Sample Thesis Proposal - Social Sciences

Diane G. Klare
Final Essay Proposal: Copyright in the 21st Century: The Politics of a Brave New Digital World
Advisor: Giulio Gallarotti
May 2008
 

Abstract
Attempts to standardize global copyright in the 21st century, due to the rapidly expanding digitization of scholarly and user-generated content, present new harmonization problems specific to digital formats. The increased globalization of all content, whether “born digital” or not, particularly information generated in lesser developed countries, introduces new challenges to international efforts to provide wide-spread access to online information while protecting the interests of content creators. These challenges arise over differing definitions of what can be copyrighted, who can or should hold the copyright, and the interests of publishers versus the interests of authors and readers. To explore these topics and propose solutions, it is imperative to understand copyright in a historical context, to see what issues previously thought to be in congruence begin to break down in a time of rapid technological change, what issues withstand the new worldwide enterprise, and how economic and political concerns can heavily influence attempts to harmonize copyright standards on a global basis.

Topic Proposal, Brief Literature Review, and Methodology
No one in the world today who is actively engaged in any facet of communication and knowledge generation can argue that the pervasiveness of the Internet globally has not changed the landscape of information exchange. Shifts in how information is shared “…stands to have a profound impact on social practices, the media, economic, and legal frameworks” (Bruns, 2007, p. 99). One can no longer assume that traditional means of disseminating scholarly materials, for example, which until recently meant a printed book or paper-based journal, will remain in the same physical format or even exist at all in the coming years. Crucial to this “perfect storm” of content generation will be an unalterable change in the relationships that previously existed between author, publisher, and the reader with regard to copyright (Strong, 1999). The current evolution of the digital means of conveying information is the most radical change in the Western world since the advent of the printing press in the fifteenth century. Information exchange, both written and visual, is no longer tied to a physical medium, but rather can be spread via a worldwide infrastructure of distributed channels via the Internet. Even strongly worded copyright protection such as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, which was enacted to “…please the new media industries [with] strong legal recognition of technical protection schemes” (May and Sell, 2006, p. 181) has failed to slow down the sharing of information electronically. Moreover, any content, scholarly or not, can be generated by anyone with a computer, word processing software, an Internet connection, and current technology that allows the sharing of such information while bypassing completely the existing economic and regulatory models of publishing that have been in place for years.

Access to a global base of generated knowledge content, moreover, has the potential to create philosophical and economic conflicts with regard to copyright laws (as defined for the past three centuries) put in place to protect authors of information versus the desired benefit of wider dissemination to a larger population. Copyright restrictions can “…put at risk the liberal political balance between individual gain and the public good that was the foundational aim of the intellectual property laws within Western democratic polities themselves” (Hesse, 2002, p. 45). In the past, means of protecting authored works in a paper-based format were clearer, since they relied on the physical possession and subsequent sale of an item to users of the materials (Koskinen-Olsson, 2008). Although sometimes subject to disputes based on differing standards, these differences, for the most part, were more easily definable in the age of strictly paper-based publishing structures.

From a humanitarian viewpoint, the increase in conflicting standards in the current environment have also been judged to be exacerbating the economic inequalities between the developed countries in the North compared to the developing countries of the South. Scholars in the South have seen a deepening economic disadvantage compared to the North. As a result, from their vantage point these countries have been unable “…to contribute as equal partners in the worldwide enterprise of knowledge production and dissemination [nor] provide their citizens with empowerment through information” (Arunachalam, 1999, p. 471). In an increasingly global world, it has become, therefore, even more critical yet more difficult to settle these discrepancies.

The digital world of the 21st century has shifted the content producing paradigm into unexplored territory. Global copyright issues and its digital underpinnings now affect the economic and political structures of information exchange, access, research, and global harmony, particularly in the academic arena. The nature of this problem has implications for governments and regulatory agencies worldwide, humanitarian concerns, private publishers, authors of research materials, and anyone within or even outside academia who produces unique content and wishes to share this content with others while retaining ownership of the work.

The study of intellectual property is huge due to the complexity and relatedness of its various components, which consists of copyright as well as industrial rights such as patents, inventions, and trademarks. It is more easily addressed by examining its specific components separately and then collectively use them as building blocks for discussions regarding trends in information exchange and scholarly communication. Therefore, the focus of this essay will be the critical juncture of the current “copyright crisis” as it is referred to in the academic enterprise, and it will address the issues of global harmonization of copyright in the age of rapid digitization. It is important to understand that digitization encompasses not only information that was paper-based at one time but has now been converted to text that is web-based; it also includes text, visual and auditory resources that were “born digital,” including artistic endeavors like music and film. And it is important to be aware of sharply differing opinions as to whether global harmonization is achievable or even desirable. For those who bemoan that “…the ratchet of intellectual property protection [is] moving seemingly inexorably, toward stronger and stronger protection” (McPhie, 2004, p. 21), there are others who believe that artistic endeavors would be “…better off when the concept of copyright disappears” (Smiers, 2000, p. 379). This essay, therefore, will address all genres of digital information concurrently, since the delineation between the “converted to digital” and the “born digital” formats has effectively been erased and approaches to international harmonization for both types cannot be considered as separate endeavors.

The introduction of my essay will provide a brief description of the current environment regarding digital copyright and lay out the major international issues of concern. I will include information on who the major players are and why it is imperative to look at the current copyright crisis as a global problem and not just a specific issue pertaining to libraries. This environmental scan will briefly lay out the politics of copyright from an international governance perspective and will provide a framework of the specific financial issues digitization of information content has on both users of copyrighted materials as well as the providers of this material. Overarching issues that this introduction will begin to address in greater detail are: Why has the use of the Internet and its related technology changed the copyright environment? Are the large-scale publishers of content overreacting to the new ability to share information among users or is their seeming protectiveness fueled only by financial greed to preserve high profit margins? How have international bodies dealt with the new digital age of copyright? Is open access a viable solution to resolve global harmonization of copyright?

In the first chapter, I will briefly discuss the history of copyright worldwide from its inception in ancient times to the mid-twentieth century. I will explain the initial development of copyright legislation and how differences in various parts of the world are rooted in deep cultural traditions. This historical foundation is necessary in order to have a better understanding of how the current copyright crisis is a legacy of traditions developed over a time span of close to three thousand years and how the differences between Eastern and Western civilizations played out in the dissemination of information globally prior to the age of the Internet. This chapter will also discuss the ramifications of early international legislation, most notably the Paris Convention of 1883 and the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works in Europe in 1886, and compare such legislation against early United States efforts to protect its own copyrighted materials at the end of the nineteenth century. What parallels can this historical perspective provide to current day copyright conflicts among the developed versus the developing nations of the world?

The second chapter of my essay will address copyright problems and issues specifically related to current international organizations, all of which came about as a result of the movement to consolidate and regulate copyright more robustly after World War II. It will begin with the definition of copyright as established by the 1948 General Agreements on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and its succeeding organization, the World Trade Organization (WTO). It will then present, as a counter, the establishment in 1967 of the United Nations’ World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and its approach to copyright protection for countries worldwide. It will contrast how these two organizations, along with other endeavors, have attempted to enforce copyright on a global basis using various mechanisms with varying success as well as international criticism. One such example is the global regime established in 1995 with the WTO’s Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), and most recently how WIPO has attempted to reestablish its prominence in regulating intellectual property by being compelled to work in tandem with the WTO on copyright protection. How have these efforts worked in the past, and can anything be learned by their success or failures? Finally, this chapter will address the economic concerns of the commercial world for copyright protection in the global enterprise versus the library world, as well as the related issue of copyright measures of indigenous knowledge emanating from developing countries.
The third chapter will discuss recent trends in trying to bridge commercial concerns of publishers with the establishment of digital repositories and open access movements, primarily in the West. This chapter will compare efforts and differing approaches, examine their degrees of success, and explore how these digital “libraries” relate to international efforts to harmonize copyright. This chapter will also serve as a segue into the second half of the essay, which will address the current digital spectrum. Questions in this chapter include: what new problems are presented with digitized content that did not exist in the solely paper-based world? On the other hand, what types of problems are present in the digital world which also occurred in the paper-format world of information? What does one do to resolve issues of authors’ rights? Do changes need to be made to the definition of “fair use”? Does the Creative Commons licensing agreement meet authors’ needs while protecting publishers’ economic pricing structures? Is “open access” the answer? How do large scale digitization projects impact copyright legislation on an international basis? Will special projects such as Google books impact global copyright standards going forward? What issues transcend publishing and information exchange regardless of the means of publication used?

