American Studies Commons^™

Writing Not Writing: Transdisciplinary Poetics, Institutional Critique, Miriam L. Atkin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation is an exploration of transdisciplinary creative practice as a means of institutional critique. The artists I have chosen as my primary focus—Robert Kocik, Eleni Stecopoulos, Zora Neale Hurston, Jimmie Durham, Leslie Scalapino and Lyn Hejinian—employ multiple mediums and fields of discourse to address the presumptions and exclusions that are structurally integral to the institutions that house them. They enact “architextural” interventions through their use of forms that move between the page and three dimensional space, incorporating architecture, sculpture, drawing, painting, film, performance, poetry and prose. My work aims at a renewed understanding of critique as such, and therefore—though …

Time Decay: Assets, Authoritarianism, And Anxiety About The Future, Jack Davies

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

This article identifies a basic formula in the Freudo-Marxist take on twentieth-century authoritarianism. This is the incommensurability of inherited past development with the pace and demands of industrial social life, damming up a tremendous excess that seeks reactionary outlet. Authoritarianism, here, breeds in the contradiction between the symptoms of the Oedipal drama and the commodity form. The implicit “repressive hypothesis” for sexuality and developmentalist teleology make this theorization of authoritarian formations untenable today. This article, however, identifies moments of promise in this literature, and turns to materials available to these thinkers—specifically interwar psychoanalytic theory on anxiety and economic theory on …

Defending “Western” Values: Reactionary Neoliberalism In The Americas, Gabriela Segura-Ballar

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

Right-wing populism and authoritarianism are on the rise globally after the financial crisis of 2008. This reactionary trend has widely channeled anxieties created by neoliberal insecurities into cultural and nationalistic backlash against the ostensible enemies of “Western” values (e.g., immigrants, racial and sexual minorities, feminists, and leftists). President Jair Bolsonaro’s “Brazil above everything, God above everyone” and President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” are the most conspicuous examples of the resurgence of a populist reactionary right in the Americas. This continental trend promotes ultra-nationalism and more coercive neoliberalization processes combined with a reactionary authoritarianism that celebrates essentialized “Western” values, …

Incipient Fascism: Black Radical Perspectives, Alberto Toscano

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

The sordid twilight of the Trump presidency raised the stakes of the debate on fascism. While much of the discussion has been magnetised by the legitimacy of analogies with the 1930s, this article argues that a rich and complex tradition of Black radical critique of right-wing authoritarianism provides a vital resource for thinking through the problem of US fascism beyond analogy – beginning with the DuBoisian insight that a racial fascism forged by chattel slavery and settler-colonialism anticipated the ascendancy of European fascisms. The article homes in on Black radical theories of fascism developed in the wake of the movements …

Neo-Authoritarianism And The Contestation Of White Identification In The Us, Justin Gilmore

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

Justin Gilmore’s article "Neo-Authoritarianism and the Contestation of White Identification in the US" examines how the political forces around Donald Trump are often interpreted as an external attack on American democracy, and how the dynamism of these attacks is thought to emanate from various sites of white chauvinism. This article argues that such an interpretation is partial. The upsurge associated with “Trumpism” represents a distinctive contestation of an alternative type of white identity, one that has been elemental for a progressive form of neoliberalism. Although the neoliberal construction of white identification is distinctive, and indeed kinder, its material basis rests …

Neo-Authoritarianism Without Authority, Massimiliano Tomba

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

This article examines two aspects of neo-authoritarianism. The first is mainly diagnostic and concerns the nature of authoritarianism as a phenomenon of transition. The article investigates tensions and conflicts between temporalities. It pays attention to the asynchronous nature of change which, alongside the social structural level of changes, also the psycho-social level, intervene politically in different forms. There are social strata that are strangers in their own country and do not share the same present with others. For them, looking to the past is the only way to imagine a different future. If they are looking for values and authority, …

A Trumpian Mechanism, Emmett Peixoto

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In 2016, a liar made a hypocrite appear worse and thereby won the US presidency. How did a liar, which is traditionally deemed something worse than a hypocrite, manage to do this? This article offers an answer. It does so by uncovering a peculiar mechanism, a Trumpian mechanism, at the heart of Trump’s relations with his critics. The mechanism explains how Trump benefited from wrong-footing his critics and is thus essential for understanding Trump’s success. The article offers a few key examples of this mechanism working against Trump’s political opponents, e.g., Trump’s (first) impeachment. It then shows how the mechanism …

Authoritarianism And Ideology, Asad Haider

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In “Authoritarianism and Ideology,” Asad Haider approaches the problem of authoritarianism by considering the classical question of tyranny, as framed by Spinoza, and how this can be traced to the Marxist theory of ideology. A fundamental axis of the debate over ideology in twentieth century Marxism was the phenomenon of fascism, theorized in highly influential but also markedly different ways by figures like Wilhelm Reich and Theodor Adorno. A close reading of two major texts—Reich's Mass Psychology of Fascism and Adorno's contributions to The Authoritarian Personality—provides a basis for conceptually elaborating different directions that can be taken in the study …

Introduction: New Faces Of Authoritarianism, Asad Haider, Massimiliano Tomba

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

No abstract provided.

