Yesterday, my English 101 class continued its study of music, more specifically Michael Jackson's "Thriller." I thought about playing the song without the video and then the video to have them compare and contrast the images in their head without the video to the video. But in the end, I decided to go with a simpler movie review type of writing--plus, the official video is almost 15 minutes long, and the class is only 50 minutes long.
We did have time for a bit of discussion about whether or not the video holds up well. Most of the students agreed that it did hold up well. It wasn't as scary as it might have seemed in 1983 when it debuted, but the music, the costumes, the dancing, and almost every other element was sound.
Only 1/3 of them had seen the video before, and only one student had seen it in the last month. I wasn't sure what to expect in that regard. I also wondered how much of Michael Jackson's story they would know. Most of them seemed to say that his history of being accused of sexual abuse of children shouldn't negate his art.
It was strange, in a time wrinkle kind of way, to watch this video with my first year students. This video premiered when I was a first year student, in 1983. I remember making a special effort to see it on MTV; it felt like an important cultural moment. And now MTV is bankrupt. Michael Jackson's red jacket that he wore is in the Smithsonian--and the Smithsonian is closed because of a government shut down.
It feels like we're at another cultural moment of a turning point, but it's hard to know where we're headed. I don't know that I felt the same way in 1983, at least not about "Thriller."
It was a fun way to have a sort-of scary, very short film. It was a great addition to my fall festival two weeks in English 101 class. Will it lead to good writing? Time will tell.
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