pop culture addict

new location!

2010-04-25T10:43:00.002-04:00

i've found a site that is much easier to use and much more visually pleasing...

so here is my new blog. enjoy!

fearing what we already are: how zombies and the undead are a reflection of modern society

2009-10-29T13:51:00.004-04:00

this entry consists of a [rather long] essay i wrote for a class called "visual sociology." we had to write an essay in place of doing a final exam and our instructions were pretty vague. basically, we were told we could write about ANYTHING as long as we somehow related it to visual culture. since i'm a lover of zombie films, i decided to focus my essay around the underlying messages that a lot of zombie films illustrate about modern culture. so here it is:

undead beings, such as zombies and vampires, have been discussed in literature for centuries. the advent of film gave viewers a chance to see the horrifying monsters previously only seen in the mind's eye. although some of these films have focused on merely being shocking and disgusting (after all, zombies are not pretty creatures), certain films have stood out, giving theorists texts rich with information about individuals, groups, and society as a whole. sure, zombies are mindless eating machines, constantly in search of their next fleshy meal, but do they represent more than a cannibalistic palate? since zombies were previously human, there are some obvious parallels between "us" and "them." it is a widely accepted opinion that becoming a zombie is disturbing and unacceptable. people would rather be killed while still "alive" than become a zombie. there is evidence of this in film every time a character says something along the lines of "promise me i'll never become one of those things." a great many theorists would argue that we are already living in a zombified state within our obsession with consumerism and pleasure seeking. as humans, we live in a comfortable state, much like the neo-natal years that lacan describes. we are comfortable in our consumerism because it satisfies us in that we always have something more to buy, more to acquire, more to add to our status. however, zombies operate in the same manner, constantly wanting more flesh, more brains, and more food. to be undead is to be without choice: a zombie wants flesh and nothing more. this is the ultimate peril of the consumer and the individual: to be without perceived choice. the reason we fear zombies then, is because they are not only a reflection of how we already are, but a look into the possibility of what we can become if capitalism, consumerism, and modern society were to fail.

when examining our fear of becoming zombies, we must inquire as to what part of being undead frightens us. possibly the thought of consuming flesh at any cost is what makes us shudder. maybe the fear lies in the fact that we have no idea what goes on in the rotting head of a zombie. our fear may be comprised of the notion that we will no longer possess our personal identity after we have died and become undead. hamish thompson claims that maybe we are not so different from the undead and this is what truly spooks us. "the portrayal in shaun of the dead of the line of checkout assistants who mindlessly (if rhythmically) 'beep' the purchases of customers, or of shaun's best friend as he whiles away the hours [playing] video games followed by a rapidly induced drunken stupor at the local pub, raises the terrifying possibility of our own general normal condition of zombiehood" (thompson 36). within the film, we see that even after the zombie apocalypse has begun, the characters do not act much differently than they did before the end of the world. comparing the film's pre-zombie world to one with zombies, we see nothing changes beyond the fact that people are eating one another.

pre-zombie world, an employee of a grocery store shuffles his feet as he gathers stray shopping carts in the parking lot. after the zombie uprising has been controlled, a zombie has been given this same task, but his chain tying him to the job is visible, where the previous man's was only implied. as thompson mentioned, we see the line of checkout clerks at the grocery store, one of which is a woman named mary. her face is blank and her motions are repetitive. she in turn, is the first zombie that shaun or his best friend ed consciously encounter and not much has changed about her. in fact, she remains as unresponsive in undeath as she was in life so much so that shaun and ed think she is drunk. the only time mary "comes to life" is when she is attempting to eat shaun. pre-zombie world, we see a line of men at a bus stop waiting to begin their morning commute. as these men stare off into space or robotically check their cell phones, they already look and act like the zombies they will eventually become. a group of london youth is shown ambling down an alley, oblivious to anything but their music, which reflects their zombified state later in the film where rigor mortis and decomposition leave the with only the ability to amble and where flesh is their only focus. outside of shaun's house, a young boy rhythmically bounces a soccer ball with his knees and later, as a zombie, he kicks a ball at shaun's head. women supposedly constantly surround snakehips, a regular patron of shaun and ed's local pub, the winchester, and we later see a group of female zombies devouring his innards. even shaun's morning routine of walking a block to the nearby convenience store for soda is paralleled in the zombie world.

this brings about kim edward's claim that "the horror genre regularly explores the notion that to know, understand and thus defeat one's enemy one must become the enemy" and that in this regard, shaun doesn't need to be "bitten and become a zombie. instead, the implication is that he always was one, and the film becomes simultaneously a satirical social commentary on the drudgeries of modern life and a witty validation of the sedentary lifestyles of young males refusing to grow up" (edwards 99).

it is evident that shaun and ed are completely comfortable in their womb-like environment. they are either at their house playing videogames, or at their local pub getting drunk where they are concerned only with satisfying their needs. shaun cannot fathom why liz wants to do more than go to the pub or hang out with ed. this is descriptive of lacan's neo-natal state where "a baby needs and seeks to satisfy those needs with no sense of any separation between itself and the external world or the world of others" (felluga, "modules on lacan: on the structure of the psyche," par. 2). after zombies are an apparent part of life, shaun's comfortable environment is torn to pieces. he no longer exists in a world where his needs are all that matters and "lacan sometimes represents [the neo-natal] state of nature as a time of fullness or completeness that is subsequently lost through the entrance into language" (felluga, "modules on lacan: on the structure of the psyche," par. 2). indeed, shaun's realization of the zombie-infested world forces him to open his eyes to the direness of the situation when ed asks if there are any zombies waiting outside. shaun begs ed not to use "the zed word" as it further drives home the reality of their "newfound" circumstances and describes lacan's concept of "the real" (felluga, "modules on lacan: on the structure of the psyche," par. 2).

six months after the devastating events of "z-day," we see that still, nothing drastic has changed in shaun's world. "all obstacles between shaun and liz have been successfully removed an all additional pressures neutralized without shaun having to significantly change" (edwards 103). liz's friends, shaun's parents and annoyingly responsible housemate, pete, have all been turned into zombies and killed or eaten by them. thus liz and shaun can focus solely on one another without any "mindless" distractions. even though ed has become a part of the legion of zombies, shaun still has the same relationship with him as ed is locked in the shed with his beloved videogames. ed's "new un-life is manifestly no different to his old existence" (edwards 103). all of the characters in the film, including shaun, do not change in a post apocalyptic world. instead of realizing how quickly life can be "changed," and thus doing what liz suggested at the beginning of the film by "living a little," shaun's "ultimate happy ending is that he has not actually had to change at all" (edwards 103).

another horrifying aspect of zombies is that humans cannot reason with them. a zombie has instincts that it cannot turn its back on. the essence of zombies is that they are consumed with devouring human flesh and a human would never be able to talk a zombie out of attempting to do otherwise. this one-track mind makes zombies unstoppable and "the true horror of zombies is that they are slow, weak, and dull, yet unrelenting. you can stop them one on one, but there is not one. they are everywhere, slowly trudging toward you" (priester, "night of the living subconscious conflict: the psychological relevance of the zombie horror film, par. 18). however, it is possible for zombies to express some semblance of their once apparent "humanity" in that they "occasionally exhibit fleeting and poignant flashes of something like human memory, such as the instinct that brings the zombies in dawn of the deadto the shopping mall that was an 'important place' in their lives. in land of the dead, one zombie still carries around the gas pump nozzle he operated in life as a filling station atttendant, as though our of residual sense of professional responsibility" (greene xv). what is interesting here is that when discussing the human memory of the zombies mentioned above, we see that these memories are reflective of a capitalist consumer culture. the zombies headed for the shopping mall are fulfilling their destiny to be consumers evermore while the zombie who is unwilling to give up an aspect of his job could be seen as one of the casualties of workaholism within today's "gotta have more" mentality.

george a. romero's dawn of the dead examines a world where zombies have existed for some time, though of course, the scientific reasoning for their existence is never given although a religious representative has stated, "when there is no more room in hell, the dead shall walk the earth." within this zombified world, what is left of humanity is quickly going under, swallowed both figuratively and literally by the zombie crisis. a group of four survivors escape philadelphia and take refuge in a shopping mall in pittsburgh. of course, zombies follow them there not only because they want food, but also for the reason of human memory or instinct mentioned above. matthew walker interjects that "in depicting zombies as the ultimate consumers, romero satirizes consumerism - the search for happiness through material acquisition" (81) and that "reading aristotle can help us understand the motivations and desires that romero's zombies share with today's devotees of consumerism. it can also help us get clear about why a life organized around material acquisition might constitute the sort of 'living death' that romero suggests" (82).

walker states that

romero is fairly explicit about the parallels between the living and the undead. in one

scene, the survivors - absurdly overdressed in fancy furs - survey their maximum-security

consumer utopia. while the groaning hordes of zombies try to claw their way back into the mall,

the survivors wonder what drives them. peter [says], 'they're after the place. they don't know why.

they just remember. remember that they want to be in here.' stephen [asks], 'what the hell are

they?' peter [replies], 'they're us. that's all.' (walker 83)

