(Unrelatedly, I am sad about the mysterious disappearace of In Media Res! That was a great site. Sorry for sending you to a dead link.)
Obviously I disagree with your take on Stein, but I have had the benefit of hearing the argument more fully as a conference presentation, where she unpacked her readings a lot. Also I have never watched SPN, so I lack context to develop a reading of Bricks of my own.
I would argue that the vid doesn't "transgress" racial and gender boundaries by using a mashup with Aretha Franklin anymore than 50s rock stars who used black female backup singers to add "vocal texture" to their hits were "transgressing" race and gender: in both cases, black women are only present as support, object, Other. The subject remains white and male.
I was about to say that I didn't see this as incompatible with my reading of the essay, because I thought the essay read Franklin's voice in Bricks as marking the presence of racial others in SPN despite their nonappearance in the same way that the voices of the backing singers in 50s rock might be understood as figures for that music's problematic relationship to blackness. But reading the essay again I see that isn't what Stein actually says in the short piece, that she actually says the vid uses the song to voice Sam and Dean's transgression of gendered and raced categories. I am not sure I agree with that myself, based only on what I know of Sam and Dean. That's what I get for linking to things without rereading them, I suppose.
I *don't* think she is arguing that the vid tells us something about Aretha Franklin; she still frames the vid as all about Sam and Dean, and certainly a consideration of cultural appropriation is absolutely necessary here. White men being transgressive is a narrative that doesn't go very far away from white men being the ones who set all the terms.
it just plain misses the point of the vid to posit it as oppositional to its source canon
I guess I think readings that miss the point can sometimes be the most interesting? I feel like Stein is doing something important by thinking about the interplay of song and source in terms of racial dynamics even though it may not be a satisfactory interpretation. I had remembered the essay (well, acadrabble) as being more engaged with a critique of SPN's racial/gender problems and the absence of POC in the show than it actually is because the conference paper I heard was, I think, but I still reckon that's true.
Re: Bricks
Obviously I disagree with your take on Stein, but I have had the benefit of hearing the argument more fully as a conference presentation, where she unpacked her readings a lot. Also I have never watched SPN, so I lack context to develop a reading of Bricks of my own.
I would argue that the vid doesn't "transgress" racial and gender boundaries by using a mashup with Aretha Franklin anymore than 50s rock stars who used black female backup singers to add "vocal texture" to their hits were "transgressing" race and gender: in both cases, black women are only present as support, object, Other. The subject remains white and male.
I was about to say that I didn't see this as incompatible with my reading of the essay, because I thought the essay read Franklin's voice in Bricks as marking the presence of racial others in SPN despite their nonappearance in the same way that the voices of the backing singers in 50s rock might be understood as figures for that music's problematic relationship to blackness. But reading the essay again I see that isn't what Stein actually says in the short piece, that she actually says the vid uses the song to voice Sam and Dean's transgression of gendered and raced categories. I am not sure I agree with that myself, based only on what I know of Sam and Dean. That's what I get for linking to things without rereading them, I suppose.
I *don't* think she is arguing that the vid tells us something about Aretha Franklin; she still frames the vid as all about Sam and Dean, and certainly a consideration of cultural appropriation is absolutely necessary here. White men being transgressive is a narrative that doesn't go very far away from white men being the ones who set all the terms.
it just plain misses the point of the vid to posit it as oppositional to its source canon
I guess I think readings that miss the point can sometimes be the most interesting? I feel like Stein is doing something important by thinking about the interplay of song and source in terms of racial dynamics even though it may not be a satisfactory interpretation. I had remembered the essay (well, acadrabble) as being more engaged with a critique of SPN's racial/gender problems and the absence of POC in the show than it actually is because the conference paper I heard was, I think, but I still reckon that's true.