I write like Chuck Palahniuk when I'm doing narrative, J.D. Salinger when I'm writing narrative about werewolves, H.P. Lovecraft when I'm being pedantic, and Cory Doctorow when I'm being miserably ranty. At least, I do according to this site. I suppose this could've been much worse. At least it doesn't think I write like Stephanie Meyers. I suspect that a large part of this evaluation is based on sentence length and my liberal use of profanity.
Showing posts with label books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label books. Show all posts
Friday, November 19, 2010
Monday, October 25, 2010
My Tribes
This is an exercise I did for my Native American literature class. we had to rewrite an excerpt from Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian (which is an excellent, heart-breaking, hilarious book. I recommend it HIGHLY). This particular bit is about the various groups that make up your identity, and how you define yourself.
"I realized that sure, I was a divorced single mother. I belonged to that tribe. But I also belonged to the tribe of native Californians. And to the tribe of college students. And to the tribe of voracious readers.
And the tribe of fatherless daughters.
And the tribe of incurable theater nerds.
And the tribe of 80s babies.
And the tribe of coffee addicts.
And the tribe of procrastinators, the writers of last minute papers.
And the tribe of tattooed teenagers.
And the tribe of descendants of Mayflower pilgrims.
And the tribe of dancing in the rain.
And the tribe of beta readers.
And the tribe of recovering metalheads.
And the tribe of fandom artists.
And the tribe of pizza and beer gluttons.
And the tribe of perpetual clutter.
And the tribe of keep on moving. It was a huge realization. And that's when I knew I was going to be okay."
I promise, I'm going to stop this "lookit how smart I am!!" college work posting. I'm just trying to blog more often, and these are all things I've meant to post for a while, so I'm kind of clearing the queue so I can get to new content.
"I realized that sure, I was a divorced single mother. I belonged to that tribe. But I also belonged to the tribe of native Californians. And to the tribe of college students. And to the tribe of voracious readers.
And the tribe of fatherless daughters.
And the tribe of incurable theater nerds.
And the tribe of 80s babies.
And the tribe of coffee addicts.
And the tribe of procrastinators, the writers of last minute papers.
And the tribe of tattooed teenagers.
And the tribe of descendants of Mayflower pilgrims.
And the tribe of dancing in the rain.
And the tribe of beta readers.
And the tribe of recovering metalheads.
And the tribe of fandom artists.
And the tribe of pizza and beer gluttons.
And the tribe of perpetual clutter.
And the tribe of keep on moving. It was a huge realization. And that's when I knew I was going to be okay."
I promise, I'm going to stop this "lookit how smart I am!!" college work posting. I'm just trying to blog more often, and these are all things I've meant to post for a while, so I'm kind of clearing the queue so I can get to new content.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Smart Bitches Unite: Identity, Community, and Activism in the Modern Romance Reader Blog
So, once there was this time (about a year ago) that I wrote a paper about the Smart Bitches website for my pop-culture class. And the prof loved it, and asked for a copy to use as an exemplar for future students doing this assignment. And more importantly, my sister liked it, and told me to post it here. So here 'tis:
“Everyone has a very firm idea of what the average romance reader is like. We bet you already know her. She’s rather dim and kind of tubby --- undereducated and undersexed --- and she displays a distressing affinity for mom jeans” (Wendell & Tam 4). For all the years that romance has existed as a separate and distinct genre in popular fiction, romance novels and their readers have been denigrated and undervalued. There is a clear and pervasive preju
dice against the genre; the stereotypical romance reader is generally a pathetic lonely housewife or a spinster, who consumes large quantities of chocolate and possibly owns a great many cats. She is not particularly intelligent, nor is she vivacious. The novels themselves are characterized as hackneyed and formulaic, when they aren’t being called outright pornographic, and the genre is rarely granted any artistic or cultural value. As an avid romance reader (since age 12), I often find myself grinding my teeth over phrases like “but you’re too smart to read that crap! Aren’t you an English major?” “I can’t believe you read that chick porn,” or “all those books are the same; formulaic and badly written.” This is an incredibly frustrating and isolating experience. Fortunately, there is a thriving, intellectual fandom community to be found online, a forum which allows romance readers to cooperatively use the romance novel to “construct meanings of self, of social identity, and social relations” (Fiske 112). Participation in these online communities provides contributors and readers with a sense of identity as members of a subset of a larger romance reading community, and enables active debate, not only of the genre and its stigmas, but also of politics and the morality of the publishing industry.
For the purposes of this paper, I will be examining the online community surrounding the Smart Bitches, Trashy Books blog, created and operated by Sarah Wendell and Candy Tam. The basic premise of the site is that the authors and commenters are intelligent, if somewhat profane, professional women with advanced degrees, who nevertheless enjoy critiquing and reading romance novels. This particular blog is a very clear example of community and identity building in online fandoms. Fandom members take a commodity, in this case the romance novel, and use it, as well as their own reactions to it, to define themselves both as individuals and as a community. In this fandom, reviews of romance novels and discussions of romance novel tropes create a dialogue and a sense of commonality between commenters. Members are drawn to the forum because of a shared love of romance novels, and they stay and become active members of the community because they are able to relate to other commenters. They form social bonds, while still asserting their individuality, by posting their own preferences and thoughts on any given subject.
