Sunday, November 25, 2018
Thursday, November 22, 2018
For your final essay, please make sure to properly cite Monster Theory, by Jeffrey Jerome Cohen.
Here is the information:
In the parenthetical citation, simply use his last name (Cohen). You do
not need to include the page numbers, since you don't have those. For the Works Cited page, here is the info to plug in:
Cohen, Jeffrey Jerome. Monster Theory. Minneapolis, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 1996.
Lastly, please note that the works cited page citation above is not formatted with the proper indentation (I can't do that in blogger), so make sure you indent the second line.
Lastly, please note that the works cited page citation above is not formatted with the proper indentation (I can't do that in blogger), so make sure you indent the second line.
Sunday, November 18, 2018
Thursday, November 15, 2018
Class Activity
In order to practice constructing imaginative and critically designed monsters that embody specific cultural fears and desires, we are going to design a vampire/zombie for today.
This exercise is intended to help us work on connecting specific cultural fears and desires to a physical, monstrous embodiment. Creativity with physicality, environment, goals, and prey is the goal here. We don't want to slip into cliches or boring metaphors, but rather to think about how we can make our vampire/zombie truly a unique representation of the present moment.
Something we know about our vampire/zombie:
It is a Whittier College student, so we will want to consider the unique stresses, anxieties, and desires of Whittier College students.
Categories to design:
-Cultural fears/desires it represents
-Prey
-Environment (where it lives and what it's environment looks like, when it wakes and sleeps, etc.)
-Physicality (face, body, skills)
-Attitude/goals
Each of these should uniquely demonstrate the cultural fears/desires the student vampire/zombie represents.
This exercise is intended to help us work on connecting specific cultural fears and desires to a physical, monstrous embodiment. Creativity with physicality, environment, goals, and prey is the goal here. We don't want to slip into cliches or boring metaphors, but rather to think about how we can make our vampire/zombie truly a unique representation of the present moment.
Something we know about our vampire/zombie:
It is a Whittier College student, so we will want to consider the unique stresses, anxieties, and desires of Whittier College students.
Categories to design:
-Cultural fears/desires it represents
-Prey
-Environment (where it lives and what it's environment looks like, when it wakes and sleeps, etc.)
-Physicality (face, body, skills)
-Attitude/goals
Each of these should uniquely demonstrate the cultural fears/desires the student vampire/zombie represents.
Tuesday, November 13, 2018
Final Project Workshop
For this workshop/peer review please follow the same guidelines as prior workshops: focus on one person at a time. Read through the proposal and then begin answering the following questions in order to best help/support them. Please answer the questions in complete sentences, with specific suggestions for improvement.
Please note that there are two different sets of questions, depending on whether the person is rewriting a fairy tale, or creating a monster. Use the appropriate set of questions and answers for your partner.
Fairy Tale Questions
1) Is the cultural problem, social issue, or real life situation that the fairy tale was inspired by a tangible, specific issue that can be traced to an event or series of events in our world today? Is there any way this problem or issue can be more specific/narrow? For example, if the social issue is "social media," that is not specific enough. Instead it could be something like "online trolling or bullying" or "body image pressure for girls on sites like Instagram" or "the influence of Russian hackers on Facebook on the election of Donald Trump."
2) Does the writer have strong research into their cultural problem or issue that inspired their fairy tale, and/or the fairy tale itself? What are some other angles they might research? Give at least one suggestion.
3) Does the fairy tale itself seem to mesh well with the social issue and cultural values the writer wants to focus on? Does the tale type seem to logically mesh with these issues?
4) How can the cultural values themselves be more precise? What specific culture or sub-culture do they reflect? (People, place) Ex. upper middle class, Ivy League college students; Mexican immigrants facing discrimination in the wake of Trumps' election
5) Is the writer altering aspects of the fairy tale in interesting ways, in order to reflect this current cultural moment? Look at the setting, the character's job/life situation, etc. Suggest a few ideas for making the story even more contemporary, in ways that align with the cultural problem and focus of the narrative.
