Stretch Activity #2: The Movie Monitor

The new movie Deadpool is controversial for many reasons.  It features an anti-hero who is very violent but lovable.  Parents have been taking their young children to see it despite the production company's very public warnings about its content. It is also another movie for Marvel, a company dominating the field of action hero movies, but that doesn't seem to like movies with leading ladies.  Since I was unfamiliar with the comic and the character, but I am a fan of most Marvel movies, I decided to go see it this weekend to observe how people react to the movie and if, really, people were taking their small children to this R rated movie.

As I entered the theater, I looked around at the seats.  My husband and I got there about 30 minutes before the movie started, and sat near the front at the aisle so I could see everyone walk in.  Most people were in their late 20s to early 30s; I saw one double date that may have contained college-aged youth.  As this was the fifth or sixth week of the movie, there were maybe only 25 people in the theater on this Friday night.

The movie started in a unique way; the directors and producers showed the audience various zoomed in perspectives of a still shot; as the 3-D picture rotated, the audience got a different perspective of the action.  While this went on, the usual names of important people popped up, except they had been given allegorical names like "guy with British accent" and "hot looking ninja woman."  The entire picture was quickly in view, and the audience could see that Deadpool was trying to even the score.  I thought to myself that maybe this movie wasn't so bad.

However, the movie quickly escalated.  After setting the scene Deadpool gets his revenge by chopping off body parts nonchalantly; I had to turn my head in disgust but those in front of me looked head-on at the carnage.  No one verbalized much reaction; I heard a few mumbles of reaction that were more surprise than disgust.  Although there wasn't a lot of blood or gore, just the sheer rate at which he chopped off body parts with his sword, or maimed a driver with a cigarette lighter, was unfathomable.

I thought this scene would set the tone for the rest of the movie.  Using swords to chop body parts and kill "bad" guys wasn't so bad.  Deadpool gets reprimanded by the X-Men, who come to haul him away for his ruthless killings; Deadpool cuts his own hand off to get free.  Deadpool had upped the ante.

Further into the plot the audience learns of Deadpool's history; he apparently was diagnosed with cancer and was offered experimental treatment by an anonymous suit.  He signs up for the treatment in hopes that he can return to his simple life with his love, in their tiny apartment in which a gratuitous sex scene montage shows the span of their relationship over several holidays.

The experimental treatment of Deadpool was the most uncomfortable for me; the audience quickly became silent as Deadpool was tortured in what wasn't a treatment facility, but a private science lab run under suspicious circumstances.  The torture scenes were very real as he was stored in an ice chest, electrocuted, and whipped; these were scenes I only peeked at, hoping they would end.  Very few of the audience members seemed disturbed by this long series of scenes.  Throughout the scenes though, Deadpool's twisted sarcasm and sense of humor permeated.

By the end of the movie, Deadpool is reunited with his love interest and exacts revenge on his torturer.  His love interest accepts his scars and they live "happily ever after."  Deadpool even alludes to a sequel as he talks directly to the audience often.  As the lights were on, a few people walked out seeming to have enjoyed the movie.  Around half stayed to watch the full ending for clues about a sequel.  Just as I got up to walk out, a family with a boy of around eleven left the theater; a child was, after all, viewing the movie... the urban legend had been a reality.

Reflection on Stretch #1

My first venture into qualitative research involved interviewing someone on Google Hangout. I had many fears about this technique, but I had even more fears about the person I interviewed, and the type of questions I asked.


My major fear with Google hangout as an interview was interference. I anticipated interference from my children, or interference from barking pets. I also worried about a lag in the video. Both these things could affect my ability to accurately record body language or words. Luckily, neither of these impacted my study, but technological glitches did wreak havoc on recording the video.

I was most uncomfortable with the person I interviewed. I had set up to interview the college's new advising coordinator so that I could learn more about what she plans to implement regarding advising. However, her child was sick and so my colleague and fellow English Instructor, Ms. L., filled in. We are friends on social media, and when my original interviewee cancelled I asked a few friends to help out; she was the first to volunteer.

