Horror Stories Research Articles

How Do Trauma and Identity Unfold Through Dialogue? A Psychoanalytic and Linguistic Analysis of Netflix's Slasher Solstice

This study aims to explore the relationship between trauma, desire, and identity through language patterns in the Netflix series Slasher: Solstice. Using a psychoanalytic and linguistic analysis approach, the research delves into how characters' dialogues and speech styles reflect their psychological states, particularly in confronting past traumas. The study employs a qualitative method with observational analysis of the interactions and dialogues of the main characters within the series. The results reveal that speech patterns, word choice, and intonation provide deep insights into the characters' psychological conditions. For instance, the character Connor displays aggressive and fragmented speech patterns as a defense mechanism against trauma, while the character Sadia exhibits emotional control through structured and formal language. This research offers a new perspective by combining psychoanalytic and linguistic approaches to understand character development within the horror genre. The analysis reveals that shifts in language style, as the narrative unfolds, indicate a transformation in the characters' identities, increasingly shaped by trauma and internal conflict.

An agar horror story and identifying a reddish liquid

An agar horror story and identifying a reddish liquid

Horror after Elevated: A Study of the Film Style of Ari Aster

American director Ari Aster is a representative director of the emerging horror genre of elevated horror, and his three feature films have revolutionized the language of the horror genre and gained great reputation in the industry and among fans. Through analyzing the three feature films and eight short films directed by him, from the two levels of aesthetic style and thematic expression respectively. It explains the spatial narration, mise-en-scène, the use of lens, and the use of sound present in the works of Ari Aster, and points out the thematic ideas of Ari Aster's works about pathological family relationships and the psychological dilemmas of the characters.

"I Found it Cathartic": Exploring Empathy and Mental Health Awareness in Psychological Horror Video Games

Horror video games have often been criticized for their negative and unrealistic depiction of mental health, primarily through their portrayal of characters with mental illnesses. Such representations can perpetuate stigma and misconceptions about mental health issues. However, there has recently been a growing interest in accurate portrayals of these characters and how playing these video games could also elicit empathy and mental health awareness. In our study, we explored how a psychological horror game such as Silent Hill 2 could foster empathy and mental health awareness through individual interviews with 11 participants. Our findings revealed that participants gained a deeper understanding of mental health issues and empathy towards characters struggling with mental illnesses by interacting and controlling them. Participants had a greater attachment to the characters' inner struggles and their gameplay was experienced as cathartic. Moreover, our findings highlighted the potential of psychological horror to serve as a platform for character-driven narratives, showcasing how engagement with such games elicited empathy among participants. We contribute to an exploratory understanding that can assist game designers and writers in crafting narratives within the Psychological Horror genre that foster empathy and mental health awareness.

SEARCH FOR THE LINGUOCULTUROLOGICAL PRINCIPLE OF TRANSLATING METAPHORS IN STEPHEN KING’S SMALL WORKS (BASED ON STORIES “THE APT PUPIL” AND “RAINY SEASON”)

This article analyzes the creative heritage of the American writer Stephen King who has become famous for his works in the genres of horror literature and dark fantasy. In the course of the study, the authors study semantic, functional, structural metaphors, their stylistic and linguocultural features using the example of Stephen King’s stories “The Apt Pupil” and “Rainy Season”. The research methodology is based on a comparative analysis of the original works and translations by Russian linguists S.E. Task, M.V. Opaleva, V.V. Antonov, I.G. Pochitalin, B.G. Lyubartsev, V.A. Weber. The chronological framework of the study covers the period of the conceptualization of Stephen King’s work (translations by S.E. Task and I.G. Pochitalin) from 1991 to the latest experiments in the linguocultural rethinking of the comparative method (translation by V.V. Antonov) in 2012-2013. The main course of the study directed at analyzing the characteristic features of original metaphors and their translation forms, which lose and gain unique cultural features in comparison with the context in English. This approach clearly demonstrates not only the diversity of the author’s idiostyle, which touches on both the mystical-religious and personal feelings of the modern man, but also the acute social problems of modern society. It allows us to trace the emergence of new meanings in translated forms of metaphors. The results of the study show that quite often translators of Stephen King, trying to adapt the text, lose flexibility.

Is that too scary?

Dr Charlottte Baker, associate lecturer at Derby University, speaks to authors, lecturers, students and practitioners to discuss the value of sharing scary stories with young children, in time for Halloween at the end of October.