6) What is the role of magic in the story? Will there be magic, or will the tale be totally realist? If so, what aspects of our real world does the magic reflect? Ex. the role of money; the need for a miracle to get out of poverty, etc.
7) Does the writer have a clear sense of the tale type? Are they missing any key elements of it?
Monster Questions
1) What cultural problem, social issue, or real life situation was the monster inspired by? Is this a tangible, specific issue that can be traced to an event or series of events in our world today? Is there any way this problem or issue can be more specific/narrow? For example, if the social issue is "social media," that is not specific enough. Instead it could be something like "online trolling or bullying of children" or "body image pressure for girls on sites like Instagram" or "the influence of Russian hackers on Facebook on the election of Donald Trump."
2) Does the writer have strong research into their cultural problem or issue that inspired their monster? What are some other angles they might research? Give at least one suggestion.
3) What are the cultural fears/desires the monster embodies? How can these be more precisely stated? How can they be better tied to the cultural problem? For example, if the cultural desire is "fame," and the cultural problem is "social media," then the cultural desire can be stated as "desire for social media fame."
4) Are there more fears or desires that connect to the ones stated, that the writer should think about? And if they only stated a fear, what is the corresponding desire? (And vice versa). For example, the desire for social media fame directly connects to the fear of being alone and unloved. It also can connect to a fear of fame as well, for example being cyberstalked and judged and criticized.
5) How can the monster's body more precisely reflect the cultural fears/desires? What about it's skills and attributes? How can the writer be more creative in considering how to "embody" these problems? For example, is this a monster created out of revenge? Ex. Ocean coral that is angry at its death due to acidification, who has grown sharp knife-like razors to cut swimmers. Is it a monster created out of the results of a problem? Ex. a monster that is the result of garbage in the coean, which is a giant patchwork of various types of garbage.
6) How can the monster's living situation/home better reflect the cultural problem it represents? Remember "monsters exist at the margins of the world, both conceptually/geographically" (Cohen).
7) Is the creative component the best possible choice for reflecting this monster, or would another option make more sense, given the cultural problem and cultural fears/desires the monster embodies? What are some problems the writer might run into with their choice of creative component, and how can they overcome these? Ex. using video editing equipment may require some youtube tutorials
For this workshop/peer review please follow the same guidelines as prior workshops: focus on one person at a time. Read through the proposal and then begin answering the following questions in order to best help/support them. Please answer the questions in complete sentences, with specific suggestions for improvement.
Please note that there are two different sets of questions, depending on whether the person is rewriting a fairy tale, or creating a monster. Use the appropriate set of questions and answers for your partner.
Fairy Tale Questions
1) Is the cultural problem, social issue, or real life situation that the fairy tale was inspired by a tangible, specific issue that can be traced to an event or series of events in our world today? Is there any way this problem or issue can be more specific/narrow? For example, if the social issue is "social media," that is not specific enough. Instead it could be something like "online trolling or bullying" or "body image pressure for girls on sites like Instagram" or "the influence of Russian hackers on Facebook on the election of Donald Trump."
2) Does the writer have strong research into their cultural problem or issue that inspired their fairy tale, and/or the fairy tale itself? What are some other angles they might research? Give at least one suggestion.
3) Does the fairy tale itself seem to mesh well with the social issue and cultural values the writer wants to focus on? Does the tale type seem to logically mesh with these issues?
4) How can the cultural values themselves be more precise? What specific culture or sub-culture do they reflect? (People, place) Ex. upper middle class, Ivy League college students; Mexican immigrants facing discrimination in the wake of Trumps' election
5) Is the writer altering aspects of the fairy tale in interesting ways, in order to reflect this current cultural moment? Look at the setting, the character's job/life situation, etc. Suggest a few ideas for making the story even more contemporary, in ways that align with the cultural problem and focus of the narrative.
6) What is the role of magic in the story? Will there be magic, or will the tale be totally realist? If so, what aspects of our real world does the magic reflect? Ex. the role of money; the need for a miracle to get out of poverty, etc.
