VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
The Dramaturgy of Appropriation: How Canadian Playwrights Use and Abuse Shakespeare and Chekhov

Both theatre and drama were imported to Canada from European colonizing nations, and as such the canonical master-texts of European drama, particularly the works of Shakespeare, have always occupied a prominent place in Canadian theatre. This presents a challenge for living Canadian playwrights, whose most revered role model is also their most dangerous competition, and whose desire to represent the spectrum of contemporary Canadian experience on stage is often at odds with the preferences of many producers and spectators for the “classics.” Since the 1990s, a number of Canadian playwrights have attempted to challenge the role of canonical plays and the values they represent by appropriating and critiquing them in plays of their own, creating a body of work which disturbs conventional distinctions between “adaptations” and “originals.” This study describes and analyzes the adaptive dramaturgies used by recent Canadian playwrights to appropriate canonical plays, question the privileged place they occupy in Canadian culture, expose the exclusionary hierarchies they legitimate, and claim centre stage for Canadian perspectives which have hitherto been waiting in the wings. It examines how playwrights challenge, usurp, or exploit the cultural capital of the canon by “re-citing” old plays in new works, how they or their producers attempt to frame the reception of their plays in order to address cultural biases against adaptation, and how audiences respond. This study draws from and builds upon contemporary theories of adaptation and particularly (Canadian) Shakespeare adaptation, seeking an understanding of adaptation based on the motives, tactics, and efficacy of adaptation. Simultaneously, it challenges the dominance of “Shakespeare,” in critical as well as theatrical practice, by comparing appropriations of Shakespeare to appropriations of Chekhov which exhibit similar tactics and motives.

Keywords: drama
theatre
dramaturgy
Canadian drama
Canadian theatre
adaptation
Shakespeare
Chekhov
Shakespeare adaptation
Chekhov adaptation
Canadian Shakespeare adaptation
appropriation
Sears, Djanet
O'Brien, Michael
Sherman, Jason
Nutting, Kristine
Mad Boy Chronicle
Harlem Duet
The Three Sisters: A Black Opera in Three Acts
After the Orchard
dramaturgy of adaptation
reception studies
Canonicity
Advisor: Copeland, Nancy
Fathers, Daughters and Masculinity in Crisis

This thesis engages with what has become a ubiquitous term in masculinity studies: “crisis”. I argue that the invocation of “crisis” which implies catastrophe, disaster and trauma, and the favorable reception of this invocation both in academic and popular thinking about men, has resulted in a rush to defend and reauthorize aspects of the masculine ideal. The defense of traditional masculinity risks re-entangling men with masculinity and masculinity with patriarchy. The retying of these categorical knots challenges the deconstruction of gender that feminism and early men’s studies carried out in the second half of the twentieth century in the name of equal rights and in the name of freeing both men and women from having to conform to rigid gender stereotypes – particularly in the home. In recent work by J.M. Coetzee, John Banville and Ian McEwan the male protagonists are fathers who are forced to address a crisis of authority and legitimacy. In the first three chapters I argue that fatherhood in these novels is the site wherein the masculine ideal is least likely to be deconstructed and as such, it is in the context of the relationship between father and daughter that I argue heteromasculinity is most powerfully constructed, maintained and defended. In the fourth chapter I consider Alison Bechdel’s graphic memoir Fun Home which provides a queer take on male crisis and father-daughter relationships and which represents female masculinity as a counter to the pressure to reauthorize heteromasculinity for the next historical turn.

Keywords: Gender
Family Relationships
Masculinity Studies
Contemporary Fiction
Advisor: Kortenaar, Neil ten
Nature and Function of the Signaling Complex Formed by the M2 Muscarinic Cholinergic Receptor

