Assistant Professor of Teaching, Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Social Justice, Chair, Undergraduate Program and Undergraduate Academic Advisor

Biography

Dr. Kim Snowden is an Assistant Professor of Teaching in Feminist Media Studies and Popular Culture at the Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Social Justice. She has a PhD in Women’s and Gender Studies from UBC and has taught at the Institute since 2004. Her primary fields of scholarship and teaching are cultural studies, literary studies, film studies, popular culture, and fairy tale studies. She teaches courses on social media, folk and fairy tales, vampires, science fiction and fantasy, social justice storytelling, young adult literature, and monsters. She is currently a GRSJ Academic Advisor for undergraduate students.

Research

My research focuses on fairy-tale motifs in vampire popular culture and I am working on a project about the use of fairy tales in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Fairy tale archetypes are frequently employed in Buffy in specific fairy-tale episodes and more generally throughout the series. My focus is on the character of Buffy because she inverts many fairy tale archetypes, and I argue that Whedon employs them as a paradox for Buffy, representing the push and pull between more traditional rites of passage and the power of the slayer legacy. In particular, I read Buffy discursively with variations of “Little Red Riding Hood” exploring the series as a variation of the tale and Buffy herself as Red.

My most recent research is on fandoms and fan culture, looking at the gendered, sexual, and racial politics of shipping with a focus on The Vampire Diaries and The 100. I am interested in the affect of fandoms, in particular the way that shipping characters can create space for queer readings, community, and alternative forms of representation. But I am also interested in the grey areas created in fandoms where affective responses often slip into bullying and harassment and a sense of entitlement to certain story outcomes. I am also currently developing a course on fandoms.

Selected Publications

Journal articles and editorials

Rev of. The Gothic Fairy Tale in Young Adult Literature: Essays on Stories from Grimm toGaiman edited by Joe Abbruscato and Tanya Jones. Marvels & Tales, Vol 31, No. 1, Spring 2017, pp. 171-174.

Rev. of Queer Enchantments: Gender, Sexuality, and Class in the Fairy-Tale Cinema of Jacques

Rev. of H & G (Dir. Danishka Esterhazy) Marvels and Tales: Journal of Fairy Tale Studies Vol. 28, No. 2 (2014)

Rev of Beyond Adaptation: Radical Transformations of Original Works edited by Phyllis Frus and Christy Williams. Marvels and Tales: Journal of Fairy Tale Studies Vol 25, No 2 (2011).

“ Gendered Multiplicities: Women Write Diaspora.” Canadian Literature 96 (Spring 2008)

“ (Un)satisfying Hunger.” Rev of The Hungry Mirror by Lisa de Nikolits and Porny Stories by Eva Moran. Canadian Literature 208 (Spring 2011).

Numerous editorials, reviews and short essays for thirdspace: a journal of feminist theory and culture , 2001 – 2008.

Book chapters

“ Fairy Tale Film in the Classroom: Creating Feminist Cultural Pedagogy.” In Fairy Tale Films: Visions of Ambiguity . Edited by Pauline Greenhill and Sidney Eve Matrix. Utah State UP, 2010.

Dr. Kim Snowden is an Assistant Professor of Teaching in Feminist Media Studies and Popular Culture at the Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Social Justice. She has a PhD in Women’s and Gender Studies from UBC and has taught at the Institute since 2004. Her primary fields of scholarship and teaching are cultural studies, literary studies, film studies, popular culture, and fairy tale studies. She teaches courses on social media, folk and fairy tales, vampires, science fiction and fantasy, social justice storytelling, young adult literature, and monsters. She is currently a GRSJ Academic Advisor for undergraduate students.