Modern Literature Commons^™

Fashion, Lifestyle, And Symbolic Capital: Identity And Resistance In Eka Kurniawan’S Beauty Is A Wound, Dewi Meyrasyawati, Cysakaren Diva Pratiwi, Nisar Ul-Haq

Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya

This study examines how fashion culture and lifestyle, understood as modes of self presentation, social performance, and everyday practice, operate as tools of identity construction and resistance in Eka Kurniawan’s Beauty Is a Wound. The objective is to reveal how beauty, personal choices, and public perception function as symbolic capital in negotiating gendered power relations, class hierarchies, and political constraints. Using close textual analysis, the research explores how female characters, particularly Dewi Ayu, mobilize appearance, behavior, and life decisions to challenge dominant ideologies and redefine their roles in society. The findings show that fashion culture in the novel extends beyond …

How Philip K. Dick Used The Unreliable Narrator To Transport Unwitting Acolytes, Michael Barros, Jordi Smith

Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy

This essay examines the use of the unreliable narrator to transport the reader into narrative worlds, specifically in Philip K. Dick's fiction. By exploring the phenomenon of narrative transportation and the role of emotions in engagement with fiction, we argue that Dick's use of the unreliable narrator significantly engages and transports readers into his narrative worlds. Subsequently, we contend that his belief in the fundamental reality of those worlds is effectively positioning himself as a gatekeeper and mediator between the narrative world and the real world, which sets him, in his mind, as a prophet, using fiction as a tool …

Kuasa Tokoh Perempuan Dalam Cerpen “Sang Pemuja” Karya Laksmi Pamuntjak, Nindita U. Dewanti, Mamlahatun -. Buduroh -

Multikultura

This study examines the forms of power exercised by the main female character in the short story “Sang Pemuja” by Laksmi Pamuntjak using the theory of power feminism. The primary focus of this study is the decisions and actions of the female character that demonstrate power over her body and life choices. This study aims to explain the practices of power feminism carried out by the female character in the short story “Sang Pemuja.” The research data consists of narrative text collected using the note-taking method, to be analyzed based on the principles of power feminism proposed by Naomi Wolf …

“He Had Named Himself The Stranger”: From 'Germanic' Heroic Hospitality To Elvish Memorial Mediation In Tolkien’S Book Of Lost Tales, Paolo Pizzimento Dr.

Journal of Tolkien Research

This article examines the narrative functions of strangeness and hospitality in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Book of Lost Tales, focusing on Eriol’s transformation from foreign traveller into listener, witness, and transmitter of Elvish tradition. Through a comparative reading of selected Old Norse and Anglo-Saxon texts—particularly Hávamál, Gylfaginning, and Beowulf—it identifies recurrent literary configurations in which hospitality regulates admission, identity, reciprocity, danger, and access to knowledge. The comparison is morphological rather than genetic: it does not posit direct derivation or a uniform Germanic code. Drawing on Jan Assmann’s theory of cultural memory, the article argues that Tolkien redirects …

Getting Tolkien Right: Middle-Earth In The National Review, Craig Franson

Journal of Tolkien Research

J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings entered Anglo-American popular consciousness as an emblem of 1960s, leftist youth culture, but the novel slowly gained currency across the political right. In the U.S., conservative intellectuals published book notes and articles on Tolkien’s writing in their movement’s leading journals, gradually habituating their readers to seeing the once-obscure English fantasist as a canonical writer for American conservatism. The most prominent of these journals was William F. Buckley’s National Review, which recurrently promoted Tolkien’s writing and offered a distinctly partisan interpretation of his texts. This paper offers a partial outline of the conservative …

Some Notes On A Tolkien’S Manuscript Linked To ‘Leaf By Niggle’, Claudio Antonio Testi

Journal of Tolkien Research

In these brief notes, I provide further information regarding a manuscript relating to 'Leaf by Niggle' that may lead to a more precise dating of the earliest version of this story.

"Everyone Leaves Me Behind”: How Harmful Tropes In Fiction Impact Autistic Women, Sara E. Allard

Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture

Until now, females with ASD have been ignored by healthcare professionals, policymakers, and the general public. The unique presentation of autistic women and girls is now in the cultural spotlight within not just the advocacy and scientific community, but also the arts. Female autistic characters are getting increased representation across literature and television, yet their narratives are still often stuck in the past. Most authors and screenwriters have yet to understand the specific struggles that female autistics face compared to their male counterparts, relying on the outdated, reductive perceptions that have plagued them for decades.

