Day One!

It would probably be more appropriate to call this "Day One Half," since the conference panels began late this morning, rather than the usual time of (gulp) 8 a.m. This allows people to get here, check in, find the proper location and so on before the conference proper gets going, which is a wise idea, because once it does get going, it's on full-tilt until Saturday night.

My goal here is to try to include at least a brief post each day, but it's late and I have an 8 a.m. panel I want to see tomorrow morning, so this will be very brief.

There's no reason to not love this conference. So many disciplines, so many ways of looking at texts and nearly everything is delivered by people who care passionately about their chosen subject matters. It goes back to what I always tell speech students - no, no, I'm not about to choose your topic; that's your job and therefore, if you choose something you don't care about, that's your fault that you're bored. Really, life would be so much more interesting if people spent large chunks of their time working on things that truly interested them, don't you think? Oh, sure - you hear a fair amount of jargon, but that's to be expected. The trick is to make sure you explain the jargon to your audience so you're not just speaking to a teensy, tiny little sliver of the folks out there. Case in point - my studies never took me into the circle of Mikhail Bakhtin's literary theories (I was a theatre major, then I studied law), but if you break it down for me, I can follow a discussion on heteroglossia just fine.

I also had my presentation today, which seems to have gone just fine. I was cutting even as I was presenting, but made my time limit and just may have given my audience a few things to think about. I spoke on the origins of the character of Buffy Summers in the Marvel X-Men character of Kitty Pryde and used a few examples to show the (to me) clear links between Whedon's work and earlier work on Marvel titles. I think Whedon deliberately acknowledged his debt to the earlier writers and artists. What do you think? The left hand image is the cover of Whedon/Jeanty Buffy #35 and the right is the Claremont/Bryne Uncanny X-Men #138. The texture of the background is made up of smaller versions of previous covers.

Enough. The presentations went well and it's done now. FryDaddy presents on Breaking Bad tomorrow afternoon and there's much more to do and see and hear.

Until then, True Believers!

Deep in the Heart of Texas!

I don't think this really counts as "Day 1" of the conference just yet, as it was spent in traveling and dealing with all the myriad of details that go with getting ready to burst from the starting gate for this shindig. The National (makes it sound like a horse race, doesn't it?) is big on its own; paired as it is this year with the regional SW/Texas conference, the program itself is the size of a respectable doorstop. I need to go through and at least figure out my game plan for tomorrow; planning more than that much is just too darned intimidating. See, the academic study of popular culture is an offshoot of American studies - and that's an awfully big boat by itself. Interested in just why Americans have such a love affair with cars and the open road? This is the place for you. Interested in the Beat poets? We're your huckleberry. Fascinated by the sharp rise in the popularity of so-called reality television programming? Want to get some ideas on incorporating the "new media" in your classroom? Want to meet other scholars who focus on the American detective novel? Or the depiction of images of women in advertising? Trust me, hang out in the lobby of the hotels (the conference is so large that it's overtaken two major hotels in downtown San Antonio) and you'll find your people.

And I have to say that this was just one of those smooth days, which is especially nice after the sturm und drang associated with getting ready to be responsibly away from campus for this long this close to the end of the semester. No problem getting to the airport, the bags were duly tagged and whisked away, security was just fine - I even had time for a coffee and an overpriced airport pastry before the boarding call. The flight was fine and even got in a few minutes early. Our bags came down the baggage carousel promptly, we were advised how to cheaply get to the hotel (no free shuttles, alas!), where an alert bellman carried our bags and filled us in on the history of the city. We unpacked, sauntered around the immediate vicinity of the hotel and found the Riverwalk where we ate ice cream in the sunshine and watched other tourists watching us.

All in all, a lovely end to a twelve-hundred-mile journey. We finished up with a wonderful, artery-clogging Italian three-course dinner on the famed Riverwalk where we were entertained by the stylings of (no kidding) "Adean Fusion," who rendered amplified show tunes on the Peruvian pan flute and an assortment of other native instruments. You know I'm telling the truth; I couldn't make that up if I tried. The Eagles' "Hotel California" was also presented, which may qualify them for inclusion in the Sixth Circle of Hell. (That's where they kept heretics, according to Dante, and it seems to sort of qualify.)

Now to take a deep breath and begin highlighting that doorstop of a program . . .

And don't forget about the Re-Watch! We're into the really, really good stuff of Season 3 here, including the introduction of Mothers Opposed to the Occult, or MOO. Always watch for your acronyms, people. Always.