"by equating 'us' with the walking dead outside the mall, peter hints that we the living might not be so much better off

than the zombies" (walker 84).

so why do we allow ourselves to repeatedly live like zombies day in and day out? why are we drawn like a moth

to flame to the bright lights and promise of the shopping mall? walker asks, "why might...both [zombies and humans]

have ceaseless desires to consume things?" (84). to answer this question, walker turns to aristotle who used the

term pleonexia, which is "the disposition to have more" (walker 84). similarly to romero, through obviously senior to

him, aristotle explains pleonexia as the "unlimited desire for sheer survival" or as that which is "motivated by an

excessive desire to hold onto life. by taking more than their fill of the goods of fortune...those who 'grasp' seek to

keep at bay the inescapable bad fortune with which death confronts us. to this extent, the grasping differ from those

whom peter says 'still believe there's respect in dying'" (walker 84).

this desire for sheer survival as outlined by aristotle can also be looked at in terms of the horror film 28 days

later, which can be regarded as a zombie film in that citizens become infected with a virus that causes them to have

no other emotion beyond rage. they resemble zombies in that they are blindly consumed by only one desire, which in

this case, is to maul anyone who shows real signs of life. paul priester looks at the character of selena in the film,

who has not only survived the past 28 days of anarchy, but is concerned only with her further survival as "at one

point she states, 'do not make plans. staying alive is as good as it gets.' initially she refuses relationships with

anyone who will 'slow her down.' in the end, she realizes that the only meaning in life comes from relationships with

others and that all humans, regardless of their survivalist value, are sacred" (priester, "night of the living

subconscious conflict: the psychological relevance of the zombie horror film, par. 12). 28 days later is on par with

romero's films in that there is the constant grasping for survival, however, the former focuses on the solitude and

isolation brought about by simply surviving (priester, "night of the living subconscious conflict: the psychological

relevance of the zombie horror film). romero's take on survival is thus more representative of "the other" and begs

the question "are 'they' a mirror image of us, obedient in our insatiable hunger for the consumerist culture?" (priester,

"night of the living subconscious conflict: the psychological relevance of the zombie horror film, par. 20).

how are we to explain, beyond scientific reasoning, why zombies exist? bringing this question back to the

zombies of dawn of the dead, it is evident that "one explanation for the dead's return to life is that their graspingness

in life - rooted in their unlimited desire for life - knows no bounds. from beyond the grave, they grasp for more living,

even if such survival fails to count as living well" (walker 85). this explanation is eerily similar to the one given by

characters in zombie films that deny suicide as a choice. as long as they are not "undead," they are "alive" and

therefore posit that any life is worth living as long as they are not mindless pieces of flesh, which is how they see the

zombies. however, romero illustrates that there is no difference between being alive and being "undead" in the reality

of a capitalist consumer culture. "the sweet life that romero thinks the mall advertises, we might guess, is a

hedonistic life - a life of enjoyment like the one aristotle talks about. but given what happens to his gang of four,

romero seems skeptical about the sweetness of this life. it wouldn't seem to be so sweet after all" (walker 86).

dawn of the dead begs us to examine our priorities not only as individuals, but as a society as well. the old

adage is that you do not realize what you have until it is gone. romero is suggesting that we questions the values of

humanity before we wipe ourselves out. romero shows us that we are living zombies that neglect to experience life

and instead focus on buying experiences. "the life of enjoyment is not one somebody can truly lead. and since it

leads to the atrophy of those capacities that most fully manifest our humanity, aristotle believes that it cant fully

satisfy us. as the path to frustration taken by dawn's characters [with the inevitable boredom of wanting for nothing],

it proves a kind of living death" (walker 88).

the ending of dawn of the dead is ambiguous in that two survivors are left, but as they leave the mall where they

had everything, the re-enter the world with nothing and nowhere to go. "to the extent that a life of unlimited means has

blinded them to the ends that make a life worth living, it has left them without a clear destination" (walker 89). in light

of the recession currently taking place in the united states where citizens are not only losing their investments, but

also their ability to spend, ergo to consume, can this period be seen as a sort of zombie apocalypse? if we allow our

essence to be defined by what we own and suddenly find ourselves without material objects and without the means to

obtain new identities, what are we but the hordes of mindless consuming zombies drawn to the shopping mall but with

no means of satisfying our hunger? society will not be able to overcome this zombified state until our priorities are set

straight and the importance of material goods as the things that define us is annulled.

if we accept that consumerism is a sort of death of humanity and that the zombie is the ultimate consumer, we

can understand the terror ignited by the zombie. roland barthes describes the noeme of photography as something

"that has been" (115). in this way, photographs are seen as representations of death as barthes theorizes that once a

picture has been taken, the subject of it no longer exists as they were within the photograph. using barthes idea of

photography capturing images of death, we look at zombies as society's moving noeme: they had existed as

individuals, but are no longer the person they were when they were alive. we can then examine zombies not as

monsters, but as tragic figures.

there are similarities between the zombie and the other popular undead character, the vampire. although the

vampire is not decomposing and is quite articulate, unlike the zombie, both have a dual role as monster and pathetic

creatures. in dracula, "stoker explored the pathos and psychological terror of a human being, with a core of goodness,

becoming trapped inside a godless and eternally undead body" (barrows 69). comparing this to zombies, it is

generally accepted within zombie culture that the physical appearance of the creature is the only part of the original

person left behind. for example, if your mother was to become a zombie, she will try to eat you no matter who you

were to her while she was alive. she could have loved to knit and hike while alive, but none of her passions,

emotions, or memories (with the exception of possibly her love for shopping) are carried over into her undead state.

as humans, it is natural to fear anything that would take away our perceived essence of "who we are" and zombies

shove this in our faces (all the while trying to eat our faces). similarly to a vampire, killing a zombie is then an act of

love for the person who used to exist in that body. "to kill a vampire, for stoker's 'vampire-hunters,' is not just to

satisfy a blood-lust or to combat evil, but to liberate a 'true' humanity which is trapped inside a 'false' humanity"

(barrows 71). the fear of being eating by a zombie is outweighed by the fear of becoming one, which can be seen as

the "psychological fear of becoming 'false,' or having one's death, a fundamental part of one's natural being, taken

away, leaving the core of 'true' humanity encased in a pallid deathless shell of skin and bone" (barrows 71).

barrows uses martin heidegger's theories of the role of death in further examining undeath.

for heidegger, a confrontation with death is not simply some kind of perverse morbidity. it is an act of

'courage.' inauthentic beings ('they') cover up death and are thus always partial and incomplete, living

blindly and deludedly into a future that will be an endless succession of present moments. since the life of

'they' has no end, it has no borders or limits and is unable to be grasped by the mind. 'true' being, in

contrast, is a bordered whole, with death making it a complete entity. for heidegger, this state of being is

described almost ecstatically as a passionate anxious freedom toward death which is free of the illusions

of 'the they' and certain of itself. societal pressures try to 'tranquilize' or 'veil' this freedom, but authentic

beings reject such pressures. (barrows 74)

jen webb and sam byrnand suggest that we sometimes sympathize with zombies for the same subconscious

reason that we fear them: they are us.

just as anxious self-aware humans try to suture the gap between the self and its unfathomable parts, and

between those two deaths, so too producers of zombie-type narratives often attempt to reconcile the two

sides...in day of the dead, dr. logan turns zombie [bub] into a kind of pet by means of behavioural

treatment - and [bub] later avenges his death as only a human would do. their 'like-us-ness' manifests;

something is reconciled; the horror is put back into the closet, out of sight - until the next relapse. (webb

88 - 89)

truly, any viewer of day of the dead sympathizes with bub the zombie as they would a small child or a mentally

handicapped individual. he is not a monster, just as lennie is not a monster in steinbeck's of mice and men. viewers

do not fear bub, but instead the possibilities of what could happen to him after dr. logan, his post-apocalyptic

surrogate father is killed. in fact, zombies like bub "clearly fall above the criterion of death when we consider them in

contrast to severely brain-damaged individuals. zombies can clearly respond to basic environmental stimulation albeit

in a somewhat anti-social and ponderous manner" (thompson 36).

if we are similar in both "life" and "undeath," how are we to regard our zombie selves? do we feel sorry for our

family members who have become zombies in that they no longer get to live their lives, or do we see killing their

zombie bodies as freeing them from a falsehood? do we even see a difference between the people we once knew and

the mass of decomposing flesh standing before us (other than the fact that we are now viewed as a meal)? should we

consider ourselves more refined and deserving of "life" than our zombie counterparts? regardless of the fantastical

nature of the subject at hand, these are deep philosophical and social questions with the possibility of generating

many opinions and debates about "human nature." at the beginning of this essay, the idea was put forth that zombies

are really just individuals without choice, be it in what they consume, but also in how they exist in their undead lives.

capitalism is said to give the individual, a.k.a the consumer, a multitude of choices, but when the only choice is

limited to buy this or that, the essence of humanity and what it is to be alive is lost. we cling desperately to our

material possessions because they are what defines us and complain that too much emphasis is placed on tangible

goods, but we have yet to break free from this cycle. perhaps a zombie uprising in true apocalyptical form would

inspire us to se our priorities straight. but then again, maybe we're already living in a world of zombies.

if you're not too moby'd out...