Final Master's Portfolio, Jonathan Correa

Master of Arts in English Plan II Graduate Projects

Jonathan G. Correa's Master's Portfolio

An Analysis Of Forty Years Of Gender Archetypes On The American Silver Screen, Xaviera I. Valencia

Senior Honors Projects

Hollywood has come under fire recently from producer Harvey Weinstein’s role in sparking the #MeToo movement to the predominantly white, male composition of the Academy Awards’ voting members. Yet the film industry also provides a platform to actors, directors, and other crew members -- through acceptance speeches and movies themselves -- to spread awareness about pressing societal issues, including climate change, sexual assault, racism, and homophobia.

Art, especially film, has a tremendous effect on society and can either perpetuate stereotypes or dispel myths. For instance, Philadelphia (1993) brought into the mainstream the story of a man who was HIV+ and …

Space-Praxis: Towards A Feminist Politics Of Design, Mary C. Overholt

Masters of Environmental Design Theses

Outside of the academy and professionalized practice, design has long been central to the production of feminist, political projects. Taking what I have termed space-praxis as its central analytic, this project explores a suite of feminist interventions into the built environment—ranging from the late 1960s to present day.

Formulated in response to Michel de Certeau’s theory of spatial practices, space-praxis collapses formerly bifurcated definitions of ‘tactic’/‘strategy’ and ‘theory’/‘practice.’ It gestures towards those unruly, situated undertakings that are embedded in an ever-evolving, liberative politics. In turning outwards, away from the so-called masters of architecture, this thesis orients itself toward everyday practitioners …

The Perceived Effectiveness Of The Scaled Agile Framework® In Software Development Organizations, James F. Carilli

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Software development projects experience very high failure rates. Due to the high cost of project failure, coupled with studies that found failure rates are closely tied to the software development method used, the purpose of this mixed methods exploratory case study was to examine the extent of perceived effectiveness of the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe®) in software development organizations using Complex Adaptive Systems as a lens to guide the study. This research focused on the extent of perceived effectiveness of the Scaled Agile Framework® on organizational outcomes, team management, stakeholder and customer management, management of emerging requirements and overall organizational …

Grappling With The Aftereffects Of Modernism In American Literature And Culture: Spiritual, Political, And Ecological, Joseph Neary

Master of Arts in English Plan II Graduate Projects

In this portfolio, Joe Neary examines various texts within contemporary American culture, including David Foster Wallace’s short story, “Good Old Neon,” Harmony Korine’s film, Spring Breakers, Richard Powers’ novel, The Overstory, and Bruce Holsinger’s book of criticism, Neomedievalism, Neoconservatism, and the War on Terror.

Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story? A Marxist Analysis Of "Hamilton" And Its Relationship To The Broadway Economic System, Alana Ritt

Honors Projects

Lin-Manuel Miranda’s mega-hit Hamilton: An American Musical has been both a critical and academic darling since its premiere in 2015. A historical retelling of America’s inception through the eyes of an oft-ignored founding father, the musical weaves together a diverse cast and hip-hop musical stylings in order to tell the story of “America then, as told by America now.” While many critics and scholars alike have praised the musical for putting an exciting and accessible twist to American history, others have argued that the musical is not nearly as “revolutionary” as it claims to be. This essay is designed to …

Look At Her: The Subversive Spectacle Of Grande Dame Guignol Cinema, Michelle Smith

English Theses

While the Grande Dame Guignol films of the early 1960s served in their time to capitalize on the reputations of aging female stars and the growing popularity of the horror genre, an updated reading of this subgenre proves that it is rich with social critique regarding the feminine experience, social performance, and the tendencies of classical Hollywood cinema that promote a dominant, patriarchal social narrative. While many popular and critical responses diminish them as “psycho-biddy” or “hagsploitation” films, the Grande Dame Guignol tradition’s transformation of its actresses from glamorous icons to unrecognizable villains rejects such limiting appraisals by focusing on …

