Here are two video lessons for you, the first on Fran Peavey's "Us and Them" (2000), and the second on Leo Braudy's "Where Our Monsters Come From" (2016). Notice the publication dates here and how your own connections to either or both of these texts will bring us up to present day. Once you've decided on a prompt, watch the relevant video(s) closely in order to brainstorm your own approach for Project 3.

Also notice that "Us and Them," as I describe below, connects to the theme of our They Say/I Say textbook (enter the conversation, be open to the perspectives of others "at the party," and do your research to come to a solution rather than just trying to "win" the argument). To drive a change in beliefs, Peavey argues, we need to understand the root sources of prejudice (or "a story"). Doing this can help communication efforts that can shift how people think and act.

"Monsters" connects in interesting ways to the themes of shadow and light, hero and villain, protagonist and antagonist that we've been exploring all semester, as well as to the rhetoric of fear, and the concept of the collective shadow. Who is the "good guy," generally the main character who leads us to the goal of the story? Who is the "bad guy," generally a villain that serves as a foil to the protagonist in our tales? It also takes us "below the surface" (King, Chang) to investigate how fiction helps to represent and put a face to our anxieties. Can the stories we tell help us to understand our individual and collective shadows?

Enjoy!

Fran Peavey's "Us and Them" (2000)

Leo Braudy "Where Our Monsters Come From" (2016)