2009-10-15T11:47:00.003-04:00

check out this article i wrote about the experience of interviewing him.

The magnificence that is Moby, my hero

Shared via AddThis

my wildest dream come true

2009-09-24T10:45:00.004-04:00

i recently had the privilege and extreme pleasure of conducting an interview with my favourite musician of all time: MOBY!

you can read the article that was published in the lance by clicking the title of this blog.

enjoy and let me know what you think!

xo stella

recent reading: moral disorder

2009-06-17T10:44:00.006-04:00

title: moral disorder

by: margaret atwood

purpose: fun

pages: 284

chapters: 11

review: i've recently started reading more and more short stories. i'm usually a novel-type girl, but short stories often do the job in less pages and can be just as satisfying. when reading the back cover of moral disorder, i thought it would be a perfect book for me. it said that although the book consisted of short stories, they followed a life throughout the book, whether it was a boy, girl, man, woman, or even an animal.

sometimes a story line would last only for one "chapter," but other times, the same story would continue on for three or four "chapters." most stories were distinctly canadian as they discussed places and pastimes. each anecdote sucked the reader in whether it was illustrating five minutes in a character's life or spanning a lifetime. the narratives illustrated life with a simple ease. atwood discussed diseases, divorces, deaths, births, siblings, families, and experiences in a relatively detached nature. she turned herself into a sort of scientist that was examining these lives and experiences and relaying her findings to the reader. this may seem like it would make the stories cold or unfeeling, however, the opposite was true. atwood's distinct narrative allows the reader to truly place themselves in the character's shoes.

my main complaint about moral disorder was that, try as i might, i couldn't see a connection between the stories [besides where the story line continued for a few chapters]. the only connection i could find was that in one story, there was a man named tig. later in the book, a man named tig dated a woman named nell. later again, there was mention of a horse named nell. i tried to read into how these stories were all directly connected but i couldn't see it.

this was my first book by margaret atwood and i was really pleased. i loved the characters and her writing style. i would definitely read others by this canadian icon.

rating: 3/5

oops!

2009-06-05T12:43:00.002-04:00

i have been doing a LOT of reading/movie watching lately and i have gotten wayyyyyy too behind to review all of the books and movies i've seen. so my next post will probably be either an essay i wrote for visual sociology, all about zombie movies and how they mirror society. orrrr i will discuss one of my new favourite bands, natalie portman's shaved head. and i promise from now on, i'll update my blog more regularly with reviews of the things i've been experiencing!

xo stella

DEMF 2009

2009-06-03T14:09:00.002-04:00

click the title of this blog to find a link to an article i wrote for the lance about the detroit electronic music festival. if you were there or want to know more about the festival, please drop me a comment!

also, here's a video of the festival on youtube.

let's not feed the lamb to the lion just yet...

2009-05-28T12:00:00.006-04:00

so i wrote an article for the scene page of the windsor star about how twilight represents an abusive teen relationship. read it and let me know what you think about it!!!

'Love story' really a tale of abuse

Shared via AddThis

p.s. i got the image of the t-shirt from www.zazzle.com

recent reading: the color purple

2009-05-15T15:27:00.006-04:00

title: the color purple

author: alice walker

purpose: school assignment, book broads book club

pages: 288

chapters: ?

review: i initially had to read this book for my women's studies class called "gal pals." then we read it for my book club, the book broads. i learned in class that this type of book is called an epistolary novel, which means that it consists of letters that move the plot along.

there are a lot of important issues and rich symbolism in this novel. but ultimately it tells the story of 2 african american sisters, celie and nettie, who are unwillingly separated from one another after celie is married off to mr. ____. nettie, who has been educated, travels to africa to become a missionary while celie is beaten and forced into pretty much being a slave to her husband.

not knowing what ever became of nettie, celie writes letters to god praying that she and nettie will be reunited one day. in the meantime, she befriends and even falls in love with her husband's mistress, shug avery. shug is everything celie is not: loud, proud, strong, and sexy. she teaches celie how to stand up for herself. when it is discovered that mr.___ has been hiding nettie's letters from celie, it's shug that helps celie control her anger and gain some self-respect.

although this book deals with friendship, love, hate, race relations, incest, abuse, feminism, and family, it's general message is about finding your place in the world through loving and respecting yourself. it is a truly beautiful story of female friendship that never quits, despite disagreements, insecurity, or separation.

a really great book club read!!

rating: 3/5

puppy poetry

2009-02-11T22:24:00.004-05:00

i'm currently reading the portable dorothy parker and am at the section containing her book of poetry called enough rope. i'll do a big post on mrs. parker in the future, but for now, i wanted to share a poem of hers i just finished reading. it's very cute and light and literally made me giggle. i hope you enjoy it as much as i do.

verse for a certain dog

such glorious faith as fills your limpid eyes,

dear little friend of mine, i never knew.

all-innocent are you, and yet all-wise.

[for heaven's sake, stop worrying that shoe!]

you look about, and all you see is fair;

this mighty globe was made for you alone.

of all the thunderous ages, you're the heir.

[get off the pillow with that dirty bone!]

a skeptic world you face with steady gaze;

high in young pride you hold your noble head,

gayly you meet the rush of roaring days.

[must you eat puppy biscuit on the bed?]

lancelike your courage, gleaming swift and strong,

yours the white rapture of a winged soul,

yours is a spirit like a mayday song.

[god help you, if you break the goldfish bowl!]

"whatever is, is good" - your gracious creed.

you wear your joy of living like a crown.

love lights your simplest act, your every deed.

[drop it, i tell you - put that kitten down!]

you are god's kindliest gift of all - a friend.

your shining loyalty unflecked by doubt,

you ask but leave to follow to the end.

[couldn't you wait until i took you out?]

recent reading: about alice

2009-01-15T10:59:00.005-05:00

title: about alice

author: calvin trillin

purpose: recommendation from a relationship book

pages: 78

chapters: 8

review: when columnist calvin trillin's wife died of cancer, he immortalized her in his book about alice. this short read highlight's alice's grace, morals and most importantly, her loving character. although it is obvious that trillin still loves his wife dearly, as a first time reader of his work, i felt excluded from many of his anecdotes that seemed to come from other columns or essays he has written. all in all, this is a short read and a very nice memorial of a woman he was, and still is, madly in love with.

rating: 2/5

recent reading: the consequences of modernity

2008-11-20T00:21:00.016-05:00

this book review is a little different from the ones i've done thus far. i had to read this entire book for my theories of postmodernism class and write a review essay about it. so i'm posting the entire essay here. granted, this may not be "popular" culture, but this book is somewhat of an introduction into the theory of modernity and postmodernity, which is extremely relevant to examining our current society and what is to come.

title: the consequences of modernity

author: anthony giddens

purpose: required school reading

pages: 178

chapters: 6

review: anthony giddens' study of modernity and subsequent postmodernity and postmodernism takes the confusion out of the argument to some extent. giddens, although at times repetitive, offers his perspective so that the layperson that he so often discusses could actually comprehend his argument. in this way, the distinction between terms like postmodernism and postmodernity are finally understandable. giddens uses real world examples that allow the reader to not only think about modernity as an abstract term with no real meaning in today's society. he clearly lays out certain topics within the concept of modernity and applies them throughout the text. one of these topics is the balance that exists between risk and trust in modern society. giddens emphasizes trust and risk in almost every argument he makes and for this reason, it is safe to say that he feels very strongly about these concepts. although it is difficult to focus on only one concept that giddens lays out because they are all related and connected within modernity, for the purpose of this essay, i will focus only on risk and trust and how they apply to the topics of modernity as giddens presents them.

firstly, i would like to quickly summarize giddens' idea of modernity. "'modernity' refers to modes of social life or organization which emerged in europe from about the seventeenth century onwards which subsequently became more or less worldwide in their influence" (giddens 1). in this statement, giddens places modernity in a historical context, which becomes important throughout the text and can be elaborated on. however, these basic definitions about modernity will later help to put the ideas of risk and trust in the proper context.

much of giddens' argument in relation to risk and trust has to do with the fact that "the disorientation which expresses itself in the feeling that systematic knowledge about social organization cannot be obtained...results primarily from the sense that many of us have of being caught up in a universe of events we do not fully understand, and which seems in large part outside of our control" (giddens 2-3). this is essentially the basis of the concept of trust and risk and how they are related to one another.

giddens first mentions the theme of trust and risk when identifying the discontinuities between modern social institutions and the traditional social order. among trust and risk, giddens also touches on the pace of change, the scope of change, and the nature of modern institutions, in which he discusses the fact that modernity has been set in motion, that areas of the globe are now becoming interconnected, and finally that there have been a change in principles from the pre-modern era (giddens 6). giddens determines that modernity is a "double-edged phenomenon" and we have to study the theme of trust versus risk with this in mind (giddens 7).