This fandom community further cements a sense of social identity through a combination of site specific lingo and pervasive hypertextual elements. Group members share a common vernacular which establishes them as members of the “in group,” the community of Smart Bitches readers and contributors. Commentary and blog posts are littered with “in group” vocabulary: the acronym TSTL
(Too Stupid to Live, usually used in reference to a novel’s heroine), alphole (an “asshole” alpha hero), and mantitte/man titty (pecs, generally referring to cover models). Many of these terms are self-referential, and require a working knowledge of past posts or discussions to be understood. For example: the expression Napoli-ed is used as shorthand on the site for rape, and is used synonymously with the term “hella rape.” This stems from an incident in March of 2006, in which the Smart Bitches successfully instituted a Google bomb on Senator Bill Napoli after he made some unfortunate comments about the extreme conditions under which he would consider allowing abortion. Without the context and awareness of Napoli’s statement, the Google bomb, and the blog community’s campaign to institute said “bomb”, this expression makes little sense, and excludes one from the “in group.”
In addition to this “in group” specific vocabulary, the Smart Bitches blog and community relies heavily on hypertext, “the technological realization of intertextuality; with a click of a mouse, one text leads to another, and another;” frequent linking and referencing of outside sources, be they web-based or more broadly cultural, is a cornerstone of the Smart Bitches blog (Gwenllian-Jones 187). John Fiske says that, “intertextuality proposes that any one text is necessarily read in relationship to others and that a range of textual knowledges is brought to bear upon it” (qtd. in Gwenllian-Jones 186). This hypertextual element is both inclusive and divisive. On one level, links to other romance blogs, current events, and the Romance Writers of America contests and statistics are inclusive, providing at the click of a mouse much of the information necessary to process Smart Bitches posts, as well as a sense of membership in the broader romance community beyond Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. However, there are equally many somewhat obscure references to outside texts on the site, which require either prior knowledge or careful research into a wide spectrum of pop cultural and literary sources. Therefore, by frequently referencing past material, other blogs and media sources, as well as a vast array of pop culture references, from Howard Keel to “Spinal Tap”, Norse mythology to Britney Spears, and Sartre to keyboard cat, the Smart Bitches blog creates a complex fan community which requires certain prior and acquired knowledge to belong and fully understand the forum. Certainly at the most basic level any person who enjoys romance novel can join the group, but in order to get all the in-jokes and context, one must be equally versed in any number of seemingly unrelated external sources, which are not inherently relevant to romance reading. Membership in the Smart Bitches fandom community may also inspire one to explore these broader references, thereby both expanding one’s personal experience and frame of reference for self-identification, as well as reinforcing bonds to the fandom.
The Smart Bitches, Trashy Books romance novel fandom is often quite political. This is one of the most outspoken romance novel fandom communities when it comes to refuting the common stigma attached to romance novels and their readers, often posting notices of online media sources lambasting romance, which generally spurs a flurry of commentary from the fandom community, both on the Bitches blog itself and on the offending media link. In one recent post, Sarah Wendell wrote a strong criticism of a Huffington Post contributor, going into a point by point breakdown of just how the man was perpetuating stereotypes both of the genre and of the readers, which resulted in a flurry of articulate comments, both on Huffington Post’s website and on Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, defending the genre and criticizing both the offending post’s author and the Huffington Post for perpetuating the stereotype. Although this may not seem overtly political, particularly in comparison to the community’s attack on Bill Napoli and his stance on abortion, it is important to note that this fandom often addresses the stereotype on romance and romance readers as a feminist issue. When discussing the question of why romance is so often denigrated, blog authors Candy Tam and Sarah Wendell ask, “Are you a woman? Look in your pants. That could be why,” suggesting that one of the major reasons romance is still so openly mocked and stigmatized is that it is “a genre written mostly by women, mostly for women” (126). When viewed through this lens of throwback patriarchal discomfort with female literacy and success, it is easy to see why any attack on the genre could be seen as an attack on women and women’s rights to produce art for the enjoyment of themselves and their fellow women.
In addition to politics, the Smart Bitches community is also keenly interested in the policies and morality of the publishing industry, particularly in the handling of plagiarism. Since the community is comprised not only of readers but also of authors and industry insiders, the community as a whole is greatly concerned with protecting the rights of authors and firmly punishing plagiarists. The most powerful example of this is the blog’s full scale campaign against author Cassie Edwards. In January of 2008 a reader spotted several instances of likely plagiarism in Ms.
Edwards’ books, passages seemingly lifted entirely unaltered from an article about black-footed ferrets, and pointed them out on the Smart Bitches forum. Within days the fandom community had mobilized against the author, sparking public exposure in the national news media and two statements from Ms. Edwards’ publisher first supporting, and then questioning and condemning, Ms. Edwards’ behavior. The Smart Bitches community aggressively pursues and publicizes any and all such cases that come to their attention, and is quite proud of their role in policing it. Interestingly, this was a divisive issue for some members of the community; some members criticized the blog community, suggesting that the attack on Ms. Edwards was out of proportion, and likely motivated by the blog’s authors’ well established dislike of Cassie Edwards’ books.
Ultimately, it is clear that romance novel blogs, and the fandom communities which spring from them, are multifaceted and complex collectives which, nevertheless, tend to be able to unify their members under a common group identity. Fandom members often achieve a strong sense of group identification, from which they derive a sense of belonging, of being understood and welcomed. Communities like Smart Bitches, Trashy Books help their members to create a cultural framework through which to view their own lives and role in society. However, perhaps more importantly, fandom communities also have the power to mobilize their members. John Fiske has written that “popular culture is always part of power relations; it always bears traces of the constant struggle between domination and subordination, between power and various forms of resistance to it or evasions of it . . .” (115). In the case of Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, this power struggle is embodied by a lingering feminist defiance, and the bibliophile’s near religious disdain for plagiarists and the publishers who would protect them.