G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) are known to exist as oligomers, but there is much uncertainty over the oligomeric size, the number of interacting G proteins and the stability of that interaction. The present approach to these questions has been threefold. Monomers of the M2 muscarinic receptor were purified from Spodoptera frugiperda (Sf9) cells and reconstituted in phospholipid vesicles, where they spontaneously formed tetramers. The size of the reconstituted complex was determined from its electrophoretic mobility after cross-linking and inferred from a quantitative, model-based assessment of cooperative effects in the binding of two muscarinic antagonists: N-methylscopolamine and quinuclidinylbenzilate. Binding of the agonist oxotremorine-M to receptor reconstituted with purified G proteins revealed at least three classes of sites that interconverted from higher to lower affinity upon the addition of guanylylimidotriphosphate (GMP-PNP). The binding properties resemble those of muscarinic receptors in myocardial preparations, thereby implying the existence of tetramers in native tissues. G proteins that copurify with the M2 receptor from cardiac membranes also were found to exist as oligomers, some of which contain both alpha(o) and alpha(i2), and the purified complexes contained receptor and G protein in near-equal amounts. A tetrameric receptor implies a tetramer of G proteins, a conclusion that is supported by the distribution of sites between different states identified in the binding of [35S]GTPgammaS to the purified complex. Covalent adducts of a GPCR fused to a Galpha-subunit provide a model system in which the relationship between receptor and G protein complex is defined with respect to stability and composition. Such a fusion of the M2 receptor and Galpha(i1) underwent a cleavage near the amino terminus of the alpha-subunit, however, flagging the likelihood of similar effects in other such adducts. Truncation of the amino terminus prior to fusion generated a stable product that revealed GMP-PNP-sensitive, biphasic binding of oxotremorine-M and noncompetitive interactions between N-methylscopolamine and quinuclidinylbenzilate. A covalent RG complex therefore exhibits the functional properties of M2 receptors in native systems. These observations are consistent with the notion that signaling through the M2 receptor occurs via cooperative interactions within a stable complex that comprises four receptors and four G proteins.

Keywords: G protein-coupled receptor
Oligomers
Cooperativity
Heterotrimeric G proteins
Signaling
Advisor: Wells, James W.
Structure, Mechanism and Chemical Modulation of the Protein Kinase-nuclease Dual-enzyme IRE1

Perturbations that derail the proper folding and assembly of proteins in the endoplasmic retriculum (ER) cause misfolded protein accrual in the ER – a toxic condition known as ER stress. The Unfolded Protein Response (UPR) is a signaling system evolved to detect and rectify ER stress. The work I present herein pertains to the most ancient member of the ER stress transducers, IRE1. ER stress stimulates IRE1 to activate a UPR-dedicated transcription factor called XBP1 in metazoans (or HAC1 in yeast) to bolster the productive capacity of the ER and purge misfolded proteins from the ER. To activate XBP1/HAC1, IRE1 cleaves XBP1/HAC1 mRNA twice to eliminate an inhibitory intron using a dormant nuclease function in its cytoplasmic effector region (IRE1cyto). My focus was to understand the mechanism of XBP1/HAC1 activation by IRE1, the regulation of IRE1 function and the manipulation of IRE1 signaling output using chemical tools. To better understand IRE1 mechanism, I determined the crystal structure of IRE1cyto bound to ADP. Structural and mutational analyses uncovered a probable novel IRE1 nuclease active site, allowing a catalytic mechanism of RNA cleavage to be inferred. Further genetic and biophysical experiments revealed that the ordered sequence of events: autophosphorylation, nucleotide binding and dimerization; orchestrates the assembly of the IRE1 nuclease active site to potentiate nuclease function. The flavanol quercetin was identified in a chemical screen as a potent stimulator of IRE1 nuclease output. To understand the mechanism of action of quercetin, I determined the crystal structure of IRE1cyto in complex with quercetin and ADP. Quercetin docked to a novel ligand binding site, termed the Q-site, at the interface of IRE1 dimers. Biophysical and genetic analyses revealed that quercetin engagement of the Q-site promotes IRE1 dimerization, thereby enhancing IRE1 nuclease activity. To gain insight on how IRE1 recognizes RNA, I performed bioinformatic analysis to identify a conserved sequence element in XBP1/HAC1 mRNA (termed XBP1mini) that may compose a higher-order structure recognized by IRE1. I developed an RNA production scheme to generate XBP1mini RNA for structural and biophysical studies. Preliminary X-ray diffraction studies indicate that XBP1mini may indeed adopt an ordered crystallizable tertiary structure.

Keywords: Unfolded Protein Response
ER stress
Advisor: Sicheri, Frank
Communist Stardom in The Cold War: Josip Broz Tito in Western and Yugoslav Photography, 1943-1980

