Digital Commons Network^™

"No One's Gonna Say That At Church:" Women's Experiences With Infertility In Christian Faith Communities, Donna Paulsen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study explores women’s experiences with infertility in Christian faith communities. Drawing from nine one-on-one interviews, the author argues that the presence of particular religious ideologies, social interactions, and rituals within faith communities contributed to the stigmatization and marginalization of study participants. Employing Muted Group Theory, the author uncovers the communicative strategies infertile women employ to resist these oppressive practices. A qualitative analysis of participants’ narratives presents two principal categories, containing a total of four findings relating to the harmful beliefs and practices of these women’s faith communities. The author argues that the veneration of motherhood and children suggests that …

The Socially Deviant (M)Other In Euripides' "Medea" And Two Modern Adaptations, Christina Faye Kramer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

For centuries male-dominated societies have developed their own culturally constructed images of the socially acceptable and socially deviant mothers. The thesis explores how the Grecian, Caribbean, and Irish cultures of Euripides’ Medea (431 BC), Steve Carter’s Pecong (1990), and Marina Carr’s By the Bog of Cats (1998) respectively, all based on the Medea myth, commonly define the social deviant (m)other and condemn her for her “otherness.” It also discusses the limitations of each society’s decision to label the Medea-figure as socially deviant. Euripides creates an impossible dichotomy between the culturally constructed concepts of heroism and motherhood, which he locates in …

Away From The End Of Motherhood: Sites Of Haunting In The Social Imaginary In Lemonade And The Handmaid's Tale, Julia Michele Fleming

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis analyzes the television series adaptation of The Handmaid's Tale, specifically the episode "A Woman's Place," and Beyoncé's Lemonade: A Visual Album. I argue that these cultural texts leverage representations of women's lived experiences to scrutinize contemporary American anxieties about motherhood and reproductive justice. Lemonade, a celebration of Black womanhood, presents a counterpoint to The Handmaid's Tale's preoccupation with white motherhood in way that speculates on the utopian potentials of a woman-centered society.

Using bell hooks' film analysis, Avery Gordon's "haunting," and Luce Irigaray's "mimicry," I examine two interconnected themes: feminist aesthetics and generational haunting. …