Week 7/8 P.K. Dick

What is the difference in emphasis between the terms science fiction and speculative fiction? Which is The Man in the High Castle?

Speculative fiction and science fiction are interrelated and at times indistinguishable. According to Atwood’s 2010 work, it makes sense to view speculative fiction as an umbrella genre; the mothership from which sci-fi, fantasy, horror and weird fiction and others are beamed. Whether art is imitating life or vice versa, Dick creates works of fiction that fundamentally echo the paranoia and doubt that pervaded his imagination.

 P.K. Dick’s The Man in the High Castle is undoubtedly a work of speculative fiction. The operative word here is ‘speculative.’ Any work that uses speculation as a narrative device, (outcomes in reality that may have happened, discoveries that were never discovered) is an example of speculative fiction. The Man in the High Castle does just that. Dick’s preoccupation with metaphysics and alternate realities provide a dark and twisting plot in a dystopian parallel universe where Japan won World War Two.

From personal experience, those who constantly speculate are either gossiping or paranoid. By utilising his own doubts in perceived reality, Dick writes with an obsessive style. The suspicion and doubt in the character’s lives provides the I Ching as an effective literary device.  This symbol of synchronicity and Orientalism is produced to link characters dependent on chance together. As a result, the protagonists in The Man in the High Castle magnify the sense of speculation and uncertainty in the novel.

WEEK 5/6 ANIME

Week Six

According to Lent (2000), what place does animation occupy in Asian societies? How different is this across Asia (ie comparing China and Japan)? 

Animation is at the epicentre of Asian popular culture. It was inspired in the first instance however, by cartoons of the West i.e. Disney, Felix the Cat etc. According to Lent (2000), as animation gained notoriety in Asia, less imitation of western cartoons occurred, replacing a Disney-esque style with a distinct animation variety of their own. What has resulted is an idiosyncratic way of animating that incorporates, rather, embodies the customs and culture that they illustrate. 

Asian animation has become a societal cycle: Reality influences animation, which influences manga, which influences reality and so on and so forth. On a large scale, we can apply this theory to Asia as a continent, but looking closer we notice the slight but distinctive differences in anime style between countries:

Culturally, animation embraced local narratives throughout Asia; including folklore, fairy tales and fantasy. Technically as well, the style of animation developed to shape itself around native artistic techniques. In Japan, animation displayed evidence of origami; China exhibited ink and wash and paper-cutting.

In an attempt to identify the societal place of animation in Asia we can see already that before subject matter, animation had taken on a life of its own, in a new form: anime.

For the Japanese, anime began as a subculture that morphed into the mainstream. Anime presented itself as a porthole to an alternate universe; ethical messages thinly veiled by epic adventures. We can see this in Miyazaki’s Princess Monnonoke, her quest to save her town and the Forest Spirit a metaphor for Japan’s expansionist reputation and alleged disregard for the environment. Ultimately, anime provides a distraction from reality by establishing an alternate reality. 

Unlike western animation, Asian anime is void of much of the cloying sweetness and light made famous by Walt Disney’s “Golden Years” productions. Instead, the anime industry has been wrought with international attacks on the explicit sexuality and graphic violence portrayed in some films.

In contrast, Chinese anime has taken on a more bureaucratic role. Anime evolved while under the autocratic rule of Chairman Mao. Unable to slow the momentum of anime’s success, Mao ruled that the only animation produced was to “educational, technically sound using characters with human traits, and varied in subject matter expressing a national character and the originality of Chinese culture.” From a stifled start, Chinese animation has grown in its role; today animated police officers on MDF signs line the streets of Beijing telling pedestrians to stop littering and use the assigned street crossings.

Animation in Asia has diversified popular culture by bringing an alternate reality by evolving from a sub-genre and reclassifying itself as the alternate reality it animates. Globally, the industry is thriving and Westerners are watching with increasing interest. Regionally, anime continues to grow according to its of country of origin; the anime snowball amassing with every film, manga and computer game. 

WEEK 3/4 Fantasy

Week Four

How does Attebery (1980) define Fantasy? Find at least five definitions.

-       W.R. Irwin defines fantasy as: “an overt violation of what is generally accepted as possibility… whatever the material, extravagant or seemingly commonplace, a narrative is a fantasy if it presents the persuasive establishment and development of an impossibility…”

    Irwin, W.R. (1976) The game of the impossible: A rhetoric of fantasy. University of Illinois Press: Illinois.

-       “Fantasy, then, presupposes a reality which it goes on to contradict.” 

   – Attebury, B. (1980) The fantasy tradition in American literature: From Irving to Le Guin. Indiana University Press: Bloomington.

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   E.M. Forster speaks of the reader of fantasy having to ‘pay something extra.’ To go against traditional conventions and subscribe to an unlikely narrative. 

   Forster, E.M. (1927) Aspects of the novel. Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc: New York.