Communist Stardom in the Cold War: Josip Broz Tito in Western and Yugoslav Photography, 1943-1980 Nikolina Kurtovic Doctor of Philosophy Department of Art University of Toronto 2010 Abstract This dissertation examines the iconographic and ideological aspects of the public image of Josip Broz Tito, the communist leader of Socialist Yugoslavia and one of the major historical personalities of the twentieth century. By studying the specific historical, political, and cultural contexts of Tito’s changing iconography between 1943 and 1980, I considers a dynamic relationship between the Western and Eastern perspectives on his leadership style, personality, and role, as communicated in the idiom of Western photojournalism and celebrity photography, as well as the style of official presidential photography in Yugoslavia. I analyze photo-essays on Tito published in Life, Time, and Picture Post, and in the official Yugoslav magazines, Yugoslavia and Yugoslav Review, as well as his portraits by Yousuf Karsh and by Ivo Eterovic in his photo-book Tito’s Private Life. I engage the issues of image reception by studying fundamental stereotypes within the canon of Tito photography, exploring their relation to the popular and political discourses on war heroism, resistance myth, masculinity, leadership, communism, disease, romance, family, leisure and celebrity in the U.S. during World War Two and the Cold War. Tito’s photographs are compared with relevant examples in modern portrait photography, photojournalism, and European painting, thereby situating Tito’s example in the tradition of Western political image making, but also in relation to local traditions. My dissertation shows that the practical role of the cult of Tito in the American press during the Cold War was to render him and Yugoslavia as examples for the satellite countries, and to enlist popular support for U.S. policy. It also helped Tito navigate a political crisis following his 1948 break with Stalin. The iconography created in this context contributed to the genesis and modernizing of Yugoslav presidential photography in the 1950s. Appropriating the rhetoric and formal devices of Western celebrity and glamour photography, Yugoslav photographs created a set of presidential stereotypes and their photographs were bearers of the conventional narrative of Tito’s presidency in Yugoslav magazines and books addressing Western audiences between 1960 and 1980. My dissertation underscores the role of cross-cultural contacts and contexts for developing, maintaining, and understanding of Tito’s publicity and celebrity in the West.

Keywords: Josip Broz Tito
photography
Cold War
communism
representation
Advisor: Legge, Elizabeth
Beyond the Double Jeopardy Hypothesis: Examining the Interaction between Age- and Race-based Stereotypes across the Lifespan.

Previous research on stereotyping has focused on perceptions of and negative consequences for individuals who activate stereotypes based on their membership in one stigmatized group. In contrast, relatively little research has examined stereotyping following categorization of targets into more than one stigmatized group. This dissertation focuses on perceptions of individuals who activate more than one set of stereotypes. In particular, I focused on the combination of stereotypes associated with the older adult age group and the Black racial group - two stereotype sets which contain elements that directly contradict one another. To examine the interaction of these two sets of stereotypes, I examined perceptions of four types of targets: young Black men, young White men, old Black men, and old White men. In Chapter 1, I examine perceptions of anger and happiness on the faces of young and old Black and White men. These perceptions are examined among young (Study 1a) and old (Study 1b) perceivers. In Chapter 2, I attempt to bias these perceptions of facial emotion in line with race or age stereotypes using a categorization priming procedure. The final three studies examine more basic perceptions of these targets of interest. I examine current and projected trait-related perceptions of novel (Chapter 3) and famous (Chapter 4) young and old Black and White men at various points across the lifespan. Finally, in Chapter 5, I directly compare these four targets on a number of traits using a forced-choice comparison task for both current and projected ratings. Overall, the results of this dissertation suggest that race-based and age-based stereotypes combine via a process of selective inhibition. Specifically, old Black and White men are characterized according to the old age stereotypes which most strikingly contrast them against their younger counterparts. Compared with their corresponding young targets, this pattern results in relatively positive evaluations of older Black men, but relatively negative evaluations of older White men.

Keywords: stereotypes
person perception
Advisor: Chasteen, Alison L.
Regulation of Germ-line Expression of the Caenorhabditis elegans Gene Fem-1 by Maternal Transcripts

In addition to previously identified roles for RNA, several new ways in which RNA serves as a regulator of gene expression have recently been described. RNA molecules are involved in both transcriptional and post-transcriptional forms of regulation, sometimes heritably affecting gene activity. Whereas most previously characterized regulatory roles of RNA involve downregulation, I describe a role for maternal transcripts of a gene in promoting zygotic activity of that gene, which I term the licensing of genetic activity. This regulation occurs in the germ line, a tissue notable for its abundance of genetic surveillance mechanisms. The maternal-effect regulation described here was identified using alleles of a sex-determining gene in Caenorhabditis elegans called fem-1. Females homozygous for fem-1 deletions produce heterozygous offspring that exhibit germ-line feminization and have reduced fem-1 activity and transcript accumulation. This phenotype can be rescued by injecting fem-1 RNA into the maternal germ line. The reduction in activity of the zygotic fem-1 locus is heritable, suggesting that the gene is becoming epigenetically silenced. Thus the maternal fem-1 RNA licenses the activity of the zygotic locus by preventing its silencing. By restricting germ-line activity to genes that were expressed in the germ line of the previous generation, this process may contribute to protecting the identity and integrity of the germ line. I performed an RNAi screen of candidate genes to ask whether they are required for maternal-effect silencing or licensing. Several enhancers and suppressors of germ-line feminization in the descendants of fem-1 deficiency homozygotes were identified. Chromatin regulation may be involved, and small-RNA pathways are important for both the silencing and licensing components of fem-1 regulation. Based on my characterization of this phenomenon, I proposed models of how maternal-effect regulation of fem-1 may be mediated. To test predictions of certain models, I examined whether specific characteristics of fem-1 make it susceptible to this silencing. Results of these experiments limit the possible models of maternal-effect regulation and suggest directions for future investigation.

