Ethno-gothic: Repurposing Genre in Contemporary American Literature

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur Redding
Keyword(s):  
American Literature ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Gothic Literature ◽  
Contemporary American Literature ◽  
Melting Pot ◽  
American Gothic ◽  
Fiction Writers

This chapter notes how traditional American gothic literature has been largely motivated by racial dread and fears of miscegenation. It then argues that many contemporary ethno-fiction writers repurpose gothic tropes and idioms to two ends. The first is to critique anxieties of American gothic in order to expose the racialism embedded in the assimiliationist and hegemonic narrative of upward mobility defined by the ethnic ‘melting pot’. The second is to use these gothic redeployments imaginatively to disinter the voices of those legions who have died and disappeared, un-mourned.

scholarly journals The Self in Society: Exploring Cultural Embeddedness in Gloria Naylor’s Fiction

2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 329
Author(s):  
Anjila Singh Mehla
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
American Literature ◽  
African American Literature ◽  
The Self ◽  
American Fiction ◽  
Gloria Naylor ◽  
Contemporary American Literature ◽  
Significant Development ◽  
Fiction Writers ◽  
Literary Phenomenon

<div><p><em>A most significant development that has taken place on the global literary scene during the last few decades or so is the dramatic emergence of African-American voices as a distinct and dominant force. Along with Toni Morrison scores of African American Fiction writers, poets, playwrights, autobiographers, and essayists have mapped bold new territories; they have firmly entrenched themselves in the forefront of contemporary American Literature. This article retraces this exciting literary phenomenon in the context of the lives, works, and achievements of Gloria Naylor and her contemporaries. Naylor discovered feminism and African American Literature, which revitalized her and gave her new ways to think about and define herself as a black woman.</em></p></div>

scholarly journals Exploring Aging Masculinities From Different Disciplines and Perspectives

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 825-825
Author(s):  
Liat Ayalon ◽  
Josep Armengol ◽  
Michael Kimmel
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
American Literature ◽  
Successful Aging ◽  
Older Men ◽  
Contemporary American Literature ◽  
The Social ◽  
Aging Men ◽  
Personal Experiences ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Types Of Information

Abstract Traditionally, gerontology research has been relatively genderless. When the intersection of age and gender was explored, this was done primarily by focusing on the experiences of older women. Much less is known about the experiences of older men. The present symposium brings together work from the humanities and the social sciences in order to explore societal images and personal experiences of aging men. The paper by Maierhofer and Ratzenböck provides a theoretical outlook on this intersection from the humanities perspective, followed by empirical applications from the social sciences. Next, Armengol uses contemporary American literature to challenge the traditional stereotype of decline in sexuality and masculinity. The paper by Ni Leime & O’Neill examines stereotypes of aging masculinities, but this time from the perspective of older men as the audience who react to their portrayal in visual culture. Finally, Ayalon and Gweyrtz-Meydan present ethical dilemmas faced by physicians who treat older men’s sexuality in light of active marketing campaigns of the pharmaceutical industry, which advocate for a model of successful aging and ongoing sexual intercourse. The discussant, Kimmel, will conceptualize the four papers by stressing the different types of information that can be obtained via different methods of inquiry. The complementary information provided by the different papers and the integration of methods and findings from the humanities with the social sciences will be discussed.

Biology and Manners

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
American Literature ◽  
Disability Studies ◽  
Fan Studies ◽  
Contemporary American Literature ◽  
Contemporary Science ◽  
The Us ◽  
Main Series ◽  
Current Concerns ◽  
The Red Queen

This volume is a new collection of scholarly essays on the US science fiction and fantasy writer Lois McMaster Bujold. The collection argues for the significant contributions Bujold’s works make to feminist and queer thought, disability studies, and fan studies. In addition, it suggests the importance of Bujold to contemporary American literature. The volume continues the establishment of Bujold as an important author of contemporary science fiction and fantasy. It argues that her corpus spans the distance between two full arcs of US feminism and has anticipated or responded to several of its current concerns in ways that invite or even require theoretical exploration. As well as papers on earlier work in the main series (the Vorkosigan Saga and the ‘Worlds of the Five Gods’ novels The Curse of Chalion and Paladin of Souls), the collection also presents work on recent publications such as The Sharing Knife sequence; the ‘Penric and Desdemona’ novellas; and the recent Vorkosigan Saga novel Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen. The collection deepens feminist research in Bujold studies by incorporating queer and disability studies perspectives; and includes historiographic retracing of scholarship on Bujold’s work.

scholarly journals GRAPHIC MEANS IN THE ENGLISH-LANGUAGE EXPRESSIVE COMPRESSED TEXTS

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (16) ◽  
pp. 166-172
Author(s):  
Natalya Lysenko
Keyword(s):  
American Literature ◽  
English Language ◽  
Information Load ◽  
Information Presentation ◽  
Contemporary American Literature ◽  
Special System ◽  
Additional Information

This article deals with the consideration of functioning of graphic means on the basis of the English-language expressive compressed texts. The types of abbreviations as well as other graphic peculiarities of the information presentation in the text have been investigated, using examples of English advertising texts, anecdotes, aphorisms, and contemporary American literature. English-language compressed texts have both leading and subordinate features. Their leading feature is increased informational saturation, while the subordinate signs usually include abbreviations, lack of auxiliary and emotionally coloured words. Among the main graphic means used in the English-language compressed texts, various cuts of words in the form of abbreviations, traditional or specific reductions should be noted. One can also mention a special system of the location of the material, which allows to highlight the main information and omit the secondary, significantly reducing the volume. The use of footnotes also helps to save a certain amount of text array. Punctuation marks in compressed text not only make it possible to reduce a certain part of the information, but may also carry additional information load. In general, the use of the mentioned graphic means in English-language compressed texts have been analyzed, the peculiarities of their functioning have been revealed in the article. As the perspectives of the research, it was offered to identify and investigate the existing graphic means in other types of the English-language compressed texts.