The Somaesthetics Of The Multitude: The Politico-Aesthetic Logic Of Antonio Negri And Michael Hardt In Constructing The Subjecthood, Jinying Li

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

"The Multitude", a concept reconstructed by Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt after the deconstruction of the subjecthood by post-structuralism, is a combination of singularity and commonality, and physicality and affection, and it is the subjecthood of postmodern society that overthrows the control of the empire and constructs the commonwealth. In the early days, Negri began to explore social issues from the perspective of the relationship between art and the multitude. From this perspective, his logics in constructing the multitude can be summed up as aestheticization and bio-politicization, and its inner trajectory of reasoning can be summarized as a transformation from …

Nelson Goodman On Exemplification, Hui Zhang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Nelson Goodman holds that there are two forms of symbolizing, namely, denotation and exemplification. In denotation, a symbol is used to refer to an object, while in exemplification the exemplifier has a label or is referred to by a label. Exemplification explains how abstract works perform symbolic functions and express metaphorical exemplifiers. Being highly creative and influential, Goodman's theory is valuable and can serve as a reference for Chinese scholars.

“Inaesthetics” And The “Passion For The Real”: Alain Badiou On The Avant-Garde Art, Kaifeng Xia

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Alain Badiou distinguishes between the didactic schema, classical schema and romantic schema in art, and further suggests that the avant-garde art does not create a new schema, but synthesizes the previous schemata into a didactico-romantic schema. Badiou strives to propose a new schema, the "inaesthetics" schema, which is both immanent and exclusive, that is, taking art as a truth-procedure. The inaesthetics schema is actually modeled around the avant-garde art, as Badiou believes that the avant-garde art embodies the "passion for the real" which implies two approaches of "destruction" and "subtraction." When Badiou attempts to combine these two approaches in his …

Wang Guowei's Theory Of Intuition And New Practice Of Symbolizing With Affective Image In Ci-Poetry, Bailing Yang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

The category of "perceiving" runs through all the fields and the whole process of Wang Guowei's research. He insists that art is based on intuition, but this does not mean that he is an anti-rationalist. He is not opposed to the use of bi(comparison) and xing (affective image) in classical Chinese poetry, yet reforms these methods with his theory of intuition, thereby giving them connotations of symbolism in modern Western poetics. Taking sorrows for the change of seasons, observations of moonlights, and astronomical phenomena as examples, this article analyzes the symbolic means of intuitive cognition embodiedin Wang Guowei's statement, "all …

Mao Qiling's Comments On The Romance Of The West Chamber And The Value Of His Concept Of “Lyric Example” In Literary Criticism, Xurong Yang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Theatre critics of the Ming dynasty spoke only occasionally about the "example (li)" of the Yuan-dynasty plays (za ju). In early Qing dynasty, Mao Qiling proposed "lyric example ( ci li)" as the primary commentary approach to The Romance ofthe West Chamber. The concept of "lyric" refers to the Yuan-dynasty plays, and the concept of "example" refers to the conventions, commonalities, laws and paradigms. Mao's concept of "lyric example" provided a comprehensive analysis of the language, the temperament, the system, and the performance as well as the critical standards in evaluating not only The Romance of the West Chamber but …

The Breakthrough And Limitations Of Qi Biaojia's Xiqu-Play Criticism, Shiyang Zhang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

In his letters to friends, Qi Biaojia expressed his hope to compile a collection of xiqu-plays in the Ming dynasty to promote contemporary xiqu-plays with textual criticism of the manuscripts. Qi inherited Wang Jide's idea of being the first to bridge the gap in the xiqu world and Lv Tiancheng's "intention to be close to the secular." Therefore, he tried hard to collect all the xiqu-plays in the Ming dynasty available to him, and compiled a monograph on xiqu-plays. Qi focused on manuscripts rather than on the playwrights or actors as his basis of evaluation. As opera music meters and …

Multidimensional Construction And Deconstruction Of The Claim That The Eight-Legged Essay Was Epitomized In The Ming Dynasty, Xiong Zheng

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

The claim that the eight-legged essay was epitomized in the Ming dynasty was solidified by scholars of the Ming and Qing dynasties with the belief that each generation had an exemplary genre since the Yuan dynasty. The claim was constructed from four dimensions of the three relationships between writing and, respectively, societal politics, scholar's vitality, and tradition of adhering to the classics and doctrines, as well as generic transformation and its value. The value of the eight-legged essay in the Ming dynasty had also been criticized in the above mentioned four dimensions by the Ming and Qing dynasty scholars. However, …

The Aesthetic Concept Of On The Absence Of Sentiments In Music And A Reflection On The Construction Of Chinese Aesthetics, Kai Lin

