Go listen to academic feminists yammering on and on about her ? and missing the point again and again. Buffy was a television hero and weekly savior of the world ? but she was also *gasp!* a girl! And the show was popular! In America! I mean, golly, take THAT, American phallocentric hegemony, you!
“Buffy the Vampire Slayer” was a popular TV show, and it was a very witty one at that. It featured a high-school (and later college) girl gifted with extraordinary powers ? and friends ? who battled all manner of demonic forces, on their own initiative, because those forces weren’t going away with wishing and the civil authorities weren’t to be trusted with the assignment. And they did so with panache, wielding irony as deftly as they did wooden stakes and the other weapons appropriate for dispatching their mythical foes.
“Buffy conferences” are popular fare among today’s video-fixated feminists. UNC-Greensboro’s Women’s and Gender Studies Department is hosting a “Why Buffy Matters” screening of Buffy episodes and also a Buffy mini-conference.
Throughout the year, two episodes will be shown each month chronicling two episodes and clips from seasons one through seven. After the screenings, discussion will follow on various concepts, metaphors, meaning and significance on subjects such as feminism, religion, theory, language, politics, etc.
I think I’d rather have a stake through my head than listen to those discussions. I can only imagine their wit-draining power. And then there’s the call for papers. Imagine the torpid horror:
We invite proposals from any academic discipline ? literature, history, communications, film and television studies, women’s studies, gender studies, religion, philosophy, linguistics, rhetoric, and cultural studies ? for papers, panels, and lectures on any aspect of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” or “Angel” as it relates to BtVS. We are most interested in critiques of the show’s cultural impact. We will also accept a limited number of pieces of fan fiction, character analysis, testimonials, or personal stories about the show.
All papers are limited to a maximum reading time of 20 minutes.
I’m not sure a rational person could endure a day’s worth of 20-minute homilies and testimonials on “Why Buffy Matters.” If Gitmo prisoners were forced to attend, I’m sure Human Rights Watch would object. One would have to smuggle in some Captain Morgan’s and take a shot every time he heard “heteronormative,” “postcolonial,” “hegemony” or any other look-I’m-an-academic buzzword, in the hopes of passing out drunk by the second paper. Buffy may have saved the world for seven seasons, but can she overcome the Blathering Boredom Demons?
