SPENCER BECK

Despite being a tale chronicling the manly attributes and heroics of an Irish warrior on Halloween, the female characters govern the events of the Echtra Nerai, or the “Adventures of Nera.” Though the audience follows Nera in his exploits, the actions and interventions of the story’s female characters remain the deciding factor in how the myth progresses. Indeed, after his entrance beneath the faerie hill, Nera and many of the other male figures only react to the decisions of the women, all of which in some way act against feminine expectations or indeed openly defy them. For example, the faerie wife of unexplained origins reveals herself to be a powerful contender amongst the sidhe, both by enabling Nera to succeed in defeating his rivals, and through her importance to the faerie king, whom she ultimately betrays.

Sound and Fury is a documentary following the decisions two sets of parents make regarding their deaf children and cochlear implants, a device implanted through surgery that can help deaf children to perceive sounds. Two brothers, one deaf and one hearing, each face the

In response to the statement, "Fantasy Literature is stupid," I say the speaker is not only ignorant and uninformed but terribly wrong. Fantasy literature is a continuation of age-old traditions and motifs found in mythology, used to reevaluate the world around us, making it incredibly valuable. Using mythic elements and themes as a starting point for the creation of new

“At this his relations...and thus for some days he spent his time.” -- (Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Distress 2)

The protagonist, Christian, of John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress faces many trials and tribulations on his path to salvation, beginning with rejection by his family members.

Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte’s 1847 novel published under the masculine nom de plume Currer Bell, chronicles the coming-of-age story of a poor early 19th-century girl turned governess. Charlotte Bronte uses stylistic devices such as analogy, imagery, and synecdoche to portray the book’s central theme: Jane is like a caged bird who wants to find her wings within the oppressive, patriarchal culture of her time period. The novel was written when Bronte was still young enough to remember the passions of her own youth and shares many similar occurrences with the author’s own life, such as the loss of her mother, attending boarding school where she lost loved ones to illness and falling in love (or what some might call unhealthy infatuation) with an older man she could not have. It is this pain of her doomed affection for married writing instructor, Constantin Heger, which can be seen within the emotional opaqueness of Jane as she reflects on her journey to becoming Rochester’s wife. Coming from a poor background and family hardship to be a writer at a time when females were no more than accessories, the author’s frustration at her limiting time period can also be seen throughout the novel. Across the story, Jane finds her own identity and happiness through her interactions with her school, her father’s family, and Mr. Rochester.

Soldiers during the Great War encountered an environment that was not the expected noble battles and promised glory, but rather endless carnage strewn throughout monotonous drudgery. They returned with warped perceptions of what it meant to go to war, and this difference between prior ideology and subsequent reality caused opposition with their civilian countrymen who perpetuated a romanticized version of the ordeal. In “They” Sassoon presents a hypothetical interaction between veteran soldiers and the English establishment to illustrate the misguided ideology the soldiers faced. By manipulating the limits of reality, the poet turns the soldiers into an antecedent and conveys the false expectation they fail to contradict because, rather than being actively involved in the discussion, they are merely the subject referred to in it. His use of consistently present tense verbs shapes the scene as a limbo in which the frustrated soldiers cannot define their own experience.

While many interpret Prince Hal's soliloquy at the end of Act 1, Scene 2 as a simple exchange of identities, through close-reading Shakespeare's use of syntax and metaphor within Hal's dialogue, the complexities of Hal's inner confliction come to light. It is too simple to read the Prince's address as the rejection of a false persona in favor of adopting his true self. Despite the passage examining Hal’s innate nature versus the facade, he displays, in analyzing these two halves of his identity, it does not just declare the thieving rogue as false and the noble king as truly Hal. Instead, as his figurative language and sentence structure display, Hal holds deep uncertainty about what he claims to do and who he claims to be.

Tennyson’s The Lady of Shalott utilizes elements of well-known Arthurian mythology in the tragic tale of a cursed noblewoman living in confinement, with a mirror as her only window to the world. Tennyson’s literary devices create an attention-grabbing metaphor of Sir Lancelot, allowing for an interpretation of the poem in which the Lady’s struggle for autonomy does not revolve around a male figure.

