Literature in English, North America Commons^™

Ahab’S Soul: An Exploration Of The Hero Of Moby-Dick, Jaedon Wilkinson

The Kabod

Presented at the National Collegiate Research Conference at Harvard University, January 2023.

See also Research Week 2023 Poster.

God In Harlem: Religious Symbolism In "Sonny's Blues", Katherine Bechter

Liberty University Research Week

Undergraduate

Textual or Investigative

Ahab's Soul: An Exploration Of The Hero Of "Moby-Dick", Jaedon Wilkinson

Liberty University Research Week

Undergraduate

Textual or Investigative

Sherwood Anderson And The Industrial Corruption Of Midwestern Individualism, Hudson Rice

Senior Honors Theses

Sherwood Anderson’s literary Midwest reflects many of the idealistic characteristics resulting from the region’s frontier, agrarian origin. The most prominent of these characteristics is the region’s emphasis on and appreciation of human particularity. His novels Winesburg, Ohio and Poor White document the region’s unique relationship with individual particularity and how this particularity clashed with a new industrial lifestyle. The two novels reflect the Midwest’s unique understanding of individuality and offer an explanation for why the region’s response to an industrial cultural overhaul was so damaging for the Midwest’s identity, as the traditional identity was supplanted by an industrial one.

Silent Horror: The Complexity, Monstrosity, And Ubiquity Of Evil In Faulkner’S Sanctuary, Bronwyn M. Gray

Eleutheria: John W. Rawlings School of Divinity Academic Journal

In a culture of moral relativism, Faulkner's novel Sanctuary shocks us with an ancient perspective on the nature of man. Not only is the villain Popeye evil, the "good guy" is infected as well, and this is seen through Faulkner's comparison of our hero Horace with Popeye, parallels drawn between Horace's festering desire for his stepdaughter and Popeye's lust for his rape victim Temple Drake. But it is not only the adult men who are at fault. Temple Drake herself is shown to be in the throes between childlike innocence (temple) and evil desire (drake, meaning dragon or serpent). Perhaps …

Wave By Wave: A Fantasy Author's Guide For Refining A Creative Writing Style, Michael Bose

Senior Honors Theses

Writing a novel is a great undertaking. Many would-be writers have set out to create a novel and give up halfway through, uncertain where or how they failed. This project aims to help prospective authors get past that barrier. By analyzing one’s own writing style, a writer can ascertain greater insight into the strengths and weaknesses of one’s own work and therefore help rectify mistakes one might make otherwise, or learn to see a chapter from a new angle. The author will demonstrate this method on himself first by way of focused revisions. A sample chapter of a fantasy novel, …

Poetry Beyond The Page: A Case For Spoken Word Poetry In Florida's Secondary Classrooms, Sarah Matherly

Senior Honors Theses

Florida’s B.E.S.T. Standards, Florida’s most recent K-12 educational standards to promote literacy, lack the rising art of Spoken Word Poetry. However, Florida’s Department of Education should integrate Spoken Word into Florida’s Secondary curriculum. Spoken Word Poetry, by its definition, holds researched benefits that align with the B.E.S.T. Standard’s poetry recommendations and literacy-centered goals. In light of such benefits, Florida’s Department of Education should consider various Spoken Word poets and poems to include in Florida’s Secondary Curriculum, as well as explore the resources and integration methods included in this thesis for both teachers and students.

“You Never Get It Out Of Your Bones”: The Christ-Haunted Security Of Jean Louise “Scout” Finch In Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird And Go Set A Watchman, Corley E. Humphrey

Masters Theses

Harper Lee’s novels To Kill a Mockingbird and Go Set a Watchman emphasize the struggle of mid-twentieth century Southern identity as Southerners searched for security, and she does so particularly in her main character, Jean Louise “Scout” Finch. Throughout the novels, Jean Louise fights to find a balance within herself as she learns to decide what to accept or reject from her Southern culture. Using New Historicism and Southern Female Gender Studies, this thesis analyzes the character development of Jean Louise “Scout” in the novels and the traits she consistently accepts—discrimination and respect, honor of family, grace—and the ones she …

Meeting The Stranger: Closing The Distance In Ernest Hemingway’S A Moveable Feast, Brett Joseph Raszinski

Masters Theses

This thesis provides an in-depth analysis of Ernest Hemingway’s memoir, A Moveable Feast. The analysis focuses on how AMF functions as a memoir, given its complicated publication history. The thesis uses the 2009 Restored Edition, which is most closely associated with Hemingway’s original manuscripts. He crafts his memories of Paris between 1921-1926, develops interactive scenes for twenty-first century readers to discover his story, and constructs a blended voice that closes the distance between his present and his past by writing about his writing process. This thesis adds to the academic conversation of A Moveable Feast, attempting to present how important …