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    Manlove insists that all fantasy must create wonder in the reader, ultimately suggesting that all fantasy be good fantasy. Manlove, C.N. (1975). Modern fantasies: Five studies. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.

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  “Any narrative which includes as part of its make up some violation of what the author clearly believes to be natural law- That is fantasy.” – Attebury, B.

From these definitions cited by Attebury (1980) we build up a complex characterisation of the fantasy genre. My understanding of fantasy is a boiled down combination of the above. For a work to come under the fantasy umbrella, the reader must be willing to subscribe to an impossible narrative that presents itself in an alternate reality; all the while retaining some characteristics of plausible fiction to hold the reader’s attention.

Le Guin achieves this by illustrating an alternate universe that ethically resembles our own. Ged presents himself as a relatable example of the human condition: impulsive, bold and arrogant. He grows to overcome his deficiencies and matures into a powerful wizard. We can draw parallels from his character into our own lives by recognising Ged’s flaws as our own. The relatable narrative despite logical implausibility makes Earthsea an excellent example of the fantasy genre. It strikes me as odd that any work of fiction as morally sound and clear in its intentions could ever be interpreted as ‘satanic.’

Week 1/2 Comics

How and why are comics becoming more accepted as an art form? Can/should they be regarded as a literary genre?

The humble comic found its origins in Egyptian hieroglyphics and Greek antiquity (Trajan’s Column). Since its glory days they have been relegated to the lowest shelf of Pantry of Culture. 

Until now.

The comic is making a resurgence! Like Lazarus from the grave, comics are making their way back from subculture death and into the mainstream. But the Comic Renaissance requires further examination: Is the comic finally achieving ‘art form’ status? And furthermore; what has changed for the comic to be endorsed as a literary genre?

The juxtaposition of images and words has been championed by some as an invaluable tool in developing literacy. Eastman of teachcomics.org proposes intertextuality as the next frontier in education. By teaching a person to read with sequential images and accompanying text, they are associating words with actions and pictures and eventually recognising the words in and out of context.

Comics boast pithy dialogues, beloved characters and a fan base beyond Harry Potter’s wildest dreams. A anthropological snapshop in every frame. What’s not to love? But does having a fan base allow a genre firmly planted underfoot to climb the ladder?

Cronin (melodramatically) recalls a 1998 exhibition shown at UNB Art Centre, an exposé on the unknown genii of comic art. As a childhood comic fanatic, Cronin relives the experience in enlarged form, comic strips blown up on jib panels and muses on the unknown artist in light of the successes of American pop art legends like Roy Lichtenstein.  

Lichtenstein focused on the detail of the comic, screen printing some of the 20^th century’s most recognised modern art.

If the elemental comic can be universally celebrated in works of art (the most obvious example being Lichtenstein’s), can one argue that its complete counterpart is artistically flawed? I propose that it is not the content but the manner in which the content is created that exclude the comic from the realm of ‘High Culture.’

Two dimensional art has reached an apex in the noughties with Takashi Murakami’s Versailles exhibition at the peak. The comic style had officially re-emerged in the mainstream with cartoon illustrations adorning Louis Vuitton handbag and Kanye West albums. They came to life in movie format with Sin City, the Marvel Series and Suckerpunch. And yet the comic remains largely disregarded as an art form.  Why? It comes down to Romanticism. 

Western society associates art as a time honoured tradition only mastered by the greats. The art world is in bubble of its own, shrouded by exclusivity and millionaires. For as long as there is an Armageddon Expo, the comic will not be an art form. 

DISCLAIMER: Pulled all my posts down to edit them after we were given the extension. Didn't notice the edit button. Yikes!

Week 12: Reality TV

Hill Defines, or rather, doesn't.

If there’s one thing to take away from Hill’s chapter on the reality genre, it’s that there is no clear cut definition; rather a whole plethora of contrasting views on what defines reality TV. The problem, it seems, is that “reality TV” is very much a blanket term. It consists of several subgenres which sometimes crossover into sub subgenres. To quote Hill (2005) “For some scholars, even the subgenres within reality TV are the result of a complex borrowing from other television genres.” And again; “Scholars of popular factual television can be in danger of genre overload when defining the reality genre. It’s all too easy to stray into the outter limits.”

Hill makes reference to Corner (2000) who looks at the different phases the genre has gone through, and I feel as though this is the closest we can get to a breakdown and subsequent definition. Corner’s Phase One includes shows about the emergency services such as police, medical workers. This would include shows like Cops or Children’s Hospital.The second phase deals more with “docu-soap” type shows, which combines elements of documentary with the drama of the soap opera. This includes shows like The Hills or Jersey Shore. The last phase Corner calls “docushow” and takes the documentary format and mixes it with lifestyle type programmes. This is where we end up with things like Jaime’s Kitchen or Grand Designs. The only thing we’re missing here is the talent/game show format of Survivor, Idol  or Big Brother, which marries the gameshow format with the reality genre. At a glance, these are the four essential subgenres of reality TV. Of course, as mentioned earlier, they crossover frequently and aren’t bound to remain inside their category. For example, Big Brother is a gameshow that also incorporates elements of the docu-soap. More frequently, docushows involve a competition, borrowed from the gameshow format (The Block, Masterchef). It’s no wonder then that a thorough definition of reality TV is much more difficult to concieve than it seems.

