The Joys of Teaching Literature, Vol 4, 2013-14
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Sara Martín, The Joys of Teaching Literature, Vol 4, 2013-14 THE JOYS OF TEACHING LITERATURE VOLUME 8: September 2017- August 2018 Sara Martín Alegre Departament de Filologia Anglesa i de Germanística Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona 2018 blogs.uab.cat/saramartinalegre 1 Contents 5 September 2017 / JEDIS AND TEMPLARS: TRYING TO UNDERSTAND OBI-WAN KENOBI .......................................................................................................................................... 1 11 September 2017 / A WEALTH OF ALLUSIONS: WEAVING THE WEB OF CULTURE ...... 4 19 September 2017 / THE LOVING GAZE: FIFTY YEARS OF LEGAL INTERRACIAL MARRIAGE IN THE USA ..................................................................................................... 7 26 September 2017 / I’VE GOT THE POWER: THE PROBLEM OF EMPOWERMENT ....... 10 10 October 2017 / CLOSE READING: THE PROBLEM OF THE LONG TEXT ...................... 13 17 October 2017 / SECONDARY CHARACTERS: TIME TO END OUR NEGLECT ............... 16 24 October 2017 / THE WEINSTEIN SCANDAL AND THE SPECTATOR’S COMPLICITY: THE PROBLEM OF SEXUALIZED SELF-PRESENTATION ............................................................ 19 31 October 2017 / THE PROBLEM OF SEXUALIZED SELF-PRESENTATION, AGAIN: SEARCHING FOR ITS ROOTS IN VICTORIAN TIMES ......................................................... 22 14 November 2017 / THE ANONYMIZATION OF AUTHORSHIP: A GROWING TREND ... 25 21 November 2017 / SAY YES TO THE DRESS!: THE GUILTY PLEASURES OF A FEMINIST ........................................................................................................................................ 29 28 November 2017 / BACK TO BASICS: SCARED BY THE VAMPIRE IN DRACULA ........... 31 5 December 2017 / WHO DARES IMAGINE THE NEAR FUTURE? ON SELF-TAUGHT AIs AND HACKABLE NEURAL IMPLANTS ............................................................................... 35 12 December 2017 / BOYS CONSUMING PORN: A BLEAK FUTURE FOR HETEROSEXUAL RELATIONSHIPS ............................................................................................................... 38 22 December 2017 /A GLOSSARY OF GENDER-RELATED WORDS (IN HOMAGE TO AMBROSE BIERCE’S THE DEVIL’S DICTIONARY) .............................................................. 41 2 January 2018 / THE DECLINE OF LITERARY FICTION (AND MICROHISTORY AS ALTERNATIVE STORYTELLING) ........................................................................................ 45 16 January 2018 / CHANGING PATTERNS IN STUDENTS’ PERFORMANCE: RESISTING CLASSROOM PARTICIPATION ......................................................................................... 49 23 January 2018 / DOUBLE NOSTALGIA AND CLASS MATTERS: 1930s FICTION ON 1980s TV (THE BOX OF DELIGHTS) ............................................................................................ 52 30 January 2018 / THE RISK OF REDISCOVERING THE ACADEMIC WHEEL (AND THE HANDMAID’S TALE) ........................................................................................................ 55 6 February 2018 / MOUNTING HYPOCRISY AND THE FEMINIST TURNIP FIELD ............. 58 13 February 2018 / THE RETURN OF THE GENTLEMAN: A PROPOSAL .......................... 62 20 February 2018 / THINKING OF MARY SHELLEY AND FRANKENSTEIN: MAKING HUMANS ......................................................................................................................... 66 27 February 2018 / MORE ON ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: ANN LECKIE’S ANCILLARY JUSTICE TRILOGY AND MARJORIE PRIME ....................................................................... 69 3 March 2018 / WHAT WE DON’T SEE FROM THE UNIVERSITY: THE BATTLE FOR SECONDARY SCHOOL EDUCATION ................................................................................. 73 13 March 2018 / NOT MY KIND OF FEMINISM: WHY WE SHOULD NEVER SILENCE OUR MALE ALLIES ................................................................................................................... 76 20 March 2018 / FANDOM AND ACADEMIA: CRITERIA TO DISCUSS TEXTS................... 79 3 April 2018 / IT COULD HAPPEN ANYWHERE: SINCLAIR LEWIS, THE RISE OF FASCISM (AND KENNETH JOHNSON’S LIZARDS) ............................................................................ 82 10 April 2018 / WHAT ABOUT THE LITTLE BOYS?: LOOKING FOR NEW MODELS .......... 86 17 April 2018 / A CLOSER LOOK AT PATRIARCHY THROUGH SOME KEY BOOKS ........... 89 24 April 2018 / CONFUSED BY LOVE: READING ANDRÉ ACIMAN’S CALL ME BY YOUR NAME .............................................................................................................................. 