The fourth chapter will examine user-generated content and its copyright implications. It will explore the “maverick” new means of content creation in word, audio, and video. Publishing original content on the web, particularly the exploding world of wikis, blogs, vlogs, and virtual worlds, presents even greater challenges to international standards of copyright protection and authors’ rights. Blogs and wikis are particularly problematic and need to be addressed separately from other digital works because this new type of content generation raises issues not previously encountered within the traditional publication mechanisms of the past. For example, should originators of web content expect the same degree of copyright protection that authors have of “not-born digital” content? How do international copyright regulatory agencies protect creative works across international lines? Would creativity in the arts be, as some postulate, even greater if copyright restrictions were removed? What is the impact of peer-to- peer file sharing of digital content worldwide? And given the ubiquitous nature of the web in today’s world, how can international agencies address and satisfactorily resolve the cultural heritage of specific nations and their specific definitions of copyright while allowing global knowledge and artistic endeavors to spawn new works?

The final chapter will pull all of the components addressed in the previous chapters to postulate what the true prospect is for redefining copyright in the 21st century. Given the history of the evolving definitions of copyright addressed in the earlier chapters, and taking into account governments, international regulatory bodies, and economic concerns of content publishers, as well as producers of user-generated content, I will place the current situation in context. What does the future of copyright hold in the digital age? Given the nature of rapid digitization and format changes, is global cooperation to establish a framework for copyright achievable or is the world changing too rapidly to establish nothing more than fleeting standards? Is there a way to resolve the economic protectionism of both governments and large publishing concerns in the developed nations of the North with the desires of the developing countries of the South to benefit financially from their indigenous information? Finally, I will address possible solutions to the digital copyright dilemma as well as directions for future endeavors by those most heavily invested in the future of information exchange.

Overview of Available Scholarly Literature

The existing literature regarding international efforts to standardize copyright is heavily weighted to the print world. Writers have only begun to address the topic of digital information and its wider implications since the end of the 1990s. This is understandable for two reasons. First, the advent of digitization has really only occurred in the last fifteen years. Second, the digital world is rapidly developing and morphing on a daily basis, so what may be relevant now may be obsolete tomorrow.
There is an extensive body of work on copyright from a historical context as well as more recent concerns elucidated in numerous law reviews, in academic journals in the information science world, as well as treatment of copyright from a financial standpoint in the world economy, much of it focusing on the impact of copyright on developing countries. In addition, international bodies such as the World Trade Organization and the World Intellectual Property Organization have generated much research on the topic of intellectual property in general and copyright in particular. Many of the copyright issues addressed in the academic literature vis à vis print copyright have correlations to the digital environment of publishing. There is also a growing body of literature that addresses peer-to-peer file sharing and piracy of film and music.

The most recent development, the area of blogs, vlogs, and other user-generated content on the web, is a very new area of exploration, but one that has very wide legal implications for the future of copyright. This area will be one of the major topics of discussion at the Annual Symposium on Intellectual Property sponsored by the Center for Intellectual Property at the University of Maryland in May 2008, which I will attend. The convergence of all these issues forms the core of my essay, and the existing literature from academic and international organizations on non-digital and digital content will be augmented by the knowledge and resources I will be able to add from attending the Symposium in May.

Finally, this proposed essay relates very closely to two courses I took at Wesleyan, both with my advisor, Giulio Gallarotti. The first was Politics of the Modern Global Economy in the fall of 2005. This class dealt with specific issues including globalization, trade, monetary relations, and the global business cycle. Copyright issues are constantly being influenced by what occurs in the global marketplace. The second class was my final class in the fall of 2007, Solving the World’s Problems: Diplomacy and Decision-Making in International Politics. Diplomacy and worldwide decisions among governing bodies have affected copyright agreements in the past and continue to do so. This essay will indirectly draw on class work I had in Suzy Taraba’s The Book as a Cultural Artifact, which explored the history of the book as a physical representation of intellectual property, and Liza McAlister’s Religion and Civic Life class, where the class had many opportunities to become better acquainted with cultural and religious traditions around the globe. Some of the differences that exist worldwide regarding intellectual property and copyright are rooted in these traditions. It is also particularly gratifying that I will be able to use the knowledge gained from my various GLSP classes thus far and apply it in conjunction with the research I will be doing to complete this essay to benefit the Wesleyan community in my work as a reference librarian here.

Cited References

Arunachalam, S. (1999). Information and knowledge in the age of electronic communication: a developing country perspective. Journal of Information Science, 25(6), 465-476.

Bruns, A. (2007). Produsage: Towards a broader framework for user-led content creation. In Proceedings Creativity and Cognition 6, (pp. 99-105). Washington, DC. Retrieved February 26, 2008 from http://eprints.qut.edu.au

Hesse, C. (2002). The rise of intellectual property, 700 B.C. – A. D. 2000: An idea in the balance. Daedalus, 131(2), 26-45.

Koskinen-Olsson, T. (2008). Access to knowledge in the digital era. Learned Publishing, 21(2), 93-104.

May, C. and Sell, S. K. (2006). Intellectual property rights: A critical history. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc.

McPhie, D. (2004). Access made accessible: Shaping the laws and technologies that protect creative works. Journal of the Copyright Society of the U.S.A., 51(3), 521-567.

Smiers, J. (2000). The abolition of copyright: Better for artists, third world countries, and the public domain. International Communication Gazette, 62(5), 379-406.

Strong, W. S. (1999). Copyright in a time of change. The Journal of Electronic Publishing, 4(3), 1-8. Retrieved April 11, 2008 from http://press.umich.edu/jep/04-03/strong.html

Appendix 1

Essay Timetable and Key Milestones

Advisor Meeting Plan
My faculty advisor, Giulio Gallarotti, will return from sabbatical in the fall semester of 2008. I have been in regular contact with him via e-mail and will continue that primary means of communication until he returns in the fall of 2008. I plan on continuing my current research during the summer and early fall of 2008, and will be forwarding preliminary chapter drafts of my essay to him electronically. When he returns in the fall of 2008, I anticipate that my major means of communication will continue to be via e-mail, with in person meetings as appropriate since he and I both work on campus at Wesleyan.

