English Language and Literature Commons^™

The Awakening’S Edna Pontellier, Female Companionship, And The Sea, Mary Aldrich

2023 Student Academic Showcase

Since the release of Kate Chopin’s foundational feminist novel The Awakening, scholars have speculated about what the protagonist Edna Pontellier’s journey says about 19th-century womanhood. Utilizing a framework established by queer theorists Adrienne Rich and Elizabeth LeBlanc, I argue that Edna represents a “metaphorical lesbian,” who rejects her expected social role to live a women-centered life. This identity manifests through her relationships with the feminine “mother-woman” Adèle Ratignolle and the more socially-independent pianist Mademoiselle Reisz. Edna’s displeasure with both these contrasting lifestyles contributes to her return to the sea, an unambiguously female figure Edna simultaneously views as a mother …

Incredible Witnesses: ​An Analysis Of Thomas Of Cantimpré’S Use Of Witnesses In The Lives Of Christina The Astonishing And Margaret Of Ypres, Marianne Hale

Student Research Symposium

I will be analyzing two of the works of Thomas of Cantimpré. An initial study of the secondary literature surrounding Christina the Astonishing and Margaret of Ypres showed a lack of attention to the witnesses used by Thomas. I researched primary and secondary literature surrounding the hagiographies of Margaret of Ypres and Christina the Astonishing and the function of witnesses in secular and religious courts to generate guidelines to assess how witnesses were used. What I found is that Thomas used many kinds of witnesses from various levels in society and various relationships to the subjects. The preponderance of his …

Critiquing The Present And Imagining The Future: Diversity In Contemporary Young Adult Dystopian Fiction, Ericka Stone

Student Research Symposium

This project investigates the historic and contemporary representations of diversity in young adult dystopian literature. First, the functions of utopia and dystopia are examined, as each genre seeks to create change within society, whether it is by presenting the possibility of a more hopeful future, or by projecting the problems of the present into a terrifying vision of what might happen if change is not made. By examining the elements of utopian and dystopian fiction and the way each genre conveys their themes, this project seeks to locate the significance of diversity and representation of all races, ethnicities, genders, and …

Back Matter

The Woodward Review: A Creative and Critical Journal

No abstract provided.

Front Matter

The Woodward Review: A Creative and Critical Journal

No abstract provided.

One In The Same + The Fated Goal Of Gatsby, Luke Anderson

2023 Student Academic Showcase

This presentation focuses on a creative and critical response to the plot of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. I reimagined the novel’s ending in a short story I wrote titled “One in the Same.” I also reflected on my creative decisions in a critical essay titled “The Fated Goal of Gatsby.” My presentation argues that the alternative ending to The Great Gatsby in my short story is a worthwhile alternative because of how the novel itself structures Gatsby’s desire for Daisy.

A Different Perspective On Christmas, Jessika Hughes

Forces

No abstract provided.

Tiny Details, Jessika Hughes

Forces

No abstract provided.

Desire In Bridgerton: Defining The Female Gaze, Hailey C. Coles

Honors College Theses

Feminist literature is rife with multiple, sometimes conflicting, sometimes partial, definitions of the female gaze. A definitive understanding of the female gaze incorporates the literature but includes other modes of thought and analysis appropriate for a number of different media. Bridgerton articulates this understanding as it privileges female sexuality not just through dialogue, but through its focus on multiple characters’ bodily awareness. Non-verbal elements like blocking, the physical articulation of bodies, changes in camera angles and foci that privilege subtle and nuanced movements, and even the pervasive use of music all contribute to the form and characterization of the female …

Something “Transcendentally Stimulating”: Resistance And Antidote To Empiricist British Culture In Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’S Sherlock Holmes, Crissy Preston, Crissy M. Preston

Master of Arts in Classical Studies

Sherlock Holmes is a name synonymous with detective and perhaps more familiar to households than his creator Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. His lasting impact as a literary figure is indisputable, but the curiosity surrounding the reasons for his longevity in popularity remain an enigma to many scholars and critics. In my thesis, I will discuss some of the reasons Holmes relates to readers from various time periods, age groups, and nationalities for more than a century. The first section of this project will establish the empiricist culture surrounding the decadent late 1800s, which compose the setting for most of Doyle’s …

Literature Through The Looking Glass: How Fan Fiction Can Save English, Jacob C. Quinn

Honors College Theses

English departments face a crisis of student disinterest. Scholars are struggling to sell the study of literature as practically useful in an increasingly STEM-dominated world. The literary realm of fan fiction, which can serve as a guiding star, demonstrates how a community of readers and writers can reach for ideals of democracy and creativity that acknowledge the inherent worth of studying literature while also examining how such study can help students thrive in a world threatened by censorship and authoritarianism. This is a prescription for a total shift in philosophy for the academic study of literature. Such study has been …

Words Matter: Crafting And Critiquing Rhetorically Effective Styles (Engl 002w) Syllabus, Natalie Mera Ford