**********************************************************
Works Cited
Brooker, Will, and Deborah Jermyn, eds. The Audience Studies Reader. New York: Routledge, 2003. Print.
Fiske, John. “Understanding Popular Culture.” Brooker and Jermyn. 112-16. Print.
Gwenllian-Jones, Sara. “Histories, Fiction and Xena: Warrior Princess.” Brooker and Jermyn. 185-91. Print.
Radway, Janice. “Reading the Romance: Women, Patriarchy and Popular Literature.” Brooker and Jermyn. 219-25. Print.
Wendell, Sarah, and Candy Tan. Beyond heaving Bosoms: The Smart Bitches’ Guide to Romance Novels. New York: Simon & Schuster,2009. Print.
---. Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. Esosoft, 7 Dec. 2009. Web. 7 Dec. 2009.
“Everyone has a very firm idea of what the average romance reader is like. We bet you already know her. She’s rather dim and kind of tubby --- undereducated and undersexed --- and she displays a distressing affinity for mom jeans” (Wendell & Tam 4). For all the years that romance has existed as a separate and distinct genre in popular fiction, romance novels and their readers have been denigrated and undervalued. There is a clear and pervasive preju
dice against the genre; the stereotypical romance reader is generally a pathetic lonely housewife or a spinster, who consumes large quantities of chocolate and possibly owns a great many cats. She is not particularly intelligent, nor is she vivacious. The novels themselves are characterized as hackneyed and formulaic, when they aren’t being called outright pornographic, and the genre is rarely granted any artistic or cultural value. As an avid romance reader (since age 12), I often find myself grinding my teeth over phrases like “but you’re too smart to read that crap! Aren’t you an English major?” “I can’t believe you read that chick porn,” or “all those books are the same; formulaic and badly written.” This is an incredibly frustrating and isolating experience. Fortunately, there is a thriving, intellectual fandom community to be found online, a forum which allows romance readers to cooperatively use the romance novel to “construct meanings of self, of social identity, and social relations” (Fiske 112). Participation in these online communities provides contributors and readers with a sense of identity as members of a subset of a larger romance reading community, and enables active debate, not only of the genre and its stigmas, but also of politics and the morality of the publishing industry.For the purposes of this paper, I will be examining the online community surrounding the Smart Bitches, Trashy Books blog, created and operated by Sarah Wendell and Candy Tam. The basic premise of the site is that the authors and commenters are intelligent, if somewhat profane, professional women with advanced degrees, who nevertheless enjoy critiquing and reading romance novels. This particular blog is a very clear example of community and identity building in online fandoms. Fandom members take a commodity, in this case the romance novel, and use it, as well as their own reactions to it, to define themselves both as individuals and as a community. In this fandom, reviews of romance novels and discussions of romance novel tropes create a dialogue and a sense of commonality between commenters. Members are drawn to the forum because of a shared love of romance novels, and they stay and become active members of the community because they are able to relate to other commenters. They form social bonds, while still asserting their individuality, by posting their own preferences and thoughts on any given subject.
This fandom community further cements a sense of social identity through a combination of site specific lingo and pervasive hypertextual elements. Group members share a common vernacular which establishes them as members of the “in group,” the community of Smart Bitches readers and contributors. Commentary and blog posts are littered with “in group” vocabulary: the acronym TSTL
(Too Stupid to Live, usually used in reference to a novel’s heroine), alphole (an “asshole” alpha hero), and mantitte/man titty (pecs, generally referring to cover models). Many of these terms are self-referential, and require a working knowledge of past posts or discussions to be understood. For example: the expression Napoli-ed is used as shorthand on the site for rape, and is used synonymously with the term “hella rape.” This stems from an incident in March of 2006, in which the Smart Bitches successfully instituted a Google bomb on Senator Bill Napoli after he made some unfortunate comments about the extreme conditions under which he would consider allowing abortion. Without the context and awareness of Napoli’s statement, the Google bomb, and the blog community’s campaign to institute said “bomb”, this expression makes little sense, and excludes one from the “in group.”In addition to this “in group” specific vocabulary, the Smart Bitches blog and community relies heavily on hypertext, “the technological realization of intertextuality; with a click of a mouse, one text leads to another, and another;” frequent linking and referencing of outside sources, be they web-based or more broadly cultural, is a cornerstone of the Smart Bitches blog (Gwenllian-Jones 187). John Fiske says that, “intertextuality proposes that any one text is necessarily read in relationship to others and that a range of textual knowledges is brought to bear upon it” (qtd. in Gwenllian-Jones 186). This hypertextual element is both inclusive and divisive. On one level, links to other romance blogs, current events, and the Romance Writers of America contests and statistics are inclusive, providing at the click of a mouse much of the information necessary to process Smart Bitches posts, as well as a sense of membership in the broader romance community beyond Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. However, there are equally many somewhat obscure references to outside texts on the site, which require either prior knowledge or careful research into a wide spectrum of pop cultural and literary sources. Therefore, by frequently referencing past material, other blogs and media sources, as well as a vast array of pop culture references, from Howard Keel to “Spinal Tap”, Norse mythology to Britney Spears, and Sartre to keyboard cat, the Smart Bitches blog creates a complex fan community which requires certain prior and acquired knowledge to belong and fully understand the forum. Certainly at the most basic level any person who enjoys romance novel can join the group, but in order to get all the in-jokes and context, one must be equally versed in any number of seemingly unrelated external sources, which are not inherently relevant to romance reading. Membership in the Smart Bitches fandom community may also inspire one to explore these broader references, thereby both expanding one’s personal experience and frame of reference for self-identification, as well as reinforcing bonds to the fandom.
