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Abstract: In the broadly conceived paranormal community, synchronicity is a well-traveled concept used to describe meaningful coincidences, acausal connections between parallel events. While psychologists are skeptical of the scientific verifiability of the concept, synchronicity proves useful for social scientists detailing the meaning-making process of paranormal investigators and researchers. Mobilizing the paranormal docuseries Hellier about a group of paranormal investigators examining a case of cave goblins in Hellier, Kentucky, this article interrogates the investigators’ use of the concept of synchronicity to explain various parallel events and scenes. Synchronicity also pairs with the investigators’ invocation of “the weird” to explain feelings, thinking, and the general “vibe” of the case and place, whereby synchronicity is similarly explained as “weird.” I suggest that accounting for feelings and expressions of weirdness in relation to synchronicity demonstrates how synchronistic events can potentially challenge or upend normative meaning-making processes and the ontological ground on which one stands.
Keywords: anthropology, coincidence, documentary, Hellier, paranormal
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Abstract: This article examines the sentience of Hundreds Hall in Lenny Abrahamson’s The Little Stranger (2018), and its not entirely unhuman relationship with the film’s protagonist, Dr. Faraday. Building on theories of sentient/anthropomorphic houses, this analysis situates the film as a unique contribution to narratives of this kind. Through a close visual analysis of the complexity and subtlety of the relationship between Hundreds and Faraday, the author argues that without keen focus on the use of visual refrains, especially with the oculus and staircase, this key element of the narrative may escape notice. It is this aspect of the film, ultimately, that makes it so unique: The Little Stranger coaxes viewers into accepting that its primary significance manifests in the depiction of the romance between Faraday and Hundreds amidst a backdrop of significant societal and cultural shifts in post-World War II England.
Keywords: anthropomorphic houses, haunted houses, house human romance, Lenny Abrahamson, Sarah Waters, sentient houses
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Abstract: Nightbreed (1990), the film adaptation of Clive Barker’s Cabal, has emerged from a critically panned failure at its release to the status of a legitimate cult film. However, re-examining the film today, based on the importance of folklore to the plot, the rural setting, the monstrous and othered community, and the inclusion of ritual and sacrifice, it is elevated to the level of folk horror. It follows in the tradition of foundational folk horror films, such as The Wicker Man (1973) and The Blood on Satan’s Claw (1971), by employing a rural setting to hide a monstrous, othered community that possesses its own secret lore. It echoes themes and issues in more recent folk horror fare, particularly the explorations of ancient rites and belief systems, in films like The Witch (2015) and Midsommar (2019). Recontextualizing Nightbreed as a folk horror film illustrates that many genre-specific elements were overlooked upon its original release, positioning it alongside other prominent works in the genre.
Keywords: Boone, Cabal, Clive Barker, Folk Horror, Midian, Nightbreed
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Abstract: This article analyzes a series of women-directed witch films released alongside the so-called “elevated horror” cycle of the 2010s but which approach the subject from a radically different perspective. From Zoe Lister-Jones’ The Craft: Legacy (2020) to Sophia Takal’s Black Christmas (2019), Leigh Janaik’s Fear Street trilogy (2021), and Charlotte Colbert’s She Will (2021), the history of the witch is taken in a more overtly topical direction, tapping into the history of the witch as a political symbol to make overt commentaries on the state of feminism in the 2010s. Each takes its own approach to anti-misogynist depictions of witches and witchcraft, though they share marked similarities in their conclusions. By unpacking these films as their own discrete corpus of woman-directed horror, it becomes possible to see a different angle on the witch as a cultural symbol of our witch-saturated horror moment.
Keywords: Black Christmas, Fear Street, female directors, feminism, witches, She Will, The Craft: Legacy
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Abstract: Le Fanu's Carmilla (1872) introduced one of the most influential female vampires in literary history, still reoccurring in trans muted forms today: Carmilla Karnstein. Carmilla evolved from a Victorian sensation to a timeless icon, appearing in multimedia texts throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, and is yet again portrayed as an antagonist in Netflix’s Castlevania (2017). Her multiple adaptations contributed to shaping the lesbian vampire trope as embodied bloodlust in vampire literature and film. Accordingly, the article compares Carmilla's queer evolution from her original character to her portrayal in the Netflix animated series, arguing that she has shifted from a vampire marked by same-sex desire to a radical, desexualized figure in her adaptation from Le Fanu's classic to the Netflix series. While Castlevania portrays Carmilla's sexual transgression and fluidity, her desexualization adds nuance to her presentation, moving beyond a sexually independent demoness to a radical female vampire figure that blurs the lines of femininity and masculinity. Ultimately, Carmilla's lust for blood, power, and refusal to submit to male authority shape and complicate the queerness of the lesbian vampire trope. Her consistent reconceptualization across eras, genres, and transmedia establishes Carmilla as a contemporary of Dracula himself in the larger vampire narrative.
Keywords: Queer Gothic, lesbian vampirism, vampire fiction, transmedia, adaptation
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Brewster, Scott, and Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock. The Routledge Introduction to the American Ghost Story. Routledge Introductions to American Literature. Routledge, 2025, reviewed by Jacques Parker.
Clark, John. The Green Children of Woolpit: Chronicles, Fairies and Facts in Medieval England. Exeter New Approaches to Legend, Folklore and Popular Belief. University of Exeter Press, 2024, reviewed by Maija Birenbaum.
DeVirgilis, Megan (ed. and trans.). The Female Vampire in Hispanic Literature: A Critical Anthology of Turn of the 20th Century Gothic-Inspired Tales. University of Wales Press, 2024, reviewed by Anahí Douglas.
Gooch, Joshua. Capitalism Hates You: Marxism and the New Horror Film. University of Minnesota Press, 2025, reviewed by Adam Nicholas Cohen.
Harte, Jeremy. Fairy Encounters in Medieval England: Landscape, Folklore and the Supernatural. University of Exeter Press, 2024, reviewed by Christina Carlson.
Hogle, Jerrold E. , and Robert Miles (eds). The Gothic and Theory: An Edinburgh Companion. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2019, reviewed by Sierra Duke.
Kremmel, Laura R. Romantic Medicine and the Gothic Imagination: Morbid Anatomies, Gothic Literary Studies, University of Wales Press, 2022, reviewed by Danielle Spratt.