American Popular Culture Commons^™

An Axe To The Funny Bone: Curated Instability And Horror-Comedy Intersections In American Storytelling, Samantha Box

Masters Theses

Funny. Terrifying. Subversive.

Horror-Comedy twists and bites at the intersection of two incredibly reactive genres— with both Horror and Comedy being well known for the political and social discourses they embody and reinvent through story. While prevalent in American popular culture, scholarly analysis of this hybrid space barely exists beyond a small number of Film Studies investigations. Despite this lack, Horror-Comedy works continue to be successfully produced. This thesis unpacks the vibrant relationship between fear and laughter in contemporary American storytelling through Horror-Comedy, maintaining a focus on structural dynamics and the audience-disarming results of simultaneously applying horror and humor to …

Folklore And Region In Actual Play Podcasting: An Interview With Clint And Griffin Mcelroy, Jasper Waugh-Quasebarth

Art Faculty Publications

The article focuses on the rise of "actual play" podcasts like The Adventure Zone, which use tabletop roleplaying games as a medium for storytelling. Topics include the show's engagement with Appalachian folklore, the emotional depth of its narrative themes such as memory and loss, and its representation of West Virginia's cultural landscape.

Finding The Sacred In The Profane: The Mardi Gras In Basile, Louisiana, Luc Guglielmi

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

In Basile, a small community in Southwest Louisiana, there would not be any Mardi Gras without Ash Wednesday and vice-versa. Most of the people in Basile speak of Ash Wednesday when defining the Mardi Gras as there is a reciprocal spiritual relationship between Mardi Gras and Ash Wednesday. The people from Basile, therefore, in giving equal spiritual value to these two feasts, assign a liturgical value to Mardi Gras because they need, and will admit this freely, to have a good Mardi Gras in order to enter into the sacred season of Lent.

Mardi Gras performs a function that is …

Adaptation Production Plan For “Cardigan, Betty, And August” From Taylor Swift's Folklore, Carlie Hillhouse

FUSION

This multimodal project creates a production plan for a fictional movie adaptation of Taylor Swift's popular songs "cardigan, betty, and august" from her 8th studio album, folklore. The production plan consists of details and descriptions for each cast member, filming locations, soundtrack, and key scenes to film for the movie.

The project was created in response to an assignment prompt that asked students to analyze how adaptation affects the way stories are told in different genres. Students had to consider audience reception, the portrayal of heroism, how mode affects a story's point-of-view, and how elements like key scenes and …

Propp, Parables, And Paideia: What The Stories Of Jesus Teach Us About Cultivating Culture, Rachelle Bowman

Master of Arts in Classical Studies

The parables of Jesus are well-known and oft-repeated. They are commonly taught to children in Sunday school, but Jesus used them to reveal truth to his adult audiences. This paper explores the importance of Jesus choosing to use stories to teach adults, whether these stories qualify as folklore, and also whether they can be analyzed as literature. After drawing conclusions on these matters, this paper analyzes several of the parables of Jesus according to Vladimir Propp’s Morphology of the Folktale and looks to see if Jesus told stories that fit within Propp’s proposed functions. Finally, this paper asks what can …

Personal Identity And The Influence Of Outlaw Folklore, William "Bacon" Nivison

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Folklore being a relatively new science there is still debate going on about what Folklore actually is. Most of what one reads is relative to who the “folk” are, where the “lore” comes from and how it is inspired. This thesis looks at folkore from a viewpoint which observes folklore from the other direction. Not how do the folk create the lore, rather how does the lore create the folk?

Folklore is well shown to be a product, or at least an abstract of one’s personal identity, but, is it not also a tool used by the individual in the …

Ethnography Of Reading Comic Books, Azadeh Najafian

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

This thesis explores why adults read comic books. This research used the ethnographic method and interviewing eleven people, four women, seven male, as its primary source. Based on information and common themes gathered from interviews, I built this thesis into one introduction, three body chapters, and a conclusion.

In the first chapter, I argued that comics could function the same as myths and explained this function and related examples under the “mythic effect” name. In the second chapter, I discussed how my informants use reading comics as a means to escape their everyday lives and how sometimes this escapism carries …

The Mothman And Other Strange Tales: Shaping Queer Appalachia Through Folkloric Discourse In Online Social Media Communities, Brenton Watts

Theses and Dissertations--Linguistics

Little work has been conducted on the intersections of queer and Appalachian identities, in part because these two identities are viewed as incompatible (Mann 2016). This study uses a multimodal critical discourse analytic approach to examine the Instagram posts of the Queer Appalachia Project, which represent a substantial body of discourse created by and for queer Appalachians. Of specific interest to this analysis are those posts which employ folkloric figures, such as West Virginia’s Mothman, to do identity work that is queer, Appalachian, and queer-Appalachian. Often, this act is accomplished through juxtaposition with Appalachian imagery and the reclamation of homophobic …

Woody Guthrie, America's Merry Prankster, Kristin Lems

Faculty Publications

A “merry prankster” is a colorful person, real or legendary, who pokes fun at authority and the rich, powerful, and arrogant. The merry prankster appears small and powerless, but manages to outwit his opponents, often summing up the situation with witty one-liners — signal examples from medieval history and folklore are Mullah Nasreddin and Till Eugenspiel. In many ways, Woody Guthrie is an American merry prankster. Small in stature but large of intelligence, he used his wits, musical creativity, and people skills to defend the poor against the rich and powerful. He consistently made enemies of the privileged and those …

