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Post by Beth on Apr 7, 2013 5:21:55 GMT -5
So, like I said yesterday I was reading Batman Unmasked and thinking about Urby in relation to Batman, but I was also thinking about the ways in which the theories Will draws on to analyse Batman could also have been used in the writing of MSCSI, and could be used to analyse it. Have you guys thought about that? What theoretical frameworks could apply to MSCSI or what scholars/academics we could use to look at it? |
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sophie_ali
Cat People
Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat, How I Wonder What You're At
Posts: 129
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Post by sophie_ali on Apr 7, 2013 8:30:43 GMT -5
This is going to be an interesting topic I can tell already!.
Gender is a really obvious one. I was thinking someone like Judith Butler and her working in highlighting how gender and sex are both social constructs. It's interesting to look at how women have been portrayed in comic books and how Cat lives up to/subverts the general trend either in comic books or cultural stereotypes about women generally.
This could also be expanded to looking at how male and female characters interact with each other generally (especially Urby and Cat- that will be interesting to see)
Also Foucault's idea of power and knowledge could be used (where he argues that the two are inextricably linked). For Cat this is quite literal in that her superpower is that she's really clever. I think that, and that had been discussed on other threads, is a good contrast to traditional superpowers which mostly based around physical strength/power.
I'm not sure if those ideas are any good but they're all I can come up with right now. I'll have to have a think and I'll come back with some more suggestions
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Post by Beth on Apr 9, 2013 14:16:17 GMT -5
I hope it's going to be an interesting topic! Gender is a really obvious one. I was thinking someone like Judith Butler and her working in highlighting how gender and sex are both social constructs. It's interesting to look at how women have been portrayed in comic books and how Cat lives up to/subverts the general trend either in comic books or cultural stereotypes about women generally.
This could also be expanded to looking at how male and female characters interact with each other generally (especially Urby and Cat- that will be interesting to see) Gender is definitely an obvious one, and I like the idea of using Butler, especially with her ideas around gender and performance. I think it's clear from what we've said before that Urby is performing masculinity (or a certain kind of masculinity) to one degree or another, and I find that really interesting. It's a critique of superheroes like Batman, Judge Dredd, etc. but I think beyond that it's also a critique of our ideas around gender more broadly. And I like how that's being done in a comic, which we all know aren't always the most gender-equal places! I am looking forward to seeing how Cat and Urby interact and react to each other. Cat's (as far as we know) only seen Urby at the end of issue one, though I want to know what happened after he arrived. Also Foucault's idea of power and knowledge could be used (where he argues that the two are inextricably linked). For Cat this is quite literal in that her superpower is that she's really clever. I think that, and that had been discussed on other threads, is a good contrast to traditional superpowers which mostly based around physical strength/power. [/strike][/quote] I was thinking about Foucault too, though more around authorship and how to analyse MSCSI with it having multiple authors. I do think his ideas around knowledge and power are great ones for analysing the body of the comic, but I think using him as a framework for wider discussions around comics, authorship, etc. would also be really interesting. I think Genette and Gray's notions of paratexts would also come in useful here - what other texts influence our reading of MSCSI? Other comics, yes, but Will's other work; Suze and Sarah's other art; interviews done with the creative team; fan art; fan vids - they all give us new way of engaging with and interpreting the comic. Which fascinates me! |
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sophie_ali
Cat People
Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat, How I Wonder What You're At
Posts: 129
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Post by sophie_ali on Apr 9, 2013 15:08:44 GMT -5
The idea of para-texts is really interesting (I hadn't come across that idea before, it's really interesting actually!). Epseically as the comic is online and works across a variet of platforms (e.g. Urbanite's tweets have influnced how we viewed him as a character in the comic and some of the things we read in the comic then influenced how we re-read some of Urbanite's tweets)
Gender performance is really interesting as well and I agree with your idea of Urbanite performing a masculinity and I suppose Cat is performing a different type of feminity that is often marginalised by wider society
I think it's really important to conisder the influence of the interent here as it opens up new channels of communicaiton that you don't necessarily get from a papercomic (e.g. the forum is attched to the comic's wesbite)- the internet is clearly changing in how we engage in stories and opening up new channels of communication
Another framework that we could analyse it though is using the idea of the Other (the Other being that which is not the Self- esentially having an Us and Them mentality in which the Other starts to become increasingly dehumanised). Here the Other (in this case the female) is being given a voice and a prominent voice in the discursive space of the text. Women here have been turned back from an object into a subject.
