| Disgust and Desire: The Paradox of the Monster Contributor(s): Wright, Kristen (Editor) |
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ISBN: 900435073X ISBN-13: 9789004350731 Publisher: Brill OUR PRICE: $59.85 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: January 2018 |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Social Science | Sociology - General - Social Science | Popular Culture |
| Series: At the Interface / Probing the Boundaries |
| Physical Information: 0.4" H x 6.1" W x 9.2" (0.60 lbs) 200 pages |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: Monsters have taken many forms across time and cultures, yet within these variations, monsters often evoke the same paradoxical response: disgust and desire. We simultaneously fear monsters and take pleasure in seeing them, and their role in human culture helps to explain this apparent contradiction. Monsters are created in order to delineate where the acceptable boundaries of action and emotion exist. However, while killing the monster allows us to cast out socially unacceptable desires, the prevalence of monsters in both history and fiction reveals humanity's desire to see and experience the forbidden. We seek, write about, and display monsters as both a warning and wish fulfilment, and monsters, therefore, reveal that the line between desire and disgust is often thin. Looking across genres, subjects, and periods, this book examines what our conflicted reaction to the monster tells us about human culture. |
