8th Annual MSU Undergraduate Literature Conference - Department of English

Join us April 20–21, 2023

The MSU Undergraduate Literature Conference (ULC), held annually each spring, welcomes undergraduate students from across the region to present their research in a public forum. If you are an undergraduate student who has written a paper that examines a work of literature or a cultural text (such as a film, television series, or video game), the Missouri State University English Department encourages you to submit your work during our call for submissions at the beginning of the calendar year. We also encourage members of the community, as well as family members and friends of presenters, to attend. The ULC is free and open to the public.

Schedule

Day One: Thursday, April 20, Glass Hall 486
9:30 a.m. – 10:45 a.m.	Gender and Sexuality in Popular Culture Billie Randle (MSU), Beowulf in the Twenty-First Century: Siding with the Monster Giovanni Acosta (MSU), Dungeons & Dragons: Underrepresented Women and Female Creatures through the Male Conquest Audrey Lutmer (MSU), Victorian Women in Refrigerators: A Modern Trope’s Reflection of Victorian Ideology Abigail Zajac (MSU), An Exploration of “Kinky”: Duhamel’s Ideology of Gender Roles and Sexual Pleasure
11:00 a.m. – 12:15 p.m.	Snack and Chat Join us for informal discussion of English Department programs and organizations!
12:30 p.m. – 1:45 p.m.	Race in American Literary and Intellectual History David Brockway (MSU), Amasa Delano as a Critique of the American Moderate Makayla Malachowski (MSU), Stories Passed Down: Frame Narratives in African American Folklore and Literature Ebony Williams (OTC), “Education over Identification”
2:00 p.m. – 3:15 p.m.	Gender and Sexuality in American Literature Rebecca Dixon (Drury), An Analysis of Internalized Homophobia throughout Toni Morrison’s First Three Texts Molly Del Rossi (MSU), Poets Can Lie: Female Experience in Ai Ogawa’s Dramatic Monologue Israel Budd (MSU), Alien Love and Familiar Horror in Octavia Butler’s “Bloodchild”
3:30 p.m. – 4:45 p.m.	Medieval and Early Modern British Literature Dessa Outman (MSU/Zoom), Childish Faith: The Role of Folklore and Juvenalian Satire in Geoffrey Chaucer’s “The Prioress’s Tale” Marianne Prax (MSU), How “The Knight’s Tale” and Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc form a Metaphorical Palimpsest Sav Archer (MSU), Margaret Cavendish: A Study of Pleasure and Identity Politics

Day Two: Friday, April 21, Glass Hall 486
9:05 a.m – 9:55 a.m.	Twentieth- and Twenty-First Century Fictions Alex Perchatkin (NYU Shanghai/Zoom), Post-Conflict Narratives in the Basque Country: Separatism and Nationalism through the Lens of Mass Literature Alana Rowan (MSU), A Phoenix Rising from the Ashes: Italics as Self-Transformation Through Internal Dialogue in William Faulkner's “Barn Burning” Tyler Cavin (MSU), In the Land of Nod: An Ecocritical Perspective on John Steinbeck’s East of Eden
10:10 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.	Gender, Sexuality, and History Hunter Mayo (MSU) Don’t Kill Yourself, You’re Too Sexy: The Ophelia Complex in David Lynch’s Twin Peaks Lillian Durr (MSU) The Monster is She: Comparative Characterizations of Women and the Monster in Frankenstein Stevie Garish (MSU) Queer History in the Media: A Look into the Life of Emily Dickinson Fiona Ross (MSU) “Give Me Back My Girlhood”: Taylor Swift’s Midnights (3am Edition) and Performing the Victorian Girl-Child
11:15 a.m. – 12:05 p.m.	Snack and Chat Join us for informal discussion of English Department programs and organizations!
12:20 p.m – 1:10 p.m.	Representing Young Adults Anastasiia Stafford (OTC), The Teenage World of Thingness in Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre Claire Meisch (MSU), Girls with Guns and Boys with Bats: The Exploration of Gender Roles in 1980s Film in Stranger Things Reanna Schrader (MSU), The War on Young Minds: Cancel Culture and Banned Books
1:25 p.m. – 2:15 p.m.	Graphic Narrative Caleb Cloud (MSU), A Degree of Separation: The Use of Defamiliarization in Maus and Barefoot Gen Tyler Wilkerson (MSU), The House of M(en): The Injustice of Superheroine Portrayal in Comics Raylene Romireo (MSU), One Piece: The Brilliance of Queerness in a World Full of Pirates

Need more information?

Please contact Dr. Lanya Lamouria, Chair of the ULC, for more information.

To present, please fill out the ULC submission form and email it to Dr. Lanya Lamouria. Please type “ULC Submission” in the subject line of the email. The submission date is February 24.