KUKU

KU ScholarWorks

  • myKU
  • Email
  • Enroll & Pay
  • KU Directory
    • Login
    View Item 
    •   KU ScholarWorks
    • Dissertations and Theses
    • Dissertations
    • View Item
    •   KU ScholarWorks
    • Dissertations and Theses
    • Dissertations
    • View Item
    JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

    (Un)Natural Pairings: Fantastic, Uncanny, Monstrous, and Cyborgian Encounters in Contemporary Central American and Hispanic Caribbean Literature

    Thumbnail
    View/Open
    Available after: 2020-05-31 (971.9Kb)
    Issue Date
    2016-05-31
    Author
    Foster, Jennifer M. Abercrombie
    Publisher
    University of Kansas
    Format
    233 pages
    Type
    Dissertation
    Degree Level
    Ph.D.
    Discipline
    Spanish & Portuguese
    Rights
    Copyright held by the author.
    Metadata
    Show full item record
    Abstract
    Since the turn of the 20th century many writers, playwrights, and poets in Central America and the Hispanic Caribbean have published fantastic, gritty, and oftentimes unsettling stories of ghosts, anthropomorphic animals, zoomorphic humans, and uncanny spaces. These unexpected encounters and strange entities are an embodiment of muddled boundaries and a creation of unsettling and sometimes monstrous myths and fictions. Cultural theorists from Central America and Cuba have associated this kind of literature with a growing culture of disenchantment and cynicism that is rooted in the loss of utopian and egalitarian ideals associated with past revolutionary projects. Through the course of this dissertation, I look beyond cultural disenchantment as I show how many writers—especially women—from Central America (Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica) and the Hispanic Caribbean (Puerto Rico, Cuba, and the Dominican Republic) have utilized strange, fantastic, and sometimes grotesque elements in their work in order to imagine alternative, utopic futures that challenge gendered hierarchies in society. Traditional dualistic categories that require all-or-nothing identities (of being all good, all bad, all feminine, all masculine, etc.) are broken down in the literature that I explore from both regions. By joining sacred domestic spaces in uncanny environments, mixing the dead with the living, blending animals with humans, and rendering passive women into abject, erotic monsters—these (un)natural pairings contest and contradict naturalized gender and sexual hierarchies by revealing the fluidity of supposedly inherent and fixed boundaries. At the same time, the (un)natural pairings that I explore provide an unlikely and creative space where traditional gender and sexual ideologies are especially foregrounded, which invites the reader to rethink conventional and hierarchal structures of power, especially as they relate to gender in Hispanic Caribbean and Central American societies.
    URI
    http://hdl.handle.net/1808/25750
    Collections
    • Spanish & Portuguese Dissertations and Theses [151]
    • Dissertations [4472]

    Items in KU ScholarWorks are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.


    We want to hear from you! Please share your stories about how Open Access to this item benefits YOU.


    Contact KU ScholarWorks
    785-864-8983
    KU Libraries
    1425 Jayhawk Blvd
    Lawrence, KS 66045
    785-864-8983

    KU Libraries
    1425 Jayhawk Blvd
    Lawrence, KS 66045
    Image Credits
     

     

    Browse

    All of KU ScholarWorksCommunities & CollectionsThis Collection

    My Account

    LoginRegister

    Statistics

    View Usage Statistics

    Contact KU ScholarWorks
    785-864-8983
    KU Libraries
    1425 Jayhawk Blvd
    Lawrence, KS 66045
    785-864-8983

    KU Libraries
    1425 Jayhawk Blvd
    Lawrence, KS 66045
    Image Credits
     

     

    The University of Kansas
      Contact KU ScholarWorks
    Lawrence, KS | Maps
     
    • Academics
    • Admission
    • Alumni
    • Athletics
    • Campuses
    • Giving
    • Jobs

    The University of Kansas prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, ethnicity, religion, sex, national origin, age, ancestry, disability, status as a veteran, sexual orientation, marital status, parental status, gender identity, gender expression and genetic information in the University’s programs and activities. The following person has been designated to handle inquiries regarding the non-discrimination policies: Director of the Office of Institutional Opportunity and Access, IOA@ku.edu, 1246 W. Campus Road, Room 153A, Lawrence, KS, 66045, (785)864-6414, 711 TTY.

     Contact KU
    Lawrence, KS | Maps