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Publication Date

2012-05-02

Availability

UM campus only

Embargo Period

2014-05-02

Degree Name

Master of Fine Arts (MFA)

Department

English (Arts and Sciences)

Date of Defense

2012-04-25

First Committee Member

Maureen Seaton

Second Committee Member

Mia Leonin

Third Committee Member

Clark Lunberry

Abstract

This poetry book depicts the complexities of the individual in society and the relevance of unique, personal and creative expression. Essentially, the project illuminates the following themes: the role of the individual in the context of society and culture, the servitude to gender roles, the exploitation of the body and the natural environment, and the diktat of popular culture. This project intends to dissect as well as radiate the effects of assigning identity according to gender by honestly illustrating human existence through memory and private contemplation. Exploitations of the environment and the body are portrayed by way of recollection, imagination and passion. The current wrecking of ocean waters aligns with and scaffolds the wrecking/utilization of the physical body. Corruption of the natural environment mirrors the corruption of the mortal self. Like gender roles assign identity, pop culture assigns identity and community via mass deliverance. Pop culture acts as a fountain of detail and context that cascades the concerns of the project. In order for the collection to emit these themes, intimacy with and exploration of the private self is significant and indispensable. Personal experience, agenda, taste and topic fixation function as tools of communication and campaign for the abovementioned matters. The collection engages closely with the reader and germinates reader empathy to raise awareness toward social injustice while simultaneously endorsing the use of personal imagination.

Keywords

poetry; Edie Sedgwick; Che Guevara; surrealism; pop imagery; feminism

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