Thinking About Stories
Popularity of teen supernatural fiction
This review of three recent works of teen supernatural fiction had an interesting description of the appeal of this genre:
"Like all speculative fiction, that of the supernatural allows teenagers to grapple with ideas. In this it’s kin to science fiction, though that genre tends to be social and political - “Stranger in a Strange Land’’ by Robert Heinlein or “A Clockwork Orange’’ by Anthony Burgess - while the supernatural inclines toward the psychological and personal."
So I thought that was a kind of interesting response to what people were saying above about teen culture today rejecting the alienated hero figure, or not identifying with the adolescent search--'cause the supernatural hero is a misfit too but maybe with less of a social context? Maybe more, as this reviewer was suggesting, a sense of alienation that's almost more individual, more personal--which in a way I would think makes it more isolating.
I can't really agree with the reviewer's positive assessment of Stephanie Meyers writing style--but her description of the last book, "Nothing But Ghosts" made it seem interesting to me, and I liked the line of text she quoted:" "My bike is the ten-speed, thin-wheeled kind, a perfect silver streak. If you were looking down on me and my bike from a cloud above, you’d think we were a zipper.’’ "
Recent TV portrayals of nursing
Interview with President of the Massachusetts Nurses Association
This interview with Beth Piknick asks her response to these current shows. She cites as the most realistic part of the shows the way in which nurses are treated by physicians:
"Q. “HawthoRNe’’ and other nurse-centered shows portray nurses not being taken seriously by physicians. Is that a reality in hospitals?
A. Absolutely. In my work in the intensive-care unit, I’ve been lucky to be able to collaborate and discuss with the physicians and residents, but in other areas [of medicine] it’s just not so. A lot of the newer physicians coming in have a better understanding of how to communicate with nurses, but some just don’t listen to what you have to say and can be very bullying."
Stories of the workplace
This article in the Ideas section of the Sunday paper was looking at the question of why there are no longer any novels centered on work. The article made some very interesting points--though I thought some of them contradictory and perhaps displaying a kind of elitism about novels as a more important story-telling medium--as there are certainly TV shows and a few films that center on the workplace. Maybe now that I'm thinking about it there's an interesting distinction there. Novels do tend to highlight inner life more, and TV and films a more external, objective view. As this author says, our current novels all tend to center on the domestic/romantic--as if our inner lives are divorced from the workplace. I think what this author tends to downplay is the extent of that alienation.
Stories and Evolution
This review of The Art Instinct by Denis Dutton focuses on the role of imagination in evolution. Dutton makes the case that stories are not about reproducing reality or storing data (the argument sometimes made about the main purpose of oral story telling), but rather
"We find beautiful artifact - carvings, poems, stories, arias - captivating because at a profound level we sense that they take us into the minds that made them. This sense of communion. . . . was about living the richer sociability that would carry on the human species and allow it to flourish."
or as the reviewer states in conclusion
"Our capacity to see the world as others might see it enlarges the compass of friendship and gives us the latitude to seek nonviolent solutions to conflicts. As Walter Lippmann wrote, "What is called the adjustment of man to his environment takes place through the medium of fictions." Far from being an entertaining byproduct of uniquely human characteristics, art may prove to be the adaptation that saves us from ourselves."
Stories, Evolution, and Baby-talk
Another book that looks at story-telling as evolutionary adaptation, On the Origin of Stories: Evolution, Cognition & Fiction.
"representations of events that had not, or not yet, occurred - i.e., fictions - became useful as teaching and learning tools, as well as for creating a communal identity. These three effects - cognitive enhancement, social learning, and community cohesion - made storytelling adaptive."
And a review of a book that posits the origin of human language in the need for infants to communicate with their mothers (mothers, not parents is assumed apparently) because
"Human babies were born less fully developed, and therefore, more helpless than those of other primates. This posed another problem: Unlike other primate babies, human infants could not cling to foraging mothers, who had to put them down, which terrified them. The solution: motherese, or baby talk, which became language"
Finding our Tongues: Mothers, Infants, and the Origins of Language
Both books were reviewed briefly in the Globe today here along with a third book on cooking and evolution.
Interview with Marina Warner
A great and wide-ranging interview with Marina Warner who both writes fiction and writes literary criticism. The variety of kinds of stories that Warner is interested in reflects her central idea which is that "We learn from imaginative structures which filter into us from all sorts of different media. We see things through the mind’s eye...We live in a virtual world. I’ve tried to argue that this is not a fatalist position but rather that it is a position of potential. Stories can go in either direction."
