Your thesis is the most important part of your paper. It gives your paper structure. Determining what the thesis of your analysis paper is will help you determine what details from the piece you should include in your paper and which ones to exclude. I had you guys answer several questions about the movies you are thinking of analyzing.
- What are the larger issues or topics your piece talks about? For Carrie this would include bullying, religion, abuse, sexuality, high school, etc. Then I asked you to ask what you feel the piece says about those topics? For Carrie I could say that the piece talks about how bullying can turn people into monsters or that sexuality especially in women is a bad thing. These would be potential theses for an analysis of Carrie.
- Next I asked you to consider the type of conflict you have. There are 5 archetypal conflicts that are usually present in most stories. Man vs Man, Man vs Self, Man vs Nature, Man vs Technology, Man vs Society. Determine which of the conflicts you have. Then think about who wins the conflict and why, what does that say about that thing? For instance, nature wins in Titanic, why? Because humans underestimated it. They thought they built something indestructible but nothing is indestructible. Or in Carrie we have man vs man and everyone loses, why? Maybe because everyone who refuses to stand up to bullying is just as complicit as the bullies and so everyone suffers in the end.
- Next think about how the societal descriptors like race, class, gender, sexuality for the characters in your movie and how they may affect your character and the piece. In Carrie, Carrie's religious background and her gender has an effect on the piece. A potential theme could be how these things affect her.
- How does the history surrounding the piece affect your interpretation of it? What real life events might the piece be influenced by? The feminist movement was hitting it's stride in the 70s when Carrie was released, and so it is pretty significant that de Palma made a movie with a mostly-female cast where just about every woman is crazy.
- Know your director. Know who they are and know some of their other work. Sometimes a good way to find a theme is to spot the reoccurring images or themes throughout their body of work. If nothing else, this information can provide you with good background info that you can use to support whatever your thesis is.
Song Analysis
We analyzed a few songs together. We looked at how the lyrics, the music, the time period the song was written, the background of the artist, etc all can be used to help us determine the meaning of the song. The two things I want you to keep in mind as you choose your own songs is the fact that a set of lyrics can mean different things to different people depending on who's listening and to pick songs where some of the lyrics are up for interpretation.
Blurred Lines
Extra Credit: Blurred Lines by Robin Thicke is a song that faced a lot of criticism after it's release. People accused the song of being misogynistic, promoting rape culture, and disregarding a woman's right to consent. My challenge to you is to defend this song by coming up with a positive interpretation of the song. After all, lots of people like it, so there must be something positive in it. Briefly right up how you interpret the message and defend your interpretation with lyrics and other elements from the song. If it is useful, you can also use the video, but remember your main point is to defend the song.
Homework
We analyzed a few songs together. We looked at how the lyrics, the music, the time period the song was written, the background of the artist, etc all can be used to help us determine the meaning of the song. The two things I want you to keep in mind as you choose your own songs is the fact that a set of lyrics can mean different things to different people depending on who's listening and to pick songs where some of the lyrics are up for interpretation.
Blurred Lines
Extra Credit: Blurred Lines by Robin Thicke is a song that faced a lot of criticism after it's release. People accused the song of being misogynistic, promoting rape culture, and disregarding a woman's right to consent. My challenge to you is to defend this song by coming up with a positive interpretation of the song. After all, lots of people like it, so there must be something positive in it. Briefly right up how you interpret the message and defend your interpretation with lyrics and other elements from the song. If it is useful, you can also use the video, but remember your main point is to defend the song.
Homework
- Outline for Movie and Song of your choice. 2 separate outlines Check out the Sample Analysis Outline underneath Class Documents and there is also a Blank Analysis Outline in case you lose or mess up the one you received in class. Due Fri 10/21 in class
- Read Sonny's Blues,The All-Girl Football Team and Virgins -PLEASE GIVE YOURSELF TIME TO COMPLETE ALL THE READING (underneath Class Documents) Due Fri 10/21 in class
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