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Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities

Where Have All The Good Men Gone? A Psychoanalytic Reading Of The Absent Fathers & Bad Dads On Abc's Lost, Melissa R. Ames Jun 2014

Where Have All The Good Men Gone? A Psychoanalytic Reading Of The Absent Fathers & Bad Dads On Abc's Lost, Melissa R. Ames

Melissa A. Ames

Fictional fathers in narratives are often allegorical in nature and contemporary television is not immune from this. ABC’s groundbreaking television drama, Lost, offers a multitude of father figures that suggests not only a crisis concerning the role of the father in the 21st century but also the crisis of national security experienced by Americans after the attacks. In particular, the program showcases three specific types of troubled father/child relationships: those in which the father is absent and/or dead, those where the father is portrayed as abusive and/or evil, and those where the father and child are estranged and/or their relationship …


Wallpaper Mania, Ellen Corrigan Jan 2013

Wallpaper Mania, Ellen Corrigan

Ellen K. Corrigan

Text panels from "Wallpaper Mania," a local exhibit in support of the Booth Library installation of the National Library of Medicine traveling exhibition The Literature of Prescription: Charlotte Perkins Gilman and "The Yellow Wall-Paper," on display September 23-November 2, 2013.


Boys And Brokeback: American Attitudes Towards Gays, Todd Bruns Jan 2012

Boys And Brokeback: American Attitudes Towards Gays, Todd Bruns

Todd A. Bruns

Movies, like television, literature and music, reflect a society’s standards, values, trends, and anxieties. The wave of alien invasion movies of the 1950s (Attack of the Flying Saucers, The Atomic Submarine, Invasion of the Body Snatchers and more) revealed the American psychological paranoia of the Cold War, just as numerous movies of the late 1970s/1980s that dwelt on Vietnam (Apocalypse Now, Coming Home, The Deer Hunter, etc.) demonstrated a collective attempt to come to psychological grips with the loss of that war. As standards shift movies can become embarrassing reminders of past social norms that make contemporary viewers justifiably uneasy: …


When Predator Becomes Prey: The Gendered Jargon Of Popular Culture, Melissa R. Ames Jan 2011

When Predator Becomes Prey: The Gendered Jargon Of Popular Culture, Melissa R. Ames

Melissa A. Ames

Throughout the first decade of the twenty-first century the vernacular of popular culture has been bombarded by sexualized terminology. Although these terms are often formed with humorous intent, their staying power and use as cultural descriptive categories is both intriguing and disturbing. Also troubling is the fact that the majority of these new terms, such as puma (a thirty-something female “dating” a younger male), cougar (a forty-plus female “dating” a younger male), and MILF (“mother I’d like to fuck”), are restricted to the female gender alone. This article analyzes the etymology of these terms, their use in popular culture (ranging …


Women & Language: Essays On Gendered Communication Across Media, Melissa R. Ames Jan 2011

Women & Language: Essays On Gendered Communication Across Media, Melissa R. Ames

Melissa A. Ames

The present volume of essays examines women's communication as it has evolved historically across multiple mediums. Part I explores how women became "gossip girls" and the important role of gossip in the perception and practice of female communication. Essays in Part II cover the convergence of oral and written communication in women's literature. Gendered performance in such arenas as salsa dance, Dr. Phil and the Internet is examined in Part III, and essays in Part IV discuss women's communication in the technology-rich 21st century. This excerpt features the introduction and one essay from the co-editor.


Ecofeminism And Experiential Learning: Taking The Risks Of Activism Seriously, Jeannie Ludlow Jan 2010

Ecofeminism And Experiential Learning: Taking The Risks Of Activism Seriously, Jeannie Ludlow

Jeannie Ludlow

No abstract provided.


The (Inter)Active Soap Opera Viewer: Fantastic Practices & Mediated Communities, Melissa R. Ames Jan 2010

The (Inter)Active Soap Opera Viewer: Fantastic Practices & Mediated Communities, Melissa R. Ames

Melissa A. Ames

In today’s cultural realm, everything exists within a hierarchy of sorts – fandom has not escaped this process of judgmental ranking and social stratification. Admitting to be a “fan” of something often earns people mixed responses depending on the subject of their devoted following. The more one’s object of choice strays from the mainstream, the lower one exists on the fan hierarchy. If the masses find the fan subject matter to exist on the cultural periphery, fans are often quite ridiculed. This has historically been the case for soap opera fans. What is often overlooked, however, is the utility of …


Twilight Follows Tradition: Analyzing "Biting" Critiques Of Vampire Narratives For Their Portrayals Of Gender & Sexuality, Melissa R. Ames Jan 2010

Twilight Follows Tradition: Analyzing "Biting" Critiques Of Vampire Narratives For Their Portrayals Of Gender & Sexuality, Melissa R. Ames

Melissa A. Ames

Vampires have dominated print literature since the 18th century, eventually becoming more visible as they crossed mediated boundaries and genre divides. Now flourishing in neo-gothic realms like science fiction and fantasy, in print genres like chick-lit and young adult, and in the visual realm (from Hollywood’s big screen to daytime television’s sudsy small screen), vampire narratives are finding increased popularity. Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series has shined a new spotlight on the all-encompassing umbrella genre that is “vamp lit,” and with it has come renewed attention to the so-called anti-feminist messages present in such narratives, such as the perceived negative characterization …


Papa’S Baby, Mama’S . . . Papa?: Toward A Faux Gestational History, Jeannie Ludlow Jan 2009

Papa’S Baby, Mama’S . . . Papa?: Toward A Faux Gestational History, Jeannie Ludlow

Jeannie Ludlow

Mr. Lee Mingwei is pregnant, the “world’s first pregnant man.” The research website of RYT Hospital at Dwayne Medical Center, an institution specializing in nanotechnological medicine, introduces visitors to Lee (primagravidus2 [G1P0000, EP1, IVF-ET1, Post term])3 and verifies his pregnancy through live feeds of his EKG, sonogram, and vital signs (weight, blood pressure, fundal height4 ). Interested viewers can watch a documentary of Lee shopping in Times Square, talking about his experience as the first pregnant man, or follow links to a U.S. News and World Report magazine cover hailing Lee as “MAN(?) of the Year” or to Lee’s congratulations …


Sometimes It’S A Child And A Choice: Toward An Embodied Abortion Praxis, Jeannie Ludlow Jan 2008

Sometimes It’S A Child And A Choice: Toward An Embodied Abortion Praxis, Jeannie Ludlow

Jeannie Ludlow

Feminist analyses of recent abortion politics in the United States note that the “abortion debate” has settled into a system of dichotomies, such as the dichotomy between women’s autonomy on the abortion rights side and the value of unborn life on the anti-abortion side. This article posits that these dichotomizations contribute to the erosion of women’s access and rights to abortion through loss of credibility for abortion rights discourse and loss of access to abortion praxis that can handle more complex situations. Maintenance of the dichotomies requires denial or erasure of more complicated situations, like late-second-trimester abortion and situations in …