Every story then is political--from fairy tales like Rapunzel which Warner sees as being about an attempted abortion--to representations of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, to 2000 years of representing children as the source of 'original sin':
"In a film like The Magdalen Sisters, you can see how nuns and priests abused children for causing Sin in others. That vision, that vision of Original Sin, that they are sexualised by this taint, that’s where the deep trouble lies and it’s brought about a real Catholic Nemesis. It may have taken 2000 years but it’s a ringing example of absolutely direct nemesis, it’s what Dante talks about in hell… you’re punished for what you did and the church will be destroyed, and it is being financially destroyed, by this absolutely central violence that it did to human nature."
What we should take from this is not, as she said above, some kind of fatalist position, or a position of superiority--of having the 'right' story, but rather humility and connection based on awareness of our shared subjectivity and story-telling, as Warner states about Aristorle in the context of an exhibit on Metamorphosis:
"I mean, take Aristotle, he was wrong about so much. He believed the most weird things about menstruation and generation and all kinds of animals What we should take from that is not to scorn him, but to accept that we’re unlikely to get it right about anything either."
Which is not to say that we can't then say anything about the ethics of our stories either--in fact saying something about their ethical implications is all the more imperative.
Restless Hauntings: Richard Marshall Interviews Marina Warner
Stories reflecting change in the Nation: realism+hope
This editorial looked at "Slumdog Millionaire" and the recent adaptation of "Oliver Twist" (which is really good, BTW) and Barack Obama's story as all versions of a shift in paradigm from cynicism to one merging realism and hope.
Al Jazeera's coverage of the conflict in Gaza
I thought this was a very interesting take on Al-Jazeera by an American living in Damascus. He points to the way in which the reality of warfare is filtered out in "objective" news coverage, and thinks about the effect it might have if that reality was conveyed in the service of peace rather than on behalf of a particular side.
North American Mythology
This was a cool editorial I thought about exploring Native American Mythologies through archaeology as a way for Americans to rethink their own story:
"As Timreck sees it, the most valuable outcome of the archeological digs and what future finds will do for us is to help make us all Indians again, because, "I've never met anyone who had any sympathetic sense of either Native history or especially Native spiritual traditions who was not environmentally conscious in contemporary terms. So offering a fantastical archeological story about Indians is a slightly different approach to focusing people back on concern for the environment in general and the surprises in their own backyards in particular.""
The Power of Stories
This article began by talking about the contrast between the reaction of older and younger Americans to the first black American president--noting that younger Americans tend not to see it as a signficant event in the way that the old folks do. Why? Because they've grown up seeing black actors play presidents on TV and in the movies. It was the central idea of the article that I really liked (and have to admit felt some personal satisfaction about :-)):
"Fiction, in fact, can shape our perceptions of the world even more than reality."
The Power of Stories
... and a challenge made about how it applies to racism in today's day and age.
The contribution of an artist from an artist's point of view
"Because of the ego's trappings, it is often hard to distinguish our personal desires from true good ...
"Sometimes I think I should be working for more global, bigger concerns: Cancer society, AIDS research, world hunger, peace, animal rights, etc. And I do often participate in those.
"And sometimes I think that time used supporting the arts in my little corner of the planet may not be the best way to give.
"Then I think about what my natural talents actually are and start seeing clearly again. I do believe that a big part of my purpose here truly is to help the present and the future by bringing art and music into the lives of people, or even one person.
"And maybe this is a slower route, not so grand and noble and earth shaping. But sharing artistic experience and exposure to the arts will build a healthier minded, more compassionate, more tolerant, less ethnocentric future society, right?
"And maybe that will make it a little easier for the big Earth shapers to have their effect realized.
"One of the most difficult problems in human experience is learning to see things from other people's point of view, instead of thinking only of and for oneself.
"Many very smart people don't do this very well. But adding this ability to the working mind is like adding tin to copper. The result is bronze, which is so much harder that it seems like a different metal."
- David Feder (musician)
Scientific Fundamentalism vs. Power of Stories
There was an interesting pairing of stories in the ideas blog section of my paper today. One was about Richard Dawkins latest target--fairytales. Apparently Dawkins thinks the magical/mythical nature of such stories has a deleterious effect on rationality.
Is he not keeping up with the neuroscience findings that rationality is not some separate facility working away on its lonesome? He is really beginning to remind me of the character, Gradgrind, in Dickens Hard Times: "Now what I want is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing else will ever be of service to them."
But beside the story on Dawkins is one about an interesting new way to control traffic--not through objective means like speed bumps (which people react to by speeding up between the bumps) or warning/stop signs, but to fictional representations of human beings, "scare-cars," that are obviously not real, factual human beings, but look enough like them to remind drivers of the potential cost of reckless driving.
"Your past is open to reinvention"
This is another of those series of brief findings from the social sciences that run in my Sunday paper. This Sunday's had a number of interesting ones--the connection of bad moods and perception; the effect of subliminal advertising, and then this one "Remember the egg salad"--showed how when told a different (and false) story about their own past, people's behavior changed in relation to the story.
