Many academic departments at Oberlin have honors programs which provide selected students an opportunity to pursue in-depth research under faculty supervision. Each department establishes its own requirements for the format and deposit of completed projects. In addition to undergraduate honors theses, this collection includes some graduate theses from the periods when Oberlin offered masters degrees, as far back as 1924. Some theses are only available by request.
Theses/Dissertations from 1984
Spain and the Strength of the West: American Foreign Policy Toward Spain, 1936-1953, Abbe J. Lubell
Voltaire, Rousseau and The Revolution in Geneva: 1763-1770, Thomas Luckett
Leon Blum: Socialist and French Premier During the Spanish Civil War, Gail Schechter
Bankers, Diplomats and Oilmen: The United States' Response to Mexican Revolutionary Nationalism, 1917-1927, James F. Siekmeier
A Raid on the Inarticulate: The Problem of Language in the Poetry of W.S. Merwin, Anthony G. Stocks
Figurative Language and Speech Play: A Study of First Grade Children, Dena Weiss-Tisman
Political Language and Trust: A Study in Machiavelli and Hobbes, Lauren Wenzel
Real People Tell the Whole Story: Dialogue and Characterization in Malory's Morte Darthur, Anne Woehrle
Social Drama, Rites of Passage, and The Winter's Tale, Aaron Zitner
Theses/Dissertations from 1983
Mrs. Brook: Confidence Woman and Mother Usurper, Rebecca L. Berg
Jewish Women Reformers and Jewish Immigrant Women: The Columbian Council of Pittsburgh, 1893-1920, Eileen Chotiner
The Secret War of British Intelligence: A Retrospective Study, Frederick S. Downs
From Trusteeship to Containment: American Involvement in Vietnam 1945-1950, Sarah E. Dranoff
Mexican Migration to the United States: An Historical and Contextual Analysis, Jonathan H. Fischer
The Charleston Convent Riot of 1834, Timothy M. Flynn
In Pursuit of Economic Opportunity: Persistence and Mobility in the Rigid Socio-economic Structure of Logansport, Indiana, 1850-1880, Owen R. Glendening
Products and Processes: Levels of Art in Pale Fire, Jon Hamilton
The Child is Mother of the Woman: Parenting and Self-Parenting in Emma and Middlemarch, Andrea E. Lehman
The United States and Naval Limitation: From the Washington Conference to Pearl Harbor, David Jonas Murphy
A Synthesis of Theme and Style: "Prelude" as a Turning Point in the Fiction of Katherine Mansfield, Peggy Orenstein
An Appraisal: George S. Messersmith on the Relationship Between the United States and Germany 1933-1934, Donald C. Philips
Community Power and Powerless Communities: Two Theories of Urban Politics, Jonathan Pincus
Insider Trading Regulations: Effective or Defective?, Paul A. Reeder
Nothing More Real Than Nothing: The Unnamable as Self-Annihilating Fiction, Shawn Rosenheim
Voices in the Wind: American Opposition to the Korean War, Joseph E. Slater
An Intellectual History of the Relationship Between Politics and the Development of Christian Doctrine Between the Councils of Nicea and Constantinople, 325-381, Bradford Scott Gram Swing
Public Insurance, Private Insurance, and the Demand for Hospital Care: Implications for Medicare and Private Contracts, Martin Zelder
Theses/Dissertations from 1982
Sample Selection Bias and the Nature of Unemployment, Joshua David Angrist
Lord Jim and Under Western Eyes: Two Treatments of Guilt and Atonement, Francis Butler
Peace Coalition Politics: The Liberal Experiment, 1954-1965, Steven K. Herrine
The Emergence of Zionism in the U.S. 1900-1948: A Dialectical Analysis, Michael Mossman
The Lesbian Subculture: Characteristics of the Lesbian Minority, Societal Attitudes Toward Lesbianism, Paula C. Rust
Stalinist Collectivization, 1927-1930, Bill Segal
Moving Beyond the Mask: The Progression of Women in Christina Rossetti's Poetry, Marianne Skoczek
Rural Women in Sri Lanka: Family Planning, Work and Development 1945-1978, Sarah Stockwell
Theses/Dissertations from 1981
Structures of Ritual Sacrifice in Abraham and Isaac and Afore Night Come, Misty Baumann
Women's Status and Roles in Contemporary Japanese Society, Schon Beechler
Where Have All the Civil Engineering Students Gone? A Study of Student Choice of Engineering Department, Dan Bernhardt
The Homecoming and The Cherry Orchard: Pinter's Inversion of Chekhov's Subtextual Method, Art Borreca
Ricardian Socialism and Its Impact on the Formation of the British Working Class, Gale Connor
An Argument for Liberating Election Research from its Downsian Bonds, Kenneth J. Fairfax
The Interweaving of Poetry and Dance in Ben Jonson's Masques, Ted Gradman
The Problematic Nature of American Radicalism: Students for a Democratic Society, Peter C. Mancall
Loyalism in Massachusetts: The Characteristics and Motivations of the Harvard Loyalists, Joshua L. Rosenbloom
Sowing the Seed: Oberlin Female Missionary Teachers of Southern Blacks, 1863-1875, Anne Spielberg
Henry Agard Wallace and Latin America (1932-1946): The Limits of American Liberalism, Jason Steiker
