Playing the dozens
A good natured, trash talking contest particularly between African Americans. It is part of an African tradition of "woofin" or "signifyin" and is generally seen as a nonviolent alternative to physical conflict. In a historical context "dozens" refers to old, brokendown slaves who were sold in the dozens.
The game, contest needs an audience in order to be successful, the audience can then cheer trach talkers on with cheers such as "snap" and "burn." Frequently these jokes take the form of "yo mama" but they can also refer to just about aspect of the offended and his or her life. However the goal is to not actually become offended; instead it is to be the most clever.


Below are a few links
Yo mama's so fat
Yo mama's so stupid
Yo mama has
Yo mama's so poor
Yo mama's so nasty
Yo mama's so ugly
Yo mama's so old

Notes from 10/26

The importance of music in relation to myth. They both belong on the bottom of the pyramid.

The invisible man't mind and imagination won't let him rest.

Mthological references: The Odyssey (Jack and his one eye,) The Eipc of Gilgamesh, The Aneeid (Sibil.)

Sibil (the Cumayan sibil) is the mythological guide to the hero's enterance into the underworld.

This fits with the story's theme of the mythological quest

The Last chapter of "Invisible Man" is related to the book of revelation

Picquaresque scenes in "Invisible Man"

The Battle Royale

Trueblood

The Golden Day *note Supercarge represents the superego

Homer Barbee

Bledsoq *represents the expulsion from Paradise

Vet on Bus

Emerson *Ralph Waldo Emerson, theoretically

Paints

Hospital *electroshock therapy results in a loss of identity

Mary

Brotherhood

Tod Clifton *the speech in reminiscent of the Bible and Shakespeare in Julius Caesar, "Go home" aka "I come to bury Caesar not to praise him."

Rinehart

Apocalypse aka riot

Notes from 10/27


What did I do to be so black and blue." Louis Armstrong song. It demonstrates the importance of music throughout "Invisible Man."





In "Dead Man" we have to wonder whether William Blake is dead from the start, dead when he is shot in the chest, or only dead at the very end in the canoe. The underlying myth is that of the American innocent, naivity, American obsession with firearms, and capitalist bounty hunters.


The Stockholm syndrome is everpresent when Blake begins to sympathize and even adopt the customs of his "captor," Nobody. Also, Bill Blake is abducted by William Blake and he eventually becomes William Blake in a particularly graphic scene where he shoots a sherrif and asks, "Hace you read my poetry?"


The main ideas within "Dead Man"


Death


What it means to be American


Circling back, notice scenes toward the beginning and the end of the movie that seem very familiar


Also important:


"Poetry is a destructive force."


"Poetry is the subject of the poem."


"All things resemble each other."





"The Bear"- note the importance of primal rhythms, Ike's struggle with his own heritage as a white man aka destroyer.


Who really owns the land, neither the white man or the Native American. The land belongs to the animals.


"Invisible Man"- important referenced texts include The Bible as well as "Portrait of the Artist As A Young Man"


Note: What is going on within that scene of the strange operation in the first third of the book?


Labotomy?


Electroshock therapy?


Possible castration?

The novel is a classic picaresque novel. It is presented as a series of munerous small gripping pieces.
***************The following info was not discussed in class***************************
This is done for the sake of keeping the novel intersting and fast paced, which was a relief considering how short of a time we had to read it. However I would like to point out the more literal aspect of the novel's consruction, its use of flash bulb memories.
Flashbulb memories are memories that are graphically captured within the human memory much like a flashbulb picture would be, thus the name.
Such memories would include things like an image of an airline hitting a World Trade Center tower. These memories are actually not better remembered than regular memories however typically such memories are reinforced by the media replaying these events. This reinforcement would not be relevent in relation to the text however I still feel as though the main character's life seems to be presented in a series of graphic flashbulb memories. I felt it worth noting that these memories do have a psychological name.