How language/stories shape political reality
A not very favorable reivew of this book in the paper today: The Political Mind: Why You Can't Understand 21st-Century American Politics With an 18th-Century Brain, By George Lakoff.
Though the reviewer, James Peyser, objects to the kind of simplistic black/white definition of liberal and conservative that Lakoff uses (and I have to say that if Peyser is accurately portraying Lakoff's definitions, I agree with him[Peyser]), there were some concepts in Lakoff's argument that I found intriguing:
"According to Lakoff, a professor of cognitive science and linguistics at the University of California at Berkeley, the way we view the world is conditioned by narratives and metaphors that over time become hard-wired in our brains. Although we can overcome these patterns of thought when trying to make sense of new events or information, it is not so easy to do. The path of least resistance - or in Lakoff's technical vernacular, the neurological path with the most chemical receptors at the synapses - is to fit the emerging reality into a preexisting mental "frame." As a result, reason is at a distinct disadvantage in political discourse."
Here's the whole review: "Code Red"
cognitive science and political analysis
I've read about him before. I think he has a decent view of cognitive science that perhaps this one book didn't capture thoroughly. I've read other reviews, that need I say is likely dynamically patriotically symptomatic, which highlighted his mention of the Bush administration's justification of American involvement using conceptual metaphors which ends up obscuring reality for the public. I can't say I'm with his conspiracy within the theory. But while the reviewer opposes at the base Lakoff's portrayal of a simplistic black/white liberal and conservative, it's actually the research on cognitive psychology and philosophy of language that Lakoff bases his argument about a black and white simplistic view of certain groups. Liken to our neural minds, he thinks there are actually very few categories restricted to analysis used by humans that are the black and white type. He argues that most categories are supposed to be more complicated and messy. He just extends this not-so-new concept of political science and subsequently paints a black and white picture I think.
Black/White Categories
I think I understand what you're saying, Kat. You're saying that Lakoff thinks black/white categories are a product of the way we wind up shaping the world through metaphor? We come up with these dualities and then this reinforces neural pathways and we see the world this way?
The reviewer is actually saying that Lakoff himself imposes this false black/white worldview in his definition of liberal and conservative:
"According to Lakoff, there are only two worldviews: progressive and conservative. In his construct, progressives (i.e., liberals) are all about empathy and responsibility, while conservatives stand for authority and obedience."
Black/white models
Well, he does intentionally impose that he thinks that most Americans have versions of both worldviews. He argues the differences in mindset and world view between the two based on the model that at everyones core they are either liberal or conservative. I'm not educated in this to determine how accurate his view is. I am aware though that he acknowledges that swing voters can and are capable of casually picking and choosing and smoothly transititioning between conservatism and liberalism as it applies to their life.
I think he is applying his studies and world view to their most logical conclusions in the act of raising the "cognitive science" bar to politics. He has an overall focused point that the two world views use language differently. Meaning the same word will have a very different meaning to a conservative and to a liberal, and goes on to express that this has and can affect some important political outcomes. His model is kind of gender driven, but if you can get past that and find a more neutral standpoint it might be enlightening on the political front.
power of stories
This is a review of a memoir by a film reviewer that talks about three years in which he was out of work, his son had dropped out of high school, and the two of them watched and discussed movies. His son, though very smart, was doing very poorly in school, was committing acts of vandalism, etc. He offerred him the deal that he could drop out if he agreed to watch and discuss three movies a week of the father's choosing.
OK--I was a sucker for this idea when the reviewer mentioned one of my absolutely favorite moments in a movie: "parents...give their children keys to the world in the only language they know. In one passage, Gilmour tells his son about those exquisite movie moments that stop the world in its tracks - Marlon Brando with the glove in "On the Waterfront"; Audrey Hepburn softly saying "Hi" on the fire escape in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" - and what he's really telling his son is to seek such moments in life."
I'm curious to see how much of a positive impact this all had on the son--the reviewer does mention that he (the son) had moved out and was supporting himself by the end of the memoir.
Link between metaphors, synesthesia, and primate tree-climbing
Guys in my office watch "Chick Flicks"
I'm noticing in my office how often the guys are actually talking about romance movies and have to admit I was a bit intrigued as to their perspective.
They were a bit shy when directly confronted about which "Chick Flicks" they liked... but after clarification I found a lot.
The thing that came up over and over again - is what was most important to them was that their wives liked the films.
Movie watching with their spouses was a way to bond... it was about spending enjoyable time together, but they did not want to commit to fully liking the films themselves.
This is what they said to me:
"I can watch about any movie - most of them are mildly entertaining and I can watch them *once* and find something to amuse myself.
But my wife owns the same film 50 times over. At least she still keeps watching them (so it's not a waste of money to buy it) but most of them I don't ever want to watch with her again."
