The senior thesis is emblematic of the kind of intellectual freedom Bard College at Simon’s Rock’s Upper College students are given. It is a year-long, self-designed scholarly project that is the capstone of a student’s work. It’s required of everyone. The thesis is not just an academic requirement for a Simon’s Rock Bachelor of Arts degree, it is work that adds to the world’s storehouse of knowledge.
At the beginning of the thesis project, a formal proposal must be submitted and approved. This collection includes senior thesis proposals beginning in academic year 1998-1999 as well as theses beginning in 2011.
Theses/Dissertations from 2012
Traumatic Brain Injury Rehabilitation: An Analysis of Functional Outcome, Katie Ansel
Power and Public Image in the Cultural Representations of Augustus in Ancient Rome, Claudia Berger
How Much Does it Cost to Buy a Duck?: An Exploration of the Sudbury School Movement, Paige Breisacher
Spiritual Landscapes and Modernization in 21st Century Nepal, Perri Brierley-Bowers
A Citizen: An Examination of Reflections on American Citizenship, Alannah Buford
Political Perspectives of the Flaneuse: Reflections on the DSK Scandal, Katherine Campbell
The Witness and the Cyborg: Adventures in Virtuality, Intimacy, and Politics, Starling Carter
The Importance of Looking Earnest: Performing Identity Through Clothing, Holly Chayes
Examination of Tumor Suppressor cep-1/p53 in Caenorhabditis elegans through RNAi Mechanism and Stress Induction, Cheryl Chen
Oh My Lady Gaga! It's the Grass Mud Horse: An Examination of Chinese Internet Language, Joelle Chevrier
Recent Influences of the West onf Bhutan: Women, Tourism, and Infrastructures, Tshering Choki
Opportunity or Opportunism? Contract Modification in Federal Procurement, Lauren Dahlin
Mushrooms: An Evaluation of Fungi Indigenous to Berkshire County, William Deng
The Blameworthiness of Implicit Bias: A New Theory, Noel Dominguez
The Revolution will Not be Televised, It Will be Live-Streamed, Maeve Dwyer
Investigating the Role of Interleukin 8 Citrullination in Breast Cancer Progression, Emma Ehrlich
Waterfall Crawl: The Use of Challenge to Facilitate Personal Growth in Outdoor Adventure Education, Max Ehrman-Shapiro
Wanderland: An Experiential History of Yellowstone National Park, Elisabeth Ellis
Science Rules: An Examination of the Practice and Purpose of Science Writing, Rachel Feltman
Murder Motifs: Reading Politics and History in Genet's The Maids, Ari Fogelson
How to Tell a Story, or Something Like It, Jordan Frye
"You Shall Know the Truth, and the Truth Shall Make You Odd": Christian Concerns in the Works of Emily Dickinson and Flannery O'Connor, Kathryn Giles
Theatre Contra Theatre: Essays and Plays Toward the Revival of Politics, Elizabeth Glass
A NEAT Training Algorithm for Artificial Neural Networks, Eitan Goldshtrom
Clothing and Power in Late Nineteenth Century Spanish and French Literature and Art, Febianna Gonzalez
The Record Was Always Broken: Rethinking Queerness, Knowledge, and Academia, Michelle Gonzalez
Literary Revisions: Analysis and Art, Jillian Hanley
Agent-Based Financial Modeling with Stock-Flow-Consistent Microfoundations, Will Hayworth
The Importance of Brownfield Remediation for the Environment, Economy and Community Illustrated by the New England Log Homes Site, in Great Barrington, MA, Nicholas B. Hernandez
Creature Comforts, Teegan Jansen
Self Perception of Aging And How It Informs Later Life, Mariah Jeremiah
The Dreamed-For Place: An Artistic Exploration of Aboriginal Australian Songlines and Life Trajectories, Johanna Koons
Home and the World: A Critique of Unschooling's Ideology, Jeffrey Landale
Do You Hear the Bodies? An Exploration of Dance, Fiona Lazar
Fabricating Illness: Reflections on Hypochondria, Jake Levy
"What a vision of lonliness and riot...": Byronic Relationships and the Female Self, Lizzie Meier
