Spaces of Expression and Repression in Post-Millennial North-American Literature and Visual Culture (New Americanists in Poland)

The essays included in this book offer an overview of literary works, films, TV series, and computer games, which reflect current social and political developments since the beginning of this century. The contributions intend to x-ray the most crucial aspects of contemporary North-American literature and culture. Addressing a variety of media, the authors of the essays probe the many ways in which repression and expression are the primary keywords for understanding contemporary American life and culture. Cover 1 Table of contents 7 Introduction 9 Negative Mobilities (Julia Leyda) 13 Eye(s) in the Sky: Icons of War and Techno-Gaze in Contemporary Audiovisual Culture (Paweł Frelik) 27 Portraits Painterly and Poetic: John Ashbery and Gerhard Richter (Paulina Ambroży) 39 The Dynamic Space of Divinity and Ontology in Mark Z. Danielewski’s House of Leaves (Andrew J. Ploeg) 61 Self-Expression and Sexual Repression in Joyce Carol Oates’s “The White Cat” and Beasts (Joanna Stolarek) 73 A Space in-between Genders: Rethinking the American Bildungsroman from an Intersex Perspective (Elli Kyrmanidou) 85 Expressing the Uncertainty, Reflecting Memory: The Role of Memorabilia in Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home (Aleksandra Kamińska) 95 Representation of Asexuality in The Big Bang Theory (Petra Filipová) 105 #effyourbeautystandards: Body Positivity Movement as an Expression of Feminist Identity (Olga Korytowska) 115 Intergenerational Transmission of Trauma in Tracy Letts’s August: Osage County (Ewelina Feldman-Kołodziejuk) 125 Affect and Memory in Toni Morrison’s God Help the Child (Patrycja Antoszek) 137 A Sense of Otherness: Auditory-Gustatory Synesthesia and Cultural Identity in Monique Truong’s Bitter in the Mouth (Urszula Niewiadomska-Flis) 145 Text, Image and Sound: Artistic Tiers in Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s Queen of Dreams (Izabella Kimak) 157 A New Take on “The Mournful and Never Ending Remembrance”: Personal Loss and the Trauma of History in E. L. Doctorow’s Andrew’s Brain (Sławomir Studniarz) 165 Repression and Control in a Post-Panoptic Anti-Utopian State: The Radch Empire in Ann Leckie’s Imperial Radch Trilogy (Anna Gilarek) 175 Emotion Management and Damage Control: Navigating Global Reality in William Gibson’s Bigend Trilogy (Julia Nikiel) 187 Player as a Victim of Repression and a Tool of Oppression in the Totalitarian World of Papers, Please (Paweł Kołtuniak) 197 Notes on the Contributors 205 "The essays in this book offer an overview of literary works, films, TV series, and computer games, which reflect current social and political developments since the beginning of this century. The authors probe the many ways in which repression and expression are the primary keywords for understanding contemporary American life and culture"-- Provided by publisher