when giddens begins discussing trust, he states that this term is often misused or implies something more than what its definition is. through luhmann, giddens says that "trust...should be understood specifically in relation to risk, a term which only comes into being in the modern period" (giddens 30). the reason that the term risk did not exist in the pre-modern era is because what is now dubbed "risk" was then considered "fortuna (fortune or fate)" (giddens 30). this idea of fate coincided with the idea of confidence, which luhmann referred to as "a more or less taken-for-granted attitude that familiar things will remain stable" (giddens 31). it can be said that the modern society forces the individual to take responsibility for his or her actions. if the individual is simply relying on confidence, they are not considering that alternative outcomes are possible, regardless of what they have confidence in. in this way, they are not held accountable for what happens because they truly believe that only one outcome is possible. different from this idea is that of trust, because the individual who puts his or her trust in something understands that there is a risk involved. when the outcome is alternative to what the person trusted would happen, they were previously aware that such a possibility was laid out before them. the difference between confidence and trust can now be identified as risk. this disparity between confidence and trust because of risk seems to me to be more of an idea that belongs in the enlightenment period because it appears to mirror positivism that came about as a direct result of the enlightenment. there appears to be a connection between confidence and what could be seen as a blind faith in god pre-enlightenment. giddens must have anticipated would feel similarly to what i just stated because he states that since "the notion of risk is relatively recent in origin, luhmann holds, the possibility of separating risk and danger must derive from social characteristics of modernity. essentially, it comes from a grasp of the fact that most of the contingencies which affect human activity are humanly created, rather than merely given by god or nature" (giddens 32). when thinking of this idea of risk being recent, i considered a random example of imagining a family in pre-modern society who were afraid of their family members contracting the plague. pre-enlightenment, this family would have had confidence that god would spare their family member from the plague if it were meant to be that way. they were passive in the sense that their confidence in god was intertwined with their belief in fortune and fate. in a modern society, if someone had the possibility of being diagnosed with cancer, we would view their situation in terms of the fact that mostly everyone runs the risk of getting cancer, which we can trust will be affected by the level of risk the person places themselves in (ex. smoking, not eating properly). although people may still believe in god and fate in a modern society, they understand the risks involved with unhealthy habits.

however, after understanding the difference between these concepts, i still feel that trust and risk are not modern or postmodern ideas, but that they belong to the enlightenment period and more specifically, to the theory of positivism. if, as woodiwiss claims, "modernity" has simply replaced the term "capitalism," i would have to agree and say that the entire concepts of risk and trust are not modern (woodiwiss 3). when discussing trust and risk, one cannot do so only in terms of the economy and capital without ignoring a large part of what these words mean. in the consequences of modernity, however, it does not feel as if giddens is strictly discussing trust and risk solely in terms of capitalistic institutions. in fact, giddens does not use the term modernity as a replacement of capitalism, but instead sees capitalism as a "dimension involved in the institutions of modernity" (giddens 55).

considering all that is written above in this essay, i can reflect on giddens' study by saying that his work allows us to think about modernity and postmodernism in different ways throughout his entire text. he offers many different conceptual tools with which we can consider modernity and postmodernism, but all are relatively limited within this text, as has been mentioned in lecture. however limited he may be, giddens does open up the dialogue for whether or not postmodernism truly exists in today's society. in class discussions, there has been disparity between some students as to whether or not we are living in a postmodern society. it is arguable that although giddens put forth many concepts without delving extremely deep into any of them and thus left the reader with an overview of modernity, this was enough because it got the conversation about modernity flowing.

works cited

giddens, anthony. the consequences of modernity. stanford: stanford university press, 1990.

woodiwiss, anthony. 1997. against modernity: a dissident rant. economy and society, 26: 1, 1-21.

recent reading: brainless: the lies and lunacy of ann coulter

2008-10-08T22:53:00.003-04:00

title: brainless: the lies and lunacy of ann coulter

author: joe maguire

purpose: fun

pages: 181

chapters: 9

review: for those of you reading this who have no idea who ann coulter is, here is a very brief introduction. she is a republican right-wing columnist who hates the new york times and all liberals. she says very controversial things and has written numerous books on how liberals and left-wing individuals are basically moronic. joe maguire obviously has some issues with her, hence, brainless.

mr. maguire gives us 9 chapters on why ann is someone we shouldn't listen to. he focuses on not only her politics, but the way she delivers her message. he points out that she is full of contradictions, inaccuracies, and even accuses her of plagiarism. these are all very good issues and reasons for why american citizens should stop listening to what she has to say. however, numerous times throughout this book, the narrative switches from informing facts to a sarcasm-riddled rant about coulter. here, maguire attacks coulter's confidence in her looks [she's tall, skinny, and blonde and lets everyone know it] and her love life. he does so in a sly way because he always brings the message back to the fact that coulter is unqualified to broadcast her opinion on politics to the world, but the fact remains that many times while reading this book, you find yourself questioning why you're just reading someone's rant about someone you already know is irrational and unbelievable.

i think this book would be more interesting if maguire had focused more on how someone like ann coulter repeatedly appears in the media when both left and right wing politicians and commentators are shocked by her words and opinions. or if maguire had addressed that coulter exists in our media as shock value. or why it's dangerous to allow someone so ill informed with such set in stone opinions to be commenting on politics. because let's face it, if you're reading this book, you probably know who coulter is and already think "idiot" is a polite term for the woman. maguire should have been appealing to the people who feel that what coulter has to say actually matters, or worse yet, let her opinions form their own. with brainless, he is simply preaching to the choir.

rating: 2/5

recent reading: dead sea

2008-09-03T17:10:00.003-04:00

title: dead sea

author: brian keene

purpose: recommended by a friend of my dad's

pages: 318

chapters: 14

review: lamar reed is a black gay man dealing with unemployment in baltimore when "hamelin's revenge" affects the nation. of course, with this being a zombie novel, you must know that "hamelin's revenge" = undead people and animals walking around. after weeks of being holed up in his house, a huge fire engulfing most of the city drives lamar from hiding. he encounters tasha and malik, a brother and sister surviving alone in their apartment building. they decide to escape the city together by heading toward the docks where they plan on taking a boat out of the city of fire and undead. luckily, or so it seems, they meet up with a large group of people who are setting sail on an old coast guard ship. the open sea seems like the best place to be until everything inevitably goes wrong.

the underlying message of this zombie novel has to do with people's positions in society and archetypal roles that everyone plays. there is always a hero, a warrior, a jester, a trickster, etc. lamar wrestles with feelings of self-disgust when someone points out that he has become a hero in the sense that he rescued tasha and malik from certain death [or undeath if you choose]. however, before the zombies started roaming the streets, lamar had gone against everything he stood for when he robbed a car dealership to pay his bills after being laid off from his factory job. he consequently can't see himself as a hero because he had done something characteristically unheroic.

although dead sea isn't terribly frightening, it does it's job as a zombie book by making you think "oh crap, what if that actually happened??" this is the second brian keene book i've read [i've previously reviewed the rising] and this wasn't the greatest of the two, but still worth reading.

rating: 3/5

recommendations: the rising by brian keene. also, the walking dead trade paperbacks by robert kirkman.

recent reading: the queen's daughter

2008-08-22T19:30:00.006-04:00

title: the queen's daughter

author: melissa mccormick

purpose for reading: book club book selected by theresa

pages: 113

chapters: 21

review: the queen's daughter is an autobiographical story of melissa mccormick's ghastly 12 hours spent in detroit in 1976. out for a night on the town with her friends, melissa was kidnapped, beaten and raped by several men after her car broke down on a detroit freeway. the experience was so bad that at one point she begged them to kill her. luckily, they didn't and she was set free the next morning. melissa decided years later to write about her ordeal and how life changed for her after suffering through and surviving a woman's worst nightmare.

it was very important to melissa that she not exploit her experience, but rather use it to inform other people. however, after reading this book, i don't really understand what she was trying to accomplish. maybe i've grown up desensitized to all the violence and horrible things in our society, but i don't think that this book was very helpful or inspirational to anyone who has been in a similar situation. i can't speak from experience because thankfully, i've never experienced what melissa had to. i think it's wonderful that she overcame a lot of what she was going through directly after, as well as years after her ordeal, but there really wasn't anything in this book that said "this is how i dealt with it and this is what may help you."

rating: 2/5

recent reading: fake liar cheat

2008-08-13T21:02:00.005-04:00

title: fake liar cheat

author: told goldberg

purpose for reading: fun

pages: 162

chapters: 21

review: i really didn't care for this book at all. it really felt like the author was trying way to hard to be ironic and over used a dead-pan style of writing. it felt like he was TRYING to be shocking, but i never bought it. the premise for the book is that this regular joe [who somewhat lives the lifestyle of jack in fight club, i.e. being obsessed with buying things from ikea, not living life to the fullest] is approached by a beautiful girl who shows him the high-life in the l.a. scene. the main thing that they do for fun is dine at fancy, upscale restuarants and skip out on the bill. honestly, that really doesn't seem all too exciting to me.

