What kind of author uses the issues of teenage suicide to get us to laugh by have cheerleaders cheer into a pep rally bon fire? What kind of author deals with teenage pregnancy by telling her parents it’s God’s child? Judy Budnitz, in her first mainstream short story collection, Flying Leap, explicitly uses humor to delve into deeper topics of the human psyche. In Budnitz collection of stories, we learn how high of an emphasis we place on becoming or simply being normal. Henri Bergson says that laughter is a social function, or, that humor allows us to select what aspects of humanity are acceptable. Budnitz utilizes humor, namely irony and puns, to highlight of we as people deal with normalcy.
Got Spirit
Got Spirit is a story about a group of cheerleaders whose lives were going all to well that is, until they lost their spirit. From then on, the cheerleader pyramids fall apart, they lose team members and eventually all die a tragic pep rally bonfire death. After the omen of the earthquake of falling cheerleaders which was probably a .002 on the rector scale, the three cheerleaders who were hurt in the earthquake were out for the season. Therefore the cheerleaders were forced to have emergency tryouts to get their momentum back. But how to replace their perfect team members they had to ask themselves. They looked for girls with dignity, style, lots of spirit, and of course a natural blond. This was just a few of the requirements. The cheerleaders believed that if they “started making compromises, exceptions, then everything would fall apart”, so they stuck to the requirements. One of the girls whose name was LaShonda was really great except for one problem. She would have to use the mens locker room to get ready for pep rallies instead of the womens. Later the girls find out that LaShonda had committed suicide because he didn’t make the team, yet the cheerleaders do not feel responsible. Another girl named Corrie tried out and got rejected even though she had won a silver medal at the Olympics. Her mom didn’t take rejection so well and went crazy. Corrie’s mom shot the mother of the girl who was accepted in the stomach. Later in the season the cheerleaders then attend a Halloween party. A few of the girls, being the girls that they are, got into a fight in the bathroom. Accusations of infidelity among the cheerleaders and there boyfriends arose. All of this was happening while Staci, a fellow cheerleader who was shunned at for getting fat, was actually in the next stall giving birth to a baby boy. Staci then puts the baby in the trash and goes back to the party. The police officers eventually break up the fight and then find the baby in the trash and arrest Staci. Staci was, of course, kicked off the team. After all of this Bunny, the captain, went kind of crazy. Crazy enough that she and her fellow cheerleaders led themselves not into victory at the homecoming game, but right into the pep rally bond fire.
Above is a video clip from the movie Bring it on: All or nothing. This movie gives you a visual of how the cheerleaders from this book act, only on a much crazier level. There are a few scenes we can help picture what’s going on in the book. The first scene we will see starts at 0:50 where they are doing tryouts. During this time we can compare Bunny to the Captain Camille and the power and control she has. The second scene starts at 3:40 and 4:36. In this scene we can get an idea of the type of cheerleaders they are looking for.
While reading this story one can come across more humor than really realizing. We can say that this story is actually portraying how people on the outside look at and judge cheerleaders. The story was very humorous especially when the team noticed that Staci was putting on weight and Bunny said asked Staci, “Do you feel okay? You look a little sick. Do you think you need to throw up?” “No,” Stacie said. “Well I think you do,” Bunny said (Budnitz 65). Also during this part and throughout this book we see a lot of power and control from Bunny. When she tells Staci to go throw up she goes. She is the captain of the squad and uses her power for good and evil cheerleader purposes. “When she jumped, they jumped. When she screamed, they screamed. When she flung herself into a round-off back-handspring double tuck with a split landing, they did the same (Budnitz 67). We all can relate to these cheerleaders in one way or another. We all went to high school and many of the characters in the story may have acted like some of your school mates. We can take this story and the story Debbieland by Aimee Bender and make many connections of similarity. The Power and control of both Bunny and the girl who beat up Debbie are the most prominent of the similarities. Although the two characters are written on end of two different spectrums of life they are one in the same. They both need the power to feel in control and are natural leaders of the pack. The narrator from Got Spirit and Debbie from Debbieland are also very alike because they survived. Though the narrator in Got Spirit went along with the pack she learned to become her own self and grew to be a better person. Debbie from Debbieland was in fact a good person to begin with but had problems accepting that there wasn’t anything wrong with her because of the teasing and taunting. She eventually grew up and learned to love herself the way she was.