Aydelotte Curricular Grants

What does it mean to write an awkward or a clear sentence? Who determines what counts as appropriate or "good" writing, and how are such notions of standardized English currently being challenged? Can a scholarly voice be an authentic personal voice, too? In this course, we will examine the grammatical building blocks of written style while scrutinizing larger cultural concerns about the effectiveness of distinct styles. While recognizing famous tenets of style in creative writing, we will primarily focus on stylistic features of academic, civic, and professional discourse. We will learn grammatical terminology and apply it in analyzing and evaluating …

Structural Analysis And Assessment Of Scholarly Style, Natalie Mera Ford

Aydelotte Curricular Grants

Does academia encourage an effective academic writing style? Do writers across the disciplines communicate in ways that uphold the values and purposes of liberal arts education? Has the turn in higher ed and scholarship to more public-facing audiences affected how scholars try to reach readers? What stylistic adjustments or improvements would you like to see in the texts you read—and are asked to write—in college? This project asks you to delve into these questions, among others, in relation to a sample of scholarly writing of your choice. Your goal is to analyze and assess how grammatical structures, both in individual …

Blue Mondays: A Woman’S Life In The East End, Rosanne Brooks

Michael Pueppke Writing Prize

No abstract provided.

Lady Gaga: Free Bitch, Karynne Henry

Faculty Curated Undergraduate Works

I would be surprised if there was anyone under 45 who had never heard of Lady Gaga. Lady Gaga rose to fame in the Early 2000s as an eager songwriter turned pop sensation. Gaga grew to push the boundaries of pop music with her out-of-this-world performances and shocking lyrics. Many pushed out by society have clung to her uniqueness and connected with her niche, yet mainstream music. Lady Gaga, once a girl with dreams, now a pop sensation, is not without scars. The star has faced criticism, loss, and pain that has carried over into her life and music. There …

Undergraduate, Honorable Mention: The Good, The Bad And The Nerdy, Athena Ballard

2023 Awards for Excellence in Student Research and Creative Activity - Documents

No idea is original. People have been writing concepts down for thousands of years, and coming up with them for even longer, so it’s statistically possible that at some point, an ancient Mesopotamian came up with James Bond. With centuries of literature and film already written—ideas that probably weren’t original then either—it’s even harder to create something entirely new. With that in mind, modern film and TV relies heavily on character tropes: pre-existing stereotypes for fictional characters based on shared attributes, appearances and even entire backstories. Tropes can do much of the storytelling without saying a word. For example, the …

George Colvile's Translation Of The Consolation Of Philosophy, Ian Cornelius

English: Faculty Publications and Other Works

The Consolatio philosophiae of the Roman statesman and philosopher Boethius (fifth/sixth century) was read and studied intensely in medieval western Europe and repeatedly translated into vernacular languages. Medieval commentaries on this text and translations of it claim attention today as case studies in a history of reading, for they exemplify the practices of medieval literary scholasticism. In an English context, the final flowering of this reading tradition may be placed in the year 1556, when John Cawoode printed a new translation of the Consolatio by a ‘George Coluile, alias Coldewel’. The translator remains unidentified. The translation is a medieval throwback …

Building Bibliographically, Susanna Ashton

Publications

No abstract provided.

Sinclair Lewis Society Newsletter, Vol 31, No. 2, The Sinclair Lewis Society

Sinclair Lewis Society Newsletter

“Translating Arrowsmith: An Interview with Rusty Allred”

“A Contemporary Review of Lewis’s Biography: Charles Shain’s Review of Sinclair Lewis: An American Life by Mark Shorer,” By Shaun F. Richards

“Lewis and Thompson Featured in Freedom’s Furies: A Review of Freedom’s Furies: How Isabel Paterson, Rose Wilder Lane, and Ayn Rand Found Liberty in an Age of Darkness by Timothy Sandefur,” by Ralph Goldstein

“Lewis, Theodore Dreiser, and “The Slap Heard ‘Round the World'”

“What Were They Reading Then?: Raw Gold by James B. Hendryx,” by Sally E. Parry, Illinois State University

“Lewis’s Additions to the New Republic‘s “‘Good Books That …

Giving Voice To The Body: Slam Poetry In The Poet X, Stefanny Leung Yu

Student Theses

When the world silences her, can slam poetry become her voice? Elizabeth Acevedo, an author and poet, uses her beautiful piece of slam poetry to explore how language can empower marginalized voices, speaking on behalf of those who are usually silenced. The Poet X is a verse novel that narrates the powerful story of a young Afro-Latina girl, Xiomara Batista, who navigates the intersecting pressures of school bullies, family issues, religious conservatism, patriarchal rules, and racialized body politics in her Harlem community. This research engages with Acevedo’s work to focus on how slam poetry serves as a powerful outlet and …

The Stolen Gift: Tolkien And The Problem Of Suicide, Martin Lockerd

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

The treatment of suicide in Tolkien’s narratives about Middle-earth—a topic surprisingly neglected by critics—helps to clarify one aspect of the relationship between Tolkien’s secondary world and his distinctly Christian view of primary reality. His writings capture the tragic pathos of self-destruction while developing and unfolding a larger, competing ethos of self-sacrifice and service to life. In order to explain the development of this life-affirming ethic, I begin by considering the paradoxical nature of death in Tolkien’s mythology as the “gift” of a benevolent creator. Next, I analyze prominent examples of suicide in The Silmarillion and the early legendarium more broadly. …

