English Language and Literature Commons^™

Autobiographical Narratives Of Sexual Violation: Trauma, Genre, And The Politics Of Telling, Sarah M. Hildebrand

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation engages with literary trauma theory and rape studies by investigating how scholars through the 1990s theorized the relationship among trauma, narration, and silence, and how the #MeToo movement causes us to rethink these views. Attending to the specific silence generated in the wake of sexual violation reveals how power structures influence the act of telling, challenging the idea that trauma is untellable. I argue that literary trauma theory needs to push beyond its foundation in biomedical models of trauma—in which the (in)ability to recall or articulate traumatic events is rooted in neurology—to examine the ways traumatic narratives are …

"Never Forget": Embodied Absence And Extended Relations Of Care After 9/11, Sophie L. Riemenschneider

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation is a reflection on how loss was articulated in the wake of 9/11. The terror attacks engendered a memorial style that sought to give shape to grief, acknowledging it without filling it in or erasing it. This new style, which I term embodied absence, exists across a range of mediums, from literature to architecture. It is such a potent memorial form because it also captures the traumatic process, which is prolonged, layered, and potentially open-ended. However, despite their ability to mirror the nature of trauma, instances of embodied absence never verbalize the attacks’ root trauma—the disconnect between our …

Here Time Becomes Space: The Victorian Spatial Imaginary, Jonathan E. Rachmani

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

My dissertation, “Here Time Becomes Space: The Spatiality of the Victorian Novel,” addresses the Victorian realist representation of space as the open zone of interaction where the circulation of affect among embodied subjects and the places and things in their environment challenges the individualist axis of Victorian plots. I envision this spatiality as a composite literary practice emerging from contact with eighteenth-century realism, the Gothic novel, and the radical revision of the social imagination under the Romantics. Through an analysis of major works by Charlotte Brontё, Charles Dickens, George Eliot, and Henry James, I trace the dialectical development of realist …

Cripping The Welfare Queen: The Radical Potential Of Disability Politics, Jina B. Kim

English Language and Literature: Faculty Publications

Drawing together feminist- and queer-of-color critique with disability theory, this essay offers a literary-cultural reframing of the welfare queen in light of critical discourses of disability. It does so by taking up the discourse of dependency that casts racialized, low-income, and disabled populations as drains on the state, reframing this discourse as a potential site of coalition among antiracist, anticapitalist, and feminist disability politics. Whereas antiwelfare policy cast independence as a national ideal, this analysis of the welfare mother elaborates a version of disability and women-of-color feminism that not only takes dependency as a given but also mines the figure …

The Influence Of L2 Proficiency On Bilinguals' Creativity: The Key Role Of Adaptive Emotion Regulation Strategies During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Yilong Yang, Shinian Wu, Jon Andoni Dunabeitia, Kexin Jiang, Yadan Li

Open Access Publishing Support Funded Articles

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought severe impact on language learners' emotional states and their performance in creativity. Yet, their ability to regulate emotions is crucial for everyday functioning during times of crisis. The question of how adaptive emotion regulation (ER) strategies, which help an individual maintain appropriate and stable mood states, might affect bilinguals' creativity remains unexplored. The present study investigated this issue by measuring various indicators of the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, L2 proficiency, adaptive ER strategies, and bilinguals' cognitive creativity (CC) and emotional creativity (EC) during the pandemic. Results from a sample of 235 bilingual participants …

Health Humanities And British Romanticism, Ben Pladek

English Faculty Research and Publications

This article gives an overview of health humanities (HH) scholarship within British Romanticism as a literary historical field. Romantic literary studies has a peculiar relationship to HH work—one that justifies examining it separately from its adjacent fields, 18th-century and Victorian studies. The article surveys HH work from the past 20 years of Romantic scholarship, drawing some conclusions about how the field's history has informed its current shape, before offering some tentative predictions about the future.

Fruits Of Forced Desire: A Marxist Reading Of Christina Rossetti’S “Goblin Market”, James Greer

Symposium of Student Scholars

Christina Rossetti’s 1859 poem, “Goblin Market,” is a tale of two maidens fearful of goblin merchants who canter about the glen selling an array of tempting fruits. Outside traditional feminist interpretations, the poem demonstrates the Marxist theory concerning commodification and reification. The maidens reveal the process in which human beings become commodities, solidifying Marx’s statement that: “the increasing value of the world of things proceed in direct proportion the devaluation of the world of men.”

Using specific aesthetic features common in the works of art during the Pre-Raphaelite movement, the poem further underscores the overall effects of laborer alienation and …

Place, Space, And Thirdspace In Selected Poems By Jawdat Haydar, Emile Whaibeh, Elie Matta

BAU Journal - Society, Culture and Human Behavior

The spatial turn of the 20^th century reshaped the examination of space in literary research, with works by De Certeau and Soja being some of the most prominent in that area. Numerous pieces of writing were revisited following the spatial turn, and Mahjar poetry was part of that reexamination. Indeed, Mahjar poetry is rife with spatial imagery, and Jawdat Haydar’s poems, four of which are the subject of this paper's analysis, are no exception. This paper argues that the representations of Lebanon and Baalbeck in Haydar’s poetry are self-conscious reconstructions created thanks to the speaker’s emotions, thoughts, and descriptions. …

A Light When All Other Lights Go Out, Caitlin Martinez

4610 English: Individual Authors: J.R.R. Tolkien

No abstract provided.