I couldn't get a clear rank in light of this as far as to which movies were better than others, but here are a couple of my observations.
It was clear - that these men had to completely ignore the romantic themes that made their wives enjoy these movies in order to focus on things that seemed more important to them.
Fever Pitch - "It's about baseball." This was the clear winner, the others all kind of tied.
Moulin Rouge - "is flashy" (it's "all about the cinematography"), they "like this particular director"... and "my wife likes it *a lot*" (even though they agreed it was the same boring story line to them.)
They mentioned that romantic Comedy is easy to enjoy because it gives them something to laugh at.
Father of the Bride "is tolerable because it's funny."
...also 40 Year Old Virgin - funny and actually taught a good moral to them.
The Devil Wears Prada - "wasn't horrible" and "Anne Hathaway is HOT."
So this piqued my interest... what romantic movies were "horrible"?
When pressed - they didn't want to admit that there were any they would outright refuse to watch. I gather that this was a little bit of a coping mechanism - them hedging their opinions the way they must have to when their wife asks "Honey will you watch this movie with me?"
However... I reminded them of something I overheard them say... an expression of pain in relation to Dreamgirls.
I could only get full commitment on these:
"Bring it on" tested their limits... and Bring it on 2,3 and 4 were shucked over to the "horrible" category.
...Anything with Jennifer Lopez sucks because she's just a horrible actress.
and Dreamgirls is *right out* - clearly at the bottom of the list. It was a fresh wound and it's sticking with them in a very memorable way.
Now why I find this all so interesting - is that I am a woman, and I personally do not like most "typical" romance movies... it sounds to me for the same reasons. It's not that I have no romance in my life, but that my life doesn't center on romance alone. The laughter is important, the focal theme about real and interesting issues - not just falling in love alone and the petty conflicts within, but a broader scope indicative of a bigger and fuller life; the creative expression and artistry of a film itself - all as relates to connecting to someone real outside the movie and *my* emotions on these deeper issues; not living vicariously through only the romantic feelings of someone else emoting on celluloid. I'll like these movies if and when it's not really the "same old boring romantic theme" or if it's a movie where it's easy to set that "same old boring romantic theme" aside for the bigger picture.
I'm fortunate because my partner does not attempt to bond with me on a "boring storyline" which doesn't connect with me. I don't have to find a coping mechanism because those movies rarely come through my household out of lack of interest. I sometimes still challenge myself and watch some of these romantic films, usually on the recommendation of a friend. Like my coworkers - I can ususally find *something* to enjoy about a story... but it's fairly easy to predict when I won't be able to place a certain type of film on my "favorite movie list" just from a paragraph plot synopsis.
gender wars at the movies
I keep hearing things about the Sex and the City movie that place it in the context of gender wars. There've been several descriptions floating aroung about how men would rather be shot, or rather have their eyes put out, or rather....fill in the blank self-destructive image....than see it. And then the fact that it's a box office success--the reviewers talk about it beating out the "boy" movies like "Indiana Jones."
I don't like the way it's being categorized in that way, but it seems to be true not only for people who are putting it dow, but also those who are supporting it from some kind of feminist reading of it as about female friendship. I never watched the series and won't be going to see the movie--I wondered what other people thought of those assessments?
Romance Narratives
That's an interesting take that the guys in the office have...though it seems to me that saying "Fever Pitch" is about baseball is like saying "You've Got Mail" is about bookstores.
I know a couple where the wife is very addicted to chick flicks and to chick lit. Her husband doesn't usually watch with her though--think she watches with her Mom. And he and I go out to watch action/superhero movies. Good thing they have World of Warcraft to bond over :-)
I don't like these kinds of movies much either--for a lot of the reasons that I was talking about in referring to courtly love narratives on the marriage post. My Dad and I used to have an ongoing argument about "Pretty Woman" (Hey, just realizing my Dad was an exception--he liked a lot of "chick flicks"--much more than my Mom does)--which to be perfectly honest I never watched. But he thought it was about the main female character being empowered--by winning the love of the rich guy. And to me that is the problem with the traditional romance narrative anyway--it tells women that their power lies in the ability to inspire love (not by being the hero, or the power of financial means or class status or political voice). It is still the man who defines the woman's value by loving her. And what gets hidden in the romance is that he is still actually the one with power and her only means to it is through his emotional tie to her (just as in the past women's only means to power/status was through marriage).
