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THE SOSLAND JOURNAL 2020 A Journal of Student Writing Mary Henn, Editor Anna Stokes, Asst. Editor Presented by the University of Missouri-Kansas City English Department through the generosity of Rheta Sosland-Huwitt and the Sosland family THE SOSLAND JOURNAL 2020 A Journal of Student Writing All works copyright © 2020 by their respective authors and used by permission. All rights reserved. This book is designed for educational use and may be used freely in classroom settings for educational purposes. Submission is open to UMKC students in writing classes. Guidelines are available at our website. info.umkc.edu/sosland_journal/ TABLE OF CONTENts Editor’s Note . v Intermediate Level Ilus W. Davis Competition Winner Psychosis in Surrealism: A Review of “Three Drops of Blood”. 1 Anahid Shook Ann Radcliffe and the Rationalized Ending: What it Teaches Us About Contemporary Horror . .11 Audrey Seider The Balance of Realistic and Stereotypical Portrayals of Homosexuality in Media. 17 Morgan Rogers Differentiating the Benefits and Hindrances of Background Music in Writing. 27 Jesse A. George Animal Protection: Studying Tiger King’s Dangerous Actions Against Animals . 41 Gina Dwyer The Crushing Weight of Big Money. 49 Mason McGregor The Cultural and Structural Implications of American Automobile Culture. 61 Lee Francis Advanced Level Ilus W. Davis Competition Winner Exposing a Misinformed and Disabled Fairytale. 73 Audrey Seider An Analysis of Harvey Weinstein’s Apology Speech. 84 Lara Makhoul Life & Decline in Mansfield Ohio: An Interview with Florence Lawson. 93 Adrienne Simmons Bring Out Your Dead: Deceased Celebrities in Advertising . 103 Dalton Blackwell Artificial Intelligence: Saving Species and Science . 119 Lindsey Gard Auto Advertising in the Age of COVID-19. 135 William Hart Contributor Notes. 141 Sosland Journal v EDITOR’S NOTE his issue of The Sosland Journal has been cultivated in an unprecedented time, especially in the world of academia. TCOVID-19 has affected individuals and communities across the globe, and our campus community at UMKC has seen drastic changes in student life and learning practices. Still, students at UMKC, as this issue of The Sosland Journal proves, have found ways to maintain their commitments to learning, achieving, and performing as ethical citizens. This year has also been impacted by the murder of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter Movement. I would like to use this space to state that The Sosland Journal stands with the movement and the black community at UMKC and elsewhere. The following pages include the work of twelve talented writers who have demonstrated their dedication and commitment to writing, research, and academic scholarship during this difficult year. From discussion of Netflix’s Tiger King to consideration of automobile advertising during the pandemic, this issue of The Sosland Journal offers student scholarship on literature, pop cutlure, art, science, and current events. It is my hope that such scholarship will spark classroom discussions, both virtual and face-to-face. As in previous issues of The Sosland Journal, this issue also offers discussion questions related to content and style after each essay. As well as encouraging discussion, the essays here can be used to consider the strategies and techniques employed by the writers of this issue. vi Sosland Journal In addition to the print edition, the current and back issues of The Sosland Journal can be accessed online through our website home: info.umkc.edu/sosland_journal/. If you have comments or ideas about ways to make The Sosland Journal more instructive and accessible, please feel free to reach out to the editorial team via email at [email protected]. The Sosland Journal is made possible through the support of Rheta Sosland-Huwitt and the Sosland family, whose generosity supports a number of programs and awards at UMKC. The editorial staff of The Sosland Journal is also grateful for the direction and support of Interim Director of Composition, Dr. Crystal Doss. Dr. Doss has supervised the production of The Sosland Journal with care for the last two years. I am personally indebted to Brynn Fitzsimmons, former editor of The Sosland Journal, for her continued support and assistance in the process of assembling this year’s issue. I am thankful for Anna Stokes, whose editorial skills, attention to detail, and overall perspective have also helped make this issue possible. Finally and most importantly, I want to thank all of the students who submitted to the The Sosland Journal this year, despite challenges faced in their personal and academic lives. I have felt a sense of privilege and renewed hope reading new student writing over the last few months. The commitment to academic achievement and progress displayed in the following pages is noteworthy. If you are reading this year’s issue of The Sosland Journal, thank you—I wish that you too will share a feeling of hope in reading the essays. Sincerely, Mary