This thesis project examines the intertextuality between Cameron Awkward-Rich’s poetry collection Sympathetic Little Monster (2016) and earlier African American texts: Harriet Jacobs’ Incidents of a Slave Girl (1860) and Toni Morrison’s Sula (1973). Focusing on intertextuality and the trope of the train, this project analyzes Awkward-Rich’s collection which details how black bodies are still subjected to oppression and anti-black/anti-trans violence. His poems explore how black trans subjects are inhibited from reaching “arrival,” wholeness, and freedom in one’s representation and expression of their identity. White supremacy and constructs of race and gender attempt to dictate the speakers’ movements, possibilities, and mobility. Paying close attention to references to the past and the trope of the train, I examine how Awkward-Rich’s poetry interrogates black trans legibility, subjectivity, and subjugation. / Includes bibliography. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2020. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

Mineralogical and petrographic analyses of the upper Jurassic - lower Cretaceous units in the vicinity of the Dinosaur National Monument quarry near Jensen, Utah, have elucidated their characteristics and the locations of formational boundaries. The lower part of the Morrison Formation is distinguished by a decreased amount of illite and an increased amount of kaolinite. In contrast, the underlying Curtis Formation contains an approximately equal mixture of illite and kaolinite. The lower Salt Wash Member and the upper Brushy Basin Member of the Morrison are both lithologically and mineralogically identifiable in this area. Above the boundary between the two, kaolinite decreases and illite increases. The strata above the Morrison, here recognized as an extension of the Cedar Mountain Formation, reveal another change in clay content. They contain kaolinite as the dominant clay mineral, whereas illite is almost completely absent. The upper Curtis Formation is a near-shore marine deposit, whereas the members of the Morrison Formation are fluvial and lacustrine. A possible climatic or depositional change is equated with the changes in the clay content within the members of the Morrison Formation. After deposition of the Morrison, the lower Cretaceous sediments that now comprise the Cedar Mountain Formation accumulated. These formed in a transitional zone (fluvial to littoral) and were eventually covered by the Dakota Formation (littoral) and the Mowry Formation (marine).

This dissertation seeks to contribute to recent scholarship by demonstrating that an African-American utopian tradition persists in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, particularly in the works of African-American women writers. If liberation remains a fundamental theme in African-American literature – a definitive stance espoused by W. E. B. Du Bois and a host of other prominent African-American scholars, but also upheld by this dissertation – then such a consistently recurring goal has only been marginally completed, at best, in the United States. Despite proclamations of a universally attainable American Dream, African Americans remain disenfranchised by prison, education, and court systems as well as other integral institutions found within the United States.With this dilemma in mind and given the potentially subversive power of literature, this dissertation argues that the African-American utopian tradition in particular functions as a useful critical lens through which one can examine the often-elusive goal of revolutionary change. This lens raises the pertinent questions that one must answer in order to strive towards one’s utopia, and also exposes the systemic and thus conventional parameters latent in the too-familiar antithetical dystopias about which so many African-American narratives admonish their audiences to confront or, if they are lucky enough, avoid altogether. By focusing on a thematic continuum represented by the utopian small towns found in Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), Gloria Naylor’s Mama Day (1988), Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower (1993) and Parable of the Talents (1998), and Toni Morrison’s Paradise (1997), this dissertation encapsulates a utopian tradition that inscribes race, gender, and sexuality, onto the African-American literary tradition. / English

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This study examines intersectionality, white privilege and essentialism in Toni Morrison’s stories The Bluest Eye and “Recitatif”. Moreover, intersectional markers are taken into consideration to analyze how the characters are advantaged or disadvantaged in the white dominant society of the two novels. Additionally, white privilege is compared to the lack of privilege that the black characters experience and how that further affects them is discussed. Furthermore, the issues that critical race theorists acknowledge with the essentialized approach in movements for social justice will be connected to Morrison’s stories. More specifically, the tendency to overlook intersectionality when essentializing women’s experiences will be connected to how the realities of Morrison’s multidimensional female characters cannot be generalized. In addition, the negative effects white standards of beauty have on the black female characters in The Bluest Eye are examined. It is concluded that black female subjectivity makes the reader better understand the intersectional experiences of the characters and this subjectivity also makes white privilege visible in the stories. Additionally, in “Recitatif”, where the reader does not know the specific race of the characters, conclusions can be made about how race and class intersect by considering historical aspects and how signs of white privilege show up in the story. Although, more important than deciding the race of Morrison’s characters, is for the reader to acknowledge the challenge she creates of considering intersectionality in the story.

Wherever we go in the world, we encounter racism- something that oppresses people in our daily lives in workplaces, stores, schools, hospitals, housing and other places. This serious issue provokes many musicians, writers and artists to show the social and personal effects of racism they experience. In the United States, many black women writers dealt with this issue, having seen it as essential to write about its violence and injustice. Toni Morrison is one of the most respected authors in America who is black and female. She writes with all her senses to portray those who suffer from racism. The Bluest Eye is Morrison's first novel; it raises issues that are specific and very essential to Black women. This novel is narrated by Claudia who is nine years old. She is black, sensitive and frustrated about the injustice that she has seen in her childhood. She narrates the events that happen to her friend Peco la Breedlove. She is the opposite of Pecola; she learns from her mother how to be strong to face any oppression in this world. The Bluest Eye is about the Breedlove family, which consists of the father Cholly, the mother Pauline, the son Sammy and the daughter Pecola. The whole family suffers from ugliness that they cannot escape from.

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<p>This thesis examines how American icons, such as Jim Morrison, become the focus of "secular" religious followings. Morrison died in Paris, France, in 1971. His grave site, in Paris, attracts thousands of visitors each year. As the lead singer of 1960s era band, The Doors, Morrison achieved extraordinary fame. Tiring of his rock star status, Morrison moved to Paris in 1971, where he died under mysterious circumstances at age 27.</p> <p>After his death, Morrison remained a focus of popular biographies and films; many attributed mythic qualities to the dead singer. The continued interest in the celebrity of Morrison, following his death, generated much popularity among a new generation of fans.</p> <p>The motivation for visiting the Morrison grave, in Paris, is not only the music of Morrison or the Doors. Rather, fans gather in Paris each year to remember Morrison as cultural hero and the values he represents: freedom and rebellion against authority.</p> <p>An ethnography in Paris completed during the anniversary of his death, July 3, supplements an analysis of the subculture surrounding Morrison. A wider conclusion concerning the purpose of dead celebrity followings, in contemporary society, is a final focus.</p> / Master of Arts (MA)