2013 Undergraduate Literature Conference

April 12, 2013

SESSION ONE: 10:00-10:50

1. The Enigmatic Fiction of Hawthorne and Melville, Rm 501, Moderator: Jonathan Gotsick

Emily Blume, “The Enigma of Hawthorne’s Hester”
Maria Golden, “Hawthorne’s Ambivalent Attitude toward Puritanism”
Madalyn Sproull, “The Enigmatic Bartleby Yet Once More”
Anna Béar, “Doppelgangers or Destiny: The Ambiguity of Melville's ‘Bartleby the Scrivener’”

2. Power at the Margins, Rm 512, Moderator: Rebecca Wigginton

Jaclyn Gaydos, “An Unconventional Religion: Emily Bronte’s Deathless Love in Wuthering Heights
Kate Miltenberger, “Advocating Multi-Cultural Understanding through House-Elves in Harry Potter
Joelle Chasse, “Racial Passing in Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre

SESSION TWO: 11:00-11:50

3. Visions of Blake, Rm 501, Moderator: Jessica Isaac

Olivia Enders, “William Blake and Emanuel Swedenborg: A Conjugal Love Story”
Lindsey Singer, “Opposites Attract: Examining Contrary States in Blake's Poetry”
Craig Stamm, “The Conversations of a Lunar London”
Cameron Vass, “respondent”

4. The Anxiety of Influence and the Influence of Anxiety in American Transcendental Authors, Rm 512, Moderator: Kirsten Paine

Channing Kaiser, “Harold Bloom’s Theory of Poetic Influence as Exemplified by Emerson and Whitman”
Kathleen Shaughnessy, “Whitman’s Overt Sexuality and Thoreau’s Overt Asexuality”
Jessica Cheng, "Homosexual or Heterosexual?: Whitman's Confusion Revealed in Poetry"
Nicholas Slapikas, “Reading Walden’s Chapter ‘Reading’ in the Light of Emerson’s ‘Self-Reliance’”

LUNCH: 12:00-1:00

SESSION THREE: 1:00-1:50

5. Class Conflict and Representation, Rm 501, Moderator: Tyrica Terry

Samantha Proctor, “On The Use Of Sound In Thomas Gray’s Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard
Alexandra Cathcart, “The Monster of an Unjust Social Order in Frankenstein

Ronald E. Reha, Jr., “Merit in Such Goodness: Re-reading Jane Eyre as a (Particularly Female) Marxist Allegory.”

6. Theories of Language and Literature, Rm 512, Moderator: Peter Moe

Samantha Harper, “When Language Fails: A View of the Enigmatic Veneration in Heart of Darkness and The Great Gatsby
Richard McKita, “Closer to What? The Heterological Fiction of Dennis Cooper”
Dan Malinowski, “The Self and Control: Peter Handke’s Kaspar, Wittgenstein and Foucault”

SESSION FOUR: 2:00-2:50

7. Global Fictions, Rm 501, Moderator: Heather Sprong

Taylor Skaggs, “Reading and Interpreting the Fiction in Mario Vargas Llosa’s Death in the Andes” Teri Dederer, “Treasure Island: A Romantic Frame for an Imperial Adventure”
Raymond Van Ham, “Wide Sargasso Sea: the Predetermined Pilgrim’s Progress”

8. Forms in Dialogue, Rm 512, Moderator: Erin Anderson

Kristin Vermilya, “Intention vs. Perception: Exploring a Reader's Expectation for the Love Story in Arthur Conan Doyle's ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’”
Audrey Winn, “Graphic Novel, Memes, and the Pittsburgh Bomb Threats”

SESSION FIVE: 3:00-3:50

9. The Emergence of Modern America: Literary Perspective & Consciousness in Daisy Miller and the Poetry of Dunbar and Piatt, Rm 512, Moderator: Liam O’Loughlin

Kelly McMasters, “The Girl of His Dreams: Perspective and Gender in Henry James's Daisy Miller
Lara Sullivan, “Standpoint Epistemology: A Consciousness Raising Exercise for An Emerging American Writer” Brittany Whoric, “The Male Gaze in Daisy Miller

10. Revisiting Gendered Expectations, Rm 501, Moderator: Elizabeth Oliphant

Geethika Reddy, “Clytemnestra’s Path to Revenge in Aeschylus’s Oresteia
Juliet Van Wagenen, “The Other Daughter: How the Conflicting Views of Feminism Present Themselves in the Mother/Daughter Relationships of Coraline
Kathleen Looby, “Monks, Masculinity, and Overcoats”

SESSION SIX: 4:00-4:50

Senior Thesis Showcase, Rm 501, Moderator: Professor Susan Harris Smith

Lauren Schmeer, “Learning Gender in Adolescence: Gender Performativity in Contemporary Young Adult Best-Sellers”
Shannon Knapp, “‘Mute Wrath and Dumb Fury’: An Exploration of the Possibilities of Feminist Readings of Lavinia in Titus Andronicus

CLOSING RECEPTION: 5:00-5:30, Rm 501, Remarks from Shalini Puri, Literature Program Director
All presenters will receive Book Center gift certificates Please join us for conversation and refreshments!