Research Catalog

Title

Horror film and otherness / Adam Lowenstein.

Author

Lowenstein, Adam

Publication

New York : Columbia University Press, [2022]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xiii, 224 pages : illustrations; 25 cm.

Summary

"What do horror films reveal about social difference in the everyday world? Criticism of the genre often relies on a dichotomy between monstrosity and normality, in which unearthly creatures and deranged killers are metaphors for society's fear of the "others" that threaten the "normal." The monstrous other might represent women, Jews, or Blacks, as well as Indigenous, queer, poor, elderly, or disabled people. The horror film's depiction of such minorities can be sympathetic to their exclusion or complicit in their oppression, but ultimately, these images are understood to stand in for the others that the majority dreads and marginalizes. Adam Lowenstein offers a new account of horror and why it matters for understanding social otherness. He argues that horror films reveal how the category of the other is not fixed. Instead, the genre captures ongoing metamorphoses across "normal" self and "monstrous" other. This "transformative otherness" confronts viewers with the other's experience-and challenges us to recognize that we are all vulnerable to becoming or being seen as the other. Instead of settling into comforting certainties regarding monstrosity and normality, horror exposes the ongoing struggle to acknowledge self and other as fundamentally intertwined. Horror Film and Otherness features new interpretations of landmark films by directors including Tobe Hooper, George A. Romero, John Carpenter, David Cronenberg, Stephanie Rothman, Jennifer Kent, Marina de Van, and Jordan Peele. Through close analysis of their engagement with different forms of otherness, this book provides new perspectives on horror's significance for culture, politics, and art"--

Series Statement

Film and culture

Uniform Title

Film and culture.

Subjects

• Criticism, interpretation, etc
• Other (Philosophy) in motion pictures
• Horror films > History and criticism

Genre/Form

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (pages 205-213) and index.

Contents

Introduction. Situating horror and otherness : tree of life, Night of the living dead, Pittsburgh -- A reintroduction to the American horror film : revisiting Robin Wood and 1970s horror -- The surrealism of horror's otherness : listening to The shout -- Nightmare zone : aging as otherness in the cinema of Tobe Hooper -- The trauma of economic otherness : horror in George A. Romero's Martin -- Therapeutic disintegration : Jewish otherness in the cinema of David Cronenberg -- Gendered otherness : feminine horror and surrealism in Marina de Van, Stephanie Rothman, and Jennifer Kent -- Racial otherness : horror's Black/Jewish minority vocabulary, from Jordan Peele to Ira Levin and Curt Siodmak -- Afterword. Horror and otherness in anguished times.

Call Number

MFL 23-3572

ISBN

• 9780231205764
• 0231205767
• 9780231205771
• 0231205775
• 9780231556156 (canceled/invalid)

LCCN

2021054769

OCLC

1285870119

Author

Lowenstein, Adam, author.

Title

Horror film and otherness / Adam Lowenstein.

Publisher

New York : Columbia University Press, [2022]

Type of Content

text

still image

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Series

Film and culture

Film and culture.

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references (pages 205-213) and index.

Other Form:

Online version: Lowenstein, Adam. Horror film and otherness New York : Columbia University Press, [2022] 9780231556156 (DLC) 2021054770

Research Call Number

MFL 23-3572