Comparing Cultural Context Through New Historicism: The Impact Of Form Upon Content In The Serialized And Novelized Versions Of F. Scott Fitzgerald’S The Beautiful And Damned, Anna Sweeney

Masters Theses

In this thesis, I analyzed the differences between the serialized portions and subsequent novelization of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Beautiful and Damned. To conduct this research, I studied the seven issues of Metropolitan magazine from September 1921 to March 1922 in which the serialized portions of The Beautiful and Damned were published, and read them against the novel. I found that the omissions and additions between the two modes of text, including the advertisements and illustrations present within the serialized portions, greatly altered the nuances and meanings of the finished novelized product. This project revealed that there is currently a …

What’S In The Potato Barn: A Discourse Of Redemption In Three Of Kurt Vonnegut’S Novels, Rebecca Tutton Parker

Masters Theses

This thesis discusses how three of Kurt Vonnegut’s novels (Slaughterhouse-Five, Breakfast of Champions, and Bluebeard) become a discourse on redemption when using Linda Hutcheon’s historiographic metafiction. Starting with Slaughterhouse-Five, Vonnegut opens the discussion about redemption by creating a character struggling with PTSD who is unable to be redeemed. In Breakfast of Champions, Vonnegut continues the discourse by introducing Rabo Karabekian who opens Vonnegut as character’s mind to the idea that redemption is possible. By Bluebeard, Rabo Karabekian is able to obtain redemption for both himself and for his author. By studying these three books together it becomes clear that Rabo …

Restoring What Has Been Lost: The Mythic Journey Of Shakespearean And Tolkien Heroes After The Fall In Eden, Taylor Loforti

Masters Theses

In order for man to understand where he is going, he must first remember where he began. The intertwining link between the beginning, the in-between journey, and the end of a story, or narrative, has been present since the ancient years of literary criticism. The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle explains that a unified and effective narrative should have a beginning, middle, and end, and the even more ancient realm of mythology tends to follow this format not only in its written structure, but also in its thematic and archetypal construction. These three main segments of a mythic narrative are later …

Iarwain Ben-Adar On The Road To Faerie: Tom Bombadil's Recovery Of Premodern Fantasy Values, Greta Rogers

Masters Theses

This thesis project discusses J. R. R. Tolkien's character Tom Bombadil as an agent of recovery of premodern fantasy values. Several premodern fantasy works espouse a sense of harmony with the world as God’s created order, a value that is missing from some postmodern fantasy works. Tolkien’s Tom Bombadil is examined as a means to recover that acceptance of the created order.

The Presentation Of Postmodern Sexuality In Short Fiction, Allie J. Kapus

Senior Honors Theses

Shifting norms in twentieth century western society, coupled with emerging postmodern thought in the 1960s, radically changed the ways in which people viewed sexuality, gender roles, and the institutions of marriage and the family. The literature of the postmodern era, namely short fiction, also reflects such ideological shifts. Literature is a powerful communicator of the human condition as well as a crucial means for reflecting the customs, beliefs, and norms of a society at the time of its writing. Such evolving differences as were occurring in the realm of sexuality came to be represented in postmodern literature. This thesis aims …

Truly Jewish: Diasporic Identity And “Chosen Glory” In “Monte Sant’Angelo”, Sara Heist

Montview Journal of Research & Scholarship

In her memoir Unorthodox, Deborah Feldman observes, “A Jew can never be a goy... even if they try to become one. They may dress like one, speak like one, live like one, but Jewishness is something that can never be erased” (96). Her intriguing observation parallels the major themes of Arthur Miller’s short story “Monte Sant’Angelo,” which explores Jewish identity. The modern psychological constructs of diasporic identity, “chosen glory,” and “chosen trauma,” developed after the short story was written, help to interpret the psychological drama unfolding in the little village of Monte Sant’Angelo. Bernstein, a diasporic Ashkenazi Jew, …

Shifting Focus: The Role Of Visual Literacy In The Twenty-First Century English Classroom, Bryanna Tester

Masters Theses

Ultimately, the English language arts classroom seeks to help make students “literate” members of society. Due to the dominance of images in twenty-first century communication, the term “literate” has also slowly shifted to include an individual’s ability to effectively and accurately communicate with verbal text as well as with visual images and symbols. Although students are native image-viewers, they are not able to be image-readers without instruction and training on how to critically “read” images. Therefore, an English teacher’s literary curriculum is not strictly bound to the written and spoken word. Instruction in reading and writing written texts are vital …

