Witchcraft and Adolescence in American Popular Culture

Miranda Corcoran

Description

In the decades since the Second World War, the teenage witch has emerged as a major American cultural trope. Appearing in films, novels, comics and on television, adolescent witches have long reflected shifting societal attitudes towards the teenage demographic. At the same time, teen witches have also served as a means through which adolescent femininity can be conceptualised, interrogated and reimagined. Drawing on a wide theoretical framework – including the works of Deleuze and Foucault as well as recent new materialist philosophies – this book explores how the adolescent witch has evolved over the course of more than seventy years. Moving from the birth of the bobby soxer in the 1940s through to twenty-first-century teenage engagements with fourth-wave feminism, the author discusses a range of themes including embodiment, agency, identity, violence and sexuality.

List of Abbreviations of Frequently Referenced Texts
Introduction
Chapter 1: Towards a Teratology of the Teenage Witch
Chapter 2
‘Bitch Witches’: Marion Starkey and the Birth of the Post-War Teenage Witch
Chapter 3
‘Leave Something Witchy’: Identity Formation and Perverse Readers in the Long 1960s
Chapter 4
Makeover Narratives and Glamourous Transformations: The Postfeminist Teen Witch
Chapter 5
‘How could there not be a choice? Free will?’: Agency and Choice in Teen Witch Texts of the Fourth Wave
Index

Sujets

• Feminist
• Literary Criticism

Informations

• Publié par: University of Wales Press
• Date de parution: 15 juillet 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781786838933
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 6 Mo

Extrait

WITCHCRAFT AND ADOLESCENCE IN AMERICAN POPULAR CULTURE Teen Witches

HORROR STUDIES

Series Editor Xavier Aldana Reyes, Mancester Metropolitan University

Editorial Board Stacey Abbott, Roeampton University Linnie Blake, Mancester Metropolitan University Harry M. Bensoff, University of Nort Texas Fred Botting, Kingston University Steven Brum, Western University Steffen Hantke, Sogang University Joan Hawkins, Indiana University Alexandra Heller-Nicolas, Deakin University Agnieszka Soltysik Monnet, University of Lausanne Bernice M. Murpy, Trinity College Dublin Jonny Walker, Nortumbria University Maisa Wester, Indiana University Bloomington

Preface Horror Studies is te first book series exclusively dedicated to te study of te genre in its various manifestations – from fiction to cinema and television, magazines to comics, and extending to oter forms of narrative texts suc as video games and music. Horror Studies aims to raise te profile of Horror and to furter its academic institutionalisation by providing a publising ome for cutting-edge researc. As an exciting new venture witin te establised Cultural Studies and Literary Criticism programme, Horror Studies will expand te field in innovative and student-friendly ways.

WITCHCRAFT AND ADOLESCENCE IN AMERICAN POPULAR CULTURE Teen Witches

MIRANDA CORCORAN

UNIVERSITY OF WALES PRESS 2022

© Miranda Corcoran, 2022

All rigts reserved. No part of tis book may be reproduced in any material form (including potocopying or storing it in any medium by electronic means and weter or not transiently or incidentally to some oter use of tis publication) witout te written permission of te copyrigt owner except in accordance wit te provisions of te Copyrigt, Designs and Patents Act. Applications for te copyrigt owner’s written permission to reproduce any part of tis publication sould be addressed to te University of Wales Press, University Registry, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff, CF10 3NS.

www.uwp.co.uk

Britis Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for tis book is available from te Britis Library.