Timetable
Proposal submitted to GSLP Office May 5, 2008
Proposed Submissions to Advisor:
• Introduction : July 18, 2008
   o Environmental scan of copyright in the digital age
   o Overarching issues in international copyright
   o A discussion of why digital copyright has international implications
• Chapter 1: A Primer on Copyright until World War II – August 15, 2008
   o A short history of worldwide copyright
   o Early international legislation on copyright by various major international    organizations
   o Similarities to current environment
• Chapter 2: Copyright Protection since 1945 – September 19, 2008
   o Movement to consolidate copyright post-World War II
   o Successes and failures in previous efforts to harmonize copyright internationally
   o Conflicts of the commercial world versus the academic/library world in copyright protection in the digital environment
   o Copyright issues unique to the developing world in the digital environment
• Chapter 3: Digitization of scholarly content into repositories and library depositories – October 17, 2008
   o Similarities and dissimilarities with print copyright versus digital copyright
   o Authors rights and fair use doctrines
   o Digital repositories and the open access movement
   o Google Books and large-scale digitization projects
• Chapter 4: User Generated Content and the Arts & Entertainment Industry - November 21, 2008
   o Digital Millennium Copyright Act
   o Blogs, vlogs, wikis, Youtube, similar user-generated content
   o Peer-to-peer file sharing
   o Creative works in Arts and Entertainment
• Chapter 5: Conclusion – December 19, 2008
   o Achievability of harmonizing standards for international copyright in the 21st century?
   o The future of copyright in the digital world
• Final Essay Submitted to Advisor w/revisions January 16, 2009
• Final Essay Submitted to GLSP – February 20, 2009


Appendix 2

Wesleyan Resources
In addition to meeting regularly with my faculty advisor, Giulio Gallarotti, I will be in regular contact with Barbara Jones, University Librarian, as I conduct research for this paper. She will also be serving as my reader upon the completion of my essay. With regard to academic resources, I will be using scholarly journal articles I will obtain through our online databases, books available at Wesleyan’s library or through CTW, and also making ample use of interlibrary loan when necessary to obtain materials outside of Wesleyan. As stated previously, I anticipate that my attendance at the Intellectual Property Symposium in May 2008 at the University of Maryland will be very helpful as I move forward in my research.


Appendix 3

Preliminary Bibliography

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Ardito, S. C. (2007). MySpace and YouTube meet the copyright cops. Searcher, 15(5), 24-34.

Arunachalam, S. (1999). Information and knowledge in the age of electronic communication: A developing country perspective. Journal of Information Science, 25(6), 465-476.

Arunachalam, S. (2003). Information for research in developing countries - information technology, a friend or foe? International Information and Library Review, 35, 133-147.

Arup, C. (2000). The new World Trade Organization agreements: Globalizing law through services and intellectual property. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Baksik, C. (2006). Fair use or exploitation? The Google Book Search controversy. Libraries and the Academy, 6(4), 399-415.

Banks, M. A., & de Blaaij, C. (2006, December). Implications of copyright evolution for the future of scholarly communication and grey literature. Paper presented at GL8: Eighth International Conference on Grey Literature, New Orleans, LA. Retrieved April 2, 2008, from http://eprints.rclis.org/archive/00011106/01/GL8.pdf

Baude, W., Hofman, J., Katz, E., McDaniel, K., Rens, A., & Riley, C. (2006). Model language for exceptions and limitations to copyright concerning access to learning materials in South Africa. The Southern African Journal of Information and Communication, 7, 82-107.

Bergstrom, T. C., & Bergstrom, C. T. (2004, May 2). Will open access compete away monopoly profits in journal publishing. Retrieved February 27, 2008, from http://octavia.zoology.washington.edu/publishing/BergstromAndBergstrom04b.pdf

Black, P., Delaney, H., & Fitzgerald, B. (2007). Legal issues for wikis: The challenge of user-generated and peer-produced knowledge, content and culture. Murdoch University Electronic Journal of Law, 14(1), 245-282.

Booth, A. (2007). Blogs, wikis, and podcasts: The 'evaluation bypass' in action? Health Information and Libraries Journal, 24, 298-302.

Botterbusch, H. R., & Parker, P. (2008). Copyright and collaborative spaces: Open licensing and wikis. TechTrends, 52(1), 7-9.

Britz, J. J., Lor, P., & Bothma, T. (2006). Global capitalism and fair use distribution of information in the marketplace. Journal of Information Ethics, 15(1), 60-69.

Bruns, A. (2007). Produsage: Towards a broader framework for user-led content creation. In Proceedings Creativity & Cognition 6 (pp. 99-105). Washington, DC. Retrieved February 26, 2008, from http://eprints.qut.edu.au

Chan, L., & Kirsop, B. (2001). Open archiving opportunities for developing countries: Towards equitable distribution of global knowledge". Ariadne, 30, 1-4.

Charman, S., & Holloway, M. (2006). Copyright in a collaborative age. M/C Journal, 9(2). Retrieved April 22, 2008, from http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0605/02-charmanholloway.php.

Correia, A. M. R., & Teixeira, J. C. (2005). Reforming scholarly publishing and knowledge communication: From the advent of the scholarly journal to the challenges of open access. Information Services & Use, 25, 13-21.

Crow, R. (2002). The case for institutional repositories: A SPARC position paper. The Scholarly Publishing & Academic Resources Coalition. Retrieved February 23, 2008, from http://www.arl.org/sparc/bm~doc/ir_final_release_102.pdf

Dahlberg, A. (2007). Are stronger intellectual property rights an obstacle or a condition for international technology transfer? In M. Sinjela (Ed.), Human rights and intellectual property rights: An analysis on the effects of the TRIPS Agreement (pp. 31-68). Leiden, The Netherlands : Martinus Nijhoff Publishers.

De Robbio, A., & Coll, I. S. (2005). E-Lis: An international open archive towards building open digital libraries. High Energies Physics Libraries Webzine(11). Retrieved February 23, 2008, from http://library.cern.ch/HEPLW/11/papers/1/

DeNardis, L., & Tam, E. (2007, November 1). Open documents and democracy: A political basis for open document standards. Yale Information Society Project. Retrieved February 27, 2008, from http://isp.law.yale.edu

Drahos, P., & Braithwaite, J. (2002). Information feudalism: Who owns the knowledge economy? London, UK: Earthscan Publication Ltd.

Duchene, A., & Waelbroeck, P. (2006). The legal and technological battle in the music industry: Information-push versus information-pull Technologies. International Review of Law and Economics, 26, 565-580.

Dutfield, G., & Suthersanen, U. (2005). Harmonization or differentiation in intellectual property protection? The lessons of history. Prometheus, 23(2), 131-147.

Finger, J. M., & Schuler , P. (Eds.). (2003). Poor People's Knowledge: Promoting Intellectual Property in Developing Countries. Washington, DC: World Bank.

Forero-Pineda, C., & Jaramillo-Salazar, H. (2002). The access of researchers from developing countries to international science and technology. International Social Science Journal, 54(171), 129-140.

Ghosh, S. (2007). How to build a commons: Is intellectual property constrictive, facilitating, or irrelevent. In C. Hess & E. Ostrom (Eds.), Understanding knowledge as a commons (pp. 209-246). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Ginsberg, J. (2007). The pros and cons of strengthening intellectual property protection: Technological protection measures and Section 1201 of the United States Copyright Act. Information & Communications Technology Law, 16(3), 191-216.

Grynberg, R., & Silva, S. (2006). Harmonization without representation: Small states, the Basel Committee, and the WTO. World Development, 34(7), 1223-1236.

Guedon, J., & Hagemann, M. (2003, January). Creating scientific value with open access: A background paper for the Budapest meeting. Paper presented at the Budapest Meeting of the Academies, Budapest, Hungary. Open Society Institute. Retrieved February 28, 2007 from http://www.soros.org/openaccess/meeting/shtml

Haider, J. (2007). Of the rich and the poor and other curious minds: On open access and "development". In Aslib Proceedings: New Information Perspectives, 59(4/5), 449-461.

Hess, C. (2002). The rise of intellectual property, 700 B.C. - A.D. 2000: An idea in the balance. Daedalus, 131(2), 26-45.

Humphreys, S. (2005). Productive users, intellectual property and governance: The challenges of computer games. Media and Arts Law Review, 10(4), 299-310.
Intellectual property rights: The music and film industry: Hearing before the Subcommittee on International Economic Policy and Trade of the Committee on International Relations, House of Representatives, 105th Cong., 1 (1998).