7) Does the writer have a clear sense of the tale type? Are they missing any key elements of it?
Monster Questions
1) What cultural problem, social issue, or real life situation was the monster inspired by? Is this a tangible, specific issue that can be traced to an event or series of events in our world today? Is there any way this problem or issue can be more specific/narrow? For example, if the social issue is "social media," that is not specific enough. Instead it could be something like "online trolling or bullying of children" or "body image pressure for girls on sites like Instagram" or "the influence of Russian hackers on Facebook on the election of Donald Trump."
2) Does the writer have strong research into their cultural problem or issue that inspired their monster? What are some other angles they might research? Give at least one suggestion.
3) What are the cultural fears/desires the monster embodies? How can these be more precisely stated? How can they be better tied to the cultural problem? For example, if the cultural desire is "fame," and the cultural problem is "social media," then the cultural desire can be stated as "desire for social media fame."
4) Are there more fears or desires that connect to the ones stated, that the writer should think about? And if they only stated a fear, what is the corresponding desire? (And vice versa). For example, the desire for social media fame directly connects to the fear of being alone and unloved. It also can connect to a fear of fame as well, for example being cyberstalked and judged and criticized.
5) How can the monster's body more precisely reflect the cultural fears/desires? What about it's skills and attributes? How can the writer be more creative in considering how to "embody" these problems? For example, is this a monster created out of revenge? Ex. Ocean coral that is angry at its death due to acidification, who has grown sharp knife-like razors to cut swimmers. Is it a monster created out of the results of a problem? Ex. a monster that is the result of garbage in the coean, which is a giant patchwork of various types of garbage.
6) How can the monster's living situation/home better reflect the cultural problem it represents? Remember "monsters exist at the margins of the world, both conceptually/geographically" (Cohen).
7) Is the creative component the best possible choice for reflecting this monster, or would another option make more sense, given the cultural problem and cultural fears/desires the monster embodies? What are some problems the writer might run into with their choice of creative component, and how can they overcome these? Ex. using video editing equipment may require some youtube tutorials
Thursday, November 8, 2018
Final Project Proposal
For you final project proposal, which is due next Tuesday for workshop, you must write a two page proposal that answers the following questions. Make sure to use complete sentences, and to present your proposal in a clean, neat manner. This should not be rushed through or you will receive a zero.
Please remember that you are choosing one of the following options (fairy tale or monster); you should not answer both prompts.
Make sure to print and bring two copies!
Fairy Tale Project Proposal
What is the fairy tale you will re-write? State its primary title or titles. EX. Beauty and the Beast
What is the earliest iteration of this fairy tale? (Culture, time, place) EX. The Story of Grandmother, oral folk tale, medieval Europe
What is the essential tale type to the story? Remember, the tale type is the basic plot structure that remains the same in most re-tellings.
What changes do you plan to make to the cultural values, to update it for today? Or, alternately, which cultural problems or issues do you plan to apply to the tale type? Why do they fit the tale type?
What inspired you in particular to write a story that reflects these values, and/or deals with these cultural issues? Where did you "find" them? (i.e. news article, library research, etc). *Please note that you must not "guess" at what the cultural values are; they must reflect some real world cultural problem, condition, or set of beliefs held by a group of people.
Where will your story be set, and how will the setting reflect these cultural issues?
What will happen in your story (the plot), in order to best reflect these cultural issues while staying true to the tale type?
Which other aspects of the tale type do you see connecting to your story? What is their relationship?
Ex. Famine in Hansel and Gretel will connect to the high cost of living in NYC, absent parents will be overworked just as the parents in the older version were starved so could not care for their children, the witch who lures the children will be an online catfisher.
What changes will you make to the characters to best reflect these updated cultural values?
Include as well a bibliography with three outside sources you plan to use for your analytical essay. These must be library-based research about either the fairy tale itself, or the cultural values/problems your fairy tale analyzes.
Monster Project Proposal
What cultural fears and desires does your monster represent? These should be as specific as possible, and you must connect them to a particular time and place. The "problem" that your monster reflects should be as specific as student loan debt in the US or pollution in the rivers of the Midwest; it should not be something vague and unrefined like "fear of the unknown" or "fear of death." Look for a real world problem--news articles are a good place to start--that is happening in our world today and use that as a jumping off point.
What is the time and place your monster represents? This should be as specific as Whittier, CA in 2018. (Please note your time must be contemporary).
How does your monster's physical body represent the cultural fears/desires? Be as specific as possible, and discuss multiple elements of its body.
How does the monster's powers (skills) represent the cultural fears/desires?
How does the monster's habitat (home) represent the cultural fears/desires?
What inspired you to focus on these cultural fears and desires? Where did you "find" them? (i.e. news article, library research, etc). *Please note that you must not "guess" at what the cultural fears and desires are; they must reflect some real world cultural problem or condition such as the imminent threat of a twitter-induced nuclear war, or the death of the polar bears due to the arctic ice melting.
What form will your creative component take? How does this form best reflect the cultural fears and desires your monster embodies?
Were you inspired by any other monsters when creating yours? If so, which ones and why?
Include as well an annotated bibliography with three outside sources you plan to use for your analytical essay. These must be library-based research about the cultural fears/desires your monster represents. Discuss how you will utilize each in your paper.
Please remember that you are choosing one of the following options (fairy tale or monster); you should not answer both prompts.
Make sure to print and bring two copies!
Fairy Tale Project Proposal
What is the fairy tale you will re-write? State its primary title or titles. EX. Beauty and the Beast
What is the earliest iteration of this fairy tale? (Culture, time, place) EX. The Story of Grandmother, oral folk tale, medieval Europe
What is the essential tale type to the story? Remember, the tale type is the basic plot structure that remains the same in most re-tellings.
What changes do you plan to make to the cultural values, to update it for today? Or, alternately, which cultural problems or issues do you plan to apply to the tale type? Why do they fit the tale type?
What inspired you in particular to write a story that reflects these values, and/or deals with these cultural issues? Where did you "find" them? (i.e. news article, library research, etc). *Please note that you must not "guess" at what the cultural values are; they must reflect some real world cultural problem, condition, or set of beliefs held by a group of people.
Where will your story be set, and how will the setting reflect these cultural issues?
What will happen in your story (the plot), in order to best reflect these cultural issues while staying true to the tale type?
Which other aspects of the tale type do you see connecting to your story? What is their relationship?
Ex. Famine in Hansel and Gretel will connect to the high cost of living in NYC, absent parents will be overworked just as the parents in the older version were starved so could not care for their children, the witch who lures the children will be an online catfisher.
What changes will you make to the characters to best reflect these updated cultural values?
Include as well a bibliography with three outside sources you plan to use for your analytical essay. These must be library-based research about either the fairy tale itself, or the cultural values/problems your fairy tale analyzes.
Monster Project Proposal
What cultural fears and desires does your monster represent? These should be as specific as possible, and you must connect them to a particular time and place. The "problem" that your monster reflects should be as specific as student loan debt in the US or pollution in the rivers of the Midwest; it should not be something vague and unrefined like "fear of the unknown" or "fear of death." Look for a real world problem--news articles are a good place to start--that is happening in our world today and use that as a jumping off point.
What is the time and place your monster represents? This should be as specific as Whittier, CA in 2018. (Please note your time must be contemporary).
How does your monster's physical body represent the cultural fears/desires? Be as specific as possible, and discuss multiple elements of its body.
How does the monster's powers (skills) represent the cultural fears/desires?
How does the monster's habitat (home) represent the cultural fears/desires?
What inspired you to focus on these cultural fears and desires? Where did you "find" them? (i.e. news article, library research, etc). *Please note that you must not "guess" at what the cultural fears and desires are; they must reflect some real world cultural problem or condition such as the imminent threat of a twitter-induced nuclear war, or the death of the polar bears due to the arctic ice melting.
What form will your creative component take? How does this form best reflect the cultural fears and desires your monster embodies?
Were you inspired by any other monsters when creating yours? If so, which ones and why?
