Professor
BA (Hons) Queen’s University
MA Queen’s University
PhD McGill University
Phone: 902-457-6727
E-mail: karen.macfarlane@msvu.ca
Research interests
The Gothic, particularly monsters and the monstrous body in contemporary culture and late nineteenth century fiction; Theory, especially feminist and queer theories; Imperialism in fin-de-siecle popular fiction; postmodernism.
Selected publications
“Creepy Little Girl.” Gothic Studies 25.1 (March 2023): 1-19.
“We are All Humans: Self-Aware Zombies and Neo-Gothic Posthumanism.” Neo-Gothic Narratives. Ed. Brenda A. Ayres and Sarah E Maier. New York: Anthem Press, 2020. 125-139.“Zombies and the Viral Web.” Horror Studies 9.2 (2018): 231-247.
“Market Value: American Horror Story’s Housing Crisis.” Neoliberal Gothic. Ed. Linnie Blake and Agnieszka Soltysik Monnet. Manchester UP, 2017.
“Here be monsters: Knowledge and the limits of Empire at the fin de siècle.” Text Matters: A Journal of Literature, Theory, Culture. Ed. Agnieszka Soltysik Monnet. (2016): 74-95.
“Aesthetics, Value and The Joy of Imperfections.” English Studies in Canada 39.2-3 (2014): 9-12.
“The Monstrous House of Gaga.” The Gothic in Contemporary Literature and Popular Culture: Pop Goth. Ed. Jason Edwards and Agnieszka Soltysik Monnet. Routledge, 2012. 113-134.
“Mummy Knows Best: Knowledge and the Unknowable in Turn of the Century Mummy Fiction.” Horror Studies 1.1 (January 2010).
“Taking (on) Identities: Transvestite Texts in Shyam Selvadurai’s Funny Boy.” Open Letter 3 (Summer 2007): 38-46.
Essays in The Literary Encyclopedia on The Handmaid’s Tale: and on Lee Maracle.
“Storying The Borderlands: Liminal Spaces and Narrative Strategies in Lee Maracle’s Ravensong.” Creating Community: A Roundtable on Canadian Aboriginal Literatures. Brandon, Manitoba: Bearpaw Publishing. Ed. Jo-Ann Thom and Renate Eigenbrod. 2002.
“‘A Place to Stand On’: (Post)colonial Identity in The Diviners and ‘The Rain Child’.” Is Canada Postcolonial? Ed. Laura Moss. Wilfrid Laurier Press, 2002.
“Mirror Images: Anamorphic Reflections in The Handmaid’s Tale.” The Newsletter of the Margaret Atwood Society 22-23 (1999): 7-11.
“‘Fence-Climbing Sisterhood’: Reading the Escaped Nun Intertext of The Handmaid’s Tale.” Q/W/E/R/T/Y: Arts, litteratures et civilisations du monde anglophone 8 (October 1998): 118-189.
Keynote presentations
“Where Have all the Monsters Gone?” International Gothic Association Conference, Lewis University, Romeoville, Illinois, July 2019.
“‘Here be Monsters’: Imperialism, Knowledge and the Limits of Empire,” International Gothic Conference, “The Monster in art and its manifestations,” Mexico City, Mexico, March 2010.
Recent conference presentations
“Viral (mis)information: Media, Control, Zombies’ at the International Gothic Association Conference, Dublin, Ireland. July 2022.
“Necroimperialism: Mummies, Desire, Empire” at the ACCUTE conference, May 2022.
“Ghosting Roommates: Haunting Neoliberal Real Estate in Paranormal Reality Series” at the 50+ Shades of Gothic Conference, (online) February 2021.
“Necroimperialism, or, When a Man Loves his Mummy” at the Australian Horror Studies Network Symposium (online) October 2021“Creepy Cute (on Gothic Dolls),” International Gothic Association Conference, Manchester, UK, August 2018.
“‘If you have ghosts’: Haunting Neoliberal Real Estate in Paranormal Reality Series,” ACCUTE Conference, Regina Saskatchewan, May 2018.
“Spectral Investments: Neoliberal Gothic and American Horror Story,” 13th Biennial Conference of the International Gothic Association, Puebla, Mexico, August 2017.
“The vanishing monster,” ACCUTE Conference, Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, Calgary, Alberta, May 2016.
“Zombies in Cyberspace,” American Comparative Literature Association Conference, Harvard University, Boston, Mass., March 2016.
“Going Viral: Zombies, Survivors, Cyberspace,” International Gothic Association Conference, Vancouver, BC, August 2015.
“Zombies and the Viral Web,” ACCUTE Conference, Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, Ottawa, ON, May 2015.
“Museum Gothic,” North American Victorian Studies Association Conference, London, ON, November, 2014.
“Baby on Board: American Horror Story’s Gothic Babies” presented at ACCUTE conference at Brock University in May 2014.
“Creepy Little Girl,” International Gothic Association Conference, University of Surrey, UK, August 2013.
“I Want my Mummy!” ACCUTE Conference, Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, Victoria, BC, June 2013.
“Imperfections,” “Imperfections” panel sponsored by English Studies in Canada, part of the ACCUTE Conference, Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, Victoria, BC, June 2013.
“The Limits of Knowledge in fin de siècle Gothic Fiction,” NeMLA (Northeastern Modern Languages Association), Boston, Mass., March 2013.