What is the importance of the imvisible man's briefcase? It carries all the stuff from his adventures. This is realted to the scene wherein the two older people are evicted out onto the street and their life's contents are expelled there as well.

Some important mytholigical notes:

Brear Rabbit, the invisible man's relation to a hibernating bear

Rinehart, a trickster figure and doppelganger

The blues, Ralph Ellison was first a trumpet player. He then discovered that the blues could be played in literature as well and became a novelist.

Flyting- a verbal battle

Importance of transcendtalism and self reliance

Dead Man
Dr. Sexson loaned me a copy of Dead Man so I am now able to make an entry. I first must note that having heard our discussion on the movie and then watched the movie gives me a greater appreciation. In class we only watched a few parts but I feel as though watching the whole has given me a greater grasp on what's really going on actually and metaphorically.
My contibution to the discussion had I been prepared for our discussion would have been a reference to the Bible only it would be more of a reference against the Bible. I first noticed this when Nobody says that because of his encounters with the white man he is expelled from his own culture and forced to walk the world alone. This reminds me of Judas and how he too is forced to walk alone. Perhaps because Nobody's situation is not his own fault, we should not be so hasty to judge the situation of Judas; perhaps he too was inadvertently forced to walk alone. This scene is quickly followed by the scene with Billy Bob Thornton, the British sounding man, and the man in drag. They then recite a sloppy, sanguine type of grace before eating. This perhaps suggests that the whole concept of grace is really just a farce much as the movie's scene of grace appears to be.
My final example would be when William Blake kills the two sherrifs. Both are stuck down dead however one is crowned with a halo of sticks surrounding his head. This is reminiscent of medieval paintings wherein any hole figure was crowned with a halo of gold. The sherrif is not only killed but his head is then crushed in, like a rotten pumpkin after Halloween. The graphic nature of the destruction of the haloed figure leads me to believe that the director was trying to represent a graphic destruction of the Christ figure.
Marilyn

Invisible Man's Descent into the Underworld
As I was reading through "Invisible Man" I could not help but note how similar his fall into the man hole is to our discussion of initiation ceremonies and how they are frequently surrounded by metaphors for death.
Sibil- Sibil is a guide to the underworld presented by Virgil in his Aeneid. She is also a priestess at the Apollonian oracle. In Medieval times sibil and Virgil were seen as predictors to the coming of Christ.

Notes from 10/17

"The Bear"

What was the book that the father took from the bookcase, more specifically was was the poem he read?

"Ode to a Grecian Urn."

Somehow our truth depends on similies

Class thoughts on "Dead Man"

Dead fawn represents the death of innovenve

Where (on their person) people get shot. Thel is shot in the heart.

Did Thel kill Blake?

Book of Thel is a book by William Blake

The film has more insight into Native American culture than any other film.

Reminiscent of the Odyssey

What is the significance of tobacco.

The new word for the course:

Initiation, specifically initiation ceremonies

Ike and William Blake are initiated.

Steps of Initation:

1. Seperation of Neophyte from family and a retreat into a forest (symbolic of death.)

2. A hut or house is used for the ceremony.

Note: There are no women's ceremonies for reasons of secrecy.

3. Symbols of death are used

4. Mutilations occur

5. Frequently a new name is given

6. Sometimes there is a requirement to kill someone.

There are 2 great prose styles in modern history, Faulkner and Hemmingway

Hemingway is described as paratactic- lots of things are held together with an "and"

Solar heroes- People who rise, reach their zenith, and then decline

Cheryl's blog- "in order to be original we must examine our origins"

Otology- the study of being

Initial thoughts on Invisible Man
I've so far found this novel to be a fairly fast read, aside from the chapter that is almost entirely the speech of the benefactor of the university. One thing that I must note is the idea of correct and incorrect behavior and how frequently the two are not easily identifiable. While the main character seems to act in a manner that seems decent to the reader, nothing turns out right for him and the other characters consistently point out how he goes about things in the wrong way. The main character's right seems to be one of honestly, slight ignorance, and a hopeful future that is extremely similar to a white man's future.
In the eyes of the black characters in the work and some of the white characters, the narrator is a fool. His actions are the actions of a Horatio Alger character, he does all the right things has a bit of help, and comes out on top. However this novel, to me, is the "anti-Alger." The main character does the "right" thing and does not end up on top. There is more to life than honesty and the "right" thing. There is a sensibilty that is not frequently confronted in other novels.