Hill goes on to say that there is, in fact, one defining characteristic of this genre. This is “the capacity to let viewers see for themselves.” This alludes to the fact that despite presenting it’s content as reality, the shows are still comissioned by a studio, many have writers, and they are in fact, still in the realm of the “fictional text.” Viewers see for themselves in the sense that they will be the ultimate judge of whether or not what they are seeing is truly real. Hill makes reference to Roscoe & Hight’s work Faking It (2001) where the authors state that all reality TV shows exist somewhere on a fact-fiction continuum, consisting of different amounts of each. Viewers then decide for themselves where their individual niche along this continuum will be. 



Hill, A. (2005) The reality genre. In A. Hill, Reality TV: Audiences and Popular Factual Television. (pp. 14 – 40). Oxon: Routledge.

Week 11/12: Reality TV

'Oh my goodness, The Hills was scripted? No way!' This actually appeared on my home page of some of the social networking sites I use by friends I honestly thought would know better.

The Hills, just like hundreds of other so called 'Reality TV' shows are spoon fed to viewers in a manipulative so that they believe what they are seeing is a genuine situation. If we're being honest, if these shows were truly 'Reality' all we would see would be a bunch of people not dissimilar to ourselves going about boring everyday activities and chances are, we wouldn't tune back in next week. 

However, this genre takes many previously unconventional things, mixes them together and produces something which over time has developed a cult following.

As Hill (2005) said first off you need a handful of random people or 'untrained actors', unscripted dialogue, surveillance footage, hand held cameras and usually some pressurized situations. All of this makes for good reality TV, dependant on your definition of good. It is also relatively low cost compared to the production of say, a sitcom, because it lacks the professionals that would be required in that situation.

From the reality TV genre has come many spinoffs including the DocuSoap eg. Airport, the Gameshow eg. Survivor and many others attracting fans who religiously tune in every week. The purpose of these shows is largely entertainment but occasionally are commissioned and used for education purposes.

As entertaining as Reality TV shows are, you'd be a bit silly to believe they are really 'reality'. The characters in these shows are put in situations which cause tension and lead to situations where fighting and other generally entertaining things occur to serve the audience.

Week 11/12 Reality Television

What signifiers of reality have emerged from the documentary genre?

The documentary genre in relation to reality is revealed through capturing the actuality and truth of the lives of ordinary people in an everyday situation. This reality in documentaries “becomes measured through the subject matter being reconstructed and that realism depends on notions of suffering, raw experience and personal struggle as emblems of the real.” (Hill, 2005) It is, in other words, another way to represent the social world and its values of “embracing flaws in a spontaneous style of filming.” Filming in documentaries show the ‘ground-breaking’ turn in ordinary people’s lives and therefore has a sense of accessibility and intimacy for the audience viewing like that in reality tv. “We shoot everything with one camera. You as the viewer., become one camera.” (Hill, 2005)

Hill, A. (2005) The reality genre. In A. Hill, Reality TV: Audiences and Popular Factual Television. (pp. 14 – 40). Oxon: Routledge.

How has the documentary genre influenced reality TV and how it presents the ‘real’?

The rise of reality TV came at a time when networks were looking for a quick fix solution to economic problems within the cultural industries. Its increased costs in the production of drama, sitcom and comedy ensured unscripted, popular factual programming became a viable economic option during the 1990’s. The deregulation and marketisation of media industries, especially in America also contributed to the rise of reality TV.

The documentary genre influenced reality television  in a positive way, as it revolutionised television. Themes of documentaray genre have been attributed to reality TV by creating drama spontaneously with static camera having its major role in capturing the unscripted drama that unfolds. Reality TV has adapted the documentary’s presentation of objective facts that shows political, social and historical issues. Moreover, reality TV has adapted the hand held cameras, with voice over narration and close ups that zooms and captures raw emotions. Every documentary has to have a story that is based on the good guys, the bad guys and the struggle and reality TV implies that indirectly.

Furthermore, unprofessional actors are recruited to demonstrate the ‘real’. Also, these unprofressional actors viewers can famillarise with more o than huge A-list celebrities. These differentiate from the fictional characters as being untrue and it shows the audiences that it is ‘real’. Moreover, the influence of the documentary to a reality TV is the theme of awareness and it is as real as it appears, or it happens as you watch it.The audiences were then left to believe that some scripted reality TV is real, and now the viewers are bewildered as to what to believe. Such likes are ‘Big Brother”.