American Literature Commons^™

Understanding Death In Brown And Poe: Backgrounds And Continuities, Anthony Cunder

The Oswald Review: An International Journal of Undergraduate Research and Criticism in the Discipline of English

No abstract provided.

Back Matter, Tom Mack, Ph.D.

The Oswald Review: An International Journal of Undergraduate Research and Criticism in the Discipline of English

No abstract provided.

The Oswald Review Undergraduate Research And Criticism In The Discipline Of English: Volume 16 Fall 2014

The Oswald Review: An International Journal of Undergraduate Research and Criticism in the Discipline of English

No abstract provided.

Magical Me: Self-Insertion Fanfiction As Literary Critique, Melody Strmel

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis examines the traditions of textual interaction that impact the forms of reading engaged in with fanfiction. This thesis continues by exploring how self-insertion fanfiction functions as a medium through which authors express their reading of the text primary through the emotional impact of the text through wish fulfillment, and the interaction of their cultural moment and the text. Furthermore, it argues that self-insertion fanfiction is a mode of literary critique in which the author acknowledges the effect of a mediated world on their perception of self and reality. Through this recognition of a constructed self, the author rejects …

Modern(Izing) Burial In Interwar American Literature, Victoria Marie Bryan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation aims to study literary representations of interwar American deathways as reflections of modernity. The study of burial in United States history tends to focus on mid- to late-nineteenth century movements that distance the dead from the living. This dissertation argues that these practices left Americans ill-equipped to process the influx of death from the conflict areas of World War I, keen to allow the further development of the funeral industry during the interwar period, and anxious about the certain rise in death tolls that would result from World War II. Interwar literature, therefore, exhibits a difficulty in meaning-making …

Relocating The Cowboy: American Privilege In "All The Pretty Horses", Maia Y. Rodriguez

Global Tides

American novelist Cormac McCarthy published the first installment of his Border Trilogy, a novel entitled All The Pretty Horses, only a decade before the turn of the 21st century. Within a few months, essays by Alan Cheuse and Vereen M. Bell would set the tone for scholarship on McCarthy's work for the decade to follow. However, in 2012 Jordan Savage revolutionized the conversation on the concept of "border" within the Border Trilogy, identifying it as an ideological myth. This paper will further Savage’s analysis using Jacques Derrida’s Deconstructionist theory in order to analyze the binaries created by the border …

Annie Proulx's Wyoming: Subversive Storytelling From The Bunchgrass Edge Of The World, Elizabeth P. Tyson

Scripps Senior Theses

Annie Proulx’s three Wyoming short story collections, Close Range, Bad Dirt, and Fine Just the Way It Is, tell regional stories that push against the myths surrounding the American West. Elements of Naturalism in her work reverse the paradigm of man’s dominance over the frontier. The cyclical nature of time in her stories shows the unfulfilling nature of nostalgia. She uses folk storytelling techniques to take an insider’s perspective and to utilize the subversive nature of dark humor.

The Divided Reception Of The Help, Suzanne W. Jones

English Faculty Publications

The reception of Kathryn Stockett’s The Help (2009) calls to mind the reception of two other novels about race relations by southern white writers: Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind (1936) and William Styron’s The Confessions of Nat Turner (1967). Like Gone With the Wind, The Help has been a pop culture phenomenon— prominent in bookstores and box offices, and the “darling of book clubs everywhere.” In January 2012 when I asked students in my Women in Modern Literature class what was the best book they had recently read by a woman, most named either The Help or The Hunger …

Gravity In A Jar: A Poetic History Of The People, Places, And Events Of Detroit, Morgan Mccomb

Honors Theses

In this thesis, I explore the history of the city of Detroit in order to better understand the factors that have led to Detroit's current state. The research materials I have used are standard history books as well as newspaper articles, journals, and published interviews with former and current Detroit residents. I have incorporated this research into the construction of both a strict research element as well as poetry in order to present varying accounts of the city of Detroit beginning in the early 20th century and continuing into the present-day. I have found that the history of Detroit has …

Terror, Hospitality And The Gift Of Death In Morrison’S Beloved, Puspa Damai

English Faculty Research

The “us versus them” narrative still pre-dominates the analysis of terrorism in the West, which invariably associates “them” with terrorism. Toni Morrison’s hauntingly memorable novel – Beloved – provides a radically different and historically grounded view of terror and terrorism in the West. The novel not only releases us from the “us versus them” paradigm by demonstrating America’s intimacy with terror, it also enables us to examine terror and terrorism from the perspective of a gendered and ethnic subject who subverts the easy categorization of “us” and “them” or civilized and terrorist. Following Jacques Derrida’s contemplations on death and terror, …