Again this would kind of also link to Foucault and his work on discursive spaces. Cat makes a comment about how people who aren't regarded as superhero's are seen as having quite marginalised voices in Gloria City. What are the dynamics of the discursive spaces in Gloria City and do they reinforce or subvert the discursive spaces in our society?
Postmodernism would also be interesting especially with the idea that our identities are becoming increasingly fragemented. In MSCSI characters seem to have more than 1 identity (their real one and their superhero once)- how do these interact? to what purpose does having more than one identity have? (e.g. with Urbanite)
I'm sorry that was a lot of ramblings, I'm not sure if that made a lot of sense (I'm really over-tired tonight!)
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Post by Beth on Apr 11, 2013 15:50:45 GMT -5
The idea of para-texts is really interesting (I hadn't come across that idea before, it's really interesting actually!). Epseically as the comic is online and works across a variet of platforms (e.g. Urbanite's tweets have influnced how we viewed him as a character in the comic and some of the things we read in the comic then influenced how we re-read some of Urbanite's tweets) Paratexts really inform my work, especially at the moment. They're really relevant (I think anyway) in looking at fan works (fic, meta, vids) and how that influences our reading of the source text. The paper I presented last week was on The X-Files porn parodies as paratexts, and I think it's a way of looking at them which makes sense. And I think they really inform our reading of MSCSI too. Like you said, we're discussing Urby's tweets and that affects how we see the comic, and the comic affects how we read the tweets. But the discussion that we're having here also affects the way we read the comic and the tweets, as do the interviews that the creative team have done and the Q&A sessions. They're all paratexts and they all affect the meaning we get from MSCSI. I think it's really important to conisder the influence of the interent here as it opens up new channels of communicaiton that you don't necessarily get from a papercomic (e.g. the forum is attched to the comic's wesbite)- the internet is clearly changing in how we engage in stories and opening up new channels of communication I think we could argue that MSCSI is a transmedia text then, given it tells a story across both the comic and Twitter. And I think it'd definitely be more difficult to do that without the internet. It's also opened up channels for fans to communicate, like you said, and I think that draws on Gray's idea of paratexts again. Another framework that we could analyse it though is using the idea of the Other (the Other being that which is not the Self- esentially having an Us and Them mentality in which the Other starts to become increasingly dehumanised). Here the Other (in this case the female) is being given a voice and a prominent voice in the discursive space of the text. Women here have been turned back from an object into a subject. That's a really interesting idea. I'm far too tired to add much more than that at the moment (!) but I think it bears thinking about. Again this would kind of also link to Foucault and his work on discursive spaces. Cat makes a comment about how people who aren't regarded as superhero's are seen as having quite marginalised voices in Gloria City. What are the dynamics of the discursive spaces in Gloria City and do they reinforce or subvert the discursive spaces in our society? See above comment! Postmodernism would also be interesting especially with the idea that our identities are becoming increasingly fragemented. In MSCSI characters seem to have more than 1 identity (their real one and their superhero once)- how do these interact? to what purpose does having more than one identity have? (e.g. with Urbanite) That's something I want to think about some more too. Plural identities are a really important part of MSCSI I think - we see that with Cat in issue one - though I don't think we know enough yet to really look at what the purpose of it is or how they interact. I also wonder if we could use postmodernism to look at memory? I think that'll be an increasingly important part of the comic. I'm sorry that was a lot of ramblings, I'm not sure if that made a lot of sense (I'm really over-tired tonight!) No need to apologise! I'm the same this evening. |
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sophie_ali
Cat People
Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat, How I Wonder What You're At
Posts: 129
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Post by sophie_ali on Apr 17, 2013 8:14:25 GMT -5
Oh I definitely think it affects the way in which readers view MSCSI. If you came across it through an article in The Guardian, for example, you'd probably read it in a very different way to if you came across it through an interview with MTV Geek. They're aimed at different audiences, and you're reading the interpretation or opinion of whoever wrote the piece. If there are comments, you may also read those, and you'll have an opinion of where the interview appears in terms of its politics, your previous experiences of the website, what else the author has written, etc. So before you even read MSCSI you're forming opinions on it, and those will influence the way you read it. I think a really good example of that can be found in the thread Riv posted a while back: mscsi.boards.net/index.cgi?board=culture&action=display&thread=77). This interview with Jonathan Gray is well worth a read: henryjenkins.org/2010/03/on_anti-fans_and_paratexts_an_1.htmlHaha, I'm off work ill at the moment so definitely haven't got the brain power to write more about postmodernism yet, but I will  I do think Queer Theory would be useful as well, yes. (I love being able to apply theories like this and talk about them to people!) |
