About

If you are reading this, hello! In the following months, this domain will be the home of my independent study in the field of the digital humanities. I am a graduate student in the English and Writing M.A. program at Kean University in Union N.J.

First, I'd like to tell you a bit about myself. A large part of my interest lies in exploring the literature and history of the Medieval, Renaissance, and Victorian periods. I find it fascinating to look into the past to learn the intricacies that have shaped the world we live in. I believe that great amounts of truth can be uncovered in excavating the past.

In the same way that it is important to study the past, it is crucial to look to the future. Herein lies the other side of my interests- utopian and dystopian worlds. Going back to Thomas More's Utopia, mankind has long been fascinated by the concept of unattainable perfection. When "utopia," literally "no place," goes bad, we are left with the remnants, a fractured, dystopian society of darkness. I am fascinated by the turning points, the why behind the turn, and the role of society to fight back and rebuild. If you notice the title of my blog, it's a play on two of my favorite dystopian stories, Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami, and Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley.

I was a traditional English major in my undergrad career, I am well acquainted with close reading and the various literary theories. I am deeply rooted in tradition and hold it close to my heart. That being said, upon beginning my graduate career at Kean, I was introduced to a new kind of methodology, the Digital Humanities. I love learning new uses for technology, and what could be better than using it to identify new things about the books we have long pored over in the traditional ways?

This semester I will be unpacking the digital humanities (DH) in hopes of finding a methodology that I will use in my graduate thesis, which will be some synthesis of DH and themes in utopian/dystopian literature. Won't you join me in my adventure?