As a Nigerian-born, Cambridge-educated author, currently residing in Prague, Helen Oyeyemi—and her writing—are culturally diverse. This thesis examines three samples of Oyeyemi’s fiction, focusing on her retelling and reclaiming of nineteenth-century narratives like the gothic novel in her White is for Witching (2009), the fairytale narrative in Boy Snow Bird (2012), and ultimately arriving at a synthesis of notions of the uncanny and magical realism in her short story collection What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours (2016). By analyzing these imaginative texts, I address the ways in which Oyeyemi strives to tackle the notion of institutionalized social normativity, a phenomenon of hegemony wherein individuals are made to conform to standards determined by dominant social groups. Using her fiction as a platform to contribute to the poignant discussion of social justice, Oyeyemi exposes the limitations of “traditional” literary forms—like the gothic novel and the fairytale genre—that are rooted in generalized stereotypes and archetypes and are therefore unable to do justice to the diversity of human experience. Part of her experimentation with rewriting well-known narratives is to highlight that human nature is far too complex, intricate, and developed simply to adhere to white, masculinist, and/or heteronormative models. As seen through her range of non-normative characters—in regard to gender, race, and sexual identity—and their unique experiences and perspectives, Oyeyemi is successful in expanding the structure of nineteenth-century generic forms through radical rewriting; in doing so, she creates an inclusionary narrative that lends voice and perspective to more facets of humanity, including the marginalized “other.” As I argue, Oyeyemi’s experimentation with and reclamation of nineteenth-century forms deliberately prioritizes and re-configures the advancement of social justice in both contemporary imaginative literature and identity politics.