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sophie_ali
Cat People
Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat, How I Wonder What You're At
Posts: 129
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Post by sophie_ali on May 1, 2013 3:51:26 GMT -5
I was reading an interesting journal article yesterday which could apply here: Livingstone. D. (2005). 'Science, Text and Space: Thoughts on the Geography of Reading'. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers. 30(4). pp391-401. To sum up the article really briefly, he examines the space where reading takes place and have that transforms the meaning of the text. I thought this could build on and extend the idea of para-texts- not only do other texts influence how we read MSCSI but maybe the actual space we read it in does as well. This could get complicated since it could be argued we're reading it in a dual space (i.e. because it's on the Internet there's a cyber space and also the physical space we sit in to access the Internet content) I'm not sure if that made any sense (I haven't had any coffee this morning you see  ) ETA: Just found another interesting article: Goswell. G. (2007). 'What's in a Name? Book Titles in the Torah and Former Prophets'. Pacifica. 20(3). pp262-277. Although this is written from a theological perspective, the basic argument can be cross-applied. On p263-264 he notes 4 functions that a title can have: 1) Identification 2) Simplify/Indicate the general content of the text 3) To recommend or tempt the reader into reading the text 4) Assert what form/genre the work is This could be applied to analyzing the title: 'My So Called Secret Identity'- which function(s) do you think (if any) the title serves? |
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Post by Beth on May 5, 2013 7:21:56 GMT -5
Ooh, thanks for those. The first one looks like it's going to be really useful for something I'm writing at the mo. And yes, the dual space idea made sense. That's actually something I'm arguing in this piece (it's an article for Infinte Earths) but I'm arguing there are actually three 'spaces' we inhabit when we read: the space of the book, the physical space we're in at the time, but also our mental space. I'm talking about it in relation to my reading and re-reading Sandman, but I think it could have other applications too.
Also, I think I managed to edit your last-but-one comment instead of mine? I've no idea how I did that, but I'm blaming it on being ill and not entirely with it! So sorry.
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sophie_ali
Cat People
Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat, How I Wonder What You're At
Posts: 129
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Post by sophie_ali on May 5, 2013 9:11:02 GMT -5
Sure. What exactly would be the best/easiest/legal way of doing that?
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Post by Beth on May 5, 2013 10:23:57 GMT -5
It's okay - I found them by going direct to the journals and logging in there. That was much easier than searching the library! Thanks though |
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sophie_ali
Cat People
Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat, How I Wonder What You're At
Posts: 129
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Post by sophie_ali on May 29, 2013 3:33:59 GMT -5
How about Goffman's 'Dramaturgical Model'?
This looks at the way the identity relates and adapts to the environment it finds itself in.
Goffman argues this using a drama based metaphor. There is a 'self' backstage but that during interaction with others the self plays out different characters. In other words we adapt our self to suit the situation. This is referred to as identity management and can involve the use of clothing, props and language to sustain this identity.
E.g.- A doctor might wear a stethoscope, medical scrubs and use medical jargon to 'convince' his audience of his identity as a doctor.
I thought this could be an interesting one to consider, given what we've been discussing in relation to identity.
I was thinking especially in relation to Urbanite- he uses impression management to keep up his pseudo, hyper-masculine identity. Hence the body Armour type costume and the hyper-masculine language he uses on twitter.
We've see the selves he presents to the public- Farley Grange and we've seen Urbanite in 'superhero mode'. Makes me wonder what his 'backstage' self might be? (have we already seen hints of it in the description of Urbanite as 'haunted')
Hope that made sense!
(Just an additional thought, Cat could smell leather when she met Urbanite, presumably he uses leather as part of his costume. Leather comes from animals and maybe Urbanite is clothing himself in leather to de-humanize himself- part of his defense mechanisms. He tells Misper to emotionally disengage after all?)
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I do think Queer Theory would be useful as well, yes. 
)