MELISSA ANN GOODNIGHT. Poor-Branded Women. (Under the direction of BRYN CHANCELLOR, M.F.A.) Poor-Branded Women is a collection of three creative nonfiction essays aiming to establish the idea that both morality and personal responsibility live on a spectrum, by examining the lives of several women. These personal essays focus on women who have lived outside the standard societal norms set forth for them throughout different points in history. They chronicle a woman’s life through an extramarital affair, a teenager grappling with her sexuality, and a woman who chose to have an abortion. These stories of real women showcase these specific topics in an attempt to get the reader to learn about topics they may not have experiences with, fully understand, or agree with, while asking the questions about why the women made these choices. These essays are written through the eyes of one woman, but all three reflect an overarching sense that ordinary life can lend itself to the extraordinary, and that women can gain strength from their own lives, and each other’s, even in unlikely circumstances.
