A Vocabulary (and History) Lesson

I teach college English--writing, mostly. Because it's college English, I almost never spend any direct instruction time on vocabulary. My students do develop their vocabulary in my classes, but mostly by doing a lot of reading and writing.

I do have one vocabulary lesson, however, which I will give if they ask and aren't satisfied with "read a lot; write a lot." It is this: learn affixes. Affixes are the bits we stick at the beginnings and ends of words to modify their meaning--in other words, prefixes and suffixes. If you learn affixes, your vocabulary increases logarithmically.

The word I most often use to illustrate affixes is "antidisestablismentarianism." Not only does it use a lot of affixes, it's also recognizable and generally regarded as a bit silly, which makes the lesson more memorable.

So I write the word on the board and ask my students to help me break it down. First, we identify the root ("establish") and note that it is a verb. Then we work our way outwards, identifying the affixes and their meanings, until they can successfully decode the word. I'll give you a moment now to try it yourself; the answer is after the break.

Image: A stack of LEGO blocks with the parts of the word
"antidisestablishmentarianism" written on them. CC0 Public Domain.

Politics and Moral Reasoning (An Argument for and against Myself)

I grew up in a deeply conservative household. Most of my family remains conservative or very conservative. I live in a very conservative state and work on a very conservative campus. Yet some years ago, during one of those wonderfully long conversations you have on road trips, my younger brother observed (in a bemused rather than a judgmental tone) that I was "kind of liberal." I laughed at the absurdity of it, because having just finished my first two years of graduate study, during which I had almost daily experienced direct or indirect disparagement of my conservative and especially my Christian values, I was keenly aware that by liberal standards, I was much more likely to be regarded as "kind of conservative." And so it remains.

It's true that I've moved to the middle, and am, at present, probably a bit left-of-center, whereas at the time of that conversation I was more right-of-center. I am, as my brother perceived before I did, "kind of liberal," and it turns out I kind of always have been. I did not experience my shift toward the political center as a shift away from my core values, but rather a more nuanced and self-determined understanding of their application in the world. What has most changed is that I no longer feel at home among conservatives; nor do I think I will ever really feel at home among liberals. Whereas the attacks on my perceived conservatism that I experience among liberals have been sly and insidious, the attacks on my perceived liberalism that I have experienced within my conservative community have been direct and vicious. As painful and exhausting as this frequently is for me, maybe this inability to belong, politically speaking, isn't entirely a bad thing.

This next paragraph is the only paragraph in which I'm going to mention the presidential candidates by name, and then I'm going to write instead about broader principles, because that's what I want to talk about right now--not which candidate was wronger, or more corrupt. I'm tired of that.

I've read a lot of statements this week to the effect that for democrats (or those who voted for Clinton, not all of whom are democrats), this election was about deeply moral issues, while for republicans, it was largely about the economy, or about preserving their way of life. Of course that's no more true than the inverse would be: that for republicans (or those who voted for Trump,not all of whom are republicans), this election was about deeply moral issues, while for those who voted for Clinton, it was about the economy, or about preserving their way of life. While it's probably true that for a lot of voters, this was about the economy, it's worth noting that regardless of their political ideology, most people believe economic issues are moral issues (and they are), and obviously, so is preserving a way of life. It may be true that some people did vote primarily out of self-interest, but I think that's as likely to be the case for liberals as for conservatives.

However, I've really only seen one side of this political divide argue that voting out of self-interest is at least potentially acceptable, and that's the liberal side. Liberals don't usually argue that they vote out of self-interest. Rather they complain that their political foes are voting against their own interests, and that they must really not understand the fact that they are doing so. The implicit argument is either that conservatives are inherently selfish, and/or that self-interest is a valid reason for political decision making. To the conservative mind it must follow that either liberals themselves vote not out of principle but out of self-interest, or that they regard conservatives with outright contempt.

Which is maybe why conservatives have scoffed at liberal moral outrage throughout this whole election cycle. And who can blame them? Liberals make regular sport of scoffing at conservatives' moral outrage, and justify it in turn because conservatives regard them as morally bankrupt. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

To be clear: I believe that liberals vote out of self-interest no more than conservatives do, but also no less (an assertion that is unlikely to win me friends on either side, so I'll just add that I include myself in this unflattering assessment). That is to say, of course people vote out of self-interest, whether consciously or unconsciously. But however rational a political argument from self-interest might be, or however necessary to healthy political life it might be that we analyze the ways that self-interest plays a role in political decision-making, as a persuasive tool for conservatives it is much worse than a non-starter.

Much has been written about the moral reasoning of liberals and conservatives. It is a truism that conservatives tend to think in terms of moral absolutes, whereas liberals tend to be more comfortable with casuistic moral reasoning. To the degree that such a generalization is accurate, it should be obvious why accusing conservatives of voting against their own interests is sheer folly, if it is not malice.

