Course on Horror

[Zouji]

I have no point of personal reference for serial killers or other premeditated murderers. So I can't really be afraid of them. Something has to be considered to be "real" in a sense for you to be afraid of it. As in you can see yourself experiencing that situation and feeling the shock of the victims. Until you can experience that then you won't truly be afraid of something.

I know that serial killers, rapists, terrorists, and other nasty people exist. I just can't see myself being personally confronted by them.



One story you should probably make the students read is Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Plus the story is short. It can be read in one sitting. The story is dated, but the moral is still quite relevant. Everyone has a darkside. Everyone can commit manslaughter under the proper circumstances. Anyone's personality can be drastically changed by drug use, so much so that they can seemingly become another person. Under the right circumstances and under the proper settings normal people can become horrible monsters. The best of us is able to fall to the dark. The fall is just that much more shocking when that person is considered to be of "high moral standing".

[Vllad]

For instance, it could be argued that the book Interview with a Vampire forever made vampires a bit less scary because once you've sat at a table and interviewed them they are much less monstrous.

I think it is the viewer not the subject that determine the level of fear. Vampires aren't less scary today because we know more about them. They are less scary now because more people know they aren't real.

For example we know a hell of a lot more about Adolf Hitler then we know about Vampires. Having another Hitler rise scrares the shit out of people regardless of how much know about them. Why? We know it is real.

I am sure their is someone out in the world today that believes monsters are just as real as Hitler. That nieve thought process however has shrunk and continues to shrink in the world because modern technology has made the world smaller and more educated.

That is the biggest threat not only to monsters but to religion, art, culture and human values.


Vllad

[Dharus]

Like "good looks" it is in the eye of the beholder.

Vllad

I just wanted to add... I hate Beholders. From Pen and Paper til now... they always killed me.

DDO had a dungeon with tons of them... pain in the arse.

/end rant.

[Zouji]

Like "good looks" it is in the eye of the beholder.

Vllad

I just wanted to add... I hate Beholders. From Pen and Paper til now... they always killed me.

DDO had a dungeon with tons of them... pain in the arse.

/end rant.

You mean the Temple of Elemental Evil?

No dungeon really compares to the Tomb of Horrors or the Return to the Tomb of Horrors (that one was 3 separate logarithmically increasing difficulty dungeons). The characters on our party said fuck it after we all died at least once in the regular Tomb of Horrors portion of Return to the Tomb of Horrors. The counter argument was but but the world is in danger if you don't do this... Fuck the world. Let someone else that is Lawful Stupid (Good) deal with this crap.

[Uncle Shags]

Well, so far so good. Either these students are all really smart and conscientious, or I've caught them just before they've discovered the joy of beer, pot, sex and skipping class.

Maybe my personality is just suited to it, but so far it's been actually pretty fun. We've had some great discussions, and they are super eager and interested in everything I have to say. I feel like a damned comedian up there with a drunk and warmed up crowd. Thursday I had, what can only be referred to as, an epic lecture. I ran an in class experiment to illustrate in-group out-group bias, showed a video on the Stanley Milgram obedience study/Stanford Prison experiment and then we talked about how that all relates to people becoming monsters. Then I showed them the results of the experiment from earlier in class, which conveniently proved my point, showing that they were all little monsters in the making. I blew their wee brains straight out of the top of their heads.

For material we are using http://www.amazon.com/Monsters-Unnatural...019533616X (it's actually not too bad) as a "text", reading Grendel, Frankenstein, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and excerpts of Beowulf and a bunch of other stuff. We're also watching a bunch of movies: Beowulf (CGI), Bladerunner, American Psycho, and then a bunch of vampire and zombie movies.

[Vllad]

More details.

Give us some idea on what the take is from your students. Gives us details on the debates or their view on monsters!

[Uncle Shags]

More details.
Give us some idea on what the take is from your students. Gives us details on the debates or their view on monsters!

Your question made me think. Unfortunately, it seems to me that at least during in class discussion, so far they think whatever the hell I tell them to think. They haven't had many ideas independent of what we're teaching. They take what we're dishing out and agree with it and have questions and such, but they haven't shown any real significant creativity or critical thinking.

I think that is fine though. They are only 18 and this is their first college experience. I'd guess they are partly apprehensive and partly incapable of having independent thoughts at this point. Throughout the semester there will be papers and student lead discussions though that are designed to get them to start using their brain as something other than a sponge. Critical thinking being the big one.

[Vllad]

That is kind of a let down. I was looking forward to hearing about the discussions you and your students had.



Vllad

[Moristans]

Just wanted to check back in on how things went Shags. I'm assuming the class ended at the smemester break so I'm curious to hear more details, a la Vllad.

[Uncle Shags]

Yep, the semester ended and it all went fairly smooth. The monster part of the course went great, but kind of fizzled at the end. The last two weeks were vampires and zombies and since there weren't any assignments based on it I know about half of them didn't watch the movies. The communication part (teaching them writing, presenting, etc.) could have gone better too. I'm not an English teacher so most of the time my feedback on fucked up sentences was "AWK" (awkward). If I were to teach the class again I'd do a lot of things differently.

One of the major themes of the course was balance. We were usually able to look at what made each monster monstrous and find out where they went wrong (if the fell into monstrosity) or what separates them from humanity. It usually came down to a lack of balance. I enjoyed this because I felt it gave a fantastic opportunity for these kids to think about what it means to be a decent human being by looking at what not to do.

For example, emotion was a big balance issue. We read two Greek plays, The Bacchae and Medea, which both were about balancing emotions with reason and what can happen when there is imbalance in either direction. Medea lost control of her grief, stress, anger and depression and plotted a revenge that included killing her own children. I've always loved the phenomenon of "cutting off your nose to spite your face" and it fit perfectly in here.

We also spent a lot of time on subjectivity and how a monster can sometimes become understood and less monstrous when their perspective is taken. The monster Grendel from Beowulf is a two dimensional demon in the poem. In the movie he becomes a little more understood, and maybe pitied. In the book "Grendel" you get a behind the scenes perspective from Grendel himself, and although many students still considered him a monster, others felt his actions were justified or understandable considering his background and treatment by the Danes.

Those are some of the more repeated ideas we touched on.

It was a good time, and it was fun to walk the line of "acceptable" academic topics and complete geekdom. For instance, check out the intro to the instructions for their final presentation (I read it out loud in my best monster truck rally announcer voice. SUNDAY SUNDAY SUNDAY!):

MONSTER BATTLE!

Monsters are mean. Monsters are violent. Monsters are scary. But when two monsters face each other in battle, the earth itself quakes! Monster Battle! Rage, blood and brawn collide in a royal rumble of doom!
Your assignment is to provide a detailed analysis of a hypothetical confrontation between any two monsters of your choosing. You will set the stage with background information on each monster, providing details of their history and monstrous characteristics. You will then square the monsters off against each other in an ideological skirmish; which monster is most evil, most scary, most monstrous? Which monster’s place in hell will be the deepest? Finally, you will stage a physical meeting between the two monsters and let the combat begin! Provide post fight highlights of their match and declare the victor.

Some of them were fantastic. My favorite was "The light-weight battle of the little people: Chucky vs. The Leprechaun." It was hilarious. Oh, and a good presentation... excellent research. :wink:

This semester I'm teaching the spring version of this class on the HBO show The Wire. So far so good.

[Vllad]

So no more repeat of the monsters? Uhhggg. You are so close to greatness.


Vllad