Ms. L is a mother figure at work; she is a very gentle soul who always does what is best for her students. We frequently attend meetings together, and often I am in charge of implementing unfriendly initiatives. I did not have time to really think about how our working relationship might impact the interview. When I asked her the question "what do you dislike about your job," she mentioned meetings. I instantly tensed up, knowing that a most recent meeting I led was met with very unfriendly faces. I hoped that it didn't show on my face, but I don't know that it didn't. She further explained why she didn't like them, and as such I tried to be sure to remain neutral and use very welcoming body language. I didn't want to influence her answers.

I learned a valuable lesson about qualitative research: be prepared to be uncomfortable. Sometimes, you will not hear what you want to hear, or what you enjoy. Your goal must be to record the person's message, and remaining welcoming to that message. Otherwise, you will taint your data and even damage your study. Worse than that, you could make that person lose all sense of self.

This meshes with what Robert K. Yin (2013) says about case study. Yin, in his book on case study research methods, urges that case study seems easier, but in fact, the intimate contact with humans makes it more difficult, and thus more imperative that researchers take it seriously.

References

Yin, R. K. (2013). Case study research: Design and methods. Sage publications.

What Researchers Do

Stretch #1: Interview Using Google Hangouts

Qualitatively Liberal Arts

    I have, since my entry into the public school system at age four, been a liberal arts girl.  I'd swap any math problem for a glimpse at a good book, or paper and pencil to write something inspiring.  However, the liberal arts require an immense amount of critical thinking, and what most in the general public fail to realize is the liberals arts are threatened by tight budgets and big business despite their ability to craft critical thinking skills in its participants.

   Part of being a liberal arts girl is that I like thinking about things.  I enjoy solving problems efficiently and effectively; sometimes I secretly solve problems no one knows exists, or no one cares about.  I often lack any ability to read research without thinking of five billion questions that I still have, or three million ways I would have researched the topic differently.  Perhaps my upbringing on a farm nurtured my critical thinking skills, but perhaps I was, too, born a liberal arts girl.  Either way, I love dissecting the written word, and I love finding the perfect word to write. This is why my colleagues are always baffled at how much I enjoy, understand, and absorb all types of research.
 
     While I do not fear crunching numbers, my true passion is interpreting them.  The numbers are merely the secret code to a larger story.  I was drawn to literature as a major because literature contains all the great stories, and those stories are equal opportunity stories (says Carl Jung's theory on the collective unconsciousness). And human stories (as opposed to particle stories, or rock stories) are the most fascinating of all the stories in this realm.

     As I experienced the epiphany of doctoral work and its relationship to career advancement, I never imagined I would persevere in a doctorate program with a strong research component like an educational doctorate.  My plan was, always, to pursue my Ph.D. in World Literature or Gender Study or Poetry.  However, I could not deny the power in research, and in order to exact change in education - and let the liberal arts lovers continue to have liberal arts available - I needed a program strong in research pedagogy.

     I do have a research background; part of my master's thesis involved the use of reader response theory and cloze sentences as therapy for adolescent male sex offenders with emotional disabilities in a language arts classroom.  However, that experience was not without its challenges.  First and foremost, my thesis chair could not understand using this theory in partnership with special education theory; her Ph.D. in Rhetoric afforded her no frame of reference for educational pedagogy in special education.  Although I loved the research, working with the students in their small focus groups, and collaborating with the therapist on poetry, I was disappointed in the dismissal of educational pedagogy as valuable.  I did finally get my thesis approved, but only through the insistence of my education professor.  This made me hesitant to do any more research.

     I fear the research process because it is only as useful as those who read and can understand it.  I fear that my ideas are only as relevant as the words I choose to write about them, making the liberal arts so essential in the space of education. The most challenging part of my doctoral experience is the inability of others in higher education to see that the lines between disciplines are merely suggestions; research from multiple perspectives and theories can exact change.   While I know that boundaries are necessary, they should not be permanent.  Higher education faculty should realize the freedom in reevaluating the boundaries; it is in these uncomfortable spaces that we can find what we didn't know we were looking for.