There are romantic moments in movies that I like very much--when Marlon Brando pulls on Eve Marie Saint's glove in "On the Waterfront"--for instance. Or that scene in "It's a Wonderful Life" when Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed are both talking to her "boyfriend" on the phone--but really showing their interest in each other. And some movies where I like the central romance--like in the movie "Holiday" with Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn. Now you guys will probably think this all "English Professory" but my overall favorite romance narratives are some of Shakespeare's comedies--'cause they have a critique of that courtly love tradition and standard gender roles within the romance--particularly "As You Like It," "Twelfth Night," and "Much Ado About Nothing." "Much Ado" has one of THE most romantic scenes to me. What happens is that there is supposed to be a wedding, but the groom rejects the bride at the church, claiming she's been sleeping with someone else. Now that kind of public disgrace would pretty much mean, at the time, that the woman would have no recourse but enter a convent--unless a male member of her family defended her honor by challenging the man (the groom). But in the play she has no brothers. Her cousin, Beatrice, stays behind in the church after the disgraced woman, Hero, is taken away sobbing by the Priest. The man who loves Beatrice, Benedick, also stays behind. Beatrice has these great speeches about wishing she were a man so that she could challenge Claudio--she's going at full rant speed about the injustice of the whole situation. And Benedick really falls for her most at that moment--he steps in and offers to "be the man" because she can't. I like that because while Benedick in a way steps into the traditional heroic role--its in a context that makes clear that that is a social constraint on both the man and the woman in the situation. And it also shows how having who the woman is depend on what men say about her--is not a source of love at all. And lastly I like that Benedick falls for her because she wants to save her cousin--her loveable quality is not her competition with another woman, but her defense of another woman.
women as prostitutes in the romance narrative
Yes -- I have huge issues with a romantic film that puts prostitution as central to the theme of the movie as some sort of positive thing.
I'm sure it's supposed to serve as a metaphor on a specific level. In a really warped way it's a form of worship of a woman's sexuality - and the number of sexual partners that sexually desire her adds value to her status as a woman.
Such as Moulin Rouge, specifically. The title is true to the theme when you consider that it's meaning is "Red Mill" - red the color of prostitutes; so basically, "a prostitute mill".
What is disturbing is that only the supposed "positive" remants of this metaphor are explored and presented as supposed compliments to the character, and that really just didn't work for me.
Satine (the main female character) experienced the "ultimate" dramatized objectification in being the prostitute "desired above all". She is so highly valued because of first her physical appearance. And second - she has a talent for knowing how to present her sexuality in a way that "makes men fall for her" - even if her feelings behind her actions are false.
You also find that this is her life's ambition to be the best actress in town and everything she does to obtain this rank inevitably leads her down the road to prostitute herself in the first place. Her sex is equated to her power. She not only acts on stage, but lies and acts in order to get what she materially wants outside of the realm to love.
Personally I found it disturbing that a character would be so egotistical as to take the pursuit of her dream to that level of self destruction. On a daily basis Satine was objectified in the most sickening of all ways. But to further have it portrayed as a noble thing - and why? I can only guess it was making some point about how she could be somehow noble despite her faults and write it off as either ignorance - she "just didn't know" about love, or "innocence" - because she only lied when she had "good intentions". I still had a hard time connecting with a woman that would find power in exploiting her sexuality in such a base way even if it was in order to obtain "her dream". In fact it made her "dream" appear egotistical itself to me. I'm sorry ... prostitution is just never going to seem "pretty" to me.
So introduce "true love".
First if I'm meant to buy all that, if we're really talking about true love here when she finally meets "the one"... I had a difficult time thinking that she could so easily shrug off all that she had done prior to meeting him and so suddenly accept "the truth". If she can't sleep with the Duke after meeting Christian because it doesn't feel "right anymore"... then what all the sudden makes her feel better about the hundreds of men she implicitly prostitued herself for just prior to meeting him? The character development far too shallow to show the depth of emotion that would have to be there. Not showing that depth of emotion made it difficult for me to suddenly believe that Satine could truly all the sudden value love and then be deeply in love with this guy.
So already the story lost any realism for me by then. It's one of those movies that's so universal probably because it only describes the surface appearance of what should be very deep and complicated emotions underneath if you can ignore the underlying disturbing issues. It can be applied to just about any scenario if you meet the precusory requirement of being in love with being in love - if you enjoy fantasizing about being in love with a story... or enjoy putting yourself into a story of being in love.
I kept trying to engage to see if I could find any redeeming qualities. Ewan MacGregor does a phenomenal job playing Christian and showing the depth of emotion you would see if a guy was falling in love with a woman... but ... his acting alone couldn't make the plot convincing to me. The scene where they met fell flat for me... with me saying "if you say so...".
Anyone who knows another woman that has been sexually exploited or raped would abhor the treatment of the Duke's character in the film.
He's presented as too farcical to even come off as a real threat or conflict. Belittling that personality type into a character so small and egotistical, lacking the darkness that pervades an objectifier of that type - is so misleading as to make me sick. I couldn't laugh it off even with the stupid songs they tried to throw in for comic effect. Fine... true love trumps the rapist... o.k.