"My Last Duchess" by Robert Browning Robert Browning's "My Last Duchess" regales readers with a speech by the Duke of Ferrara on his departed former wife, whose death he arranged, as he uncovers her portrait for the envoy of his new bride. I argue that Browning uses punctuation to indicate important aspects of the Duke of Ferrara’s dialogue in the form of asides, which reveal how strongly social constraints motivate his actions, despite his boasts of power. Even though the Duke is the one in charge, he is controlled by the standards which, as an aristocrat, he must uphold. These limitations are apparent in his speech patterns where he uses the specific placement of language to impart information without risking his reputation. By failing to uphold the expectations of her station, the Duchess compromises his status, an intolerable act he warns his future wife against through conversation with her family envoy.

Though some may judge Jonathan Swift’s stylistic sarcasm as a scathing critique of a lack of action on the part of the Irish peasantry, and of the hedonism of the rich, his essay highlights the landowner’s power to act. By defining Ireland’s peasants and their aristocratic landlords alike in terms of wardrobe and nourishment, Swift’s metaphors in “A Modest Proposal” complicate the role each caste has played in the drastic state of the country’s society. Through outrageous imagery and acting in a caricature of the nobility, Swift presents the lower classes as the gentry sees them: ever fixed and objectified. In contrast, Swift’s gentleman enjoys the freedom of transition, unlike the impoverished masses who are defined by their poor status, and powerless to change their state of existence. As evidenced by his sophisticated language and the deeper meanings his ironic tone belies, Swift must align his appeal to the sentiments of the upper class, who alone can begin to enact change.

The development of our personalities through social institutions is a key aspect of the human experience, but such a practice becomes detrimental once we base ourselves around concepts rather than who we truly desire to be. "The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot and Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro both present narrators who strongly react to living within the confines of society from a post-modern perspective. By presenting a stream of consciousness, we see both struggle to validate their actions, and by extension, their existences.

In Feed, Tommy Pico describes growing up in the “food desert” of the Kumeyaay reservation. While, as the title suggests, his work centers on eating and nourishment, meditations on familial and intimate attachments also influence Feed overall. Pico’s narrative timeline, interrupted by his stream of consciousness prose, creates a vivid landscape depicting his experiences as a queer, Indigenous male within the 21st century. His poetic persona, “Teebs,” ruminates on a hunger food cannot satisfy, for a cultural way of life, and of loving, which the settler-colonial state has undermined, manifesting elements of US Homonationalism. Ultimately, in presenting his separation from a Native identity alongside scarce romantic fulfillment, Pico associates these two forms of communal connection as no longer concretely accessible.

Donne’s carefully formulated poetic structure introduces what one believes will be the subject of each argument he lays against the intrusion of the rising sun. One might think his misdirection to imaginative and peculiar metaphors would lose him the case, but through raising the power of love beyond the natural order of the morning in his poem “The Sun Rising,” Donne only justifies why he and his lover should not be liable to the sun’s dominion in a way which satisfies the sun’s obligations.

Vertigo centers around the blurring dichotomy between reverie and reality for detective John Ferguson (James Stewart). Within the film, Alfred Hitchcock's distinct combination of diegetic and nondiegetic sound distinguishes between elements of fact, and those in a fiction created by the detective's scheming client and his false wife. Subsequently, the film projects Midge Wood (Barbara Bel Geddes) as the level-headed, conventional foil to Madeleine Elster (Kim Novak), Ferguson's elusive and mysterious paramour. Ferguson's first kiss with Madeleine features a grand musical track that coordinates emotional moments with dramatic visuals, percussive elements, and swooning strings. In contrast, Midge's attempt to reveal her love to Ferguson and regain his affection features a definite lack of a musical track. The reverberating

Cherie Dimaline's The Marrow Thieves presents a post-apocalyptic world in which Canada's government hunts the native populations to extract their ability to dream. As outlined in Tuck and Yang's "Decolonization is not a metaphor," settler colonization seeks to obtain land above all else. However, Dimaline reimagines imperialism when the land has corrupted beyond value. This reorganization of Canadian priorities to native genetics facilitates a reconnection with the land.