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Robert Lee
Keyword(s):  
American Literature ◽  
Contemporary American Literature ◽  
Karen Tei Yamashita

The Introduction offers a succinct profile of Karen Tei Yamashita as author. Her biography, main publications, and general standing in contemporary American literature are all indicated. There follows annotation of the essays at hand, her autobiographical essay “Reimagining Traveling Bodies” and an interview as to how Yamashita envisages her main themes and craft.

Ursula K. Le Guin

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra J. Lindow
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
American Literature ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Columbia University ◽  
Contemporary American Literature ◽  
Left Hand ◽  
Radcliffe College ◽  
Neil Gaiman ◽  
Book Award ◽  
National Book

One of the most influential voices in contemporary American literature, Ursula K. Le Guin (b. 1929–d. 2018) began publishing in the 1960s and soon became known for her courageous exploration of ethics, ecology, and diversity using fantastic and futuristic settings. Elevating fantasy and science fiction from pulp-era sword and sorcery and space opera, her fiction explores and condemns chauvinistic traditions of colonialism, nationalism, sexism, and racism. Through her literary approach to genre themes and settings, she inspired not only generations of genre writers but also many mainstream writers who incorporated fantastic elements in their work. Ursula Kroeber was born on in Berkeley, California. Her parents were the Alfred Kroeber, pioneering anthropologist, and Theodora Kroeber, author of Ishi in Two Worlds. She graduated from Radcliffe College in 1951, earned a masters degree from Columbia University in 1952, and married historian Charles Le Guin in 1953. A prolific writer, she published more than sixty books including novels for adults and young adults, picture books, short story collections, critical nonfiction, poetry, screenplays, and works of translation. Genre and mainstream recognition occurred throughout her career. Her first fantasy novel, A Wizard of Earthsea (1968), earned the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award. Her groundbreaking novel The Left Hand of Darkness (1969) won Hugo and Nebula Awards. She was only the second woman to receive both honors for one book. The Farthest Shore (1973) won the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature. The Dispossessed (1974) won Locus, Nebula, and Hugo Awards. Overall, her novels alone received five Locus, four Nebulas, two Hugos, and one World Fantasy Award. In 1989 she accepted the Pilgrim Award for her critical work. In 1994, 1996, and 1997, she earned Tiptree Awards for her exploration of gender through her depiction of androgyny and alternative cultures that privilege nonheteronormative marriage. Le Guin’s lifetime achievement awards recognize her importance in American literature. In 2000, the US Library of Congress named her a Living Legend for her significant contributions to America’s cultural heritage. In 2002, she won the PEN/Malamud Award for excellence in short fiction and the Grand Master Award from the Science Fiction Writers Association. In 2014, she received the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. In his introduction to her National Book Award acceptance speech, author Neil Gaiman describes her as someone who made him not only a better writer but also a better person as a writer.

‘Let's Hurt Someone’: Violence and Cultural Memory in the Plays of Neil LaBute

2008 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 322-336
Author(s):  
Ilka Saal
Keyword(s):  
American Literature ◽  
Cultural Memory ◽  
Associate Professor ◽  
Cultural Work ◽  
Political Theater ◽  
Contemporary American Literature ◽  
The Us ◽  
Duke University ◽  
The One ◽  
The University

In this essay Ilka Saal examines one of the most perplexing aspects of Neil LaBute's work: his deployment of excessive and gratuitous violence. She insists that such deployment of violence has little to do with a humanist critique of the propensity for evil in all of us, nor with the playwright's biography (as suggested by a number of critics), but instead functions as a satirical interrogation of the mythological significance attributed to violence in American culture. The casual cruelties of LaBute's ordinary mid-Americans point up the central and ‘ordinary’ role that violence has played in the nation's history and self-understanding. Focusing on the example of the one-act play a gaggle of saints and drawing on the theories of Jan Assmann and Richard Slotkin, she shows in what ways LaBute uses violence to interrogate the country's cultural memory and to alert us to the general lethargy that has settled over the nation with regard to the historical violence it systematically exerted against its Others. Ilka Saal received her PhD in Literature from Duke University, North Carolina and is now working as Associate Professor of English at the University of Richmond, Virginia, where she teaches modern and contemporary American literature and culture. She is the author of New Deal Theater: the Vernacular Tradition in American Political Theater (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), Dramatizing the Disease: Representations of AIDS on the US American Stage (Tectum, 1997), and co author of Passionate Politics: the Cultural Work of American Melodrama from the Early Republic to the Present (Cambridge Scholars Press, 2008).

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document