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Thesis (M.A.)--Boston University. Missing page 52

Pain is a physical experience that is often imbued with metaphorical significance. Understanding better how pain operates as a cultural signifier can reveal assumptions about the status of different bodies and subjects. Even though pain is a nearly universal phenomenon, there is currently a dearth of sustained inquiry into pain as a literary, physical, and social phenomenon. What critical analysis there is about pain often metaphorizes the experience and forgets the lived, material realities of pain. At the same time, pain is a factor in virtually all cultural and social interactions, influencing everything from medical care to community acceptance. Thus, uncovering the functions of pain is a necessity. This dissertation reads for the ways pain forges intercorporeal relationships between bodies through the process of co-suffering, offering a new way of looking at the grotesque body. Using examples from a broad range of science fiction texts, from popular non-fiction science writing to superhero comics to novels to television, this dissertation explores the various ways that normative and non-normative pain response is witnessed and perceived. Putting forth a theory of co-suffering as a form of attention to and embodied translation of pain language, this dissertation examines the various ways in which listening to the voice of pain creates intercorporeal kinship between bodies. Through this kinship, bodies become subjects and gain access to community. Ultimately, this dissertation shows that, while pain can foster such kinship, predictable and standard pain responses are necessary for creating co-suffering. Thus co-suffering can be emancipatory, as it helps marginalized bodies gain subjectivity, but it can also be a way for cultures to enforce rigid behaviors on subjects, as it requires that bodies conform to those standard pain responses.

This creative thesis collects five fictional stories, as well as a critical preface entitled “Fractals and the Gestalt: the Hybridization of Genre.” The critical preface discusses genre as a literary element and explores techniques for effective genre hybridization. The stories range from psychological fiction to science fiction and fantasy fiction. Each story also employs elements from other genres as well. These stories collectively explore the concept of the other and themes of connection and ostracization.

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Zugl.: Halle, University, Staatsexamensarbeit, 2007.

This collection contains a preface entitled "Of Other Worlds" and the following short stories: "The Mind's Eye," "Waking," "The Conquest of the World," "Persephone," and "Extradition." This creative thesis includes a blend of science fiction and literary realism short stories, which are collectively concerned with questions of time, narration, and the use of language. As well, the preface discusses science fiction theory, narrative strategies such as the use of the first person perspective, and the author's theory of composition.