Jorgensen, R. F. (Ed.). (2006). Human rights in the global information society. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Ki, E., Chang, B., & Khang, H. (2006). Exploring influential factors on music piracy across countries. Journal of Communication, 56, 406-426.

Kirsop, B., & Chan, L. (2005). Transforming access to research literature for developing countries. Serials Review, 31, 246-255.

Koskinen-Olsson, T. (2008). Access to knowledge in the digital era. Learned Publishing, 21(2), 93-104.

Landes, W. M., & Posner, R. A. (2003). The economic structure of intellectual property law. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Leong, S. H. S., & Saw, C. L. (2006). Copyright infringement in a borderless world: Does territoriality matter? International Journal of Law and Information Technology, 15(1), 38-53.

Lor, P. J., & Britz, J. (2005). Knowledge production from an African perspective: International information flows and intellectual property. The International Information & Library Review, 37, 61-76.

Loren, L. P. (1997). Redefining the market failure approach to fair use in an era of copyright permission systems. Journal of Intellectual Property Law, 5, 1-58.

Lynch, C. A. (2003). Institutional repositories: Essential infrastructure for scholarship in the digital age. portal: Libraries and the Academy, 3(2), 327-336.

Masango, C. A. (2006). The future of the first sale doctrine with the advent of licenses to govern access to digital content. The Southern African Journal of Information and Communication, 7, 64-147.

Maskus, K. E. (2000). Intellectual property rights in the global economy. Washington, DC: Institute for International Economics.

May, C. (2003). Digital rights management and the breakdown of social norms. First Monday, 8(11). Retrieved April 11, 2008, from http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue8_11/may/index.html

May, C., & Sell, S. K. (2006). Intellectual property rights: A critical history. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc.

McCalman, P. (2005). Who enjoys 'TRIPS' abroad? An empirical analysis of intellectual property rights in the Uruguay Round. Canadian Journal of Economics, 38(2), 574-602.

McPhie, D. (2004). Access made accessible: Shaping the laws and technologies that protect creative works. Journal of the Copyright Society of the U.S.A., 51(3), 521-567.

Mossinghoff, G. J., & Oman, R. (1997). The World Intellectual Property Organization: a United Nations success story. World Affairs, 160(2), 104-108.

Okediji, R. L. (2006, March). The international copyright system: Limitations, exceptions, and public interest considerations for developing countries. International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development. Retrieved March 28, 2008, from www.iprsonline.org/unctadictsd/docs/ruth%202405.pdf

Ondari-Okemwa, E. (2004). Impediments to promoting access to global knowledge in sub-Saharan Africa. Library Management, 25(8/9), 361-375.

Papin-Ramcharan, J., & Dawe, R. A. (2006). The other side of the coin for open access publishing - A developing country view. Libri, 56, 16-27.

Peinado, M., Petitcolas, F. A. P., & Kirovski, D. (2003). Digital rights management for digital cinema. Multimedia Systems, 9, 228-238.

Peitz, M., & Waelbroeck, P. (2006). Piracy of digital products: A critical review of the theoretical literature. Information Economics and Policy, 18, 449-476.

Pilch, J. (2003). Understanding copyright law for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian materials. Slavic & East European Information Resources, 4(1), 75-101.

Pilch, J. (2006). U.S. Copyright relations with Central, East European, and Eurasian nations in historical perspective. Slavic Review, 65(2), 325-348.

Pinfield, S. (2007). Can open access repositories and peer-reviewed journals coexist? Serials, 20(3), 163-171.
Piracy on the high C's: Should foreigners' intellectual property always be protected? (1996). The Economist, 338(7953), 17-18.

Posner, R. A. (2002). The law & economics of intellectual property. Daedalus, 131(2), 5-12.

Rao, S. S. (2003). Copyright: Its implications for electronic information. Online Information Review, 27(4), 264-275.

Rasenberger, M., & Weston, C. (2008). The Section 108 Study Group Report. The United States Copyright Office. Retrieved April 1, 2008, from http://www.section108.gov

Reddy, G. B. (2007). Infringement of copyright and doctrine of fair use. DESIDOC Bulletin of Information Technology, 27(4), 29-36.

Rowlands, I., Nicholas, D., & Huntingdon, P. (2004, March 18). Scholarly communication in the digital environment: What do authors want?. Retrieved April 5, 2008 from http://www.ucl.ac.uk/ciber/ciber-pa-report.pdf

Samahon, T. N. (2000). TRIPS copyright dispute settlement after the transition and moratorium: Nonviolation and situation complaints against developing countries. Law and Policy in International Business, 31(3), 1051-1075.

Schmidt, K. D., Sennyey, P., & Carstens, T. V. (2005). New roles for a changing environment: Implications of open access for libraries. College & Research Libraries, 66(5), 407-416.

Seadle, M. (2007). Who wins? Economic gain and open access. Zeitschrift fur Bibliothekswesen und Bibliographie, 54(4-5), 238-242.

Sender, K., & Decherney, P. (2007). Defending fair use in the age of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. International Journal of Communication, 1, 136-142.

Smiers, J. (2000). The abolition of copyright: Better for artists, third world countries, and the public domain. International Communications Gazette, 62(5), 379-406.

Stamatoudi, I. A. (2002). Copyright and multimedia works. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Sterling, J. A. L. (2000). TRIPS Agreement: Copyright and related rights. Luxenbourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities.

Strong, W. S. (1999). Copyright in a time of change. The Journal of Electronic Publishing, 4(3). Retrieved April 11, 2008 from http://www.press.umich.edu/jep/04-03/strong.html

Tang, P., & Hulsink, W. (1998). The winds of change: Digital technologies, trading information and managing intellectual property rights. International Journal of Technology Management, 15(8), 869-893.

Thorin, S. E. (2003, August). Global changes in scholarly communication. Paper presented at e-Workshops on Scholarly Communication in the Digital Age, Feng Chia University, Taichung, Taiwan. Retrieved February 26, 2008, from http://www.arl.org/scomm/disciplines/Thorin.pdf

Travis, H. (2006). Google Book Search and fair use: iTunes for Authors, or Napster for Books. University of Miami Law Review, 61, 87-167.

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Sample Thesis Proposal - Sciences

CRAYFISH IN OUR MIDST: A STUDY OF CRAYFISH DIVERSITY AND ABUNDANCE IN LEBANON, CONNECTICUT
by Carol L. Morris-Scata

Submitted to Wesleyan University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Liberal Studies.

January 2008
Geoffrey Hammerson, PhD.
Wesleyan University
GLSP Instructor

ABSTRACT
Crayfish are regarded as both keystone species and environmental engineers because of the relationships that they have with other organisms in freshwater ecosystems. Invasive species of crayfish, entering ecosystems as a result of migration or human activities, have disrupted native populations of macroinvertebrates, fish, and crayfish due to competition for resources, higher reproductive rates, or tolerance to environmental change. Two crayfish species, Cambarus bartonii bartonii and Orconectes immunis, were identified as historical species in Connecticut by Hobbs in his comprehensive study of crayfish for the Environmental Protection Agency (1972). However since the publication of Hobbs’s study, five introduced species have been documented in Connecticut’s waters. This study for Wesleyan University’s Master of Liberal Arts Program seeks to determine the presence of crayfish populations in Lebanon, Connecticut and particularly to examine whether recent invaders to Connecticut’s freshwater systems have replaced the historical species of crayfish in the Lebanon area. By utilizing barrel traps and hand collection methods, I will document the abundance and diversity of crayfish species in specific ecosystems in Lebanon, Connecticut and assess their relationship to abiotic factors such as pH, water temperature, water velocity and depth and electrical conductivity. From this data, a map of crayfish densities within Lebanon, Connecticut can be drawn; the two major drainage systems in Lebanon, Connecticut may also be compared for population patterns. Through statistical analysis of the data, I will discuss whether the historical species are indicative of this area of the state, and if the targeted abiotic features are limiting factors for the establishment and flourishing of the those crayfish species that are present.

