DANCING WITH THE DEVIL: An analysis based on some aspects concerning the adolescent stage

by Guadalupe Bustingorri

During the adolescent stage changes appear as regards feelings and physical appearance. There is also a powerful search for personal identity and peers´ acceptance, plus the fact that sexual issues are strongly present. DANCING WITH THE DEVIL, a Texas ghost story retold by S. E. Schlosser (2010), deals with the previously mentioned matters. 

This ghost story tells about a teenage girl who is eager to go to the high school dance against her mother´s wishes, since she believes that the dance was meant to be done for the Devil. Without caring about her religious mother´s refusal, the girl decides to run away in order to enjoy the grand ball. She goes wonderfully dressed so that everybody turns around to look at her for the very first time, even the handsomest guy she has even seen in her life. Finally, this good-looking man takes her to hell.

In this paper, I aim to demonstrate that DANCING WITH THE DEVIL may be appealing and perfectly suitable for young adult readers, since it might make them feel identified with its character and her behaviour towards seeking their own personal identity when thinking about their actions and feelings. Apart from that, teenagers may notice and see the changes in her appearance, which are observable in the adolescent stage.

Teenagers aspire to find their own personal identity and they seem to need the approval of their peers in order to feel they belong to a particular group. According to Professor Robert Havighurst (as cited in Koelling, 2004), teens develop identity and create healthy and useful relationships with peers. In addition to this, teen people start rejecting the authority of their parents or any adult in charge of them.

It is worth noticing at this point what Aguirre (1974) suggests, “the identity crisis has two faces: one of them is personal and individual and the other one is social. The first one is characterized by the affirmation of the ego, and the second one by the rebellion against the whole adult values system.”

As it can be seen in the following extract, the main character of DANCING WITH THE DEVIL, is determined to go to the dance. She does not really care about what her mother says about it. The girl is rejecting her mother´s opinion secretly. Apart from this, she is trying to get the approval of her peers. It is the kind of social acceptance that she has been waiting for.

“The girl was so excited about the dance. She had bought a brand new, sparkly red dress for the dance. It was going to be the best evening of her life. Then her mother came in the house, looking pale and determined…"You are not going to that dance," her mother said. The girl nodded as if she accepted her mother's words. But she was determined to go to the dance. As soon as her mother was busy, she put on her brand new red dress and ran down to the K.C. Hall where the dance was being held… As soon as she walked into the room, all the guys turned to look at her. She was startled by all the attention. Normally, no one noticed her. Her mother sometimes accused her of being too awkward to get a boyfriend.… But she was not awkward that night. The boys in her class were fighting with each other to dance with her.” 

Many aspects as regards the adolescent stage are recognizable in the previous extract. To start with, in S. E. Schlosser´s retold story, the idea of self identity, authority rejection and peers´ acceptance seem to be reflected. Teenagers are able to work out their own actions in their actual lives. 

Physical appearance is a key factor during adolescent stage, which is characterized by hormonal and physical changes. Teens are in a constant fight with their bodies. Basically, they compete among themselves and with their own selves. Physical attraction and sexuality awake throughout this growing period in every human´s life.  Koelling (2004) states that adolescents experience wild physical changes and that there is a strong focus on relationships with the opposite sex. 

In the following extract taken from DANCING WITH THE DEVIL, the previously named concerns may be seen: 

“The boys in her class were fighting with each other to dance with her… When she turned, she saw a handsome man with jet black hair and clothes standing next to her. "Dance with me," he said. She managed to stammer a "yes", completely stunned by this gorgeous man”

This example allows the reader to view just from the very beginning the important role of competition. This fact is connected with physical and sexual attraction. Sometimes, teenagers not only compete in order to gain popularity, respect or acceptance, but they may compete with their looks. Going deeper in these issues, teenage readers might feel identified when seeing themselves in any similar situation.  

When analyzing this story, the readers can appreciate why the adolescent stage is so complicated. Stories can serve as a great and potent mirror which reflects the actual teenagers´ situations on the fictional ones, so that young adult readers are able to enjoy the reading of the story meanwhile they are feeling characterized with the characters described in it. As G. De Vos (2003) argues, young adult readers enjoy reading about topics connected with their lives just because they might feel identified or simply because the topics are common and understandable for them.