Heat Treatment of Lithic Raw Materials: Archaeological Detection and Technological Interpretation, Mary Beth D. Trubitt
Public Opinion on the Death Penalty: The Reasons Behind the Views, Lauren Ungar
England Under Stephen: An Interpretation of King Stephen's Reign Through the Monastic Chronicles of Richard of Hexham, Aelred of Rievaulx, and William of Malmesbury, Eric Stephen Zakim
Antislavery and a Modern America: Free Soil in Ashtabula County, Ohio, 1848, Michael Zakim
Theses/Dissertations from 1980
The Development of Dante's Political Thought: A Quest for Italian Unity, Ronald Henry Bedard
Patterns of Disenchantment: The Position of the Liberal and Labour Party: 1910-1914, Jonathan Broder
Virginia Woolf's Feminism, Laurel A. Fields
Three Homilies of Aelfric and Their Revisions by Wulfstan: A Structural Approach, Susan J. Haas
The Second Berlin Crisis, 1958-1962: Soviet Initiative and United States Response, Jessica J. Houston
Socio-Historical Studies of the National Woman's Party and the National Women's Trade Union League, Janet Ellen Joseph
Prison Design and Prisoner Behavior: Philosophy, Architecture, and Violence, Barbara A. Krancer
Francesco Guicciardini and Philippe De Commynes: Tradition and Innovation in Early Modern Historiography, Alex H. Levine
The Role of the Protagonist in "The Faerie Queene": A Study of the First Three Books, Gretchen Mertz
Julius Caesar in Medieval France: The Textual Sources and Iconography of the Faits des Romains, Mark M. Nelson
"Pianos in the Woods": Emily Dickinson's Imaginative Vision, Steven R. Schindler
DeGaulle, the European: 1961-1966, Leonard V. Smith
Women's Liberation: Is it Smashing the Hothouse?, Wendy Tarnoff
Letters Of Stanley E. Kerr: Volunteer Work With The "Near East Relief" Among Armenians in Marash, 1919-1920, Susan Kerr van de Ven
Theses/Dissertations from 1979
The Gambler's Throw: The German Spring Offensive, 1918, Lorin Mark Burte
John F. Kennedy and the Black Press: 1960 and 1961, Laura D. Coleman
The Three Frances: 1940-1944, Sarah Fishman
Mortuary Metaphor: Location of the Remains of the Deceased as a Symbol of Group Membership, Barbara Allen Fuchsman
Theories of Vision in the Middle Ages, J.E. Griffith
"The Evil that Men do Lives After Them" (Sometimes): A Study of Twentieth Century Analysis of Plato's Political Theory, Merril Hirsch
Felix Vallotton’s Intimites: “Le Cauchemar d’un Erudit”, Lisa Marie Holst
The Emergence of Populism: The Transformation of the North Carolina Farmer's Alliance Into the People's Party, 1886-1892, Douglas A. Johns
The Irish Parliamentary Party and the Liberal Alliance, 1910-1918, Jeffrey A. Mazer
Two Upper Cretaceous Flysch Sequences in the Caribbean Mountains of Venezuela and Their Relationship to Caribbean Tectonics, Stephen A. Meyer
Three Measures of Political Alienation, 1952 to 1976, Michael J. Muha
Matter Made Even: As You Like It, Paul Nadler
Margaret Sanger and Marie Stopes: Feminist Leaders in the Twentieth Century Struggle for Birth Control, Carolyn Pratt
Georgii Valentinovich Plekhanov: And the Determinist Marxism of the Second International, Edward Shlasko
Theses/Dissertations from 1978
The Euclid Avenue Elite Cleveland, Ohio, 1860-1910: Work, Life, and Architecture, Jan Cigliano Hartman
An Analysis of Faunal and Human Osteological Remains from the Eiden Site (33 Ln 14) of Sheffield, Ohio, Karen Elizabeth Dennis
Referrals to Mental Health Treatment Facilities, Laura A. Dummit
Protestant Women Missionaries and the Elevation of Womanhood in Japan 1920-1940, Elizabeth A. Gans
Women in an Evangelical Community: Oberlin 1835-50, Lori D. Ginzberg
"For the General Good…": Changing Institutions in the Town of Plymouth, Massachusetts, 1620-1700, Emily Harris
A Legal History of Affirmative Action, Timothy J. Hoy
The Heart and Mind of Simone de Beauvoir, MaryAnn Janosik
Student Peace Union, Five Years Before the New Left, Howard Metzenberg
The Changing Universe of "Civic Interest" and the Course of Municipal Reform in Chicago, 1886-c.1900, Keith Schlesinger
Post-Industrialism and Normative Technocracy, Allen Shabino
The New Liberalism, 1906-1914: An Analysis of its Impact Upon Britain's Politics, Policies, and People, Nancy Thompson
Occupational Socialization in Two Service Organizations, Doniel E. Weil
Theses/Dissertations from 1977
The Politics of Destruction: The Emergence of Joseph R. McCarthy, Michael H. Barr
Kinship and Community Among Some Black Families in Oberlin, Michael Bobker
Cuban Race Relations and Afro-Cuban Political Activity, 1933-1959, Steve Burkholder
The Nigerian - Bifran Civil War and the American Press: Images and Realties, Linda J. Chiswick
Social Change in the Late Eighteenth Century: Three New Jersey Towns, John B. Gilmour
The Notion of Complexity in the Study of Interest-Group Pluralism, William Frank Jeffers
Uses of Language in Politics: Sequences in Political Campaign Speech Events, Sally Ballog Staruch
Ibsen and Shaw: A Comparison, Katherine Waldbauer
Theses/Dissertations from 1976
An Analysis of Voter Turnout in Cuyahoga County, 1840-1860, Jean M. Anderson