Introduction To Creative Writing, Shamecca A. Harris

Open Educational Resources

This introductory creative writing course asks students to explore their literary interests and proclivities through regular reading and writing activities designed to promote an in-depth understanding and appreciation for the craft of writing. Students will intellectually engage with both contemporary and classic authors within the main genres of creative writing and use the craft elements discussed in class to compose their own original poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction work. While studying various forms of creative writing, emphasis will be placed on the creative process of writing while encouraging students to find their writing voice. Student responsibilities include workshop participation, several …

A Comparison Of J.R.R. Tolkien’S The Lord Of The Rings And Peter Jackson’S Film Adaptations, Jonathan Mendyk

4610 English: Individual Authors: J.R.R. Tolkien

No abstract provided.

Crossing The Threshold: An Analysis Of The Hero's Journey, Megan C. Hulings

Theses - ALL

The Hero's Journey is well-known amongst storytellers the world over as a useful structure to create compelling characters and engaging plots, though many see its use as derivative and uninspired. After its explosion in popularity in the 1970s, audiences have come to expect stories to hit every step of the Hero's Journey beat-for-beat.

This thesis will explore the history of the Hero's Journey, from its conception to its modern interpretation. It will examine the individual parts that can elevate this simple structure into a complex narrative. By navigating the works of both Christopher Vogler and John Yorke, this thesis will …

Call For Manuscripts

Virginia English Journal

No abstract provided.

Lessons From Horror: The Rejection And Failures Of Arête, Renato Econa

Virginia English Journal

Lessons from Horror explores the rhetorical term of arête in the context of horror and horror literature. Arête, the concept of excellence as used in ancient Greece, is defined and then applied to two horror novels in order to better understand how the path to moral excellence can be corrupted. The first novel, Carrie by Stephen King, warns of the influence and pressure of others to both accept and reject the path to excellence. The second novel, Sour Candy by Kealan Patrick Burke, explores the idea of fear of failure in arête, and the possibility of turning oneself into a …

One Bold Experiment, William D. Smyth

Virginia English Journal

A monthly exchange of letters from 165 seventh graders in an arts school in Charleston, South Carolina to similar classrooms in 16 countries around the world proved to be the writing project that captured every state writing standard all at once -- brainstorming, writing, collaboration, analysis, proofreading, and re-writing. This one activity was the highlight of the year for each student as letters and gifts poured in from every continent September to June. This was truly a teacher's dream come true.

I, Too: A Culturally Responsive Expression Of Teacher And Student Writing, Tiffany Lewis, Kevon Merritte, Haley Novak

Virginia English Journal

No abstract provided.

All-American Boys, The Hate U Give, And The Great Gatsby: The Process And Product Of Multi-Genre In A High School English Methods Course, Mary Beth Cancienne, Bria Coleman, Kailyn Gilliam, Kristina Gooden

Virginia English Journal

“All-American Boys, The Hate U Give, and The Great Gatsby: The Process and Product of Multi-Genre in a High School English Methods Course” explains the process of teaching an eight-week multi-genre project to a high school English methods class and within the process highlights student’s representative examples. The cumulative assignment in the course aims to have a digital multi-genre project that they can serve as an exemplar to support their writing instruction as first-year teachers the following year. Bridging the author's voice with the student's voice, the MGP enhances student writing by showing that reading and writing can be …

Re-Imagining Remediation: Problematizing Adolescent Literacy Remediation, Michelle Lague

Virginia English Journal

This article explores the unique literacy needs of adolescent learners and challenges the traditional practice of literacy remediation, often tied to standardized test scores, in U.S. public schools. A call for more responsive literacy instruction that employs a disciplinary, holistic approach rather than a skills-based, deficit-informed approach is articulated, as well as recommendations for practice in literacy instruction informed by research on literacy identity development. As we begin to imagine our schools in a post-COVID world, we must rethink our instruction and move toward a model of literacy that is more relevant, more responsive, and, above all, more human.

An Introduction To The Culturally Responsive Education Model (Crem): A Personal And Professional Journey To Reflective And Transformative Pedagogy, Monica R. Manns

Virginia English Journal

The Culturally Responsive Education Model (CREM) is a framework by which educators can recognize, digest, and implement cultural responsiveness in their classrooms and school communities. Based on the research of James Banks, Gloria Ladson-Billings, Zaretta Hammond, Marva Collins, Bell Hooks, Geneva Gay, James Comer, and Paulo Freire, the CREM serves as a tool, a practitioner’s guide to culturally responsive teaching and learning, with specific focus on content integration (the curricular and programmatic expansion to celebrate and acknowledge the contributions of diverse groups); knowledge construction (helping students understand how people create beliefs based on their diverse biographies while validating students’ funds …

Introduction From The Editor

Virginia English Journal

No abstract provided.