I remember an argument, many years ago, between a cousin and another one of my brothers. This cousin could not understand why, given that both my parents are disabled, and this brother is himself disabled, my family tends to vote for politicians who promise to cut medicare, medicaid, and social security. How could it be logically or morally consistent to vote against the very programs on which my family depends just to get by from day to day? But it is absolutely logically and morally consistent to vote against such programs, even if you benefit from them, if you believe (as conservatives do, with a great deal of political philosophy behind them) that they are beyond the proper purview of government. For conservatives, what matters is voting for what is good, not simply what is good for them. Liberal readers will be quick to point out that this is what matters to them as well, and they'd be telling the truth, too. But to liberals (at least to white, middle- and upper-class ones), it often seems that only they have the moral courage to knowingly vote against their own self-interest; they have so much privilege to lose, and they are eager to lose it. We all see through a glass, darkly. Sometimes the glass is so dark it's more of a mirror than a window on the world.

But if conservatives don't believe in casuistic moral reasoning, what right had my parents to take government handouts which they believe it has no right to give? Pretty much the same right that a liberal who votes for strong gun control would have to shoot someone in the face to save the lives of their children. Put in less visceral terms, even the most ardent conservative can't completely avoid casuistic moral reasoning (and I don't believe that, if pressed, many of them would argue that they should), but they prefer a more clear-cut moral consistency. They would prefer a world in which people are free to keep more of their hard-earned money and choose how to bestow it charitably, rather than have the government take it and decide who deserves to have it, and how much, and for how long.

Having been welfare recipients since almost my earliest memory, my family knows better than most how precarious welfare is to rely on, and how unhealthy dependency on it is. The prospects of homelessness and hunger are terrifying, especially when thinking of your children. If a government is in control of your rent and your bread, you are at serious risk of being enslaved by it. A great many conservatives will tell you that this is why a majority of low-income and people of color vote democrat; they even call it "welfare slavery." Of course private charity can be precarious too, can foster unhealthy dependency too. And contrary to conservative protestations, private charity has never in recorded history been adequate on a widespread scale, which is why we have a social safety net in the first place. But given how well-versed liberals are in critiquing the mechanisms of power, is it really so hard to understand that government welfare is a twice-over exercise of alarming force? Is it really so hard to understand why conservatives who rely on it for survival would still vote to abolish it, not out of ignorance or foolishness but as a matter of principle? Is that not exactly what liberals urge us to do by enacting policies that they argue are necessary to abolish systemic racism, sexism, etc.? Is it not more worthy of respect than ridicule? Alfred P. Doolittle was wrong, you see: you are never too poor to afford moral principles.

Ironically, liberal bewilderment at low- and middle-income conservatives "voting against their interests" also makes it hard for conservatives to take liberals seriously when they talk about "the Patriarchy." What is more patriarchal than the assumption that conservative voters do not really know what is good for them? What is more patriarchal than liberal policies which aim to expand dependence on government to provide for basic necessities, rather than affirming that responsibility to provide food, shelter, and health care belongs with individuals, families, and communities? How can it be morally and logically consistent to uphold the right of self-determination (which liberals seem to hold above almost all others) while denying that huge swaths of Americans are capable of exercising it responsibly on their own behalf?

Well, we liberals and "kind of liberals" would answer, it's also pretty hard to exercise self-determination when you're chronically sick and can't get health care; or when you don't have access to a shower and clean clothes and a car so that you can get and keep a job; or when you have to choose between being able to feed yourself and your kids or getting out of an abusive marriage. Expanding the social safety net isn't about expanding dependence on but about expanding access to welfare, with the goal of helping people get back on their feet as quickly as possible, which we assume is what everyone involved wants.

Except it isn't necessarily what everyone wants--and I don't mean the debunked and extremely demeaning conservative myth of welfare queens and the undeserving poor. I mean the principle which both liberals and conservatives believe in: that people with power want to hold onto it. And if you put the power to help people increasingly in the hands of government, it's not really in government's interests for people to stop needing their help. There's a lot more power in giving than in receiving.

Conservatives, for their part, keep voting in ways that put us all ever more at the mercy of the ultra-rich, who are no less likely to do everything in their already terrifyingly considerable power to hold onto it, who are not answerable to the electorate, and who keep on amassing to themselves a greater and greater share of our nation's wealth, which is our only means of "voting" against them by refusing to buy what they're selling. But since most of their wealth now is self-generating via financial market manipulation, and since government demonstrated after the crash of 2008 that it has no interest in curbing their power to continue manipulating said markets, we're all basically screwed anyway, and that, dear readers, is another thing that conservatives and liberals basically agree about. Alas, it's also one of the many things we seem incapable of agreeing about how to solve.

I've offered a handful of examples of liberals and conservatives arguing from principles (some of them the very same principles) to reach very different conclusions, both of which are (sometimes, sometimes not) based on facts as well as moral reasoning. I assure you, I could offer more, but a thorough enumeration isn't my goal. My goal was to prove to myself, if not to the few people who occasionally read my blog, that it really is possible to find common ground between liberals and conservatives, on principles if not on policies. That ground is where I try to live.