The Smart Bitches, Trashy Books romance novel fandom is often quite political. This is one of the most outspoken romance novel fandom communities when it comes to refuting the common stigma attached to romance novels and their readers, often posting notices of online media sources lambasting romance, which generally spurs a flurry of commentary from the fandom community, both on the Bitches blog itself and on the offending media link. In one recent post, Sarah Wendell wrote a strong criticism of a Huffington Post contributor, going into a point by point breakdown of just how the man was perpetuating stereotypes both of the genre and of the readers, which resulted in a flurry of articulate comments, both on Huffington Post’s website and on Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, defending the genre and criticizing both the offending post’s author and the Huffington Post for perpetuating the stereotype. Although this may not seem overtly political, particularly in comparison to the community’s attack on Bill Napoli and his stance on abortion, it is important to note that this fandom often addresses the stereotype on romance and romance readers as a feminist issue. When discussing the question of why romance is so often denigrated, blog authors Candy Tam and Sarah Wendell ask, “Are you a woman? Look in your pants. That could be why,” suggesting that one of the major reasons romance is still so openly mocked and stigmatized is that it is “a genre written mostly by women, mostly for women” (126). When viewed through this lens of throwback patriarchal discomfort with female literacy and success, it is easy to see why any attack on the genre could be seen as an attack on women and women’s rights to produce art for the enjoyment of themselves and their fellow women.
In addition to politics, the Smart Bitches community is also keenly interested in the policies and morality of the publishing industry, particularly in the handling of plagiarism. Since the community is comprised not only of readers but also of authors and industry insiders, the community as a whole is greatly concerned with protecting the rights of authors and firmly punishing plagiarists. The most powerful example of this is the blog’s full scale campaign against author Cassie Edwards. In January of 2008 a reader spotted several instances of likely plagiarism in Ms.
Edwards’ books, passages seemingly lifted entirely unaltered from an article about black-footed ferrets, and pointed them out on the Smart Bitches forum. Within days the fandom community had mobilized against the author, sparking public exposure in the national news media and two statements from Ms. Edwards’ publisher first supporting, and then questioning and condemning, Ms. Edwards’ behavior. The Smart Bitches community aggressively pursues and publicizes any and all such cases that come to their attention, and is quite proud of their role in policing it. Interestingly, this was a divisive issue for some members of the community; some members criticized the blog community, suggesting that the attack on Ms. Edwards was out of proportion, and likely motivated by the blog’s authors’ well established dislike of Cassie Edwards’ books.
Ultimately, it is clear that romance novel blogs, and the fandom communities which spring from them, are multifaceted and complex collectives which, nevertheless, tend to be able to unify their members under a common group identity. Fandom members often achieve a strong sense of group identification, from which they derive a sense of belonging, of being understood and welcomed. Communities like Smart Bitches, Trashy Books help their members to create a cultural framework through which to view their own lives and role in society. However, perhaps more importantly, fandom communities also have the power to mobilize their members. John Fiske has written that “popular culture is always part of power relations; it always bears traces of the constant struggle between domination and subordination, between power and various forms of resistance to it or evasions of it . . .” (115). In the case of Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, this power struggle is embodied by a lingering feminist defiance, and the bibliophile’s near religious disdain for plagiarists and the publishers who would protect them.
**********************************************************
Works Cited
Brooker, Will, and Deborah Jermyn, eds. The Audience Studies Reader. New York: Routledge, 2003. Print.
Fiske, John. “Understanding Popular Culture.” Brooker and Jermyn. 112-16. Print.
Gwenllian-Jones, Sara. “Histories, Fiction and Xena: Warrior Princess.” Brooker and Jermyn. 185-91. Print.
Radway, Janice. “Reading the Romance: Women, Patriarchy and Popular Literature.” Brooker and Jermyn. 219-25. Print.
Wendell, Sarah, and Candy Tan. Beyond heaving Bosoms: The Smart Bitches’ Guide to Romance Novels. New York: Simon & Schuster,2009. Print.
---. Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. Esosoft, 7 Dec. 2009. Web. 7 Dec. 2009.
Dear Formspring: Make it easier for Me to Answer a Fuckton of Questions All at Once, Please? K, Thanks.
What's your favorite type of flower?
Stargazer lilies.
Would you rather be rich or famous?
Rich. If I ever get depressed over my lack of fame, I'll console myself by buying an island. Thanks.
If you could have been the author of any book, what would it have been?
Either Stardust or Agnes and the Hitman. Or y’know, Bounty, the book that’s got its main characters burrowed into my head without a shot in hell of ever getting onto the page…
What video game have you played the most?
Marvel v. Capcom. Addictive. You don’t even have to be good at button mashing to do okay in this one, and that’s what I like about it, because I am an incurable button masher.
If you could date any celebrity, who would it be?
Jeffrey Dean Morgan. Or Bruce Campbell. At any age. Shotgun a plus, but not required.
Were you a Michael Jackson fan?
When I was 5, yes. I watched Captain EO so many times back then... Now I'm just kind of sick of hearing about him and his death. Yeah, he died, boo hoo, move on.
Would you rather be really hot or really cold?
