American Literature Commons^™

Female Hysteria Across Cultures And Periods In American Literature, Jessica Daine Droogsma

Honors Program Theses

Modernity would like us to believe we are in control: you can be whatever you want if you work hard enough; you are in charge of your own destiny; practice makes perfect; if you don’t like something, change it; you are what you eat. These popular aphorisms reflect our society’s addiction to self-determinism. We are completely set on the idea that we create and direct our own lives. However, there are larger influences in the world which are sometimes out of our control. The government, the media, society as a collective, and other such establishments have power over the individual. …