It is possible to suggest that DANCING WITH THE DEVIL matched perfectly well with the demands of any teenage reader. Teenagers may feel tremendously identified with the feelings, actions, authority rejection and search for personal identity of the main character. In the educational field and, of course, in the classroom, students can discuss about all the issues which have been already mentioned. By reading this story, young adult readers may take advantage of the main character´s actions and decisions, basically because students might feel identified with her and, what is more important, they might start thinking about their own beliefs and values.  A distinction between what is wrong and what is right may be perceived by the students. Their world-views may be also affected, reshaped or rethought considering that, in the course of the adolescent stage, teenagers are building their own system of values. Moreover, they are shaping and forming their identities and personalities inside a particular community. DANCING WITH THE DEVIL has a profound impact on adolescents because its main character is a teenage girl who goes through and deals with ordinary and understandable situations for teenagers. This story, without detours, raises and highlights the attitudes, actions and issues concerning the adolescent stage. 

References

• S. E. Schlosser. (2010). Dancing with the Devil. http://a8mericanfolklore.net/folklore/2010/07/dancing_with_the_devil.html
• Koelling. (2004). Make sense of Teens as Growing People and as Readers.
• R. Havighurst. (2004). Make sense of Teens as Growing People and as Readers.
• G. De Vos. (2003). Storytelling and the Young Adult.

A ZOMBIE´S LAMENT: An analysis based on some features which characterize the adolescent stage

Ivanna Palazzetti, Guadalupe Bustingorri

The adolescent stage is characterized by hormonal changes, the feeling of not belonging to adulthood and of being discriminated by the society. A ZOMBIE´S LAMENT, a story written by S. G. Browne, deals with the previously mentioned issues which are present in the adolescent stage. 

This essay is the analysis of A Zombie’s Lament. This story tells about a man named Andy, who has a car accident in which his wife dies and his daughter orphans. After this accident he becomes a zombie. He complains about his new “life” and about his parents who do not accept him as a zombie. He spends his new existence attending Undead Anonymous meetings with other zombies to talk about what they can do to protect themselves. 

In this paper, we aim to demonstrate that A ZOMBIE´S LAMENT may be appealing for   young adult readers since it might make them feel identified with its character and his behaviour, actions and feelings, which are observable in the adolescent stage.

At the beginning of adolescence stage, teenagers suffer from appreciable hormonal changes that may affect their physical appearance, making them feel uncomfortable with their own bodies. During adolescence many body functions change and some of them make the body produce substances or fluids such as sweat or grease. All these substances produce new scents which are not very pleasant, so hygiene should be very careful and frequent.

As it can be seen in the following extract, the main character of A ZOMBIE´S LAMENT, Andy, reflects upon these changes by making a differentiation between him as a “normal” human being and him as a zombie:

“I´ve taken dozens of showers and even soaked in a tub filled with disinfectant, but I still smell like a crawled out of a compost bin and washed my hair with ammonia.” (p. 1)

Here the author is denoting the main character´s unpleasant smell by comparing it with ammonia despite his persistent attempts to eliminate it. Teenagers pass through this situation because of the hormonal changes. When it happens to them, they could feel uncomfortable with themselves and different from the rest of the people as regards their image.

As Aguirre suggests (1974), “the identity crisis has two faces: one of them is personal and individual and the other one is social. The first one is characterized by the affirmation of the ego, and the second one by the rebellion against the whole adult values system.” However, it has been demonstrated by Papalia and Wendkos (1998) that sometimes teenagers turn to their parents when they have to make an important decision since they are searching for their own system of values.

S. G. Browne seems not to agree with this idea through Andy´s thoughts in the following extract:

“I don't really understand it. I mean, it's not like we're any different than we were before we died. We crave security, companionship, and love. We laugh and cry and feel emotional pain. We enjoy listening to Elvis Presley and watching public television.” (p.1)

This example allows the reader to think about how adolecents may feel when adults leave them aside, even though they have things in common. Adults sometimes see them as weird people and teenagers do not feel equal to the first mentioned ones.

Some teenagers believe that  they are proned to undergo unfair discrimination on the adults´ part. The underlying notion is that adolescents should be treated with equal respect as individuals by adults, institutions and law on the basis of their humanity, rather than being regarded as "second-class citizens," intellectually inferior and adults´ properties. This discrimination takes many forms, including the lack of citizenship rights such as voting. This feature of discrimination is shown in the following fragment of the story:

“After all, when you're undead, you're about as anonymous as a transvestite(...)” (p.3)

As regards unfair discrimination, the writer of this story studies this affair in depth by treating Andy, the main character of A ZOMBIE´S LAMENT, as an anonymous individual.