Introduction
Looking over the lightly ruffled waters of Brewster Pond, I stand smug, basking in the knowledge that this peaceful waterway and I share a secret. From its cool waters, a sparkling collage of blues, browns and greens, behind its ancient dam of algae-covered concrete, is fed a meandering stream: Bartlett Brook. Here slower moving water, the pools and eddies that give refuge from turbulent riffles, hiding beneath the surface, is an active world of fish, macro-invertebrates, and crayfish. I had swum in this pond before, in younger years; I had sledded with my children over the steep ruts of Meeting House Road, stopping at the brook’s edge. But I had never really wondered about that world beneath its surface, nor realized that whole societies of creatures existed, with their own rules and regulations, their relationships, their give and take economies; an ecosystem in which crayfish form an integral part.

Proposal
Crayfish, those lobster-like creatures with their bulging eyes and somewhat frightening front claws, seem like an unlikely topic for a Master’s thesis. Yet it is crayfish and their watery world that is to be the subject of my final project. My goal is to determine what varieties of crayfish exist in Lebanon, Connecticut and their relative concentrations. In particular, I am interested in whether the two historical species of crayfish recognized by Horton H. Hobbs (1972), Cambarus bartonii bartonii and Orconectes immunis, dominate Lebanon’s waters or have been replaced by five introduced species now known to exist in Connecticut: Cambarus robustus, Orconectes limosus, Orconectes rusticus, Orconectes virilis, Procambarus acutus acutus (http://iz.carnegiemnh.org/crayfish/country_pages/state_pages/connecticut.htm). Because introduced species often change the ecosystems that they have entered (Capelli and Munjal 1982), and can negatively impact endemic organisms, I suspect that fewer specimens of the historical species in Connecticut will be present in Lebanon’s waterways because of species migration and invasion.

Specific water resources within each of the four USGS quadrangles that comprise the town of Lebanon, Connecticut, including parts of the Yantic and the Shetucket drainage systems, will be surveyed using a systematic sampling plan. In addition to measuring, photographing, and identifying crayfish specimens, I will also collect data regarding water temperature, pH, electrical conductivity, water flow, and water depth to investigate whether these abiotic variables are contributing factors to the establishment of specific species of crayfish in Lebanon’s wetlands. Research by Paglianti and Gherardi (2004), for example, indicates that temperature and diet affected growth and survival rates of indigenous and invasive crayfish species, whereas Rabalais and Magoulick (2006) looked at current velocity, water depth, and substrate composition and determined their impact on crayfish densities of invasive and native species. I intend to share the results from this GLSP Master’s project with the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection in the hopes that my findings will become part of a larger study on crayfish that is currently being conducted.

Review of the Literature
When I tell someone that I am studying crayfish, the usual response is a wrinkled up nose and a look of disgust. “Why study crayfish?” I am asked. First the presence of crayfish in freshwater ponds, streams and wetlands is an indicator of biomass, or living matter and energy availability within an ecosystem (Dorn, Urgelles, and Truxler 2005). Crayfish, for example, are shredders, and they can strongly influence the amount of leaf breakdown that occurs within a stream, thereby affecting the organisms that rely on stream detritus for food (Creed and Reed 2004). Secondly crayfish have a distinctive appearance, and as they are larger animals that occur in a variety of freshwater habitats, they are easier to capture and identify than other aquatic arthropods such as insects. Therefore they are an excellent choice for a study of interactions within a freshwater ecosystem because they are so visible.

According to Helms and Creed (2005), “Crayfish have strong trophic and nontrophic effects in many freshwater systems.” This means that crayfish can influence the nutritional relationships within an ecosystem as well as change the physical environment of that ecosystem through their behavior. Depending on the species, crayfish can fulfill an ecological role as an herbivore, carnivore, detritivore, or omnivore (McCafferty, 1981). Therefore their foods can range from snails, worms, tadpoles, salmon eggs and insect larvae to algae, water vegetation, and dead fish (Crocker, 1968). Furthermore they are an important prey species, the favorite food of larger aquatic predators such as trout, bass, cod, pickerel, and eels, as well as land-dwelling animals that rely on water habitats for food. These other predators would include painted turtles, otters, minks, rat, and some birds such as grackles (Barr 1994).

As a result, crayfish are an important part of the freshwater food chain, and their abundance and variety gives important information regarding the community structure and function within a particular area. In many respects they are a “keystone species” because they directly and indirectly influence so many other living creatures that are linked above and below them in an aquatic food web (Flinders and Magoulick 2005). Additionally they are have been regarded as “ecosystem engineers” (Jones 1997) (Helms and Creed 2005) because their unique role within an aquatic community determines the biotic relationships throughout that system.

Crayfish play a role in human activities as well, yet they are also affected by human activities. Crayfish are a source of food in many societies, including the southern states of the United States where a greater number of “crawdad” varieties may be found in comparison to the northeast region (Rabalais and Magoulick 2006). They have also been used as bait for fish, and are popular as a lure for trout and bass. Because bucket bait is often released, different varieties of crayfish have been introduced to non-native waters. The effects of these introduced species on aquatic habitats have been substantial and sometimes detrimental.

There have been numerous studies that have investigated the effects of invasive species on habitats and on pre-existing crayfish. The decline of the white-clawed crayfish (Austropotomobius pallipes) in England, the UK’s only native crayfish, is perhaps one of the most well known instances of species takeover. Austropotomobius pallipes has been given protected status because the signal crayfish (Pacifastacus leniusculus), an introduced species, has flourished in UK waters, thereby threatening native populations through competition for resources and habitat. The signal crayfish was found to be more aggressive in its quest for food and shelter, and reproduced more rapidly with greater numbers of offspring (http://www.jncc.gov.uk/protectedsites/sacselection/species.asp?FeatureIntCode=S1092).
The introduction of disease is another repercussion that may occur from an influx of non-indigenous species, like the signal crayfish, to a water habitat. Pacifastacus leniusculus was shown to transmit crayfish plague that destroyed many populations of the white-clawed crayfish across England.

In the United States and Canada similar concerns have been raised about the impact of invasive crayfish on aquatic ecosystems. Fast growth, high reproductive rates, and high tolerance for environmental changes have been the hallmarks of success for invasive species (Paglianti and Gherardi 2004) (Herbert and Gelwick 2001). In Wisconsin the invasion of rusty crayfish Orconectes rusticus has greatly reduced the presence of fish in Spring Lake. Rusty crayfish ate fish eggs as well as devoured aquatic plants, thereby limiting food and shelter resources for fish (Roth, Hein and Vander Zanden 2006). Similar patterns have been discovered in other lakes in Wisconsin (Capelli and Munjal 1982) where large shifts in crayfish populations and decline in fish populations have occurred.

A final point to consider about the importance of studying crayfish is their role as indicators of water quality. Generally crayfish have been shown to exhibit moderate pollution tolerance (http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/rbp/app_a.html), although some species are more successful in polluted conditions than others. In the case of the white-clawed species Austropotomobius pallipes , Lyons and Kelly-Quinn (2003) have shown that populations of these native crayfish were totally eliminated in known habitation sites in Ireland when water quality greatly diminished, although no correlation was established for particular pollutants and white-clawed crayfish demise. Introduced species, however, expanded their domain. While extinctions can occur over long periods of geological time, this loss of biodiversity as a result of human activities is a major concern.

