CAS graduate student Kenya Davis successfully defends MA thesis

Kenya Davis, a Communication Arts and Sciences graduate student, successfully defended her MA thesis on Tuesday, October 18. Her project titled “Re-presenting Iris West: Race-Bent Black Women in Post-Racial Comic Book Adaptation” analyzed the fictional comic-book character Iris West in the television series The Flash. In her thesis, Kenya explores the racial politics of casting a Black woman, Candice Patton, in a role formally represented as white. Davis argues that The Flash avoids the sociopolitical implications of race and racism by intentionally portraying Iris West through a white female romantic lens, but, in contrast, fans of the show were divided by race—some of whom engaged in hate speech, threats of violence, and intimidation of Candice Patton and those fans who came to Patton’s defense.