Barbie and the Easy Man

As we celebrate Women’s History Month, conversations about gender, power, and representation take center stage. While history often focuses on real-world trailblazers, fictional storytelling has long been a powerful tool for examining societal norms and challenging assumptions. Two summers ago, one film, Barbie (2023), explored gender norms and societal expectations by portraying an encounter with…

Liminality in Butler’s Kindred

Read or Listen to the Blogcast One of Octavia Butler‘s first novels has been recently made into a graphic novel. Kindred is a twentieth-century novel that explores the intersections of mid-twentieth century life for an African American woman living in Los Angeles with the life of her ancestors in nineteenth-century Maryland. Dana, Caught Between Two…

The Magician, The Witch, and the Fall of Humankind

Read or Listen I have just completed reading, rather re-reading, The Magician’s Nephew, the penultimate book in C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia series. I have to admit, this is my favorite book. I always look forward to meeting the stubborn Diggory and the ambitious, wise, and cautious Polly. I anticipate the moment that the…