After reading this story we can see just why Budnitz is considered a little crazy for her writing. Here we have the stereotypical cheerleader in a high school story but with those magical Bender-Budnitz twists. We read pun after pun not realizing it because it is pushed deep within the lines of catfights and the aftermath of the earthquake of cheerleaders falling out of the precious pyramid. We may ask ourselves why are we all laughing at these poor cheerleaders cheering their way into a pep rally bond fire. Don’t worry according to Bergson its okay to laugh at this. We just have to put the three rules of laughter into affect. We laugh at the cheerleaders because we might see certain attributes of ourselves within them therefore we laugh, who would of though you and one of these cheerleaders had something in common? Budnitz has created this bubble where she uses humor in order to help us deal with our emotions. The so called ice breaker of the story is the underlying fact that this whole story is actually an answer in a college acceptance essay for the one survivor of the squad. We really forget that this is what the natural blond is considering turning in order to get into college and do something other than play around with the spirit that apparently lives in all cheerleaders. We laugh to deal with the underlying issues Budnitz has stashed in the margins. Drug use, football, gasp teenage sex life, double gasp teenage pregnancy, eating disorders, we have all seen it in our own high schools our own world and reading a story with a little humor in it can make us come together and realize what the message is hidden in the margins.
What Happened
The story begins on a hot summer afternoon where two sisters, Leah and Ellie, are sitting on a swing. Ellie, the younger of the two, looks up to Leah and like most younger siblings Ellie’s story fades into the background. We instantly learn that Leah is a bit absent minded. After the discussion of a tattoo, Leah realizes she is late for work and rushes off to the local diner. She spends most of her time serving coffee to old ladies and catching the occasional smile from the cook Raymond. We then learn that back in spring on the night of prom, Leah and her boyfriend Corey had parked behind a gas station and had sex. Jump back to Leah getting off of work in time for family dinner. Leah reveals that she is pregnant. There are meetings with the soon to be grandparents and plans are made for Corey and Leah to be married. We eventually learn that the Leah and Corey have a baby boy named Stan. The baby’s mysteriously dark complexion and big brown eyes worries Corey and we soon learn the truth that the father of Stan is Raymond, the cook. Afraid of what will be done and said, Leah takes off with Stan in the middle of the night.
Anatomy of Humor: Judy Budnitz
The picture above is of the famous "Golden Girls" sitting around the table eating cheesecake and gossiping and talking about their troubles. Much like the little old ladies in the story at the diner.
There were several moments of humor in this story. First of all, the old ladies in the diner gossiping and talking about how Mrs. Ramsey got “robbed” for weeks was amusing since old ladies, especially from the south, are known to over-exaggerate and gossip all the time. Since making fun of old people isn’t exactly PC, having someone else describe the situation makes it okay to laugh. Freud would term this as tendentious humor, as it is meant to joke about a subject that is slightly inappropriate, since older people are supposed to be wise and respected, etc.
The picture above goes along with the irony discussed. It’s a serious accident, but it’s kind of funny since it’s a car lodged in a pain/accident center.
A couple of other moments that were funny would be when Leah broke the news that she was pregnant to her family. First, she instantly zones out and pictures giving her dad the Heimlich maneuver, due to his response to her news. While at the same time little innocent Ellie is deep in thought contemplating her mashed potatoes. Another is the fact that as soon as Leah tells her family she is pregnant and learns their reaction, she instantly denies it. She compares herself to Mary, saying its Gods child. This moment creates a sort of ironic situation since a serious subject, teenage pregnancy, is being discussed, yet there are thoughts of potato mountains and a flabbergasted father receiving the Heimlich for no apparent reason interjected, which makes the scene comical.