I must also note that when I first read the autobiography of Malcolm X, and it was a while ago so I don't remember it well, before his complete transformation he would not accept the help of whites with his reform campaign, not even financially. The reason? Even with funds there is a certain amount of control that whites exert on blacks when they choose to "help" them. It does not even need to be a question of intentions. Even a well meaning white who is organizing campaigns or donating money will feel entitled to his or her say in the campaign.
This is relevent to the tezt because I fell that the Brotherhood's leaders are exerting this sort of control over the main character especially because they have formed the organization that he's working for. In reality they are no different from the benefactors of the college. The will allow civil rights but only when those rights are obtained the right, aka white way. Why would any white person in Harlem really care about the rights of black people especially an affluent one? It is suspicious the way these people picked out the specific black to do their job. If they really cared about the cause wouldn't they just let one rise to power, and then back him with their support? The fact that they must choose their Harlem leader/speaker and that he must then act in complete accordance with their rules is psychotically controlling and signifies their fear of an African American who just openly espouses his ideas on any random street corner. Just because their control does no have a white sheet and hood does not make it any less frightening or real.
Marilyn

What do we need to know about Stevens?
First and foremost he's a romantic
A romantic: venerates nature, like Emerson (American) and Colebridge (European)
deifies the mature of the creative: the poet has god-like powers
tends to be a secular humanit- "In the absence of God we have the world."
"In the absence of God we have ourselves." The human being is central
Theme of all his poems- interaction of reality v. imagination

The North represents reality and winter and the South represents the imagination and summer.
Spring and autumn represent the "gray area." They are not quite real or part of the imagination, though the spring tends toward reality and the autumn tends toward the imagination

"The sharp flash, the vital, arrogant, fatal, dominant X." Motive for Metahphor. The X is a metahpor for reality.
"Poetry is the subject of the poem." Man with the Blue Guitar

Notes for the Test:

• What are the four Disney characters Deb gives us that are related to abduction?
• The animal, primal- the wolf
• The satyr, Hades- Phil in Hercules
• More man than beast- the Beast in "Beauty and the Beast"
• Prince Charming- Mr. Perfect

• Flirtation, it's a woman's power to abduct a man. It's Daisy Miller's power.
• Flirtation is "Dancing around the boundaries of comfort."
• What is the name of Hazel Motes's Church? The Church of Christ Without Christ
• What do the lion, scarecrow, and tinmam want (individually?)
• Who or what is the new Jesus? A mumified dwarf.

• What is the difference between the imaginary and the inaginative?
• The imaginary is not real v. the imaginative is supremely real.

• What did Frank L. Baum believe he was doing when writing the "Wizard of Oz?" Writing a great American myth
• Abductors- know them.
• Daisy Miller is a symbol for America
• "The Master"- Henry James
• Daisy's brother is a trickster figure
• What was the name of Charles Foster Kane's estate- Xanadu
• Where does the name come from: Kubla Khan, poem by Coleridge and an actual Mongolian palace
• The Wizard of Oz can be known as a? Road movie
• Imagination is always trying to find meaning
• Mater Dolorosa- weeping woman
• Zora Neale Hurston- "lies"
• What are the levels of the pyramid? The consistent base is the myth
• Who is Patty Hearst's grandfather? William Randolph Hearst
• Where does Hazel Motes buy his car? Taulkingham
• Who's the only true beleiver in Wise Blood? Motes
• What text exemplifies Southern Gothic? Wise Blood
• Frank L. Baum Wikipedia fact he advocated the extermination of indeginous peoples
• Theosophist- one who believes the divinity lives within yourself it is not dediated by any institution
• Opposite of love is indifference

Study Guide (it's a work in progress)

Stevens Poems
"Sunday Morning"- it is confirmation that Stevens is a secular humanist
"The Study of Two Pears"- This is an important demonstration of Stevens's continual battle of the imagination v. reality. In this poem you are just supposed to see the pears as two pears.

