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Date Permissions Signed

5-20-2021

Date of Award

Spring 2021

Document Type

Masters Thesis

Department or Program Affiliation

English

Degree Name

Master of Fine Arts (MFA)

Department

English

First Advisor

Trueblood, Kathryn R., 1960-

Second Advisor

Wong, Jane

Third Advisor

Loar, Christopher F.

Abstract

Since its prominent emergence in the 21st century, speculative writing has become a popular genre amongst marginalized, disenfranchised, and oppressed peoples, largely due to its omission of westernized themes and tropes that have had a stranglehold on genres such as science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Some of the subgenres that have emerged out of this “counter literature” include spec. personal history, solarpunk, indigenous futurism, dystopian/utopian lit, spec. poetry, and many others. Using speculative writing, coupled with Garcia Lorca’s perspective on the duende and Joseph Meeker’s ideology of “The Comic Way,” I have started to excavate what the recent death of my father means for my truth. Consequently, I have also begun examining how my relationship with the land is linked to my relationship with my family and community; I have speculated conversations with my father, our ancestors, and with families the world over. What’s more, by looking to my family’s Mexica roots (more commonly known as the “Aztecs”) and pulling inspiration from my ancestor’s ways of knowing, my creative works strive to elicit change in my audiences’ relationship with the land and their own family and community so that solutions to our socioecological crises can be forged.

Type

Text

Keywords

speculative writing, duende, the comic way, survival, eco-speculation, socioecological, family, trauma, cross-genre, hybrid writing, indigenous thought

Publisher

Western Washington University

OCLC Number

1255405131

Subject – LCSH

Speculative fiction; Creative nonfiction

Format

application/pdf

Genre/Form

masters theses

Language

English

Rights

Copying of this document in whole or in part is allowable only for scholarly purposes. It is understood, however, that any copying or publication of this document for commercial purposes, or for financial gain, shall not be allowed without the author’s written permission.

Rights Statement

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NKC/1.0/

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

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