Cold. Let it rain, give me some layers, and I'm a happy camper. Summer just pisses me off.
BOOBS?
Bewbs
Would you rather be a vampire or a werewolf?
Werewolf. A) I wouldn't want to be anything that was even remotely associated with crafter's herpes skin, B) un-death does NOT appeal, C) I’m pale enough as it is without throwing solar urticaria and photosensitivity into the mix.
If you won a $1,000 shopping spree for any store, which store would you pick?
Target. $1000 bucks isn’t actually that much money for a shopping “spree”, either. Gimme $5000+ and you’ll have a different answer.
What one thing are you exceptionally good at?
Writing last minute essays. And by last minute, I mean 3-6AM the morning before a paper is due, I start writing/brainstorming. Admittedly, this only works for papers under 8 pages in length, but I am a queen of procrastination and bullshit.
Would you rather have the ability to fly, or the ability to breathe underwater?
Fly. I don’t go into the ocean if I can help it, so… yeah, being able to breathe underwater wouldn’t be terribly useful unless I found myself living in a bathtub… And if I could fly, I could go anywhere I wanted, without paying for gas. Win, says I.
If you had to cook dinner for someone tonight, what would you make?
I would either run down to Ralphs and bust Buitoni spinach tortellini in Alfredo sauce, or I’d try to make Bernie’s meatloaf: sausage, pork, and beef, with creamy melty cheese inside and bacon on top. Goddamn, the pure, unadulterated YUM of that meatloaf… I’m sorry, what were we talking about?
If you could go back in time 10 years and tell your younger self something, what would it be?
You’re skinny and hawt. STFU and get over it with this fat nonsense. You have NO IDEA. PS: get the stick out of your ass and stop sabotaging yourself. Get your act together, do well in school, and go to a real college.
Who's the most overrated actor?
Julia Roberts. I hate her. She sure as hell isn’t MY American sweetheart. I just want to kick her in the shins, honestly. She always plays the same character, herself, and it has gotten boring after 20 odd years.
What is your guiltiest of guilty pleasures?
I watch a lot of terrible reality TV. I’m not talking contest shows or "Real World" knock offs here, either. If it were only that... No, I watch those stupid A&E shows, like “Dog the Bounty Hunter” and “Paranormal State”. Because they are AWFUL. I don’t even really know what attracts me about them. I love how fake and bullshit the “evidence” they find on PS is, and Dog is the same kind of voyeuristic, there but for the grace of god buzz of "Cops", but with a wacky, trashy protagonist family! It is pure, pure crack, and it isn’t even remotely good for me, but I can’t stop.
What was the last book you read?
Improper English. It was awful. The female protagonist is an entitled, selfish idiot. She gets pissed that her boyfriend, a COP, decides to stay on his stakeout and bust CHILD PORNOGRAPHERS rather than run to her side when she’s mopey over the manuscript of her book being criticized. The book hit the wall when I read that. I’m sorry, but if you don’t get that busting child pornographers > your weep-out over constructive crit, you aren’t worth my time.
If you could become any fictional character, who would you be?
So many… Annith in my little sister’s novella, The Minion and the Mistress, because dude, Ruuk is hawt, and I would take a piece of that. Elizabeth in P&P. Matilda in Faking It. Um… yeah, that’s a list of romances, isn’t it? I think I need to find myself a boyfriend, stat.
If you could instantly become fluent in another language, which language would you pick?
French. Even though I SHOULD be practical and learn Spanish.
Where's your favorite place to buy clothes?
Target!! Or Crossroads in Berkeley, CA.
What was the worst job you've ever had?
Selling pizza at Hurricane Harbor when I was 17. Some people shouldn't be allowed to wear swimsuits in public. And some men should be required by law to wax their chests and shoulders. *shudder*
Stargazer lilies.
Would you rather be rich or famous?
Rich. If I ever get depressed over my lack of fame, I'll console myself by buying an island. Thanks.
If you could have been the author of any book, what would it have been?
Either Stardust or Agnes and the Hitman. Or y’know, Bounty, the book that’s got its main characters burrowed into my head without a shot in hell of ever getting onto the page…
What video game have you played the most?
Marvel v. Capcom. Addictive. You don’t even have to be good at button mashing to do okay in this one, and that’s what I like about it, because I am an incurable button masher.
If you could date any celebrity, who would it be?
Jeffrey Dean Morgan. Or Bruce Campbell. At any age. Shotgun a plus, but not required.
Were you a Michael Jackson fan?
When I was 5, yes. I watched Captain EO so many times back then... Now I'm just kind of sick of hearing about him and his death. Yeah, he died, boo hoo, move on.
Would you rather be really hot or really cold?
Cold. Let it rain, give me some layers, and I'm a happy camper. Summer just pisses me off.
BOOBS?
Bewbs
Would you rather be a vampire or a werewolf?
Werewolf. A) I wouldn't want to be anything that was even remotely associated with crafter's herpes skin, B) un-death does NOT appeal, C) I’m pale enough as it is without throwing solar urticaria and photosensitivity into the mix.
If you won a $1,000 shopping spree for any store, which store would you pick?
Target. $1000 bucks isn’t actually that much money for a shopping “spree”, either. Gimme $5000+ and you’ll have a different answer.
What one thing are you exceptionally good at?
Writing last minute essays. And by last minute, I mean 3-6AM the morning before a paper is due, I start writing/brainstorming. Admittedly, this only works for papers under 8 pages in length, but I am a queen of procrastination and bullshit.
