English Language and Literature Commons^™

Celtic Water Hags, Violent Children, And Wild Men: Reexamining The Syncretic Nature Of Beowulf, James L. Baugher

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis reaffirms the Celtic influence on Beowulf. The first chapter reevaluates past attempts to demonstrate a Celtic connection with particular emphasis on the work of Martin Puhvel and R. Mark Scowcroft. The second chapter compares Grendel’s Mother to the Lady of the Lake, from the Prose Lancelot, using the Celtic water hag motif. The third chapter analyzes how Grendel exemplifies the Celtic motifs of the violent child and the wild man by comparing him with Cu Chulainn, from the Táin Bó Cúailnge, Lancelot, from the Prose Lancelot, and the Celtic wild man tales surrounding Suibhne, …

Composing The Postmodern Self In Three Works Of 1980s British Literature, Jonathan Hill

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis utilizes Foucault’s concept of “technologies of the self” to examine three texts from 1980s British literature for the ways that postmodern writers compose the self. The first chapter “Liminality and the Art of Self-Composition” explores the ways in which liminal space and time contributes to the self-composition in J.L. Carr’s hybrid Victorian/postmodern novel A Month in the Country (1980). The chapter on Jeanette Winterson’s novel Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit (1985) titled “Intertextuality and the Art of Self-Composition” argues that Winterson’s intertextual play enables her protagonist Jeanette to resist the dominance of religious discipline and discourse and …

The Madwoman Persists: Expression As Resistance In Emily Holmes Coleman's The Shutter Of Snow And H.D.'S Hermione, Spring Healy

Honors Projects

Emily Holmes Coleman’s The Shutter of Snow and H.D.’s HERmione each feature a female narrator struggling to survive in a patriarchal society that confines them and polices the movement of their bodies through space in attempt to gain control. The characters Marthe Gail and Hermione Gart experience bouts of insanity in response to their confinement by the patriarchy. I explore the various ways these two women push against their confinement, and argue that despite their places in society, Marthe and Hermione are able to use expression—writing, language, voice, movement, sexuality—to successfully resist the patriarchy and create legitimate identities.

Transmutations Of Ophelia's "Melodious Lay", Danielle Byington

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

There are multiple ways in which language and image share one another’s aesthetic message, such as traditional ekphrasis, which uses language to describe a work of art, or notional ekphrasis, which involves literature describing something that can be considered a work of art but does not physically exist at the time the description is written. However, these two terms are not inclusive to all artworks depicting literature or literature depicting artworks. Several scenes and characters from literature have been appropriated in art and the numerous paintings of Ophelia’s death as described by Gertrude in Hamlet, specifically Millais’ Ophelia, …

The Unkindness Of Strangers: Exploring Success And Isolation In The Dramatic Works Of Tennessee Williams, Chelsea Nicole Gilbert

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis aims to explore the theme of isolation in the dramatic works of Tennessee Williams using his essay “The Catastrophe of Success” as the base theory text. The essay attacks the American idea of success though an in-depth examination of the “Cinderella myth” that Williams claims is so prevalent in both Hollywood and American Democracy. Williams’ deconstruction of this myth reveals that America’s love for stories like it results the isolation of three groups: homosexuals, women and the physically disabled and terminally ill. Williams passes no judgment on his characters, instead showing their lives as they truly are. Through …

"Some Things Grew No Less With Time:" Tracing Atu 510b From The Thirteenth To The Twentieth Century, Rachel L. Maynard

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis provides a comparative analysis of seven different variants of the fairy tale commonly known as “Donkeyskin,” classified in the Aarne-Thompson-Uther folktale motif index as ATU 510B. By comparing so many different iterations of one fairy tale, it is easier to recognize the inherent attitudes concerning women and their place in society contained in this tale. Additionally, reading multiple variants from different centuries lends a perspective on the way that these attitudes changed over the centuries. Each of the thirteenth century texts considered end with their heroines trapped in loveless marriages, much like the seventeenth-century fairy tale, “Donkeyskin,” their …

How Disassociating The Past Reassociates The Present: Distilling The Magic Out Of Magic Realism In Susan Power’S The Grass Dancer, Abby N. Lewis