Crayfish, therefore, are signalers; the presence or absence of historical species can indicate that conservation management is needed to protect water resources for wildlife and humans alike. Here in the United States, the Nature Conservancy estimates that 51% of 330 known crayfish species are in jeopardy due to environmental degradation and resource mismanagement, including water quality changes, habitat alteration or fragmentation (http://www.natureserve.org/library/1997speciesreportcard.pdf ).

Methodology
For this final project, I will conduct my study in different streams, shallow pools, lakes, and ponds of Lebanon, Connecticut from late June 2008 through October 2008. I will obtain crayfish by using barrel traps, purchased from Cabellas, which have been baited with wet cat food. Crayfish are notorious for being able to escape from traps, however, and it may be possible that traps will only capture a few adult crayfish. As a result, a kick net and handpicking will function as a second, back-up method of collection, particularly in the narrower and shallower streams and pools where it is feasible. Both slow and fast moving water resources within each of the four USGS quadrangles that comprise the total area of Lebanon will be tested, for a minimum of 8 test sites. Within each test site, I will use a 10 ft by 10 ft roped grid to define the trap location or hand collection area. Traps will be moved around this square to ensure that the results are reliable for that site. By using these methods, I will be creating a map of Lebanon that identifies crayfish diversity and abundance. In addition I may be able to compare population patterns within the two major drainage systems in Lebanon, the Yantic system and Shetucket system.

As noted earlier I will be testing the water at each site for pH, temperature, electrical conductivity, water flow, and water depth to determine if there is any correlation between these factors and the development of crayfish communities. Electrical conductivity (EC) shows the amount of dissolved solids in water, hence the quality of that water resource. An increase in total dissolved solids (TDS), as indicated by increasing EC, is an indicator of pollution from natural or man-made sources. Probes for temperature, pH, and electrical conductivity from Hanna Instruments, Inc. will be utilized for this data collection. I expect to find variations in species by area, due to differences in the above factors; however only data collection will tell if this hypothesis can be supported.

I trapped throughout October and November 2007 to gather some initial information about crayfish locations and to practice using traps, bait, scientific equipment, as well as data collection. These test locations in three different quadrangles of Lebanon included: 2 sites on Brewster Pond, 3 sites on Bartlett Brook, 1 site on Pease Brook, 1 site on Williams Pond, 1 site on Cabin Brook, and 1 site on Exeter Brook. A total of 10 specimens with hard exoskeletons were caught that ranged in size from 4-5.5 inches in length. It appeared that two different species were caught near the dam at the headwaters of Bartlett Brook, but these identifications will have to be verified with the experts at Connecticut DEP. As fall is the mating period for crayfish, it is reasonable to expect that these were adults, and that smaller crayfish will be in these vicinities in late spring.

Water velocity was estimated as slow, medium, or fast, in each of these locations. However an exact method for measuring water flow will have to be determined. In addition, it will be important to choose a statistical model that best shows the relationships between these abiotic features and crayfish populations.

Data collection sheets and an identification key were devised prior to trapping, and I also began a field notebook. The experiences this autumn already show that the key and data sheet model will need to be modified. Although the identification manual, Crayfishes (Astacidae) of North and Middle America, by Horton H. Hobbs, Jr. (1972) continues to be a valuable resource, the discovery of many species since its publication, and the regional differences that occur within species will require that my original identification sheet, which I created using color photographs from several crayfish databases, will have to be revised to include more morphological examples and specific identifying features for each of the target species.

It has been my coursework at Wesleyan that has guided me to this final project, particularly the three courses that I have taken with my adviser, Geoffrey Hammerson, PhD.: SCIE 619 The Biology of Mammals, SCIE 638 Conservation Biology, and SCIE 616 Biology of Marine Mammals. Those experiences in Geoff’s classes spurred my interest in the natural world and its intricate relationships; his courses made me see that there is much to study, literally right in my own backyard.

SCIE 614 Classic Studies in Animal Behavior with Dr. Joyce Powzyck was instrumental in introducing me to the many permutations that exist in animal behavior and the attempts by human observers to understand them. With Professors Suzanne O’Connell (SCIE644 Oceanography) and Professor Jelle Zeilinga de Boer (SCIE 641 Earth Resources) I learned that geological processes shape the natural resources upon which animal and human cultures are founded. Yet Michael Pestel’s course, Green Architecture (ARTS 623), demonstrated the disastrous effect that human civilizations can have on the environment, and the need for a paradigm shift, an embracing of “green living” if our Earth is to continue to be home for so many creatures.

Finally my courses with Professor Michael McAlear (SCIE 680 Genetics Lab, SCIE 681 Recent Advances in Biotechnology, SCIE 68O Molecular Biology of Emerging Diseases) helped me to develop an understanding of, and appreciation for, the tiniest members of our environment, bacteria and viruses; in many respects they are the power brokers of the natural world.

I chose my coursework at Wesleyan carefully, and I feel that my proposed project reflects the broader understanding that I have developed as a result of the differing viewpoints and expertise offered by my instructors in the GLSP program.

Adviser Meeting Plan and Timetable
Because I live here in Lebanon, Connecticut and my adviser lives out of state, I plan to communicate with him by email and the post office. When Geoff returns to Wesleyan to teach this summer, I will of course meet with him to discuss my progress. Over the winter months and into the spring, I plan to continue to do research and to write the review of literature/introduction section for my scientific study. I also will finalize my research plan by determining specific trap sites. The majority of the resources that I need are available through Wesleyan’s library and databases. However I will also utilize the Connecticut DEP for additional information and support. The following is a tentative timetable:

Timetable
Proposal Submitted: January 2008
Work to be submitted to adviser as follows:

January through March 2008
Find a reader for project
Continue research on crayfish
Complete Introduction for Scientific Study
Complete study/ practice of probes and other water quality indicators from Hanna.
Obtain GPS system and water flow meter

March through late May 2008
Firm up research methods and materials
Prepare equipment; edit data sheets
Obtain collector’s license from CT Fisheries Dept.; prepare ID badges for equipment
Finalize trap drop locations

Late June through October 2008
Begin weekly trapping and recording data from chosen sites
Compile digital photography record
Prepare voucher specimens for identification

November, December 2008
Review/determine statistical models to be used; locate personnel at Wesleyan who can assist with computer-generated statistics
Write Methods section of scientific study
Begin developing tables, graphs, charts etc. from data

January through March 2009
Complete statistical analysis
Complete Results section of scientific study

April, May 2009
Complete Discussion, Literature Cited sections

June 2009
Send complete scientific study to adviser for review
Send complete study to reader for review

July, August 2009
Revised final version submitted to adviser: July 31, 2009
Revised final version submitted to reader: July 31, 2009

Project completed and submitted to GLSP: August 15, 2009

Literature Cited

Capelli GM, Munja BL. 1982. Aggressive interactions and resource competition in
relation to species displacement among crayfish of the genus Orconectes. J
Crustacean Biology 2(4): 486-492.

Carnegie Museum of Natural History. 2004 Nov 4. State of Connecticut crayfish species checklist. <http://iz.carnegiemnh.org/crayfish/country_pages/state_pages/connecticut.htm> Accessed 2007 Oct 28.

Creed RP, Reed JM. 2004. Ecosystem engineering by crayfish in a headwater stream
community. J North Am Benthological Society 23(2): 224-236.

Crocker, DW, 1957. The crayfishes of New York state (Decapoda, Astacidae). Bulletin of the New York State Museum and Science Service 355: 1-97.

Crocker DW, Barr DW. 1968. The handbook of crayfishes of Ontario: U of Toronto
Press. 158 p.

Dorn NJ, Urgelles R, Trexler JC. 2005. Evaluating active and passive sampling methods to quantify crayfish density in a freshwater wetland 24(2): 346-356.

