Acephalous

When Faculty Attack!

A conservative sent me a passive-aggressive email concerning University of Iowa professor Ellen Lewin’s intemperate response to a passive-aggressive email the College Republicans sent about “Conservative Coming Out Week.”  Instead of completing the Circle of Irony by responding to that conservative in an equally intemperate fashion, I would like to spend a moment pointing out the obvious:

The professor’s response (“FUCK YOU, REPUBLICANS”) is clearly inappropriate, but in her defense, the College Republicans were just as clearly trying to be “provocative” by appropriating the language of the causes they oppose.  They claim, for example, that they can host something called “Conservative Coming Out Week” without ever stopping to think about who exactly kept homosexuals afraid to exit the closet.  Thin as liberal support for gay and lesbian causes frequently is, it is safe to say that the people who currently wish “those people” were back in the closet weren’t the most ardent supporters of them exiting it.

Similarly, I’m sure the College Republicans chuckled to themselves when they first saw the phrase “Animal Rights BBQ” because they’ll be asserting their rights to barbeque animal … while simultaneously demonstrating their commitment to punning ungrammatically.  I should add: that latter commitment extends to all matters ungrammatical, as evidenced by their decision to host the discussion “Whose Conservative Anyway?  Guess which athletes, movie stars, and performing artists are Republican.”  This is not to say that Dr. Lewin’s response was appropriate, even if

In 2010, Lewin’s salary from the University of Iowa was $94,800.00 plus benefits.  In her spare time, [she] was written books entitled, Inventing Lesbian Cultures in America, and Gay Fatherhood: Narratives of Family and Citizenship in America.

My annoyance at the grammar of these proponents of English as an official language aside, the strange juxtaposition of Dr. Lewin’s salary and what she does “[i]n her spare” times speaks to the fundamental misunderstanding about what academics do and what their responsibilities are that snakes through the article and the comments below it.  Professors don’t write books in their “spare time” because they have no spare time.  Academics devote what these conservatives are calling “spare time” to professional duties these same conservatives would call “was written books.”  Obviously, the implicit claim is that this professor on the public dole has enough “spare time” to “was written books” about gays and lesbians instead of how awesome George Washington was, because as Dr. Lewin herself pointedly noted, this is all about conservatives’ tactically “delicate sensibilities.”

Were the College Republicans actually offended that a professor responded to their offensive provocation in a manner that demonstrated she was provoked by their offense?  Absolutely not.  As their faculty advisor (and fellow devotee to writing English good) wrote:

It’s not my place at this point to debate the merits of whether the CR message was offense, but let me remind you that they have First Amendment rights as much as you do[.]

The point can’t be the merit of a conservative student organization openly mocking homosexuals and animal rights activists, because so long as they do so without explicitly saying “FUCK YOU, HOMOSEXUALS” and “FUCK YOU, ANIMAL RIGHTS ACTIVISTS,” they’re merely exercising their right to implicitly say “FUCK YOU, HOMOSEXUALS” and “FUCK YOU, ANIMAL RIGHTS ACTIVISTS.”  In short, the point can’t be about the merit of the College Republicans’ argument because it has no merit: it’s all about the tactical employment of rhetorical legerdemain in the service of a hateful ideology.

My students just think they're so funny...

The winner of the Caption Scott McCloud Contest is:

Well, she wishes to remain anonymous, but agreed that her brilliant interpretation of McCloud's textless panels ought to see the light of day.  As I said in class: "Congratulations!  I hate you!  You're awesome!  (Damn it.)"

Every quarter I present my students with five panels from McCloud...

...and have them compete to see who can come up with the most hilarious narrative.  Here are the panels:

They need to add narration or dialogue (or both), as well as specify what the word-picture relations are and how the transitions between the panels work.  Every quarter I learn a little something about my students with this exercise, and this quarter is no exception: I've learned that they're either high, horny, heart-broken, violent, menstruating or some combination thereof.  Should be a fun class tomorrow.

How do you take your average orphan and turn him into a lunatic in a fetish-bat costume?

The Joker, of course, has a theory:

But his version, from Alan Moore's The Killing Joke, is only technically correct.  Bruce Wayne did have "one bad day," yes, but it was different from the "one bad day" the Joker had:

The difference could be that wives and children can be replaced—for tax purposes, if not in our hearts—whereas birth-parents cannot, but while that's true, that's not the most significant difference.  The most significant difference—the one that, despite not knowing the secret identity of the Batman, the Joker deeply understands—is that "one bad day" is far worse when, instead of being told of a death secondhand, you witness it yourself.  Hence, his plan:

"But what I DOOOO want to know is, what will I DOOOO in this writing class?"