Include as well an annotated bibliography with three outside sources you plan to use for your analytical essay. These must be library-based research about the cultural fears/desires your monster represents. Discuss how you will utilize each in your paper.
Thursday, November 1, 2018
Notes Allowance for In-Class Essay
For your in-class essay next Monday, you may bring one page of notes, double-sided (handwritten or typed). These notes should relate to the creation/destruction of the female companion for the creature.
While you are not required to create this page of notes, it is strongly recommended, as you will be expected to include examples from the book in your essay.
You may not use the book itself while writing the essay. You may also not write out a sample essay on the notes; your notes should be about the book and include examples and quotations but not entire paragraphs.
Lastly, you will not be expected to use MLA citations for the in-class essay, but if you choose to directly quote, you should use quotation marks and incorporate the quotes naturally into your sentences.
The notes must be turned in with your essay.
While you are not required to create this page of notes, it is strongly recommended, as you will be expected to include examples from the book in your essay.
You may not use the book itself while writing the essay. You may also not write out a sample essay on the notes; your notes should be about the book and include examples and quotations but not entire paragraphs.
Lastly, you will not be expected to use MLA citations for the in-class essay, but if you choose to directly quote, you should use quotation marks and incorporate the quotes naturally into your sentences.
The notes must be turned in with your essay.
The In-Class Essay:
Aim and Organization
AIM:
To successfully prove a clear, specific thesis. The thesis should, obviously, address the prompt given in class. Following directions here, as always, is crucial to receiving a passing grade.
ORGANIZATION:
An in-class essay is organized into five paragraphs. The first paragraph is the introduction, then comes three body paragraphs, then a concluding paragraph. No more—no less!
You will want to make a brief outline before you write your essay.* Make sure the body paragraphs appear in a logical order, not simply the order they came to your mind in. Build on the information as you go.
Introductory Paragraph: Make sure not to take too much time writing in introduction. This paragraph should be about five sentences long (give or take a sentence or two). Provide a clearly arguable, well-qualified, thesis.
Body Paragraph One: Don’t forget to provide clear examples to back up your argument, as well as a topic sentence at the beginning of the paragraph.
Body Paragraph Two: Don’t forget to provide clear examples to back up your argument, as well as a topic sentence at the beginning of the paragraph. And remember, Body Paragraph Two should follow Body Paragraph One in terms of building logically upon it.
Body Paragraph Three: Don’t forget to provide clear examples to back up your argument, as well a topic sentence as the beginning of the paragraph. And remember, Body Paragraph Three should follow Body Paragraph Two in terms of building logically upon it.
Concluding Paragraph: Re-state your thesis. Summarize what has been successfully argued in the essay. End with a thoughtful and strong statement. This paragraph, like your introductory paragraph, need not be longer than five sentences, but should also not be shorter.
Grammar and formatting: Make sure to check your grammar and spelling as you go along. There is a bit more room for error in an in-class essay, but your essay must be readable and legible (so make sure your handwriting is clear). Double-check your essay for errors before you turn it in. You may choose to double-space or single space an in-class essay (depending on what your teacher requests).
*You will be required to turn in your brief outline with your essay for your this class. See “Sample Outline” below for details.
SAMPLE OUTLINE FOR IN-CLASS ESSAY
Par. 1: THESIS: Write out thesis statement here.
Par. 2: TOPIC SENTENCE/MAIN IDEA: Write out topic sentence/main idea for Paragraph 1 here.
Par. 3: TOPIC SENTENCE/MAIN IDEA: Write out topic sentence/main idea for Paragraph 2 here.
Par. 4: TOPIC SENTENCE/MAIN IDEA: Write out topic sentence/main idea for Paragraph 3 here.
Par. 5: CONCLUSION: Final thought to leave reader with.
*Remember, this is just a sample outline—yours can differ slightly. Also, you obviously will want to fully develop your intro, body paragraphs, and conclusion—so while you are providing the main idea of these paragraphs here in the outline, you will flesh them out with evidence/support in your actual essay.
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