The Clare Spark Blog

March 16, 2012

Index to blogs on popular tv shows

Filed under: Uncategorized — clarelspark @ 7:00 pm
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Dick Wolf and Judith Light

I haven’t commented on all the crime shows. It is enough to say that we are to believe that good cops will eventually triumph over bad cops, and that most criminals are tracked down and punished. I.e., the State is looking out for you and me, with all the tools that modern science (including profiling) can muster. Law and Order: Criminal Intent (not analyzed here) adds a flourish: the Vincent D’Onofrio character is often dissatisfied with normal procedures, co-opts Freud, and seemingly obeys a higher (more compassionate) law.

https://clarespark.com/2009/10/15/the-christianization-of-ziva-david-ncis/

https://clarespark.com/2009/10/02/roman-polanski-and-his-critics/

https://clarespark.com/2010/05/20/criminal-minds-and-the-pathology-of-rural-america/

https://clarespark.com/2010/10/24/mad-men-and-the-jewish-problem/

https://clarespark.com/2010/12/12/hbo%e2%80%99s-in-treatment-and-boardwalk-empire/

https://clarespark.com/2011/04/27/james-m-cains-gorgon-gals-2/

https://clarespark.com/2011/05/20/the-mentalist-melville-blake-and-israel/

https://clarespark.com/2011/07/07/network-and-its-offspring/

https://clarespark.com/2012/02/04/blue-bloods-freud-trauma-911/

https://clarespark.com/2012/02/09/glee-goes-la-raza/

https://clarespark.com/2012/05/18/smash-season-finales-and-the-demonic/

https://clarespark.com/2012/06/26/aaron-sorkins-scottish-blood/

https://clarespark.com/2012/07/03/andy-griffiths-greatest-performance/

https://clarespark.com/2012/07/09/hbo-does-gellhorn-in-red/

https://clarespark.com/2012/09/23/homeland-and-the-idea-of-the-fifth-column/

https://clarespark.com/2012/07/29/girls-or-the-new-lost-generation/

https://clarespark.com/2013/02/14/is-there-a-culture-of-violence/

https://clarespark.com/2013/01/26/decoding-call-me-ishmael-and-the-following/ (Read this first)

https://clarespark.com/2013/02/25/potus-michelle-and-the-end-of-the-democratic-republic/

https://clarespark.com/2013/04/26/the-television-season-goes-dark/

https://clarespark.com/2013/05/27/smash-the-perfect-liberal-backstage-musical/

https://clarespark.com/2013/06/20/james-gandolfini-as-tony-soprano/

https://clarespark.com/2013/09/22/the-newsroom-season-two/

https://clarespark.com/2014/03/24/the-good-wife-and-bad-timing/

https://clarespark.com/2014/06/25/penny-dreadfuls-sinister-significance/

February 9, 2012

“Glee” goes La Raza or “Duende”

Filed under: Uncategorized — clarelspark @ 7:03 pm
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Ricky Martin

(For  related blogs see https://clarespark.com/2012/06/21/the-hispanic-vote/and https://clarespark.com/2009/07/04/unfinished-revolutions-and-contested-notions-of-identity/.)

On February 7, 2012, the hit show Glee buttressed the cultural nationalist view of those Latino irredentists who want to take back the Southwest, overwhelm Anglo-American culture, and generally advance what could be described as “brown supremacy” as opposed to competing ideologies in America. Somehow the episode titled “The Spanish Teacher” with guest star Ricky Martin slipped into some heavy propaganda without being noticed by the Wikipedia detailed account of the episode. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spanish_Teacher.) This blog fills in what the Wiki summary glaringly omitted.

The hunky pop star Ricky Martin (whose guerro appearance bears no resemblance to, say the mestizo construction workers in my neighborhood) predicts that in a few decades, Spanish will be the dominant language in America. [Add to the language factor, the conception of “duende” that Lorca defined as essential to Spanish culture: “According to Christopher Maurer, editor of “In Search of Duende”, at least four elements can be isolated in Lorca’s vision of duende: irrationality, earthiness, a heightened awareness of death, and a dash of the diabolical. The duende is a demonic earth spirit who helps the artist see the limitations of intelligence, reminding him that “ants could eat him or that a great arsenic lobster could fall suddenly on his head”; who brings the artist face-to-face with death, and who helps him create and communicate memorable, spine-chilling art. The duende is seen, in Lorca’s lecture, as an alternative to style, to mere virtuosity….” From Wikipedia definition of “duende.” The word is repeated many times during the first dance and song number as the quality that non-Hispanics lack. I have a new insight into Ernest Hemingway: thank you Wikipedia.]

Moreover, by the end of the episode, duende-deprived Will Schuester (played by Broadway star Matthew Morrison), formerly the school’s Spanish teacher, hands over his job to the Ricky Martin character (formerly a teacher in night school), for [gringo] Will not only is less competent to teach Spanish, he lacks “authenticity.” The glowering Latina student “Santana” upbraids the abashed and guilty Will for pretending to participate in the culture of a [race] for which he lacks [roots]. This sacrifice perfectly reflects what black nationalists demand for their group: only someone with “African American” blood can transmit their cultural heritage and relate an accurate history to students in high schools and colleges. Such is the legacy of multiculturalism, embraced by the Democratic Party, and though devastating to the conception of the melting pot (see https://clarespark.com/2011/06/16/the-antiquated-melting-pot/), does appeal to the most authoritarian, racialist, and backward tendencies in post-1960s social movements. [Added later: I had forgotten a detail: the Ricky Martin character states that his grandparents(?) were illegal immigrants! This would not be an issue for irredentists, for were not great gobs of the USA stolen from Mexico? Maybe not Ohio, the locale of “Glee,” but you get the point.]

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