Academic Writing

  • “Contemporary art created from waste creates a discussion concerned with capitalist value, appropriating “used” materials, and jeopardizing the integrity and authority of the artist. Waste artwork destabilizes traditional notions of authorship and creation. The influence of the artist is no longer integral in the construction of the artwork, because the pieces used are either readymade or have existed in realities separate from that of the artist. Waste artwork defies notions of what it means to be productive, challenging traditional notions of authorship and authority. Where does the artist fall in relation to their artwork when they did not fully construct their piece? When this originality of authorship is compromised, the artist exists in a new form which subverts the traditional borders of recognized artistic prestige. The artist is no longer given authority because they have created something new, but rather because they have re-contextualized old objects to create new meaning.”

    Excerpt on Waste Artwork and the Death of the Author, Spring 2021

  • “Abject destabilizes prestigious and authoritative authorship by provoking visceral responses of the viewer through notions of the uncanny, separating interpretations of the artwork as separate from our rationalized reality. The use of abject to exert the permeability of the body crosses traditional boundaries of interiority and exteriority, causing the viewer to rethink their own subjectivity. This existential thought process is done internally by the viewer and unconcerned with the role of original authorship.”

    Excerpt on Abject Artwork and the Death of the Author, Spring 2021

  • “The methods of caring for illness during the Black Plague were dichotomized into progressive healing versus transgressive harm to the (fragile) coherence of the masculinized professionalism of medicine. Men were reinforced as competent, educated, and healing; female healers were pagan, queer, and ineffective. Though the medical system during this era was never formally monopolized by a singular system of medical education, there remained a clear division of masculine versus feminine competence. This penalization reveals the gendered disparity between practicing medicine and reinforces the healing potential of women as only permissible within a domestic sphere, where it exists without the health, and policy, of the public. The systemic exclusion of women by universities established a greater monopoly of men in the ‘valid’ medical field, and women were cast as “witches” because of their disobedience to the patriarchal regulations. Throughout these experiences, the persistence of gendered competence in the scenario of epidemic and crisis reinforced men as the competent leaders, and women as the subversive disobedient.”

    Excerpt on Feminine Healers and the Black Plaque, Spring 2021

  • “The birth control pill was a preventative medicine in more than one form: it allowed (some) women to exercise reproductive agency and prevent unwanted pregnancies, but also functioned as a preventative measure of managing the population and controlling the threat of consequential economic and political instability [of the 1960’s]. The invention of the birth control pill and promotion of women’s agency did not necessarily correlate with the increased respect of that agency due to the lingering patriarchal attitudes of the decade. Under the façade as an advancement for women’s agency, the pill was somewhat of a retroactive response to the baby boom and particularly privy to primarily married, upper-class, white women who adhered to the spill-over of the 1950’s conservative agenda which controlled the capitalist culture.”

    Excerpt on the Impact of the Birth Control Pill on Women’s Agency in the 1960’s, Spring 2021

  • Naturalist philosophy does not fit seamlessly into these imperial and hegemonic systems of thought. Naturalism promotes the individualistic agency of natural beings that conduct their own operational hierarchies in order to create a reciprocal exchange between natural components of the environment, overly contesting notions of speciesism. Speciesism, racism, sexism, and classism are all conspicuously intertwined under New Imperialist ideology, as the Empire was rooted in hegemonic patriarchy. Believing that everything in nature holds intrinsic value yet consistently having Imperial men succeed on the back of the natural beings they oppress creates an apparent cognitive dissonance.”

    Excerpt on the Intersectional Paradox of New Imperialism and Naturalism, Winter 2020

  • “Their initial camp purpose of herding sheep metaphorically represents an attempt to maintain social order in a natural environment, and the disruptive blend of the Chilean sheep into their American herd parallels the disruption of clear binaries as the men explore their relationship outside of social captivity. The neglect of social roles at camp juxtapose their compulsive domestic roles in their marriages: Jack is with Lureen for financial prosperity, while Ennis is with Alma for familial purposes – women here are used for masculine teleological purposes but cannot satisfy their partners in the way that Jack and Ennis can for each other on the fantastical frontier.”

    Excerpt on the Confinements of Western Gender Roles in Brokeback Mountain, Fall 2020