Shadows on the Small Screen: The Televisuality and Generic Hybridity of Southern Gothic

Abstract

Though many current and recent examples of Southern Gothic television fall into the category of supernatural and are organized around the conventions of the horror genre, they exhibit generic hybridity, remaining rooted in the grotesque, drawing heavily on the legacies of Southern Gothic literature, and encompassing the history and concerns of the South. The televisuality of the Southern Gothic series emphasizes the ambiguous contours of the vegetation-clothed landscape and the humidity of the climate, as well as the psychological states that underlie the text. The resulting admixtures of people and races, past and present, and literary source texts contribute to a blending and blurring of genre. Case studies include Carnivale, True Blood, The Vampire Diaries, True Detective and American Horror Story Coven.