I don't offer any solutions. Perhaps I ought to try, but I don't know what they are, and right now I'm too tired from having to defend my moral principles and my political choices from every direction. A lot of people seem to think that being moderate (like voting third-party) is a cop out, the most morally inconsistent position of all. Maybe sometimes it is. But it's also really hard. It's lonely. At least in the trenches you have lots of comrades to guard your back. It's pretty exposed out here in no-man's-land, and this war doesn't seem close to a cease-fire anytime soon.

So I'll just end this post with a meme that's been making the rounds recently among both my liberal and my conservative social networks. I don't know where the image came from; I wasn't able to track it to its source, but if anyone can point me to it, I'd love to give proper credit.

The World Doesn't End This Week

Yesterday, we spent some time in each of my classes talking about voting rights in Idaho. My students were surprised and happy to learn that they can register to vote at the polls on the day of the election in Idaho.

Today, one of my students mentioned that she wanted to vote, but was nervous to go to the polls alone because she's never voted before. In fact for most of my students, this is the first time they have been eligible to vote--what an initiation! Although I voted early, weeks ago, I offered to go to the polls at 5 PM with this student, if she wanted moral support; she said she might. Then I extended the offer to any of my students. I offered to give them a ride, or to meet them there tonight.

When I arrived as the sun was going down and the temperature was dropping, I saw a line stretching out of city hall, down the sidewalk, and around the corner. It was growing by the minute as more young people arrived, having finished with classes and work for the day, eager to participate, many for the first time, in this great experiment called democracy.

My nervous student wasn't there; I hope she found another friend to go with her. I did see a few of my other students, and we waved at each other and chatted cheerfully for a few minutes as they waited patiently in line. One of my students told me she wasn't too nervous about the election, but mostly excited. She was happy to be exercising her civil rights and responsibilities. As we chatted, I overheard another student, not one of mine, say to his friends that even though he knows his vote won't make a difference here because Idaho's electoral votes are going to go to Trump anyway, there was no way he was going to miss the chance to participate in this election. He believes his vote matters, even if it doesn't ultimately change the outcome. Everywhere I looked, I saw the same passionate hope, and I felt so proud.

I see approximately eleventy-dozen headlines a year for articles about how Millennials are disengaged, ignorant, lazy, entitled, selfish, irresponsible, losers. It's infuriating, because as a college professor I work with Millennials every day. I have taught nearly a thousand students at four universities, in four different states. The young people I saw waiting in line to vote tonight are not exceptional, except to the degree that their entire generation is. They are enthusiastic. They are engaged. They are resilient. They are compassionate. They work hard, many working 20 or more hours per week while maintaining full-time enrollment and still having to take on debt to pay for their education. Some of them have been military veterans; others are preparing to serve in the armed forces. They are, on the whole, pragmatic yet still hopeful, even in the face of obstacles that would crush some previous generations.

That is why I am confident that regardless of the outcome of this election, this week is not the beginning of the end of the world or this country. We can keep on screwing up America for the next four years, even the next eight, and as long as we don't actually manage to burn it to the ground, America will eventually be OK. The future is, ultimately, in the hands of these Millennials, and that's a great thing.

UPDATE, written at about 2am. Shared on Facebook, want to share it here too.

I managed to tear myself away from poll-watching for a few hours, but had to check one more time before trying again to sleep. All evening I have been praying for grace. Grace in my heart, to not give in to anger and to have compassion for my political adversaries, some of whom I love as family. Grace for this nation, that we may survive the outcome of this election and recommit ourselves to liberty and justice for all. Grace for a world engulfed in uncertainty, violence, and oppression, but searching for light and mercy, that God's light and mercy will shine brighter than the darkness through each of us.

America, I'm not breaking up with you, but I'm really terribly disappointed, not just in your choices tonight but in the past 16 months. We have to do better.

To all my friends who feel unsafe and alienated tonight because of the policies Trump has proposed, I love you. You are not alone and all is not lost. I will stand up for you, for liberty, and for justice.

To all my friends who voted 3rd party: this election was insanely close, and a lot of people are going to blame you for the outcome, and maybe you will second-guess yourselves, but I don't. You faced a difficult choice and followed your conscience. I wish the race had gone differently. I wish McMullin had won Utah. I wish your wish for real change had worked. Keep fighting for what you believe. We need idealists as well as pragmatists.

To all my friends who voted for Trump: I'm upset, but I'm not going to blame you. I am going to call on you now to be better than your candidate. You say you voted not for racism, misogyny, fearmongering, ableism, and authoritarianism, but rather for SCOTUS judges who will uphold the constitution, to protect religious freedom, to increase economic security, and to protect us from extremism. Now you must prove that you really believe it by pressing congress to prevent your guy from carrying out his worst campaign promises.

To the rest of the free world, on behalf of my country, I'm sorry. We let you down. I hope there are enough of us sickened by this election that we will do better next time. I believe there will be a next time.

Now the words of St. Francis' prayer comes to mind: Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love. Where there is injury, pardon. Where there is darkness, light. Where there is sadness, joy! Oh divine Master, grant that I may not seek to be consoled but to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive, and it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.