the beautiful woman, aka claire, has a nice car, apparently lives in a mansion, and dresses to the nines all the time. the main character, lonnie, falls hard for her and loves what she brings out in him. until she apparently performs a sexual favour for her boss. lonnie then blackmails her boss by informing him that he will tell the boss' wife about his extramarital activities. the story just gets ridiculous here because apparently this totally improvised and impulsive blackmailing scheme causes claire's boss to commit suicide. where the hell that comes from, i don't know. i really don't think that a rich, successful person would respond to some young punk and his girlfriend blackmailing them by killing themselves.

then, in even more unbelievable scenarios to follow, claire disappears and lonnie discovers that she has framed him for murder. oh and also, he develops a cult following from copy-cat dine n' dashers who call themselves "lonnie's army." of course he had nothing to do with this so-called army of his and these people carry out horrible things in his name like setting a school bus on fire. it's just really ridiculous. there is no way that someone could go from skipping out on a dinner bill to being wanted for murder. this story reeks of fight club and i really feel like goldberg was trying way too hard to imitate chuck palahniuk's biting writing style, but he has miserably failed. in my opinion palahniuk is probably the best contemporary writer that i've read to date and to try to imitate him is like trying to imitate van gogh: there's only one. as a writer, i understand being inspired by a fellow author, but trying to imitate someone usually just makes you a second-rate THEM instead of a first-rate YOU.

if you're in the mood for something edgy, quirky, and full of black humor, save yourself and just read some chuck p.

rating: 1.5

the dark knight

2008-08-05T15:24:00.007-04:00

the second installment of the new batman series has been a box-office blast and has beat out "the shawshank redemption" for the top spot on the best movies list on imdb.com. if you're one of a few people who hasn't yet seen the film, be advised that some spoilers might be ahead.

there is no beating around the bush: heath ledger has completely stolen the show in the new batman film. i have to start out by saying this because i can't wait to talk about his performance until later. ledger's last performance [technically, i know that terry gilliam's the imaginarium of doctor parnassus will be his last performance, but he never finished shooting on that film] is UNREAL. there is no way that you could look at ledger as the joker and see the charming young australian in "10 things i hate about you." ...and that's not just because of the joker's grisly makeup. ledger changes his voice, his mannerisms, and the way you view him for the role of the joker. he does exactly what an amazing actor does to portray someone that is truly not themselves. he makes himself completely unrecognizable to the point that you believe that the joker really does exist and that the city of gotham isn't fiction at all. to be able to make something so real for an audience that is in actuality completely unreal is the essence of what an actor does and ledger nailed it 100%. rumors of post-humus oscar nods have been surrounding ledger's performance and whether they are true or not, it is safe to say that ledger's portrayal of the joker was the greatest in his portfolio of work. it's sad to think that he was becoming an exponentially better actor with each film he did and that we probably would have seen even more amazing roles from him if he had not passed away so young and suddenly.

i have to tear myself away from thinking about ledger and how much i hate that he's gone and talk about the rest of the film because it's freaking awesome. christian bale once again plays the best batman that we've ever seen [at least in my opinion]. the character of bruce wayne/batman develops nicely in "the dark knight" because we see that wayne understands what being a hero means. he ends up sacrificing batman's non-homicidal image to take the fall for the murders committed by the white knight of gotham: the new d.a. harvey dent. of course dent doesn't commit the murders until after half of his face is burned off as a result of the joker trying to kill him. and then the joker pushing him over the edge into madness where dent becomes the villain two-face who is obsessed with fate and chance. now, i've always hated aaron eckhart as an actor. i'm not sure if it's the roles he plays or his acting. my friend remy commented that possibly i don't like his large chin. i don't think that's it. but whatever it may be, roles or chin, i loved him in this movie. i can't exactly pinpoint what i loved about him other than i think he played both harvey dent and then two-face exactly as i envision them.

also adding to the greatness of "the dark knight" is the face that maggie gyllenhaal, whom i love, replaced katie holmes, whom i can't stand, in the role of bruce wayne's childhood friend/love interest rachel dawes. comparing gyllenhaal to holmes is like comparing filet mignon to a hamburger. gyllenhaal brings sexy swank to the character while still upholding dawes' fierce and unyielding call for justice in gotham. even on the most basic level of appearance, gyllenhaal LOOKS like what you would imagine bruce wayne's love to look like. no, she's not conventionally beautiful, but her inner beauty shines through. wow, that was cheesy. also, let's not forget that bruce wayne is a billionaire. when he was a child, wouldn't it stand to reason that his closest friend would come from at least a little bit of money? gyllenhaal has a "money" face while holmes just talks out the side of her mouth. seriously, what is that? also, just as a sidebar, i think it was pretty neat how "the dark knight" sort of kept it in the family. many of you may know that gyllenhaal's brother, the beautiful jake, is godfather to ledger's daughter matilda. the gyllenhaals and ledger were a close-knit group so i think it was fitting that in ledger's last movie, he was among friends.

"the dark knight" also propels jim gordon's story line ahead as he finally becomes "commissioner gordon." in the film, he's full of tricks that make him a great cop, even going so far as to fake his own death to be able to later catch the joker and once again help batman. of course this backfires and results in rachel's death and the creation of two-face, but seriously gordon was just doing his job.

"the dark knight" is full of themes: anarchy [thanks to the joker], fate, duality, and chance [upheld in a twisted way by two-face], the true meaning of being a hero [batman is criticized repeatedly but does what's right for gotham, even if it appears to hurt himself], and finally, i think it puts forth the lesson of not putting all your eggs in one basket. gordon and batman put harvey dent up on a pedestal as the white knight of gotham. they claim that dent is the real hero because he'll fight crime the way it's meant to be fought: through the legal system. but after dent becomes two-face and murders five people, his white knight image would be ruined if the public found out about the murders. gordon and batman admit that they were naive to think that one person could change gotham and that they didn't account for someone without rules or scruples [aka the joker]. when anarchy exists, even in crime, there is no way to fight back because there are no limits or boundaries set.

the movie was amazing and if you haven't seen it, you should go NOW. if you saw it and have an opinion about it, leave a comment!

pop culture addict is turning japanese

2008-07-14T14:32:00.002-04:00

hey there everyone...

so i'm off to japan for ten days. not much to say in this post other than that. hopefully we'll be pretty much fully immersed in japanese culture and i'll have some cool things to report back to you.

wish me luck and when i get back, i'll post a ton of pictures on my facebook account i'm sure.

xo stella.

recent reading

2008-07-09T17:09:00.004-04:00

so i haven't been up to date with all the books i've read since i started the blog. i've decided instead of doing a separate entry for each book, i'll just give a quick review of each of them in this post. the way i do my book reviews is that i list the title of the book, the author, the reason i decided to read the book [ex. for fun, for required school reading, for my bookclub, it was recommended, etc.], the copyright date of the book, the number of pages [to give everyone an idea of the size of the book if they decide they are interested], the number of chapters [if it applies to the format of the book], and then finally my review and a rating out of 5. also, i think i'm going to include a section about other books i would recommend if you like the one i just finished a review of, if i can think of one.

title: i am america [and so can you!]

author: stephen colbert

purpose for reading: fun

pages: 227

chapters: 14

review: hilarious! the chapter on religion was one of my favourites, especially the chart on different "trains" in comparison to the jesus train like the crazy train [via ozzy osbourne], the night train, and the midnight train to georgia. if you are a fan of "the colbert report" on comedy central, you'll love this book. if you've ever seen the show and are familiar with "the word" section of the program, you'll understand all his notes in the margins of the book. the book reads the same way as "the word" plays on t.v. and it's funny as hell.

rating: 4.5/5

title: lightning

author: dean koontz

purpose: fun

pages: 351

chapters: ?

review: this book is very intriguing and catches the reader's attention very quickly after beginning. it's very suspenseful while still being emotional at times. the story focuses around laura shane who has had a "guardian" looking over her ever since birth. we meet laura on the night of her birth after her mother died during labour. from then on, we see her grow up and dodge serious harm to herself, but not without tragedy. the death of her father at age 12 makes her an orphan who's life is anything but easy. as time goes on, laura is finally able to talk to the guardian who has saved her from harm on numerous occasions and ask him who he is and why he cares so much about her. there's a bit of a twist here that i don't want to give away, but i will say this: this is a work of fiction so obviously some imagination has to be used. i think the twist in this book could make a lot of people say "okay this is just stupid" but koontz's writing is good enough that if you stick with the book and give yourself up to imagination, you'll start to think that this twist is actually a feasible thing. beyond that, laura's life is very interesting and her character development was done very well.

rating: 3.5/5

recommendation: odd thomas by dean koontz

title: emma

author: jane austen

purpose: book club

pages: 495

chapters: ?

review: i had no idea that the movie "clueless" starring alicia silverstone was based on emma but there were a lot of similarities between the book and the film that were impossible to ignore. sometimes this would help me when situations got confusing in the book because i have seen "clueless" too many times to count and could sort of expect what was coming. other times, the fact that i had seen the movie so many times hindered the book because it made certain scenarios boring because i already knew what the outcome would be. all in all, it is a classic book and my first austen. like any classic, i think you have to really try to transport yourself back to that time and think about how life was when the author was writing it. on the other hand, it's also interesting to examine the ways that our society has changed or stayed the same since 1815. for example, the book heavily focuses on different people marrying someone that is on the same "level" that they are in terms of money, power, and breeding. i think this still exists somewhat today. if we see some rich man marrying a middle income woman, we always think that she's just after his money and social standing. or sometimes if someone is very popular and good looking and they are with someone not so great looking, people will say that the former could do better than the latter. that's just my opinion and if you have a different one, i encourage you to let me hear it! : )

rating: 3/5

title: black hole

author: charles burns

purpose: book club

pages: ?

