Day 19

Homework:

Read https://poestories.com/read/blackcat 

Bring: proof that you have ordered your book (https://www.amazon.com/Art-Fact-Historical-Anthology-Journalism/dp/0684846306)

Day 18

Horror: Same monster same fear?  Same monster different fear?

Discussion Leader

Vote: 

• Monday and Wednesday (MW)
• Wednesday and Friday (WF)
• Monday and Friday (MF)

Homework:

None

Day 17--At Home Class

Hide and Seek Monsters: Victorian Monsters in Movies

Pick one of the following monsters, read the attachment and write a 200 word analysis of how these elements are (or are not) found in monster movies from 2 distinct decades.  This will require you to do detective work.  You will have to look up the movies if you are not familiar with them.  You will also need to use evidence from the reading to support your claims (prove that you have read it).

I would recommend the following structure:

1.  How the monster seen in Victorian times
2. Movie 1--similarities and differences and why (cultural differences in the times?)
3. Movie 2--similarities and differences and why (cultural differences in the times?

Discussion for next time: why have these monsters remained so common in our culture despite over 100 years of change?

• Frankenstein as a Non-White Threat:  
• Gothic Images of Race in Nineteenth-Centurury Britain by H. L. Malchow--Was Frankenstein's monster "a Man and a Brother"?
• Dracula and His Sexuality: 
• Gothic Images of Race in Nineteenth-Centurury Britain by H. L. Malchow--Vampire Gothic and Late-Victorian Identity
• Jack the Ripper and How We See/Write about Murder:
• Victorian Demons: Medicine, Masculinity and the Gothic at the  Fin-De-Siécle by Andrew Smith--The Whitechapel Murders: Journalism, Gothic London, and the Medical Gaze
• 
  
• Jekyll and Hyde and Devolution: Victorian Demons: Medicine, Masculinity and the Gothic at the  Fin-De-Siécle by Andrew Smith--Degeneration, Masculinity, Nationhood and the Gothic

Note: TV shows are fine too.  Buffy did a good one on Frankenstien and Buffy itself is all about Vampires.  I'm pretty sure that Smallville had a few episodes that were similar to Jekyll and Hyde.  Also movies that mixed them like The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Van Helsing.  

Day 16

• Discuss decade findings from last class

New Criticism: 

New Criticism emphasizes explication, or "close reading," of "the work itself." It rejects old historicism's attention to biographical and sociological matters. Instead, the objective determination as to "how a piece works" can be found through close focus and analysis, rather than through extraneous and erudite special knowledge. It has long been the pervasive and standard approach to literature in college and high school curricula.

New Criticism, incorporating Formalism, examines the relationships between a text's ideas and its form, between what a text says and the way it says it. New Critics "may find tension, irony, or paradox in this relation, but they usually resolve it into unity and coherence of meaning" (Biddle 100). New Criticism attempts to be a science of literature, with a technical vocabulary, some of which we all had to learn in junior high school English classes (third-person, denoument, etc.). Working with patterns of sound, imagery, narrative structure, point of view, and other techniques discernible on close reading of the text, they seek to determine the function and appropriateness of these to the self-contained work.

New Critics, especially American ones in the 1940s and 1950s, attacked the standard notion of "expressive realism," the romantic fallacy that literature is the efflux of a noble soul, that for example love pours out onto the page in 14 iambic pentameter lines rhyming ABABCD etc. The goal then is not the pursuit of sincerity or authenticity, but subtlety, unity, and integrity--and these are properties of the text, not the author. The work is not the author's; it was detached at birth. The author's intentions are "neither available nor desirable" (nor even to be taken at face value when supposedly found in direct statements by authors). Meaning exists on the page. Thus, New Critics insist that the meaning of a text is intrinsic and should not be confused with the author's intentions nor the work's affective dimension (its impressionistic effects on the reader). The "intentional fallacy" is when one confuses the meaning of a work with the author's purported intention (expressed in letters, diaries, interviews, for example). The "affective fallacy" is the erroneous practice of interpreting texts according to the psychological or emotional responses of readers, confusing the text with its results.