Once again we see Budnizt intertwine many issues that we all hear about or face into a story with elements of fantasy. The fact that Leah would have sex as a teenage is appalling to her parents. Then she gets pregnant and with a black baby to top it off. Budnizt creates many diversions to help along the way when talking about the racial tension and issues that are dealt with in the story. We have this heartfelt story of acceptance within Leah’s family but racial discrimination outside in the real world. Budnizt has created a story letting the read teach him/her that racial discrimination still can occur and it can have a lasting impact on all peoples that are involved. We as the reader feel the emotions of Leah being a teenage mother when the little old ladies stop being nice when her belly pops up. We feel the emotions of Corey when he realizes Stan was not his child and though he had loved Leah, he wasn’t ready to grow up. We feel the emotions of Raymond the true father of Stan, when he steps up to the plate and disappears into the night to be with his son and Leah. Because Budnizt lets us feel these emotions sometimes through her humor and sometimes through the pain we feel a closer connection to the characters, people in real life who had to deal with racial discrimination and to other readers.
Work Cited
Bergson, Henri. "Laughter": An Essay on the Meaning of Comic.
"Henri Bergson's Theory of Laughter." Timo Laine. 2004-2008 Timo Laine. April 9, 2006.
http://www.timoroso.com/philosophy/writings/sketches/2006-04-09-henri-bergsons-theory-of-laughter
Budnitz, Judy. Flying Leap. 1998. St. Martins Press. New York, New York.
3 comments:
A lot of Budnitz's work parallels movies I feel. They would make a great manuscript. As you show with the Bring it on Clip.
---Jennifer Rose
I agree with Jennifer. Budnitz's work parallels movies, but she adds her own twist to them. I actually liked her book better than alot of the books we have read so far. It brought the familarity of realistic situations. ---Charlene Winburn
Thanks for your posting, Sharonda, Andy, Renee, and Sarah. Be sure to put your name at the end of your posting so your classmates know who you are! I agree with Jennifer and Charlene who write that some of the stories of Budnitz parallel movies. I'm thinking of "Got Spirit" in relation to a movie like Mean Girls. Interesting observation.
You begin your post by writing, “Henri Bergson says that laughter is a social function, or, that humor allows us to select what aspects of humanity are acceptable. Budnitz utilizes humor, namely irony and puns, to highlight of we as people deal with normalcy.” This is a compelling statement—especially the idea of Budnitz grappling to deal with concepts of normalcy. She certainly attempts to make abnormal situations appear “normal.” I’m thinking, for instance, of the first story in her collection, “Dog Days,” in which a man dressed in a dog suit wedges himself into the character’s imagination as a real dog. I’d like to have seen the other ways in which you found Budnitz to address the concepts of normalcy throughout her text. Are you really pointing, in some ways, to the ways she draws upon stereotypes and convention? You write about “Got Spirit,” “We can say that this story is actually portraying how people on the outside look at and judge cheerleaders.” The humor of this piece certainly hinges on stereotypes and perceptions. In fact, if we, the reader, didn’t already have preconceived notions about cheerleaders, the humor may not have been quite as effective. You write, “We all can relate to these cheerleaders in one way or another.”
At times, this posting offers us a bit too much summary. I’m more interested in your original analysis. For example, you write, “We may ask ourselves why are we all laughing at these poor cheerleaders cheering their way into a pep rally bond fire. Don’t worry according to Bergson its okay to laugh at this. We just have to put the three rules of laughter into affect.” How do you see Bergson’s three rules applying to this case, specifically? I’m particularly interested in how you would compensate for Bergson’s rule that laughter is purely cerebral—and not emotional. You write, however, that “Because Budnizt lets us feel these emotions sometimes through her humor and sometimes through the pain we feel a closer connection to the characters, people in real life who had to deal with racial discrimination and to other readers.” How would you respond to this emotion/intellect dichotomy that you’ve presented.
Thanks for integrating an analysis of your multimedia into your work; however, I couldn’t get the clip to work. Also, be sure someone in your group checks for typos before posting! The author’s name was spelled wrong in nearly half the instances.
Thanks for your posting!
Post a Comment