National Day on Writing

My photo of an ASU student. CC-BY 2.0

The National Council of Teachers of English created the National Day on Writing, "on the premise that writing is critical to literacy but needs greater attention and celebration." NDOW is celebrated yearly, on October 20th, and while I was serving as an assistant director of ASU Writing Programs, I had the privilege of organizing last year's celebration on the Tempe campus. Along with several colleagues, we planned to have members of our campus community share their responses to #WhyIWrite both on social media and on colorful origami squares. Over 200 people created squares for our quilts on October 20, 2015.

Photo by Bruce Matsunaga for ASU Department of English. CC-BY 2.0

The day's activities were cut short by rain, and we had to wait for the paper to dry out before our project's next phase. On October 31st, as Professors Shirley Rose and Maureen Daly Goggin chaired the annual Feminisms and Rhetorics conference on our campus, we began assembling these origami squares into "paper quilts," which we put on display near our Writing Programs offices.

My photo. CC-BY 2.0

As I sorted through these squares, selecting which ones to place in each quilt, I was profoundly moved again and again by the variety, thoughtfulness, and intimacy of responses. Many students wrote about using writing to learn, or to satisfy teacher expectations. But many more participants wrote about writing for self-expression, keeping in touch with loved ones, and preserving stories and traditions.

When I invited one university employee to share a reason why he writes, he regretfully told me that he doesn't really write--he is an accountant and only writes expense reports for his job. Well, that is writing! I told him. That kind of writing, which often doesn't get recognized as writing, is just as important as the kinds of writing we more readily recognize. I was grateful that he chose to make a square for our quilt.

Photo by Bruce Matsunaga for ASU Department of English. CC-BY 2.0

I was surprised by how many participants shared that writing helps them maintain their mental health. Sometimes, students wrote about how they use writing to create a better future for themselves and for others. A student who wrote "I write because 62 million girls don't have that chance" provided a sobering reminder that writing is a gift and a privilege not shared by everyone. That is why I am so proud to participate in the National Day on Writing. Through this celebration, we bring visibility to the importance of literacy and writing for everyone, regardless of their background, current circumstances, or plans for the future.

This cause is close to my heart. I invite you to celebrate National Day on Writing with me by sharing your responses to the theme of #WhyIWrite in the comments below and all over social media today.

Photo by Bruce Matsunaga for ASU Department of English. CC-BY 2.0 

My photo of Susan. Do not share without permission.

Not Live Blogging General Conference

Image: "Salt Lake Temple in Autumn" by Sascha Wenninger, (CC BY-SA 2.0)

I didn't live blog the Women's Session of conference last weekend, because I was watching it at my sister-in-law's stake center, along with my two other sisters-in-law and all my nieces but the youngest. It was a precious experience.

I fully intended to live blog my way though this conference weekend, as I have for the past few years. But my efforts to do so have been frustrated. I'm in the process of buying a house in Rexburg, and just renting a room meanwhile. Most of my stuff, including my desktop PC, is still in storage. And it turns out I can't use YouTube to cast a live stream from either my phone or my laptop to my TV. Thus, in order to watch conference on my TV, I had to plug my laptop in via an HDMI cable, which means I couldn't use it to type. So I had to choose between watching conference and not blogging, or listening to conference and blogging. After wasting too much of the Saturday morning session and the hours between it and the afternoon session struggling to get my tech to work the way I want it to, I reluctantly decided it's better to watch conference than to live blog it.

Not being able to blog during conference led me to ponder on the value of having done so. Blogging has been my way of note-taking. It's both easier for me than hand-writing notes, and also more communal. I love being able to share my thoughts on conference with the handful of folks who read my blog. Thinking about those people, and not just myself, altered the way I paid attention to conference. I don't know that the alteration was better, though it certainly wasn't worse. I have found it refreshing, though. And I've also really enjoyed the conversations that occasionally arise either in the comments here on my blog, or else on Facebook and elsewhere that I publish the blog.

This weekend I've been having a lot of fibromyalgia-related pain in my hands, possibly due to the rapid and frequent changes in the weather recently. Gripping a pen for long enough to take notes was decidedly unpleasant. So I didn't take any notes during conference sessions, and that made it harder for me to stay awake and attentive. I ended up doing some cleaning yesterday, and practiced tying a new bow-tie this morning (fortunately I made a passable bow by the time my hands hurt too much to continue). I'm doubly grateful for conference talk summaries, as well as the ability to watch and read conference talks at a later time, because I definitely don't remember any of the talks as well as I usually do.

Here, though, are some of the things that do stand out in my memory:

President Uchtdorf's "Fourth Floor, Last Door" talk during the Women's Session last weekend was wonderful. I appreciate his urging of us to press forward in following our spiritual promptings and gospel callings, even to the "fourth floor, last door." I guessed who the young woman was behind that last door, who pleaded with her mother to let the missionaries share their message, before he revealed that it was his beloved wife Harriet Uchtdorf. I did not learn until later that evening that one of the elders who came to her door to share the gospel is my great-uncle, Richard Kowallis.