Would you rather have the ability to fly, or the ability to breathe underwater?
Fly. I don’t go into the ocean if I can help it, so… yeah, being able to breathe underwater wouldn’t be terribly useful unless I found myself living in a bathtub… And if I could fly, I could go anywhere I wanted, without paying for gas. Win, says I.
If you had to cook dinner for someone tonight, what would you make?
I would either run down to Ralphs and bust Buitoni spinach tortellini in Alfredo sauce, or I’d try to make Bernie’s meatloaf: sausage, pork, and beef, with creamy melty cheese inside and bacon on top. Goddamn, the pure, unadulterated YUM of that meatloaf… I’m sorry, what were we talking about?
If you could go back in time 10 years and tell your younger self something, what would it be?
You’re skinny and hawt. STFU and get over it with this fat nonsense. You have NO IDEA. PS: get the stick out of your ass and stop sabotaging yourself. Get your act together, do well in school, and go to a real college.
Who's the most overrated actor?
Julia Roberts. I hate her. She sure as hell isn’t MY American sweetheart. I just want to kick her in the shins, honestly. She always plays the same character, herself, and it has gotten boring after 20 odd years.
What is your guiltiest of guilty pleasures?
I watch a lot of terrible reality TV. I’m not talking contest shows or "Real World" knock offs here, either. If it were only that... No, I watch those stupid A&E shows, like “Dog the Bounty Hunter” and “Paranormal State”. Because they are AWFUL. I don’t even really know what attracts me about them. I love how fake and bullshit the “evidence” they find on PS is, and Dog is the same kind of voyeuristic, there but for the grace of god buzz of "Cops", but with a wacky, trashy protagonist family! It is pure, pure crack, and it isn’t even remotely good for me, but I can’t stop.
What was the last book you read?
Improper English. It was awful. The female protagonist is an entitled, selfish idiot. She gets pissed that her boyfriend, a COP, decides to stay on his stakeout and bust CHILD PORNOGRAPHERS rather than run to her side when she’s mopey over the manuscript of her book being criticized. The book hit the wall when I read that. I’m sorry, but if you don’t get that busting child pornographers > your weep-out over constructive crit, you aren’t worth my time.
If you could become any fictional character, who would you be?
So many… Annith in my little sister’s novella, The Minion and the Mistress, because dude, Ruuk is hawt, and I would take a piece of that. Elizabeth in P&P. Matilda in Faking It. Um… yeah, that’s a list of romances, isn’t it? I think I need to find myself a boyfriend, stat.
If you could instantly become fluent in another language, which language would you pick?
French. Even though I SHOULD be practical and learn Spanish.
Where's your favorite place to buy clothes?
Target!! Or Crossroads in Berkeley, CA.
What was the worst job you've ever had?
Selling pizza at Hurricane Harbor when I was 17. Some people shouldn't be allowed to wear swimsuits in public. And some men should be required by law to wax their chests and shoulders. *shudder*
Monday, May 3, 2010
The Invisible Bear: Parental Deceit and Creating the Other in The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear, and The Red Ripe Strawberry
One of the most popular and widely taught books in Don and Audrey Wood’s vast picture book oeuvre is The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear, and The Red Ripe Strawberry. The book is widely used to teach preschoolers about friendship and sharing, as well as early fraction concepts (half of a strawberry). Originally published in 1984 when I was only one year old, this book is also one of my own personal favorite early childhood reads. However, since I began reading the book as an adult to my own son, I have been struck by the absence of the Bear from any of the many beautiful illustrations of the story. Since the villain of the book, the Bear, is essentially invisible in the visual narrative, the Bear becomes a possible lie, an adult deception used to manipulate a child-like Mouse into sharing his meal with the Narrator. This omission of the Bear can be a catalyst to a deeper examination of some of the ideological paradigms of the book, particularly those ideologies which are shaped in the book by the Bear’s looming “presence”. In The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear, and The Red Ripe Strawberry, the Bear becomes a symbol of parental deceit, as well as a tool of social identity construction, the outsider Other to the Mouse and Narrator’s insider duo.
At the surface, The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear, and The Red Ripe Strawberry is a book about sharing and friendship. The Mouse is convinced, whether it be by trickery or truth, that the Big Hungry Bear is after the strawberry, and in order to save the berry from the Bear, the Mouse comes to trust the Narrator and shares the strawberry. However, it is interesting to note that the trust and friendship which develops between Narrator and Mouse is founded on what seems to be an untruth, or at least, an inflated sense of danger. The Bear is an invisible enemy, never physically appearing on the page in the illustrations. In fact, the only evidence of the Bear’s existence at any point in the book is derived from the Narrator’s own assertions that the Bear is coming, “tromp[ing] through the forest on his big, hungry feet, and [will] SNIFF! SNIFF! SNIFF! Find the strawberry…” Is there a Bear? And does he want the Strawberry? Possibly, but given the Bear’s significant physical absence from the book, it seems that the imminent threat he presents to both berry and Mouse is overstated, and that the actual threat may in fact be the Narrator.
