Browsing by Author "Claycomb, Ryan, committee member"

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Open Access
I kin sea slugs: awkward kin, inhuman horror, and queering encounter in Octavia Butler's Dawn
(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2023) Witter, Genevieve, author; Badia, Lynn, advisor; Claycomb, Ryan, committee member; Chatterjee, Sushmita, committee member
Anthropocentrism is rooted in narratives of evolutionary teleology and the human/nonhuman binary which exalts the human, homo sapiens, as the dominant Earth species, and taxonomizes nonhuman species according to human value systems. Octavia Butler's science-fiction novel, Dawn, raises important questions about the human as an identity category, according to anthropocentrism, and as a species. By introducing a multispecies encounter with an extraterrestrial species, Butler troubles our understanding of what it means to be human. Butler queers human-centric notions of ecology and evolutionary teleology through her protagonist, Lilith, as she attempts to adapt to a radically different, and at times hostile, environment. Lilith's horror for both the Oankali, humanity's alien rescuers, and the potential for an inhuman future, prompted by a hybrid-species zygote, introduce an opportunity to dissect human abjection for the non-/in-human and to overcome anthropocentric discomfort with human vulnerability to the nonhuman. Joining the conversation with Lee Edelman's theory of reproductive futurity, Donna J. Haraway's concept of sympoiesis, and Julia Kristeva's essay on abjection, this argument examines Lilith's fear for the inhuman to discuss the ways in which anthropocentric ideology jeopardizes humanity's ability to take action amidst the worsening climate crisis. As nonhuman Earth species' fate becomes increasingly tied to humanity's ability to responsibly address climate change, we need to reevaluate the way that humanity situates itself in multispecies Earth ecologies.
Open Access
Near, far, wherever you are: the relationship between historic-based conspiracy theories, emotions, and information engagement will go on and on
(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2025) Klane, Megan Sandra, author; Anderson, Ashley, advisor; Abrams, Katherine, committee member; Claycomb, Ryan, committee member
It is often said that there are three words in the English language that are known throughout the world: God, Coca-Cola, and Titanic. The RMS Titanic has captivated individuals since her conception in 1911, but her legacy was penned in the history books when the "unsinkable ship" hit an iceberg and sank on April 15th, 1912. While history books, historians, and maritime experts acknowledge the facts surrounding the Titanic and her sinking, conspiracy theories put the official narratives into question. While research has been conducted on the Titanic and on conspiracy theories about her, communication research has minimally studied this phenomenon. Instead, communication literature primarily focuses on political conspiracy theories, the characteristics of conspiracy theories, and how algorithms promote conspiracy theories on social media. However, the influence of conspiracy theories further lies in their relationship with human emotion and how they retain the ability to elicit both positive and negative emotions. Similarly, emotion possesses a relationship with how individuals engage with information via information seeking and scanning – when individuals either actively seek information about a topic or passively encounter information about a topic. The objective of this study was to determine the relationship between historic-based conspiracy theories, emotions, and information engagement. To do so, an experiment was conducted whereby participants were randomly exposed to either a video containing a conspiracy theory about the sinking of the RMS Titanic or a video containing purely factual information about the sinking of the RMS Titanic. Participants then answered a survey regarding both the emotions they experienced after watching their respective videos, and how they perceive themselves engaging with information about the Titanic on various social media platforms. In the end, this research determined that a relationship does, indeed, exist between historic-based conspiracy theories, emotions, and information engagement. The findings revealed that participants who were exposed to the conspiracy theory video not only experienced greater levels of positive emotion, but the results also illustrated how positive emotion mediates information seeking and information scanning. As a result, these findings aid in closing the gap in communication literature while also serving as the foundation for future research to be conducted on this phenomenon.