Date of Graduation

Spring 2026

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

English

Committee Chairperson

Jacqueline Alnes, PhD

Committee Member

Nancy Pearson, MFA

Committee Member

Jason Vanfosson, PhD

Abstract

Play Family is a collection of lyrical essays, letters, photographs, and poems that examine grief, using form as a means to consider and recognize what is lasting amidst the lost. Play Family explores the emotions exposed by the indelible loss when a loved one passes and also the seemingly smaller losses as children take the first hesitant steps away from parents and then the more confident steps toward a life that places parents on the periphery. Using photographs of vintage Fisher Price Little People toys and engaging memories of play to forge a path to the past, Play Family uncovers the melancholy, wistfulness, longing, and messiness of love. Experimenting with both visual art and form, Play Family explores loss in formally inventive ways, engaging sense memory and funneling those discoveries through essays, poems, and letters to craft a whole that is less about the space left by grief than the love that has been revealed.

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