Delving Too Greedily: Analyzing Prejudice Against Tolkien's Dwarves As Historical Bias, Mitchell T. Dennis, Kenton Sena

Mythlore: A Journal of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and Mythopoeic Literature

Tolkien's writings are imbued with the perspectives of their narrators and within them, the narrators' biases. This is most evident in the bias against the dwarves, particularly in the third age. Dismissing testimonials from neutral sources and dwarves alike, scholars have continuously inaccurately treated the anti-dwarf bias as a criticism of the Dwarves’ relationship with nature. The criticisms levelled by scholars have led to the dwarves being dismissed as particularly environmentally destructive, a direct contradiction to how the dwarves interact with natural spaces and how they construct their own. Consequently, a more nuanced reading of the dwarves lends itself to …

Milton’S Learning: Complementarity And Difference In Paradise Lost, Peter Spaulding

Dissertations (1934 -)

When we consider, in the vein of Golda Werman’s Milton and Midrash, the idea of Milton’s Paradise Lost as self-consciously responding to the Bible, the question of why he makes the changes and additions that he does comes to the fore. This dissertation explores the middle books of Paradise Lost as Milton’s midrashic interventions that, among other things, emphasize the presence of education in the Garden. These scenes shed some light on Milton’s own views of education. Specifically, these interventions show a theory of education that conceives of difference as non-combative, a distinctly non-Hobbesian view of difference. Using Aristotle’s four …

Kleggan, Paulette Bane

Faculty Research and Publications

No abstract provided.

Gainesville, Paulette Bane

Faculty Research and Publications

No abstract provided.

Pedagogical Alliances Among Writing Instructors And Teaching Librarians Through A Writing Information Literacy Community Of Practice, Zoe Mcdonald, Deborah Minter

Department of English: Faculty Publications

In this praxis piece, a WPA and a writing instructor describe a writing information literacy community of practice among writing instructors and teaching librarians. Through paying attention to one resulting assignment, a full class annotated bibliography, the co-authors argue this professional development program extended collaborations among the writing program and the library to center contextual notions of authority and metacognition that connect to composition’s democratic political commitments.

Unfairy Tales And Other Refugee Stories: Creating Relations Through The Humanitarian Imagination In Mohsin Hamid's Exit West And Helen Oyeyemi's Gingerbread, Gabriella Pishotti

Graduate Student Scholarship

Contrary to many analyses of refugee narratives that focus on how their subject matter becomes compromised by issues of authority, believability, and expectation, this article explores how refugee novels such as Mohsin Hamid's Exit West and Helen Oyeyemi's Gingerbread lean into such problems in a way that appeals to the humanitarian imagination. These novels recognize the incomprehensibility of the refugee experience and play upon this reality by intermixing their stories with fairy tale elements. In doing so, the tropes of fairy tales provide these stories with greater narrative flexibility while making the unfamiliar realities of refugees comprehensible through familiar narrative …

Banned Or Grand?: Why Graphic Novels Maus And Persepolis Belong In The Classroom, Lauren Volk

Munn Scholars Awards

My capstone essay, “Banned or Grand?: Why Graphic Novels Maus and Persepolis Belong in The Classroom,” seeks to research both the objections to oft-banned memoir graphic novels being incorporated in the secondary school curriculum and the reasons why these graphic novels should not only be incorporated into the curriculum, but also why they assist students in developing necessary skills, such as higher-level critical thinking, a deeper understanding of complicated historical events, and the analysis of form and structure in literature, rather than just content. To enhance my research, I connected my main points to the pedagogical theory of learning transfer.

Adverse Childhood Experiences And Identity Achievement In The Lives Of Pip And Heathcliff, Brianna Leigh Blosenski

English Senior Capstone

Charles Dickens’s novel Great Expectations and Emily Brontë’s novel Wuthering Heights both focus on characters orphaned at a young age. Adverse childhood experiences, or ACEs, are clearly present throughout these characters’ adolescent lives, as they face various types of neglect, abuse, and household dysfunction. The presence of these ACEs thus influences their identity achievement: the settling of their moral codes and ethical standards. Through the exploration of their identities from childhood to adulthood, the reader observes Pip attaining identity achievement—due to the influence of a positive parental figure—and Heathcliff failing to do so.

A Choice To Make: The Portrayal Of Female Characters’ Agency And Emotion In Madeline Miller’S Circe And Anaïs Mitchell’S Hadestown, Abby Swartzentruber

English Senior Capstone

In the novel Circe and the musical Hadestown, Madeline Miller and Anaïs Mitchell create transformative retellings of selected Greek myths, where the narrative perspective is shifted to the women, allowing for a deeper examination of the complexity of these characters. Circe details the life of the titular goddess as she grapples with the tension between her exile and her agency, experiencing a complex web of non-linear emotions. In Hadestown, Eurydice must learn to overcome her pessimism to trust another, while Persephone must abandon her coping mechanisms and finally stand up to the abuses of her husband, Hades. Mitchell …