The American South is a rich source of literature that combines the humorous and the horrific in its attempts to explain and expose the region's deep-seated social turmoil. One of the most prolific genres to come out of the South is southern gothic literature that, though not always humorous is known for its use of grotesque imagery and reliance on highly charged melodramatic narratives. When these works are comic, they don't merely reflect the region's strife but attempt to transform it. This dissertation looks at how southern gothic writers Beth Henley, Fannie Flagg and Flannery O'Connor use dark comedy in their works as defiant acts designed to question the status quo and reform the southern landscape by creating ruptures where marginalized people can assert themselves into the norms of American culture. Drawing on several different definitions of comedy, including Barecca's works on female narratives and linguistic theories of jokes, this work defines dark comedy and identifies where humor and horror come together in the works of these southern gothic writers to form particularly dark comic moments. Then, it uses Butler's theory of sites of rupture to explain how dark comedy can be transformative. In Giving an Account of Oneself, Butler explains Foucault's regime of truth as a system that is always both self-reflexive and social - a system where the norms that govern recognition create boundaries where subjects are formed. She goes on to conclude that ruptures can occur within the "horizon of normativity" whereby those relegated to the margins can gain entry and be encompassed within the governing norms. Dark comedy, then, occurs at or even creates that site of rupture in the individual and in the society that experiences it, and allows for the individual, and by extension society, to change its understanding of what is normal and resides within the margins. Within the text, then, dark comedy changes the governing norms to include the once marginalized oddities.

I created the term Neo-Raconteur to convey my interest in medium theory to support the artistic custom of revealing cultural conventions for allocation into artistic genres. The term evolved from the French word "Raconteur," meaning: somebody who tells stories or anecdotes in an interesting or entertaining way. In the past a Raconteur's anecdotes were verbally volleyed, ever voluble, yet quip. Neo-Raconteurs may decide not to speak at all choosing their anecdotal expression to manifest itself through singular or multiple means, manners, or methods of design and technology as well as or involving more traditional techniques of extraction to convey the narrative. I demonstrate how it applies to my work in time-based-media within the realms of Southern Gothic symbolism -- which rely on the supernatural, physical geographic settings, instances of the grotesque and irony along with visual and/or psychological shadow(s) of foreboding caused by tradition or hidden truths, occasionally both.

S'inspirant de l'inconscient collectif jungien, « détaché des sphères personnelles, exist[e] en marge de celles-ci, [...] possède un caractère tout à fait général et [...] ses contenus peuvent se rencontrer chez tous les êtres1 », le concept de la psychosphère, tel que présenté dans la télésérie américaine True Detective (HBO, 2014), en est la trame de fond narrative. Décrire l'invisible et l'intangible n'est possible que par l'étude de ses manifestations. Ce mémoire s'intéresse donc aux phénomènes et aux concepts qui rendent possible la représentation de ce que Ralph Noyes décrit comme un « vast and complex cauldron of ideas, memories, volitions, desires and all the other furniture of conscious experience and unconscious mental functioning2 ». Outre les questions plus larges de la généalogie du récit, la poétique narrative de la psychosphère relève essentiellement de l'archive: True Detective fait maintes allusions à la fiction gothique américaine. Celles-ci désignent à leur tour une explication transhistorique d'un retour à la violence ritualisée. Toutefois, cette explication, s'il en est une, demeure fragmentée, incohérente et ultimement différée. / Inspired by Jung's collective unconscious, the concept of a psychosphere, as seen in HBO's hit series True Detective (2014), underlines the narrative structure of the show. Describing the invisible and the intangible is only made possible by the study of its manifestations. This thesis analyses the phenomena and concept which enable the representation of what Ralph Noyes describes as a « vast and complex cauldron of ideas, memories, volitions, desires and all the other furniture of conscious experience and unconscious mental functioning3 ». Apart from broader questions of genealogy, the narrative poetics of the psychosphere are essentially archival: True Detective contains many allusions to previous Gothic fictions, which point toward an trans-historical explanation for the return of ritualized violence. However, any such explanation is fragmented, incoherent, and ultimately deferred.

This thesis details the literary and visual influences in my work, the definition of American Gothic, and its connection it to my work. Literary sources such as Edgar Allan Poe and Fanny Kemble help spark a vision of the landscape. Visual influences include Japanese woodblock prints, scenic wallpapers, vintage postcards and Victorian mourning pictures. My regional explorations span the James River, Tidewater swamps and architecture within the city of Richmond.My work depicts local history and ecology inspired by Richmond and the surrounding region. Subtle Gothic elements add anxiety to the otherwise pastoral scenes. Gothic foreboding in the work questions our ecological future and the permanence of our human presence in the landscape.

This is a creative thesis in the form of a screenplay titled “Andalusia” in which a woman, Katherine, searches for meaning in her life. After suffering through a childhood wrought with tragedy, disappointment, and chaos, Katherine strives to create a healthy reality in which she can thrive. After failing miserably at this once, she takes a different path and finds herself hidden away in her dead father’s house writing about the Mississippi Delta town of Andalusia.