To do New Critical reading, ask yourself, "How does this piece work?" Look for complexities in the text: paradoxes, ironies, ambiguities. Find a unifying idea or theme which resolves these tensions.

---

VS

New Historicism: 

New Historicism is an approach to literary criticism and literary theory based on the premise that a literary work should be considered a product of the time, place, and historical circumstances of its composition rather than as an isolated work of art or text. It has its roots in a reaction to the "New Criticism" of formal analysis of works of literature, which was seen by a new generation of professional critics as ignoring the greater social and political consequences of the production of literary texts. New Historicism developed in the 1980s, primarily through the work of the critic Stephen Greenblatt, gaining widespread influence in the 1990s and beyond.

New Historicists aim simultaneously to understand the work through its historical context and to understand cultural as well as to investigate the intellectual history and cultural history through literature. The approach owes much of its impetus to the work of Michel Foucault, who based his approach both on his theory of the limits of collective cultural knowledge and on his technique of examining a broad array of documents in order to understand the episteme of a particular time. Using Foucault's work as a starting point, New Historicism aims at interpreting a literary text as an expression of or reaction to the power-structures of the surrounding society.

New Historicism attempted to reintroduce the concept of history into literary studies, in part as a corrective to the ahistorical and apolitical nature of much of Post-structuralism. However, in adopting the Foucauldian notion of epistemic rupture between ages and civilizations, which makes understanding the text in the terms in which it was produced impossible, New Historicism has been criticized for reducing the importance of literature as a work of art and turning it into just another historical artifact.

AND/OR

Auteur Theory

Born out of an influential group of 1950's French film critics and filmmakers, the Auteur Theory explores the notions of individual creative vision and control in cinema.  In short, the critical perspective dictates that  the director is in a unique and irreplaceable position of personal artistic perspective, and that the film is, most importantly, a product of that perspective.  The employment of the French word for "author" (auteur) associates the director with the individual output of other mediums (painting, literature, etc.), and rebels against the seeming "collectiveness" of the film studio.  Francois Truffaut's sensational assertion that "there are no good and bad movies, only good and bad directors" importantly situates film as the characterized output of a creative individual, and responds to the economic and productive tensions in filmmaking.

No Homework!

Day 15

• Discuss Homework
• In groups of 2:
• Pick a film from your assigned decade and do the foloowing:
• Watch the trailer/clip and/or read summary
• Look up/brainstorm big events from your decade
• See if you can determine how the film is a product of the culture in which it was made

Homework:

•  Watch 3 of the 6 following videos: 
• Answer the following:
• What is the difference between suspense and surprise? 
• How is fear different between the two?
• Which, in your opinion is more successful? 
• Why is Hitchcock considered a "master of suspense"? 
• What is a MacGuffin? (probably isn't in videos)  Why would Hitchcock like and use MacGuffins in nearly every film?

Day 14

Final day in the library (room 121).

Bring your own laptop if you would like.

Note 1: you can revise one blog post this semester and resubmit it for a better grade.  You have until April 20th to resubmit.

Note 2: The rubric will alter slightly as a category for your source will be added.  It will evaluate the quality of your source and how well it is integrated into the text.

Note 3:  Commenting on other's blog due date has been moved to Fridays instead of Thursday due to the number who forget.

Note 4: From now on, points will be taken off for incorrect formatting of titles

• movies, TV shows, books, music albums (longer works) are always italicized
• TV episodes, short stories, individual songs (shorter works) are always in quotations

Homework:

At the same time, there were two styles in Hollywood vying for audiences The Classic Hollywood style and an unnamed, grittier style that was played in the cheaper theaters--eventually to be known as Film Noir

Classic Hollywood:

• Bad guy was always brought to justice
• Women were women
• Men were always just and moral and the hero
• Lighting was bright and even
• few camera "tricks" (no playing around with angels and such)
• Bad guys were always just bad (no complications or ambiguity)

Film Noir:

Bring to class:
Outline of Film noir including:

• major themes
• major character types
• rules
• frequent symbols/images
• a paragraph about what in our culture/history cause this split between classic and film noir and do you see a presence of either in our modern movies?

