The Thing and Kristeva

How does the film "The Thing" represent a fear of women and it's regenerative powers from Julia Kristeva's article, "Powers of Horror"?

Julia Kristeva writes in her article, "Powers of Horror", in a section -Fear of Women--Fear of Procreation- about the fear of women and how men fear this "power". She says, "It is this power, a dreaded one, that patrilineal filiation has the burden of subduing" (77). Her idea that men fear this "power" that women can procreate.

"The thing" in the film is representation of a woman's presence. The film has a group of men that are stranded in the middle of a frozen tundra and are being attacked by "the thing". "The thing" is a monster that replicates a person from within and is slowly taking over the men.

The men are going insane knowing that "the thing" could be anyone and they do not know who is effected by it. The "thing" replicates from within the body it has taken over, just like a women has children. The women gets pregnant and creates child, yet another human.

How does this relate to men's reactions to their fear of procreation?

Kristeva speaks of ritual impurity and the power of pollution. These are things that men do to prevent the cycle of procreations. The mental idea of men is, "if a woman undergoing her period touches fire, food cooked on that fire makes her ill and threatens her with death" (78). This mentality is that if you hurt the woman then she will subside, get hurt, and die.

This is strongly seen in the film "The Thing". There are flame torches that the men are using in the film. It is used to kill "the thing" every time it is seen attacking one of the men. The mens fear of it taking over makes them kill it where ever it is noticed even if it is part of one of the men. They light "the thing" on fire and watch it die. This gives them a feeling of resolution of it procreating with another member of the group. This all represents the fear of women and their ability to procreate that Kristeva speaks of.

Ma Vie En Rose and its Relationship to Schiavi

What is "coming-in" compared to "coming-out"?

There is a section of Schiavi's aritcle, "A girlboy's own Story", that discusses the term "coming-in". It states that it is oppisite to the known term, "coming-out".
"Coming-in" is a term used by people to explain that they have this knowledge of already knowing what they are before they are adults and see society differently.

It is a knowledge of an inner feeling that one knows before anyone else. When someone is "coming-in", they are experiencing this inner feeling. "Coming-in" is way to express a persons ability to feel what they are even before they understand what society expects them to be.

The "coming-out" is term used by many homosexuals that is a time in a persons life when they tell people they are attracted to the same sex; that they are "gay" or "lesbian".

This term is not a representation of Ludo in Ma Vie en Rose, but an expression used my homosexuals to "come-out" or tell their friends and families that they like the same sex not that they are a different sex.

How does Ludo experience this "coming-in" phase that one goes through according to Schiavi?

The film Ma Vie En Rose is a film that portrays a young boy who is struggling with his inner feelings of his own representation of what he feels that he really is.The boy's name is Ludovic, Ludo is his nickname in the film.

He believes that he is a girl even though he is a boy on the outside. The film portrays the difference's transgendered people face with the people around them.

Ludo is a young boy facing an inner feeling of being a girl even though on the outside he is a boy. This experience that he is going through is what Schiavi was stating one goes through in their "coming-in" period of life.

He was originally accepted by his family, assuming they Ludo was just going through and episode of some sort, but in the end, the mother and father were upset, frustrated, confused and alienated from their son. They did this because of their assumption that Ludo would grow out of it, or that they can fix him some way.

Ludo knew from the very beginning that he feels like he is a girl but his family did not understand that this was the "coming-in" phase.

"Far From Heaven", Kathy's Desire and Identification & Raymond with 'The Fact of Blackness'

The film "Far From Heaven" has two main characters that exemplify many theories from Stacey's "desire and identification"theory with women, like the main protagonist Kathy, to the black character Raymond and his perfect example of Fanon's ideas on his article, "The Fact of Blackness".

How does Jackie Stacey's article, "Desperately Seeking Difference", identify with the female character Kathy in the film "Far From Heaven" with desire and identification?

Stacey discusses in the article the how "binary opposition between masculinity and femininity offers a limited framework for the discussion of a fascination..., which is articulated actively through an interplay of desire and identification" (395). The character Kathy in "Far From Heaven", is facing the opposition between masculinity and femininity with her fascination with the African-American culture and people. She does this by interacting with the black character Raymond who she then turns her fascination into desire of his personality. Her identification with this character becomes highly seen when she finds out that her husband is homosexual and feels like she will be judged and exiled from her social status due to her husband sexual orientation.

Though the two situations are different, Kathy's desire for Raymond leads to her identification of herself and understanding how black people were feeling. Kathy also takes on both the role as mother and father in the film. Her husbands, situation had made Kathy keep her feminine expectedness as well as made her have to fill in for her husbands absence, while he was facing his sexual orientation in private. This is the example of Stacey's opinion of women facing the opposition of femininity and masculinity and how a woman is to take on both roles through desire and identification.

How does the character Raymond in "Far From Heaven", portray the image to Frantz Fanon's article, "The Fact of Blackness"?

Raymond is a black male in the 1950's who is educated and well rounded in his knowledge of business, hard work, art, and the world. Fanon's states, "In the white world the man of color encounters difficulties in the development of his bodily schema. Consciousness of the body is solely a negating activity" (418). The bodily schema in not only the physical aspect of what is expected in a male but his whole self and his development.

Raymond's encounters with the white people throughout the film, slowly prevented difficulties in his development of his bodily schema. His relationship with Kathy, went from business oriented to friendship, and quickly became misread by both the white and black community. He was once discussing something with Kathy in the film outside a movie theater and grabbed her arm as she was walking away. Without hesitation, a white male yells, "hey boy" to get him to stop. If this was a white male addressing a women in the same manner nothing would have been said to anyone. He was prevented here, the capability to evolve and grow as a man due to his color and dealing with the white man.

