Charleena Schweda

Charleena Schweda

Charleena Schweda holds a B.A. and M.A. in English and American Studies and General and Comparative Literature. Having studied at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) and the University of Limerick, Ireland (UL), she joined the research training group as a doctoral researcher in English Studies in 2022. Aside from her position at the RTG, she works as a research assistant at the Chair of American Studies: Culture and Literature and as a lecturer at the Chair of English Studies: Culture and Literature.

In her research, she studies anglophone culture, literature, and film, particularly around the turn of the millennium and in the Victorian era. She specialises in Gender Studies, Queer Studies and popular culture, with a focus on representations of womanhood, girlhood, and queerness in horror and monster texts. During her studies she worked as both a journalist and an editor and functioned as a student representative for the Department of General and Comparative Literature. She interned at the Goethe-Institut Irland and the Nuremberg International Human Rights Film Festival, among others.

Project: “Hell Is a Teenage Girl”: The Sentimental in Female Coming-of-Age Monster Films

Monsters have always roamed the worlds of fiction, mythology, and religion. Ambiguous and multi-coded, they function as playgrounds for discussions on socio-cultural issues. When monsters appear as adolescent girls, these negotiations centralise their gender, focusing on themes such as girlhood, the female body, sexuality, gender roles, and, above all, the experience of coming-of-age as a girl. Monstrosity becomes an allegory for puberty; the ‘horrors’ of coming-of-are are aligned with the horrors of monstrosity.

In this context, my project explores how the sentimental emerges and functions in what I loosely regard to be the subgenre of female coming-of-age monster films: Horror films which explore intimacy, girlhood, and emotionality through the metaphorically charged concept of female monstrosity. Within this specific framework, the sentimental operates as an aesthetic and narrative mode that I call “sentimental monstrosity”. To identify its diverse functions, I explore a range of anglophone horror films from the early 21st century, combining close readings of these individual films with a comparative approach that regards literary, filmic, and cultural traditions from the early 19th century until today.

 

Edited Volumes

  • Allirand, Lise et al. Literatur und das Böse: Beiträge zum Studierendenkongress Komparatistik 2019. Ch. A. Bachmann: 2021.

Book Contributions

  • Forthcoming: Schweda, Charleena. “‘Death’s Sadistic Design’: Visions, Predeterminism, and the Disruption of Futurity in Final Destination and Triangle.” Zukunftsträume (WT), ed. Stefanie Kreuzer und Christiane Solte-Gresser. Traum – Wissen – Erzählen. Fink/Brill: 2025/2026.
  • Schweda, Charleena. “‘The Children of Her Rage’: Mutterschaft und Doppelgängerinnen im Horrorfilm.” Der Wille zur Wiederholung II: Der Doppelgänger in Literatur und Film, ed. Jörg Türschmann et al. Serienräume – global, lokal, glokal. Springer: 2025, pp. 287-296.
  • Schweda, Charleena. “‘The only thing that matters to her’: Artificial Intelligence and the Sentimentalization of Motherhood in M3GAN (2022)”. Sentimental State(s), ed. Heike Paul and Sarah Miriam Pritz. Transcript: 2025, pp. 211-33.
  • Schweda, Charleena. “Viktorianische Vampirinnen: Instrumente zur Darstellung kontemporärer Tabuthemen.“ Literatur und das Böse: Beiträge zum Studierendenkongress Komparatistik 2019, ed. Lise Allirand et al. Ch. A. Bachmann: 2021, pp. 109-118.

Podcast Episodes

  • “Female Monsters – Weibliche Monstrosität feat. Charleena Schweda.” Dr. Horror, hosted by Stefan Sonntagbauer, 28.12.2023.

Teaching

  • Monstruous Women: Horror, Gender, and Coming-of-Age in Female Monster Fiction since the 19th Century
  • Grundseminar Culture

Talks

  • “Zwischen Diversifizierung und Eingrenzung: Schwierigkeiten bei der Umsetzung eines queeren Kanons.” Göttingen, 23.02.2024, Kanonisierungspraktiken im Literaturstudium.
  • “‘Death’s Sadistic Design’: Visions, Dreams, and Destiny in 2000s Horror Films.” Saarbrücken, 08.02.2024, Zukunftsträume | Rêves de l’Avenir | Dreams of the Future.
  • “‘The Children of her Rage’: Doppelgängerinnen als Spaltung des Selbst im Horrorfilm. ” Wien, 15.12.2023, Je est un autre: Der Doppelgänger in Film und Literatur.
  • “‘More than a toy, […] a part of the family’: Artificial Intelligence as a Threat to Interpersonal Intimacy and Family Values in M3GAN (2023).” Erlangen/Nürnberg, 22.10.2023, Sentimental State(s).
  • “‘[A] man with no interior, a man with no thoughts’: (Un-)Certainties and the All-Encompassing Masculinity of The New York Trilogy.“ Bochum, 10.01.2020, Urban Masculinities (Student Conference).
  • “Viktorianische Vampirinnen: Instrumente zur Darstellung kontemporärer Tabuthemen.“ Bochum, 14.06.2019, Literatur & das Böse (10. Studierendenkongress der Komparatistik).
  • “A Tale of Marriage and ‘Madness’: The Connection between Social Failure and Female ‘Madness’ in Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre and Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations.“ Bochum, 05.04.2019, Foucault & Cultural Studies (Student Conference).