For Monday: Bailey, “Teenagers from Outer Space” (pp.27-55)

 

Answer TWO of the following:

Q1: How might this story be a version of Superman if instead of one alien, a hundred aliens descended on Smallville? How can we tell that both Bailey and Landis (Superman: American Alien) are sharing the same conversation about the acceptance “others” in the heart of America?

Q2: The entire story is told from Nancy Miller’s viewpoint, and by her own admission, “much of what follows is reconstructed from second-hand reports, with all the bias and self-interest inherent in such accounts” (29). Do we trust her version of events? Is there anyplace where it seems she adds her own bias or opinions into the mix? Or does she help us see the limitations of others’ biases and values?

Q3: Writing about Johnny (who is proclaimed as a hero after the aliens leave town), Nancy says, “Maybe he thought he was innocent, courageous, whatever...People do it all the time. People want to be blameless. People want to be brave” (47-48). Who is the hero of this story? If this is a traditional aliens vs. humans story, who “saved the world”? For the reader, who is most brave and selfless? And why might the people telling the story later not see this?

Q4: How might this story be a metaphor for women growing up in American society, especially in the 1950’s? What might Bailey mean that every woman has to choose between “freedom” and “slavery,” or “aliens” and “duty”? Why might he also explain why Joan makes the decision she does?

For Friday: Landis, Superman: American Alien, “Eagle,” “Angel,” and “Valkyrie”

Answer TWO of the following:

Q1: In “Angel,” Pete is arguing with Clark about the future of Superman and what role he intends to play in society. He finally tells him, “Superman will never be able to retire.” What is it that Pete sees that Clark doesn’t here? Why is Superman bigger than one hero or one alien or one costume? (and related to this, why should he start talking to the other people who are  “like him” in the world)?

Q2: In “Eagle,” Clark reflects that “It feels good to help people. No, I’m not afraid…what’s there to be afraid of?” What hasn’t he figured out yet about being a super hero, and how do the next three stories show him why there’s a lot to be afraid about? Also, why is a superhero more than simply saving lives and feeling good about yourself?

Q3: “Valkyrie” is the only comic that doesn’t have the name of a bird. What is a Valkyrie, and why is this significant to the comic? Why end the bird metaphors with this title? What changes in this comic that we don’t see completely (or as developed) in the others?

Q4: Each one of these comics is about taking a large step into adulthood from the illusions (and delusions, sometimes) of childhood. If we stop reading this as a superhero comic and consider that it symbolizes what we all go through in this process, which comic relates the most to our journey? What can Superman teach us about our own identity as we become a new, more responsible person capable of saving the world day in, and day out?

For Monday: Superman: American Alien, “Parrot” and “Owl” (and the two mini-comics between them)

Answer TWO of the following:

Q1: “Parrot” seems to allude to the fact that parrots can imitate human speech and ‘pretend’ to be something they’re not. While Clark Kent is literally pretending to be Bruce Wayne (Batman) in this comic, what other identities is he “parroting”? What does his one-night fling with Minerva teach him about finding his “true” self (or does he)?

Q2: The style of these two chapters is dramatically different from one another and from the pervious comics, as “Parrot” is bright and humorous, while Owl is angular, fuzzy, and tense. Why might Superman in particular be so adaptable to all these different stories and approaches? It might be harder, for example, to tell a Batman or Wonder Woman story this way.

Q3: In “Owl,” Clark Kent meets Superman’s arch-rival, Lex Luthor, and has a one-on-one interview with him (though of course Luthor doesn’t know who he really is). During this interview, Luthor tells him “People aren’t important. Not as a whole...That’s why you see people throughout history rising above the masses. Those are the changers. Those are the doers. You are not important. You’re not. I am.” How are we supposed to read this speech? Is it true? Is he helping Clark to understand/embrace his own identity? Could these words ever be expressed by a superhero? Or are they fundamentally a sociopath’s point of view?

Q4: In the short comic after “Parrot,” which is entitled “The Real Question,” the alien known as Mxyzpltlk breaks down the “fourth wall” and talks directly to the reader. Why are comics able to do this more effectively than a traditional novel? And what does he mean by the sentence, “We are gods. You are just puppets”?

For Wednesday: Landis, Superman: American Alien (“Dove” and “Hawk”)

NOTE: Read the first two stories/chapters of the book, "Dove" and "Hawk" for Wednesday's class. If you're confused about where to stop, you can stop reading where you see the full page of Clark on a boat with a with a bunch of women and champagne glasses.

Answer TWO of the following:

Q1: Discuss how the art in one of the chapters helps to tell the story, and is also appropriate for that story. Why would this story be much different if we just had the words? Discuss at least one specific panel or page in your response.

