Student Symposium 2008
Listed below are the names of the current English majors who presented their research papers and posters at this year's annual Berry College Student Research Symposium. Along with the students' names, you will find the titles of their projects and the names of their faculty mentors, along with a brief abstract describing the research and projects.
Lance Michael Simpson
Richards Scholar
“Redeeming Freaks in Flannery O'Connor and Carson McCullers”
Mentors: Dr. Michael Mejia and Dr. James Watkins
English, Rhetoric and Writing
Southern literature is replete with images of the malformed and distorted—the grotesque. Georgia authors Flannery O'Connor and Carson McCullers are especially well known for their fascination with the grotesque. They populate their fiction with freaks and isolated outsiders whose alienation is offset by the promise of an elusive redemption from inequity and incompleteness. My paper interprets O'Connor's Wise Blood (1949) and McCullers' The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (1940), as respective religious and secular lenses through which human depravity is exposed, and redemption is made both detestable and desperately necessary. Specifically, I focus on these authors' very different fictional re-creations of the Christ-figure. For O'Connor, redemption comes only through an acceptance of God; her characters constantly fight against a higher power. In contrast, McCullers illustrates that humans selfishly create God in their image. Her characters battle internally, revealing from their own grotesque existences that people cannot redeem themselves. The works of these writers focus on humanity's struggle with its own flawed existence. Comparing the two teases to the surface the cracks, fissures, and contradictions inherent to the Southern identity—implicating us in our own run-ins with redemption.
Molly Nelson
“Thomas Campion and the Lyric”
Mentor: Dr. Paul Trolander
English, Rhetoric, and Writing
During the Early Modern Era, both education and literary production valued imitation (in modern terms, loose translation) of works of the Classical Latin and Greek literary canon. This research investigates seventeenth-century poet Thomas Campion’s imitation of Carmina V, a poem by the ancient Roman poet Catullus. Campion’s imitation is one of many Elizabethan and Jacobean imitations of this poem; other imitators include Jonson, Crashaw, and Donne. The purpose of imitating Carmina V varies by author, and many appropriate Catullus’ expression of deep love to serve the “carpe diem” theme common to seventeenth-century poetry. Campion’s version, however, does not intentionally change Catullus’ meaning, but attempts to make an English version of the poem consistent with the high standards Campion advocates for lyric poetry. Campion’s interests lay in adapting English poems to Latin poetic meter in a way editorially pleasing and adaptable to music. Campion’s fascination with lyric form was anachronistic as none of his contemporaries seemed interested in the issue. Investigating his theory of poetry alongside his imitation of Carmina V can give insight into his word choices in the translation, ultimately illuminating the musical culture for which he wrote.
Nick Kimbro
Richards Scholar
“Creativity in Contemplation”
Mentor: Dr. Paul Trolander, English, Rhetoric and Writing and
Dr. Jeffery Lidke, Religion and Philosophy
This paper seeks to explore and define the relationship between Zen Buddhism and its sacred arts, as well as creativity more generally. Herein I seek to articulate these relationships by discussing the Zen notion of life itself as the ultimate artistic medium, each moment being an entirely new and unique act of creation when experienced by the attentive mind. This broad understanding of creativity leads to a conception of art as expressive of a basic harmony between subject and object. Like Buddhist practice in general, artistic production requires both patience and acceptance, and is conceived as happening independently of the artist once true mindfulness is attained. In this paper I present a creative model for the application of Zen principles, as well as offer an analysis of the Zen practices of calligraphy and koan study, ultimately seeking to reconcile eastern and western artistic practice.
