Semester of Graduation

Spring 2026

Degree

Master of Fine Arts (MFA)

Department

English

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

With a candor that yields both emotional poignancy and a guilty amount of comedy, the seven fictional short stories in WATCH MY: STORIES grapple with the infinite nuances of queer, mixed Black/Asian identity in a post-post racial, techno-medicated America. Pulling elements from the Anti-Bildungsroman, Asian American literary traditions, and Black queer literary traditions, this darkly funny collection uncovers the suffocating hand that is contemporary American culture, and dares readers to gasp for alternatives.

A gay couple’s staged Tiktok videos make them confront Koreaboos, and racially charged sexual fantasies. Watching story after story of police brutality, a remote college student comes to racial consciousness, with worrying consequences for how she views her quarter-Black baby brother. An Instagram-obsessed young man in the Philippines wishes for California so much, his phone screen transports him to Disneyland. Through characters brimming with contagious anxiety and desire, WATCH MY: STORIES explores Black/Asian identity politics, queer intimacies, and parasocial relationships across physical, virtual, and even delusional realities.

Amidst the tech-induced drone of our overstimulated lives, WATCH MY: STORIES aims to be a disruptive, provocative, yet compassionate collection that reminds us of the hot blood pumping behind our smart phones. With cultural reflection crackling at its core, this collection inherits the acerbic, breezy Californian tone of Anthony Veasna So’s Afterparties, and the captivating, satirical heart of Nafissa Thompson-Spires’s Heads of the Colored People.

With a center hub of the greater Los Angeles area as its setting, what links these stories together is their commitment to untangling the terse relationship that Generation Z has with identity and individualism. Born alongside the propagation of the internet, Gen Z has come of age in a world presupposed with “hyper-connectedness.” Yet despite more labels to identify with, and the fruition of infinitely more ways to see and be seen, Gen Z has become an exceptionally lonely and anxiety-ridden group. The arc of this collection considers how identity (racial, sexual, and personal) is valorized and problematized differently, under the looming panopticon that is the digital age.

Date

3-13-2026

Committee Chair

Maurice Ruffin

LSU Acknowledgement

1

LSU Accessibility Acknowledgment

1

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Available for download on Friday, March 11, 2033

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