So the stereotypes protrayed in the film itself were completely misleading in the most devious of ways. And in my experience the most insidious lie is the lie that is half truth. Young girls who watch this film are being taught that because they are women - their only power over men is sex, and it's ok to use that to your advantage because your "true love" will find you despite how hard you try to hide yourself. He will "rescue you" from yourself in the end because his passion renders him blind to your faults - and that you lose nothing in the entire process - not a piece of your soul. In fact, it's as easy as just changing your mind one day. Maybe it is.
It teaches them that they are lost - none of their dreams worthwhile until a man comes in and validates them and makes them possible. It says - don't worry if you are raped because that's just a show of how valuable you are and how many will want to possess you because of it. It's a compliment - no matter how many lies you tell or manipulative games you play, it is never your fault.
It never breaks outside of the "women are objects" motif. They're either an "abused" object - or a "valued" object, but beyond this - inert and shallow. Further Satine's lying "for the right reason" never stops - she even lies to Christian in order to "protect him" from his own feelings for her.
All I can say - is that from my personal experience I know what "love at first sight" feels like, I know what strong romantic, lasting, and loving emotions feel like and one thing these feelings never do for me is to lead me to doubt in the feelings of my lover so much that I can't trust my lover's actions... and further prompt me to be dishonest in order to manipulate the situation to "save my romance" - even if I die.. or become a prostitute... again. Wha?
All of these things to me, would add up to what Christian began to feel in the end... how would you be able to tell that what Satine was really expressing were her true emotions? Even when she "loves him" she judges him as rendered ignorant by his passion for her and puts her judgment over his in the relationship. Are they *really* in love? What is love???
It was too much for me to overlook, with a not a lot of solid evidence for anything positive as the piece was presented. It's possible that with a more careful treatment of these issues in the plot that the movie might play out in a different way for me... but then, I think - it would be a completely different film.
I think like a lot of those "roomy" surface portrayals of romance, this is a movie that allows an already longing heart to read in the emotions that they already feel into the story line. This indulgent behavior "being in love with the romance" of the film is a stereotype that marks to me the only real threat to true love, not something that allows it to happen. The love presented is about rank, not about the feelings being manipulated and emoted - in a self centered effort to keep a hold of something you want. It's training a woman to ignore the bad things about being ranked and objectified as if trying to convince them to settle for the peanuts of emotion thrown out to them in worship of their sex.
Prostitution Narrative
Heh, jaz...
That was so awesome! You're a great story teller 
... I think you are absolutely correct. In a nutshell, the movies I've seen with romance narratives were too superficial for my taste, and I lost interest in most chick flicks early on. But I do so like romantic comedies. I think because I like that kind of light hearted fun as one narrative to a romantic story. But I think romance/heroic movies just generally brings out new forms of sexism and patriarchy as some "newer" or "edgier" complex to the story - it's sad because it's not even widely acknowledged or realized from both men and women that alot of the popular, well liked, great reviewed romance stories still have the "man defines woman" underpinning, and I think the same narrative is just as common with romance/love songs.
Man defines Woman
I have to be honest. That gender narrative has been weighing pretty heavily on me for some time now.
I used to be able to watch a romantic movie like that and just be happy for the people falling in love. It was their own experience, and it could be beautiful to watch if you're the type of person that is in love with being in love. But that's not enough for me anymore - because my experience of being in love doesn't fit into this cookie cutter pattern. All in all, I'd like to be understood and valued just for who I am and what my experience is.
When I try to describe my life to people and share the beauty I feel like I have so that they can appreciate me the same way I appreciate them and their experience; they don't seem to understand.
All they analyze is how to fit me into that narrative. Some are "nicer" about it than others.
But the thing is - the people that like me - the people that value me... most of them have to frame it within this romantic reference.
Even here... the people who don't know me or "Agent" from before are going to read my post about the PJ party - and though I was careful to make the language gender neutral, if they know I'm a woman, they're going to assume my lover is a male.
At best in the real world if people find out my situation they look at me with this blank stare - like all of the sudden there is no positive social script to follow. When I'm out there on my own merit, they don't know how to value me. I'm realizing now that most women value themselves by the type of man they can attract and keep. I've learned that in the flesh the best thing to do is to not talk about my sex life no matter how hard they press.
But even that is hard.
Bless their hearts - the people who value me in that situation end up attaching me to my closest male counterpart and quite often slip. Though they know I'm not married to him, put me in that frame and quite often introduce me as his wife.