The Power Of Multiplying: Reproductive Control In American Culture, 1850-1930, Virginia B. Engholm

Theses and Dissertations--English

Prior to the advent of modern birth control beginning in the nineteenth century, the biological reproductive cycle of pregnancy, post-partum recovery, and nursing dominated women’s adult years. The average birth rate per woman in 1800 was just over seven, but by 1900, that rate had fallen to just under than three and a half. The question that this dissertation explores is what cultural narratives about reproduction and reproductive control emerge in the wake of this demographic shift. What’s at stake in a woman’s decision to reproduce, for herself, her family, her nation? How do women, and society, control birth?

In …

Apparitional Economies: Spectral Imagery In The Antebellum Imaginaton, Holly F. Osborn

Theses and Dissertations--English

Apparitional Economies is invested in both a historical consideration of economic conditions through the antebellum era and an examination of how spectral representations depict the effects of such conditions on local publics and individual persons. From this perspective, the project demonstrates how extensively the period’s literature is entangled in the economic: in financial devastation, in the boundaries of seemingly limitless progress, and in the standards of value that order the worth of commodities and the persons who can trade for them.

I argue that the space of the specter is a force of representation, an invisible site in which the …

Italian-American Literature And Working-Class Culture, Fred L. Gardaphé

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Eleven Criminals: Stories, Brendan Steffen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This is a work of fiction about criminality and masculinity. It explores all kinds of crimes, both real and imagined.

Silk Road: A Novel, Elizabeth Mckay Mcfadden

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Silk Road: A Novel

Southern Bestsellers In The Twenty-First Century, Jodie Free

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores the concept of bestsellers in the twenty-first century, with a particular focus on six novels written by contemporary southern authors. These novels are analyzed through the lens of social consciousness, with attention to how they reflect current social issues, and how they engage with and subvert cultural and literary stereotypes. Bestsellers are books that are widely read, shared and discussed, often because they connect to concerns about identity; this study speculates on the influence of bestsellers on national and regional reader identity, specifically race, gender and class. Chapter I explores feminine roles in Lee Smith's The Last …

The Judge’S Hold: A Struggle For Voice In Cormac Mccarthy’S Blood Meridian, Daniel R. Johnson

Pell Scholars and Senior Theses

Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian is a novel that provides a clear critique on the ways in which the American west was acquired. The text is awash with gratuitous violence, symbolism and storytelling, together creating a piece that offers a modern interpretation of American identity. This analysis will approach the novel by examining a struggle for voice between the two main characters Judge Holden and The Kid in the narration. In doing so, it will be shown that Blood Meridian uses Holden's voice to suppress all other worldviews within the text in order to show the invulnerability of the political rhetoric …

Physicians, Patients, And Poets, Mary Ball Markow

Honors Theses

I examined the works of William Carlos Williams, Peter Pereira, Rafael Campo, Tory Dent, Lucia Perillo, and John Rybicki to gain a better understanding of the field of medicine. I selected these authors based upon their varied experiences with illness, disease, and loss. Their prose and poetry illuminate the nature of medicine and provide insight into human nature as well. The thesis has been edited for the SMBHC Thesis Repository to protect the copyright interests of some authors and publishers. The table of contents has been edited to reflect the changes.

Suffering And Coping In The Novels Of Anne Tyler, Camden Story Hastings

Honors Theses

Through an exploration of the causes of the characters' suffering and their mechanisms for coping, this thesis shows that by developing the perseverance necessary to navigate ordinary, everyday obstacles, Tyler's characters cope with extraordinary circumstances causing them pain. They also realize that victories in the little things lead to discoveries about themselves and the sources of their distress. The six novels discussed here include The Accidental Tourist, Saint Maybe, The Beginner's Goodbye, Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant, Ladder of Years, and Breathing Lessons. Nine major characters from these six novels are explored and, while various causes lead to their individual …

Faulkner's Feeble Few: The Mentally Impaired Citizens Of Yoknapatawpha, Matthew Brent Foxen

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This thesis explores Faulkner's use of mental impairments and illnesses, by analyzing closely three of his characters. With chapters focusing on Benjy Compson, Tommy, and Darl Bundren, this work investigates the literal, aesthetic, and figurative purposes that each man serves in his respective novel. It identifies commonalities and differences among these and other mentally impaired or ill characters.