This lie, or exaggeration, about the Bear presents an interesting ideological problem within the book. When viewed as an allegory for the adult/child relationship, the lie of the Bear in the Narrator’s interactions with the Mouse presents a kind of tacit approval of parental deceit. There are no consequences for the Narrator as a result of the “lie,” and in fact, the Narrator is rewarded for the lie, in that the Mouse happily shares the strawberry with them. This relationship represents an implicit ideological supposition that children (represented here by the Mouse) are intrinsically gullible, and further, that it is appropriate for the adults in positions of power over those children to lie to them “for their own good.” Additionally, since the lie in the story seems to be motivated by greed rather than a genuine protective urge, the book can be read even further as an approval of all parental deceit and even adult covetousness, regardless of the short and long term effects the lie may have on the child. In this way, the narrative of The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear, and The Red Ripe Strawberry can be read as a statement of the proprietary nature of the adult/child relationship, as well as an expression of adult superiority to children. The Mouse in the story is gullible and easily swayed, requiring no real evidence of the Bear’s existence before surrendering half of the strawberry to the Narrator, and the Narrator is clever and wise, all-knowing in the Mouse’s eyes, qualified to direct the Mouse’s actions, and well-deserving of a cut of the strawberry. Ultimately, the Narrator’s covetousness is not only allowed, it is rewarded in the book, as the Mouse is shown happily handing over half of his hard-won berry (which he has struggled to pick, hide, and guard throughout the narrative) while the Narrator proclaims “and we’ll both eat it all up. YUM!” Although this sharing on the Mouse’s part represents an explicit message about sharing and generosity, the implicit message is that the Narrator, or the adults the Narrator represents, has an inherent right to manage the dispersal of children’s property, as well as a right to deceive children for their own ends.
One of the other significant, implied ideological thrusts of The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear and The Red Ripe Strawberry is both the creation of, and the cultivation of fear for, the Other, the Bear. From the third opening on, the Narrator builds a case against the Bear, escalating the Mouse’s fear of the Bear until the Bear has been solidified for the Mouse as a shared enemy, and a threat worthy of thwarting by consuming the berry with the Narrator’s help. This creation of a shared enemy, an “Other,” against which to cast one’s self is a critical element of group identity building. In order to cement a unified social identity, a group singles out an out-group, a set of people which appears or behaves differently, or aggressively, toward the in-group, and comes to define the in-group in relation to the out-group. Essentially, by casting the Bear as aggressor, the Narrator is establishing a commonality between themself and the Mouse. The Narrator knows of and is separate from the Bear, and by telling the Mouse about the Bear, stoking the flame of the Mouse’s fear of the Bear until Mouse is literal sweating and panicked, the Narrator creates a social bond with the Mouse. This us-against-them paradigm bonds the Mouse and Narrator, and allows them not only to establish a friendship, but also enables the Narrator to achieve their ultimate goal, eating the strawberry. The berry becomes a kind of communal property, produce which the Mouse and Narrator have acted together to protect from external aggressors (the Bear), and as such it is shared between the members of the in-group, Mouse and Narrator.
This enacting of social identity building is largely implicit, in that there is no concrete statement of social unity or identity between the Mouse and Narrator, and even the more obvious general theme of friendship is never explicitly addressed in the book. However, if it can be argued that the Mouse and Narrator are friends by book’s end, then it is equally true that they have entered into a social union, as friends, against the Bear, the enemy. Indeed, this process of social identification and “Othering” is largely subconscious, operating on a large social scale and internalized, left unexamined by the lay person, so it is unsurprising that this social construction of the Other should appear as an implicit, unspoken, and possibly unconscious, ideological process in The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear, and the Red Ripe Strawberry.
The creation of the Other is a form of social control, establishing not only social bonds but also cultural norms, and presents a device for policing deviation from those norms, providing rich ground for pejorative slang and punitive threats; “if you’re not with us, you’re against us”, “Limey bastards”, etc. In the case of the book, this drama of the corrective potential of Othering is largely absent, although there is certainly an implied danger that, should the Mouse deviate from the Narrator’s direction, the Bear may get the berry and, by extension, the Mouse. In other words, if the Mouse fails his social group, he may well be left to the tender mercies of the Other, the Bear, which the Mouse’s social conditioning at the Narrator’s hand has given him every reason to fear and distrust. In this way, The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear, and The Red Ripe Strawberry becomes not only a sweet tale of friendship and sharing, but also an enactment of parental social conditioning and, possibly, the construction of prejudice. The Mouse’s fear of the Bear is, after all, unsupported by evidence in the book, built solely upon hearsay testimony from a trusted adult against an invisible and unknown enemy.
At its core, The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear, and The Red Ripe Strawberry is as much a book about friends and sharing as it is a book about lies, covetousness, social identity and child-rearing. The narrator creates an unseen enemy, an invisible Bear, to trick the Mouse into sharing his strawberry. This simple story reflects many unspoken ideolog
ical standards, both in a larger social context and within the more nuclear parent-child dynamic. It is a story of blind and unquestioned faith in a parental figure, and an unexamined fear of the Other. It is also, at its simplest, a funny story about a scared Mouse possibly getting tricked out of half of his lunch, a slapstick comedy of berries in be-schnozed spectacles, and a preschool thriller about looming unseen hungry Bears.
*******************************************
Work Cited
Wood, Don and Audrey. The Little Mouse, The Big Hungry Bear, and The Red Ripe Strawberry. Swindon: Child’s Play Ltd., 2000. Print.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
15 Books
Per The Rules: Don't take too long to think about it. Fifteen books you've read that will always stick with you. First fifteen you can recall in no more than 15 minutes.
(This is by no means a list of favorite books. In fact, at least one of them I loathed. However, these are honestly the books that most stick in my mind. Some of them stick more because of the time in my life they represent for me, or because of the wonderful teachers/people who inspired or required me to read them.)