Courtney Baker
“The Corpses in the Closet: Jane Eyre, Bluebeard and the Woman Question”
Mentor: Dr. Paul Trolander
English, Rhetoric, and Writing
“Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel,” ponders the eponymous narrator of Jane Eyre (Brontë 93). This oft-quoted passage demonstrates one of Jane Eyre’s chief concerns: the proper place and position of women, or as this discourse was often dubbed in the nineteenth century, ‘the woman question’. In answering this question, Jane frequently alludes to the tale of Bluebeard, a chilling sixteenth century folktale which emphasizes the precarious power balance between man and wife. In Secrets Beyond the Door: A History of Bluebeard’s Wives, the scholar Maria Tatar writes that Bluebeard can be seen as a female equivalent of the Oedipus myth, in which the wife must compete with the memories of her husband’s sexual past. In Jane Eyre, like Bluebeard, ‘the corpses in the closet’ or the husband’s sexual past plays a pivotal role. However, Bluebeard’s moral is decidedly patriarchal. Thus, while Jane Eyre is often regarded as having a feminist agenda, because it subscribes to the logic of Bluebeard and other fairytales, and thus the patriarchal logic they are built upon, the feminist response provided by Jane Eyre is conflicted.
Abigail Butcher
“Jane Eyre and the Feminine”
Mentor: Dr. Paul Trolander
English, Rhetoric, and Writing
My paper will focus on the pagan/feminine elements in the novel to illustrate how Charlotte Brontë's work is an early feminist novel.
Jessica Hoover
“Female Emigration in Jane Eyre and 19th Century British Empire
Mentor: Dr. Paul Trolander
English, Rhetoric, and Writing
Charlotte Bronte’s 1847 novel, Jane Eyre, tells the fictional life of Jane Eyre who is a governess at Mr. Rochester’s estate where he hides his violent and deranged wife, Bertha. Jane decides against living with Rochester out of wedlock, but must decide how she will live independently. Bronte’s solution is often read as a feminist success because Bertha dies, and Jane is able to marry Rochester. However, I will add to research about the novel, making the case that Bronte uses Bertha’s Caribbean born plight and eventual death as an improbable means to save Jane from foreign emigration. By doing so, Bronte actually participates in the period’s commodification of women through sacrificing Bertha for others in the Empire. I will present research concerning the patriarchal ideologies behind the British Empire’s commodification of women through mass female emigration in the 1800s, and the historical reality of Jane’s limited opportunity for avoiding emigration. My research will also demonstrate how women became objects of the Empire from being forced into extreme roles of domesticity, specifically in the Caribbean and India. Such analyses of these historical realities and Bronte’s participation in ideologies of empire and patriarchy undermine traditional feminist readings of Jane Eyre.
Megan Patton
“Jane Eyre: The Liberated Victorian Woman”
Mentor: Dr. Paul Trolander
English, Rhetoric, and Writing
By exploring the different religious ideologies represented in Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, I will show that Jane’s changing religious viewpoints stem from the numerous available doctrines of the nineteenth century. In the novel, Jane is presented with the views of the Tractarians, Unitarians, and Evangelicals over the course of the book, as she comes under the influences of Mr. Brocklehurst at the Lowood School, Mr. Rochester in her job as governess, and St. John Rivers in her flight from Mr. Rochester. Jane’s own religious beliefs are thus dynamic throughout the novel depending upon the man in her life. Jane’s religious dependence mimics the religious subjugation of women in Victorian England who were supposed to rely on their fathers and husbands for religious guidance. By correlating Jane’s eventual religious independence with women’s changing roles in religious affairs, such as their inclusion in teaching Bible classes and missionary work, I will show that Christianity provided a necessary female “space” outside of the home for Victorian women, setting the stage for a general increase in women’s rights in the future.
Poster Presenters
Liz Reinhart
“The Psychological “Curing” of Gays and Lesbians in the United States”
Mentor: Dr. Tina Bucher
English, Rhetoric, and Writing
Psychologists have studied homosexuals and homosexual behavior since psychology first became popularized in the late 1800’s. Until recently, psychologists have sought to “solve the problem” of homosexuality through numerous means, many of which are considered barbaric by today’s standards. This presentation explores the various types of treatments that were administered in an attempt to cure homosexuality and their effectiveness, or in most cases, lack thereof. The format follows a timeline, beginning with the earliest treatments involving surgical removal of various body parts in the late 1800’s and ending with the most recent treatments, specifically discussing the popularity of reparative therapy, which has its roots in contemporary Christianity and whose practice has spawned “ex-gay camps” across the country.