Flinders CA, Magoulick DD. 2005. Distribution, habitat use and life history of stream dwelling crayfish in the Spring River drainage of Arkansas and Missouri with a focus on the imperiled Mammoth Spring crayfish (Orconectes marchandi). Am Midland Naturalist 154(2): 358-374.

Helms BS, Creed RP. 2005. The effects of 2 coexisting crayfish on an Appalachian river Community. J N. Am. Benthol. Soc. 24(1): 113-122.

Herbert ME Gelwick FP. 2001. Spatial variation of headwater fish assemblages
explained by hydrologic variability and upstream effects of impoundment. Copeia 2003 (2): 273-284.

Hobbs HH Jr., 1972. Crayfishes (Astacidae) of North and Middle America. Biota of freshwater ecosystems identification manual no.9. Washington, D.C.: Department of Environmental Protection. 173 p.

Joint Nature Conservation Committee. 2007 Nov. 1092 White clawed crayfish
Austropotomobius pallipes. <http://www.jncc.gov.uk/protectedsites/sacselection/species.asp?FeatureIntCode=S1092> Acessed 2007 Nov 11.

Lyons R, Kelly-Quinn M. 2003. An investigation into the disappearance of
Austropotamobius pallipes populations in the headwaters of the Nore River, Ireland and the correlation to water quality. Bull. Fr. Peche Piscic. 370-371: 139-150.

McCafferty WP, 1981. Aquatic entomology: the fishermen’s and ecologists’ illustrated
guide to insects and their relatives. Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett Publishers. 448 p.

The Nature Conservancy. 1997. 1997 Species report card: the state of US plants and animals.
<http://www.natureserve.org/library/1997speciesreportcard.pdf >. Accessed 2007 Dec 2.

Paglianti A, Gherardi F. 2004. Combined effects of temperature and diet on growth and survival of young-of-year crayfish: a comparison between indigenous and
invasive species. J Crustacean Biology 24(1): 140-148.

Rabalais MR, Magoulick DD. 2006. Influence of an invasive crayfish species on diurnal habitat use and selection by a native crayfish species in an Ozark stream. Am Midland Naturalist 155: 295-306.

Roth BM, Hein CL, Vander Zanden, MJ. 2006. Using bioenergetics and stable isotopes to assess the trophic role of rusty crayfish (Orconectes rusticus) in lake littoral zones. Can J of Fisheries & Aquatic Sciences 63: 335-344.

US Dept of Environmental Protection. 2005 Aug. 10. Use of biological information to better define aquatic life uses in state and tribal water quality standards: tiered aquatic life uses. <http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/rbp/app_a.html>. Accessed 2007 Dec.1.

Bibliography of Additional Resources

Charlebois PM, Lamberti GA. 1996. Invading crayfish in a Michigan steam: direct and indirect effects on periphyton and macroinvertebrates. J N Am Benthological Soc 15: 551-563.

Claussen DL, Hopper RA, Sanker AM. 2000. The effects of temperature, body size, and hydration state on the terrestrial locomotion of the crayfish. J Crustacean Bio. 20(2): 218-223.

Creed RP Jr. 1994. Direct and indirect effects of grazing in a stream community. Ecology 75: 2091-2103.

Cronin G, Lodge DM, Hay ME, Miller M, Hill AM, Horvath T, Bolser RC, Lindquist N, Wahl W. 2002. Crayfish feeding preferences for freshwater macrophytes: the influence of plant structure and chemistry. J Crustacean Bio. 22(4): 708-718.

DiStefano RJ, Gale CM, Wagner BA, Zweifel RD. 2003. A sampling method to assess lotic crayfish communities. J Crustacean Bio. 23(3): 678-690.

Dukat H, Magoulick DD. 1999. Effects of predation on two species of stream dwelling crayfish (Orconectes marchandi and Cambarus hubbsi) in pool and riffle habitats. J Ark Acad of Sci 53: 45-49.

Englund G., Krupa JJ. 2000. Habitat use by crayfish in stream pools; influence of predators, depth, and body size. Freshwat Biol 43: 75-83.

Flinders CA. 2000. The ecology of lotic system crayfish in the Spring River Watershed innorthern Arkansas and southern Missouri. M.S. Thesis, University of Central Arkansas, Conway Arkansas. 107p.

Hazlett BA, Acquistapace P, Gherardi F. 2006. Responses of the crayfish Orconectes Virilis to chemical cues depend upon flow conditions. J Crustacean Bio. 26(1): 94-98.

Harvey BC, Stewart AJ. 1991. Fish size and habitat depth relationships in headwater streams. Oceologia 87: 336-342.

Hobbs HH Jr. 1981. The crayfishes of Georgia. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press. 549 p.

Huxley TH. Raymond SA (editor). 1880. Crayfish: an introduction to the study of zoology.  London: C. Kegan & Paul Co. 33p.

Lodge DM, Hill AM. 1994. Factors governing species composition, population size, and productivity of cool-water crayfishes. Nordi J Freshwa Res 69: 111-136.

Mundahl ND, Benton MJ. 1990. Aspects of thermal ecology of the rusty crayfish Orconectes rusticus (Girard). Oecologia 82: 210-216.

Rader RB, Batzer DP, Wissinger SA (edited). 2001. Bioassessment and management of North American freshwater wetlands. New York: John Wiley & Sons. 480 p.

Whitledge GW, Rabeni CF. 1997. Energy sources and ecological role of crayfishes in an Ozark stream. Can J Fish Aquat Sci 54: 2555-2563.

 

Sample Thesis Proposal - Arts

Nancy Otter
Can Iphigenia Speak? Poems from the Scarp of Euripides' Iphigenia at Aulis
Advisor: Lisa Jarnot
December 2008

Abstract
My goal for this project is to write a poem, or series of poems, in the voice
of Iphigenia, daughter of Agamemnon, sacrificed by him, according to Euripides,
at the outset of the Trojan War. My purpose is to sound out aspects of Iphigenia's
voice which are not audible in the Classical texts, a kind of imaginative
archaeology. I plan to set these imaginative pieces in juxtaposition to others,
some scholarly, some not, touching on power, gender, and culture. Together, the
created and selected pieces will form a text that explores Iphigenia as a symbol
we in the 21st century have inherited, and who therefore helps shape
contemporary ideas about war, gender, sacrifice, and community.

Development of Topic
The fate of Iphigenia is the hinge on which hangs the prosecution of the
Trojan War, according to legend. Oddly, however, Iphigenia is unmentioned in the
Iliad, and her story only obliquely alluded to in the Odyssey. Euripides' plays,
Iphigenia in Tauris and Iphgenia in Aulis, give Iphigenia her oldest known voice.

Whether I imagine Iphigenia living in Mycenae at the supposed time of the
Trojan War, or during the Classical period when Euripides wrote about her,
audiences would locate her within the narrow confines of an aristocratic woman's
world: at once privileged and trapped. My poems will present Iphigenia's
thinking as she remembers that life, including what she was taught to do and
believe, and compares it to the soldiers' encampment in Aulis where the sacrifice is to take place. I want to depict how the character Iphigenia might recall the
stories and songs she would have heard from the other women of the house,
including her powerful and furious mother, and how or whether they prepared
her to make sense of the situation she encounters at Aulis. I want to draw out her
thinking about the comparisons between her situation and that of a soldier, and
between herself and Helen.

