Cambridge Deems Twilight Worthy of Analysis

[Crystal Cuckoo]

While at first I cursed at the idea of studying Twilight, I realised that I have only a year of school left, and I'm guaranteed to not study it this year.

And maybe, just maybe, the "in-depth" text analysis will make all the 14 year old twilight fangirls hate the book just as much as I do.

 

[j0frenzy]

Could most of you please read more than the headline. They are studying its impact on popular culture. They aren't analyzing it as good literature, they are analyzing why it is popular. And I fully support the idea of trying to study cultural trends. It is interesting to me.

 

[Therumancer]

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding the article, but I think a lot of people here have the wrong impression.

What it is, is the educational establishment looking to see (yet again) if they can harness youth pop culture as an educational and conditioning tool. It's not so much about Twilight, or any other piece of fiction, it's about whatever is popular at the time. It's NOT a new idea, and like always it's going to fail.

The reasons it's pointless is because by the time the educational system can analyze and work with anything that's pop culture, the fad is probably going to be overwith. What's more youth counter-culture is such that as soon as authority figures embrace it, half the point goes away and they cease to care. What's more, they want to similar things and try and present them in a 'critical, and ethical way' which of course is pretty much going to miss the point because the 'negative' aspects in an educator's mind are what attract rebellious youth. This is the same exact mentality that has spawned all those retarded "rock against drugs" productions, and people rapping about positive things and staying in school. The point being missed is that punk rock for example is popular because it's anti-societal, anti-authority, etc... it's less about the music itself, than the appeal of the message. That is why you can't get a real 'educational' message though. The most you can do is set yourself (and anyone else unfortunate enough to be involved) for massive mockery by the group your trying to deal with.

Even worse of course is when they try and analyze video games. Some decades out of touch geezer who has forgotten what it was to be young in any real sense, decides that since kids like these increasingly mainstream video games, that an educational game can be created that they will play. Throw in some antiseptic explosions, aliens, and sound effects, and the kids will forget they are doing math problems. Sadly all that does is create another boring math problem and waste a bunch of money and time on all sides. The idea has been around since like the Apple 2, and I'm amazed Edutainment software hasn't been given a bullet in the head. Really, the only game that went anywhere was "Oregon Trail" and that mostly for the lulz factor as much as anything, and the fact that the educational content was fairly minimal. I can remember a few others like Dark Castle (which was okay, but more of a simple adventure game than anything educational), and "In Search Of The Most Amazing Thing" (which was an exercise in self validation). I suppose Carmen Sandiago is the biggest winner overall coming a generation or two later, but mostly that winds up teaching you how to use a referance book.

At any rate I find it somewhat funny to see them trying to analyze Twilight, given the massive panic "Fear Street" generated during it's heyday.

I also admit I see a slow motion train wreck developing... here is a question, how do you think they are going to take a piece of pop-literature like Twilight (with all the redeeming quality of Toxic Waste) and mangle it into education?

Are we going to get some pretty boy vampire who pops out of lockers and says "stay in school or I won't be able to make out with you behind the bleachers"? Some Mary Sue vampire interest who tells kids to stay off drugs so it won't interfere with the orgasmic pleasure of simply being around a walking cadaver? How do we work mathematics, social studies, science, or pretty much anything else into this subject?

What's more even with the reintepetation of Vampires, you still basically have a group of dead people who run around slurping blood to preserve their own lives. Even if non lethal it's pretty gross. What's more, I still can't get my head around why in some of these books you have these centuries old vampires attending a high school anyway. I don't know how old Edward is supposed to be in Twilight, but I know the protaganist is pretty ancient in some other works. What is the ethical message here? If you look young enough, your real age doesn't matter when your cruising for jailbait?

We here on The Escapist should compile a "list" of all the absurd ways this could turn out... because honestly all I can think of is an increasingly absurd collection of things. Largely inspired by some of the other stuff they have tried to convert.

 

[tthor]

you can't be all That surprised. its like the psychologists doing an indepth study of a criminally insane patient.

 

[thebobmaster_v1legacy]

I read the first Twilight book. That book is in the land of "Not bad enough to be good, but not bad enough to be bad".

Also, you want a fantasy author so badly to analyze? Pick Eoin Colfer. Hey, may not be deep, but the Artemis Fowl books make damn good reading.

 

[Therumancer]

I'd be shocked, but when I worked at the University of Wollongong, I attended a two day seminar event in which researchers discussed their findings on the impact of Hello Kitty and anime and manga on females and fan consumers. Two of them even discussed the yaoi phenomenon, pointing out how Australian laws made it near impossible to research the topic (in the past, imported yaoi comics had to be destroyed because the suits were afraid they were pedophilic).