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Day 13--In Library

Pick a book and after reviewing the table of contents and intro, tell the class if it is useful, what it is about, and anything else similar.

More research!

Homework:

None

Day 12

Meet in Library room 121

Homework:
If you forgot to post comments last week, do it by midnight tonight.  From now on, they will be due Friday at Midnight

Meet in the library on the second floor (outside stairwell) on Wednesday

Day 11

Proof that boys in dresses don't affect the child, rather it is our reaction to them in dresses that cause issues.  

 

http://scalar.usc.edu/works/star-of-the-sea-a-postcolonialpostmodern-voyage-into-the-irish-famine/postcolonial-theory

http://www.decolonize.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/an-introduction-to-postcolonialism.pdf

http://www.criticalmediaproject.org/cml/topicbackground/race-ethnicity/

1. How is race shown in film?  Is it good or bad, in general? 
2. If a film is set in Africa, what do you expect the plot to be? 
3. What is causing us to keep white people in the lead roles and people of color in smaller roles?
4. Is the quote "The victor writes the history" applicable to film?
5. What are things that are lost when colonization happens?
6. Why is race and colonization frequently shown in sci-fi and fantasy films?

Homework:

Do the two library tasks listed under "Course Content" by Sunday Midnight

Meet in Room 101 in the library Monday!

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Day 10

Homework:  Make a "cheat sheet" (like I handed out in class) to describe the key components of Feminist Critique and Disability Studies and an example in film the exemplify's the theory

Hint:

1. Feminist Critique
1. Performance (See Judith Butler)
2. Disability
1. Uncanny--(Freud)

Question:  

1. Do teacher's like apples more than other people?
2. Is it damaging to a boy's psyche to be dressed in dresses at a young age (still in diapers)?
3. Have you ever changed what you were doing to fit your gender or social group?
4. What do you think about men in drag?
5. What is your favorite movie featuring a person with a disability or illness

Disability:

• Martyr
• Mystic
• Monster

Homework:  Make a "cheat sheet" (like I handed out in class) to describe the key components of Feminist Critique and Disability Studies and an example in film the exemplify's the theory

Hint:

1. Feminist Critique
1. Performance (See Judith Butler)
2. Disability
1. Uncanny--(Freud)

Class MONDAY in Library, room 121 (bring laptop if you have one)


Order this book: https://www.amazon.com/Art-Fact-Historical-Anthology-Journalism/dp/0684846306/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1518028773&sr=8-1&keywords=art+of+fact

The Art of Fact: A Historical Anthology of Literary Journalism

Need it by March 5

Day 9

Psychoanalysis (finally)

Why is it important to understand theory before delving into topics of fear and horror?

Psychoanalysis Part 1
 

• Writers of the 1970s who turned to Freud and Lacan - the two most influential psychoanalysts - we- re critical, however, of what they perceived to be an underlying essentialism in Jungi- an theory, that is a tendency to explain subjectivity in unchanging, universal terms.
• According to Freud, large parts of human thought remain unconscious; that is, the subject does not know about the content of certain troubling ideas and of- ten much effort is needed to make them conscious
• These ideas have also influenced film study and some psychoanalytic critics explore the 'unconscious' of the film text - referred to as the 'subtext' - analysing it for repressed contents, perverse utterances, and evidence of the workings of desire. 

Sometimes, psychoanalytic analysis can get a bit odd, but keep it in mind when it comes to subtle, subconscious, and coded moments.  A lot of psychoanalytic analysis has to do with fantasy (which equals desire) and art represents the artist's desire.  Therefore, many of the director's or writer's desire and fear will show up coded in the language of film.  Sometimes they will have to code things out of necessity (sex couldn't be shown so they would use metaphors like cigarets, going into tunnels, or wind blowing a door open).  But often, there will be things that are clearly expressions of desire and fear but the artist might not realize he or she is doing it. 

