Some game publishers and developers do not think that games with non-sexualized female protagonists are worth making because they would not sell. With close to a half of gamers being female (47%) it is a bit puzzling that they are not catered to. This could be because publishers think that male gamers, who they perceive as their main demographic, would not buy games with non-sexualized female protagonists. A study was done to see if that statement is correct. By questioning 91 Swedish male gamers, aged 18 and above, it was found that in games where one can choose the character’s sex 46% of the subjects play as a female character at least half of the time and in total 90% of the 91 subjects have at some point chosen to play as a female character. No one of the subjects have any negative thoughts about there being more games with non-sexualized female protagonists who are heroic in their own right and not a trophy, when asked 47% said it would be “Very good”, 24% said it would be “Good” and 29% said that they have “No opinion” in the matter.

Please note: creative writing theses are permanently embargoed in OpenBU. No public access is forecasted for these. To request private access, please click on the locked Download file link and fill out the appropriate web form. / Creative writing. / 2031-01-01T00:00:00Z

Refugees, a novel in progress, begins in the collective first-person with a group of people who live on the same residential street of middle-class homes in an east coast American city and are experiencing the most exquisitely vivid aurora borealis to appear in recorded history. But they quickly learn that this gorgeous wonder is a harbinger of civilization's demise and possibly the end of all life on the planet, because the solar storms causing the sky's fantastic nightly coloring is also slowly stripping away the atmosphere and leeching oxygen into space. This "we" narrative switches to third person, moving between two characters—Julie and Amira—as the narrative moves forward. The first chapter covers the first few months of this apocalyptic crisis, and Julie and Amira are central as they are forced decide if they still have the strength and the will to even attempt survival in these new and brutal circumstances. The second chapter, also told in third person, picks up seventeen years in the future with Aya, Amira's daughter who was six during the initial atmospheric disaster. A small group survived in an underwater refuge, recently discovered the atmosphere above had healed over time, and sent an excursion group, including Aya, to evaluate the changing environment. This chapter reveals the history and particular struggles of these characters living in this complex society, both residual and nascent. The third chapter returns to the group of neighbors—including Julie and Amira—seventeen years prior, immediately following the catastrophic event as their story continues to unfold. This chapter opens, like the first chapter, in the "we" voice, tracing the movement of the group south in a search for help and a desperate, though orderly, effort toward survival. This next phase of their journey introduces fresh conflicts and new characters and points to approaching challenges and the persistent hope for survival. Two short stories, unrelated to the novel and each other and entitled "Awake" and "Her," are also included.

This qualitative research study used a theoretical framework of third-wave feminism and reader response theory to examine two research questions: How do girls and women relate to the female protagonist in dystopian young adult literature (YAL)? and How are the responses to dystopian YAL similar and different for the targeted teen audience and the adult audience? A group of four teenaged girls and another group of three adult women read and discussed the YAL dystopian text Uglies. For this project, I collected participant journals and transcripts from individual interviews and book club discussions. I selected quotations from each data source that highlighted the participant’s reactions to the protagonist. Data were analyzed in two phases. In phase one, I used discourse analysis, and in phase two I used constant comparative analysis. The analyses revealed that participants from both groups identified with the protagonist’s attempts to improve society, which aligns both groups’ responses with inclusive aspects of third-wave feminism. However, other aspects of feminism were incorporated into their answers as well. The women participants demonstrated a broader societal concern, such as those shared by second wave feminists. The girls, in contrast, were firmly situated within individualist aspects of third-wave feminism. Whereas, the women related to the protagonist on both a personal and broader societal level, the girls related only on a personal level. Findings from this research extend reader response theory by showing that responses to literature are strongly shaped by generational position.

In this thesis paper, I will detail the making of Camp Shakespeare For Young Performing Artists, my final graduate short film at the University of New Orleans, from its inception as a script to its final form as a finished short film. In Part One I will examine the personal and cultural influences that led me to develop the script. Part Two will review the pre-production process – how my collaborators and I prepared for the shoot. In Part Three I will scrutinize the day-to-day process of filming. Part Four will chart the post-production process in which the film took its final shape. Finally, I will conclude with an analysis of whether the film met the goals I set for it along with my own successes and failures as a filmmaker and leader of a creative team.

