2016 Theses Bachelor's

The Wicked Witch: Exploring Medea, Tituba, and Sula as Figures of Deviance and Non-Normativity

Gorla, Erasmia

This paper explores the portrayal of three women understood as witches in literature: Medea, Tituba, and Sula. I examine these women within the context of their communities, with a focus on the relationship between the women and their normative community-members as well as the methods by which the women's communities deem them as Other. I explore, as well, the characteristics common to all three of these women—shared, too, by various self-identified and accused witches throughout history and literature—including the practice of magic, the expression of a transgressive sexuality and a tendency toward filicide. Central texts include: Argonautica, Apollonius; Medea, Seneca; Metamorphoses, Ovid; Sula, Morrison; Moi, Tituba sorcière, Condé; and Caliban and the Witch, Federici.