Everything and the Kitchen Sink; or, Towards an Understanding of a Creative Practice, "Codex Symphonia," Metamodernism, and Rhizomic Composition (open access)

Everything and the Kitchen Sink; or, Towards an Understanding of a Creative Practice, "Codex Symphonia," Metamodernism, and Rhizomic Composition

Creativity is not a hierarchical, but an intertextual, rhizomic process, pulling from a vast array of interests, experiences, and influences. These feed into each other, to inform and motivate artists as creating persons in an ongoing process we call the creative act. Anytime an artist sets out to make something, they are experiencing a dynamic yet concentrated moment of energy in the chaotic cloud of creativity. To demonstrate this, I explore several ideas that inform my piece, Codex Symphonia, including musical influences, but also visual art, film, literature, philosophy, social theory, and politics. In this document, I show that the act of creating a musical work is a deeply personal process that relies heavily on the experiences and vast network of influences on the composer. With this document I look to the contextual structure(s) that point to the possibilities that a work might exist. That is to say that the composition Codex Symphonia is a specific result of an extensive network of ideas and influences not coming from a single origin—it is, in fact all of them together at the same time in a metamodernist act of reconciliation.
Date: May 2023
Creator: Reeder, Kory
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Sowing the Seeds of Stewardship in Texas: An Ethnographic Study of Nature and Visitor Experience at Texas State Parks (open access)

Sowing the Seeds of Stewardship in Texas: An Ethnographic Study of Nature and Visitor Experience at Texas State Parks

This study uses a mixed methods approach to investigate how individuals perceive nature and engage with Texas state park (TSP) programs and resources while also identifying major barriers that visitors perceive/encounter when visiting TSPs. This study looks through the anthropological lens by using theoretical frameworks such as habitus, presentation of the social self, space and place, as well as communities of practice (CoP), to better understand the factors that influence the establishment and maintenance of an individual's relationship to nature and participation in related practices. This study illustrates how an individual's relationship to nature is influenced by experiences in early life that involve activities, landscape or bioregion, and social factors. Relationships with nature are strengthened through social support especially when CoPs are involved. By understanding park visitor experiences through motivations and limitations to participating in the outdoors, parks can expand engagement tactics, foster existing and create new CoP related to nature that aid in the introduction and adoption of outdoor learning and experiences creating lifelong stewards. The study offers recommendations on how TSPs can address visitor barriers and increase nature affinity with the use of targeted outreach and engagement methods through agency interpretive resources and programs with the goal of …
Date: May 2023
Creator: Saintonge, Kenneth C.
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library

The Lived Experiences of Puerto Rican Mental Health Professionals Who Provided Postdisaster Counseling Services to Children

This photovoice study explored the lived experiences of nine Puerto Rican mental health professionals who provided postdisaster counseling services to children. Due to the complex and multilayered experiences of Puerto Rican mental health professionals, this study used intersectionality as the theoretical lens to facilitate thematic analysis of the data. Results from coresearchers' narratives and photographs generated seven major themes: (a) la politiquería of disasters; (b) the impact of compounding disasters; (c) Puerto Rico se levanta: strategies for collective healing; (d) impact of disasters on children; (e) experiences with clients; (f) awareness, action, change; and (g) supporting, connecting, and transforming. The results and discussion provide awareness into the experiences of Puerto Rican clinicians who formed part of disaster response efforts in their own community. Clinical, educational, and research implications are drawn from coresearchers' narratives and insight.
Date: May 2023
Creator: Rodríguez Delgado, Mónica
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Role of Counselor Trainees' Co-Regulated Mindfulness: A Cluster-Randomized Controlled Study (open access)

The Role of Counselor Trainees' Co-Regulated Mindfulness: A Cluster-Randomized Controlled Study

Mindfulness is a practice that has the potential to help counseling students build a variety of skills that are necessary for clinical efficacy, including therapeutic presence, attunement, empathy, cognitive flexibility, and non-reactivity. However, mindfulness is rarely taught to students in mental health training programs, which makes it an untapped possibility to improve counselor education. Additionally, rarely do researchers explore the role of counselor mindfulness and counselor trauma on clients' perceptions of therapeutic presence. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to explore the effects of a 15-week mindfulness training program for counseling students to understand its effect on client's perceptions of therapeutic presence, counselor state mindfulness development, and counselor trauma symptoms. Participants in this cluster-randomized controlled intervention were masters counseling students currently enrolled in clinical practicum accredited by the Counsel for the Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP). Counselors provided data at three timepoints on their state mindfulness, trauma symptoms, and therapeutic presence. Clients provided data at three timepoints on their perceptions of their counselor's therapeutic presence. We analyzed data through repeated measures ANOVA and two-level longitudinal hierarchical linear models. Implications for counselor education, professional counselor development, and future research are offered and limitations are discussed.
Date: May 2023
Creator: Warwick, Lindsey A.
Object Type: Thesis or Dissertation
System: The UNT Digital Library
Texas Register, Volume 48, Number 21, Pages 2639-2782, May 26, 2023 (open access)

Texas Register, Volume 48, Number 21, Pages 2639-2782, May 26, 2023

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.
Date: May 26, 2023
Creator: Texas. Secretary of State.
Object Type: Journal/Magazine/Newsletter
System: The Portal to Texas History