Have a basic, Wikipedia, defnintion of the following:

Henry James aka. "The Master"- Though he was born in New York City, in 1843, James spent most of his life in Britain and most of his youth traveling between Americ and Europe. James was one child out of three, the other two were William James the philosopher and Alice James the diarist. He was a literary critic but his short stories and novels were the source of his fame. He wrote a total of 22 novels, two of which were unfinished, 112 short stories, many plays, and some non-fiction essays and books. He never married, and it is questioned whether or not he was gay. He was one of the first to work in a genre called trans-Atlantic literature wherein characters from the European, old world face characters from the American, new world. American characters are typically bold, rude, ignorant, and innocent while European characters are ususally more sophisticated and refined. Some of his more famous novels include: "Portrait of a Lady," "The American," "Washingtons Square," and "The Wings of the Dove." James died of a stroke in London in December 1915

Flannery O'Connor- Flannery O'Connor was born in Georgia to an Irish Catholic family. After graduating from Georgia State College for Women, she was invited to stay with Robert Fitzgerald, translator of Odeipus, The Odyssey, and The Illiad. She formed a strong friendship with his wife, Sally and she helped in editing O'Connor's letters to her friend Betty Hester, to later be published. O'Connor was diagnosed with lupus, a disease which had taken her father's life, and spent most of her life at her farm raising birds. Despite the grotesque nature of all her works, O'Connor places heavy emphasis on the state of grace that she wishes most of her characters to reach. She also addresses the issues of poverty and race. Her work is typically described as Southern Gothic, a style of writing where events that occur are highly unusual and these events help the reader understand the social issues and culture of the American South. Included in this genre are William Faulkner, Truman Capote, and Tennessee Williams. At the age of 39 O'Connor died of lupus to be outlived by her moter who lived till the age of 99.

Wallace Stevens- Wallace Stevens was born in Pennsylvania 1879. He attended but did not graduate from Harvard then moved to New York where he attended and graduated from New York Law School. Stevens married Elsie Kachel Moll and together they had a daughter, Holly. He worked at several law firms in New York before joining Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company and moving to Hartford. In 1955 he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. He was then offered a faculty position at Harvard but he declined. He also joined a society of people dedicated to the arts and literature which included Barbara and Henry Church. He died in 1955 at the age of 76. It is worth noting Steven's emphasis on imagination v reality and the supreme power of fiction. Stevens's work also flourished in a manner different to that of most poets. As he aged he produced more work instead of the typical other way around.

Zora Neale Hurston- For most of her lifetime Hurston refused to tell her actual birthday, only recently did researchers figure out that she was born in Notasulga, Alabama in 1891. However when she was young she moved to Eatonville, Florida and this is the place where she grew up. Hurston began her education at Howard University but because of financial struggles she was forced to give up. She was then offered a scholarship at Barnard College and she graduated with a degree in Anthropology. It was here that she was first able to look at her experience growing up with the eyes of an ethnographer. She applied this to her novels: "Of Mules and Men" and "Their Eyes Were Watching God." Hurston was awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship to conduct ethnographic research in Haiti. Zora's work was not popular for her time, partly because of her political leanings and because of her use of dialect. Also, though she was a part of the Harlem Renaissance she didn't approve of the judicial decision on the integration of schools. Because of this she was assigned to cover the murder trial of Ruby McCollum. She was buried in an unmarked grave in Fort Pierce Florida; that grave was later discovered by Alice Walker and Charlotte Hunt.