“No Way Out”: The Gothic Concept of Home in Shirley Jackson’s Horror Fiction

The “haunted house formula” is a central component in every Female Gothic narrative from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Typically, it revolves around a heroine trapped in a gloomy mansion, seeking to escape a male villain. This trope, which covertly explores feminine anxieties such as domestic confinement and familial oppression, recurs multiple times in Shirley Jackson’s “house trilogy” as well, namely The Sundial, The Haunting of Hill House, and We Have Always Lived in the Castle. However, as noted by many critics, while Female Gothic narratives usually conclude with the protagonist’s successful escape and her marriage to the male hero, in Jackson’s fiction, there is “no way out”. Her protagonists remain confined within the domestic space. This essay explores Jackson’s reappropriation of the haunted house trope as a symbol of the paranoia experienced by women in 1950s suburban America. The analysis begins by outlining the theme in traditional Female Gothic fiction, followed by an account of the sociohistorical context in which Jackson operated, without dismissing the significancy of her personal life experiences as well. Jackson’s “house trilogy” will then be examined, paying particular attention to the ways in which the haunted house formula is subverted to function not as an escape narrative, but as a metaphor for modern women’s inescapable confinement.

Ableism in the Air: Disability Panic in Stephen King’s The Stand

Abstract This article uses Stephen King’s 1990, uncut release of his famous 1978 horror novel The Stand to reveal the ways the contemporary horror genre implements the language of pandemics and contagious disease to promote ableist ideas about disability. The horror novel villainizes an antagonist as a central function of its plot. When the antagonist is an airborne disease that inflicts disability and death upon its victims, the novel can be a site of production for what I term “disability panic,” a fear and disgust at the possibility of becoming disabled, and a contempt for those who already are. This article argues that The Stand calls attention to how stereotypes and misconceptions around illness-induced disability form in times of crisis. This article merges genre studies in horror, disability language, and rhetoric of disease in literature to uncover how King reveals that the language of the horror novel can contribute to a cultural fear and hatred of disability. This novel, though written decades ago, mimics the language of corona virus disease 2019 in current popular media. This article demonstrates how fear of airborne disease in a horror novel can increase fear of real-life pandemics and contribute to ableist views of those suffering from illness-related disability.

Learn from Customer Complaint Horror Stories

The best stories about water customers’ complaints and employees’ experiences in the field can also be the best tools for training laboratory staff.

Unveiling the Uncanny: A Study of Gothic Elements in Jinnistan by Ayesha Muzaffar

This research explores the gothic elements in Jinnistan by Ayesha Muzaffar. This study utilizes the theory of uncanny by Sigmund Freud as a theoretical framework. Freud explores the word play between the concept of "homely" and its opposite, leading some to associate the unheimlich with the notion of the "unfamiliar." The study also uses Catherine Belsey’s textual analysis as an analytical framework. Gothic literature is a worldwide recognized genre. Gothic stories included symbols that symbolically conveyed the inner suffering of their tortured protagonists, such as supernatural phenomenon, unsettling environments, and ruined architectural settings. In Pakistan, gothic fiction is in its emerging phase with only a few writers exploring this genre in their noteworthy writings. Ayesha Muzaffar is a notable author in realm of horror fiction. The analysis of this study focuses on how the cultural elements have influenced the elements of uncanny in Jinnistan. This study aims to get better understanding of the evolutionary progression of gothic elements within Pakistani literature.

Contemporary Horror Story-Telling: Its Function and Reproduction of the Belief in Ghosts in the Thai Context

This article explores the function and reproduction of the belief in ghosts in the context of current Thailand through contemporary horror story-telling on the Internet. The study reveals that contemporary horror story-telling employs motifs and tale types as key elements in creating fear. Horror stories can be categorized into three tale types: ghost, sixth sense, and haunted place. Key motifs are the characters, objects, events or actions, and places. Contemporary horror story-telling plays crucial roles in creating entertainment, shaping moral standards in the society, reflecting fears, concerns, and problems in the contemporary society, and passing on Buddhist belief and ceremonies in the Thai setting. The transition from traditional horror story-telling to online platform exemplifies a success formula of horror stories on ghosts, which have long been popular in Thai society. Horror stories are reproduced as a vehicle for traditional horror story-telling in the contemporary Thai context. The phenomenon highlights the prevalent notion of traditional ghost stories while also building a new framework of horror stories tailored to the modern period.

