Terrorizing the familiar : postwar women writers and the American gothic landscape
The American literary tradition and especially the gothic tradition are founded upon the violence inherent to the founding and expansion of the United States. This thesis attempts to locate an appropriation of the largely male-authored violence of the nineteenth century into postwar feminist works, namely Haunted: Tales of the Grotesque and Bellefleur by Joyce Carol Oates and Hangsaman and We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson. Grappling with women's issues such as pregnancy (both planned and unplanned) and childbirth, domestic violence, and sexual abuse, these works resituate violence into a feminist framework, illuminating the ways in which women can resist victimization, and overpower patriarchal oppression in the domestic space (both literal and ideological).
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- In Collections
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Electronic Theses & Dissertations
- Copyright Status
- In Copyright
- Material Type
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Theses
- Authors
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Taylor, Christi
- Thesis Advisors
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Michaelsen, Scott
- Date Published
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2014
- Subjects
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Oates, Joyce Carol, 1938-
Jackson, Shirley, 1916-1965
Women in literature
Violence in literature
Gothic fiction (Literary genre), American
Feminism in literature
Family violence in literature
Women authors
- Program of Study
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Literature in English - Master of Arts
- Degree Level
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Masters
- Language
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English
- Pages
- iii, 44 pages
- ISBN
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9781303875526
1303875527