Choosing A Moral Compass: The Journey Towards Moral Maturity In Harry Potter, Tricia Mieden

Masters Theses

This thesis examines Harry Potter’s moral development and illustrates how a reader’s involvement with literature complements moral education in the classroom. Using Lawrence Kohlberg’s theory of moral development as a guide, this thesis considers how Harry solidifies his moral commitments as he matures and, as a result, becomes more aware of how his moral principles influence his actions. Through an analysis of Harry’s cognitive reasoning, which is evidenced through the narration, readers are able to develop a similar awareness to the ways their moral principles influence their choices

Incongruity And Social Expectations: Cultural Identity In Carson Mccullers’ Southern Gothic Novel The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter, Emily Page

Masters Theses

This study explores Carson McCullers’ novel The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter (1940) in order to determine 1) the text’s relationship to cultural measures for identity in the 1930s and 40s American South and 2) the categorization of the novel as a Southern Gothic novel. The novel depicts cultural conflicts in the South and presents an intimate perspective of the corruption and prejudices between members of the southern community. Southerners in the novel fall into adopting ideal standards for race, gender, and class, judging and determining how people in different levels of each should act within the community. These culturally …

Keep Moving Forward: A Postcolonial Interpretation Of Narration In Barbara Kingsolver's "The Poisonwood Bible", Katherine Pagan

Masters Theses

Barbara Kingsolver’s novel "The Poisonwood Bible" follows the fictional Price family as they embark as missionaries to the Belgian Congo in 1959. With the intent to evangelize to the native people in a remote tribe, the family is shocked at the resistance to their outside culture. Narrated by the four daughters (and occasionally their mother), "The Poisonwood Bible" gives a unique look into the shifting perspectives of the Price women. Thrust into a foreign culture, they quickly learn that in order to survive, they must adapt to the native society. Utilizing Gerard Genette’s theories on narration and perspective as a …

The Polyphonic Survivor: Dialogism And Heteroglossia In Art Spiegelman's "Maus: A Survivor's Tale", Joshua Novalis

Masters Theses

Using Mikhail Bakhtin's theories of polyphony, dialogism, and heteroglossia, this thesis will seek to show that Art Spiegelman's Maus is an innately heteroglossic work. Through the use of the graphic novel medium, a multi-perspectival blend of visual and textual narrative, Spiegelman creates a work where various key voices are allowed to speak within the work—without any one voice being given full authority over the other. Vladek Spiegelman, for example, is given the ability to speak freely, despite his narrative’s shortcomings. Although Spiegelman shows Vladek’s perspective to be flawed and inaccurate at times, Art’s interviews with Vladek provide a perspective into …

Batman As Monomyth: Joseph Campbell, Robert Jewett, John Shelton Lawrence, Frank Miller, Grant Morrison, Scott Snyder, And The Hero’S Journey To Gotham, Andrew Thigpen

Masters Theses

In 1988, Jeffrey Lang and Patrick Trimble wrote an article called, “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow,” which explains the absence of a hero of the American monomyth in comic books. The American monomyth was proposed by Robert Jewett and John Shelton Lawrence and describes a community in harmonious paradise threatened by evil. The normal institutions of law and order fail to defeat the evil, but fortunately, a hero from outside the community arises to resist temptation, defeat the evil, and return the community to its peaceful condition. Lang and Trimble observe the death of Superman during the events …

Real Or Not Real: Fragmentation, Fabrication, And Composite Identity In The Hunger Games And The Mass Effect Trilogy, Tessanna Curtis

Masters Theses

As one glance at box office ratings from the past decade can attest to, twenty-first century Western society seems particularly fixated on coming-of-age stories. These stories reflect the quintessential search for identity, as explained by developmental psychologist Erik Erikson. As Erikson argues throughout his works, the fundamental task of the individual on his journey to becoming a healthy, mature adult is the formation of a personal identity and sense of self that is both unified and whole. What seems particularly ironic, however, is that these coming-of-age stories are released into a culture that is largely dismissive of Erikson’s theory of …

Perceptions Of Southern Culture And Writing Program Effectiveness At A Community College: A Phenomenology, Mary Fetters

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this hermeneutical phenomenological study was to develop a deeper understanding of the perceptions of students, faculty, administration, and visiting Southern authors of the effectiveness of Chattanooga State Community College’s Writers@Work program for encouraging composition student writing and learning about Southern culture. Southern culture is defined as phenomena which shape the regional experience and resonate through the lives of individuals native to the US South. Participants in the study that was conducted in Chattanooga, Tennessee consisted of two current English administrators, four current English professors, eight composition students who participated in the Writers@Work program, and two visiting Southern …