President Uchtdorf's Saturday morning message also resonated with me. It was a great reminder of the plan of salvation, which is truly a plan of happiness. In that vein, too, was President Nelson's talk on joy and spiritual survival. I was glad that President Nelson taught plainly that we can have joy even in the midst of great hardship and suffering, without once suggesting that those who suffer from depression and anxiety are in any sense lacking in faith or righteousness. Joy is really a gift.

Elder Cook's talk in the Saturday afternoon session was direct, uncompromising, but also uplifting. I appreciated his stern yet loving reminder of the many different kinds of stumbling blocks we may encounter on our spiritual journey. I will certainly return to his message to ponder which stumbling blocks I am most prone to stubbing my toes on.

I confess that by the time Elder Christofferson stood at the podium, I had lost my battle with drowsiness. From the summary, though, I think I must place this one high on my list of talks to listen to soon (and Elder Yamashita's from this session as well). It is vital that we understand the nature of God's love, and I think Elder Christofferson is right that the adjective "unconditional" can be misleading. God's love is infinite, everlasting, and perfect. It is never in short supply, and will always be far more than sufficient for our needs. But we cannot abide in it unless we choose to do so, and in that sense (and only that sense) it is conditionally available to us.

Sister Reeves gave a great discourse on the power of repentance in the Sunday morning session, and I'll have to revisit that one too, because most of my thoughts on it were quickly diverted by Elder Ballard's talk, in which he spoke to those members of the church who are struggling with doubts. Quoting the apostle Peter, Elder Ballard asked, "to whom shall [you] go?" Now, when he said that, I stiffened in alarm--not so much for myself (though I've wrestled with many a troubling bit of doctrine or history) but for my friends whose faith crises or faith transitions have been acute and exacerbated by accusatory rhetoric from members of their own congregations and yes, not infrequently also by conference talks which could have been formulated with greater care. To my delighted surprise, Elder Ballard went on to specifically call out such lack of support from the membership to those whose journey along the path of discipleship has been arrested for one reason or another. It seems to me that he and many of his fellow general authorities have been doing something to listen to those members of the church who are struggling--I mean really listen to them! And to respond to their concerns more positively. In my experience, few of those I know in that situation are there because of unrighteousness or rebelliousness. They do not need admonition but nurture in truth and love--and patience! They need to have patience with human leaders and members, with ambiguous doctrine and troublesome history. And they need to receive patience from those who do not understand why they are troubled by things that so many members don't give a second thought to. Elder Robbins' talk built on a similar principle.

I loved Bishop Davies' and President Eyring's sermons on the joys of worship and Sabbath observance. Basically the whole Sunday morning session was full of Win.

I had to laugh when Elder Bednar made his list first thing in the Sunday afternoon session. I wanted to jump online and ask somebody to check if he's ever given a talk as a GA (or for that matter, when he was president of Ricks/BYU-I) that didn't include a list. I guess in that instance it was a good thing that I didn't have ready access to social media! It was, of course, a great talk on coming to know the Lord.

Then there's Elder Schmutz's talk. I believe this will go down in the annals of conference as one of the great ones, along side most of Elder Holland's sermons. I think it might be my favorite of this conference (though I still need to go back and watch/read the ones I missed due to tech or sleepiness problems). Elder Schmutz taught that while suffering is an unavoidable part of mortality, there is nothing inherently ennobling or sanctifying about it. Rather, suffering becomes ennobling and sanctifying when we consecrate our sorrows to Christ. Then, through the atonement, our suffering becomes transformative, and we can receive comfort and a greater measure of compassion, even in the midst of our afflictions. It really bothers me when people glorify suffering for its own sake. I have seen, in my own life and in the lives of those I know, that suffering can as easily be demeaning and destructive as it can be ennobling and sanctifying. It really is compassion--the pure love of Christ--that makes the difference.

By the time the next General Conference rolls around in April, I should be settled into a new home of my own, with plenty of space for my meager stuff, plus shenanigans. Today a friend on Facebook posted a photo of her and her daughter inside a "Conference fort." I don't have any kids as an excuse to build a Conference fort, but I think I'm just going to do it anyway. Because awesomeness is its own excuse.

Here We Have Idaho

At the beginning of August, I moved back to Rexburg, in the Snake River Valley of Idaho, the land of my maternal roots. My family moved from the Salt Lake area to Idaho Falls when I was 16; I stayed here in southeast Idaho until I was 28, when I moved to Pullman, Washington to begin graduate study. From there I moved first to Saint George, Utah, and then to Mesa, Arizona for a PhD at Arizona State. If all goes as planned, I will soon buy a home here in Rexburg, effectively planting myself for the long term.

Photo: Idaho border signage. CC BY-SA 2.0

I loved living in the Phoenix metro area. I loved all the wonderful friends I made there, the amazing range of culinary options at both restaurants and grocery stores, the plentiful opportunities to enjoy the visual and performing arts, and the great roads (even with the not-so-great drivers). But I am really enjoying the beautiful clear skies (especially at night when I can see so many more stars), the cooler weather, the open fields and greener hills, and the total lack of anything that can reasonably be called traffic (local opinions notwithstanding). A friend recently asked me how big Rexburg is, so I did a bit of research and found the results rather amusing.

