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Monsters vs. Patriarchy
Toxic Imagination in Global Horror Cinema
by Patricia Saldarriaga and Emy Manini
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Book Presentation:
Across the globe, the violent effects of patriarchy are manifest. Women, trans people, gender-nonconforming people, and the racialized Other are regularly subjected to physical danger, beginning with the denial of vitally important health care, and, in its most horrific form, rape, trafficking, and murder. Monsters vs. Patriarchy links these real-world horrors to the monstrification and dehumanization of people as expressed in contemporary global cinema. This monstrification has been achieved through a toxic imagination attributed to women, a trait that historically referred to the power of women to negatively affect others, including their own children in the womb, with only the use of their imagination. This process reflects the misogynist and racist world in which we live, where female bodies, people of color, and alternative identities represent a threat to patriarchal power.
Monsters vs. Patriarchy examines female monstrosity as it appears in horror films from around the world and considers specific political, scientific, and historical contexts to better understand how we construct and reconstruct monstrosity, using an intersectional approach to examine the imposition of gender and racial hierarchies that support national power structures. The authors contend that monstrous female cinematic subjects, including ghosts, witches, cannibals, and posthuman beings, are becoming empowered, using the tools of their monstrification to smash the colonial, white supremacist, and misogynist structures that created them.
About the authors:
PATRICIA SALDARRIAGA is a professor of Luso-Hispanic studies at Middlebury College in Vermont. Among her publications, she is a coauthor of Infected Empires: Decolonizing Zombies (Rutgers University Press). EMY MANINI is an independent scholar working in contemporary literature and culture of the Americas. She is based in Seattle, Washington. She earned her PhD in Spanish literature from the University of Washington in 2002. She is a coauthor of Infected Empires: Decolonizing Zombies (Rutgers University Press).
Press Reviews:
"With the same far-reaching scope and incisive critical eye that they demonstrated in Infected Empires: Decolonizing Zombies, here Saldarriaga and Manini interrogate women, toxic imagination, and monstrosity in the horror film. The result is another tour de force." -- Cynthia Steele ― translator of Crónicas de la Nueva Esperanza / Chronicles of New Hope
"Monsters vs. Patriarchy is an intelligent, politically charged exploration of global horror cinema, exposing how patriarchal power dehumanizes marginalized identities through 'toxic imagination.' Essential reading for those who see horror not just as entertainment, but as a lens, a weapon, and a force for radical resistance." -- Angela Ndalianis ― author of The Horror Sensorium: Media and the Senses
See the publisher website: Rutgers University Press
> From the same authors:
> On a related topic:
The Politics of Monstrous Figures in Contemporary Cinema (2025)
Witches, Zombies, and Cyborgs Re-enchanting the Ends of the World
The Monster Always Returns (2017)
American Horror Films and Their Remakes
Monsters, Demons and Psychopaths (2016)
Psychiatry and Horror Film
Monstrous Nature (2016)
Environment and Horror on the Big Screen
by Robin L. Murray and Joseph K. Heumann
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