chapters: ?

review: black hole is a graphic novel that looks daunting because it is so thick, but truly, you could finish this book in a few hours. i thought the artwork was really cool, but the writing was terrible, even for a graphic novel. if you've ever read a graphic novel or a comic book, you know [if you will admit it to yourself], that sometimes the writing isn't all that great. it can be very descriptive, by which i mean someone will say "i am angry and now i will punch you." maybe that's not a great example and i might be exaggerating a bit, but in my opinion, what graphic novels add for imagery and visuals, they usually lose in writing. once again, only my opinion and if you're an avid reader of graphic novels/comic books and think differently, feel free to let me know. i admit that i just recently got into graphic novels and maybe i'm just reading the wrong ones! feel free to recommend some titles to us less-informed readers! : )

anyways, back to black hole. set in the 70's, the story is that a disease has struck a community that affects the teenagers. the disease is sexually transmitted and carriers of the disease develop deformities. for example, one girl grows a tail, another girl sheds her skin like a snake, someone else grows a second mouth on his neck. i really felt like burns romanticized not only drug use [which is to be expected whenever a text is about the 70's i guess], but more so, i felt that he romanticized STDs. for example, in the story, a non-infected guy ends up losing his virginity to the girl who has grown a tail. during sex, she tells him to pull on her tail and he ends up becoming aroused by her deformity. obviously, he now gets the disease and it manifests as scales on his body. these teenagers seem to be turned on by the deformities that the others have and in almost every sexual encounter that someone has with a diseased person, their deformity, whatever it may be, is involved.

i really didn't see the point of the book. i didn't think that it exposed much of anything. i didn't see the moral if there was one. if you've read this book and can shed some light on it, share your insight. i was pretty much the only one in the book club who really didn't like it. the other girls felt that it discussed the feeling of being an outcast in high school, but i thought that argument was kind of weak and little along the lines of grasping at straws.

rating: 2.5/5

title: judaism: a very short introduction

author: norman solomon

purpose: fun

pages: 136

chapters: 9

review: firstly, something i may or may not have mentioned before...i'm obsessed with jewish people and jewish culture. i'm not exactly sure why, but there it is. this is strange because i'm an athiest who was raised catholic. but i am fascinated by jewish customs and traditions and respect their belief in god. anyways..."very short" is right. things weren't explained very well in this book and i don't feel like i gained any insight into the jewish culture beyond things i already knew. i wouldn't recommend wasting your time reading this book if you're interested in learning about judaism.

rating: 1/5

title: i'm a lebowski, you're a lebowski: life, the big lebowski, and whathaveyou

author: bill green, ben peskoe, will russel, and scott shuffitt

purpose: fun

pages: 234

chapters: 7

review: this book is for anyone who is a die-hard fan of coen brother's cult classic "the big lebowski." this book is simply fun. it's a great fanbook written by the founders of lebowski fest, an annual festival celebrating "the big lebowski" and all its fans [look for a link to the lebowski fest website in my "check this out!" section on the left-hand side of the blog]. the book is filled with quotes and interviews with the actors of the film, as well as some celebrity fans of the movie like tony hawk and patton oswalt. there are lot of interesting facts that you might not have picked up in the movie, as well as a "by your side guide" to the movie. on top of that, after reading the book, you'll have learned about the man that inspired the lazy man's hero, the dude, as well as the three men who make up walter.

but hey, if you're going to read this book, make sure you do it before the sabbath...SHOMER FUCKIN' SHABBOS!

rating: 3.5/5

title: the rising

author: brian keene

purpose: recommended by a friend of my dad's who is big into horror and zombies

pages: 321

chapters: 23

review: this is a pretty decent zombie book which has both similarities and differences from other zombie stories. for example, along the same lines of the movie "28 days later," civilians come under military abuse of power after the zombie rising [and yes, i know "28 days later" isn't technically a zombie movie, but everyone categorizes it as that...and if you haven't seen that movie...WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH YOUR LIFE!?...see that movie now!!!!]. i have to admit that if the zombies had been like most where they are slow moving and just mindless flesh-eating machines, i wouldn't have enjoyed the book as much as i had and might have tried to quickly finish it and move on. however, the rising features a different kind of zombie: a zombie who can talk and do anything a human can, just at a slower pace, obviously. the zombies can shoot guns, drive cars, and really screw with a person's head. in this book, when a person or an animal dies [yes, there are zombie animals!], a new entity takes over the corpse after the soul of the person has left. the best way to think of this entity is as a demon. apparently, there is an infinity amount of demons waiting to take over the corpses of the recently dead and inherit the earth. when a demon takes over your body, it can see everything that you remember from your life. it will know who your kids are, what job you worked at when you were alive, and intimate and personal memories from your life. the zombies use this to really freak out their still-alive human counterparts. this new breed of zombie brought life to the genre for me [no pun intended]. altogether, a pretty enjoyable read...if you're into that kind of stuff.

rating: 3/5

title: killing yourself to live: 85% of a true story

author: chuck klosterman

purpose: fun

pages: 235

chapters: ?

review: if you've never read chuck klosterman, get on that shit now! he writes in the autobiographical first person and sometimes you read a section and sit there thinking to yourself "it must be exhausting to be him." i seriously don't even know where to start. he's so hilarious that you will literally "lol" while reading his stuff. this book is the story of him traveling cross-country going to the spots of the deaths of musicians. but more than that, it's an examination of why we're so obsessed with death and why people usually don't get recognition until they're dead. it's also about the dynamics of chuck's relationships with three women that he's either in love with or has been in love with in the past.

rating: 3.5/5

recommendation: sex, drugs and cocoa puffs by chuck klosterman

title: 1984

author: george orwell

purpose: fun

pages: 311

chapters: ?

review: i'd always wanted to read this book because it's a modern classic. it was pretty much exactly what i expected and it lived up to what i had heard about it being an unnerving story about an all-controlling government. i'm not big into politics and political parties, so i'm not sure if i 100% understand what this book meant when it was published in 1949.

rating: 3/5

recommendation: animal farm by george orwell

george a. romero's diary of the dead

2008-07-02T14:45:00.007-04:00

like any true lover of all things zombie, i was ecstatic to hear that the daddy of the genre, george a. romero, was adding to his dead series of films with 2007's "diary of the dead." and like any true lover of all things zombie...i have to say it sucked.

romero is famous for using a post-apocalyptic world as the backdrop for discussing social issues. in "dawn of the dead," the underlying theme was society's obsession with consumer culture shown by survivors fleeing to "safety" at the local mall. in "day of the dead" he discussed military control and the romance we have with weapons and war. "diary of the dead" is concerned with the issues of ever increasing voyeurism via the internet.

the premise of the film is that a group of university students are making a horror film to submit for a class project of sorts. the main filmmaker, jason, is really interesting in making documentaries and is said to always have a camera in his hand. the film brings up the fact that not only does he actually miss out on living most things because he is constantly recording them, but he alienates himself further from his friends by annoyingly taping them during a crisis. he is so obsessed with recording them and how they are feeling during this zombie uprising that he completely disregards their feelings and only views them as subjects in his movie.

"diary of the dead" further goes on to show the impact blogging and d.i.y. sites like youtube have on society and the dispersion of information [...and yes, i'm aware that it's somewhat ironic to be discussing said issues via a blog...anyways...]. when the first zombie attack occurs, a local cameraman for a news station captures it on video and uploads it to the web. soon after, people realize that what is being said on the news is generally a lie and they take to sharing their experiences in the crisis through the internet. they use the internet as a resource to find out what's actually going on.

i will say this: as always, romero is adept at holding up a mirror to society. he's an excellent commentator on the issues society faces and then beyond that, he throws in blood and gore. and this is why i tend to love his movies.

so why didn't i like this one? firstly, the film is shot with two handy-cams. it's like reliving "the blair witch project" all over again. but kudos to romero because this is something he hasn't really tried before. okay, beyond that, the movie is INCREDIBLY cheesy, even for zombie movie standards. it's just over the top at every turn. the actors either over-act or under-act all the time. the worst performance is from a virtually unkown actor by the name of scott wentworth who plays the student's drunken lethargic professor andrew maxwell. he sports a fake british accent that's extremely distracting while spewing forth woe-is-me monologues and one-liners about his days back in england on the archery team and his love-affair with booze. even before the end of the world, he's a drunken loser who could hardly be believed to be a professor. he seems more like a vagrant that the kids picked up on their trek home from their dorm rooms.

that's another thing: all these kids live in the dorm at a university in pennsylvania. they are all heading home to their respective home towns, in get this...a winnebago owned by one of the students. huh?? students who live in dorms are rarely even allowed to have cars on campus let alone a home-on-wheels. romero slipped up on that logic.

although "diary of the dead" has some pretty decent gore and new ways of killing zombies [a kid zombie is pinned to the wall from an arrow to the brain], it felt completely amateur and reminded me of when i was invovled in a haunted house back in high-school. for example, in a hospital emergency room, the group stumbles upon a flickering light behind a privacy curtain. of course there are two zombies dressed as a doctor and nurse feasting on the guts of a patient. this is so obviously meant to be a disturbing sight and it has the opposite effect and just seems like a pathetic attempt to scare and upset the audience. it was as if romero, the master of the genre, was some highschool kid trying to copy someone as great as oh, say, ROMERO, and failing miserably.

let's just hope papa horror isn't slowly becoming a zombie himself.

