Open access institutional repositories (OA IRs) are electronic systems that capture, preserve, and provide access to the scholarly digital work of an institution. As a new channel of scholarly communications IRs offer faculty a new way to disseminate their work to a wider audience, which in turn can increase the visibility to their work and impact factors, and at the same time increase institutions prestige and value. However, despite the increased popularity of IRs in numbers, research shows that IRs remain thinly populated in large part due to faculty reluctance to participate. There have been studies on the topic of open access repositories with the focus on external factors (social or technological context) that affect faculty attitudes towards participation in IRs, and there is a lack of understanding of the internal factors and the psychology of the reluctance. The goal of this mix method study was to identify the overall factors that affect faculty attitudes towards participation in IRs and examine the extent to which these factors influenced faculty willingness to participate in IRs. First, from literature review and the Model of Factors Affecting Faculty Self-Archiving this study identified eleven factors that influenced faculty members' intention to participate in OA …

The environmental problems associated with the boom in hydraulic fracturing or "fracking," such as anthropogenic earthquakes and groundwater contamination, have motivated some citizens living in affected areas such as Denton, Texas to form movements with the goal of imposing greater regulation on the industry. As responses to an environmental threat that is localized and yet mobile, these anti-fracking movements must construct rhetorical appeals with complicated relationships to place. In this thesis, I examine the anti-fracking movement in Denton, Texas in a series of three rhetorical analyses. In the first, I compared fracking bans used by Frack Free Denton and State College, Pennsylvania to distinguish the argumentative claims that are dependent on the politics of place, and affect strategies localities must use in resisting natural gas extraction. In the second, I compare campaign strategies that use local identity as a way of invoking legitimacy, which reinforces narrative frameworks of environmental risk. In the third, I conduct and analyze interviews with anti-fracking leaders who described the narrative of their movement, which highlighted tensions in the rhetorical construction of a movement as local. Altogether, this thesis traces the rhetorical conception of place across the rhetoric of the anti-fracking movement in Denton, Texas, while …

Keep Denton Beautiful (KDB) is inspired by Keep America Beautiful's model of community engagement to create a clean, beautiful, and vibrant city. The community mural initiative, Artscapes, aims to enliven public spaces, abate graffiti, and inspire community members to keep Denton, Texas, clean and beautiful. The goals of this research project are to understand the impact of Artscapes initiative, community perceptions of public art, and find ways KDB can better align future mural projects with the needs and desires of community members. By talking to artists that have worked with KDB, members of the mural art committee, and community members from the neighborhoods that have existing murals, this research provides input from these three populations to continue creating public art for the Denton community. I discuss the context of my work through Lefebvre's concept of "Right to the City," Rafael Schacter's opposition between sanctioned and non-sanctioned murals, Bourdieu's concept of symbolic and social capital, and David Harvey's work on neoliberalism and the entrepreneurial city.

Dataset generated for the University of North Texas Libraries collection tabulating information about materials orders, cataloging, and circulation organized by call numbers.

Dataset generated for the University of North Texas Libraries collection tabulating information about materials orders, cataloging, and circulation organized by call numbers.

Dataset generated for the University of North Texas Libraries collection tabulating information about materials orders, cataloging, and circulation organized by call numbers.

Annual report of the UNT Libraries for fiscal year 2011-2012, including highlights of each division's programs and services throughout the year as well as overall financial statistics.

Dataset generated for the University of North Texas Libraries collection tabulating the number of items published by decade within each subject area.

Dataset generated for the University of North Texas Libraries collection tabulating information about materials orders, cataloging, and circulation organized by call numbers.

Photograph of a male speaker at the masters commencement ceremony for the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The speaker is dressed in green and black graduation regalia. There are people seated in the background, watching the speaker.

Photograph of students at the masters commencement ceremony at the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The students are wearing black robes with white and gold stoles. There are people seated in the background, watching the graduates. Several of them smile towards the stage, while others look off to the side.

Photograph of students standing at the masters commencement ceremony at the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The students are wearing black graduation robes, white and gold stoles, and blue medals. There are people seated in the background, watching the ceremony.

Photograph of a male student at the masters commencement ceremony for the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The student is wearing a black graduation robe with a gold, white and green stole. He is walking across the graduation stage and shaking a presenter's hand. The presenter is wearing green and black graduation regalia with a large silver medal around his neck. There are people seated in the background, watching the ceremony.

Photograph of a female student at the masters commencement ceremony for the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The student is wearing a black graduation robe with a white and green stole. She is walking across the graduation stage and shaking a presenter's hand. The presenter is wearing green and black graduation regalia with a large silver medal around his neck. There are people seated in the background, watching the ceremony.

Photograph of students at the masters commencement ceremony at the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The students are standing in line, waiting to walk across the graduation stage. They are wearing black robes with gold and white stoles. There are people seated in the background, watching the ceremony.

Photograph of a male student at the masters commencement ceremony at the University of the North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The student is walking across the stage and shaking hands with a presenter dressed in green and black graduation regalia. There are other academic administrators and academia dressed in colorful regalia standing on stage. There are people seated in the background, watching the ceremony.

Photograph of a student at the masters commencement ceremony at the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The student is walking across the stage and shaking hands with a presenter dressed in green and black graduation regalia. The student is wearing black robes with a blue, white, green and gold stole. There are people seated in the background, watching the ceremony.

Photograph of academic administrators and academia onstage at the May 2010 masters commencement ceremony at the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. They are dressed in black, green, blue, red and gold academic regalia. There are people seated in the background, watching the ceremony.

Photograph of male and female students at the masters commencement ceremony at the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The students are waiting in line to walk across the stage and receive their degrees. There is a member of the academic administration dressed in white and green regalia standing to the right of the photograph.

Photograph of a female student dressed in graduation regalia at the masters commencement ceremony at the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. She is wearing a black robe with a green and brown stole and black cords. There is a male student standing behind her.

Photograph of two female students dressed in black graduation regalia at the masters commencement ceremony at the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The student on the right is wearing a brown and green stole. There are other students standing in the background.

Photograph of a female student in black graduation regalia at the masters commencement ceremony for the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. There are other students standing behind her.

Photograph of two female students dressed in black graduation regalia at the masters commencement ceremony for the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The woman to the right looks down.

Photograph of students standing at the masters commencement ceremony at the University of North Texas, in Denton, Texas. The students are wearing black graduation robes with white and gold stoles. Friends and family members sit in the stands in the background, watching the students on the floor.