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The Cosmopolitan Evergreen And The Global Digital, Lorraine Janzen Kooistra

Studies in Scottish Literature

Examines how Patrick Geddes’s The Evergreen: A Northern Seasonal used the affordances of fin-de-siècle print culture to imbricate the regional and the transnational, and shows how the magazine’s digital remediation on Yellow Nineties 2.0 makes its cosmopolitan vision newly accessible to global audiences today.

Contributors To Ssl 48.1

Studies in Scottish Literature

No abstract provided.

“The Battle Against Sameness”: Queer Marriages In Forster And Woolf, Lindsey Hatton

Departmental Honors & Graduate Capstone Projects

The Bloomsbury Group was known for unconventionality, both in their lives and in their writing. This holds especially true for E.M. Forster and Virginia Woolf, whose novels uniquely depict queer relationships as an alternative to traditional, rigid, heterosexual marriages. This paper looks at Clarissa and Richard from Mrs. Dalloway, Margaret and Henry from Howards End, and Maurice and Alec from Maurice and how each of these couples subvert the societal conventions of the Victorian era in different ways. A close reading of these texts and characters allows for a nuanced understanding of Woolf and Forster’s revolutionary visions and demonstrates how …

Hecabe: The Dog-Queen In Contemporary And Ancient Mythmaking, Makayla Steede

Honors Theses

This thesis will examine the character of Hecabe from Greek mythology as she is depicted in both ancient and contemporary sources. The sources feature both literary and scholarly work relating to Hecabe and Greek mythology. The primary source texts are The Iliad by Homer, Hecabe by Euripides, Trojan Women by Euripides, A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes, and The Women of Troy by Pat Barker. The goal of the thesis is to examine the roles Hecabe plays in each book and examine the similarities and differences in how her story is told across the various texts.

The Power Of Reading In The Comic Feminine Middlebrow Novel, Amy Rambo

English Theses

Often overlooked in critical discussions of British Literature produced in the early twentieth century, comic feminine middlebrow novels offer unique insights into the lives of middle-class women in the 1930s. The novels within this genre feature strong female characters negotiating issues of class and gender. However, comic feminine middlebrow novels also contain subtle conversations regarding the nature of reading and the importance of middlebrow texts in the lives of middle-class women. This thesis examines four such middlebrow novels: Miss Buncle’s Book by D. E. Stevenson, Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons, Christmas Pudding by Nancy Mitford, and Diary of a …

Mutually Exclusive: Being Gay And Being A Man In E.M. Forster’S Maurice, Kimber Foreman

Departmental Honors & Graduate Capstone Projects

This paper outlines the impacts of English heteronormativity on E.M. Forster’s novel Maurice by exploring applicable cultural context and its reflection within the text. Maurice was published after Forster’s death, and as his only novel with explicit queer characters, is the best suited for parsing Forster’s own understanding of the society he lived in. With a primary focus on the characters of Maurice and Clive, the paper examines the dichotomy that Forster posits heteronormative English society creates between traditional English masculinity and the identities of gay men. This examination ultimately leads to the conclusion that Forster writes the Greenwood-bound fate …

Tolkien, Enchantment, And Loss: Steps On The Developmental Journey (2022) By John Rosegrant, Marilyn R. Pukkila

Journal of Tolkien Research

Book review, by Marilyn R. Pukkila, of Tolkien, Enchantment, and Loss: Steps on the Developmental Journey (2022) by John Rosegrant

Affect And The Tomb In Robert Henryson's Testament Of Cresseid, Elizabeth Elliott

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

The penultimate verse of Henryson’s Testament of Cresseid suggests the possibility that Troilus raised a monument in memory of his former love, Cresseid: “Sum said he maid ane tomb of merbell gray” (l. 603). Examining the political implications of this uncertain act of memorialisation, this article considers how Henryson's poem mobilises the reader's emotional response to constitute Cresseid as a mourned subject, whose subjectivity is recognised only insofar as it is limited to suffering and death. In doing so, the Testament also establishes a subjectivity for women that offers conditional tolerance predicated on respectable behaviour, contributing to the historical production …

With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility: Examining The Power And Privilege Of Escapism In Young Adult Literature And Its Culture, Stacey Watson

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis will explore the systematic biases embedded within this genre, highlighting the ongoing battle between tokenism and inclusive storytelling. Thesis will also emphasize the importance of this genre, its tight grasp on popular culture, and showcase positive representations introduced by new creators over the years.

