Creative Writing Commons^™

Things We Have In Common: Essays And Experiments, Willow Grosz

All NMU Master's Theses

Things We Have in Common is a collection of short stories, flash pieces, and image-text experiments that attempts, in the wake of the death of my mother, to excavate the relationship between memory and narrative, identity and belonging against a backdrop of the main forces that have influenced my familial group, namely generational poverty, a changing relationship with our Athabascan and Caucasian heritages, and the complicated ecology, geography, and culture of Alaska. Like many forays into memory, this project represents a joyous failure. Please read this collection as a love letter to Alaska.

Bramble And Knife, Sara Ryan

All NMU Master's Theses

This thesis is a collection of poems that center on the themes of extinction, family, the female body, and the presence of the animal. During my time in the Upper Peninsula, I found a connection with the natural world around me, and this led to my fascination with animals and extinction, both of which manifested in my poetry. As I struggled with the residual effects of toxic relationships, as well as the bleak romantic landscape of the UP, I saw my own body reflected in the bodies of animals. I specifically noticed this reflection while studying the art of taxidermy; …

In Post Memoriam: An Exploration Of Family And Grieving, Courtney A. Mauck

All NMU Master's Theses

This collection of essays, poems, and fiction details the author’s exploration of familial trauma and grief. The author wrestles with the concept of “postmemory” as theorized by Marianne Hirsch and questions what it means to have the experiences of someone else passed down through generations. The collection includes essays on the connection between eggs and ovarian cancer, the exploration of animal magnetism, as well as a fictional recreation of a familial story. By braiding several forms of writing together, the work aims to create an interwoven narrative that questions the very concept of memory.

Deeper Than Roots, Braelyn D. Spencer

All NMU Master's Theses

This collection of essays explores the author’s relationship with home. The author works through family, death, relationships, illness, and growth. The essays consist of an analysis of rooms within a house, the act of burying loved ones, and discovering what it is to move away. These essays aim to mix retellings of everyday events and relationships with deep personal turmoil and the growth that result from it.

Check The Box Marked Other: Exploring Gender In Family Life, Serenity E. Dougherty

All NMU Master's Theses

The concept of a traditional family structure has been fading over the last 50 years and with this decline the notion of responsibilities being determined by gender is also losing ground, though it still has a long way to go. This short story collection works to continue to normalize the increasing variety of family structures, especially variety that has its roots in new notions of gender challenging old conventions. The stories are all set in Nebraska, an ideal landscape for exploring tradition versus modernity. Though there are major cities in NE, most of the state is composed of smaller rural …

All Feathers And Attitude, Virginia Macdonald

All NMU Master's Theses

This collection of essays and prose poems seeks to examine the elements of an identity: how memories, culture, work, place, family, and brain chemistry simultaneously create and undermine a sense of self. How the sense of self is not contiguous, or smooth. How hope and regret wrestle.

While deeply personal, All Feathers and Attitude is not a memoir, but rather an assemblage of interpretations based on actual events. The individual pieces are gathered into sections that correlate somewhat to the themes mentioned above, but the sections are not labeled as such. The readers may draw whatever conclusions they wish regarding …

In A Relative Way, Gabriel W. Waskiewicz

All NMU Master's Theses

In this series of interrelated personal essays, I explore how relationships with certain family members and friends have helped form my life. Through the lives of those profiled here, I believe readers will get a better glimpse into the troubles I’ve been through in my own life. The many parallels I have with the lives of these family members and friends show that they have endured comparable situations or have even been through many of the same problems that I’ve had to withstand. By first seeing how these important individuals shaped my life, readers will get a better understanding of …

Around The Table, Rachel E. Mills

All NMU Master's Theses

ABSTRACT

Around the Table

By

Rachel Elizabeth Mills

This collection of nonfiction essays revolves around concepts of food and home. The essays focus on the universalizing nature of food, both from a personal perspective, and from a diasporic Middle Eastern perspective. In these essays I explore how food unifies and creates communities. The essays range from exploring my own upbringing in rural Upper Michigan, and how food creates bonds within my own family and community, to examining how food creates ties and communities within the Arab diaspora. This collective narrative, in focusing on the communal characteristics surrounding the human need …