Comments | proxydialogue: Post it: Borrowing from the Big Leagues, a drive-by Acafan rec.

proxydialogue

Post it: Borrowing from the Big Leagues, a drive-by Acafan rec.

Jun 13, 2011 18:11

A day or so ago (or maybe a month ago, who knows--time is funny in the summer) I ran across yet another rant from a frustrated slasher who was cheesed off about the bad rep. we get, even within the other areas of the fan community (not all! I am accusing no one, but we all know the conversation is out there.) I couldn't for the life of me tell you ( Read more... )

smashing things, supernatural, post its, recs, acafandom

Comments 8

fannishliss June 13 2011, 22:17:03 UTC

as another acafan, I agree with you. I think slash can totally be a legitimate cultural critique. I especially believe that the things that are slashy about Supernatural (including the incest vibe) are a legitimate challenge to us as viewers to ask ourselves what the culture is creating that the Show is mediating for us. I love Show, I don't think it's misogynist, and I think it's talking to us about Men's Culture right now -- it's talking to us, women viewers, and slashy women specifically, about Men's Culture.

I know my response is random, but the Show and all its aspects are too big for me to get all the way around. My phd is in Romanticism for all the heck, not 21st C. cultural Studies!! There's a lot I'd like to tackle that I just don't have the chops.

but anyways, in a nutshell : RIGHT ON SISTER.

proxydialogue June 14 2011, 00:43:19 UTC

Yes, to all of the above, yes!

I really must post on that someday, SPN does crazy awesome things to deconstruct norms and comment on male culture and too often gets represented a show that abides by and only perpetuates those norms. (Dean is a very "manly" man in many ways, but he is totally coded as a mom.)

Also, rock on Romanticism! Love me some Shelley (both of them). Thank you for this most excellent comment, it has given me many things to think about (your comments always do.)

May I ask (if you don't find it too personal, and if you do just tell me to shut my yap already) what you wrote your dissertation on?

fannishliss June 14 2011, 00:57:19 UTC

I'd love to work with you on Supernatural and cultural studies. I feel like I could totally write a book. :) You probably know who to cite! :D

My diss. was on Mary Shelley within her sociopolitical context as a radical and feminist. I worked on her novels and looked at her treatment of domesticity as the site of social change and utopian possibility. When the Byronic hero freaks out, there is usually a clearheaded woman around to provide contrast -- domesticity can be a really good thing, especially when hypermasculine norms threaten the foundations of society. Sound familiar? :D

Young Severus is reading my dissertation -- but he doesn't get it. Poor kid!

proxydialogue June 14 2011, 19:20:53 UTC

Hahaha! There is definitely enough around for a book! I wouldn't say that I'm the citation go-to however, the reading I've done is limited (though always facinating), and any acafan cred I have is very small, if it exists at all (I have yet to even take the GRE's so I can apply to my Grad schools). However, I very much return the sentiment that you would be an excellent partner for SPN culture analysis. (You've certainly got the cred. I creeped on you via lj after I friended you. Hope you don't mind. That does sound familiar! Oh Mary Shelley, she was the bees knees in so many ways. If I may ask a tangential question, the notion of the strong woman taking the helm in lieu of the byronic hero's melt-down reminds me of Dracula a little bit. The wife who is bitten and bears the mark on her forehead while the husband wigs? Is there a connection between Shelley's pattern of doing so and Stoker's? (I heard a story once that they had a contest or something going on to see who could write a horror story, and Shelley wrote Frankenstein and ( ... )

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