Even at my place of work. I'm in an office of men. I don't wear a wedding ring. Things were really weird for a long time - some people stand offish... my boss included - though they were pleasant enough in general. They did not know how to frame me in light of what they knew about me. Would I be a threat to their marriages? It was all about my sexual reference - and I wear no wedding ring, fake or otherwise. I don't talk about my situation other than on my HR forms listed myself as "single". It took my friend one time of pulling up in a car to pick me up for all of that to change. Suddenly everything I did was ok - people treated me in a more friendly fashion one on one. ...and my boss every time he pulls up now will say "your husband is waiting for you outside". It's uncomfortable and often pointless to correct.
My girlfriend there - as most girls do - tried to press me about my situation with him. She introduced the topic by telling me something about "my husband" and I corrected her on my marital status. She pressed me on what was going on with me and this male. When I asked why her questions were so important to her, she mentioned that she just wanted to be sure that I was getting something out of the relationship -- to be sure that I was happy. She's the rare person that let me get by with telling her I don't want to discuss the situation, but I am indeed, extremely happy with my personal life and with my relationship with this person.
So no matter what I do - it seems I cannot fight the narrative or people's presumptions about me. Some days it's incredibly hurtful.
...and then there are the "not so nice people" that I won't even get into.
I know what that guy is saying about "50 movies all about the same thing".
..and now when I watch these films I do find them hurtful most days. It seems like a subtle kind of brainwashing to me. Because if these people opened their eyes to what they were saying in its entirety, I don't think they'd like what they see. Both the guys and the girls.
If women had the same respect as soylent green - then everyone would come to the realization that women are people - not objects - and to treat them as anything else than that is horrifying. Whatever ridiculous way I can find to laugh about all of this, is the only salvation I've ever had.
Other's people's narratives
BTW - found something even grosser than a movie!
This same romantic narrative in real life:
This article is all about women being property, framed within the "quest for love", as written by a woman being disgusted with how men present their end of the narrative, but pawning it off in some "funny, romantic-comedy way".
The (female) author brings up the "[wedding] Ring check as an identifier that someone is available"... the only time they mention in the article that this doesn't work is in relation to a man questioning whether the mother hitting on him (with her child in tow) is really single.
A friend who shall remain nameless warned me that a ring-check won’t convince a man you’re available. “My ex-wife didn’t fit into her wedding ring right after having our daughter,” he said. “If I were to see you with a baby so young, I’d probably assume you weren’t wearing a ring because you’re still bloated from the pregnancy.”
Oh HA HA... not.
It's a logical assertion that her uterus has already been claimed by another man so he doubts her word and doesn't want to step on "marked territory". Though amazingly the thought that the "single father" also not wearing a ring might be manipulating her never comes into question. He's the validater afterall... ironically it implies that married or not there's "no blame" if he chooses her as his object - as she must be "deserving" of such affection if she can indirectly convince him to do it. Women are expendable.
Her value is judged by him and defined by him. It's more acceptable for a man to leave his wife for another woman than a woman to leave her husband for another man. He's only switching objects that he gives value to... heck maybe he made a mistake and thought a rhinestone was a diamond. He was gipped! ...where if she does this she's "trading up" and is completely villified. Talk about a double standard...
Here's another doosey:
"if he sees a mom who looks “put-together” — “You know, her clothes are stylish, she’s in good physical shape, and she’s wearing lipstick” — she’s sending the message that she’s available. When I replied that I know a lot of married moms who look put-together and are sending no such message, he thought for a minute, then added, “Well, that’s OK. If she’s hot, men don’t care if she’s single or married.” "
I know nice guys in less pointed situations who believe that makeup and looking "put-together" is the sign of a woman looking for action.
Primp up for the part, girls - or else you'll never convince them to "snap you up" and crave you like hot pizza, and beer in front of the latest ball game. Sure, you'll have to compete with the inanimate objects in his life too - but if you wear lingerie and sex it up, maybe you can distract him long enough to pay some attention to you.
.. and the thing is - maybe the author thinks guys are asses for putting it so bluntly, but part of this is because she conversely doesn't want to have to face that the "primping" is a behavior she should think about and be responsible for given that men will respond a specific, somewhat logical way to her outward show. God forbid women question the use of makeup. Oh but I'm just really not a feminist right? ... something about old fashioned values and not letting women express their beauty and dress any way they darn well want to? Heheheh... I'm actually all for "if you've got it, flaunt it" if you want to hon... but do it knowing how you will be perceived in public. It's kind of like the concept of an interview.
Let's look at self image in a healthy way, why don't we? We don't live on an island, but we aren't defined by the faults of other people's perceptions either. Act responsibly and with thought and maybe all women won't be perceived as "manipulative bitches" when things get rocky with "your man". Sadly though - it seems like the coping skill being taught is that guys are objects to be owned as well. The concept of "owning your man" is a farce, every bit as much as the same concept about women.
This article does nothing for a positive image of women (in my opinion) unless you are really attached to how this all works...
Later there's a whole gross list of stalking cues on how to find guys to woo. I won't go on. I need more fun in my Agent life right now.