“First-Rate Eddication”: The Educational Roles Of Merlyn And Dumbledore, Carissa Johnson

Masters Theses

The Once and Future King (1957) and the Harry Potter series (1997-2007) are Bildungsroman stories of young, orphaned boys, Wart and Harry, who endure extraordinary circumstances and become wise, mature, and heroic. The transformation that they undergo is the effect of strong education from their teachers, the wizards Merlyn and Dumbledore. This thesis uses progressive educational theory to demonstrate the model these wizards employ. This study also utilizes a study of discourse grammar and Lawrence Kohlberg’s theory of moral development to discuss the nature of Wart’s and Harry’s education. Because of the moral education demonstrated in the stories, reading them …

Flannery O'Connor And The Poetics Of Prayer: The Analysis Of A Prayer Journal, Emily Wilson

Masters Theses

Prior to the recent discovery of her college prayer journal, kept between 1946 and 1947, knowledge of Flannery O’Connor’s religious influence and activity had been restricted to her letters and published works, such as Mystery and Manners and The Habit of Being. Works such as these shed light onto O’Connor’s background and religious views, making her Catholic faith obvious and explicit. This prayer journal exposes a new aspect of her faith – that is the personal relationship between herself and God shown through narrative. Her prayer journal makes it clear that her external expression of faith, showcased in most of …

An Uninformed Pilgrim, Lillian Fassero

Aidenn: The Liberty Undergraduate Journal of American Literature

Joseph C. Pattison’s article, “The Celestial City, or Dream Tale,” examines Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Celestial Railroad” and portrays the narrator as a Christian hero standing against the modernist persuasions of his time – a protagonist who enters the story with firm orthodox convictions and exits his dream journey with unaltered principles or character. However, Hawthorne’s narrator frequently adopts new modernist arguments and wavers in his pre-formed convictions. He toys with Christian faith but promptly discards any accusations of guilt that such beliefs suggest. While he repeatedly compromises his principles and doubts the ramifications of Christian faith, his dynamic nature is …

Analyzing True Self-Reliance And Individualism, Stephanie Greene

Aidenn: The Liberty Undergraduate Journal of American Literature

This essay analyzes the story of “Rip Van Winkle” by Washington Irving and criticizes Daniel Plung’s assessment of it in his article, “Rip Van Winkle’: Metempsychosis and the Quest for Self-Reliance.” In Plung’s article, he assesses that in the story of “Rip Van Winkle,” the main character, Rip, attains self-reliance and individualism through his escape and experience on the mountain. However, although Plung’s points support his assessments, there are also many other details in the story that contradict Plung’s analysis. This essay seeks to enlighten readers to a differing interpretation of “Rip Van Winkle” by studying other details in the …

“You Can't Ever Find A Place That's Nice And Peaceful”: The Adolescent Identity In J. D. Salinger’S The Catcher In The Rye, Whitney Thacker

Masters Theses

Many consider The Catcher in the Rye the most poignant and popular story of adolescence in American literature, challenged only perhaps by Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Reading reviews, examining the public reception, and uncovering depths of research would evidence this well. However, the value of the novel rests not in its popularity—a simple sign of its inherent value—but in its ability to resonate truth. More than merely telling a story, Salinger creates a life, or at the very least a glimpse of a life, through the actions and attitude of his ornery adolescent character Holden Caulfield. This …

"Ushering" In The Fulfillment Of Prophecy, Alison M. Pulliam

Aidenn: The Liberty Undergraduate Journal of American Literature

During the 19^th century, a phenomenon known as “Holy Land mania” was sweeping the United States. Americans were intrigued by the state of the Holy Land and whether or not this state matched the images described in biblical prophecy (Robey 62). Interest in Israel’s condition invaded many aspects of American life, including literature. Looking through the lens of historical criticism, it is easy to see how authors of this time period fed on the “Holy Land mania” to include references to prophecy and the Middle East in their writings. In particular, critic Molly K. Robey accurately points out in …

Mad To Be Sincere: Authenticity, Irony, And Kerouac’S Response To Modern Reality, Jonathan Michael Devin

Masters Theses

This project explores the qualities of sincerity, authenticity, and irony in Jack Kerouac's novel On the Road. The thesis asserts that that On the Road is neither ironic nor authentic, but, rather, that it both possesses aspects of traditional sincerity and anticipates the New Sincerity movement in contemporary literature. Through observing the characteristics of traditional sincerity and New Sincerity in the novel, the thesis amends the novel's critical position by showing a level of complexity, foresight, and nuance in the text. Ultimately, the thesis shows Kerouac's response to modern reality, presenting the limitations of authenticity and irony while esteeming the …