Childhood and the horror genre are not strangers to one another. Examples include the enduring popularity of Kinder- und Hausmärchen (Children's and Household Tales), published in 1812 and better known today as Grimm’s Fairy Tales, Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw (1898), Universal Pictures and James Whale’s Frankenstein (1931), RKO Pictures and Val Lewton’s The Curse of the Cat People (1944), Mervyn LeRoy’s The Bad Seed (1956), Wolf Rilla’s Village of the Damned (1960), William Friedkin’s The Exorcist (1973), and the killing spree of Chucky in Child’s Play (Tom Holland, 1988). The figure of the child in each of the films that I have chosen is a variation of the problem child or bad seed. From the literary tradition of the wise child, who has an innate wisdom and a sharp, at times alarmingly keen perception that can disconcert adults, the bad seed is a child whose precocity is frequently coded as monstrous. The bad seed is endowed with the corruption and horror of the adult world, and in many instances what is at stake with the bad seed is the notion of the innate innocence of childhood and the anxiety of parenthood. I present the figure of childhood within the representational strategy of the modern horror film. Innocence, criminality, and anxiety are key terms for understanding the figure of childhood as a cinematic subject in terms of the bodily, relational, and reflective dimensions. I have selected films within and beyond Hollywood and maintain that the bad seed is a transnational representation of childhood and an iconic horror character alongside the Thing Without a Name (Frankenstein), the doppelgänger (Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde), and the vampire (Dracula). ____________________________________________________________ Curriculum Vitae ____________________________________________________________ OFFICE: Department of Comparative Literary & Cultural Studies SUNY at Stony Brook, Humanities Building - Room 2048 Stony Brook, NY 11794-5355 EMAIL: hstaats@gmail.com FAX: 631-632-5707 ____________________________________________________________ I. EDUCATION: 2008-Present Ph.D. Candidate, Graduate Program in Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies, Stony Brook University/SUNY 2008 M.A. in Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies, Stony Brook University/SUNY 2004 B.A. in Film Studies, Brooklyn College/CUNY ____________________________________________________________II. PUBLICATIONS: A: Articles Published: "Will Higbee: Mathieu Kassovitz." Review, Contemporary French Civilization, 33:2 (Spring/Summer 2009): 200-202. "Valerie Orpen: Agnès Varda's Cléo de 5 à 7." Review, Contemporary French Civilization, 33:1 (Winter/Spring 2009): 261-264. “Ônibus 174 (Bus 174): Intention in the System of Representation.” Cineaction, 67 (Summer 2005): 58-62. ____________________________________________________________ III: PAPERS PRESENTED: (2009) "Who is the Postwar Cinematic Child?" American Comparative Literature Association: Global Voices, Local Languages. Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. (2008) "Cine-Subjectivity and the
Child: The Politics of Culture and the State of Transnational Governance." Crossroads Conference. University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA.