Oh boy... I'm sure from the outside this isn't a topic anyone wants to touch with a ten foot pole.
Thanks for letting me rant guys and gals. We should go have pizza... toss back a couple of A&Ws and watch Fever Pitch sometime - eh? 
Dress Coding
I've thought a lot about dress codes in my own life because I never liked the standard "girly" appearance even when I was little. Maybe this is because on special occasions my Mom used to put me in cute pink frilly dresses with petticoats and white tights--ITCHY! HOT! Get these off of me! (Tangent...the little girl who lives upstairs from me...on holidays her Mom does a similar thing to her and when they go out to relatives I can always tell when they've gotten home 'cause there's a trail of clothes going down the sidewalk to her front door--she's usually nekkid by that time.) However one thing you could say here is that female clothing is often about being uncomfortable (pantyhose? high heels?).
I think the first time I made a connection to gender and some difference in the way I was being treated was when I was 11--still running around shirtless (grew up in Florida). At 11 there really would have been no way to tell that I wasn't a boy except for maybe the length of my hair. But suddenly my being shirtless was something my male buddy could brag about to his friends as some sign of his accomplishments.
Then when I was about 15, an older female friend arranged a double date with her and her boyfriend and her boyfriend's younger brother who was in an Art class with me. I wore something nice, neat--barely got any attention. Next day decided to try an experiment and wore a real tight top of my Mother's and low slung jeans. Big Difference! Spent the rest of High School and most of college in overalls and/or baggy t-shirts and jeans.
But two things about that--one is that I realized I was still playing the game. It's really impossible to get outside the symbolic coding system--that is I was still dressing for guys--I was just saying something different than girls who wore provocative clothing. And another is that once in college I was walking down the street in winter--big old Army surplus parka on and no way to tell my gender except my height--and I still got cat-called by a bunch of guys on the street. To me this said that the code had little to do with looking pretty, or feminine, or sexy--the cat calls said--just being female means this group of guys think they have rights they can assert over you. It's about power.
So now, I'm not sure how to describe how I dress--except that I try to look pleasing to myself and comfortable--but I'm aware that even my notions of what "attractive" is are always going to be inside the current cultural dress code.
Those tests for unconscious tendencies...
Merging literary criticism with science
Recent developments in literary criticism have been turning to various ways of merging the analysis of stories with science. Generally I really like this idea--and in fact I like the whole recent trend of the breakdown of particular disciplines. I disagree, however, with the central idea of at least one faction of this movement--the idea that literary studies needs science in order to give it a way to reach some kind of empirical truth.
An article in "The Boston Globe" by Jonathan Gottschall presents that idea (and to my mind the problems with that idea) clearly. Gottschall presents the decline in literary studies generally and the rise of the sciences as being caused by the fact that literary studies has no methodology for reaching a final truth. This seems to ignore the much more obvious reason for the rise of the sciences in academia which is that scientific pursuits in our society end in marketable products and therefore receive corporate funding. Gottshcall also presents several studies he and fellow researchers conducted which test the validity of some conclusions in literary studies. Here again, I can see that Gottshcall's approach is problematic in that he misrepresents the theory that he's setting out to test. For example, Gottschall explores whether the idea referred to as "the death of the author" in literary criticism has any validity. But what Gottschall describes this idea meaning is completely nonsensical and needs no scientfic study to prove it false. Literary critics who support this idea, Gottschall claims, are saying that "there can be no shared understanding of what literary works mean." How could any critic even communicate with another if that were true? Gottschall is clearly setting up straw men.
"Catcher in the Rye" not as popular with today's teens
Found this an interesting article--less about the book and more about the differences between being a teenager today and 60 years ago. For one thing, assomeone in the article points out, there was no "teen culture" at the time the book was published. Holden has to choose between adult behaviors/settings and ones associated with children (couldn't think of an adjective to correspond with "adult" beside "childish"--which wasn't quite right).
Some of the impatience with Holden's whining I can sympathize with. As one student says " ‘I can’t really feel bad for this rich kid with a weekend free in New York City.’ ”
Other reasons for rejecting what he represents though seem to point to a much stronger value of needing to belong, of not being the alienated hero. And connected to that--an impatience with that kind of questioning of social values and trying to discover who one is:
" “Holden is somewhat a victim of the current trend in applying ever more mechanistic approaches to understanding human behavior,” Ms. Feinberg wrote in an e-mail message. “Compared to the early 1950s, there is not as much room for the adolescent search, for intuition, for empathy, for the mystery of the unconscious and the deliverance made possible through talking to another person.”
Ms. Feinberg recalled one 15-year-old boy from Long Island who told her: “Oh, we all hated Holden in my class. We just wanted to tell him, ‘Shut up and take your Prozac.’ ”Get a life Holden Caulfield