Undergraduate Honors Theses

American Indian author Susan Power’s novel The Grass Dancer is often categorized as magical realism, yet Power has stated the novel is a representation of her reality and that it is not a magical realist text. The term magical realism was first applied to the work of Latin American authors such as Gabriel García Márquez whose writing depicts magical events in a matter-of-fact narrative tone. It has since expanded to include other cultures. The question is whether it is a term that can readily be applied to the literary work of all cultures. The closest Wendy B. Faris, one of …

The Revival Of America's First Genre: Exploring The Panther Narrative's Feminist Principles In Post-Revolutionary War America, Abigail Bentley

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

America’s victory in the War of Independence posed new challenges for the men who drafted the Constitution. Gender roles shifted dramatically during the war, creating a new attitude about women’s roles in the new republic. Before the Constitution was ratified, women like Abigail Adams advocated for women to have a more active role in the new nation. Radical literature regarding women’s roles also became a driving force in the movement. The Panther Narrative used the resurgence of America’s first genre, the captivity narrative, to combine the new republic’s obsession with personal freedom and radical ideas about gender spheres. The anonymous …

Gender, Consent, And Hermaphroditic Legibility In James Joyce's Ulysses And Finnegans Wake, Carter R. Elsea

Honors Theses

It is difficult to imagine a more elusive, polemical author than James Joyce. He is often spoken of as both a cosmopolitan and a nationalist, syphilitic madman and genius, and misogynist and writer of écriture feminine. This final paradoxical view of Joyce is one that I find most compelling. However, this is not a project in feminist historiography attempting to reclaim Joyce for feminism, but rather a demonstration of the pulsing bodies that already exist between the texts. When exploring this idea of écriture feminine in Joyce’s Ulysses, one might be surprised that Hélène Cixous refers to Joyce’s treatment of …

Judging A Book By Its Cover: The Context Book Covers Provide, Virginia Emily Cranwell

Theses and Dissertations

This paper seeks to prove how the context of books, specifically the book jackets and bindings, are a crucial part to understanding the history and the text of the story. The paper begins with printing history in order to illustrate how the context of books has changed, and how the Twentieth Century saw a use of book jackets to promote the book. The paper then looks at the books of a particular author, Alasdair Gray, as an example of how the context of the book can be used to enhance and reveal aspects of the text. Finally, this paper discusses …

Cross Roads Of The Living And The Dead: Necropolitics And Market Logic In Chris Abani's Graceland, Joshua Dunn

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis argues that Chris Abani’s 2004 novel Graceland presents the austerity programs imposed on Nigeria in the 1980s as a form of financialized necropolitics. Through its representation of the entanglement between transnational capital interests and repressive state security forces, Graceland offers new ways of theorizing neoliberal governance and its relationship to the construction of what Achille Mbembe calls “death worlds.” In the novel, the state’s instrumentation and destruction of human bodies (for the accumulation of wealth) becomes an apt metaphor for structural adjustment. But the novel goes further by demonstrating how this logic of accumulation utilizes biopolitical and even …

Supporting Immersion Teachers: An Autoethnography, Lauren Speece

Theses and Dissertations

Immersion programs face a variety of challenges that are common to the field, such as lack of materials appropriate for students’ language abilities, assessment, teacher recruitment and retention, balancing content and language, and relevant, high quality professional development for teachers. However, within specific micro-contexts, other issues can affect the success of immersion programs. Since the teacher’s role is critical in all aspects of the immersion classroom, more emphasis needs to be placed on talking with teachers about their experiences in order to provide better professional development, and to build a stronger community of support.

This narrative autoethnography examines my journey …

A Social Study Of Discworld Autonomy, Morgan Rogers

Senior Theses

From 1983 to 2015, Sir Terry Pratchett wrote a series of forty-one novels, several short stories, and companion works set on the Discworld. The Discworld is a flat world that rides through space on the backs of four giant elephants that stand themselves on the back of the Great A’tuin, a world turtle. The Disc is based around the Hub, or central point, and the Rim, or the circumference of the world. There is a waterfall all around the Rim of the world that falls into space itself. The Hub compares to the Earth’s poles in that it is the …

Bilingualism And The American Family, Caitlin M. Nickerson

Senior Honors Projects

Bilingualism is the ability to speak more than one language fluently. People of all ages may aspire to learn a second or third language in order to fulfill both personal goals and communicate with a variety of people in different contexts. Irrespective of one’s walk of life or socioeconomic status, being bilingual is a valuable skill. Although English is the language of power in the United States, there are hundreds of other languages spoken in this country.