Claiming Ownership Of One’S Body Through Language: The Disability Memoir, Sarah Elizabeth Kaufman

Theses and Dissertations

This paper examines the ways in which the disability memoir creates pathways that generate new ways of thinking. Focusing primarily on the disability memoirs of Simi Linton, Ellen Forney, and Kenny Fries, this analysis will personalize the disability experience as these authors live it and redefine its social stereotypes.

A Mind Of Her Own: Women's Interiority In The Middle English And Older Scots Pastourelles, Anne L. Klinck

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

The pastourelle achieved what might be called its classic form in Middle French poetry of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries: a mini-narrative in which the narrator, a knight or clerk, tells how he tried to have his will with a lower-class girl he happened upon while riding in the country. He greets her, sweet-talks her, and propositions her; she protests vigorously. Sometimes the debate ends here. Otherwise, her accoster overcomes her resistance by guile or force, and sexually assails her. The tone is light-hearted and cynical, the action crude. To modern readers, this narrative may be mildly amusing, rather tedious, …

Calkas’S Daughter: Paternal Authority And Feminine Virtue In Troilus And Criseyde, Jennifer Alberghini

Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality

The heroine of Geoffrey Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde has been of considerable interest to medieval feminist scholars as a woman who is depicted as both virtuous and an adulteress. Yet critical discussions do not often view Criseyde’s virtue in light of her role as daughter. This article explores that role, focusing on how her father Calkas is described by the characters as having authority over his daughter’s body in the marriage market. This will later enable them to use him as an excuse for Criseyde’s failure to return to Troy and thus preserve her status as virtuous. However, the characters …

Finding Their Chrysanthemum: Linguistic Representation In Children's Literature, Marielena Zajac

Master of Arts in Professional Writing Capstones

Children in America today struggle with finding themselves in the books they read due to societal expectations. From an early age, children are dictated on the correct way to speak and write in “American,” which can leave children and their home languages feeling unseen and dismissed. To help further the conversation and promotion of linguistic diversity in American society, this capstone analyzes dialectal representation in children’s books, with a heavy focus on attitudinal linguistic principles rather than prescriptive mechanics. The secondary research explores current literature and resources that discuss literacy acquisition in adolescents, trends in dialects in America, and childhood …

Reclamation: The Crown Of African American Identity, Lindsey Kellogg

English MA Theses

African American voices have been the main sources of influence on society and culture. For this reason, it is important that African Americans speak up and reclaim their voices. Not only are their voices important, but the stories that lie behind the voices are what need to be amplified. With the application of postcolonial theory, this thesis takes modern stories located in North America depicting racist behavior towards African Americans from the year 1970 to present-day New York City in order to fully amplify the process of social struggle. As these narratives are passed down through generations serving as a …

Sandstorm Spring 2022, Leslie Malland

Sandstorm: A Journal of Arts and Letters

Full Manuscript

Carlos Bulosan And Filipino Collective Memory: Teaching, Transgression, And Transformation, Jeffrey Cabusao

English and Cultural Studies Journal Articles

Who is Carlos Bulosan? Why is he significant? Why teach Bulosan in our classrooms? These questions function as points of departure for this lecture delivered in Summer 2021 for the UNITAS International Lecture Series cosponsored by CLASS and Kritika Kultura. By reviewing the significance of Carlos Bulosan, this talk provides an opportunity to examine the continued relevance of Bulosan and his works for the twenty-first century. A pioneering Filipino writer of the twentieth century, Bulosan developed a unique transgressive aesthetic that travels across national and literary boundaries and, in the process, reimagines the boundaries of Filipino identity and literary categorization. …

Poverty, Social Isolation, Uselessness, And Loneliness: The Fears And Anxieties Of 19th-Century British Governesses, Lydia Pejovic

English (MA) Theses

This essay focuses on the prevalent fears of governesses in nineteenth-century Britain: poverty and social isolation, uselessness/redundancy, and a life of loneliness. Through looking at Emma, Jane Eyre, and The Turn of the Screw, novels which span the century (their publication dates ranging from 1814-1898), and comparing them to the historical reality of many middle class women at the time, these fears are revealed to be quite valid. The fears and anxieties displayed by the characters in the three novels are reflected in statements made by former governesses (including Mary Wollstonecraft), and are likewise reinforced through census reports and common …