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Ji Kang's ( 223-263) On the Absence of Sentiments in Music has three types of aesthetic concepts. First, listeners of sorrowful music release his emotions through listening. Second, peaceful listeners obtain aesthetic pleasure through appreciating the beauty of musical form. Thirdly, peaceful listeners focus specifically on moderate music, in order to acquire peace and preserve his health. Going beyond utilitarian emotions, Ji Kang laid more emphasis on the second type of aesthetic concept, which was close to Kant's definition of disinterestedness. Yet, he regulated desire due to vigilance, rather than stressing "aesthetic freedom" like modern aesthetics. Therefore, Ji Kang's three …

A Paranoid Anxiety Of Life And Its Artistic Expression: A Thematic Study Of The Story Of Zhuangzhou Drumming The Basin, Yugui Jing

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

The original story of "Zhuangzhou Drumming the Basin" as first appeared in the Stories to Caution the World has been circulated both in China and abroad, and the motif of "unfaithful widow" is given distinctive artistic forms of expression. Zhuang's wife, the female protagonist in the story is constructed as an embodiment of carnal desire. Such representation reflects the status and tragic existence of women in a patriarchal society. Zhuangzi, who tests his wife's faithfulness, is in fact a representative figure of ancient scholars of little means who are separated from society and family, and a sexually jealous character of …

Fictional Text And Reality Of The Possible, Shusheng Zhang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

This article explores the issue of reference in fictional texts, that is, the relationship between fictional texts and reality. Paul Ricoeur thinks that the reference of poetic language is not cancelled, but only suspended. Through its semantic creativity, it possesses the ability to transform reality and to turn our personal environment into a habitable world. The interpretation of the concept "world /Welt" and "environment /Umwelt" by Martin Heidegger and Hans-Georg Gadamer shed light on the significance of fictional texts in reality, for they propose to us possible modes of existence in the ontological sense. In other words, fictional texts can …

Juxtaposition, Narrative Strategies, And Multimedia Explorations: Representation Of Time In Comics, Xu Lian

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Following the tradition of narratology and comics studies, this article explores various ways of representing time in comics and displays the complexity and diversity of temporal representation in the grammar of comics. It focuses on spatialization, closure, order, speed, and innovation enabled by virtue of multimedia explorations. Spatialization strategies such as juxtaposition and collage are basic ways to represent time in comics, and closure of perception is also critical in understanding time. However, new forms like music comics and webcomics have significantly changed the structure of temporal representation.

The New Development Of Marxist Literary Criticism Today: An Interview With Barbara Foley, Shengzhen Zhang, Barbara Foley

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

This interview with Prof. Barbara Foley covers a wide range of critical approaches and new challenges in the fields of Marxist theory, Marxist literary criticism, and Marxist pedagogy. Prof. Foley holds that Marxism provides a meta-theory, a privileged standpoint from which to study the connections between literature, politics and history. After examining fundamental principles of Marxism － － historical materialism, political economy, and ideology critique － － Foley analyzes long-standing debates over the nature of literature and sets forth key concerns of Marxist literary criticism. This interview also examines a broad range of literary works － － from classical to …

“Poetic Wisdom”Or “Poetic Knowledge”: On The Interlingual Transformation Of “Della Sapienza Poetica”, Weixuan Lin

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

While the term “Poetic wisdom” as the translation of “della Sapienza Poetica” helps to convey the aestheticconnotation of the original, it shadows the meaning of “poetic knowledge” and its epistemological background. Since René Descartes's rationality denied the value of philology, Giovanni Battista Vico tried to use “della Sapienza Poetica” as his method to seek truth in philology, and as his determination to defend philology. When approaching “della Sapienza Poetica” from the perspective of “poetic knowledge," we can understand and justify many of the puzzling arguments in Vico's New Science and give due respect to the concept which lacks among Western …

Third Reading Of Early Film Theory: The Turn To Dispositif, Affect, And Action Comedy, Yingjin Zhang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Early film studies has spread rapidly since the 1990s and become a mainstay in film studies in Euro-American academia, bringing technological innovation, visual culture, and urban modernity into film historiography and thus enriching scholarship in a field previously dominated by close textual reading. This article continues my tracking of early film studies but concentrates on methodological issues of the recent focus on “media archaeology.” My “Reading Early Film Theory: Collective Sensorium and Vernacular Modernism” (2005) introduces Miriam Hansen's theory and Zhen Zhang's book on reconstructing a cultural history of Shanghai film. My follow-up “Rereading Early Film Theory: In Pursuit of …