There are a number of different ways in which children can become bilingual. For example, they may enter the school system speaking the …

Robert Burns's Hand In 'Ay Waukin, O': The Roy Manuscript And William Tytler's Dissertation (1779), Patrick G. Scott

Studies in Scottish Literature

Discusses Robert Burns's sources and manuscripts for his expansion of the song "Ay waukin, O," first published as song 213 in James Johnson's Scots Musical Museum, III (1790); highlights an often neglected and misdated printed item, William Tytler’s Dissertation, as Burns's source for two of the four stanzas; considers the two full-length manuscripts, identifying one as being an Antique Smith forgery, and detailing the provenance and purpose, of the other, now at the Birthplace Museum; examines and reproduces the Roy manuscript and its pencilled additions; and so clarifies the relationship among the three genuine manuscripts to argue that …

Disabled ≠ Disempowered: A Critical Framework For Analyzing The Representation Of Mental Disabilities In Young Adult Literature, Michele L. Dobbins

English Undergraduate Honors Theses

In this honors thesis, I focus on young adult novels that highlight rather than minimize the experience of having a mental disability, and I argue that this topic must be included in education and book discussions in order to create more inclusive classrooms and communities. I examine representations of depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, and autism in popular young adult novels, paying special focus to the way characters represent the relationship between power and disability. After reading a wide range of novels from award-winning bestsellers to reviewers’ recommendations, I noted the frequency of topics such as identity, community, institutions, and romanticization …

Window Dressing: Isolation In Cornell Woolrich's Short Fiction, Annika R. P. Deutsch

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Cornell Woolrich was a prolific American noir detective fiction writer. Though recognized by some as the father of noir fiction, he is often overshadowed by other writers of his era, such as Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and James M. Cain. Many of the themes found in Woolrich’s writing, particularly isolation and the associated fear and anxiety, are as palpable today as they were in the times he was writing. In this thesis, I argue that Woolrich’s continued relevance is the result of his unique portrayal of American city life. Woolrich utilizes recognizable themes from the noir, mystery, and thriller genres …

The Two-Sided Coin: Madness And Laughter As Subversion In Alice’S Adventures In Wonderland And The Sandman, Tessa Starr Swehla

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Mad female characters in Western literature have traditionally represented attempts by dominant patriarchal discourse to subjugate women’s discourse: these characters are usually pathologized in both their dialogue with other characters and in their physical bodies. This subjugation by representation of mad female characters in dominant discourse parallels similar attempts to portray women as lacking in humor. This thesis studies the intersections between madness and humor and the ability of female characters that embody both to challenge and subvert dominant discourse. By examining the characters of Alice from Lewis Carroll’s novel and Delirium from Neil Gaiman’s graphic novel series The Sandman …

Running In Rem Cycles: Escapism In The French Postwar Films Le Silence De La Mer And La Vache Et Le Prisonier, Danielle Green

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

This thesis compares two postwar critiques of escapist entertainment that appear in Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Silence de La Mer (1949), and Henri Verneuil's La Vache et le Prisonnier (1959). Their directorial choices acknowledge the power, even shortcomings of escapism through entertainment. Overall, Melville and Verneuil's films argue that escapism creates a "dream" cycle in which the audience, in an attempt to escape reality through entertainment. The films' cyclical narrative structures symbolize their characters' psychology, a tactic that frames Le Silence and La Vache into France's postwar culture. In a side-by-side comparison, the repetitive narrative structure of Le Silence and La …

Tolkien And The Deadly Sin Of Greed, Amanda A. Kieffer

The Kabod

Tolkien’s genius as a writer and insight as a philosopher and theologian (of sorts) are reflected in his subtle yet impactful interweaving of the consequences of greed within the lives of the peoples of Middle-Earth. He shows readers that greed is not simply the love of money. Greed is the root of all evil, and it takes a variety of forms, as represented by Sauron’s desire to possess power over and control others, Saruman’s imitative desire, and Feanor’s over-possessiveness of his sub-creative acts. Tolkien also reveals that a proper relationship with nature can provide recovery from the drab familiarity which …