A Pandemic Of Greed And A Disease Of Poverty In Edgar Allan Poe's "The Masque Of The Red Death", Benjamin Herrick

Master's Theses

The breakers tripped. Again. The breakers, a mandatory halt to trading on the floor of the stock exchange in response to the S&P falling more than 7% from the previous close. This was instituted after the Crash of 1987 to calm the markets before trading is allowed to resume. They are supposed to mitigate a drastic crash. They have only ever triggered once before, in 1997. Not for the tech bubble. Not even in the crash of 2008. All trading stops for fifteen minutes when the Level One breaker trips. If it drops further in the same day, the Level …

F. Scott Fitzgerald’S Homme Épuisé: Usurping The “Madwoman” In Tender Is The Night (1934) [2022], Emma Hill

Master's Theses

Nineteenth-century women writers commonly use themes of entrapment and madness in what are now classified as gothic novels. In texts such as Jane Eyre, Frankenstein, and The Yellow Wallpaper, confinement and madness are synchronous in developing the figure of “the madwoman.” These texts were written during a time when it was uncommon for female writers to seek publication, and many used pseudonyms to get their works published or to be taken seriously by critics. The “madwoman” emerged as a powerful trope to articulate what writing under a patriarchal system feels like. That is to say, confinement scenarios resulting from female …

The Effects Of Explicit Instruction Targeting Social-Emotional Learning Competencies On The Improvement Of Expressive And Receptive Vocabulary Development For First-Grade Students Identified With Speech-Language Deficits, Anna Perry

Rehabilitation, Human Resources and Communication Disorders Undergraduate Honors Theses

Background/Introduction: Studies have shown that both social-emotional and behavioral aspects are deeply intertwined with academic success (McClelland et al., 2007). This study was designed to examine the effects explicit instruction targeting social-emotional learning may have on the vocabulary skills of first-grade students identified with language deficits, behavioral disorders, and developmental disabilities. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of explicit instruction targeting social-emotional learning competencies on the improvement of expressive and receptive vocabulary development in children identified with language deficits, as well as behavioral disorders and developmental disabilities. By implementing and teaching social-emotional competencies through explicit …

“Strumpet,” “Huswife,” “Whore”: Centering Othello’S Bianca, Phoebe Merten

English (MA) Theses

Is Bianca a sex worker? What meanings change if she is or isn’t? Not enough artistic or critical attention has been paid the character. It seems likely that the initial lack of attention stemmed from Bianca’s status as a purported sex worker, as though this makes her somehow categorically different from the other women in the play, or inherently less interesting. There has in the past decade or so been a marked increase in scholarship on sex work, but this too largely skims over Bianca, likely because of the ambiguity surrounding her profession.

In my introduction I go over some …

(Re)Fashioning Gender: Dress As Embodied Feminist Critique In Modernist Women’S Writing, Lauren Elizabeth Sperandio Phelps

English Dissertations - Archive

In this dissertation I examine early twentieth century women writers’ use of fashion as a mode of critiquing gender, race, and class oppression. Through close reading of the novels of Nella Larsen, Edith Wharton, Anzia Yezierska, Radclyffe Hall, and Virginia Woolf, I explore how fashion in these works functions to emphasize elements of identity formation and conditioning. I argue that by taking up fashion as a tool for critique women writers were able to simultaneously challenge oppressive social structures as well as appraisals of women as unfit for serious analysis or literature. If fashion is considered trivial, then using it …

A Teacher Goes To School: A Retrospective Analysis Of Pedagogical Insights On Secondary Writing Instruction, Karen Stelter Otto

English Dissertations - Archive

High school English teachers are familiar with current masters in the field (Kittle, Burke, Gallagher), but are not familiar with the scholarly literature on the topics of composition. Although helpful, these professional development books offer examples of quality lessons for helping students become stronger and more confident writers, but rarely do these books address the research that supports these findings. This dissertation is a retrospective study and analysis of the pedagogical insights on secondary writing instruction that I learned through my doctoral journey. I examine five areas of interest: peer review, teacher review, service-learning, grammar, and grading. I analyze the …