• The state of Idaho is home to 1.6 million people; that's about half as many people as live in the Phoenix Metro area, where I just moved from. 
• Rexburg has a population of roughly 30,000 people. This is about 20,000 fewer people than the student population of Arizona State University's Tempe campus, where I just spent the last five years as a student and faculty member. 
• Idaho Falls, where I spent my teens and early adulthood, is about the same size as ASU Tempe. 
• In the Winter 2015 semester (what would be called Spring semester at other schools), BYU-Idaho had a total on-campus enrollment of nearly 17,000 students--for comparison, my former employer, ASU Writing Programs, served over 11,000 students in Fall 2014. 
• Bonus climate comparison: The hottest day on record in Rexburg was 102 degrees, in June 1988. That's considered pleasant spring weather in Mesa, where 120+ degree temperatures are not uncommon throughout the summer, and summer nights rarely dip below 80--which is a normal high temperature for Rexburg summers. Winters are another story. Come January or February, I will probably have to endure more than one -20 day. 

Although I will miss the rich cultural affordances of living in a major metro area, I am still a small-town girl, and I relish the thought of teaching at a smaller university. Although I will miss Arizona's mild winters, I am enjoying being able to spend summer afternoons outside again. Above all, I'm enjoying being closer to my family.

Photo: Me with several nieces and nephews at Pineview Reservoir last week, taken by Jared Robinson.
Please do not use without permission.

Review: Ghostbusters (2016) and Ghostbusters (1984)

I went to see Ghostbusters (2016) on opening weekend, mostly because it's the first movie of the summer that I was really excited about this year, but also partly to spite certain factions of the internet who have tried to pre-emptively tank the movie by spiking reviews without even having seen the movie.

I was too young to see the original Ghostbusters (1984) when it first came out in theaters, but I did watch it and Ghostbusters II (1989) around the time the latter was released, and those two films (plus the cartoons) sparked a significant interest in the paranormal among my circle of friends for a time. We got up to some silly stuff, and to this day I'm not entirely sure how much of it we believed and how much we knew was just pretend--it's funny how the childhood imagination works that way.

My point is that Ghostbusters was a big part of my childhood. I'm really fond of this franchise; it's partly why I was so excited (and a little bit nervous) for the reboot. And it's a big part of why I was so pleased with the 2016 film. It was just really fun. I deliberately did not rewatch the original film before going to see the new one. But in the past few days, I decided I'd like to see how the 1984 film, which I hadn't seen in several years, stacks up to the new one, so tonight I popped in my old Ghostbusters DVD and wrote up a review.

Image: Ghostbusters logo stencilled on a car door.

CC0 Public domain. Free for public use. No attribution required.

To start with, here's the short review I posted on Facebook the night I saw Ghostbusters (2016): 

I really liked it! It hit all the right notes, and though the tune was familiar, it's an old favorite. I felt like it did a great job of winking at the original films without feeling beholden to them. The cameos were marvelous. The main characters were likable and at times lovable. The new gadgets were awesome. 

There were things about Ghostbusters (2016) that I did not like, but they were minor: some crude humor, Leslie Jones's character is still pretty much a token.[1] These minor criticisms are pretty much the same ones I have about the originals (though in the case of Jones's character, the fact that more than 30 years have passed make this criticism significantly less forgivable, and I really hope they fix this for the sequel).

Wondering if you should go see it? Here's my advice:

• If you liked the original Ghostbusters and are not opposed to a remake on principle, you will very probably like this movie.

• If you like sci-fi/action/comedy movies, you will very probably like this movie.

• If you like summer blockbuster movies, you will probably like this movie.

• If you are an academic, you will like at least parts of this movie, if not the whole thing.

• If you are a butthurt dudebro, you are the villain of the story, both in real life and in the narrative, and you will definitely not like this movie.

• If you like poetic justice served meta, with a dash of ectoplasm, you will DEFINITELY like this movie.

Now that I've rewatched the 1984 film here's my comparative review:

Ghostbusters (1984) is still a good movie. The special effects have held up well, it's got some great sight gags and set pieces, and the character actors all do a stand-up job. The soundtrack is awesome. It's still fun to watch!

But you know what? With the exception of that soundtrack, Ghostbusters (2016) is a better film. I would even say a much better film. The comedy is better. The science is better. The action is better. The characterization is better. I'm not saying the reboot is a great movie. Just that it's a good movie, and a better one than the original.

Humor is highly contextual, so it's possible that some of the jokes from 1984 have just dated poorly. The 2016 reboot does a great job of poking fun of a lot of contemporary issues; I laughed most of the way through the movie. I was a little kid when I first saw the original films, and I'm sure a lot of their contemporary humor flew over my head even at the time. Slapstick humor is more ageless, and both the original and the reboot make good use of it. Slimer and ectoplasm, pratfalls, "scares" that are not especially scary--I laughed harder at these jokes in the reboot, but it cashes in on callbacks to the original, so it's not a fair comparison. We'll call it a draw. Jokes that rely on social faux pas have never been my preferred flavor of comedy, but I recognize their role within the genre. In the 1984 film, that kind of social humor routinely punches down. In the 2016 film, the punches are aimed upward, or at least on a level, which is not only funnier but also more responsible.