The "Beard of Evil"

Note: This post is actually going to be a "one reel wonder," since I'm posting on Monday and the Re-Watch posting doesn't go up until Tuesday. Tomorrow, FryDaddy and I are making a twelve-hundred-mile trek to San Antonio to attend and present at the mack daddy of popcult conferences, the joint regional SW Texas and National PCA/ACA shindig. San Antonio is reputed to be a beautiful city and we're both looking forward to seeing some of its charms, including the Alamo. San Antonio is named for Saint Anthony of Padua, who is listed as (among other things) the patron saint of lost articles. So if I misplace my hotel key, I at least know who to ask for intercession. More will be posted from the conference itself.

Reel One: Tonight, the film class discussed the trope of the "alternate universe," especially the "mirror universe" in which people and settings are familiar, yet somehow "off" just a crucial little bit. It's a popular theme in fantasy and science fiction, with examples including Alice's trip to Wonderland and "The Wish" episode in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But for the purposes of our class discussion, we went back to the vaults and took in the Jerome Bixby scripted "Mirror, Mirror" episode of the first Star Trek series. This wonderful (and, in places, wonderfully cheesy) episode features an ruthlessly logical Mr. Spock, who can be distinguished from the "real" Mr. Spock by his pointy goatee, hence, "the Beard of Evil." Said Beard has also been parodied on other shows, including South Park. The class seemed to enjoy picking "Mirror, Mirror" apart and I've asked them to write on how the concept by telling me what their "mirror image" would be like and how I might be able to distinguish the "real" from the "false."

Should make for interesting reading!

Coming Soon: The exam film! Working title: "The Exam Film."

She Knows It's a Multipass

Reel One: Over at the film class, it was time to see that not all science fiction takes itself so very, very seriously (Dark City) and/or goes for the scare factor (Alien). We needed something with color and pop and humor and - yeah, it'd be nice if the world gets saved! Luc Besson's The Fifth Element seemed to meet all the criteria. I'm eagerly awaiting the student responses on fashion in the film. So. Much. To Write. About. Chris Tucker's Ruby Rhod alone could be an entire response paper! And I think Gary Oldman's Zorg might just be the actual flip side of the villain Stansfield in Besson's Leon: The Professional which was filmed three years earlier. Fun stuff and a good way to begin our wrap-up leading to the final exam.

Reel Two: Over at the Re-Watch, oh - best buckle up, children, we're deep in the good stuff! This week features two guest bloggers, one a co-author of a Glee book (she blogs here) and the other the uncrowned Queen of Angel Studies (and if I have my way [which is a very good way], she'll soon get a crown. Something tasteful, but with a bit of dash and flair). Episodes this week deal with relationship breakdowns, the return of Spike, and the realization that love is a powerful force, and not always for good. You most definitely won't be "bored now!"

Next week: Probably a truncated post, then postings from the big ol' honking National and Regional popular culture conference deep in the heart of San Antonio, Texas. It'll be huge! Tell your friends.

Buffy's Just the Runner-up . . .

Reel One: In class this week, we took a detour. Sherry Ginn, a neuropsychologist who has a yen for studying how women are depicted in science fiction, agreed to come talk to my class about sex and gender in television. Ginn currently serves as head for the Science Fiction and Fantasy section of the national Popular Culture/American Culture Associations in addition to her professional affiliations in the psychological field, so I considered having her come down to my school on a weeknight to be a downright coup. As a class, we watched an episode of Babylon 5 and discussed color, tribalism, and some of the uses of symbolism in the episode, then talked about evolutionary psychology's point of view toward sex (briefly, men want lots of offspring, so they mate with anything and everything while women want their offspring to benefit from the best genetic material out there, so they're pickier. Actual results may, of course, vary) and how science fiction either mirrors prevailing attitudes towards sex (Captain Kirk) or pushes those boundaries, particularly in the depiction of gay characters (Torchwood). My students seemed engaged and interested and a couple eagerly sought Ginn's e-mail to continue the conversation. As am I. (Just don't ask her about River Tam's amygdyla. She gets testy that so many things were just done so wrong. And yes, she would know about that.)

Reel Two: Over at the Re-Watch, Season 3 continues with a couple of personal favorites. The title of the post, for instance, comes from "Homecoming" and is said by a defiantly-non-superpowered Cordelia who frightens off a bloodthirsty killing machine of a vampire bent on revenge just by snarking at him. Ah, Cordelia. This week's post is written by Jennifer Knoch, editor by day and blogger by night. Her blog can be accessed here. Great stuff, both in the Re-Watch post and the blog (which focuses on book recommendations). And oh - watch how Sunnydale's teenagers fail to deal with their suddenly regressed adult population. I knew selling band candy could only lead to trouble!

Next week: Color, humor, and story come together in Luc Besson's The Fifth Element.