Creepypasta and “the Fabrègues Affair”: Imitation and aggression in a recent case of youth violence

This article offers a critical analysis of “the Fabrègues Affair” (2022), a case of youth violence in which two twelve-year-old girls carried out a series of stabbings, resulting in the death of one of their fathers. What was initially viewed as a simple “family tragedy [ drame intrafamilial]” ballooned into a national conversation when the girls claimed, after their arrest, that their violent act had been inspired by “creepypasta,” crowdsourced online horror fictions and videos. While the crime, in its purported relation to digital forms of storytelling, appears eminently specific to the present moment, and while news coverage consistently emphasized the girls’ femininity and sexual orientation in an apparent attempt to further sensationalize their act, the conventional wisdom, as it appears in media coverage of the case, exposes a striking reliance among commentators on outdated psychoanalytic models that do not attend to the specificities of the moment, or to questions of gender and sexuality. This article explores how theories of the relationship between imitation and aggression have been applied in “the Fabrègues Affair” before proposing alternative feminist approaches to understanding the social phenomenon of violent behaviors among girls who appear to draw inspiration from imaginary monsters. In doing so, it aims to contribute new perspectives, drawn from feminist theory and horror studies, to girlhood and childhood studies in the contemporary French context.

Integrating sound effects and background music in Robotic storytelling – A series of online studies across different story genres

Social robots as storytellers combine advantages of human storytellers – such as embodiment, gestures, and gaze – and audio books – large repertoire of voices, sound effects, and background music. However, research on adding non-speech sounds to robotic storytelling is yet in its infancy. The current series of four online studies investigates the influence of sound effects and background music in robotic storytelling on recipients’ storytelling experience and enjoyment, robot perception, and emotion induction across different story genres, i.e. horror, detective, romantic and humorous stories. Results indicate increased enjoyment for romantic stories and a trend for decreased fatigue for all genres when adding sound effects and background music to the robotic storytelling. Of the four genres examined, horror stories seem to benefit the most from the addition of non-speech sounds. Future research should provide guidelines for the selection of music and sound effects to improve the realization of non-speech sound-accompanied robotic storytelling. In conclusion, our ongoing research suggests that the integration of sound effects and background music holds promise for enhancing robotic storytelling, and our genre comparison provides first guidance of when to use them.

A COMPOSITIONAL EXPLORATION OF THE HORROR ELEMENTS IN THE SHINING, DRACULA AND THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE: A COMPARATIVE STUDY

The horror genre has captivated audiences across various media, eliciting a range of emotions through its skillful manipulation of compositional elements. This research paper explores the intricate tapestry of narrative structure, character development, atmospheric construction, and thematic exploration that shape the horror experience. By employing a mixed-methods approach, integrating qualitative textual and visual analysis with quantitative data on audience responses, this study delves into the intricate dynamics of intermedial adaptation. Through a comprehensive examination of renowned literary horror works and their cinematic counterparts, including "The Shining" by Stephen King, "Dracula" by Bram Stoker, and "The Haunting of Hill House" by Shirley Jackson, this research unveils the creative strategies employed by writers and filmmakers to evoke fear, suspense, and thrill. The quantitative analysis provides empirical evidence of audience engagement and emotional resonance, while the qualitative exploration unravels the nuanced compositional elements and adaptation techniques. By synthesizing these complementary perspectives, this study contributes to a deeper understanding of the horror experience across media platforms, offering valuable insights for artists, scholars, and audiences alike. Ultimately, this research underscores the enduring cultural significance of horror narratives and their potential to provoke meaningful discourse while captivating generations to come.

Madness and Fear. Horror in Władysław Reymont’s Short Story I Killed!

The article discusses the generic features of Władysław Stanisław Reymont’s short story I Killed!in the context of horror fi ction. The work’s generic status carries specifi c interpretative implications.Through the language of horror Reymont emphasizes the possible horror of a revolutionary uprising.

Viralization of Mystic Stories and Lore in Horror Films Produced by Indonesia

This research aims to investigate the influence of social media influencers and title-naming on the success of the horror genre. Influencers are vital in promoting a film through social media. Engaging influencers’ reviews can reach a broader and more diverse audience. This ability becomes a unique appeal to introduce a film title to their followers so that the title can create curiosity among the enthusiasts on the depiction of the atmosphere. This research is conducted using a qualitative approach. The main data of this research is the influencer, horror films, and films synopsis released in 2023. The data are collected by tracking the internet. This research covers 1) The phenomena of horror film influencers 2) The use of titles in horror films 3) The criteria of horror films in cinemas. This research recommends film activists give some space for influencers as a strategy to uplift the appeal of a film.

