Can’t Afford the Manolos? Buy the Book!: Chick Lit & Contemporary Consumerism

At the airport, across from the magazines at Wal-Mart, and probably somewhere near the front of local bookstores — chick lit is everywhere. One would probably recognize it from a distance as a sea of shiny pink1, the small glossy paperbacks cheerfully beckoning from their carefully constructed display. Chick lit has exploded into the western2 market over the last decade, captivating millions of readers with their tales of young, urban professional women navigating the worlds of careers, relationships, and of course, shopping. By the end of the novel, each of these components is generally resolved in somewhat formulaic fashion

Dialectics of Diaspora Space: a Study of Contemporary, Diasporic, South Asian Fiction

In light of these continuing debates concerning immigration, national identity and belonging, re-examinations of immigrant and ethnic communities, often referred to as ‘diaspora,’ have become increasingly popular and prudent. Khachig Tololian, editor of Diaspora magazine, calls diaspora “exemplary communities of the transnational moment.”5 In an increasingly globalized world, where labor, capital, and resources are passed fluidly from continent to continent, diaspora are created by relocation or displacement of immigrant workers and their descendents.6 For these unskilled, immigrant laborers, middle class immigrants, and the children of both groups, adaptation to the culture, society, and life in a new ‘host’ country can be difficult, to say the least. So, in response to a new cultural landscape and a tenuous sense belonging, as well as to maintain a connection with a shared past, citizens of the world’s numerous diaspora replicate linguistic, cultural, and social norms, creating their own “cultural space[s]” that mirror and often replace a past relationship to their land of origin, or ‘home’.

You Shall Have No Other Gods Before Me: Covenant in Faith and History

In this paper I have attempted to explore "covenant" in faith and history, as it extends throughout the entire framework of the Bible and the entire history of the people who produced it. With such a monstrous topic, a comprehensive analysis of the material could take a lifetime to do it justice. Therefore, I have taken a very specific approach to the material in order to investigate the evolution of covenant from the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) to the Christian Scriptures (New Testament). I have made every effort to approach this thesis as a text-based, non-doctrinal discussion. However, having my own religious convictions, it has, at times, been difficult to recognize and escape my biases. Nevertheless, I am confident that this final product is, for the most part, objective and free from dogmatism. Of course, I have brought my own perspective and understanding to the material, which may be different from the reader's, so there may be matters of interpretation on which we differ, but c 'est fa vie in the world of religious dialogue. The structure of this paper is symmetrical: Part I examines the traditions of the Torah and the Prophets; Part II, the Gospels and Paul's letters. I have balanced the Old Testament against the New Testament (the Torah against the Gospels; the Prophets against Paul) in order to give approximately equal weight to the two traditions, and establish a sense of parallelism in the structure of my overall work. A word should also be said about three matters of style. First, instead of the customary Christian designation of time as B.C. or A.D., I have opted to use the more modem B.C.E. (Before the Common Era) and C.E. (Common Era) notations. This more recent system is less traditional; however, more acceptable in academic and, certainly, more appropriate for a non-doctrinal discussion. Second, in the body of this paper I have chosen to highlight several texts using a variety of colors. This highlighting serves (1) to call the reader's attention to specific passages, and (2) to compare the language and imagery of similar texts. All highlighting has been added to the texts at my own discretion. Finally, the divine name, traditionally vocalized as "Yahweh," is a verbal form of the Hebrew "to be," and means, approximately, "I am who I am." This name was considered too holy to pronounce by the ancient Israelites, and, the word adonai ("My LORD") was used in its stead. In respect of this tradition, I have left the divine name in its original Hebrew form. Accordingly, should be read as "the LORD" throughout this paper. All Hebrew and Greek translations, where they occur, are my own. The Greek translations are based on the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible.

Consumed by Faith: The development of Christian Fundamentalism and its applications in contemporary society

My research aims to understand how and why fundamentalists justify violence against people who do not fit their profile of "righteous" or "saved" persons, such as abortion doctors and clinic workers, gays and lesbians, and Jews. The first section of this paper travels through the history of fundamentalism since its origins in the British and American apocalipticism, or belief in the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. However, my history of Protestant Fundamentalism in the United States will focus on the ways in which Fundamentalism developed in response to many changes in American social structure. I interpret Fundamentalism as an anti-modern movement seeking to reassert "traditional" Christian values.

Man-Made Menopause

In this study I suggest that there are three distinct time periods mark new developments in society’s understanding of menopause, Victorian America in the mid and late nineteenth century, mid-twentieth century America, and contemporary America. This is the case not only in terms of advances in biological science, but also the ways in which the medical establishment has viewed menopause has also changed, and in terms of changes in prevalent gender assumptions. In this paper I hope to expose the ways science, history, and society has medicalized menopause, and the ways in which menopause has been viewed by individual women, their health care providers, and society as a whole more generally. I also wish to expose the fact that how we have come to think about menopause is by no means simply the result of value-free, objective science and medicine.