A collection of personal essays, media crticism, and coursework
A tale of two lotus casinos
Analyzing Two Very Different Percy Jacksons and the State of the Modern Adaptations originally published on: https://issuu.com/thepostgradgazette/docs/the_post_grad_gazette_mar._19_2025/s/70777254 Percy Jackson was my entire life in the third to fourth grade. I read and reread the books constantly (even one time aloud…
Keep readingSabrina Carpenter, Sex, politics, oh my!
Originally published on: https://issuu.com/thepostgradgazette/docs/pgg_9_jan25-final/s/64792588 I was at dinner with two of my best friends from high school back in December. One of the things I love most about when we get together is how deeply we can analyze (one might…
Keep readingNew York Smells Like Virginia
Originally published on: https://issuu.com/thepostgradgazette/docs/pgg_7_sept24_final/s/57141444 The first thing I noticed was the water. If I close my eyes in the shower, I’m back in my grandmother’s upstairs bathroom. Northern tap water, my Tias used to say, came from springs, not swamps…
Keep readingConfessions of a delusional girl
Originally Published in: https://issuu.com/thepostgradgazette/docs/pgg_4_feb24_final/s/43988454 I’m on a first date and texting updates to my friend from the toilet. First, the rundown: he’s cute, he paid for dinner AND drinks, he dresses good, we are now at a bar playing darts, I’m winning…
Keep readingYaya: Essay on home
My grandmother, my Yaya, died last Tuesday. This Thursday, I’ll board a plane and go, for perhaps the last time ever, to my Yaya’s house. Growing up, visiting Yaya in Virginia was my favorite thing in the whole world. We’d…
Keep reading“The Husband Stich” and Symbolic Representations of Female Personhood
Carmen Maria Machado’s “The Husband Stich” is a retelling of the classic children’s story “The Girl With The Green Ribbon” through a feminist lens. The woman at the center of this narrative is a representation and placeholder for the universal…
Keep reading“To Room Nineteen”, “the midnight zone”, and cultural fears of motherhood
Both “To Room Nineteen” and “The Midnight Zone” play with cultural fears and issues women have surrounding patriarchal expectations of motherhood, and by extension womanhood. The main women in the stories use two opposite approaches to address these issues, one…
Keep readingEvil Woman? A Feminist Reading of the Wife of Bisclavret
Marie De France’s 12th Century story, Bisclavret, is one of the first werewolf stories in literature (Mark). It examines themes of loyalty, betrayal, and truth through the main character of Bisclavret, and notably, the assumed “failures” of his wife. While…
Keep readingClotel: The Failures of Sentimental Activism
William Wells Brown’s novel Clotel and its subsequent revisions tell the story of three enslaved women and the circumstances they encounter as they try to survive the south and achieve freedom. The novel argues the ineffectiveness of white abolitionists and…
Keep readingRuPaul’s Drag Race as a Reality TV Drag Performance
Drag performance is an ever-changing art that is dependent on societal ideas surrounding gender, parody, and performance. Drag has been seen as gender expression and gender subversion, but ultimately, drag is a transformative process. There is differing opinion on what…
Keep readingAdolescent Development in Clueless
In the 1995 coming of age movie, Clueless, protagonist Cher Horowitz struggles to balance her intentions of doing “good” for others with her own self-interest and general naivety. The struggles Cher faces represent many struggles of adolescent development, from her…
Keep readingA Critical Analysis Paper of Living Old in America
Aging in America is a complex, ongoing process that reveals how American society feels towards old age. Through the examination of the way society interacts, perceives, and cares for old Americans, one can understand clearly what America’s true feelings and…
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Rachel Loring 