Furthermore, S. G. Browne goes on with this issue of being discriminated by making Andy complain about his civil rights:

“We can't vote, get a driver's license (...)” (p.1)

A connection between Andy´s complain and adolescence may be established through the fact that adolescents can neither vote nor get a driver´s license until they are eighteen years old. 

Throughout this analysis, it has been demonstrated that A ZOMBIE´S LAMENT is perfectly suitable for young adult readers. Teenagers may feel deeply identified with the main character and his behaviour, actions and feelings, which are observable in the adolescent stage, such as hormonal changes, the feeling of not belonging to adulthood and discrimination from the society towards adolescents. 

Lie Still, Sleep Becalmed (review)

Written by Steve Duffy

(Review by Guadalupe Bustingorri)

Lie Still, Sleep Becalmed written by Steve Duffy is part of a book called Zombies – Encounters with the hungry dead created by John Skipp, an American author, who has collected different stories that reflect upon some of the teenagers’ interests when reading is the subject matter. It is worth mentioning at this point that this book can be matched with what is known as horror fiction, a genre of literature which is quite accepted by teen and young adult readers.

Lie Still, Sleep Becalmed counts with three male friends and a girl, who is dating with one of them, as main characters. This story takes place in a night trip. At first, everything was going easy and enjoyable for these friends, but this situation changes when a person known by them called Andy appears turned into a zombie. The story has an attractive and unexpected end that leaves the reader thinking about it for some minutes.

To some extent, the story is pretty much attention-grabbing since it deals with some issues related to teen people such as love insecurities when starting a new relationship, sexual feelings, courage and the stereotyped personalities among a group of friends who are, more or less, at the same average age. Lie Still, Sleep Becalmed also includes a great sense of adventure which is present at least in most of the teenagers´ lives around the world.

However, there is nothing said out of the ordinary about these affairs in this horror story. What I mean to say here is that, there is nothing new or undiscovered about them.

If it is only for entertainment or just because of the pleasure that reading might provoke, I would highly recommend this story. But if you are seeking for originality or the deeply treatment of certain issues as I have previously mentioned before, do not even dare to waste your time.

Running away (TV show proposal)

Dear Sir,

My name is Ricardo Ruben. I am a psychologist and a writer. Since I admire your work as the President of the most important network, I have decided to write this letter in order to recommend you a musical fiction oriented to young adults.

I have been thinking about retelling the story of a group of homeless children who form a rock band which helps them to run away from drugs, alcohol, stealing and violence. The band would have ten members and each of them would tell a different and problematic life-story. These ten members would be between thirteen and eighteen years old.

The name of the programme and of the band would be “Running away”.

The last thing I would like to mention is the fact that during the course of the television series, a famous producer will discover and help the children to make their dream comes true.

I am looking forwards for your reply as soon as possible.

Faithfully,

Mr. Ruben

Eat up, Gemma: a change of view in Didacticism

By Bustingorri Guadalupe 

Eat up, Gemma is a short story written by Sarah Hayes and illustrated by Jan Ormerod.  Gemma is a baby girl who refuses to eat her food while everyone in her family asks her to do it. The story is specially designed for little children. However, adults may also enjoy it and reflect upon it.

The story seems to be innocent in its content but, at the same time, it hides an important change in the way in which stories are written for children. Different view changes were arising as regards Didacticism after the 70s. Certain issues such as social- class division, gender roles and racism were discussed and, to some extent, redefined. In concordance with these arguments Eat up, Gemma has a great ideological impact because it represents one of those changes.

It is for sure that ideology is present in almost every human act. Everything that people do is surrounded and shaped by ideology. That is why children literature can not escape from some of the ideas of a certain period in history. Before the 70s, children’s fiction was illustrated and written with white characters and other races were nearly denigrated.

The use of black characters in Eat up, Gemma represents a change of view as regards the negative representation that black people and other races used to have before the 70s. Perhaps the fact that black characters should be included in children’s stories is what really leads Jan Ormerod and Sarah Hayes to include them in Eat up, Gemma. Perhaps Eat up, Gemma is the perfect image of that revolutionary and important transformation in children’s literature. 