ISBN 978-1-78683-892-6 eISBN 978-1-78683-893-3

he rigt of Miranda Corcoran to be identified as autor of tis work as been asserted in accordance wit sections 77 and 79 of te Copyrigt, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

Typeset by Cris Bell, cbdesign

Printed by CPI Antony Rowe, Melksam, United Kingdom

Contents

Acknowledgements

List of Abbreviations

Introduction

1. Towards a Teratology of the Teenage Witch

2. ‘A Pack of “BobbySoxers”’ Marion L. Starkey and the Birth of the PostWar Teenage Witch

3.‘A guide to life’ Identity Formation and Perverse Readers in the Long 1960s

4. BecomingWitch Makeover Narratives and Glamorous Transformations

5. ‘How could there not be a choice?’ Agency and Power in FourthWave Teen Witch Texts

Conclusion ‘By then I might be an entirely different person’

Endnotes

Select Bibliograpy

Index

vii

ix

1

21

55

91

127

163

195

205

235

243

Acknowledgements

HIS BOOK is te product of tree-years’ wort of researc and writ- T ing, but it is also te product of a lifelong interest in witces, orror and te Gotic. I owe an immense debt of gratitude to my moter, Mary Corcoran, wo appily indulged er strange daugter wit weekend trips to te library and te video store. I am so tankful for er support, guid- ance and understanding. Se as always been tere for me, even toug te academic world I presently inabit is a million miles from were we started. I also want to express my deep, eartfelt tanks to my partner Andrea Di Carlo for is endless love and support.Ti voglio bene.I am also lucky to ave ad te support of wonderful friends. I am immensely grateful to Cara O’Callagan, Brian Farran, Laura Quirke, Erik Grayson, Edel Semple and Evelyn Hurley for teir kindness and ability to distract me from te rigours of researc. Equally, I am so fortunate to ave ad a number of academic collaborators wo ave also become dear friends: Steve Gronert Elleroff, Jeffrey Kaan, Miniature Malekpour and Anne Maler. I would also like to tank everyone involved wit teNew Ray Bradbury Reviewandhe Iris Journal of Gotic and Horror Studies for creating two intellectually enricing, yet always welcoming, communi- ties. I am supremely tankful to Kat Ellinger and everyone atDiabolique magazine, not only for publising my work, but for being an all-round group of wonderful people. I am incredibly lucky to ave worked for te past number of years wit kind and compassionate colleagues in te Department of Englis,

viii Acknowledgements •

University College Cork. heir support and understanding ave been end- less and unfailing. hank you as well to my students (past and present, undergraduate and postgraduate): you are always so inspiring. Lastly, I would like to tank everyone wo elped and guided me as I worked on tis book. I am enormously grateful to te anonymous reviewer wose insigtful feedback and constructive criticism saped te present monograp into its final form. A uge tank you to University of Wales Press (UWP) Head of Commissioning Sara Lewis for er patience and kindness. I am likewise indebted to everyone involved wit te UWP Horror Studies series for giving my first monograp a ome. hank you to Peg Aloi for sending me copies of er previously publised work. I would also like to express my boundless appreciation to Steve Gronert Elleroff, Jeffrey Kaan and Andrea Di Carlo for reading drafts of tis book, weter in wole or in part.

List of Abbreviations

‘AW’

Ca

CAS

Cr

CW

DM

LOC

‘SD’

Ray Bradbury, ‘he April Witc’, inFrom te Dust Returned (London: Eartligt, Simon & Scuster, 2001), pp. 21–35.

Stepen King,CarrieHodder & Stougton, (London: 1974), Kindle edition.

Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and Robert Hack,he Cilling Adventures of Sabrina (vol. 1) (New York: Arcie Comics, 2016).

Artur Miller,he Crucible(London: Penguin, [1953] 2000), Kindle edition.

Afia Atakora,Conjure Women(London: 4t Estate, 2020).

Marion L. Starkey,he Devil in Massacusetts: A Mod- ern Inquiry into te Salem Witc Trials(New York: Ancor Books, [1949] 1989).

Micael homas Ford,Love and Oter CursesYork: (New HarperTeen, 2019).

Ray Bradbury, ‘he Sleeper and Her Dreams’, inFrom te Dust ReturnedEartligt, Simon & Scuster, (London: 2001), pp. 17–19.