DEMF [detroit electronic music festival]

2008-06-11T15:49:00.003-04:00

hello all...

i've been slacking on my blogging. but that's only because i've been "out there" doing/experiencing stuff so that i have something to write about.

hmmm what shall we talk about today? alright, how about this one. in the may 2008 issue of the lance, i wrote an article about the [then] upcoming detroit electronic music festival, or DEMF, as it is widely referred to. i had the opportunity to interview jason huavere who was the festival director for DEMF 2008. his company, paxahau productions, put on the event to much success. after the article was published, my lovely and wonderful editor lindsey rivait informed me that mr. huavere loved the article! yayyyy!! : ) also, she had put the article on the wire and it was picked up by a british columbia university newspaper and reprinted there. i'm posting the link to the sentinel's website [where my article can be found if you are so inclinded] in my "check this out!" section located on the left hand column of my blog.

as for DEMF, i was lucky enough to be given a set of press passes for the entire weekend. i was accompanied by igor beric who is an avid fan of techno. this was our first DEMF experience and i 100% recommend it for anyone who even kinda likes electronic music. hart plaza in downtown detroit was transformed into the biggest outdoor nightclub you've ever seen. over 100 artists were playing at 5 different stages that each offered it's own feel and variation of electronic music. there was techno at one stage, house at another, trance at the next, hip-hop and electronica further on. not only was the music great, but there were so many vendors and awesome sponsors that offered up free swag that could make anyone feel like a v.i.p. and this was the first time that i've been to a music festival and there was a food vendor selling fresh fruit.

the people at DEMF were unreal as well. you could sit in one place and see so many different people walk by you in a split second. the fashion and dancing seen at the festival ranged from obvious groups like ravers and ginos to new age hippies and metalheads. and EVERYONE GOT ALONG. everyone smiled at each other and there was a definite feeling of collective enjoyment and experience. i'm not naive enough to think that some illicit substances might have played a part in this, but even if that was the case, no one seemed to have a bad trip or anything. lol.

igor and i had predetermined which artists were absolutely essential to witness and we decided on benny benassi and my forever hero...the one and only moby. i'll talk about benassi first even though we saw him on the second day of the festival. after seeing him deejay, i 100% understood the appeal of seeing a dj perform live. it was like a give and take between him and the crowd. they played to each other. when the crowd wanted to jump and get crazy, benassi could read it and brought on an explosion of music. he transformed songs that i have frankly grown tired of and revitalized them by mixing in red hot chili pepper's "other side" and u2's "with or without you." he made the songs danceable and fresh and the crowd responded accordingly. although his electronic stylings differed from moby's they both had something in common: the remixing powers of "where's your head at" by basement jaxx.

moby remixed it during his set on the first day of the festival where he was the headliner. amazingly, igor and i made it to the front of the crowd [with a little help from our press passes] and i was within 20 feet of my hero. at one point, he remixed my favourite song of all time, "porcelain" and i cried tears of joy. lol i'm only slightly pathetic, but more than that, i love music and i love moby. that was probably the closest thing i'll have to a religious experience. anyyyyways, he remixed some other electronic favourites like the chemical brothers' "hey boy hey girl" and some of his own pieces like "go." being a fan of moby, i have heard him say many times how much he loves being in detroit, which is the home of techno. jason huavere also confirmed in my interview with him that moby was so excited to be playing DEMF this year. you could read the happiness on moby's face as he performed to a huge crowd under the stars and skyscrapers as he donned his chrome dome and a DETROIT hoodie.

xo stella.

"forgetting sarah marshall"

2008-05-07T10:31:00.005-04:00

so after seeing the film "forgetting sarah marshall" three times now, i've decided to do a blog entry about it.

*WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD*

in the media, a lot of what you hear about "forgetting sarah marshall" deals with the fact that writer/star jason segel does full frontal nudity in the film and how he prepared for it. segel is quoted as saying, "when a woman does nudity in a movie, men immediately switch into a sexual mode. for women, from what i understand, it's not like that. they see a naked, out-of-shape man crying and it's funny -- something weird, disturbing and disgusting we can all laugh at." and laugh you do during said scenes. however this judd apatow-produced flick is way more than penis shots.

small-time musician peter bretter (segel) and actress sarah marshall (kristen bell) have just ended a five year relationship...on her terms. she reveals that even though she loves peter very much, there's someone else. to say that peter doesn't take the breakup well is an understatement and after having a few one night stands, decides to take a vacation to hawaii. however, when he checks into his hotel, he finds that sarah and her famous new beau aldous snow (russell brand) have had the same idea.

peter befriends rachel (mila kunis) who works at the resort. their relationship develops based on the fact that they were both extremely hurt by their exes. peter also realizes how different rachel is from sarah in several quick flashback sequences that feature he and sarah on the red carpet; her getting pictures taken, and him holding her purse.

one of the greatest parts of this movie is when we get to hear an excerpt from a rock opera peter has been working on: dracula...with puppets. this is after rachel encourages peter to play a song from the opera at a local bar and peter realizes that sarah never supported him in his dream to create this musical. segel nails the voice of dracula as he sings a ballad dealing with the slaying of van helsing and dracula's immortal fate. the song itself combined with segel's facial expressions make for big laughs and the desire to hear more...which we do towards the end of the film.

"forgetting sarah marshall" is jam-packed with famous funny faces. paul rudd plays a stoner surfing instructor who is full of "wisdom." jonah hill is a waiter obsessed with aldous snow, while jack mcbrayer of nbc's "30 rock" plays a frustrated christian on his honeymoon. the scenes where he is trying to have sex with his new wife are ridiculously funny and full of quotable lines like "no! god put our mouths on our head for a reason!" when his wife tries to orally please him. also, bill hader plays peter's stepbrother brian who is on a mission to get peter over sarah, along with the help of his pregnant wife liz.

the movie is like any judd apatow flick in that is it quotable to no end. remember how everyone was quoting "anchorman" a few years back [and actually still are]? you'll probably see that happening with "forgetting sarah marshall." segel puts his comedic writing genius on display in this film and it delivers.

beyond all the naked scenes, quotable lines, and comedic genius, this film is very sweet in that it shows how it really is to have your heart truly broken. peter's distressing scenes of weeping are funny, but there is truth in them that everyone can recognize. it's like looking back at a situation that was horrible and being able to laugh about it now. what's more is this film gets into the nitty-gritty of relationship dynamics. peter realizes that the pedestal he's had sarah on is unwarranted, but not before we learn that he wasn't the only one who was hurt in the relationship. although sarah did things that are unforgivable, like any relationship, she did them for a reason. kristen bell does a really great job in the scene where she tells peter how hard she worked at the relationship and how much it crushed her that he didn't do his part. the film accurately shows how complicated both relationships and breakups are in that there's always two sides to every story. at one point, sarah questions her decision to end the relationship when she looks back on how great peter always was to her. this is such a "true" moment because everyone can identify with breaking up with someone, only to second guess yourself...especially when you see them with someone new.

all in all, the film delivers on every level. it's uproariously funny and very cute without making you puke. all the actors play their roles perfectly and the audience is able to pick up on the necessary nuances in their facial expressions and body language during uncomfortable scenes. this film is a must-see in theaters...if only to see the full frontal scenes on the big screen.

rating: 5/5

book list from 1999 onward.