Like many 20th century feminists, I read the Western literary canon---
much of which I treasure--- with a varying mixture of puzzlement, rage, and pity,
all rooted in consciousness of what is missing. It is not just Iphigenia's voice.
"Literary history and the present are dark with silences," as Tillie Olsen
famously wrote in 1965. Olsen's eye was on the unwritten, unpublished,
unrecognized writings of women, people of the working classes, people of color.
She echoed and expanded on the mockingly angry story of Shakespeare's sister,
imagined by Virginia Woolf in 1928. Silences also exist within texts, as Kristeva,
Wittig, Spivak, Gilbert and Gubar, and others began to point out in the 1980s.
Voices, stories, and perspectives of some characters are unheard, distorted, made
ridiculous. When these are archetypal characters, like Helen, Clytemnestra, or
Snow White, inhabiting myths, legends, and fairy tales, such silences become a
defining element of the archetype, and, as linguists, psychologists and
anthropologists have shown, powerfully shape culture and individual
consciousness.

At least since the time of Anne Finch, writers in English have from time to
time tried to sound out buried voices and stories of archetypal female characters from within the European tradition, particularly named figures like Eve, Lilith,
Medea, or Rapunzel who shape notions of female identity. Generic images like
the wicked old witch, or the evil stepmother have also been held up to a new kind
of light by both literary critics and social theorists. This project seeks to build on,
and join, that effort.

I first heard of Iphigenia when I was a young teenager, 13 or 14 years old,
about the character's age. My parents took me to a production of Euripides'
Iphigenia in Aulis at Ford's Theater in Washington, DC. Given the time in history
---it would have been 1968 or 1969--- and my parents' deep involvement in
antiwar activities, it's likely the production was an antiwar fundraiser. My
mother doesn't remember the evening at all. Why does the memory stick with
me? I had been reading about Greek mythology (and other mythologies) for as
long as I could remember, I knew the pantheon and a few stories. But here,
remarkably, on the stage, were mortals depicted as living, working, moving
within that world. Here, more mysteriously, was a girl my age, apparently
central to the conflict, upon whom the lives and fortunes of the king and queen,
the entire state apparatus, seemed to depend. Could girls like me be important?
I had heard my mother say, referring to the Selective Service and my draft-age
brother, "Don’t play Abraham with my Isaac!" Why did she never say, "Don’t play
Agamemnon with my Iphigenia!"? What would it mean if she did? How did these
stories ---Isaac's well-known and Iphigenia's obscure--- shape expectations,
assumptions, status of boys and girls? Iphigenia's story, I soon learned, was
richly laced with paradox and contradiction. She seemed at once to be the vital key to unlocking the state's potential, and yet, finally, powerless herself to resist
the state. And I had never heard of her until that night. Further, in the nearly
40 years since I was taken to that play, I have almost never heard of her again.

In his play, Euripides graces Iphigenia with moving and powerful speeches.
She addresses her royal father, the warrior Achilles, and her mother, the queen,
thoughtfully and bravely. Although she is pleading with Agamemnon as a
daughter to a father, these are public speeches, she is conscious of an audience
beyond him, and is addressing her role as a public representation of the ruling
family. What would we hear if Iphigenia spoke for herself? Is it possible even in
the 21st century? Or is Iphigenia an Attic enactment of the kind of speech which
is not speech that Gayatri Spivak picks apart in her seminal essay "Can the
Subaltern Speak?" Setting aside, for now, discussion of whether Iphigenia is
subaltern, my question is, "Can Iphigenia Speak?" That is, in Spivak's terms, in
the 21st century, is it ideologically possible to fabricate a discursive space in
which Iphigenia can exist as a speaking subject? Looking back from the 21st
century, could the character Iphigenia tell her own story, the story of herself as a
metaphor? Digging beneath Euripides' text, would it be possible to imagine the
ideas and options she considers silently between line 1776 where she pleads with
the chorus to hide her from the approaching soldiers, and line 1845 in which she
tells Clytemnestra and Achilles: "I have made up my mind to die"? Subsequently,
Iphigenia articulates the paradox of simultaneously embodying power and
impotence. In my work, I want to explore how she made that transition and came
to that understanding.

Methodology and Literature Review
My project, then, takes root in the crossroads where the young girl I was in
1968 meets post-modern theory. Both the girl and the theory are looking at texts
---literary and otherwise--- and thinking: there is more here than meets the eye;
there is something "they" (the author-ities, the voices from the center) are not
telling me. Post-modern deconstruction assigns itself the task of exposing
previously submerged meanings within a text, sometimes simply measuring
silences, sometimes working to make silence speak. The work of such theorists,
including Spivak, Wittig, and Butler, will inform my project. In addition to social
theorists, I will also read carefully other re-tellings of Classical stories such as
H.D.’s Helen in Egypt, Wittig's works, Margaret Atwood's The Robber Bride, and
the many poems written about Odysseus and Penelope. Bringing to the page and
ear previously inaudible voices, particularly where they are shrouded within
foundational texts, enacts post-modern theory by both shattering and enriching
interpretation of archetypes. It's possible that the effort to understand
Iphigenia's complicity in her own murder may raise disturbing questions about
what kind of milk we continue to suckle from our literary and cultural forebears.

My research will go beyond literary and critical sources. The interactive
Archaeological Map of the Ancient Aegean, and other internet sources let me see
the color of the water, the sky, the dust, the shape of the trees and the angle of
the hills in both Mycenae and Aulis, as well as the remains of the temples of
Artemis at Aulis and Brauron. Archaeology and geography texts and sites have also helped me imagine Iphigenia's journey from Mycenae to Aulis, and her life in
the palace of Agamemnon, as well as the social context within which Euripides
produced his texts.

Although I am writing in the 21st century, I want to give Iphigenia a voice
that suits her archetypal status. I plan to echo the metrical and stylistic forms of
Homeric poetry to the extent possible and meaningful. At the same time, I am
conscious that the poetic forms we know today from the ancient world are forms
used, perhaps exclusively, by males. Some scholars suggest that women's
storytelling may have been primarily in weaving, tapestry. I will work at shaping
my final product so that it echoes this tradition as well. Iphigenia's story recalls
us, as it did Euripides' audience, to the mythological time when the foundation of
much of our social structure, particularly patriarchy, was laid. My project of
sounding out Iphigenia's voice is meant to complicate and enrich how that
heritage is understood.

Ultimately, this project is a work of art, and as such, its final form is bound
to be, to some degree, unpredictable. Beyond traditional art forms, I will also
look to this century in shaping my final product. The final work may well include
quotations, elements of collage, a nonlinear structure, or other elements which
announce themselves in the course of the project's development. I will look to
contemporary writers' and artists' use of structure and form, as well as language,
to call assumptions and traditions into question, to rattle the narrative and the
reader a bit, to pull apart the notions of author and authority. In the end, my goal
is to throw light, not cold water, on tradition.

Wesleyan Resources
A GLSP class, "Epic Tradition from Homer to Milton," augmented ---and
sometimes contradicted--- by books and articles by feminist Classicists, added to
my understanding of the social constraints and value system that would have
shaped Iphigeneia as a literary character. Classes like Ellen Nerenberg’s seminar
on Primo Levi pushed me to think about how people make decisions when forced
to the very edge of existence, and how such moments can effectively be presented
in literature. Karen Anderson's class, "Creation Narratives," enriched my
understanding of the variety of foundational, archetypal systems humans have
developed, from which individual and collective actions emerge.

Finally, the five writing classes I have enjoyed over my Wesleyan years
have given me the confidence, and, I hope, skill I need to discover and bring to the
page an Iphigenia who is as proud and passionate as her parents, Agamemnon
and Clytemnestra, as brave, and perhaps as angry, as Achilles, and as
independent as her world and her imagination could allow. As the fates would
have it, my last writing class also gave me a project advisor, Lisa Jarnot, whose
knowledge of the Classics, skill as a poet, and deep natural curiosity are a perfect
kit for guiding me through the many thickets this project promises to include. I
will also be relying on the insights of visual artist and printmaker Natasha Miles,
an instructor at CCY, Green Street Art Center, and Greater Hartford Academy of
the Arts, in the design and construction of my final project.