In "I Can Carry on from Here: The Relocation of American Indians to Los Angeles," author Ned Blackhawk discusses the trials faced by Native Americans encouraged to relocate from rural reservations into the industrialized landscapes of a metropolitan city. Throughout House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday, tensions over assimilation and the conflict of tribal versus "Americanized" expectations shape the way in which the audience views Abel, the titular character.

Alfred Hitchcock’s 1958 film Vertigo details the story of an acrophobic detective (James Stewart) who falls in love with a married woman, Madeleine, after being hired to follow her by her husband. After John Ferguson discovers the woman he actually developed feelings for was not Madeleine (Kim Novak), but a decoy named Judy Barton (also Novak), Ferguson grows determined to bring back the idea of a woman he desires by making her resemble her old disguise. In the scene of her final reveal, the camera movement and lighting represent a spiritual permanence in her transformation, rising from the dreams of a broken man who, in contrast, descends dizzily into further madness.

When considering the relationship of dreams to indigenous cultures, its prominence within metaphysical and cultural histories typically comes to mind. Observably, this association results in a tendency to correlate visions with an archaic past, or near-extinct “old ways” which challenge assimilation narratives common in popular culture. As a genre, indigenous futurism utilizes elements of speculative science fiction, such as post-apocalyptic prospects and inventive technologies, to examine the fortitude of indigeneity in the face of colonization. While Rebecca Roanhorse’s “Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience” transforms dream fasting into a commodity for tourist colonizers, the dreams of Cherie Dimaline’s The Marrow Thieves (TMT) catalyze native persecution, yet also an assertion of identity. In effect, by redefining the significance of the dream, both works bridge the gap between legacies of indigeneity and the modern myth of native invisibility found in mainstream conventional fiction.

While many recognize Macbeth as representative of King James I’s obsessions with absolutism and witchcraft, the play’s explorations of gender also reveal a tangible influence from the conversation surrounding the royal’s assumed femininity and hesitancy to drive England to war. More explicitly, Shakespeare’s play concerns the “womanly infirmity” of the Macbeths in their reluctance towards violence. Much like the unstable, newly-Jacobean England, the environment of Macbeth encourages a universal rejection of feminine weakness. However, the narrative path of Lady Macbeth exploits her attempt to overcome the rigid definitions of female behavior as a measure of her immorality in a way it does not for her husband. Moreover, only Lady Macbeth will meet a stereotypical conclusion by succumbing to hysteria, despite Lord Macbeth having more reason for a descent into madness. Thus, while the theatrical realm rejects general deviancy, Lady Macbeth exclusively faces a villainization founded upon the basis of sex.

Mari Kurisato's "Imposter Syndrome" explores the historical legacies of white colonizer legislation towards Indigenous peoples through a science fiction future of robots, space pods, and virtual realities. Through describing the non-human character, Aanji Limax, Kurisato's analogous narrative examines anti-transgender legal discrimination and blood quantum laws. Using imagery of futuristic medical and governmental systems, Aanji's plight to become human mirrors both characteristics of blood status and concerns over "passing" as cisgender. This metaphorical duality reflects the disconnection of two-spirit identities with indigeneity resulting from the influences of a binaristic settler state, yet projects a future for people like Aanji, able to rejoin their communities apart from their oppressors, through the medium of speculative fiction. Kurisato's narrative illustrates an allegory for gender exploration and the act of transition.

Repetition within storytelling across centuries suggests that certain structures, topics, and motifs entice and delight us, and what begins with a cultural purpose can be carried over purely for entertainment value. Elements of structure similar to those of Ovid's "Arachne and Minerva" can be observed in the Kalevala's "Wainamoinen and Youkahainen" and Disney's Beauty and the Beast, all of which involve themes of hubris, binary opposition, and challenge. Comparative analysis of these three multiforms reveals a pervasive fascination with the contention of unequal opposing figures, and the importance of the "wise old crone" figure.