Not at all surprisingly, the 2016 film's special effects and battles are more exciting. Again, I'm willing to charitably attribute this in part to technical advances over the past 30 years. But only in part. Sometimes, bigger effects and more extensively choreographed fights come at the expense of character and plot; in the reboot, the opposite occurs. The fancy new gadgets and more elaborate battles reveal aspects of the characters and advance the plot.

I also found the new Ghostbusters more personally relatable, possibly because the main characters are women and I'm a woman, but I think there's more to it than that. First of all, all four of the 2016 leads are much better developed than those in the 1984 film, which mostly focuses on Venkman, who is actually a deeply repugnant character (more on that in a minute). All the 2016 leads are given backstories and character arcs. The amount of time spent on each of them is also more equal. Ghostbusters (2016) is truly a buddy movie.

More so than because of my gender, I believe I found the new team relatable (and the old team comparatively unrelatable) because I am now an academic myself. I aspired to academia from a very young age, but I had only the vaguest notion what it was like--one friend's dad was a professor of archaeology, another was a rocket scientist, but my most vivid notions still came from the media. Both the 1984 and the 2016 teams are made up of three academics and one everyman character. But with the exception of Egon and Stanz's characters, I don't recognize my professional world at all in the 1984 film. The 2016 film's depiction of academia and academics had me and my fellow academic friends in stitches. It was absolutely on point.

I admit that "relatability" is highly subjective, and I don't pretend to be unbiased. But even if the 2016 film's increased relatability is at least in part because I share a gender with the leads, that's a really good argument for more films with primarily-women casts. I lived 37 years enjoying hundreds of SF/action/comedy movies starring men. I've identified with male heroes in the movies and TV shows I watch and the books I read for 37 years--much more so, often, than I did with the women in those same stories (who typically didn't do much and were most often written by men, I must add). And it's a real shame that I had so few opportunities to identify so strongly with women heroes in the genres I love best. It's perhaps an even bigger shame that men of my generation had so few opportunities to identify at all with women characters. 

As much as I still love my male-led genre classics, the 2016 Ghostbusters was special for me because I didn't have to put as much effort into identifying with the heroes. Now, I think making an effort to identify with people who are different than you is really important, but so is seeing yourself reflected in your heroes. I want the rising generation of girls and boys to grow up with plenty of opportunities to identify with and admire both men and women heroes.[2] I don't want the box office to be dominated by female-led films the way it has historically been dominated by male-led films (though I'm totally up for more gender-flipped remakes; it's a really interesting creative exercise and frankly, shaking things up creatively in a major way is pretty much the only good reason to do a remake). I would like something much nearer to parity. Contrary to the popular narrative, women have always been a large and essential part of SF fandom. There is an audience for women-led genre films like this, and Hollywood has begun to realize it. The butthurt dudebros are going to lose the culture war, but only because they can't abide sharing any toys at all. (If you are a guy who is not opposed to seeing more women leads and women in general in your media, you are not a butthurt dudebro, and you have nothing to worry about.)

The question of relatability isn't simply one of gender or professional identity. As I wrote before, Peter Venkman is a surprisingly repugnant and unredeemed character for a heroic lead in an '80s film (antiheroes are more common nowadays). In contrast, all of the 2016 reboot's leads are likable as well as heroic. It wouldn't be fair to compare Venkman to four awesome women, and I don't have time to line up the other three counterparts, so let's stick with one whose narrative arc is most similar to Venkman's (though it is, as you'll see, a very superficial similarity): Dr. Erin Gilbert.[3]

SPOILERS AHEAD.

Dr. Erin Gilbert (Kristin Wiig):

• Appears to be a brilliant and conscientious physicist
• Is first seen nervously preparing to give a lecture; the equations on her white board are apparently legit awesome science (plus some nifty Easter eggs)
• Craves acceptance and prestige from those she perceives as her peers (this gets her into trouble)
• Through backstory we learn that she set aside her interest in studying the paranormal in order to be seen as credible in the eyes of her colleagues; in doing so, abandoned a research partner and childhood friend (but believed that she was doing Abby no professional harm)
• Is denied tenure and fired for having written a book on the paranormal prior to her career in academia (likewise, their unconventional research subject causes Abby Yates and Jillian Holtzmann to lose their institutional support, such as it was)
• When she realizes the pain she caused her friend, Erin is remorseful and works to repair the relationship, both personally and professionally
• Awkwardly tries to hit on Kevin the airheaded blonde secretary; is totally ignored by him, still likes and looks out for him. Though she continues to admire his appearance (something he seems accustomed to and comfortable with), she does not press her advances
• With one notable lapse back into her selfish need for personal validation[4], works together with Abby, Erin, and Patty in a true partnership to do Awesome Paranormal Science and save the city from ghosts
• As a reward for saving the city, Dr. Gilbert and her team ask for and get a firehouse and other resources to continue their work of doing awesome science and protecting the city. That's it. There's no romance. No fame. Just awesome women supporting each other and doing awesome chaotic-good science because awesomeness is its own reward

