Reframing the Subject: Abjection in Twentieth-Century American Literature

Author

Amy Leigh White, University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Date of Award

5-2004

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

English

Major Professor

Mary E. Papke

Committee Members

Allen Dunn, Amy Elias, Stephen Blackwell

Abstract

In response to major societal change in the early years of the twentieth century, modern psychology suggested new ways of thinking about selfhood. One’s relationship with oneself, one’s subjectivity, came to be viewed as being processed through a matrix of factors that the self is subject to. The notion of the Cartesian “self” was thus seriously questioned. Is there an essential self? To what extent is self conditioned by environment? Can we know ourselves? If not, is the self worth talking about?

Recommended Citation

White, Amy Leigh, "Reframing the Subject: Abjection in Twentieth-Century American Literature. " PhD diss., University of Tennessee, 2004.
https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss/4567