The purpose of this thesis was to analyze the impact South Asian mythology and epics such as the Mahabharata and Ramayana have on modern gender roles and how modern ideals and gender roles are reshaping or reinterpreting these stories and myths. The primary mode of research for this thesis were interviews, including people of varying ages and gender. The interviews revealed that there are several generational and cultural forces that are reshaping these myths and offering different interpretations of these stories. People from the younger generation, especially those who have grown up in a more westernized culture, tend to be less reverent towards these myths and more critical in their analysis of the characters.

The guiding research question was: How and with which criteria does the public in the Balkan countries of Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina determine which fortune telling methods are or aren’t acceptable in the Catholic community setting? Detailed individual interviews with individuals from Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina were used to try developing an answer to the question. The interview question topics ranged from fortune telling to more religious and culturally focused. With 8 female interviewees being willing to answer question, significant insight into the communities revealed the divisions of catholic vs. secular, older vs. younger, and coast vs. inland. Their insight led to the conclusion that Catholic communities in Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina determine the acceptability of a fortune telling method based on their familiarity with it from knowledge passed down through elders and their cultural history.

Magic as a practice can be found in cultures all throughout history and well into the contemporary age. Love magic specifically is a type of magic intended to promote feelings of attraction or desire, love and/or intimacy in another person. Despite some pretty compelling negative aspects of love magic, like its historically violent and controlling nature, its implications of problematic neurotic behavior, or the coercive, nonconsensual impacts of its effects, I argue that on an individual level it can have many benefits that make it a worthwhile therapeutic practice. For the spell caster, it can function as a stress-relieving response in uncontrollable situations, as well as a form of communication in instances where direct communication isn’t possible. These beneficial claims have been corroborated with many cultural and psychological studies and connect the seemingly fantastical idea of love magic to the scientific world.

Since 800 CE— long before the creation of the National Park Service (NPS) in 1905 — the Havasupai Tribe has depended on the natural resources and diverse ecosystem of the Grand Canyon. A deeper examination of how the national park came to fruition however demonstrates an often negated and harrowing history of land theft, forced assimilation via reservation systems, and genocide. Political ecology is a way of considering how power dynamics, resource management, and society intersect. In the United States, this approach exposes the ways that anti-Indigenous legislation originating in the Department of the Interior has functioned both as a driver of ecosystem degradation and structural barricades to Native American self-determination. In order to achieve a just and sustainable future for all, it is necessary to dismantle hegemonic discourses regarding Indigenous communities.

I will be arguing that, although Kierkegaard is masterful when it comes incorporating rhetorical strategies and poetic elements in his works in an attempt to grasp the reader’s attention, his reliance upon a theistic system contradicts what I believe to be the message of subjectivity. This is why he does not affect me in a way that Nietzsche does and I will be objectively showing why I have been influenced more by Nietzsche through the use of their texts. His ideas on the overman, the will to power, and masks and appearances are liberating for the subjective thinker and invoke a sense of nobility in human existence that is not matched by Kierkegaard’s ideas. Perhaps my reader will disagree with my opinion but I hope this provides a dialogue or “loving fight” between these two thinkers for my reader to come to his/her own conclusion about the nature of subjectivity and its role in human existence.