Keywords: Genetics
Maternal effect
RNA-mediated regulation
Advisor: Spence, Andrew
Lipid Bilayers as Surface Functionalizations for Planar and Nanoparticle Biosensors

Many biological processes, pathogens, and pharmaceuticals act upon, cellular membranes. Accordingly, cell membrane mimics are attractive targets for biosensing, with research, pathology, and pharmacology applications. Lipid bilayers represent a versatile sensor functionalization platform providing antifouling properties, and many receptor integration options, uniquely including transmembrane proteins. Bilayer-coated sensors enable the kinetic characterization of membrane/analyte interactions. Addressed theoretically and experimentally is the self-assembly of model membranes on plasmonic sensors. Two categories of plasmonic sensors are studied in two parts. Part I aims to deposit raft-forming bilayers on planar nanoaperture arrays suitable for multiplexing and device integration. By vesicle fusion, planar bilayers are self-assembled on thiol-acid modified flame-annealed gold without the need for specific lipid head-group requirements. Identification of coexisting lipid phases is accomplished by AFM imaging and force spectroscopy mapping. These methods are successfully extended to metallic, plasmon-active nanohole arrays, nanoslit arrays and annular aperture arrays, with coexisting phases observed among the holes. Vis-NIR transmission spectra of the arrays are measured before and after deposition, indicating bilayer detection. Finally, the extraction of membrane proteins from cell cultures and incorporation into model supported bilayers is demonstrated. These natural membrane proteins potentially act as lipid-bound surface receptors. Part II aims to encapsulate in model lipid bilayers, metallic nanoparticles, which are used as probes in surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy. Three strategies of encapsulating particles, and incorporating Raman-active dyes are demonstrated, each using a different dye: malachite green, rhodamine-PE, and Tryptophan. Dye incorporation is verified by SERS and the bilayer is visualized and measured by TEM, with support from DLS and UV-Vis spectroscopy. In both parts, lipid-coated sensors are successfully fabricated and characterized. These results represent important and novel solutions to the functionalization of plasmonic surfaces with biologically relevant cell membrane mimics.

Keywords: Lipid Bilayer
Biosensor
Surface Plasmon
Lipid Raft
Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering
Atomic Force Microscopy
Nanoparticle
Self Assembly
Membrane
Gold
Advisor: Walker, Gilbert C.
Genetic Variations Associated with Resistance to Doxorubicin and Paclitaxel in Breast Cancer

Anthracycline- and taxane-based regimens have been the mainstay in treating breast cancer patients using chemotherapy. Yet, the genetic make-up of patients and their tumors may have a strong impact on tumor sensitivity to these agents and to treatment outcome. This study represents a new paradigm assimilating bioinformatic tools with in vitro model systems to discover novel genetic variations that may be associated with chemotherapy response in breast cancer. This innovative paradigm integrates drug response data for the NCI60 cell line panel with genome-wide Affymetrix SNP data in order to identify genetic variations associated with drug resistance. This genome wide association study has led to the discovery of 59 candidate loci that may play critical roles in breast tumor sensitivity to doxorubicin and paclitaxel. 16 of them were mapped within well-characterized genes (three related to doxorubicin and 13 to paclitaxel). Further in silico characterization and in vitro functional analysis validated their differential expression in resistant cancer cell lines treated with the drug of interest (over-expression of RORA and DSG1, and under-expression of FRMD6, SGCD, SNTG1, LPHN2 and DCT). Interestingly, three and six genes associated with doxorubicin and paclitaxel resistance, respectively, are involved in the apoptotic process in cells. A constructed interactome suggested that there is cross-talk at the Nrf-2 oxidative stress pathway between genes associated with resistance to doxorubicin and paclitaxel. This unique GWA approach serves as a proof-of-principle study and systematically investigates targets responsible for variable response to chemotherapy in breast tumor cells and possibly the tumors of breast cancer patients. Overall, the model discovered novel candidate genes that have not been previously associated with doxorubicin and paclitaxel cytotoxicity. Future studies will be directed at illustrating a causative relationship between the observed genomic changes and drug resistance in breast cancer patients undergoing doxorubicin and paclitaxel chemotherapy.

Keywords: Breast cancer
Pharmacogenomics
Advisor: Ozcelik, Hilmi