Dr. Peter Venkman (Bill Murray):

• Has two PhDs, in psychology and parapsychology
• Is first seen unethically tampering with his own research project, deliberately causing pain and humiliation to a male research subject and ignoring the very results he is supposedly looking for, in order to hit on a hot blonde female research subject
• Peppers his colleagues (and pretty much everyone else he doesn't want to bang) with sarcasm and put-downs
• Gaslights a woman librarian about having seen a ghost (sees the ghost himself shortly thereafter and flips out)[4]
• Loses his team's funding and evicted from their research lab not because of their unconventional research subject but because Venkman is legitimately a terrible researcher who until now doesn't even believe in his own work. He deserves to be fired, and he takes his colleagues (who apparently do care about and are good at research) down with him
• Immediately tries to drum up the team's morale by talking about how they don't need academic support anymore because they can provide a very expensive service that will soon be in high demand. (Throughout the film he is consistently motivated by self-interest)
• Creepily hits on a client, and persists in his pursuit of her even after having been rebuffed multiple times and even though he acknowledges that his behavior is creepy[5]
• Continues to be an arrogant a-hole throughout the entire film. His knee-jerk antagonism of an EPA agent who was actually doing his job (and whose own contempt is at least partly a reaction to Venkman's bad behavior) leads to the shutdown of the team's ghost containment unit, which puts the entire city in Armageddon-level danger. Projects responsibility for this onto the EPA guy; is never called out on it in any way
• Is portrayed as the hero of the film; the others are basically his vastly more competent sidekicks
• As a reward for saving the city, gets fame, glory, and the girl

If "relatability" is an important part of what makes a movie enjoyable, then I guess I can understand why butthurt dudebros cling to the original Ghostbusters with such extreme fervor: like them, Venkman is an entitled a-hole loser. And for this, he gets everything they fantasize about--a fantasy the realization of which is becoming increasingly scarce both in the media and in real life (thank goodness)! For me, and for a lot of guys I know, Venkman was always alienating; I identified with Egon, and I'm happy to say I still identify with Egon because Egon is awesome. But Erin Gilbert, Abby Yates, Jillian Holtzmann, and Patty Tolan are all my kind of heroes--heroes I can not only relate to but also genuinely admire, even with their faults.

The aforementioned butthurt dudebros were afraid that the reboot would ruin their memories of a beloved film from their childhoods. Perhaps they were right to fear that. If Ghostbusters (2016) had been an inferior film, Ghostbusters (1984) would have remained untarnished. By not only being a better movie on its own merits, but also one which both affectionately and critically talks back to its predecessor, Ghostbusters (2016) has indeed diminished my enjoyment of the original. I didn't expect that, but in retrospect, I think it's a good thing.

[1] Jones' acting and comedic timing were great; she's often the best part of any scene she's in. What I mean by saying that her character was a "token" is that she is the only POC among the main cast--and there are precious few POC in the film at all. Seriously, scroll through the full cast list on IMDB. SO MANY white faces. And this is NYC! Seriously! I will say that although both Patty in the 2016 film and Winston in the 1984 original were the "blue-collar" members of team, Patty at least had a greatly expanded role, and she wasn't just world-wise. She had studied the weird and creepy history of the city in her spare time, and her self-education contributed vitally to the team's success. Though she lacks their credentials, Patty is Erin, Abby, and Jillian's intellectual peer.

[2] Shout-out here to Rey from Star Wars: The Force Awakens. I wish she were there for 7-year-old me; I'm proud she's there for my nieces and nephews, who all love her and identify with her.

[3] A note on names: whether we refer to someone by their first or last name indicates a degree of familiarity or formality. First name typically is less formal and more familiar. Last name is more formal and less familiar. The tendency to use only last names in professional contexts has also faded over time; it's much more common now to call colleagues by their first names even in professional contexts and especially when those colleagues are equals and friends. Although they're both doctors, in his films Peter Venkman is typically called by his last name, and in her film, Erin Gilbert is most often called by her first name (as far as I can recall anyway). But I would argue that this isn't a gendered slight; it's actually a reflection of how relationships are constructed within the films. I take the liberty of following the films' own name-use conventions.

[4] In a key bit of backstory from the 2016 film, we learn that Erin was gaslighted about her own paranormal experiences as a child. This is definitely not a narrative accident. It's subtly lampshaded by Bill Murray's cameo as a paranormal debunker who goads Erin into releasing a trapped ghost. This leads directly to his character falling out a window and probably dying (it's not explicitly shown). What a beautiful piece of intertextual comeuppance!

[5] To his credit, Venkman refrains--not without a struggle--from taking advantage of Dana while she's possessed by Gozer and extra-highly sexualized. But it's worth noting that later Gozer-Dana does get it on with her extremely dweebish (and likewise then-possessed) neighbor, whose advances she has previously rebuffed. And Venkman does still win her in the end. The sexual politics here are truly appalling, though not extraordinary for the time.