Making Selves As We Make Scholars: The Many Uses Of Life Writing In College English, Lindsey Rose Gendke

English Dissertations - Archive

This dissertation addresses the perennial question, for both new and more seasoned English professors, “What should we teach in English?” In composition, “What types of writing should we teach?” And in literature, “what literature, and which authors, should we read?” In the current age where teachers are concerned with promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion, perhaps these questions are more relevant than ever. Thus, employing Wayne Booth’s rhetorical stance as my theoretical frame, I inquire 1) what are the most pressing needs of traditional-age college students, and 2) what theories and teaching strategies uncovered in recent English studies have the potential …

Pandemic Pedagogy: A Case Study Of Commenting Practices In A Pandemic, Nicholas G. Nicklin

English Theses - Archive

This thesis reviews best practices for commenting on student submission and reports the findings of a case study from the 2020 spring semester.

Response: In And Out Of The Game, As Usual, Steven E. Jones

English Faculty Publications

In this response article, I revisit the idea of paratext in video games. I start, however, with the example of a book by Tolstoy, and the textual studies work of McKenzie and McGann, in order to make the point that paratextuality has never been limited to Genette’s rigid definition, even in the case of print texts. Video games foreground what has always been the case: the dynamic, volatile, multidirectional nature of paratexts, which can take you into but also out of the enclosure of the main text (or “game itself”) in unexpected ways. Illustrations include Animal Crossing: New Horizons and …

Muslim Young Adult Graphic Novels : Destabilizing Perceptions, Sidra Habal

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

This paper seeks to analyze common trends in the Muslim Young Adult graphic novels Huda F Are You? by Huda Fahmy and the Ms. Marvel comics by G. Willow Wilson. The main characters, Huda and Kamala, respectively, struggle to define their own identities beyond being Muslim as well as figuring out who they are, who they want to be, and how they wish to represent themselves. The common themes found within these novels include this question of identity as well as exploring family bonds, navigating romantic interests, and building strong groups of friends. These characters are trying to find a …

“People Like They Historical Shit In A Certain Way”: The Civil War Plays Of Suzan-Lori Parks, Or Commercialized Memory And Black Lives, Brandon Eric Fisher

All Theses

Suzan-Lori Parks has explored the relationship between Blackness, slavery, and capitalism throughout her career. I argue that Parks’s three works—The America Play (1995), Topdog/Underdog (2001), and Father Comes Home from the Wars (2015)—should receive critical attention as her Civil War plays. By this phrase, I mean that Parks embeds her critiques of racial capitalism in historical narratives about America’s bloodiest conflict. In these three plays, she takes up several white supremacist Civil War tropes—tropes like what scholar Cody Marrs calls the “Father Abraham” story and the “Agrarian Imagination” myth—and criticizes them as narratives that deny African American history. To …

Lack Of Affirmative Consent: Trauma In Jhumpa Lahiri’S “Interpreter Of Maladies”, Ansalee Morrison

English (MA) Theses

Most scholars who have published analyses of the title story of Jhumpa Lahiri’s 1999 Pulitzer Prize-winning short story collection, Interpreter of Maladies, read Mina Das’s character as a woman who chose to be unfaithful to her husband with a friend who once stayed in their home, resulting in the conception of her second son, Bobby. This general consensus is likely influenced by how Mr. Kapasi, the story’s narrator and the tour guide in whom Mina confides her story, concludes that the “pain” Mina complains of is actually “guilt” (Lahiri 63). The work of Tzuhsiu Beryl Chiu, however, stands out …

Traumas And Recovery In Takaya Natsuki's Fruits Basket, Vesper North

English (MA) Theses

This thesis examines the various traumas within Takaya Natsuki’s anime series Fruits Basket and how the act of transformation triggers the beginnings of recovery for numerous characters. Fruits Basket bears striking similarities to the French fairy tale Beauty and the Beast (as well as later adaptations) originated by Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve. Throughout, I draw parallels between the “Beauty and the Beast”-genre with Fruits Basket and how the anime expands upon shared themes, specifically trauma. Additionally, I analyse the birth of and recovery from traumas (caused by bullying, loss, abuse, and feelings of otherness) for “Beauty and the Beast” archetypes within …