L'efecte hipnòtic en el cinema postmodern desenvolupa una aproximació al discurs postmodern a través de la categoria estètica d'allò sinistre (das unheimliche), com el camí que senyala l'ombra i el fantasma, el desplaçament del subjecte i la representació de l'inconscient, el real del desig, per mitjà de la metàfora de la hipnosi aplicada al cinema.Hypnotic effect in postmodern cinema develops an approach to postmoden theories throught the sinister aesthetic category (das unheimliche), understood as the way that shows the shadow and the ghost, the subject displacement and the unconsciousness representation, the real of the desire, by the metaphor of hypnosis applied to cinema.

The focus of this study is the two autobiographical novels Den högsta kasten (1997) and Djävulsformeln (2000) by Swedish author Carina Rydberg. Both novels generated lively public debate regarding how they ought to be read and understood, what genre they belonged to, and the ontological status of the narrating “I”. The aim is to investigate why the protagonist, Carina, is perceived as unintelligible by many readers and explore how she can be understood in relation to what constitutes an intelligible identity from a literary and cultural perspective. The novels, as well as their protagonist, are approached from the perspective of genre theory, the argument being that Carina’s unintelligibility is directly dependent on what genre she is read in relation to. In the first part of the thesis the ambiguities of autobiographical texts are discussed, and the narrative and protagonist are analyzed in relation to the autobiographical genre. In the second part of the thesis the consequences of reading the texts as examples of the Gothic with emphasis on monstrosity, the uncanny and sexual transgression are examined. The two readings demonstrate how interpretations of text and character are highly influenced by the reader's expectations connected to genre. Rydberg’s transgression of the norms of genre, gender, and identity leaves the reader with a contradictory set of genre-specific expectations, which in turn makes it difficult to understand and accept the protagonist. The main theme of both novels is Carina’s unsuccessful attempts to reconcile what she sees as two separate, essentially incompatible identities: woman and author. The final chapter includes a comparative study in which Rydberg’s novels are linked to works by other Swedish female writers, both past and contemporary, to demonstrate that the conflict of woman versus author is a common problem for female writers. The thesis closes with a discussion about the possibility of placing Rydberg in a specifically female literary tradition and demonstrate how a feminist analysis can make the unintelligible intelligible.

This essay deals with recurring grotesque motifs in Mikael Niemi’s novels Kyrkdjävulen, Populärmusik från Vittula (Popular Music from Vittula), Fallvatten and Koka björn (To Cook a Bear). It aims to widen the academic understanding of Niemi’s works by focusing on their aesthetics in relation to previous studies, which have mostly been concerned with placing Niemi in a context of Tornedalian minority literature. With the grotesque defined as monstrous and boundary breaking imagery that challenges common rational, ideological or moral world views, this study shows that these motifs can both strengthen, nuance and undermine postcolonial interpretations of the novels.Through Mikhail Bakhtin’s theory of the grotesque, emphasis is placed on the subversive and utopian aspects of the grotesque motifs. With the use of Sigmund Freud’s term the uncanny (das unheimliche) and Julia Kristeva’s term the abject, psychological and emotional aspects of the selected motifs are drawn to the surface. And, by turning to Sara Ahmed’s thoughts on emotions and performativity, the function of disgust in said motifs is examined. The grotesque motifs in question are: the degradation of the mouth, the lower animals, the boy with the knife, the witch mother, and the androgyne. The first part of the analysis shows that in Niemi’sworks the mouth is associated with storytelling, power, agency and the subject’s ability to both knowand express himself, but also to take the world into himself and be changed by it. The mouth is often degraded, which in a carnivalesque manner results in a linguistic revival. The second part of the analysis argues that lower animals, such as rats, reptiles and bat-like devil spawn, are symbols of the abject – that which man must cast out in order to exist. The motifs of the rats and devils are associated with themes of language, identity and writing, but also allude to a threatening feminine principle. In the third part of the analysis, the motifs of the boy with the knife, the witch mother and the androgyne are found to be juxtaposed to and interwoven with each other in narratives concerning gender, sexuality and coming of age. The results of the study show that Mikael Niemi utilizes grotesque aesthetics to give shape toprocesses of growth and change, captivity and liberation, and a complicated sense of identity that eludes clear and rational definitions. The grotesque in these novels is not purely utopian in a Bakhtinian sense, but more emotionally ambivalent. A determining factor to whether the grotesque image brings true renewal or only a repetition of past pain is the will and choice of the individual. Thus, Mikael Niemi’s novels speak not so much of the power of a minority identity, as of the power and potential of the individual to reinvigorate that identity. They form an individualized, existential project in a Tornedalian context.