Structural and Contextual Frameworks: Distinguishing Literal from Metaphorical Depictions of Exaggerated Size

In 2016, the authors proposed the Contextual Framework and Structural Framework for understanding pictorial metaphors. These two dichotomous frameworks are especially useful for assessing the apprehension by viewers of pictorial devices that can be used either literally or metaphorically. One such pictorial device is exaggerated size—that is, depicting objects as being overly large. This pictorial device can be used metaphorically (e.g., to indicate importance) or literally (e.g., to depict a giant). We analyze three comic book covers from the Silver Age of American comic books using both frameworks to illustrate how observers distinguish metaphoric pictorial devices from literal ones

“Man? Where’s a man? Don’t let him go!”: Molina’s Trans/gender Web in Interpretation and Performance

Using perspectives typical of English and theatrical fields of study, this capstone project interprets Molina from Manuel Puig’s 1976 novel Kiss of the Spider Woman as a heterosexual transgender woman and then investigates why such an interpretation does not exist in performance adaptations. Although Molina has been called a transgender woman in recent criticism, there is a conflation of gender and sexuality that has been uninvestigated in this text. It has not been addressed how Molina constructs her identity or how this interpretation might be employed in performance, which this essay seeks to confront. The first half of the project focuses on a close reading of the text that interprets Molina’s subjective construction of gender and sexuality as a heterosexual transgender woman, finding that the presupposed assumption of Molina as a gay man is a result of critics privileging what other characters say about Molina rather than her subjective articulation. The second half of the essay analyzes elements of the performance that prevented performing Molina as a transgender woman in Hector Babenco’s 1985 Kiss of the Spider Woman movie adaptation – such as the intentions for the movie, the writing of the screenplay, and the personal acting choices of William Hurt, who played Molina – through production research and a semiotic reading of the film. This project speaks to the broader context of how individual identity is constructed, how gender is performed, how societal attitudes oppress individual identity, and how transgender characters have been minimized in media

First records of Spermophora kerinci, Nesticella mogera and Pseudanapis aloha on the European Mainland (Araneae: Pholcidae, Nesticidae, Anapidae)

The alien spider species Spermophora kerinci Huber, 2005, Nesticella mogera (Yaginuma, 1972) and Pseudanapis aloha Forster, 1959 are recorded from greenhouses in Germany. These are the first records from the European mainland. All these species have recently been found in the British Isles