Truthfully I can see how they got that impression with Yaoi. Though to be honest you can see the same thing with pretty much any style of Japanese eroticism, it seems a little more common there, and less likely to try and say "well she's actually 18 she just looks 11" in the text somewhere, other than as a stock disclaimer. This gets into another discussion all together though.

My feelings aside, Australia does need to chill out with the censorship. I find it ironic that Australia went from being portrayed as the free land of nude/topless beaches, and kinky television (I remember American News Magazine shows talking about how Austrlia apparently once had an ongoing TV series all about exploring kinky sex even if it wasn't outright pornographic), to what seems to be a police state of internet firewalls, video game bans, etc... I really have to wonder what happend to you guys because either there was always a lot of bad information with you guys being really prudish, or there must have been some major incidents we're not hearing that shook the entire country because guys like Michael Atkinson have apparently been in power for a while and are just now flexing their muscles.

As far as Hello Kitty goes... well, all I can say is that from what I've read about it's history it started ironically as a sort of signature/mark for porcelin products that took off, and branched into other things, unintentionally becoming the kind of enduring icon that countless people have tried to create and failed. I suspect it's success was largely because it wasn't intentional.

 

[DanDeFool]

If what we regard as trash is popular with young people, we need to know why ...

Wasn't there an article on the escapist a while ago that actually determined why twilight was popular? I'm pretty sure it was because it had the "Unpopular, tragic, misfit girl gets the dream-boy, becomes immortal, is desired by pretty much everybody and ends up being the hero" plot.

What bothers me, is you've pretty much summarized the plot of a lot of Anime titles I've seen (and in most of them you have to transpose boy and girl in your description). Though I regard most of that stuff as crap too, so I guess it isn't as serious an indictment of the genre as one might suppose.

And yeah, that was pretty much what the article said. It also said how tragic it was that Twilight has become the major entry in the subgenre of nerd-chick fantasy because of how crap it was, and that now people aren't going to take nerd-chick fantasy seriously anymore.

 

[kawaiiamethist]

I'd be shocked, but when I worked at the University of Wollongong, I attended a two day seminar event in which researchers discussed their findings on the impact of Hello Kitty and anime and manga on females and fan consumers. Two of them even discussed the yaoi phenomenon, pointing out how Australian laws made it near impossible to research the topic (in the past, imported yaoi comics had to be destroyed because the suits were afraid they were pedophilic).

Truthfully I can see how they got that impression with Yaoi. Though to be honest you can see the same thing with pretty much any style of Japanese eroticism, it seems a little more common there, and less likely to try and say "well she's actually 18 she just looks 11" in the text somewhere, other than as a stock disclaimer. This gets into another discussion all together though.

My feelings aside, Australia does need to chill out with the censorship. I find it ironic that Australia went from being portrayed as the free land of nude/topless beaches, and kinky television (I remember American News Magazine shows talking about how Austrlia apparently once had an ongoing TV series all about exploring kinky sex even if it wasn't outright pornographic), to what seems to be a police state of internet firewalls, video game bans, etc... I really have to wonder what happend to you guys because either there was always a lot of bad information with you guys being really prudish, or there must have been some major incidents we're not hearing that shook the entire country because guys like Michael Atkinson have apparently been in power for a while and are just now flexing their muscles.

As far as Hello Kitty goes... well, all I can say is that from what I've read about it's history it started ironically as a sort of signature/mark for porcelin products that took off, and branched into other things, unintentionally becoming the kind of enduring icon that countless people have tried to create and failed. I suspect it's success was largely because it wasn't intentional.

The people of Australia aren't prudish, so much as our government are oversensitive big brothers. EB Games are currently getting customers to fill out a form to send to our big bros, to let them know we're mature enough to handle a little sex and gore.

I don't recall the specifics of the law, so don't quote me, but at the seminar, a major issue faced for academics and female fans of yaoi, is that in Australia the law states that sexual materials involving under 16s and those who LOOK under 16, are illegal. This is especially bad for yaoi fans, with many characters easily looking under 16, even if they are 20. While no Australian yaoi reader (or artist, or fan writer) has been charged under this law, the fact stands that they can be.

Those two days truly amazed me, it was odd for an anime fangirl to be sitting among important acaedmics who were actually interested in researching that area of pop culture. Faculties across the globe were actually funding this!

 

[snide_cake]

It's a good book to read so you get an idea of how NOT to write a book.