This article outlines three harmful …

“A Natural Human Activity”: The Split Attraction Model As A Tool For Reading Tolkien’S Legendarium, Sarah Courtis

Journal of Tolkien Research

The works of J.R.R. Tolkien have long been a refuge for readers seeking escape; a world of eucatastrophe where difference is celebrated, and friendship lauded. Despite his egalitarian themes, gatekeepers attempt to bar those living at the margins and intersections from reading themselves into the texts, denying that applicability which Tolkien called for in his own works. One such applicable interpretation of the legendarium is through the lens of asexuality and aromanticism. As there are no graphic sex scenes (though contrary to GRR Martin’s claims sex does exist in the world and is expanded upon in The Nature of Middle …

Introduction: Asexuality And Aromanticism In Tolkien's Works, Clare Moore, Rory Queripel

Journal of Tolkien Research

This article introduces this special issue focused on asexuality and aromanticism in the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. It seeks to fill a gap in queer Tolkien studies by presenting multiple articles on asexualt/aromantic interpretations of Tolkien's work.

Rekontekstualisasi Syair Demonstran Sudan Di Media Sosial: Analisis Wacana Kritis Terhadap Representasi Kritis Kemanusiaan Dan Resistensi, Muhamad Fatih Fauzan

Multikultura

This study examines the representation of the humanitarian crisis and popular resistance in the poetry of Sudanese demonstrators, drawing on the documentary film Sudan, Remember Us (2024) by Hind Meddeb. Using Norman Fairclough’s Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), the study analyzes data that have been recontextualized through social media. The results show the use of dehumanizing lexicon (lāji'an, mumazzaqan) and hyperbolic metaphors to depict the suffering of the Sudanese people. The poetry employs intertextuality with the story of the Prophet Job to morally legitimize the victims, and is distributed through social media platforms. At the macro level, this poetry functions as …

From Viðkenning To Valarindi: The Enigma Of Goldberry And The River-Woman, Derek Simon

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

THIS IS A TWO-PART ARTICLE. IN ORDER TO READ OR DOWNLOAD THE OTHER PART, FOLLOW THE LINK AT THE END OF THIS ABSTRACT.

Building upon the previous examination of the eddic and skaldic contours of Goldberry’s River kenning names, this reading of Goldberry’s enigma focuses on the mythological referents of her kinship relations and their narrative consistency in the legendarium.  Tending to the intrinsic connection between “[t]he incarnate mind, the tongue, and the tale” (Tolkien, On Fairy Stories, 41), I contend that the poetics of kenning diction sustain if not demand a reading of the River-woman references mythologically through …

When The Metamorphosis Turns White: Kafka Reimagined In Igoni Barrett’S Blackass, Bisola J. Ajibade

Vernacular: New Connections in Language, Literature, & Culture

Igoni Barrett’s Blackass (2015) has frequently been described as a “race-rewrite” of Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis (1915). This framing has shaped much of the critical conversation surrounding the two texts. While these approaches productively illuminate questions of identity and biopolitics, less attention has been paid to situating both texts across the intersecting contexts of German modernism and Nigerian postcolonial literature. This article provides a close comparative reading of Kafka’s The Metamorphosis and Igoni Barrett’s Blackass in order to examine how Kafkaesque elements are reconfigured within a contemporary postcolonial Nigerian context. Drawing on Deleuze and Guattari’s theory of minor literature, alongside …

Get Busy Living: Leaping Out Of Confinement With Kierkegaard In The Shawshank Redemption, Christian Wilken

Journal of Religion & Film

This article offers a Kierkegaardian reading of The Shawshank Redemption (1994), arguing that the film functions not as a miracle narrative but as a cinematic enactment of existential theology. While existing scholarship frequently interprets Shawshank through biblical typology or Foucauldian notions of incarceration, few consider how the film dramatizes Kierkegaard’s categories of anxiety, despair, and the leap of faith. Shawshank presents prison as more than a space of punishment—it becomes a refuge from the “dizziness of freedom,” a structured escape from the terrifying burden of possibility. Brooks’s suicide tragically embodies what Kierkegaard calls the “despair of weakness,” the inability to …

Storytelling, Henry D. Juarez

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Heternormativity, Erandi Hernández Aguilar

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Sin Título, Daisy Camacho

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Journal Entry #1, Erandi Hernández Aguilar

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Pain Into Anger!, Davion Holman

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Amá Always Said. Apá Only Knew., Venus Elizalde

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

A Letter To My Juror, Michael Anthony Mariscal

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Memories Are Like Clues: A Message To My Juror, Michael Anthony Mariscal

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Mi Deseo, William Hopeau

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Living Vicariously Through The Fading Childhood Memories Of Home, Gina Muñoz

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

More Than A Brown Girl, Mia Rose Rios

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Mamadas, Erandi Hernández Aguilar

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Namesake, Adrian Garcia

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Tik Tok, Francisco Vallejo

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Xonecuilli (Blue Worm), Benjamin Perez

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Untitled, Ethan Pena

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.

Untitled, Paul Zargosa

CouRaGeouS Cuentos: A Journal of Counternarratives

No abstract provided.