This project is a critical analysis of the works of 6 American war veterans and how they demonstrate trauma in their narratives. The texts covered here are Philip Red Eagle’s Red Earth (2007), John A. Williams’ Captain Blackman (1972), Roy Scranton’s War Porn (2016), Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried (1990), Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five (1969), and Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 (1961).

In Western medicine, the hard sciences have generally been understood as the sole guiding force in patient care and treatment. However, both history and the present day suggest another strong influence on Western medicine: folklore. The term folklore can easily be dismissed as a term representing beliefs and stories of the past, but its relevance transcends time and continues to impact people daily. It “involves values, traditions, ways of thinking and behaving. It’s about art. It’s about people and the way people learn. It helps us learn who we are and how to make meaning in the world around us” (Sims & Stephens, 2011, pp. 1-2). With its wide range of influence, folklore exists as the umbrella term encompassing several categories. Folk beliefs are one of these categories and can develop from “observation, memory, testimony or inference” (Hutton, 1942, p. 83). Given that each of these forms are subject to some sort of error, folk beliefs become “a jumble of the true and the erroneous” (p. 84). Similarly, contemporary legends are narratives that often combine the physical and supernatural world to explain nuances or uncertainty present in the relevant experiences of a people. Folk beliefs can result in the formation of contemporary legends and they can also stem from contemporary legends. These two categories are often associated with subjects that promote fear and uncertainty, and thus play an essential role in navigating folklore’s application to biomedicine. This paper explores the historical and modern effects that folklore has had on two separate maladies: Hansen’s Disease (leprosy) and Major Depressive Disorder (depression). While these conditions do not resemble each other in physical presentations, Hansen’s Disease and Major Depressive Disorder patients both have faced and continue to face discrimination. Andrea Wiley and John Allen’s three-part definition of a malady: society’s perception (sickness), the individual’s experience (illness), and medical professionals’ diagnosis and treatment (disease); was utilized as a tool for analyzing the application of folklore to modern medicine. The way that a society views a particular malady often dictates the sick role expected of a diagnosed individual. Additionally, the public’s view can directly affect medical professionals’ understanding of a malady. This then can drastically shape a patient’s diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis. This anthropological analysis acts as an interdisciplinary bridge between medicine and the humanities.

Once upon a time and in a land that is not quite here, a girl and her brother are left in the woods on the cusp of winter and lose their way home. They find, instead, a little house that smells of ginger and cinnamon and the ancient, bent woman who presides over it and calls herself Oma Yaga. Three tasks she sets before the girl, with the promise of food as her reward. She accepts, not knowing that this deep, the woods are a strange and hungry place: you do not make it out the same as when you entered, if you make it out at all.

You have heard this story before, you think, or one like it—listen again. It is never the same twice.

We, in the Ages Lying: An Exploration of Monstrosity in "Beauty and the Beast" examines the tropes and themes of traditional and non-traditional "Beauty and the Beast" adaptations with a focus on the question of what is and is not monstrous. This thesis contains an in-progress essay with detailed outline. The focus of the project was one's own adaptation of the tale, "We, in the Ages Lying", which takes place in tribal Botswana, following the maturation of main character, Ntwadumela, and the interactions with the beast, the "phiritoo".

Both "After Annie" and "When It All Happens, The End, And She's in Her Forties" focus on evolving familial relationships characterized by both love and loss. Though told in different styles, different voices, different tenses, both stories triumph the power of memory in relation to love while simultaneously emphasizing the trauma and long-lasting effects of loss. With one, through the relationship between grandfather and granddaughter and the other, through a daughter's loss of her mother, both stories converge at the intersection of duty and the need for flight (and perhaps self preservation). "After Annie" and "When It All Happens, The End, And She's in Her Forties" speak to the careful ghosts of memory, which are sometimes, thankfully, even stronger than the pull of what's been left in their absence.

This thesis examines contemporary cinematic adaptations of the Ovidian Pygmalion story. The films Blade Runner (1981), Lars and the Real Girl (2007), Ruby Sparks (2012), and Her (2013) are analyzed. This thesis seeks to understand why this particular myth is so resonant in today's popular culture and what this relevance reveals about modern society. The roles of female subjugation, sexualization, and relationship with technology will be major areas of concern. Research includes film criticism, Ovidian scholarship, and new advances in computer technology.

In my thesis paper, I examine the gothic elements found in classical gothic fairy tales from European and Japanese tradition, particularly those works by the Brothers Grimm and Yei Theodora Ozaki. By examining the principle gothic elements that are unique to both stories, and further analyzing the commonalities of story, plot, and other major tropes, a better understanding of the message meant to be imparted and other cultural nuances can be ascertained. Gothic literature creates an atmosphere of gloom and suspense, toying with concepts of dread and darkness by employing Gothic elements such as shadows, the supernatural, sinister buildings, and strong-willed villains, all of which affect the rational mind in an irrational way. Fairytales freely use such tropes to their advantage, playing with the many fears of children, while simultaneously painting an idealistic fantasy world. The degree of usage and the application of gothic elements is closely examined in the Grimm works, "Hansel and Gretel," and "The Robber Bridegroom," as well as the Japanese tales, "The Goblin of Adachigahra,""Kintaro the Golden Boy" and "The Monkey and the Crab." These stories have been chosen due for their usage of animal tricksters, themes of control, and aspects of isolation, supernatural entities, and substantial gothic imagery. The gothic elements of death, sinister older women, the supernatural, fears of abandonment, and cunning animals are akin to both Western and Eastern tales, while the concept of gothic setting and the type of monsters prepared to feast on men is significantly different for both cultures, similar lessons are intended to be gleaned by children from these tales, with the intention of generally producing positive results \u2014 while the means differ, the message is strikingly similar, yet there remain cultural differences in terms of central themes and character traits.The effect of re-introducing the darker, gothic elements of traditional fairy tales into modern literature and retellings of the original narratives has been profound.Today, whether it has been at the bequest of the public or simply a new-age movement by modern cinema audience for the "gritty and realistic," fairy tales are returning to their former gothic forms. "Snow White and The Huntsman" is one example of a film which has gone this route, opting for a more gothic, classic telling rather than the chip, cheery, rosy cheeked Disney versions. There is a tendency for most media nowadays to be far less censored and fantastical, aiming for a more realistic, grittier approach \u2014 this bleeds into film and literature likewise, and thus children are impacted by this shift as well. Children seem to be able to handle more, perhaps desensitized at younger and younger ages by the products of our widely consumerist society, or perhaps due to parents raising their children in such a way so that the darkness that tinges these tales doesn't disturb and derail but rather, emphasizes their meaning of teaching certain lessons. Tales such as these are still valuable, and will continue to be so long as we seek a reality greater than our own, where the evil of the world is wiped away, and we all live happily ever after.