It's also got a lot of Mormon references and you can probably make connections with it toward films such as Dances with Wolves and The Jungle Book and Edward Scissorhands, with indigenous/different people being treated poorly by others (ie. the 'vampires' treat the 'werewolves' in a belittling fashion in Twilight).

But it's a real stretch, and I doubt Meyer even intended for it to be like that.

I just threw up a bit in my mouth at the thought of all those kids being forced to read or watch Twilight now. As if we haven't got enough literacy issues with the kids at the moment...

 

[DanDeFool]

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding the article, but I think a lot of people here have the wrong impression.

Spoiler

What it is, is the educational establishment looking to see (yet again) if they can harness youth pop culture as an educational and conditioning tool. It's not so much about Twilight, or any other piece of fiction, it's about whatever is popular at the time. It's NOT a new idea, and like always it's going to fail.

The reasons it's pointless is because by the time the educational system can analyze and work with anything that's pop culture, the fad is probably going to be overwith. What's more youth counter-culture is such that as soon as authority figures embrace it, half the point goes away and they cease to care. What's more, they want to similar things and try and present them in a 'critical, and ethical way' which of course is pretty much going to miss the point because the 'negative' aspects in an educator's mind are what attract rebellious youth. This is the same exact mentality that has spawned all those retarded "rock against drugs" productions, and people rapping about positive things and staying in school. The point being missed is that punk rock for example is popular because it's anti-societal, anti-authority, etc... it's less about the music itself, than the appeal of the message. That is why you can't get a real 'educational' message though. The most you can do is set yourself (and anyone else unfortunate enough to be involved) for massive mockery by the group your trying to deal with.

Even worse of course is when they try and analyze video games. Some decades out of touch geezer who has forgotten what it was to be young in any real sense, decides that since kids like these increasingly mainstream video games, that an educational game can be created that they will play. Throw in some antiseptic explosions, aliens, and sound effects, and the kids will forget they are doing math problems. Sadly all that does is create another boring math problem and waste a bunch of money and time on all sides. The idea has been around since like the Apple 2, and I'm amazed Edutainment software hasn't been given a bullet in the head. Really, the only game that went anywhere was "Oregon Trail" and that mostly for the lulz factor as much as anything, and the fact that the educational content was fairly minimal. I can remember a few others like Dark Castle (which was okay, but more of a simple adventure game than anything educational), and "In Search Of The Most Amazing Thing" (which was an exercise in self validation). I suppose Carmen Sandiago is the biggest winner overall coming a generation or two later, but mostly that winds up teaching you how to use a referance book.

At any rate I find it somewhat funny to see them trying to analyze Twilight, given the massive panic "Fear Street" generated during it's heyday.

I also admit I see a slow motion train wreck developing... here is a question, how do you think they are going to take a piece of pop-literature like Twilight (with all the redeeming quality of Toxic Waste) and mangle it into education?

Are we going to get some pretty boy vampire who pops out of lockers and says "stay in school or I won't be able to make out with you behind the bleachers"? Some Mary Sue vampire interest who tells kids to stay off drugs so it won't interfere with the orgasmic pleasure of simply being around a walking cadaver? How do we work mathematics, social studies, science, or pretty much anything else into this subject?

What's more even with the reintepetation of Vampires, you still basically have a group of dead people who run around slurping blood to preserve their own lives. Even if non lethal it's pretty gross. What's more, I still can't get my head around why in some of these books you have these centuries old vampires attending a high school anyway. I don't know how old Edward is supposed to be in Twilight, but I know the protaganist is pretty ancient in some other works. What is the ethical message here? If you look young enough, your real age doesn't matter when your cruising for jailbait?

We here on The Escapist should compile a "list" of all the absurd ways this could turn out... because honestly all I can think of is an increasingly absurd collection of things. Largely inspired by some of the other stuff they have tried to convert.

Spoiler'd the text wall, but pretty much this.

They should just e-mail this to whoever's in charge of this Cambridge study with a note saying, "Hey idiots! Some jerk on the Internet already figured this out! Go back to scrabbling around in Shakespeare's mausoleum and jerking off to Upton Sinclair's gruesome depictions of human misery, you ivy-league, elitist, academia-tards!"

Just to clairfy, not being sarcastic here. Between that article The Escapist published on Twilight's popularity earlier on and the comments we're getting on this thread, I'd say we've already got this down to a science.

And if my interjections about "scrabbling around" and "jerking off" seem crass to you, let me just say that I HATE literary education in America. All my four years of high-school English really did was make me very depressed to be a middle-class white male. Seriously, between The Grapes of Wrath, Beloved, The Jungle, and Mc Teague, I pretty much lost any pride I ever could have had in my race/gender/social class.