2008-04-22T19:59:00.000-04:00

as per request of one of my readers [lol], i'm going to post a list of the books i have read from 1999 onwards. i think that i'm missing a few though...i know i've read all the harry potters, for example, but i only have a few reviewed in my notebook. sometimes i forget to write them in i guess. anyways, i'll just include the title of the book, the author, and my rating out of 5.

harriet the spy by louise fitzhugh 3/5

a string in the harp by nancy bond 4.5/5

first person plural: my life as a multiple by cameron west, ph.d. 5/5

the twits by roald dahl 2.5/5

if you only knew by rachel vail 4.5/5

standing in the light by mary pope osborne 3.5/5

sabrina: showdown at the mall by diana g. gallagher 2.5/5

the islander by cynthia rylant 5/5

the chronicles of narnia: prince caspian by c.s. lewis 4/5

daring to be abigail by rachel vail 4/5

by the shores of silver lake by laura ingalls wilder 4/5

crocker by kin platt 4/5

clueless: romantically correct by h.b. gilmour 3/5

64, 65 by norah mcclintock 4/5

portraits of little women: meg's story by susan beth pfeffer 3/5

on the other side of the hill by roger lee macbride 2.5/5

meet molly by valerie tripp 2.5/5

dinah forever by claudia mills 4/5

the complete tales and poems of winnie the pooh by a.a. milne 3/5

nancy drew: mystery of crocodile island by carolyn keene 3/5

molly's surprie by valerie tripp 2.5/5

a tale of redwall: martin the warrior by brian jacques 5/5

wishbone: salty dog by brad strickland 1.5/5

portraits of little women: jo's story by susan beth pfeffer 3.5/5

charlie and the great glass elevator by roald dahl 3.5/5

the diary of a young girl by anne frank 2/5

the journal of william thomas emerson by barry deneberg 2.5/5

sabrina: halloween havoc by diana g. gallagher 3/5

the chronicles of narnia: the voyage of the dawn treader by c.s. lewis 2/5

superfudge by judy blume 4/5

the burning time by kathy lasky 3/5

the long winter by laura ingalls wilder 3.5/5

bridge to terabithia by katherine paterson 4/5

moonkid and liberty by paul kropp 3/5

holes by louis sachar 5/5

harry potter and the sorcerer's stone by j.k. rowling 5/5

portraits of little women: beth's story by susan beth pfeffer 1/5

the haunting at cliff house karleen bradford 1.5/5

clueless: extreme sisterhood by randi reisfeld 2.5/5

chicken soup for the kid's soul by jack canfield, mark victor hansen, patty hansen, irene dunlap 3/5

the secret of platform 13 by eva ibbotson 4/5

leslie's journal by allan stratton 3.5/5

the grave by james heneghan 4.5/5

nancy drew: the 13th pearl by carolyn keene 1/5

harry potter and the goblet of fire by j.k. rowling 4.5/5

the a-z encyclopedia of serial killers by harold schechter and david everitt 5/5

sabrina: santa's little helper by cathy east dubowski 2/5

little house in the highlands by melissa wiley 3/5

a tale of redwall: mossflower by brian jacques 5/5

the winter of red snow by kristiana gregory 1.5/5

alex mack: take a hike! by cathy east dubowski 1.5/5

stay true: short stories for strong girls compiled by marilyn singer 3/5

please, please, please by rachel vail 4/5

wishbone super mysteries: the ghost of camp ka nowato by michael anthony steele 2/5

portraits of little women: amy's story by susan beth pfeffer .5/5

goosebumps: welcome to dead house by r.l. stine 1/5

charlotte's web by e.b. white 4/5

the chronicles of narnia: the silver chair by c.s. lewis 2/5

wings to fly by celia barker lottridge 2/5

top ten shakespeare stories by terry deary 2/5

the hobbit by j.r.r. tolkien 2/5

spook by steve vance 2.5/5

"a" is for alibi by sue grafton 3/5

to kill a mockingbird by harper lee 4.5/5

little house in brookfield by maria d. wilkes 2.5/5

a tale of redwall: outcast of redwall by brian jacques 3.5/5

chicken soup for the teenage soul ii by jack canfield, mark victor hansen, kimberly kirberger 2/5

welcome to the ARK by stephanie s. tolan 5/5

thwonk by joan bauer 4/5

the quiet little woman by louisa may alcott .5/5

scribbler of dreams by mary e. pearson 4/5

the sisterhood of the traveling pants by ann brashares 4.5/5

alex mack: zappy holidays by diana g. gallagher 2/5

ophelia speaks by sara shandler 3/5

not that i care by rachel vail 3.5/5

sabrina: ben there, done that by joseph locke 1/5

the chronicles of narnia: the last battle by c.s. lewis 5/5

ella enchanted by gail carson levine 3/5

high fidelity by nick hornby 3/5

a series of unfortunate events: the bad beginning by lemony snicket 3/5

what are friends for? by rachel vail 3/5

a tale of redwall: mariel of redwall by brian jacques 3/5

died to match by deborah donnelly 3.5/5

the nanny diaries by emma mclaughlin and nicola kraus 4.5/5

biography of nick drake by patrick humphries 2.5/5

lord of the flies by william golding 1/5

"b" is for burglar by sue grafton 3.5/5

blood and chocolate by annette curtis klause 1/5

a series of unfortunate events: the reptile room by lemony snicket 3.5/5

time after time by sue hassler 3/5

veiled threats by deborah donnelly 4/5

a tale of redwall: the bellmaker by brian jacques 2/5

harry potter and the order of the phoenix by j.k. rowling 5/5

a series of unfortunate events: the wide window by lemony snicket 3/5

happiness by will ferguson 3/5

moody food by ray robertson 3/5

please don't kill the freshman by zoe trope 3/5

rule of the bone by russell banks 3.5/5

confessions of a shopaholic by sophie kinsella 3.5/5

elegance by kathleen tessaro 3/5

the unthinkable thoughts of jacob green by joshua braff 5/5

animal farm by george orwell 3/5

survivor by chuck palahniuk 4.5/5

the perks of being a wallflower by stephen chbosky 4/5

a million little pieces by james frey 4/5

little women by louisa may alcott 3/5

deja dead by kathy reichs 4/5

it's the crude, dude by linda mcquaig 3.5/5

the second summer of the sisterhood by ann brashares 3.5/5

the devil wears prada by lauren weisberger 3/5

my friend leonard by james frey 3.5/5

the zombie survival guide by max brooks 1.5/5

angels and demons by dan brown 4/5

the cocktail party by t.s. eliot 1.5/5

wicked: the life and times of the wicked witch of the west by gregory maguire 3/5

the da vinci code by dan brown 3/5

the beauty myth by naomi wolf 4/5

bruiser by ian chorao 3.5/5

don't know much about history by kenneth c. davis 3.5/5

july, july by tim o'brien 3/5

glue by irvine welsh 3/5

would my fortune cookie lie? by stella pevsner 1/5

the alchemist by paulo coelho 3/5

the greatest story ever sold by frank rich 4/5

mcsweeney's: created in darkness by troubled americans edited by dave eggers, et al. 3/5

captains of consciousness by stuart ewen 3/5

death takes a honeymoon by deborah donnelly 3.5/5

bestial: the savage trail of a true american monster by harold schechter 3/5

"c" is for corpse by sue grafton 3/5

sex, drugs, and cocoa puffs by chuck klosterman 5/5

what should i do with my life? by po bronson 2.5/5

harry potter and the deathly hallows by j.k. rowling 4/5

fight club by chuck palahiuk 3.5/5

may the best man die by deborah donnelly 3/5

"d" is for deadbeat by sue grafton 3.5/5

citizen girl by emma mclaughlin and nicola kraus 2/5

the science of success by james arthur ray 1/5

you may now kill the bride by deborah donnelly 3/5

odd thomas by dean koontz 5/5

the memory keeper's daughter by kim edwards 3/5

the gum thief by douglas coupland 2/5

nobodies: modern american slave labour and the dark side of the new global economy by john bowe 4/5

the god delusion by richard dawkins 5/5

30 days of night by tim lebbon 3.5/5

alright, that's the list so far. after going through the whole thing, i realize how many books i'm missing...like a few harry potters and chronicles of narnia. and classics like stuart little. and all the roald dahl books i read like matilda, the bfg, james and the giant peach, and the witches!!! plus all the goosebumps books i was obsessed with as a kid. i started this book journal way too late in life apparently. oh, well, i'll be vigilant about writing them down from now on.

if you see a book that sounds interesting or you want a detailed review of what i thought of it, just leave me a comment with the title of the book and i'll get back to you asap.

xo stella

my first ever blog!

2008-04-22T11:03:00.001-04:00

alright, so here we go.

basically, i created this blog for mostly personal use. i keep records of every book i read and do sort of a mini review of it. although i have been keeping these records in a small notebook for the last god-only-knows how many years, i figure i might as well keep it online as well.

the title of my blog is "pop culture addict" which is 100% true. i'm a culture fiend and i love it. so this blog is going to be dedicated mainly to all things pop culture. most often than not, you'll find book reviews, concert/cd reviews, or movie reviews. basically what i think of what's being put out there by people daring enough to create. i'll just critique it. lol

also, i'm in the process of applying to have my own show on CJAM 91.5 FM, and in the event that i get it, i'd like this blog to be around so that i can post my playlists for each week's show, as well as information about upcoming concerts and cd releases or anything else of interest.

as for "housekeeping" type stuff...no, i hardly ever use capitals...i'm not sure why, i just am not fond of them. so if that bugs you, probably stop reading this blog now or get used to it lol

i was considering publishing all my book reviews that i have in my tiny notebook, but there are over 100 of them and i just saw that i started the book journal in 1999....so the first entry is "harriet the spy" because i would have been in like grade 6 or something? i think what i'll just do is post the books that i read from now on on here... so be prepared to read my review of "emma" by jane austen in a little while. oh, by the way, i'm in a (very small) bookclub with my good friends cassie and theresa where we all take turns choosing which books we read. so this will be kind of neat because i'll have read something that i probably wouldn't have before as we all have sort of differing tastes.

anywhoooo... hope you enjoy what's to come!

xo stella.