John Hope's Haiku

Initially just posted my haiku in the Google Drive. Here it is!

In the stadium’s

Silence and empty stands, they

simulate ballgames.

My haiku is about the Orioles and White Sox game during the Baltimore riots when the organization decided that instead of cancelling the game they would play it without a live crowd. This did make some sense, because they don’t want to endanger the fans or the players, but it still amounted to one of the weirdest games in the history of baseball and reminded me a lot of postmodernism, particularly Baudrillard. For Baudrillard simulations come to take the place of reality. Part of what made this seem more of a simulation was the lack of the crowd. Though the decision was for a good reason it seemed to be indicative of trends in our culture towards watching online and being further and further separated from the “real.” Though an isolated event, if the future of baseball is the empty ballpark this is more troubling because it separates us from the realities of the game by embedding our experience more and more in screens.

Ethos and Paul de Man and Michel Foucault

There's an interesting problem we seem to run into when studying Paul de Man and for some with Michel Foucault. Both theorists were brilliant but had some shady secrets it seems. I don't think we care as much about Foucault's shenanigans now as people did in the 80s, but Paul de Man's antisemitism is still problematic. For a long time people didn't teach Paul de Man because of his comments on Jews and the European canon.

Even if the comments are false I think this still raises a good question. If a theorist has brilliant contributions literary criticism, but is an awful person should we continue to teach them? I suppose this is only a 20th century problem too because it's not like we're going to stop teaching Plato, Aristotle, or even Freud anytime soon. But should Paul de Man cease to be a part of the literary theory canon due to his shady comments about Jews in the 40s?

Ulysses and the New Critics

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/174659

I have a question about this poem. How far could we make a connection between Odysseus between this and other works, particularly the Odyssey and Dante's reimagining of the character?

I guess this is the problem with the New Critics is that if you take their theory to the extreme wouldn't you technically have to imagine that this character isn't connected to any other work.

That being said it is also problematic to just read this poem solely in the context of Homer and Dante because Tennyson is also revising the character in someway.

Meghan Trainor and "Dear Future Husband" as Simulacra

After realizing that I have only nine blog posts, I quickly went to Facebook to see if there was any cultural artifact I could analyze through one of our theorists. And with that, I bring you Meghan Trainor's "Dear Future Husband":

Now, a feminist critique of this song (and of Meghan Trainor's strange, proto-pop-feminism writ large) would be too easy. There is obviously a ton of strange things going on in this video. I mean, the "future husband" that meets her strange list of criteria is the one that brings her pizza. Oh, sorry bachelor #1 who likely spent all day making me a beautiful scallop dish. Your hard work to make me something that I might enjoy is worthless because it might make me look like one of those "skinny bitches" from my other song, "All About That Bass". AH!

What I am interested in is the bubblegum tempo, abundance of color, spunky dance moves, and bright lipsticks. Trainor has attempted to avoid criticism of her music's messages by making a really smart evasive move: she says the music, and subsequently the music video, is a fantasy. She (or more likely, her very smart publicist) asserts that her music is simulacra, something that we must view as imaginary only. Her music is like Disneyland, “there to conceal the fact that it is the ‘real’ country, all of ‘real’ America, which is Disneyland” (Baudrillard 1565). Trainor's seemingly isolated sentiments concerning her relationship to men, her body, and her role as a woman is indicative of gender inequality issues in the hyperreal. 

There are many ways to read this music video: feminist, performative, postmodern, marxist. Respond with what you think! Let's tear this garbage apart.

Religion as an ISA: What do we do?

A question that has been on my mind: how can Christians (or religious people in general) deal with the idea of religion as an ISA?

Obviously, there are a lot of elements of organized religion that put people into boxes—that “interpellate” them, as it were.  My Christian faith teaches me ways to view myself and ways to view the world.  It gives me a social structure within which to operate.  It gives me perspectives on other people’s truth claims and acts as a filter for my own experiences.  Most significantly, it teaches me who I should submit to (God).  Is religion an oppressive structure?

I suppose that, in one respect, the answer has to be Yes.  If we look at individuals as the most important basic element of the world, than any structure that restricts or even directs them is oppressive to a degree.  But perhaps that is where I can differ from the structuralists who imply that all structure is oppressive.  Seen from a religious point of view, the most important thing in the world is not me as an individual, but God.  Within that mindset, seeing the world through a set of religious structures is not oppression; it is liberation to act within reality rather than within whatever misconstrued visions of reality I as an individual might otherwise hold.

I’m curious how this strikes you all.  Does it sound brain-washed?  Is it an adequate response to the question of ISAs and religion?  Do you have other suggestions for how the two relate?

Incorporating feminist thinking

Looking at feminist theory has been an interesting experience for me since coming to Whitworth.  Before Core-250, I had never felt particularly oppressed by a patriarchal structure.  The feminist lecture in that class, though, made me start thinking about the ways I have internalized patriarchy.  For example, as a kid growing up with dreams of being a great author someday, I wanted to be in the league of Dostoevsky, Tolkien, or Milton.  Not Jane Austen; she didn’t seem quite legitimate.  Neither did any woman writer, once I stopped to think about it.  And neither did I.  I had internalized the idea that great writing is male writing.  My growing understanding of feminism, first in Core-250 but now in this class as well, has made me see some very real problems in society that have taken root in my own head too.

At the same time, I am not always sure how helpful it is to start thinking about the ways I have been “oppressed.”  For one thing, there are many places in my life where I experience privilege (race, socio-economic background, nationality, education, supportive family…).  For another, I am not sure how much I buy into the mindset of clinging to my own rights.  I don’t want to become so concerned with the ways I am being oppressed that I fail to take where I am and work with it.  I don’t know; what do you all see as the balance between fighting oppression and simply living life with grace?

Teaching writing as an ISA

This semester, I have been taking a class in preparation to work in the Whitworth Composition Commons.  One interesting element of the class is the theory that it involves.  In particular, we have looked at how writing centers must be careful in what they do; their ostensible goal is to "produce better writers," but that phrase includes an inherent value question.  What makes a writer "better"?  What standard do writing tutors help their clients to approach?  Does a writing center, by advocating traditional academic standards like thesis-driven organization or standardized spelling, fit students into molds, thus functioning as an effective arm of the academic ISA?

This question especially arises when working with students from a diverse set of cultural backgrounds.  If a student comes from a culture with different standards for writing (for example, less emphasis on making things clear for the reader, or less emphasis on citing sources), should a writing tutor train the student to switch to the standards of American academia?  If they do not do so, tutors may be setting their clients up for failure in their classes, but if they do, they may be using their authority to suppress alternative voices.

What do you think?  How can teachers (of any kind) balance the conflicting impulses of standardizing students' writing and making room for those student voices to be heard?