Most girls in Gopher Slough, Florida, worry about whether GSHS will win the next football game (they won't), when their boyfriends will take them muddin', and how many times they can sneak cigarettes behind the bleachers before they get thrown into in-school suspension. Libby Hoyer is not most girls. Instead, Libby is worried about her slipping grades, especially in Geometry, where she can barely keep her head up long enough to take the weekly quizzes. She's concerned about losing her friendship with her best (only) friend, Bobbi Jo, who's distracted with her own Aber-zombie boyfriend, and she's unsure of how to define her new relationship with Neil, a mysterious boy from her class who is not as carefree as he pretends to be. Libby is also troubled by the fact that she can't seem to remember her distant father, even though he only left five years ago. Everyone else, it seems, is worried about Libby's sporadic eating habits. If she continues to refuse to eat or to purge anything she's forced to eat, she might disappear. But Libby isn't afraid of disappearing. She's afraid of being seen.

Análise da construção da personagem feminina nos romances Middlemarch, de George Eliot (1871-72), e The Portrait of a Lady (1881), de Henry James, observando como a exploração da subjetividade das protagonistas ao longo de suas trajetórias interfere no enredo e na concepção do romance como um todo. A finalidade última é verificar como esses autores contribuem para o nascimento do romance moderno. / Analysis of the female characters design in George Eliots Middlemarch (1871-72) and Henry Jamess The Portrait of a Lady (1881) regarding the exploration of the female protagonists subjectivity along their trajectories interfere with plot and the conception of the novels. The final aim is to discuss how these novelists contribute to the beginning of the modern novel

Análise da construção da personagem feminina nos romances Middlemarch, de George Eliot (1871-72), e The Portrait of a Lady (1881), de Henry James, observando como a exploração da subjetividade das protagonistas ao longo de suas trajetórias interfere no enredo e na concepção do romance como um todo. A finalidade última é verificar como esses autores contribuem para o nascimento do romance moderno. / Analysis of the female characters design in George Eliots Middlemarch (1871-72) and Henry Jamess The Portrait of a Lady (1881) regarding the exploration of the female protagonists subjectivity along their trajectories interfere with plot and the conception of the novels. The final aim is to discuss how these novelists contribute to the beginning of the modern novel

Gender representation in the horror genre has many interesting discussions surrounding it through multiple perspectives such as psychoanalysis and culture. This article intends to expand the investigation of how female characters are portrayed in horror games. The research on female representation will investigate the potential connections between horror cinema and horror games in the survival horror game Fatal Frame (2001, Koei Tecmo), the first title of a series that is iconic f0r drawing inspiration from Japanese mythology and horror tropes while simultaneously using a large cast of female characters. To gather information about the audience to support the game analysis, an online survey will be released targeting players of the games. Thereafter, recorded, non-commentary footage of the first game, Fatal Frame (2001), will be observed and textually analysed through a framework with data points, based on the background of psychoanalysis, horror cinema, culture, and game theory.

Ce mémoire se concentre sur la figure de l’héroïne d’action dans les jeux vidéo. La culture vidéoludique, qui glorifie la masculinité militarisée, tend à sexualiser les personnages féminins et à négliger les préférences des joueuses afin de cibler les hommes et les garçons. La figure de l’héroïne d’action naît du désir d’inclusion des femmes dans la culture du jeu vidéo. Ces protagonistes féminins, bien que souvent objectifiés comme le témoigne le célèbre personnage de Lara Croft, présentent tout de même un potentiel subversif en envahissant l’espace traditionnellement masculin. Ce mémoire analyse quelques protagonistes qui correspondent à la figure de l’héroïne et la remodèlent. / This master thesis focuses on the action heroine trope in video games. The video game culture, which glorifies militarized masculinity, tends to sexualize female characters and to neglect the preferences of female players by targeting men and boys. The action heroine trope is born from the desire to include women in the video game culture. These female protagonists are often sexualized, such as the famous Lara Croft, but they also have a subversive potential by invading a traditional masculine space. This master thesis analyzes a few characters that are modeled and reshaped on the action heroine trope.