Q2: What does Clark mean in “Dove” when he tells his father, “When you break something, you’re not just breaking the thing, you’re like...hurting everyone who made it the way it was”? Why might this also say something about Clark’s relationship to his powers and his mysterious identity as an “alien”?

Q3: In class on Monday we discussed how modern heroes, and especially super heroes, are often more “gray” than “white,” and how they often resemble the “dragons” in fantasy stories. How does “Hawk” discuss the thin line between being a hero and a villain for Clark? According to this story, what makes him a hero rather than a “monster”?

Q4: In-between the two chapters, there is a two-page illustration called “The Castaways.” How does it connect the two stories without “telling” us outright? Why can  single picture do this even more powerfully than a paragraph or an entire story?

For Wednesday: Van Eekhout, “On the Fringes of the Fractal” (pp.194-205)

Answer TWO of the following:

Q1: According to the story, Stat is “determined by a complicated algorithm that factored in wealth, race, genealogy, fat-to-muscle ratio, dentition, and dozens of other variables from femur length to facial symmetry to skull contours. It was determined by the attractiveness of one’s house. The suitability of one’s car” (195). Why is this satirical, and what specifically might it be satirizing in our own world?

Q2: A fractal, as the story explains, “is a pattern that repeats itself. Magnifty it, and you’ll see the same pattern as if you’d reduced it” (200). While the world they live in is clearly a fractal of interconnecting neighborhoods and divisions, what does the title mean—“On the Fringes of the Fractal?” Why might being on the fringe of something help you see reality more clearly—and when do our characters do this?

Q3: Why is the “future” of this story dominated by generic names and places? Why is everything a Peevs Drugs and a Peevs 24-Hour Whatevers—or in the next town, a Wiggins Drugs and a Wiggins 24-Hour Whatevers? Also, why do they seem unaware that another town—with the same stuff, but different names—exists just down the road from their own?

Q4”: When they ultimately find the city, they find not a thriving metropolis but a wasteland—“a sad place, a lost place, a haunted place” (202). Why, then, do they like it so much and never want to leave? What would this city represent to someone who had spent their entire life in Peevs or Wiggins-land?

For Monday: Wolven, “Caspar D. Luckinbill, What Are You Going to Do?” (pp.267-285)

Answer TWO of the following:

Q1: If the narrator of this story is introducing us to his world, how does he want us to see it? What kind of world does he think he lives in? What clues tell us the narrator (and the author’s) true feelings about “the future”?

Q2: When trying to figure out why Caspar has been targeted by mediaterrorism, his friend explains, “Computers don’t need explanations...Computers just do what they do” (270). What might this suggest is the greatest threat in an increasingly automated, technological civilization? (and why should we be afraid ourselves?)

Q3: What do you think was the point of the mediaterrorism campaign against Caspar? Was it trying to make him more aware of the world outside his creature comforts? Was he really responsible, in some way, for the terrors inflicted in the FRF? Or is there another explanation for targeting him?

Q4: At a few points in the story, Caspar learns to appreciate the silence of trees. As he remarks, “Only here I can be at peace, amid the indifferent, ignorant trees. They don’t recognize me, trees. They don’t care” (279). Besides not showing him images of violence, why do trees become an important symbol in this story? Note that the story ends with a vision of metaphorical trees of data.

Short Paper #1 Assignment: due in-class on Friday. Feb. 2nd

Short Paper #1: Society 2.0

“Recognition software doesn’t violate privacy. Recognition software expands privacy. When every machine recognizes every user, the lived environment becomes personal and unique…That’s what it says in the promotional materials my company sends to potential investors. I didn’t write it. I don’t believe it.” (Wolven 276).

For your first short paper, I want you to get your feet wet with the “pale blue dot” approach to science fiction. That is, to make us see our own society from a different perspective, the way an outsider would see it, but we no longer can. To do this, I want you to explain a modern innovation (something introduced into society no more than ten-fifteen years ago) to someone from 1918. It can be anything—Instagram, Facebook, Texting, Siri, Drones, Tinder, etc. The trick is to explain why it was invented, what problem it was supposed to solve or cure, and why people embraced it.

However, as you write, consider your AUDIENCE: this is a person who doesn’t know anything about modern technology. They didn’t have radios, television, computers, or anything other than rudimentary telephones and typewriters. So how can you explain to them why this is “good” when they might think it’s horrible? You might also consider whether you think it’s good, too! Assume that someone attending ECU in 1918 might be horrified that people “swipe” to meet people rather than go up and talk to them. How can you defend this? Why is this “better” or “improved” than dating in 1918?