As it was mentioned before, Eat up, Gemma is an enjoyable and innocent story for children in its surface, but its content and illustrations are probably based on the different values and points of views that were revolutionizing Didacticism after the 70s. So, as far as I am concerned, Sarah Hayes’s story is a powerful and purposeful exemplifier of what was going to come next in relation to children’s literature and its didactic use.  

Teletubbies: Why are they so much questioned?

By Palazzetti Ivanna – Bustingorri Guadalupe

Teletubbies is a TV show which was specially created by Anne Wood and Andrew Davenport for babies and little children. Its first appearance on television was in 1997. The characters of this TV show are Tinky Winky and Dipsy, whose blue and green colours respectively are proper of male characters, Laa-Laa and Po, who apparently are females, and the Sun, which is a smiling baby face. The setting is a great garden full of coloured flowers.

What is the reason why Teletubbies are so hypnotizing for children? What do these ETs have that call children's attention so much? Why are they so successful among young audiences? What is the reason why adults hate and mock on Teletubbies? We are sure that the answer to the first three questions is that this TV show makes children laugh and have fun. However, the last question seems to be harder to answer. That is why we will try to explain and justify our agreement with the social prejudice as regards the stupidity of these modern ETs.

To start with, we think Teletubbies are not based on something real. They seem to be strange aliens or something like that, and as far as we know, science has not still proved the existence of extraterrestrial subjects.

Apart from that, these four ETs show stupid movements and speak with a very basic vocabulary. In fact, these four telly-characters repeat actions and words at least two times in a row in only thirty minutes. However, the use of repetition is a great and powerful tool to get children engaged with the TV show.

We should not forget about the shiny sun. We do not understand quite well the meaning of the baby´s face which is constantly smiling. It seems to be diabolic and overexcited. Why does he laugh all the time? What is that makes him laugh? It is quite abnormal. Why does not he cry? Would not it be more normal if he would also cry as all babies do?

In addition, one of the Teletubbies called Tinky Winky can be seen playing with a pink bag. This seems to show homosexual features since it is apparently a boy using a girl’s stuff. For us, it is completely unnecessary to display situations or images to little children that can be discovered and experienced by themselves in future time. It does not mean that we are against the free election of sexuality, but the fact that Tinky Winky plays with a female handbag, looks like made on purpose for getting kids asking questions which are difficult to be answered at their ages.

As if this was not enough, during the TV show, a video is played with the objective of teaching something useful to the audience. But it is still something meaningless and out of the real world since people in it repeat actions and words like parrots, and what is funnier, they celebrate a birthday party to a teddy bear in one of the programmes. 

But all these arguments can be justified if we bear in mind that Teletubbies was made for babies or very little kids. Perhaps their parents turn the TV on and select this TV show in order to keep their children distracted for a while. Perhaps children enjoy watching such strange silly ETs moving all the time and saying things that are senseless. Maybe little kids get fun with those kinds of TV programmes and their parents find them very interesting for their children´s growing.

Anne Wood and Andrew Davenport´s creation seems to underestimate children´s capability and intelligence. It does not help neither complement the knowledge the school tries to transmit. Putting it all together, this TV show is not recommendable for children. It is prohibited for people who are looking for something interesting and at the same time entertaining on TV. We think it is obvious why Teletubbies are so questioned.

What Makes Good People

Written by Wes Fessler

(review by Guadalupe Bustingorri)

“What Makes Good People” is a short story about values and emotions written by Wes Fessler.  Archie was a clever boy who wants to know if he was a good person and what makes good people. He thinks about the good people he knows and the good values they have. In this story there is a positive message to be learned by children. Characters are very friendly, so that children can get pleasure from them and learn significant lessons of life. I have really enjoyed the story a lot and I think it points out common doubts that children usually have during their lives.  I must say I will strongly recommend it. 

You can read it here.

It was a dark, rainy day (by Palazzetti Ivanna, Albim Giselle, Bustingorri Guadalupe and Diquech Natalia)

It was a dark, rainy day. Autumn was about to come and the food they had collected during the summer was ready to be eaten, but it wasn´t enough for all of the ants. So the colony arranged a meeting led by Red Ant to decide who should stay and who should go.

It was a difficult moment for the whole colony. They had been working so hard, that all of them had the right to remain in their ants´ nest. But they could finally arrive at the cruel decision of sending the eldest people away.

A desperated voice was heard from the very back. It was a little ant whose grandma was about to be sent out.

“Why are you going to take my grandma away from me?” he asked.

“What´s wrong with that?” said little Red Ant “It makes room for new people.”