In Charles Stroziers Essays from the Fundamentalist Mindset (chapter 10), he discusses the 7 seals of fundamentalism. These include violence, time, revenge, paranoia, survivalism, the Elect, and redemption. This reading had much in common with the previous fundamentalist essays, and Strozier once again argues that the Book of Revelation indirectly influences millions of people to take on an apocalyptic mindset.
Watchmen: A New Take on Superheroes and the Apocalypse
When looking at Watchmen today, readers may not recognize how politically and socially significant this comic-style novel truly is. It was originally released as separate comics during the late Cold War era. Our nation was living in a time of nuclear threat, post-Vietnam politics, political disasters such as JFK’s assassination and Watergate. This novel reflects many of the issues that the U.S. was facing in the time it was written.
Marisol Paper
Hi All.
I just thought it’d be interested to see each other’s papers, so for those interested, I’m posting mine here.
-Amy
Amy Gijsbers van Wijk
Final Paper
04 December 2012
The Anti-Apocalypse and the “Book of Revelation”:
Biblical Ramifications of Gender, Sexuality and Dominance in Jose Rivera’s Marisol
The Bible is often looked to as a source of inspiration: for films (from Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat to Passion of the Christ), for musicals (Jesus Christ Superstar), and best-selling book series (the “Left Behind” series). Many of these pieces are culturally-known, often successful creations that take an idea held within the Bible and create a piece in line with its teachings. These pieces of art are often discussed, though whether or not these works of art are continuing the messages of morality and faith proposed is less often analyzed. Continue reading
You Call This A Doomsday Cult?
http://www.theonion.com/articles/you-call-this-a-doomsday-cult,10783/?ref=auto
This Onion Open-Ed references Jonestown and provides interesting commentary on cult patterns so I thought that I would share it with you all.
12/21/12 is Coming Up, And People Are Freaking Out.
Hey everybody, I came across this article in the New York Times yesterday, and thought it was worth sharing!
Observations on Zone One
What I immediately noticed about Colson Whitehead’s Zone One is his use of kairotic time similar to what we had read in “The Albertine Notes”. However, unlike “The Albertine Notes,” the use of kairotic time is easier to follow in Zone One. There is no concept of chronological time in “The Albertine Notes”; instead days are marked by events such as before Albertine or after the blast. In Zone One, events still play a big role in marking time, but there is still a sense of chronology. Whitehead emphasizes the before and after by adding a sense of nostalgia of New York pre-apocalypse.
A Different Kind of Zombie Apocalypse
Whitehead’s Zone One has many component that are common to post-apocalytpic zombie texts. Obviously, an important part to the text is the removal of zombies. Also the story is told with kairotic time and the world is trying to rebuild civilization despite an unstable central government. However, this book is not like most zombie novels, instead of gore and thrill, emotions and personality play a larger role. Continue reading
article on yours truly and my house in Rockaway
Hi everyone, this could be one of our course readings–
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/27/nyregion/house-featured-in-radio-days-survives-hurricane.html?hpw
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/25/opinion/sunday/is-this-the-end.html?src=me&ref=general
Zone One: All Places At Once
Reading Colson Whitehead’s Zone One, I was reminded most of one reading in particular – Rick Mood’s The Albertine Notes. As Colby mentions in her post, I too found myself getting lost amongst the time in Mark Spitz’s world because he so often slips from pre-Last Day to post-Last Day.
What stuck out to me the most was the relationship, if I can call it that, between Mark Spitz and the skels. On one hand, there was this desire to recognize their humanness, and in a sense it is completely unavoidable. There is the fact that he sees skels and automatically associates them with people he “knew;” his desire to leave “Ned the copy boy” alone; his noticing of thongs – all of these things show that, in this knew world ruled by military organization and tactical emotion-quelling, he struggles to reconcile the pre-Last Day with this “new” world.
I did also love the fact that Whitehead doesn’t allow for this novel to become a hack-‘n’-slash, Zombie-hating kind of story, which I feel it easily could have. He instead ties in elements, like Mark Spitz’s emotionalism, that allow for the reader to feel, and notice, moments of connect and disconnect. There is the fact that PTSD becomes PASD, and that all of the sweepers are heavily aware that their jobs are both allowing some closer and completely screwing up their psychological relations to the dead, the Apocalypse, and their place in this new world.
Lastly, the language in Whitehead’s book is so concise and crisp, which I think fits the processing one’s mind would go through in the new world. One would focus and process things in terms of essential-ness: “What is the essential knowledge about what I am doing? What memories? What thoughts?” in a way that one can easily be thrown off track, but also make associations. I found this interpretation (as someone who tends to dislike both violence and zombies in entertainment) much more rewarding than the more violent, kill-em-dead types of entertainment that often utilize military ethics, control, and violence in regards to zombies and the Apocalypse.