REMEMBER, too, that the three stories in this conversation, “Openness,” “Caspar D. Luckinbill,” and “On the Fringes of the Fractal” don’t exactly celebrate the future. They’re explaining it to us, the outsiders, but always want us to see what’s wrong with these societal innovations.

REQUIREMENTS

• About 3-4 pages, double spaced
• Only choose ONE innovation (don’t move from one to another)
• Think about your 1918 audience: what would they understand and not understand? What would confuse them? Disturb them?
• Be sure we know how you feel about this innovation by the time we finish your paper. Are you excited to show this to your ECU ancestors…or ashamed?
• DUE IN-CLASS ON FRIDAY, FEB 2^nd (we’ll discuss them in class!)

A Few Changes and Wednesday's Class

"Revise the syllabus, we will..."

Just a reminder--the course calendar has changed slightly. Here are the changes I discussed in class for the next two weeks (the only weeks affected):

Wed, 24  Writing Workshop (no story due)
Fri, 26    No Class (I have to cancel due to a prior obligation)

Mon 29  BASFF, Story TBA
Wed 31  BASFF, Story TBA
Fri 2      Writing Workshop / Short Paper #1 due (bring to class!)

I will give you the Short Paper #1 assignment on Wednesday and we'll discuss some ideas about writing papers for Comp 2. I'll also let you know what stories to read for Monday's class. Remember that I pushed back the due date of the paper from Monday to Friday, so don't get worried when you look at your syllabus!

See you on Wednesday!

For Monday: Weinsten, “Openness” (pp.141-151)

NOTE: Answer TWO of the following questions with a short response, at least a few sentences. Be specific, and try to respond to the story, not just what you think I want to hear. There are no ‘right’ answers, just honest responses. These questions will form the basis of our in-class discussion on Monday. Questions are due IN CLASS on Monday, and turning them in afterward counts as a missed response.

Q1: What are the “layers” that the narrator constantly refers to in this story? How does it relate to our own processes of displaying our identities on-line today? Do you think we could ever get this this point (and would you want to)?

Q2: Once the narrator becomes involved with Katie, he remarks, “There was something beautiful about sharing things in the old way—the two of us walking by the shore, the smell of the pine sap, the summer air cooling in the afternoon—and for the first time in years, I wished I had a sketchpad with me” (145). Why do the layers prevent this kind of interaction with other people and the world? Do we have the same problem with our own “layers”?

Q3: What does the author mean when he writes, “We were the first generation to grow up with layers, a group of kids who’d produced thousands of tutorials on blocking unwanted users but not a single one on empathy” (148)? Why might we consider this one of the main ideas of the story—and what the narrator, himself, learns through this relationship?

Q4: How could we argue that this story, for all its science fiction technology, is actually about a completely different kind of “layers” that we all have? In other words, how is this story about the difficulty of having meaningful relationships in general, even aside from technology? 

Welcome to the Course!

Welcome to the Course! So what is Freshman Composition 2, "Writing in the Outer Limits"? In my writing classes, I like to ask students to enter different 'conversations' out society finds important, since the world is shaped by what we talk about--and how we say it. In popular culture, the conversation is dominated by a single form of entertainment--Science Fiction and Fantasy. From Star Trek to Game of Thrones, these genres are used as a frame to discuss the realities of our 21st century world. Behind the masks of wizards, aliens, Jedis, and Hobbits, we can find ourselves and our own problems staring back at us...though it's often easier to tackle these problems in fiction, where the dangers seem less real and threatening.

The great science fiction writer, Ursula K. Le Guin, once wrote that "all fiction is metaphor," and this is certainly true for both genres, as they allow us to predict the future and understand the past--all without a time machine. For this class, we'll read several books that initiate us into the various conversations of SF/F, and respond in a series of informal and researched papers that help us answer the question, "who are we, and what is our role in the universe?"

Be sure to buy the three books for class as soon as possible, since we'll start reading--and writing--next week. Please contact me at jgrasso@ecok.edu with any questions or concerns. See you in class!

Paper #4/Final Exam: Brave New Worlds

“I notice that capable men are still at a premium in our society; we still need the man who is intelligent enough to think of the proper questions to ask. Perhaps if we could find enough of such, these dislocations you worry about…wouldn’t occur” (“The Evitable Conflict,” 265).

INTRO: We already live in an age of science fiction: an age where we can watch a live video feed from Mars, as well as track asteroids as they sail past Earth. We also live in a world of global warming, virtual reality, artificial technology, and self-driving cars. What’s next? Or perhaps the better question to ask is: how is the future being shaped in the news today? What happened in yesterday’s news feed which will affect how you raise your kids tomorrow?