Structural morphology is a powerful tool that, when utilized to examine mythological narratives, can reveal thematic patterns, which suggests the great importance of certain social institutions for that society. In Ovid's Metamorphoses, a mortal weaver's hubris insults the goddess Athena, which has negative consequences when she is turned into a spider by the deity. Alan Dundes' structural method of six motifeme sequences can be applied to Ovid's "Arachne and Minerva" to study the effects of violating an interdiction, in order to prove that such a theme has great significance to Greco-Roman culture, evidenced by similar patterns of progression within various narratives in Greek mythology. This motif, in turn, reflected the tumultuous Greek and Roman relationship with their deities, and the chaotic nature of their everyday lives.

Many mythologies and religious doctrines showcase the "War in Heaven" motif to make commentary on internal conflict within the society at the time it was written. Revelation, the final book in the King James Bible, describes Jesus' victory over the Satanic "Beast" with the help of angels to impart moral commentary and pro-Christian sentiments in an era of persecution and religious divide. Both the works of Cassandra Clare and Laini Taylor represent and rework represent and rework the theme of godly angels combatting demonic entities as a way of responding to modern moral dilemmas. Clare’s The Mortal Instruments series and Taylor’s Daughter of Smoke and Bone illustrate conflict between heaven and hell beyond the everyday in order to project messages about war in our own world. Clare’s strict divisions of morality between warriors of angelic blood and hellish demons are rectified by a human girl to prove to readers that anyone can overcome evil. Adversely, Taylor’s protagonist’s, thrust into a morally grey battle between angels and chimera, exposes awful sacrifices that sustain enmity when both sides feel they are justified.

An ancient prose narrative, all versions of “Arachne and Minerva” warn readers of the consequences facing those who disrespect the gods by recounting Athena’s actions when faced with mortal hubris. In studying prose narratives, William Bascom defined a valid myth as one: set in an earlier world, focused on a main character of a divine nature, and considered sacred and true by its original audience. Ovid’s “Arachne and Minerva” adheres to Bascom’s definition of a myth because it was viewed as a truthful account of the past, detailed the goddess Athena’s true process of addressing human disrespect, and focused the legitimate divine repercussions that follow committing blasphemy in the eyes of the gods.

The contrasting social backgrounds of John Bhelley suggest their artistic works would have nothing in common, but closer examination of their applications of allegory reveals striking similarities of mindset and technique. However, the use of allegorical anthropomorphization of

In Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, the Wife of Bath's Prologue, the passage of Husband Number Four features an unfocused stream of consciousness characterized by disjointed interjections and changes of subject. In tandem, these factors become telling features of the Wife, Alison's, conflicted psychological state. At Line 458, she says, "Now wol I speke of my ferthe housbonde" then describes his character a man who "he hadde a paramour" (line 460).

Why is "the greatest love story of all time" a tragedy? What happens when that story becomes a modern queer adaptation and Romeo and Juliet, played by two, gay male characters, live in the end? Alan Brown's film Private Romeo uses Shakespeare's cultural legacy to demonstrate the effects of social constructs such as love, romance, and gender, within the lives of the students at McKinley Military Academy. Implications of their budding teenage romance are inevitable for Sam and Glenn (Romeo and Juliet, respectively), considering they attend an all-male military school. Brown utilizes the backdrop of this hypermasculine campus to reveal the boys' complex interactions within both a homosocial, yet heteronormative space that may or may not be inclusive of homosexuality. Though the lovers' initially meet when assigned to read the parts of Romeo and Juliet in their English class, their attraction quickly bleeds off the page and into the academy spaces. Because Brown preserves the actual lines from Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet," as opposed to using modern, colloquial speech inside and outside of the classroom, Sam and Glenn's relationship transcends the walls of the classroom and permeates their personal lives. In his book, Anthony Patricia discusses the ways in which Private Romeo finally achieves an effective "queering" of Shakespeare's famous play, through the use of Juliet's original gender pronouns in reference to Sam, the male-male couple portraying the "star-crossed" pair, and ending on a positive note. Our video discusses this final outcome, along with two other scenes from the film, a hazing scene which can be implied to be corrective assault, and the infamous Consummation Scene, using his arguments in order to demonstrate how Brown's treatment enables Sam and Glenn, not Romeo and Juliet, triumph over prejudice.