Edit: And Twilight will probably only make it worse. My advice? Have your kids read The Lord of the Rings instead. Or if you insist on doing Vampires, have them read Interview With the Vampire. Perhaps not an excellent book, but certainly better than Twilight.

And don't get me started on The Jungle. Yes, it was an important book and pretty much led to the founding of the FDA. Well done. But making teenagers read that stuff is a good way to A) Turn people off to literature for the rest of their natural lives, and B) make a bunch of kids lose all faith in humanity and start cutting themselves.

 

[Zaydin]

So... a poorly written self-insertion fan fic is suddenly worth literary merit? The only good thing Twilight has managed to to boost hte sales of real good books mentioned in the series. If someone wants to read Twilight, fine. But it's not a good book by any stretch of the imagination. If Stephen King says SMeyer is a poor author, I'd listen.

 

[LloydEsaka]

Know what, they put Star Wars in the curriculum somewhere and I'll say this is alright (the whole shebang. Movies, books, games, and pen and paper RPG)

 

[Snotnarok]

The fans of Twilight might be worthy of analysis.

I had to, I hate the series and the berserk fans that have attacked people. Not to mention the girls who meet the actors and ask them to drink their blood.

 

[Revolutionary]

Well im gonna go shoot myself, see you later.

 

[Brad Shepard]

Mass Effect and Final Fantasy have a massive effect on me, but i dident see my teacher breaking out the ps2 or the 360.

Fucking A, i cant stand Twilight! i just want to punch somthing in the neck right now!

(My hate for Twilight and all things that killed vampires and good books runs deep)

 

[Brad Shepard]

I'd be shocked, but when I worked at the University of Wollongong, I attended a two day seminar event in which researchers discussed their findings on the impact of Hello Kitty and anime and manga on females and fan consumers. Two of them even discussed the yaoi phenomenon, pointing out how Australian laws made it near impossible to research the topic (in the past, imported yaoi comics had to be destroyed because the suits were afraid they were pedophilic).

sorry, this is going to bother me if i dont ask, how do they feel about Pedo Bear?

 

[Chewster]

Studying something in academia doesn't mean that people are trying to legitimize it as literature or high art or whatever. Everyone here seems to think that these guys are attempting to shoehorn it into school curriculum everywhere, when it seems they just want to understand the appeal, which had nothing to do with them.

This series of books, whether we like it or not, has had an impact on the world. Of course it is worthy of analysis. Understanding why is important if we are to ever offer better alternatives that are accessible to younger generations. It as much as says such in the fucking article, but since Twilight is the "Literary Scapegoat of the Week", we get a slew of ZOMGWTF posts that contribute nothing.

And to those who did get it but still this this will fail, I would argue that there are potential common threads that one can eventually tease out of various generations of popular culture. Just because they are studying the popularity of one particular artifact, doesn't mean that they hope to harness it's appeal in its entirety or that they study this piece, alone and in a vacuum. This is one part of a larger whole. And it is not a matter of control but of understanding and you cannot understand a subset of society by ignoring its popular culture as the impact it has had. This is what academic research does.

That's not to say I think Twilight is quality, but we all know it sucks people, and frankly, picking on it is sort of like picking on the special ed kids. Sure you can do it, but it's easy and there are better things you could do with your time.

 

[Reep]

Oh God, oh Dear God, nooo, NOOOOOO

 

[minarri]

I think a lot of you are misunderstanding this issue: I'm pretty sure that at this point it's just professors and whatnot examining the widespread appeal rather than the cultural impact of these media. Not necessarily "hey let's replace Hard Times with Twilight" or anything.

I'm all for examining things for what they are.


People study everything. No need for an uproar.

 

[Grand_Arcana]

At first I was fuming with rage, but now that I've read the whole post I'm more at ease. I hope that they do not succumb to the delusion that it's actually good storytelling. Instead, they're probably going to try and figure the psychology of the book. In other words, why it is so popular, what sort of people would like it, and what it's creation and popularity means for the author and her fans.

Now that I think of it Twilight could be the next Catcher in the Rye from a cultural standpoint. Neither books were astounding displays of storytelling, but they do endear themselves to a certain type of person (I could definitely hang with Holden, but I don't always agree with him.) They also have characters who are emotionally and psychologically immature, and by the end both of them fail to mature (Bella "runs away" from her family, friends, and human contact. Holden has an anxiety attack when faced with having to grow up.)