Revealing the Visual Structure of the 1981 and 2019 Versions of Ratu Ilmu Hitam Film Posters

The horror film Queen of Black Magic, which is a remake of the film with the same title, was released in 1981 and 2019. This film was released with the same title, but with different characters. The 1981 version features Suzzanna as the horror queen as the main character, while the 2019 version does not feature Suzzanna and the main character is not famous. This film with the title black magic has become an iconic film, because it emphasizes the word science for horror stories. The word black, which is synonymous with magic, is juxtaposed with the word science, thus forming a paradoxical word relationship. The queen is a figure and incarnation of a ghost, which directly places the ghost in a noble and respected position. The posters for the two films have different designs because of the strength of the ideas, social and cultural atmosphere that exist in the two posters with the large distance between the years of release. This research aims to determine the differences in design concepts between two film poster designs. This analysis is based on Levi Strauss’s version of structuralism theory which reveals that the 1981 version of the Queen of Black Magic poster emphasizes the importance of Suzzanna as a figure or queen of horror who attracts public attention, while the 2019 version of the Queen of Black Magic poster emphasizes the exploration of the formation of visual elements that lead to the meaning of black magic.

Laboratory horror stories: Poison in the agars.

The fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe is a single-celled eukaryote that can be cultured as a haploid or as a diploid. Scientists employ mating, meiosis, and the plating of ascospores and cells to generate strains with novel genotypes and to discover biological processes. Our two laboratories encountered independently sudden-onset, major impediments to such research. Spore suspensions and vegetative cells no longer plated effectively on minimal media. By systematically analyzing multiple different media components from multiple different suppliers, we identified the source of the problem. Specific lots of agar, from different suppliers, were toxic. Interestingly, the inhibitory effect was attenuated on rich media. Consequently, quality control checks that use only rich media can provide false assurances on the quality of the agar. Lastly, we describe likely sources of the toxicity and we provide specific guidance for quality control measures that should be applied by all vendors as preconditions for their sale of agar.

Decision making factors regarding hospice care: A qualitative exploration in patients with recurrent ovarian cancer.

e24035 Background: Women with recurrent ovarian cancer (ROC) often must make end-of-life choices involving hospice care. We qualitatively explored patients’ (pt) understanding of hospice, and main decision-making factors. Methods: Pts were recruited by purposive sampling for semi-structured interviews, which were recorded, transcribed, and consensus coded. Results: 40 pts completed interviews. Median age = 63.4 yrs and time since diagnosis = 5.5 yrs. Important facilitators and barriers to hospice emerged. Key facilitators included: 1) desire to reduce care burden on family; 2) desire for a high quality death; and 3) acceptance (not afraid to die). On reducing care burden, one pt noted: “ I would think that the single most important factor would be the relief that it would give my family members. That they would not bear nearly as large a burden if hospice were to pick up part of that...” On desire for a high quality death, and acceptance: “ I’d wanna go out with as much dignity as possible...if it’s my time to go, let me go. I don’t wanna be...connected to all kinds of IVs and tubes and things just to keep my heart beating .”. Key barriers were: 1) lack of knowledge about hospice; 2) equating hospice to ‘giving up’; 3) loss of faith; and 4) letting go of perceived life-extending medical care like hydration or nutrition. Lack of knowledge was a prevalent theme: “ You only do hospice when it’s at the very end of the road. But maybe that’s not true. Maybe you do that to get some special care for a couple of months to get you through a tough...time. I guess I don’t know.” On giving up: “I would not say I'm a fan of it (hospice) at all...I would rather go out fighting....to me it's like giving up...I can't really imagine that I would actually do that.’Regarding loss of faith or letting go of perceived life-extending care: “ Well, my thoughts on how it works is I'm really not sure. They're there to keep you comfortable in your last days, but I don't know because I've heard so many horror stories with hospice...yeah they keep your pain down, but they don't give you faith. They don't give you hydration... it's like, God, pretty much starving you to death. But I don't know if that's true. I mean, that's just what I've heard.” A pivotal decision making factor that could be either a facilitator or barrier was family support for hospice, reinforcing the need for shared decision-making among the pt, family and clinical care team. One pt stated: “ It's an emotional toll, financial toll, it’s a physical toll on the family...and I would just want to talk to my family about all aspects of it, and then they would go from there, what they would want to do, or what I would want to.” Conclusions: Understanding perceived barriers and facilitators to hospice care through elicitation of pt beliefs and values and focusing efforts on educating pts and their support systems about the role of hospice can empower women with ROC to make informed pt-centered decisions about their end-of-life care.

Cyborg Skin

We are pleased to present an excellent collection of articles that represent the newest directions in what Barbara Stafford called “body criticism.” The authors in this issue of Screen Bodies work in diverse fields and employ a wide range of methods, but all share a concern with spectatorship and the ways that the effects of screen-based technology are mediated by the body. This research centers women and offers advancements in feminist film theory, posthumanism, and studies of the horror genre.