ENGL 250 Great American Books - Course Blog

THIS...IS...JEOP---um. right.

alice — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 21:56:16 -0500

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest meets "A Good Man is Hard to Find" meets The Haunting of Hill House meets Invisible Man

Alex and his guests...Eleanor from The Haunting of Hill House and the Grandmother from "A Good Man is Hard to Find" (oh, and Pitty Sing)

a commercial break

Skin whitening cream (by L'Oreal)

BAD!

Joined by Randall P. McMurphy (before he runs out of HEAV 101's window)

a guest appearance by The Misifit

as usual...

I can say "meow". I can say "moo". For twenty bucks, I'll call the guy a "chicken $*#(&er".

alice — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 21:35:44 -0500

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (and about 16 animal violations)

Catz rule, dogz ... um marry weird guys in bad 70s cartoon outfits (and Randall P. McMurphy is flipping in his grave. So is Ken Kesey, I think)

Mc-Anti-Hero offers Scooby the 'good stuff.'

so scary....

Ratched and Meow's surgical policy

so many kitties. so few litter boxes.

TRL gone AWOL

alice — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 21:12:39 -0500

Invisible Man, The Bluest Eye, Light in August, Lenny Kravitz, Michael Jackson, and City Bus

Meeting Michael Jackson: Black or White (you tell us)

What the hell WAS this?

An Interview with Invisible Man

Being mean to Pecola

Lenny Kravitz got shorter

Final projects

vzimmer — Tue, 05 Dec 2006 22:48:24 -0500

Ok, so im super late, sorry. When the assignment was given to do these videos my first thought was, great, just one more thing to take up my time. However, after creating it and watching some of the videos i think that this was the best assignment all semester. It was super fun and not to mention funny. It was a good way to be creative and actually learn something about the books. I really enjoyed the first one we watched b/c lets face it, it was hilarious. Im very excited about watching the others and i hope they are just as fun and creative as the first two. Great job to everyone.

Bull Goose Loonies: Satires and Bookbashings

alice — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 17:30:21 -0500

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Light in August, The Bluest Eye, Autobiography of My Mother, and "A Stroke of Good Fortune" (we think!)

Forcing William Faulkner to eat his own words.

A Cuckoo's Nest session gone awry.

Billy Bibbitt, back from the dead. And a really messed up Ruby.

Sock Puppet Mania: Satires of Almost Every Book We've Read

alice — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 17:23:55 -0500

Their Eyes Were Watching God, Autobiography of My Mother, The Bluest Eye, Light in August, and probably everything else

Janie and Teacake from Their Eyes Were Watching God

Joe and Joanna from Light in August

Xuela from The Autobiography of My Mother

Pecola in The Bluest Eye

Class Monday November 20

alice — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 00:26:58 -0500

Hi all,

I've decided to cancel class for Monday November 20 (tomorrow) (lucky you). On the Monday we return, we will be finishing Autobiography of My Mother and reviewing for Wednesday's essay exam. Try to work towards your own analyses of the text in answering the exam questions, and come to class prepared to discuss them. I have attached a copy of the exam questions for those absent on Friday. If you have specific questions about the exam questions, please email them to me over break. Remember, you have to do a little research for the second question.

I've also decided to randomly choose groups to present their films (please make sure they are on DVD/DVDR:

Friday December 1
Groups 3, 5

Monday December 4
Group 2

Wednesday December 6
Group 1

Friday December 8
Group 4 (and any make-up groups)

Please let me know if you have any questions. Have a safe and productive break!

Apropos?

alice — Sat, 11 Nov 2006 15:13:36 -0500

'Cuckoo's Nest' hospital investigated for abuse

POSTED: 7:42 a.m. EST, November 11, 2006

Adjust font size:

PORTLAND, Oregon (AP) -- Federal investigators are looking into patient care at the hospital made famous in the movie "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," where there have been reports of abuse, short staffing and overcrowding.

The Oregon State Hospital is one of the oldest and most dilapidated state mental institutions in the nation. The movie was filmed there in 1975.

Justice Department officials are expected to visit the hospital next week. The department alerted Gov. Ted Kulongoski in June that it would investigate whether patients' constitutional rights were violated.

The facility is at the center of discussions about reforming mental health care in Oregon. Reports of abuse and other problems led lawmakers to reassess the hospital's future.

Lawmakers have proposed replacing it with two separate hospitals and two residential facilities at an estimated cost of at least $324 million.

It's unclear how long the investigation could take. Justice Department spokeswoman Cynthia Magnuson said she could not discuss the timeline or details of the investigation.

In preparation for Monday November 13th's guest speaker, Sol Neely

alice — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 18:59:41 -0500

Hi all,

In prepartion for his guest talk on The Bluest Eye and Lacanian imagery on Monday November 13th, Sol Neely would like you to thoroughly read the following webpage and passages on “RSI and the Borromean Knot”; “The Real”; “The Imaginary”; “The Mirror Stage”; “Meconnaissance”; “The Symbolic”; “Symbolic Order and Language”; “The Law”; “The subject”; “Object a”:

http://web.uvic.ca/~saross/lacan.html#Death_Drive

HighTensions

vzimmer — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 16:43:22 -0400

I enjoyed the movie. I mean, it wasn't all that scary, which i believe a true horrow film should be, and it consisted of cheap gore. Which fine, it sometimes ok, but whatever. Either way, i like all movies so its hard for me to say that i didn't like it. After thinking about it, Eleanor and Marie should really become friends. Neither one know who they are, neither one know if they like girls or boys, and neither can tell when something is reality or not. The way that Eleanor is with Theo reminds me of how Marie is with Alex. They are only giving you the idea that Eleanor likes Theo, and its the same way with Marie and Alex. They never actually say "hey im a lesbian" but they give you that notion. Also, just like Eleanor, Marie can't tell whats real from whats not. You would think that if you go around killing people you would know that you're the one doing it. However, this is not the case for poor Marie. She's confused, but so is Eleanor. You only get the story from Eleanors POV so maybe she was the only one experiencing these adnormal conditions and happenings of the house. They are both detached from reality struggling with their identities.

Some foreshadowing that i caught onto was the beginning, how they show you the end before it even begins. Well, thats a good clue that someone is crazy in the movie. Also, the dream that Marie has when she's in the car on the way to Alex's country house. She says that she was running through the woods, but the person who was chasing her was herself. Kinda creepy. But foreshadows the split personality. When Marie is tidying up the room before Mr. Psycho comes upstairs is also foreshadowing. Ok, how would you konw that Mr. Psycho is goign to check the bed for warmth, and the sink for water, and the heater for heat, but yet not check under the bed, like the whole bed not just the bottom. In a way that was foreshadowing the fact that Marie knew what he was going to do when he came into the room.

The film stereotyped Marie BIG TIME! The stereotypical lesbian has short hair, a mor muscular/masculine look, and acts like a badass. Which is Marie in a nutshell. She also pretty much says to Alex that boys are bad while in the car and discussing Alex's sex life. I mean come on, stereotypical lesbian. Mr. Psycho is also stereotyped, i mean not that he really existed or whatever but, why are psycho killers always the ugliest person in the world. I mean come on, give me a horror film where yes im scared of you, but wow, your pretty good looking. I think that would be scarying than some creepy ugly old dude. You know he's not getting any, and he's prolly just frustrated with his own ugliness, but with a cute dude, you'd never see it coming.

The story begins and ends at the same place. You see crazy ass Marie's feet hanging off a bed talking to herself about how she's "never letting anything come between us."