Undergraduate Research Symposium

In order to improve mental health for the University of Minnesota, Morris and the surrounding areas, an online media campaign has been launched to develop awareness, destigmatize, and promote proactive mental health practices. A Facebook page has been created to serve as a tool that discusses various issues within the mental health community and provides information about how to contact available counseling resources. Historically, a mental health Facebook presence at UMM has not existed. A new media source that students are more comfortable with could better impact the student body and surrounding area. Facebook is a popular platform that allows for the creation of webpage like content within the realm of social media. Additionally, this page serves as an independent resource for Student Counseling Services to reach out to the student body in a manner consistent with the current technology. Furthermore, the group created a series of videos with topics surrounding stress reduction, anxiety relief, and proactivity in mental health. The curated videos, as part of an on-going process towards mental health promotion, include various elements of mental health including, but not limited to: stress, coping strategies for stress and anxiety, and proactivity in mental health.
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Since the early 1900s, Hollywood has been the heart of America’s mainstream media. During the 2016 Oscars, the racial ratio in nominees was nonexistent. The issue lies with the representation of stereotypes associated with racial minority groups within the United States, and the lack of positive role models detached from these stereotypes. Since its birth in 2006, YouTube has accumulated over one billion content creators. With so many creators, we would expect a larger representation of racial diversity compared to Hollywood. Via a survey of 100 UMM students ages 18-24, I recorded and analyzed the types of content the students watched, their perceptions of racial diversity on YouTube, and the relationship between subscriber count and pay. Some of the most popular YouTubers are of a racial minority in the United States and are paid over $1 million per year with a few million subscribers. With this, I examined the popularities of Hollywood actors and YouTubers through their amount of pay as a common relationship. As the percentage of racially diverse citizens in the United States increases, it is important to have widespread representation within the media to expand the culture of a global community.

Shakespeare’s stories and themes echo into culture today in shows such as House of Cards and Sons of Anarchy, and in films such as West Side Story, The Lion King, Let the Devil Wear Black, King of Texas, and She’s the Man. This is due not only to his skill at writing, but also the timeless plots and situations he sets within the plays. Literary studies on Shakespeare’s work are available, but there isn’t an abundance of scholarly research on his plays in the disciplines of Rhetoric and Philosophy. This study closes that gap while providing a rhetorical analysis using Bitzer’s Rhetorical Situation as well as Burke’s Dramatism Pentad. The analysis will be of selected cuttings of three popular Shakespeare plays, Julius Caesar, The Merchant of Venice, and King Henry V. In return, this study will yield a better understanding of different Shakespearean persuasion techniques and uses that still find their way in modern language and culture.

As part of a Communication, Media, and Rhetoric (CMR) media activist project we are partnering with #NoDAPL by creating a media portfolio. This media project emcompasses the history of the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) and personal stories generated from the protests. During this project we have created a series of six videos, a collaborative public event, and a social media page. The goal is to work towards creating a statement piece that share accurate information on DAPL and its connection to the University of Minnesota Morris (UMM) in hope of promoting positive action within and beyond the Morris community. Through the process of research on the history and current news of DAPL, shooting video, interviewing, post production, creation of a social media campaign, and visiting the aftermath campsites of DAPL post eviction, we created several multimedia persuasive messages. The videos contain personal stories and interviews on the DAPL subject as well as ideas to encourage activism. In our presentation, we will introduce these videos and discuss our creation process as well as our learned experience. This project will address the connection of the history of UMM with tribal policies involving the U.S. government, the Indian Removal Act of 1830, DAPL, and the personal stories of DAPL protesters. Our hope is to create a political artistic piece that motivates others towards positive action concerning DAPL.

We are all familiar with Netflix, but by conducting a chronological and critical case study on the service utilizing media theory, historical analysis, and contemporary critical analysis of the company’s practices, this project identifies and increases understanding of the corporate ideologies (providing low-cost content of interest to a wide audience) embraced by the company and the entertainment media industry. The media theories reviewed were originally created to describe the context of cable and broadcast television, but are selectively applied to newer media distribution methods such as online internet streaming due to the differences between media forms. The findings of this project point to a trend of media organizations operating on a system of capitalism, navigating and taking advantage of popular culture and consumer desires in a cultural economy. Netflix distinguishes itself by offering the illusion of choice and consumer engagement/agency not seen in other media. In reality, Netflix provides a limited selection of blockbusters and "must-see-TV", thus being beholden to a financial economy. Netflix acts as a culture industry, producing and distributing not only a product (shows, movies, etc.), but lasting cultural impact and significance.

Due to the rise of smart phones and self-publishing sites like Youtube and Vimeo, web distribution has become increasingly viable as a platform to get your content seen. Our directed study group, The C-Squad, has been working together to create a sketch-comedy web series showcasing the humor and talent of our production team. Our core group of seven students has lead this process every step of the way, from writing, to acting and filming, editing, and finally online distribution. By familiarizing ourselves with every step of the content creation process we have become knowledgeable regarding the technology of filming, editing, and audio recording. We have also learned of the amount of time and coordination that goes into creating shot lists, scouting locations, and planning times to shoot together. By discussing our process step by step and showing clips from our program, we hope to illuminate all of the behind the scenes work that goes into creating the content that surrounds us every day.

Sustainability is of great interest to those at the University of Minnesota, Morris, and being in a farming community allows for sustainable food consumption. Though there are opportunities to practice in food sustainability locally, there is a lack of knowledge of these practices on the university campus. Our understanding of the subject and the target audience of university students has led to our belief that a strong social media presence is adequate in providing information about local food sustainability, particularly the Morris Area Farmers Market. A publicity campaign using social media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram provide our target audience with eye-catching information through photos and videos of interviews of students and vendors in order to make the videos more persuasive and have more impact on the audience. We have generated and posted content for these various sites throughout the semester. We have also curated rules of thumb for efficient posts to share with the Board Chair so that the sites may continue to provide information and catch attention. The farmers market occurs mostly during the summer, when there are less students on campus, but there is overlap between the growing and school seasons, as the final farmers market takes place on the campus mall. We hope to increase the student presence at the Morris Area Farmers Market as well as the views to the social media sites, and build a better connection between the campus and community through the summer of 2017.