REPONSE: I want you to find an article on-line, or from a journal, or in a magazine (Best American Magazine Writing 2015, for those who took Comp 1 with me, perhaps) which discusses some important contemporary issue. It can be about anything, as long as it’s current and of national importance. Print this article out and include it with your paper (and be sure to read it carefully!). Then I want you to write a short science fiction story (maybe 3-4 pages double spaced) that takes this article into the “future.” Take the same issues, problems, and concerns and place them in a new setting—a future Earth, or another planet, or among aliens, or robots, or on a starship. If science fiction is a metaphor for our own world, help us see the problems and debates of this issue in a different time and place. Remember, it’s often hard to see why we should care about something in our own time: but if you can fool us into seeing it in a different context, we might finally understand why our 21^st century problems matter.

FOR EXAMPLE: The Star Trek episode we watched in class, “Let That Be Your Last Battlefield” (1969), was released during the Civil Rights Movement, at a time when you couldn’t really discuss race or equal rights on a television show...but you could talk about aliens with the same issues. At the end of this episode, with their planet in flames and their hatred intact, Lt. Uhuru asks, “do you suppose that’s all they ever had, sir?” And Captain Kirk responds, “No...but that’s all they have left.” A fitting epilogue for a country that was tearing itself apart over age-old prejudices when they might have united in brotherhood.

DUE: Thursday, May 4^th by 5pm in my box or office

For Tuesday: Asimov, I Robot: “Escape!” and “Evidence”

 

The robot eye of H.A.L. from 2001: A Space Odyssey

Answer TWO of the following:

Q1: In trying to ascertain whether or not Byerley is a robot or not, Dr. Susan Calvin remarks, “To put it simply—if Byerley follows all the Rules of Robots, he may be a robot, and may simply be a very good man” (221). How might this statement allow Asimov to use Byerley as a metaphor for how a “cleaner, better breed” should act like in society? Where do we see Byerley functioning like this in the story?

Q2: Dr. Susan Calvin remarks in “Escape!” that a robot’s brain “is built by humans and is therefore built according to human values” (177). Why is this a significant statement, and how does it help explain why the Brain acts as he does? Why would Calvin argue that the Brain acted the way a human would act, rather than the way a robot would?

Q3: Byerley refuses to submit to X-ray tests and other investigations which he considers a violation of his personal rights, even if they would immediately expose the lies about his robotic identity. As he tells Quinn, “You have little concern with the rights of the individual citizen. I have great concern. I will not submit to X-ray analysis, because I wish to maintain my Rights on principle” (230). Why might this also be a political statement on Asimov’s part, one that raises concerns about due process in the 1950’s—as well as in our own age?

Q4: In both stories, it initially seems like the robots are breaking the First and the Second Laws of Robotics. However, it later turns out that to truly obey these laws requires a fair amount of deception, secrecy, and creativity. Do you think this is justified? Are these merely the “white lies” necessary to save humanity? Or are these robots taking too many liberties in deciding what is good for us—and what isn’t?

Scissortail Creative Writing Festival Assignment (optional)

Remember, no class on Thursday: instead, you can go to the Scissortail Creative Writing Festival. Here's a link to the schedule for Thursday, Friday, and Saturday: http://ecuscissortail.blogspot.com/2017/01/2017-schedule-of-readings.html

You can go to 1 or 2 sessions for extra credit. But for each one you go to, make sure to answer the following 4 questions (just like our blog responses, except you have to do all 4!) in a short paragraph--a few sentences each. As long as you give a thoughtful, honest response, I can excuse 2 absences or 2 missed blog responses--or 4/4 if you do a good job on two. But remember, this is extra credit, so if you just give me hasty, one-sentence responses or try to BS about sessions you didn't attend, I can't give you credit. 

THE QUESTIONS

Q1: Which of the authors interested you the most and why? Why did you respond their poems and/or story and why might you read more from this author?

Q2: Which piece (if any) did you find difficult to follow or understand and why? Is is simply not your kind of material, or was it too vulgar, or depressing, or confusing? 

If you liked all the pieces you heard by each writer, answer this instead: how did each author's reading work together as a whole? Why did these 3 (or 4) writers work well together? Was there any common themes or ideas that seemed to link them together?

Q3: Discuss briefly how the authors presented their material: their reading style, introductions, gestures, and other details that helped you appreciate the stories/poems. In other words, how did the authors help you understand their work through their performance?

Q4: How did the audience react to these authors/works? Did certain works get more response than others--and if so, why? Did people laugh? Were they completely silent. Did people seem to 'get' these writers, or did some leave them scratching their heads? How could you tell? 

Hope to see you at the Festival!