In the end, Raymond had to leave town, because of misunderstanding seen by others with his relationship with Kathy. His daughter was attacked, which prevented his growth as a father, because white children attacked her. He had to sell his business and move out of town. All of these things are encounters Raymond had as a black man dealing with white people and how throughout the film, he was prevented his right to develop his physical schema as man because he was black.

Dancer in The Dark & Marx

Marx speaks of many different forms of alienation.

Does Selma in the film "Dancer in The Dark" portray a good example of Marx's form of labor alienation that he speaks of?

Marx describes labor alienation as someone who is not themselves at home because their mind is always at work. When they are at work, then they are at home. During this form of alienation, the persons form of alienation will affect their mind and can put them at danger both mentally and physically. Selma exemplifies a perfect example of this when she alienates herself at work in the film, "Dancer in the Dark". The musical aspect of the film, is when Selma is showing Marx's form of labor alienation. Her "daydreaming" as she likes to call it, is her form of labor alienation. This example portrays Marx's theory of labor alienation.

How does Selma in "Dancer in the Dark" portray Marx's labor alienation?

When Selma is "daydreaming", she puts herself at risk of being injured at work. She works in a factory where a person must pay very close attention to what they are doing and if they mess up on anything it can break the machinery and shut down the plant.

Selma goes into her "daydreaming" at work, when she hears noise and creates music in her mind. When the musical numbers are going on in the film, it makes it seem as if Selma is having an outer body experience. This causes Selma to mess up by putting two sheets of metal in a machine and break the machine and hurt herself. Because of this, Selma is fired.

This is an example of labor alienation and how Selma feels at home at work because she can hear noise which then creates music in her mind and then brings her to another place that is home to her. Musical numbers equal home. This puts her at risk of hurting herself and affects her minds way of thinking properly. Because she was alienating herself at work with her musicals, she then alienated herself from her work with then took her away from home as she knew it.

Castration Anxiety, Fetishism and its relationship to the Film "Rear Window"

What is the importance of Freud’s theory of male castration anxiety for the film “Rear Window”?

“Rear Window”, by Alfred Hitchcock, starts off with a man in his apartment … alone, and he is stuck in a wheel chair with a cast from his ankle up to his waist, focusing on his neighbors around him through his window and into theirs. He then sees something that peaks his interest. He then uses his camera to get a closer look into other people’s lives.

The film, “Rear Window”, portrays many examples of Freud’s theory of male castration anxiety. The theory is Freud’s perspective on the male and their relationship to the penis. The male, follows Freud’s theory, with his explanation of castration anxiety. This is a fear that the male will loose his penis one day.

This is loosely seen throughout “Rear Window”, by the male protagonist, who is helpless within his apartment. The protagonist being without the use of his penis due to his injury reopens the fear of castration anxiety. According to Freud, this anxiety never goes away, but just goes into repression. The cast that is preventing the protagonist from using his penis resurfaces the fear and anxiety.

How does this castration anxiety coincide with Freud’s theory of Fetishism?

Freud’s theory of Fetishism is a substitute of something to repress the castration anxiety in the male. The male protagonist is a photographer, in the film, “Rear Window”, and uses a camera with a long range lens to see into other’s apartments. Though this is what the camera was used for as seen throughout the film, it also could be seen as his fetish.

The camera size and elongated lens make it hard to not realize that the whole entire thing is large and long. The camera is the substitution for the lack of the use of his penis. He can not use his penis, which then resurfaces the castration anxiety, and therefore forces him to find something else in his life to substitute for this. This is the connection between Freud’s theory of the male castration anxiety and his theory of Fetishism.

Persepolis and Epileptic

Persepolis is a graphic novel by Marjane Satrapi that portrays a story of a youg teenage girl.
What part of the graphic novel gives the example of White's definition of the way people tell a story? White discusses that there are ways people tell a story. They can choose to leave stuff out in their story.

There is an example of White's idea of how a story is told, on page 12 in Persepolis. It is an example of how a person can see how society sees a certain event going on in life and misunderstand what they might believe due to outside influence telling a story to someone else. Because of this, "Marji"realizes that she does not understand what is really going on in her country. She is in a room full of older people talking about the king and how he is a killer. They are all laughing and she does not know what to do. She then laughs awkwardly and alone. The last part of the panel, she is saying to herself that she does not know anything and that she must read to understand.

Persepolis is a story that the writer Satrapi actually lived and wanted to portray her experiences living in Iran. Because the story is a first person account of what she experienced, Satrapi can choose to leave things out of the story. She could have even have left things out subconsciously, knowing that it would not work well with the way she wanted her story to go. White explains that people tell stories like this to make sure they get their point across without outside opinions/facts misleading the story.

Sleepwalk and Time

Is time fast or slow throughout Sleepwalk, by Adrian Tomine?

Sleepwalk, by Adrian Tomine, is decieving.
The book is broken up into smaller short-comic-stories that seem to make the read fast.
But, if you look further into the stories and the depiction of time throughout each story, time is slow.
There is a beginning, middle, end. There are flashbacks that bring us back in time farther then the present story at hand.
McCloud discusses how a rope can be used to explain the time use in a comic.
He says, every inch on a rope represents every second in time on a comic panel (96).
Each panel is a different part of time.

Does Sleepwalk use McClouds use of time in a reasonable manner?

Sleepwalk does this but the rope is shorter and and the time is more spread out with each panel and with each story.
It bring more time into a shorter story. It allows the reader to understand what is going on and to also have an imaginaiton of the time in between and what is happening during that time we do not see as a reader.