SEK is substituting for his co-author/course director, so he when he walks into class, he doesn't know which students are supposed to be there and which aren't ... and there's one that certainly isn't.  SEK doesn't know that yet.  It is imperative for the reader to read said student's voice like this:

 

SEK walks to the Smart Podium and begins to open the images and videos he will be projecting on the wall during class.  MR. HELLO! approaches him.

MR. HELLO! HELLOOOO!  Will YOOOOU be doing the teaching of THIS writing class today?

SEK: I'm the sub.  I was told you were expecting me.

OTHER STUDENTS: We are.

MR. HELLO! I am not INNNN this writing class, I am considering adding a writing class to my portfolio this quarter.  May I add THIS writing class? 

SEK: I'm just the sub.  You'd need to ask the teacher.  

SEK explains course policy about adding this deep into the quarter.  

MR. HELLO! But I am thinking of adding THIS writing course THIS quarter.

SEK: Even if I wanted to, I couldn't add you to this class this quarter, because I'm not the teacher.  I'm just the sub.

MR. HELLO! But what I DOOOO want to know is, what will I DOOOO in this writing class?

SEK politely informs MR. HELLO! of what generally goes on in the composition department.  The other students—the ones actually enrolled in the class—begin to fidget.

MR HELLO! So what YOOOOU are telling me is that when I add THIS writing class, I will be DOOOOING writing.  How much writing will I be DOOOOING in THIS  writing class, counting by WORDS.

OTHER STUDENTS: At least two thousands words a week.

MR HELLO! So what YOOOOU are telling me is that when I add THIS writing class, I will be DOOOOING more writing than it is normal to DOOOO.

SEK: I can't add you to this writing class, because I'm just the sub, and it's already a little too late in the quarter to add.

MR HELLO! So what YOOOOU are telling is that when I add THIS writing class, I will be—

SEK: I can't add you to this class—

MR HELLO! But when you DOOOO—

SEK checks the clock and sees that it's about a minute after class should've started.

SEK: I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to ask you leave.

MR HELLO! So what YOOOOU are telling is me is that when I DOOOO return on Monday to add this class, YOOOOU will be adding me to it.

SEK: I'm just the sub, and I'm subbing for the course director, but I can assure you, she's not going to let you add this late in the quarter.

MR HELLO! But when I DOOOO see you on Monday, YOOOOU will—

OTHER STUDENTS: Enough already!  Just leave!

MR HELLO! (addressing SEK) I will be seeing YOOOOU on Monday.

SEK: Alright then, you do that.

MR HELLO! leaves.  SEK stands in front of the class that isn't his with his mouth agape and his eyes agog.

SEK: I didn't get the best night of sleep last night, so I'm just wondering did I just nod off or did that actually just happen?

Batman is always Beginning again

(I never thought I'd dip back into this well, but then life happens and there you go.)

Heath Ledger notwithstanding, I think it's fairly obvious that Batman Begins is the better of recent reboots.  Nolan structures the first film not around an admittedly ingeniuous performance, but around a modified classical dynamic, by which I mean, he abides by his Aristotle.  It opens with the most incentive of incentive moments—a boy watching his parents murdered before his eyes—then proceeds to a classic peripeteia*—that moment of reversal when the boy who witnessed his parents' murder decides to forsake revenge and fight all crime instead the responsible criminals.  It need not bear mentioning, I don't think, that the deus ex machina, which Aristotle would otherwise despise, in this case fits within "the unity of action," because it has "an air of design" that's well-nigh indisputable. 

The real crux is the film's anagnorisis—or "revelation" in the I-murdered-my-father-made-kids-with-my-mother-sense—which occurs at a time Aristotle would've approved of, but not in the way he'd prefer.  You'll remember that, early in Batman Begins, the recently returned Bruce Wayne takes his horny butler's advice and invites some models to go swimming in a restaurant with him:

Nolan's use of a medium-long shot there is deceptive, as these aren't really women so much as beards:

I'm not saying they're all legs and hair, the cropped medium shot notwithstanding—but for the purpose of the plot, Nolan certain reduces them to as much.  (We're just going to skip over the scene of them skinny dipping, you know, for the kids.)  The point is that these women are props, mere things Alfred suggests Bruce Wayne should acquire should he not want to be discovered as the Batman.  So, then, anagnorisis avoided ... except:

The love of Wayne's life can't even look at him—and not just because I caught  bad capture.  She's just watched him escort two soaking models from a hotel she's about to learn he bought, so she shouldn't want to look at him.  But when she does, he makes a plea: