Browsing by Author "Dickson, Donald B."

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    Electromagnetic Induction for Improved Target Location and Segregation Using Spatial Point Pattern Analysis with Applications to Historic Battlegrounds and UXO Remediation
    (2010-10-12) Pierce, Carl J.; Everett, Mark E.; Mathewson, Christopher C.; Dickson, Donald B.; Zhan, Hongbin
    Remediation of unexploded ordnance (UXO) and prioritization of excavation procedures for archaeological artifacts using electromagnetic (EM) induction are studied in this dissertation. Lowering of the false alarm rates that require excavation and artifact excavation prioritization can reduce the costs associated with unnecessary procedures. Data were taken over 5 areas at the San Jacinto Battleground near Houston, Texas, using an EM-63 metal detection instrument. The areas were selected using the archaeological concepts of cultural and natural formation processes applied to what is thought to be areas that were involved in the 1836 Battle of San Jacinto. Innovative use of a Statistical Point Pattern Analysis (PPA) is employed to identify clustering of EM anomalies. The K-function uses point {x,y} data to look for possible clusters in relation to other points in the data set. The clusters once identified using K-function will be further examined for classification and prioritization using the Weighted K-function. The Weighted K-function uses a third variable such as millivolt values or time decay to aid in segregation and prioritization of anomalies present. Once the anomalies of interest are identified, their locations are determined using the Gi-Statistics Technique. The Gi*-Statistic uses the individual Cartesian{x, y} points as origin locations to establish a range of distances to other cluster points in the data set. The segregation and location of anomalies supplied by this analysis will have several benefits. Prioritization of excavations will narrow down what areas should be excavated first. Anomalies of interest can be located to guide excavation procedures within the areas surveyed. Knowing what anomalies are of greater importance than others will help to lower false alarm rates for UXO remediation or for archaeological artifact selection. Knowing significant anomaly location will reduce the number of excavations which will subsequently save time and money. The procedures and analyses presented here are an interdisciplinary compilation of geophysics, archaeology and statistical analysis brought together for the first time to examine problems associated with UXO remediation as well as archaeological artifact selection at historic battlegrounds using electromagnetic data.
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    Gimme That Real Old Time Religion: Re-embedding White Identities Through Ethnic Neo-Pagan Reconfigurations of European Heritage in Texas
    (2015-08-05) Furth, Brett H; Green, Thomas; Dannhaeuser, Norbert; Dickson, Donald B.; Del Negro, Giovanna
    According to social theorists, Westerners are increasingly inter-connected with other societies through the complex processes of modernity and globalization, thereby creating an increasingly multiethnic and religiously pluralistic world still dominated by the rationalism of modernity. Consequently, their world is disenchanted and their identities disembedded from traditional contexts, thus placing many individuals in a state of identity crisis. For working and middle-class white Americans, this problem is exacerbated by the unmarkedness of white racial identities, and the subsumption of ancestral ethnic European identities within this unmarked racial category. This dilemma has led some to question and challenge the authenticity and legitimacy of their religious identities and traditions, and to develop strategies to re-embed, revalorize, and refashion their racial and class identities. My research offers an investigation of one such strategy, specifically that employed by Neo-Pagans with an ethnic focus. I explore how recent traditions compose a new strategy that is attractive to white Americans seeking to re-root and give new meanings to their racial and religious identities. Furthermore, I suggest that a key reason some are drawn to and mark identification with ethnic Neo-Pagan traditions is a desire to refashion ethnoreligious identities to re-embed themselves in a re-enchanted physical and social world where ethnic ancestry and whiteness matter in new ways. This research is guided by the following questions: How might ethnic Neo-Pagan options mitigate the foregoing dilemma experienced by primarily white and working or middle-class adherents? What potential benefits come with identification with these traditions? Are ethnic Neo-Pagans concerned with legitimacy and authenticity as they reconstruct European folk traditions and histories, and how might those practices and narratives conflate European ethnicities into newly revalorized forms of whiteness? These questions are addressed through a combination of qualitative data-collection methods. Interview and participant observation data for this project were collected at diverse Neo-Pagan field sites in Texas. I identified and analyzed themes of ethnic heritage and ancestry that emerged from these data to determine how they bear on prominent race and class performance theories, particularly regarding questions about changing constructions of race, ethnicity, and religious identities in response to globalization.
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    Wrestling with Ssireum: Korean Folk Game vs. Globalization
    (2012-10-19) Sparks, Christopher A.; Green, Thomas A.; Balfour, Stephen; Dickson, Donald B.; Werner, Cynthia A.
    Ssireum is a Korean form of grappling. Wrestlers grip sashes that are looped around their opponent's waist and thigh while competing inside a sand circle with the goal of making any part of their opponent's body above the knee touch the ground. In Korea ssireum is understood to be a national sport developed during the country’s modernization in the early 20th century that has origins as a thousands-of-years-old folk game. By the start of 21st century ssireum's popularity had waned and a once prosperous professional league collapsed. The effects of globalization are frequently cited as the cause. However, the sport continues to be played at various levels throughout the public education system in addition to semi-pro and amateur leagues. This dissertation asks the question, "What does it mean collectively to play ssireum?" The answer comes from fifteen months of participant observation and interviews in Korea's collegiate ssireum league. The goal is to establish the first major body of academic information about ssireum and to place it within the larger cultural context of contemporary Korean society. Fieldwork data is interpreted using theories drawn from Roger Abrahams, Fredrik Barth, Pierre Bourdieu, and Eric Hobsbawm. Ssireum's ritualized use of symbols appropriated from the past is a means of maintaining the boundaries of an ethnic identity that allows everyone involved to assume they are "playing the same game." Ssireum is a vehicle for negotiating, performing, and evaluating a unique identity. For those involved, playing ssireum makes Koreanness. Ssireum dramatizes a traditional identity which has incorporated distinctly modern ideologies about the world. The relationships of people within ssireum are inextricably linked to existing protocols for social interactions in Korea; recruitment of talent, training regimens, competition events, future careers, and industry solvency could not be maintained otherwise. Globalization, frequently invoked in the rhetoric about ssireum, fills contradictory roles of boogeyman and savior, and misdirects attention away from counterproductive internal processes damaging the industry.