Adventures in MFA Land

Each year the students complete the first three chapters of a novel, a synopsis, submission or indie pub plan, and do a practice pitch. They design their own assignments, participate in workshops, and its always amazing to work with them. New this year, we did our long performance reads in the auditorium. Guests invited! Will definitely do that again next year.

PCA 2019 in Washington D.C.  Scary Vulnerability: Considering the ‘Guilty Mom’ Horror Film Through the Lens of Lacan’s the Real Abstract The ‘guilty mom’ is at the center of three tensions: society’s expectation that she provide for her child’s emotional and physical safety, the child’s needs, and her own needs. Within the context of a horror film, this tensional dynamic highlights the unique vulnerabilities of this marginalized, archetypal character and creates an avenue through which viewers experience Jacques Lacan’s the Real. A comparative assessment of The Exorcist (1973), Babadook (2014), and Hereditary (2018) offers the opportunity to examine the ways in which Lacan’s conflicting imaginary order and symbolic order create the impossibility of absolute comprehension. Salvoj Zizek expands on Lacan’s theory to identify the “real Real” (2006). This modality can additionally inform an analysis of the unique terror of the ‘guilty’ mom horror film. Read the pap...