JORDAN P. UPTON
PAST WORKS
Articles, Reviews, Papers, & More
MEMORY, SPACE, PLACE, AND COMMUNITY: TRACING THE HISTORY OF COATS SCHOOL
October, 2019
The Coats School was built in a small, rural community in central North Carolina in 1900. For over one hundred years it stood as a beacon of community, education, and the future. This essay explores the rhetoric surrounding the school through its various iterations through time.
SEVEN SAMURAI MOVIE REVIEW
November 6, 2018
Akira Kurosawa, the widely acclaimed Japanese filmmaker, released Seven Samurai in 1954. This highly influential film examines how a small farm town defends itself from marauders with the help of seven master-less samurai in 16th century Japan. This short review explores how the film finds itself in the Medieval world as we know it.
ANTHONY PICO'S STORY FEATURED ON THIS AMERICAN LIFE
October 29, 2018
Anthony Pico was born in the foster care system. He saw the way the system worked from the inside. Or, rather, how it didn't work. The radio show This American Life follows Anthony as he travels through California delivering speeches on the frequently overlooked and underfunded world of foster care.
A REUNINFICATION STORY: WE JUST HUGGED
October 8, 2018
Bonnie Hendrix was raised knowing that she was adopted. While her adoptive parents were kind and loving, she always wanted to find and contact her birth mother. After years of not knowing and having to overcome the hurdles in her way, Bonnie and her birth mother finally met.
STAFF PROFILE: MEET AGAPE OF NC'S DIRECTOR, KIM SCOTT
July 26, 2018
While Kim Scott was happy as her own boss at her private practice, a chance encounter with her church's minister led her to become the director of AGAPE of N.C., an organization focused on adoption, foster care, and other services for children in need.
MAKING LEMONADE FOR THOSE GIVEN LEMONS
July 9, 2018
Eleven-year-old Meredith Finch saw how difficult the life of a foster child can be. While her parents fostered numerous children in their home for years, Meredith also knew that they could not take in every child that needed help. So, Meredith opened a lemonade stand in her town and donated the profits to charity, all on her own.
CLASS STRUGGLES DUE TO CAPITALISM AS SHOWN IN THE VIOLENT BEAR IT AWAY
November 21, 2016
Flannery O'Connor's landmark 1960 novel The Violent Bear It Away follows young Francis Marion Tarwater as he navigates the world according to his great-uncle, also named Tarwater. This paper discusses how class and a capitalistic system can alter landscapes and viewpoints in more ways than one.