Moving Foward?: Problematic Ideologies In Twenty-First Century Fairy Tale Films, Alyson Kilmer

All Master's Theses

Fairy tales, as a reflection of our values and belief systems, are crucial in shaping and maintaining cultural ideologies. In the twenty-first century, cinematic fairy tales have the unique position of representing such values in an expansive and expeditious manner. Audiences must therefore be critically conscious of the messages promoted by these tales. An analysis of the five most popular contemporary fairy tale films, Disney’s Princess and the Frog (2009), Tangled (2010), Universal’s Snow White and the Huntsman (2012), and Disney’s Frozen (2013) and Maleficent (2014), revealed minimal attempts to propitiate critical audiences in regard to changing cultural values, but …

Trout, Allan Mitchell, 1903-1972 (Mss 346), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Manuscripts Collection 346. Correspondence and writings relating to the career of Allan Mitchell Trout, political reporter and columnist for the Louisville Courier-Journal. Includes letters from readers, written mostly on the occasion of his retirement, collections of Trout's "Greetings" columns, speeches and articles, historical memorabilia, correspondence relating to the Allan M. Trout Collection at Western Kentucky University, and messages of sympathy to his wife after Trout's death.

Perrin, Anne Gray (Fa 516), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Collection includes materials assembled by Anne Gray Perrin for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class. Included are interviews with four informants about family and personal narratives and ghost stories; photographs of the 2004 Kentucky American Saddlebred Pleasure Horse Association’s State Championship in Shelbyville, Kentucky; and photos documenting material culture in Bowling Green and Shelbyville, Kentucky.

Teegarden, Mike (Fa 499), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 499. Paper: "Folklore in the Media," by Mike Teegarden, which examines folklore elements found in advertisements from 'Sports Illustrated.' This paper was done for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University.

Mendelsberg, Joanna (Fa 498), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives project 498. Paper: "Folk Speech in Advertising: Proverbs and Sayings," by Joanna Mendelsberg, which examines these folklore elements in advertisements from 'Sports Illustrated' and 'Mademoiselle' magazines. This paper was done for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University.

Biggs, Amy (Fa 494), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 494. Paper: "Ads in the Media," by Amy Biggs, which documents folklore elements in magazine advertisements. Produced for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University.

Gilkison, Tamara (Fa 497), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 497. Paper: "Folklore in Advertising: A Collection of Ads From Various Magazines," by Tamara Gilkison, which examines how folklore elements were used in print advertising. This paper was done for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University.

Mathews, Cynthia M. (Fa 501), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 501. Paper: "[Mass Media and 'The Far Side']," by Cynthia M. Mathews, which examines folklore elements from "The Far Side" comic strip. This paper was done for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University.

Hutcherson, Anna (Fa 502), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 502. Paper: "Folklore in Rapping" written by Anna Hutcherson for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University. Includes pictures from "Right On" and "Word Up" magazines.

Hall, Timothy W. (Fa 500), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 500. Paper: "Folklore in Cinema," by Timothy W. Hall, which examines urban legends found in popular movies. This paper was done for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University.

Phillips, Noelle (Fa 496), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 496. Paper: "Tempting by Association: The Use of Folklore in Selling Liquor," by Noelle Phillips, which discusses folklore elements found in liquor advertisements from various magazines. This paper was done for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University. Project does not contain supporting material.

Collin, Andrea (Fa 495), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 495. Paper: "Folklore and Advertising in 'Time Magazine'," by Andrea Collin, which examines folklore elements in advertisements from 'Time Magazine'. This paper was done for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University.

Archbold, Annie (Fa 203), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 203. Photographs, negatives, and proofsheets from various folklife projects coordinated by Annie Archbold while she was a folk studies faculty member at Western Kentucky University.

Oberdier, Andrew (Fa 427), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 427. Paper: "Irish Folklore in the 'Boston Globe'" written by Andrew Oberdier for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class.

Pierce, Greg (Fa 430), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 430. Paper: "Folklore on the Cover of 'Time' Magazine: A Survey" written by Greg Pierce for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class.

Mains, Brian (Fa 182), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid and full-text scan of paper (Click on “Additional Files” below) for Folklife Archives Project 182. "Folklore and the Media -- Study: 'Park City Daily News.'" Paper written by Brian Mains for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class. "Park City Daily News," Bowling Green, Kentucky, referenced.

Zanders, Roderick (Fa 505), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 505. Paper: "Folklore in Football," written by Roderick Zanders for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class, which focuses on folklore elements related to football with emphasis on the Super Bowl.

Kenney, Melissa R. (Fa 503), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 503. Paper: "Urban Legends in Motion Pictures," written by Melissa R. Kenney for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University. Includes a video cassette containing clips discussed in the paper.

Morris, Holly (Fa 508), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 508. Paper: "Cultural Tourism: Folklore in Tourism Brochures" written by Holly Morris for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class. The paper looks at folklore elements found in cultural tourism brochures. Includes paper and supporting material.

Hawes, Susan (Fa 506), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 506. Paper: "Women in Mass Media" written by Susan Hawes for a folk studies class at Western Kentucky University. The paper examines how women and folklore are highlighted in advertisements. Project includes paper and supporting material.

Lawson, Jamie (Fa 504), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Folklife Archives Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Folklife Archives Project 504. Paper: "Tabloid Folklore: From UFOs to Elvis," written by Lawson for a Western Kentucky University folk studies class. The paper examines folklore elements in supermarket tabloids, with emphasis on the outrageous claims made in these publications.