1.Curse of Chalion~ Lois McMaster Bujold
2. The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Big Hungry Bear~ Don and Audrey Wood
3. American Gods~ Neil Gaiman
4. Moby Dick~ Herman Melville (I will never forget the pain and frustration. That fucking albatross...thanks a ton Beerman/Chaplar! ;P I should probably read it again now, as an adult, in light of the fact that I rather liked The Confidence Man)
5. Gulliver's Travels/ "A Modest Proposal"~ Jonathan Swift (Thank you so very much, Chris Juzwiak. I love you.)
6. Anything and everything Shakespeare wrote (don't make me pick one. I won't do it. Although I should probably say R&J, despite the fact that it is by no means my favorite, simply because the damn Nurse is so inextricably tied to my life)
7. Guards! Guards!~ Terry Pratchett (really any book in the Guards set within the Discworld series, but Guards! Guards! stands out because it contains THE ABSOLUTE BEST character introduction EVER)
8. Pride & Prejudice~ Jane Austin
9. Watchmen~ Alan Moore
10. Agnes and the Hitman~ Jennifer Crusie (I never knew a mob hit could be hot, but this book proves it definitively can)
11. The Picture of Dorian Gray~ Oscar Wilde
12. Fables~ Bill Willingham
13. The Eyre Affair~ Jasper Fforde
14. No Exit~ Jean-Paul Sartre
15. "Sight Unseen"~ Donald Margulies ( And thank you, Ken. This was one of my favorite scenes to perform ever. You always pick such excellent material)
(This is by no means a list of favorite books. In fact, at least one of them I loathed. However, these are honestly the books that most stick in my mind. Some of them stick more because of the time in my life they represent for me, or because of the wonderful teachers/people who inspired or required me to read them.)
1.Curse of Chalion~ Lois McMaster Bujold
2. The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Big Hungry Bear~ Don and Audrey Wood
3. American Gods~ Neil Gaiman
4. Moby Dick~ Herman Melville (I will never forget the pain and frustration. That fucking albatross...thanks a ton Beerman/Chaplar! ;P I should probably read it again now, as an adult, in light of the fact that I rather liked The Confidence Man)
5. Gulliver's Travels/ "A Modest Proposal"~ Jonathan Swift (Thank you so very much, Chris Juzwiak. I love you.)
6. Anything and everything Shakespeare wrote (don't make me pick one. I won't do it. Although I should probably say R&J, despite the fact that it is by no means my favorite, simply because the damn Nurse is so inextricably tied to my life)
7. Guards! Guards!~ Terry Pratchett (really any book in the Guards set within the Discworld series, but Guards! Guards! stands out because it contains THE ABSOLUTE BEST character introduction EVER)
8. Pride & Prejudice~ Jane Austin
9. Watchmen~ Alan Moore
10. Agnes and the Hitman~ Jennifer Crusie (I never knew a mob hit could be hot, but this book proves it definitively can)
11. The Picture of Dorian Gray~ Oscar Wilde
12. Fables~ Bill Willingham
13. The Eyre Affair~ Jasper Fforde
14. No Exit~ Jean-Paul Sartre
15. "Sight Unseen"~ Donald Margulies ( And thank you, Ken. This was one of my favorite scenes to perform ever. You always pick such excellent material)
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Save the Contemporary
So, one of my deep, dark, not-so-shameful secrets is that I read romance novels. Contrary to popular belief, this neither makes me a bored house wife snarfing bon-bons, nor some kind of pervy spinster who gets off on purple prose. The whole romance novel = girl porn thing makes me insane. First of all, so what if is it porn? What's so wrong with a girl liking porn? This drives me particularly bug-fuck crazy when a man who regularly watches porn sneers at "girl porn." As if it were somehow superior to watch a film of "real" sex, rather than read about it. Lame. And second, the majority of mainstream romance novels are definitively NOT porn. The sex scenes are only perhaps 10% of the books, unless you're talking the racier Blazes and genre fiction, and they aren't really... arousing. If I want to read porn, I'll read porn. But the fact is that romance novels read more like the novel form of rom-coms.
That being said, there is a book giveaway going on, and I want some free books. Oh yes. So, if any like minded strangers happen upon this entry, stumble over to http://savethecontemporary.com/ and help the "campaign" go viral by emailing, tweeting and/or blogging about it to get your own chance at some great free category romances. Or, just man up and read some romances, because I don't really want the extra competition for the freebies anyway. ;P
Plus, they're giving away a LUSH bath bomb with the books. Score. Because the only thing better than reading a good contemporary is reading a good contemporary in a long, hot bath. WANT.
UPDATE: Well, I didn't win (I never seem to win these things...) but my sister did! Which is really just as good, because she wanted the tote bag, I wanted the bath bomb, and we were going to share the books anyway. So, SCORE!!
That being said, there is a book giveaway going on, and I want some free books. Oh yes. So, if any like minded strangers happen upon this entry, stumble over to http://savethecontemporary.com/ and help the "campaign" go viral by emailing, tweeting and/or blogging about it to get your own chance at some great free category romances. Or, just man up and read some romances, because I don't really want the extra competition for the freebies anyway. ;P
Plus, they're giving away a LUSH bath bomb with the books. Score. Because the only thing better than reading a good contemporary is reading a good contemporary in a long, hot bath. WANT.
UPDATE: Well, I didn't win (I never seem to win these things...) but my sister did! Which is really just as good, because she wanted the tote bag, I wanted the bath bomb, and we were going to share the books anyway. So, SCORE!!
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