By: Kathryn Hampshire Many modern television shows engage in critical conversations without viewers realizing it. One such program is Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (SVU). This crime drama centered on sexually-motivated offences follows “the dedicated detectives who investigate these vicious felonies,” as the opening mantra states (“Merchandise”). “Special victims” include those who have experienced rape, […]

Written by Shelby Hatfield Marc E. Fitch, author of Paranormal Nation: Why America Needs Ghosts, UFO’s, and Bigfoot, makes the claim that the belief in the supernatural rises when our nation experiences traumatic events. This theory is a psychological explanation of why Americans follow trends of believing in supernatural beings. The author says that even […]

Written by Jackson Eflin The internment of Japanese-Americans after Pearl Harbor was an atrocity, something that haunts the popular conscience of America and is thus often suppressed or forgotten, especially in mainstream media. An exception to this came in the third season of Teen Wolf, in which the primary antagonist is an internment camp’s vengeful […]

The following post is by Morgan Blair, an undergraduate from the University of Louisville, and it deals with the concept of the uncanny as it is utilized by writer Georg Heym and director Robert Wiene. The uncanny itself is an important facet to consider when studying the paranormal, particularly ghosts and hauntings. Morgan’s post provides […]

Written by Kameron McBride If you were asked to picture a ghost it would more than likely be a white creation that looks like a bedsheet with eyes cut out. When Charlie Brown needed some dorky costume in his Halloween special, he tossed a sheet over his head and cut out 17 eyeholes too many. […]

Written by Ruthie Weller-Passman How far can a vengeful wish reach? In Griffin Dunne’s film Practical Magic (1998), revenge can be carried on beyond the grave itself. This manifests itself in two distinct manners that are intertwined by the end of the film: in a family curse, and in the ghost of a murdered boyfriend […]

Written by Wendy Faunce Almost 100 years ago, Freud analyzed the qualities of things considered uncanny. He referred to the uncanny in his study of the subject as the “Unheimlich,” saying, “‘Unheimlich’ is the name for everything that ought to have remained… hidden and secret and has become visible” (Freud 934). He later refers to […]

Written by Brittany Means The episode “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” (1998) of The X-Files is one that stands out from other episodes in that it is both a Christmas special and one in which the two agents actually encounter the monster of the week without any question as to whether or not it is […]

Written By Malorie Palmer In Alice Rayner’s article “Double and Doubts,” she grapples with the idea that the theatre provides a haunted experience. “Theatre, in all of its aspects, uniquely insists on the reality of ghosts,” Rayner explains, positing that ghosts are not merely a fictional element in theatre.  Rather, in each of its facets […]

Written by Kameron McBride “What is a ghost? A tragedy condemned to repeat itself time and again? An instant of pain, perhaps. Something dead which still seems to be alive. An emotion suspended in time. Like a blurred photograph. Like an insect trapped in amber.” This opening narration, spoken by the great Federico Luppi, begins […]