Henn Editor, The Sosland Journal ESSAYS Sosland Journal 1 INTERMEDIATE CATEGORY WINNER PSYCHOSIS IN SURREALISM: A REVIEW OF “THREE DROPS OF BLOOD” Anahid Shook Stories about the mentally compromised are sometimes told with a flourish, enticing the reader with thoughts boarding on whimsical or the opposite extremity—dark and cruel. The idea is to draw the reader into a realm where common sense does not prevail, and encourage them to seek alternative meanings to symbols or events as perceived by the ill character. Recent studies have shown that schizophrenic hallucinations in particular are dependent upon situational and cultural background (Banerjee). The story “Three Drops of Blood” begins with the narrator, Ahmad, exhibiting common behaviors associated with schizophrenia, disbelieving or questioning whether he was ever truly delusional. He proceeds to compare himself to other patients that are more outwardly ill and less verbal, as well as those who work in the facility he is incarcerated in. Throughout the story, author Sadeq Hedayat uses symbolism to assist the reader through Ahmad’s madness. In “Three Drops of Blood,” Hedayat uses symbolism to tell the story of Ahmad’s daily life in the mental institution. Ahmad begins the story by speaking about those who run the institution and its constituents, which then progresses to memories of his ex-fiancée, Rokhsareh, and his old neighbor friend, Siyavosh, who does not visit him anymore. Roksareh is mentioned at the top of the narrative as 2 Sosland Journal someone who is not present in Ahmad’s visions, when in fact she is referenced in visions in the form of a cat who is promiscuous, yet dedicated to a single tomcat. Alternatively, Siyavosh is fondly spoken about often when Ahmad remembers his time before his incarceration in the mental institution, depicting him as a favored friend with whom he spent time in college. Ahmad, throughout the story, portrays himself as a neutral party and as someone without ulterior motives. It soon becomes apparent that Ahmad uses other characters in his hallucinations to depict his darker thoughts and murderous intentions. In the end, the story becomes difficult to discern while Ahmad speaks in ways that are common to persons diagnosed with schizophrenia. At some point, the reader realizes that Ahmad’s fiancée, Roksareh, had an affair with his best friend, Siyavosh, and that Ahmad has actually been incarcerated at the mental facility for multiple years. Hedayat leads the readers through Ahmad’s schizophrenic mind using symbols such as cats, guns, the tar, birds, and specifically, three drops of blood. A symptom of schizophrenic disorders includes severe paranoia, which Ahmad displays when he expects the physician to attempt to poison him. Delusions of grandeur or superiority, depending on interpretation, are also exhibited in the same breath when Ahmad criticizes the physician’s technique of patient care and treatment, stating, “If I were [the physician], I’d give everyone poison in their dinner one night, and then, in the morning, I’d stand in the garden with my hands on my hips and watch them carry out the corpses” (Hedayat 94). Obviously, this is not a realistic response to sick patients or treatment, but it hints to how Ahmad views those other patients—below him and of no consequence if they were to be disposed of. Another delusion involves some narcissism: Ahmad claims that a young girl obviously likes him and brought flowers for him when another patient, Abbas, swept through and pulled the young girl away to kiss her. It is up to interpretation of the reader whether Abbas was a fabricated personality of Ahmad and if the family that Sosland Journal 3 the girl belonged to was indeed his own (Hedayat 96). Hedayat finely illustrates skimming the line between the diagnosed symptoms of schizophrenia and an imagined disbelief of reality using symbolism in his characterization of Ahmad. Immediately, one of the first symbols introduced to us is the theme of the cat. Ahmad notes that the warder—the physician who runs the mental hospital—has lost his canary from the cage outside of his window to a free-roaming cat (Hedayat 95). Throughout the story, Ahmad focuses on the killing of cats by shooting, even though he never admits to harming a cat himself. This may invoke a power fantasy where Ahmad has the power to enact revenge on those who wronged him without allowing himself to be seen as the actual perpetrator. He creates characters that act out in ways that he believes are below him, and thus Ahmad uses characters such as Abbas, the warder, and Siyavosh. It was once believed that having dual personalities was a common symptom of schizophrenia, though current literature explains how dissociative identity disorder and schizophrenia are unrelated mental illnesses (Fischer). When these multiple different characters kill cats using a gun, Ahmad is always witness and never expresses any emotional attachment or dismay to the murder of these cats.

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