The Wizard of Oz- The Wizard of Oz was written in 1900 by L. Frank Baum. I am going to assume that everyone knows this story so the only things I'm going to write are other important bits of information. There are three interpretations of this work, all of which were mentioned in class: spiritual, advocating spiritual humanism, populist, and racist. The production of the book was a musical done first in Chicago, 1902 and then a year later in New York. There was then created an Oz film series in silent film (1908 & 1914.) There were other, less successful versions created in 1910, 1914 and 1925. The most famous and successful version was released in 1939, featuring Judy Garland as Dorothy. This movie did not use the musical score used in the 1902, a musical score that has has, proved impossible to revive. Later versions include: "The Wiz" an all black version produced in the 70's on Broadway, a 1978 movie featuring Diana Ross as Dorothy and Micheal Jackson as the scarecrow......it sounds terrifying, and a 2005 muppet movie. There has also been an ABC television series based on the film, another series called "The Oz Kids," and tributes to the work both in Futurama and Scrubs. Other new versions include a receration based on the original book done by the Toronto Opera Company, and a version based on the book Wicked. The book and movie still serve as great American fairy tales.

Citizen Kane, originally "The American"- Citizen Kane was released in 1941 by RKO pictures. It was the first full length feature directed by Orson Welles. The character of Charlie Kane is supposedly based on William Randolph Hearst, Howard Hughes, Samual Insull, and Welles himself. If there is any need for a plot summary click on the link above, the rest of this entry will be about detials and facts surrounding the movie. The movie is reknowned for its new uses of cinematography including its use of deep focus, a technique whereby the foreground and background could be simultaneously in focus. Also the use of low angle shots, which allowed the ceiling to be shown. For this we can thank Gregg Toland, the film's cinematographer. Herman J. Mankiewicz and Welles wrote the screeplay although Mankiewicz wrote most of it. The film started the career of many of the actors featured therein. Welles liked actors who were quickly able to change and act the way he want instantaneedously, so that they could easily conform to his vision. The film also revolutionized the use of makeup in movies, the characters were able to believabley age while not acually aging. Also, jump-cut shots were used to show the passing of time; the same scene was shot over and over while the characters changed outfits and "aged." Welles started great conflict with Hearst over whether or not the movie was based on Hearst's life including: the comment "You provide the pictures, I'll provide the war," the reference to Rosebud, Hearst's status as a newspaper mogul, and the similarity Susan Alexander had to Hearst's mistress Davies. Hearst offered RKO $800,000 to have the pictured destroyed before it was printed. Because RKO refused Hearst refused to mention the film in his papers, potenitally affecting its revenue.

Doppelgänger- The doppelgänger is the double, ghostly look alike, evil twin, or sometimes evil omen. The doppelgänger is Germanic in origin "doppel" means double and "gänger" means walking. Thus the doppelgänger is the walking double. Doppelgänger have no reflection or shaow and communicating with one is considered extremely unlucky. Sometime they can even plant ideas or thoughts in a character's head. Seeing a doppelgänger dooms one to a lifetime of sightings or to death. Supposedly Abraham Lincoln saw another face beside his while looking in the mirror; this was recently after he was elected. This face was deathly pale and his wife took it as an omen that he would be elected to a second term but would not survive. The most famous case of the doppelgänger is that of Emily Sagee, a schoolteacher in the 1800's. She and a crowd of around 13-42 children witnessed Sagee bilocate. The doppelgänger apparently ate but without any food, moved and was still, and was in fabulous health despite Sagee's deteriorating condition.

Xanadu- Xanadu was a capital within Kublai Khan's vast empire. There is an outer city, inner city, and a palace. This inspired Samual Coleridge to write the poem Kubla Khan and Xanadu becamse acssociated with riches, fertility, and prosperity.

An important note: All of the above are summaries of articles accessed on Wikipedia. I have provided to each entry and in no way claim that this is entirely my own work.

Lines in Wallace Stevens that I found to be important.
"I do not know which I prefer, the beauty of inflections or the beauty of innuendos, the blackbird whistling or just after." Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird