The Mother-Daughter Dyad as Modernized Archetypal Mythology in The Last House On The Left and Carrie

This thesis analyzes The Last House on the Left (1972, Wes Craven, USA) and Carrie (1976, Brian De Palma, USA) – two horror films from the 1970s – in terms of Carl Jung’s concepts of the collective unconscious, the shadow, the feeling function, the dual nature of the mother archetype, and specifically, its constellation as the negative mother complex of the daughter. It examines the mother-daughter relationship as female-specific and a unique psychological experience, asserting how the sexual likeness to her mother imbues the daughter with a deeper understanding of her darker unconscious contents. Stressing Jung’s notion of mythology as a ‘language’ of the unconscious, this thesis presents the mother-daughter relationships featured in the films under scrutiny as contemporary manifestations of well-known Greek myths – Demeter/Persephone and Clytemnestra/Electra – and argues that their violent manifestations of mother-daughter relationships gone awry construe the films as compensatory reactions to fears of the liberated woman, bringing “to the consciousness what [has been] ignored or repressed” in the collective consciousness by patriarchal culture (Rowland, Psyche and the Arts 189-90).

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts (MA)

Level thesis:degree_level

Master's

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Media Studies

Grantor dc:publisher

Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research, University of Regina

Year dc:date.issued

2020

Author dc:creator

• Murrow, Kelsi Elizabeth

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Stojanova, Christina

Committee member dc:contributor.committeemember

• Ramsay, Christine

Language dc:language.iso

en

DOI

https://doi.org/10.82465/4961

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:uregina.scholaris.ca:10294/9225