge and choices, specifically in the context of risk. I also found evidence of suppression of dissent (Martin, 2015) and academic bias in vaccine debate research, which resulted in cultures of silence. Further areas of study included how specific contexts such as motherhood and issues of privilege and access affect publics’ experiences, knowledges, and choices.

Effects of Wingwall Configurations on the Behavior of Integral Abutment Bridges

This research includes parametric studies performed with the use of three-dimensional nonlinear finite element models in order to investigate the effects of cantilever wingwall configurations on the behavior of integral abutment bridges located on straight alignment and zero skew. The parametric studies include all three types of cantilever wingwalls; inline, flared, and U-shaped wingwalls. Bridges analyzed vary in length from 100 to 1200 feet. Soil-structure and soil-pile interaction are included in the analysis. Loadings include dead load in combination with temperature loads in both rising and falling temperatures. Plasticity in the integral abutment piles is investigated by means of nonlinear plasticity models. Cracking in the abutments and stresses in the reinforcing steel are investigated by means of nonlinear concrete models. The effects of wingwall configurations are assessed in terms of stresses in the integral abutment piles, cracking in the abutment walls, stresses in the reinforcing steel of abutment walls, and axial forces induced in the steel girders. The models developed are analyzed for three types of soil behind the abutments and wingwalls; dense sand, medium dense sand, and loose sand. In addition, the models consider both the case of presence and absence of predrilled holes at the top nine feet of piles. The soil around the piles below the predrilled holes consists of very stiff clay. The results indicate that for the stresses in the piles, the critical load is temperature contraction and the most critical parameter is the use of predrilled holes. However, for both the stresses in the reinforcing steel and the axial forces induced in the girders, the critical load is temperature expansion and the critical parameter is the bridge length. In addition, the results indicate that the use of cantilever wingwalls in integral abutment bridges results in an increase in the magnitude of axial forces in the steel girders during temperature expansion and generation of pile plasticity at shorter bridge lengths compared to bridges built without cantilever wingwalls.