Visual Studies Commons^™

Sequential Art, Graphic Novels, And Comics, Brian Kelley

SANE journal: Sequential Art Narrative in Education

The first global distribution of a paper prepared for the Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Graphic Novels Special Interest Group of the International Reading Association,the Executive Board of the New Jersey Reading Association, and the Legislative and Professional Standards Committee of the NJRA.

Comic Vision, Gale Acuff

SANE journal: Sequential Art Narrative in Education

A narrative, rhetorical poem

"Just A Girl": The Community-Centered Cult Television Heroine, 1995-2007, Tamy Burnett

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Found in the most recent group of cult heroines on television, community-centered cult heroines share two key characteristics. The first is their youth and the related coming-of-age narratives that result. The second is their emphasis on communal heroic action that challenges traditional understandings of the hero and previous constructions of the cult heroine on television. Through close readings of Xena: Warrior Princess, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly, Dark Angel, and Veronica Mars, this project engages feminist theories of community and heroism alongside critical approaches to genre and narrative technique, identity performance theory, and visual media …

Weaving Through Reality: Dance As An Active Emblem Of Fantasy In Performance Literature, Tara Maylyn Frankel

CMC Senior Theses

Literature uses dance to reveal underlying messages of fantasy through the themes of the central narrative of female characters. Examining the original texts with respect to their varying adaptations for film and stage, performance literature reveals how directors relate a three-dimensional story to an audience from a two-dimensional world. Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Red Shoes” shows an underlying semiotic code where transitioning from the black and white of reality to the red of fantasy is only accomplished through dancing. Oscar Wilde’s Salome displays an eroticization of the exotic solo-improvised dance that provides a semblance of control for the main character. …

Love, Sex, And Gender Embodied: The Spirits Of Hatian Vodou, Elizabeth Mcalister

Elizabeth McAlister

No abstract provided.

German Film And The Frankfurt School (Spring 2009), Robert D. Tobin

Syllabi

This course is an introduction to German cinema. We will study masterpieces of German film, important critical and theoretical discussions of them, and the contexts in which they were produced and received. As a critical lens, we will rely heavily on psychoanalytic and Frankfurt School criticism, focusing on writings by Walter Benjamin, Siegfried Kracauer and Theodor Adorno. By the end of the semester, students should know the history of German film, have a better understanding of German culture, and have developed a critical understanding that is useful for their appreciation of all cinematic form.

A photo of this Spring 2009 …

Diabolical Frivolity Of Neoliberal Fundamentalism, Sefik Tatlic

Sefik Tatlic

Today, we cannot talk just about plain control, but we must talk about the nature of the interaction of the one who is being controlled and the one who controls, an interaction where the one that is “controlled” is asking for more control over himself/herself while expecting to be compensated by a surplus of freedom to satisfy trivial needs and wishes. Such a liberty for the fulfillment of trivial needs is being declared as freedom. But this implies as well the freedom to choose not to be engaged in any kind of socially sensible or politically articulated struggle.

Where I Am, There (Sh)It Will Be, Melanie Mcdougald

Melanie E McDougald

No abstract provided.

Female Agency And Oppression In Caribbean Bacchanalian Culture: Soca, Carnival, And Dancehall, Kevin Frank

Publications and Research

In this essay Kevin Frank discerningly analyzes agency and gender in public sexual performances emanating out of what Paul Gilroy identifies as part of the compensatory politics of the subordinated within Black Atlantic culture, Jamaican dancehall (dancehall reggae/ dancehall queens).

Queer Transitions In Contemporary Spanish Culture: From Franco To La Movida, Gema Pérez-Sánchez

Gema Pérez-Sánchez

Gema Pérez-Sánchez argues that the process of political and cultural transition from dictatorship to democracy in Spain can be read allegorically as a shift from a dictatorship that followed a self-loathing “homosexual” model to a democracy that identified as a pluralized “queer” body. Focusing on the urban cultural phenomenon of la movida, she offers a sustained analysis of high queer culture, as represented by novels, along with an examination of low queer culture, as represented by comic books and films. Pérez-Sánchez shows that urban queer culture played a defining role in the cultural and political processes that helped to move …

Images Of Women In Contemporary Egyptian Film: Elements Of The Body Sexuality And Consumerism, Nahla Zeitoun

Archived Theses and Dissertations

Among the various cinematic themes which have been studied over the past several years is that of the image of women. Women, taken as cinematic figures, evoke multiple images of a cultural and social discourse and draw attention to gender and family relations in a broader sense in a specific society. Moreover, Egyptian cinema has been a major point of reference for Egyptian culture in this country. It has shaped and expressed the changing of scenarios of modern Egypt to an extent that no preceding art form could ever achieve. It has influenced the way in which people perceive various …

“Drawing Difference: The Women Artists Of Madriz And The Cultural Rennovations Of The 1980s", Gema Pérez-Sánchez

Gema Pérez-Sánchez

No abstract provided.

Carte-De-Visite Photograph: "2 Headed Girl, Millie Crissie," No Date., J. H. Fitzgibbon

Broadus R. Littlejohn, Jr. Manuscript and Ephemera Collection

Conjoined twins Millie and Christine McKoy in full portrait. Date of photograph unknown (likely ca. 1870, subjects died 1912).