93 8 May 2018 / TUTORING TFG/BA DISSERTATIONS ON VIDEOGAMES IN ENGLISH STUDIES: THE WALKING DEAD AND THE LAST OF US ..................................................... 96 15 May 2018 / AN UNSOLVED PROBLEM: ZYGMUNT BAUMAN’S MODERNITY AND THE HOLOCAUST .................................................................................................................... 99 22 May 2018 / IN MIDDLE-EARTH AGAIN: TOLKIEN (AND WILLIAM MORRIS) ............ 103 5 June 2018 / A PERSISTENT BUNCH: DOCTORAL STUDENTS AGAINST THE WORLD .. 106 12 June 2018 / AN EXTREMELY GUILTY PLEASURE: THE GREATEST SHOWMAN ......... 110 26 June 2018 / KATHARINE BURDEKIN’S SWASTIKA NIGHT IN THE TIMES OF THE HANDMAID’S TALE: A WARNING ABOUT PATRIARCHAL ENSLAVEMENT .................... 113 2 July 2018 / ANATOMY OF THE BOND GIRL: THE CASE OF SOLITAIRE ....................... 117 10 July 2018 / DEATH OF THE NOVEL, DEATH OF THE READER: A DEBATE (WITH AIs) 120 17 July 2018 / BIBLIOMETRICS AND OPEN ACCESS: FIGHTING FOR COMMON SENSE 123 14 August 2018 / WHEN CULTURE ONLY INTERESTS WOMEN, PATRIARCHY WINS .... 127 21 August 2018 / 46 VOLUMES, 200 HOURS: BENITO PÉREZ GALDÓS’ EPISODIOS NACIONALES ................................................................................................................. 130 CREATIVE COMMONS LICENCE/LICENCIA .................................................................... 135 PLEASE, NOTE: These are the posts published in my academic blog The Joys of Teaching Literature (blogs.uab.cat/saramartinalegre/, since September 2010-) between September 2017 and August 2018. The six previous volumes are also available from http://ddd.uab.cat/record/116328. Sara Martín Alegre, Barcelona, August 2018 [email protected] gent.uab.cat/saramartinalegre 5 September 2017 / JEDIS AND TEMPLARS: TRYING TO UNDERSTAND OBI-WAN KENOBI I am using this first post of the new academic year to process ideas I’m considering for my plenary talk on Obi-Wan Kenobi, to be given at the conference on ‘Star Wars and Ideology’ (April 2018, Universidad Complutense in Madrid, http://eventos.ucm.es/10096/detail/congreso-internacional_-star-wars-e- ideologia.html). I asked specifically to focus on Kenobi because there is one image in Lucas’s saga that still bothers me after many years: that of the burnt, mutilated body of Anakin Skywalker, fallen at the feet of Obi-Wan on planet Mustafar’s volcanic landscape. This is how the relationship between master and padawan ends: with Kenobi using sickening violence to smash the body of his former pupil. Inexplicably, despite the appalling way in which Obi-Wan punishes Anakin for his first crimes as Darth Vader, the Jedi Master still remains a favourite with many Star Wars fans. True, Skywalker/Vader’s crimes include the near murder of his pregnant wife Amidala and the extermination of all the children apprenticed to the Jedi Temple. Kenobi is himself the only survivor of Order 66, evil Palpatine’s decree to annihilate all the Jedis and, besides, Anakin is trying to kill him. Even so, when Obi-Wan coolly uses his lightsaber to cut off both of Anakin’s legs and his remaining arm (the other was lost to Count Dooku), and when he abandons his former apprentice to be burnt to death by lava, he is not acting as a Jedi, whether knight or master. He is acting in anger, fury and resentment, exactly the emotions that the Jedi code tries to suppress because they lead to the dark side. Palpatine, or Darth Sidious if you wish, rescues the disfigured, half-dead Vader to imprison him in the iconic cyborg black suit. Meanwhile, Kenobi sees Amidala die in childbirth and organizes the adoption of her newly born twins, Luke and Leia. He hides for nineteen years on planet Tatooine, keeping an eye on the boy, fostered by farmers Owen and Beru Lars (Leia is left in the aristocratic hands of Bail Organa, a member of Alderaan’s royal family). Apparently a new film, scheduled for 2019 and still to be written, will narrate Obi-Wan’s Tatooine exile, which he starts looking like Ewan McGregor and from which he emerges looking like Alec Guinness. 1 Sara Martín Alegre, The Joys of Teaching Literature, Vol 8, 2017-18 I’m convinced that Guinness’ English avuncular looks in the 1977 film, Episode IV: A New Hope, and McGregor’s Scottish good looks in Episodes I-III have played a major role in convincing audiences that Kenobi is a good man always acting right, no matter the circumstances. We first met him as teen Luke’s new mentor: a clever, serene old man, at all times one step ahead of the malevolent Empire thanks to his proficient use of the Force. Who could have thought back in 1977 that when he meets Darth Vader to let himself be killed by him in strange circumstances both were sharing the memory of the Mustafar horror? Well, nobody, not even George Lucas, who must have came up with that grisly moment only about 2000. By the time Kenobi wins the awful combat with Anakin in Revenge