This dissertation deploys the theoretical fields of hauntology and critical space theory to argue that the Gospel of Mark is a haunted place. A project written largely in New Jersey's wealthy northern suburbs, each chapter converses with vignettes from Newark, New Jersey's Ironbound neighborhood—a low income, largely Latinx and immigrant community—to explore relations between these two otherwise isolated locales. The result is a discussion of gentrifications harmful effects on vibrant communities, made invisible to suburban Christian readers.

The first chapter establishes this methodology, arguing that readers of Mark are subjected to ghosts of marginalized people from the historical world around the second gospel and contemporary contexts, where neocolonialism has forced material bodies into squalor. With critical space theory, this project contends, specters help to create Mark as a space. The second chapter provides a framework for reading Mark that begins at the end: the passion narrative (Mark 14-16). With Jesus' declaration that "you always have the poor with you" (14:7) as a guidepost, chapter two contends that Mark's protagonist slowly fades into social death throughout this chapter, eventually disappearing entirely, and leaving the reader with nothing but the ghosts of society's detritus. The dissertation's third chapter turns to the Gerasene demoniac (5:1-20) and, alongside an examination of "broken windows" policing in sanctuary cities, argues that Jesus' exorcism of the demon named Legion is instead policing of non-normative behavior. Finally, the project turns to harmful interpretations of the dual healings of Jairus' daughter and the woman with the flow of blood (5:21-43). The third chapter observes how justifications for uneven economic development in Newark mirror the racist degradation of Jews through scholarly readings of this pericope.