Machinations in C++ Major: An Automated Algorithmic Approach to Cooperative Musical Improvisation, William Meltsner
The Conflict of Western Modernity and Japanese Traditionalism in the Fiction of Natsume Sōseki, Ian Myers
Evidence, Nicole Myles
The Way You Did Once: An Intuitive Approach to Directing Collaboration, Kristen Nash
Stranger in Your Own Land: An ethnography of rural schools and Western-educated Asomi in Kenya, Abigail Nehring
Word Vomit: Arab-Jewish Family Thanksgivings in Brooklyn, Israel, Chloe Li Piazza
Ways of Seeing, Natasha Rajaratnam
The People Zindabad (Long Live the People): Political Theatre as a Means for Social Change, Hector Rivera
On the Interpretation of Physical Probability, Sarita Rosenstock
Pipe Dreams - Global Politics and the Political Economy of Energy in Afghanistan, Abdul Samad Sadri
See Self Split: A Cognitive Mapping of Third Generation Mexican American Consciousness, Zooey Salazar
Implications of Faith in Paulo Freire's Pedagogy of the Oppressed: 'Un-doing' the Radical Educator, Mirah Sand
Kiezdeutsch: An Emerging Multiethnolect of German, Barbara Helene Schmehl
Trumpets of God: The Visionary Writings of Hildegard of Bingen and Elisabeth of Schonau, Alexandra Smith
Like is Not Like That: A Linguistic and Social Analysis, Rebecca Solomon
Nevergreen: The nature image commodity in green advertising, Eva Thornton
Making Sense of Scents in Memory, Victor K. Vazquez
Pathway: An Exploration of Bhutanese Film Practices, Kinley Wangmo
In the Desert: Reflections on Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Letter on Poland, Milo Ward
Sweet Beats Are Made of This: An Exploration of Dalcroze Eurhythmics with Students at Simon's Rock, Miles Douglas Wilcox
Making a Stand for Co-Existence: The Makings and Preservation of Cantonese Identity, Michael Xu
candy for candy coated tongues, Lucy Zipple
Theses/Dissertations from 2011
Senior Thesis Proposal, Katie Ansel
From the Few to the Many: Education and the Creation of Three Nations In India, Jamila Benkhoud
Senior Thesis Proposal, Claudia Berger
Senior Thesis Proposal, Juliana Biro
Senior Thesis Proposal, Paige Breisacher
The Roving Jewel "What Are Your Songs About?", Philip Breslow
Senior Thesis Proposal, Alannah Buford
A Garden Enclosed: A Character Study and Performance of Clare from Tennessee Williams’s The Two Character Play, Sinead Byrne
Senior Thesis Proposal, Starling Carter
An Overview of 20th and 21st Century Display Technologies: CRT, LCD, OLED, Kyle Chao
Senior Thesis Proposal, Holly Chayes
Senior Thesis Proposal, Cheryl Chen
Senior Thesis Proposal, Joelle Chevrier
Senior Thesis Proposal, Tshering Choki
OneForm: A Synthesis of the Digital Age, Adrian Cushman
Senior Thesis Proposal, Lauren Dahlin
Senior Thesis Proposal, William Deng
Out West, Off to War: The Frontier in American History and Contemporary Military Culture, Jeff Dietrich
Senior Thesis Proposal, Noel Dominguez
Stories of Three Generations of African Women: Exploring the Past, Healing the Present, Strengthening the Future, Pauline Dongala
Rituals and Remedies: The Supernatural in Medieval Great Britain, Faye Donnelley
Senior Thesis Proposal, Emma Ehrlich
Senior Thesis Proposal, Max Ehrman-Shapiro
Senior Thesis Proposal, Elisabeth Ellis
Senior Thesis Proposal, Rachel Feltman
Senior Thesis Proposal, Ari Fogelson
Senior Thesis Proposal, Jordan Frye
Senior Thesis Proposal, Kathryn Giles
Senior Thesis Proposal, Elizabeth Glass
Senior Thesis Proposal, Michelle Gonzalez
Senior Thesis Proposal, Jillian Hanley
Senior Thesis Proposal, Nicholas Hernandez
The Efficacy of Art Therapy in the Treatment of Psychotic Disorders, Iris Hood
Senior Thesis Proposal, William Hopewell
Comic Books and Graphic Novels in Elite and Popular Culture, Sarah Jacobs
Senior Thesis Proposal, Teegan Jansen
Senior Thesis Proposal, Mariah Jeremiah
Reading in the End Times: Multilinear Writing as the Beginning of New Theory, Cody Jones