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Dreams
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What is Dreams?

Dreams appear across multiple academic disciplines, making them a genuinely cross-cutting subject for students. In psychology and social science courses, dreams are examined as windows into unconscious thought, emotional processing, and mental health. Freudian psychoanalytic theory treats dreams as central evidence for understanding the unconscious mind, and papers engaging with that framework explore how dream interpretation became foundational to a broader theory of human psychology. Beyond clinical psychology, dreams surface in literature courses through works like A Raisin in the Sun and A Midsummer Night's Dream, where the concept carries metaphorical weight about aspiration, identity, and social possibility.

The papers archived under this topic take several distinct approaches. Some are explanatory and scientific, investigating sleep cycles and the biological or psychological reasons humans dream. Others are psychoanalytic, focusing specifically on Freud's theoretical position and what it contributes to understanding the mind. A number of papers take a literary or cultural angle, analyzing how dreams function symbolically in narratives tied to family, identity, and ambition. Personal and reflective writing also appears, connecting individual dream experiences to broader questions about life, society, and self-understanding.

A strong essay on dreams begins by clearly committing to one disciplinary lens — clinical, literary, or cultural — rather than trying to cover all three at once. Evidence carries the most weight when it is specific: a close reading of a text, a clearly explained theoretical framework, or a well-supported psychological claim. The most common pitfall is treating "dreams" too loosely, allowing the essay to drift between metaphorical ambition and literal sleep phenomena without acknowledging the distinction.

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Research Paper Doctorate

Behaviorism and psychoanalysis: therapeutic approaches and historical development

¶ … history of behaviorism and psychoanalysis. The writer explores the changes the field has undergone since its inception as well as some of the people who were important to those changes.

Paper Undergraduate

Photography, memory, and identity in Christopher Nolan's Memento

Based on the short story of his younger brother, Jonathan Nolan, Film Director and Screenwriter Christopher Nolan created the film Memento, released in 2000. Guy Pierce stars as the lead character, Leonard Shelby. The film is a highly non-linear, thriller film-noir mystery. Leonard Shelby was once a man who lived a humble, yet charmed life. He married the woman of his dreams; he lived in a lovely home. His occupation was in the insurance industry as an investigator. One particular case haunts him repeatedly, that of Sammy Jankis, a man who suffered memory loss as a result of an accident. Shelby did not believe in the man's condition and did not rule positively on his claim; Jankis' wife ultimately sacrifices her life in order to prove the truth—that her husband truly did suffer from memory problems. Their lives weigh heavily upon Shelby. The paper argues that Memento brings to light differences in perspective on the potential for photography upon identity and memory between Susan Sontag and bell hooks.

Paper Undergraduate

Disassociation and personality disorders in Fight Club and Abre Los Ojos

The exhibit of my choice for the research essay is the film Fight Club. It is a screen adaptation of a novel of the same title; therefore, the novel will be referenced as well. While the focus of the paper will be upon Fight Club, in an effort to expand the context of the ideas to be discussed, the essay will also include analysis of a related Spanish film, Abre Los Ojos (Open Your Eyes). This film preceded the release of Fight Club by two years and went on to later be adapted for an American audience under the title, Vanilla Sky, starring Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz, and Penelope Cruz, who is cast as the same character, Sofia, in both versions of the film. The paper will discuss these films, questions they raise, and ideas they execute in relation to Doniger's piece, "Many Masks, Many Selves."

Material possessions and the construction of self-identity in postmodern consumption

Two questions are answered in this paper: (1) How can studying material culture (the objects people possess and relate to) allow us to identify the difference between self and social identities? How are our identities expressed through our relations with material culture? (2) How does society regulate gender identity? To what extent can an individual choose or change their gender identity?

Anne Frank's diary and the resilience of human hope

This paper looks at the attributes of The Diary of Anne Frank and examines the elements that make this tale so endearing and enduring. Anne's ability to sustain her optimism and see people as essentially good in the face of the terrible persecution and prejudice of the Holocaust is discussed.

Paper Undergraduate

Transition of care for pediatric sickle cell disease patients

Recent years have seen a number of different investigations of the issues involved in the transition of care -- from pediatric-oriented to adult-oriented services -- for those who suffer from sickle cell disease.

Research Paper Doctorate

The role of forensic psychologists in homicide investigation and reconstruction

It should be noted that psychology has not had a clearly defined space in the judicial field. On the one hand, while the law demands tangible and verifiable data, psychology, answers from knowledge conjectural.

Paper High School

Pierre Huyghe and Ai Weiwei's installation art and postmodern identity

After reviewing the artists from Art21, the artists chosen are Pierre Huyghe and Ai Weiwei as the subjects of this paper. The pieces the paper will be "This is not a time for dreaming" by Huyghe and "Forever" by Weiwei. Both pieces are installation pieces although the artists are not classified under the same grouping on the Art21 website. Weiwei is listed as "Featured in Change" and Huyghe is listed as "Featured in Romance." Though they are not featured or classified in the same group, their respective groups are related. There are several different kinds of people in the world for whom change is romantic. Weiwei is a renowned activist as well as renowned artists. Artists typically have a deep passion within that they express via their art. Therefore, Weiwei could see the connection between romance and change. For the native Parisian Huyghe, romance may very well be an expression of change. The paper will perform analyses and provide insight into the intention & meanings of their works. The installations of these very different artists are similar in that they communicate to the audience with subtlety and pluralism.

Paper Undergraduate

Satan's portrayal in Twain's "The Mysterious Stranger" and Goethe's "Faust"

This story is meant to be a comparison and contrast between to books, written by different authors, who have something in common in the tales they have told. The paper looks at "Faust" by Goethe and "The Mysterious Stranger" by Mark Twain. The two authors tell classic tales of Satan and they have some very different views about him and his influence.

Paper Undergraduate

Gender roles and family dynamics in Kafka's Metamorphosis

This paper discusses Franz Kafka's "The Metamorphosis." In the story, a young man turns into a giant insect. Reading this story through the lens of psychoanalytic literary theory, it can be read as a man who has to use his body to work until he cannot stand his body. At that point, his sister is forced to sell her body to support the family.

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