Homework:

Group B post by midnight tonight

Day 8--No Class

Sorry I canceled so late.  I was so sick I didn't remember that it was a teaching day.  

Before Monday, please pick one of the following quotes from the article on Psychoanalytical article and put it in your own words and try to explain why the quote is significant within the theory or why it is significant in understanding fear.  This is something we were going to do in class.


1). Whereas early ap- proaches, such as those of Tarratt, concentrated on the film text in relation to its hid- den or repressed meanings, 1970s theory, as formulated by Jean-Louis Baudry, Chris- tian Metz, and Laura Mulvey, emphasized the crucial importance of the cinema as an apparatus and as a signifying practice of ideology, the viewer-screen relationship, and the way in which the viewer was 'constructed' as transcendental during the spectato- rial process.

2). Similarly, the spectator in the cinema identifies with the larger-than-life, or ideal- ized, characters on the screen. Thus, as Mulvey (1975) later argued, the viewing expe- rience, in which the spectator identifies with the glamorous star, is not unlike a re-enactment of the moment when the child acquires its first sense of selfhood or subjectivity through identificaton with an ideal self. But, as Lacan pointed out, this is also a moment of misrecognition - the child is not really a fully formed subject. He will only see himself in this idealized way when his image is reflected back through the eyes of others. Thus, identity is always dependent on mediation. 

3). Nevertheless, Metz advocated the crucial importance of Lacanian psychoanalytic theory for the cinema and stressed the need to theorize the screen-spectator relation- ship-not just in the context of the Imaginary, but also in relation to the Symbolic. To address this issue, Metz introduced the notion of voyeurism. He argued that the viewing process is voyeuristic in that there is always a distance maintained, in the cinema, between the viewing subject and its object. The cinematic scene cannot return the spectator's gaze.

4). The Oedipal trajectory, Metz argued, is re-enacted in the cinema in relation not only to the Oedipal nature of narrative, but, most importantly, within the spectator- screen relationship. Narrative is characteristically Oedipal in that it almost always contains a male protagonist who, after resolving a crisis and overcoming a 'lack', then comes to identify with the law of the father, while successfully containing or control- ling the female figure, demystifying her threat, or achieving union with her.

5). The concept of 'lack' is crucial to narrative in another context. According to the Russian Formalist Tzvetan Todorov, the aim of all narratives is to solve a riddle, to find an answer to an enigma, to fill a lack. All stories begin with a situation in which the status quo is upset and the hero or heroine must - in general terms - solve a prob- lem in order for equilibrium to be restored. This approach sees the structures of nar- rative as being in the service of the subject's desire to overcome lack.

6). The narrative endings of films, which al- most always punished the threatening woman, reinforced Mulvey's argument about the voyeuristic gaze, while the deployment of the close-up shot, which almost always fragmented parts of the female form for erotic contemplation, reinforced Mulvey's ar- gument about the fetishistic look.

7) Cowie argued that the importance of fantasy as a setting, a scene, is crucial be- cause it enables film to be viewed as fantasy, as representing the mise-en-scene of de- sire. Similarly, the film spectator is free to assume mobile, shifting modes of identifi- cation-as Cowie demonstrated in her analysis of Now Voyager (USA, 1942) and The Reckless Moment (USA, 1949). Fantasy theory has also been used productively in rela- tion to science fiction and horror-genres in which evidence of the fantastic is particu- larly strong.

8). Cultural studies has developed partly in response to these problems. It sees cul- ture as a site of struggle. It places emphasis, not on unconscious processes, but on the history of the spectator (as shaped by class, colour, ethnicity, and so on) as well as on examining ways in which the viewer might struggle against the dominant ideology. Whereas the cognitivists have clearly rejected psychoanalysis, the latter's status within cultural studies is not so clear as cultural critics frequently utilize areas of psy- choanalytic theory.