(2008) "The Transcultural Child: Trauma and Subjectivity in Germania anno zero and Le Chiavi di casa." Re-envisioning the Child in Italian Film: New Perspectives on Children and Childhoods from Early Cinema to the Present. University of Exeter, Devon, UK. (2008) "Michael Winterbottom's The Road to Guantánamo & A Mighty Heart: Violence, Identity & Self-Determination." Framed: Delimiting the Film Image. CUNY Graduate Center, New York, NY. (2007) "Michael Winterbottom's The Road to Guantánamo, Exilic and Diasporic Documentary Filmmaking." Comparative Literature Colloquium, Humanities Institute, Stony Brook University. Stony Brook, NY. (2007) “Michael Winterbottom’s In This World: Exilic and Diasporic Nonfiction Filmmaking.” Stony Brook Manhattan Graduate Conference, "Transgressing Boundaries: Interdisciplinary Dialogues," Stony Brook Manhattan. New York, NY. (2005) “José Padhila’s Bus 174: Intention in the System of Representation.” Comparative Literature Colloquium, Humanities Institute, Stony Brook University. Stony Brook, NY. ____________________________________________________________ IV. RESEARCH: A: Research Assistant: I have recently worked as a research assistant to Paula J. Massood and The Spike Lee Reader (Temple, January 2008). The reader is a combination of already existing articles and some newly commissioned pieces, in particular Lee’s more recent work, arranged according to a selection of films (those that are most often covered in a classroom), such as She's Gotta Have It, School Daze, Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X, and Bamboozled. Contributors include: Christine Acham, Toni Cade Bambara, Mark D. Cunningham, Anna Everett, Daniel Flory, Krin Gabbard, David A. Gerstner, Ed Guerrero, Keith M. Harris, bell hooks, Wahneema Lubiano, James C. McKelly, Tavia Nyong'o, Beretta E. Smith-Shomade, Michele Wallace, S. Craig Watkins, and Paula J. Massood. ____________________________________________________________ V: TEACHING: A: 2004-Present in the Departments of Comparative Literary & Cultural Studies, Cinema and Cultural Studies, and Writing and Rhetoric -- SUNY at Stony Brook. At Stony Brook, I have designed and taught many inter-disciplinary undergraduate courses: WRT 102.85: Intermediate Academic Writing and Narrative Media (Spring 2005) WRT 102.65: Censorship and Film (Summer and Fall 2005) CLS 215.61: Classical Mythology (Summer 2005 and 2006) CCS 101.03: Images and Texts: Understanding Culture (Fall 2005) WRT 102.30: House, Home, Homeland (Spring 2006) CCS 201.01: Writing About Culture (Spring 2006) HUM 201-D Film and Television Genre: Modes of Documentary Imagination (Spring and Summer 2007) CCS 311: Documentary and Gender (Summer 2008) CLT 335.01: Re-envisioning the Child in Postwar Cinema (Summer 2008) CCS 487: Independent Research in Cinema and Cultural Studies (Fall 2008) CCS 392-K: American Cinema and Cultural Studies: Between Realism and Representability: The Cinema of Spike Lee (Fall 2008) HUM 220-G: Cross-Cultural Encounters: Return from Exile: Responding to the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq (Fall 2008) CCS 312-I: Cinema and the Ancient World (Spring 2009) B: 2009-Present in the Media Culture Department -- College of Staten Island/CUNY. At CSI, I have designed and taught the following inter-disciplinary undergraduate courses: CIN 100: Introduction to Cinema (Fall 2009) CIN 240: Third Cinema (Fall 2009) ____________________________________________________________ VI: INTERNSHIPS & COMMUNITY OUTREACH: A: INTERNSHIPS: The Modern Museum of Art, New York, NY, May 2002 to September 2004. Responsibilities include, but not limited to: Upkeep and maintenance of Celeste Bartos Film Studies Center, under supervision of Charles Silver and Ron Magliozzi. Research Assistant to Professor Richard Cocks at Albion College for his book on Stanley Kubrick, The Wolf at the Door: Stanley Kubrick, History, and the Holocaust. Catalogue and organize “Raising Foodini: A Tribute to Pioneer Puppet Master Morey Bunin,” which was screened at The Gramercy Theater in Manhattan, September 14, 2003. B: COMMUNITY OUTREACH: 1. Americorps*NCCC, Denver, CO, January 1999 to January 2001. Team Leader. Responsibilities included but were not limited to: Organizing work items. Conducting training in areas of education, environment, public safety, unmet human needs. Serving as field representative and conducting on-air interviews with local media to promote Americorps*NCCC programs. Determining weekly salary format, via Excel, for team of 12. Managing $30,000 to $50,000 of federal government funds in 15-state radius of Colorado. 2. YMCA of Greater Tulsa, Tulsa, OK, February 1999 to March 1999. Responsibilities included but were not limited to: Launching first location in United States of Power-Up, a computer literacy program, under Colin Powell’s America’s Promise initiative. Serving as Team Leader for 600 students; boosting student literacy at Bryant Webster Elementary School. ____________________________________________________________ VII. MEMBERSHIPS |