A fictional post

[hazelk]

Not being much of a fic person I haven’t really weighed in on the whole FanLib thing but this response by the CEO to criticism hosted in Henry Jenkins’s blog was interesting. It does sound as if rather than hoping to become the fanfic equivalent of YouTube what FanLib are attempting to create is more the fictive counterpart to American Idol with the web site playing the role of the early ‘freak show’ rounds of the contest. Given the current popularity of all manner of talent shows it may well end up being successful on its own terms but be no more or less likely than the TV versions to discover writers/stories with real star quality.

The whole thing does seem to presuppose that fanfic writers have essentially the same motivations as Idol contestants, individual celebrity, fame and fortune. Not that there’s anything wrong with that but writers on LJ don’t give the impression of being there primarily for the competition.

We are pattern-finding and story-telling animals. It’s what we do. We take the real world and turn it into narratives and symbols so our brains can manipulate them more easily.
http://subterraneanpress.com/index.php/magazine/summer-2007/column-bears-examining-4-by-elizabeth-bear/

I don’t write stories in my head to any great extent, I find patterns and chop them into ever finer messes but for those to whom stories come naturally it makes sense that fanfic would be both a way to ‘talk’ about them or function as a form of narrative jamming, taking a storyline for a walk as it were.

Speaking of fanfic but more specifically (and based on a sample size of two) does anyone get the impression that fic!Buffy is a more womanly woman than she was on the show? Emotionally intelligent but otherwise not that bright? Joss’s Buffy can have a hard, quite abstract edge to her thinking. Her first line in the first comic has her philosophising about the world not individual inhabitants of it and she’s as capable as Giles or Wesley of understanding the big picture, that there may only be bad choices that Willow may still be evil. The main difference between her and the Watchers is where she draws the line between a necessary evil and a convenient one.

Comments

[yourlibrarian]

Emotionally intelligent but otherwise not that bright?

I always thought that SMG brought more intelligence to Buffy than had originally been intended and eventually it became part of the character. Though one thing that always bugged me in the show was her SAT scores. I thought it not only unlikely she'd do that well, but it seemed unnecessary. And I also had a bit of a problem with the notion that because she had scored so well she had her whole future open to her, as if doing less well wouldn't have still left her many possibilities. There was just something very classist about it.

[owenthurman.livejournal.com]

I agree with all that.

There was some need for Buffy to be smarter than she was in the movie just to keep up with the weekly verbal gymnastics of the teevee series.

Around 1996 the ETS added about 100 points on average to SAT scores, so if you remember scores from before then, you need to add 100 points to compare to the scores at Sunnydale High in 1998.

Nevertheless 1430 is very, very high. Maybe number two pencil oval filling is a little-known slayer power.

Even in the minutes we see at Hemery TV Buffy was a clever queen bee more than an empathetic caretaker type. I don't think that is any less "womanly;" I know a lot of women like that and a lot more who aspire to it.

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

I think Joss has said as much about SMG’s influence on the character but wherever the trait came from originally, it was incorporated from very early on, even in Witch it’s Buffy who figures out the body switch.

SAT scores are a bit of a mystery to me, we don’t have equivalent standardised tests in the UK. For Americans applying to us we pretty much ignore the SATs and base entry almost entirely on AP grades. However it does strike me (and from a recent conversation with shadowkat) that Buffy and Cordelia’s scores may have been intended as a gentle poke at the system. Buffy does have the kind of intelligence that might let her do freakily well at multiple choice. She‘s quick thinking and performs well under pressure, she doesn’t panic. I think one of the problems with these types of test is that they largely assess the ability to read the question accurately and recognise information when prompted (as opposed to being able to recall/analyse stuff freehand). I could imagine someone like Buffy passively soaking up a lot of the necessary information while not paying attention in class.

There was just something very classist about it.
Is it really classist to hint that a middle class person with a college degree would have opportunities that a middle class person without one (other things being equal) would not? It’s not a judgment of personal worth but implicitly a criticism of how society is organised, one the problems with a class system being that lower class people have fewer opportunities and less prestige attached to those they do have.

[yourlibrarian]

What about your A levels and O levels, how do those work? I know in Brasil they have the vestibular, a type of national test where your scores determine what schools you enter but once there tuition is free. Here getting into a school is only part of the problem.

Having gone through both the SAT and GRE I can assure you passive absorption and good guessing is not enough to get a score of that sort. Cordelia's scores didn't surprise me. She was very focused and driven to achieve and certainly had more time to spend on her studies than Buffy did. What annoyed me so much about that is it seemed to be Mary Sue-ing Buffy. She not only was the Slayer and skilled in ways her friends were not, but that score marked her as almost as smart as Willow school-wise. It just seemed unnecessary.

And the classist issue came from the idea that anyone who doesn't get into a top university is somehow just scraping by. Buffy could have gotten an 1100 or 1200 SAT score, or even a 1000 which is considered a minimum at most colleges, and still had many many schools open to her. So my point was that Buffy could still have gone to any of hundreds of colleges with a very average score, not that she couldn't go to college at all without it. You only need a score that high if you're shooting for the Ivy League.

And since the whole point of the episode seemed to be that Buffy had "choices" now and a possible future, there was too much emphasis put on the score. She had already been shown having a hard time getting recommendations, she had no extracurricular activities she could point to, and presumably her GPA wasn't that great. This all meant that the score really wasn't the slam dunk it was portrayed to be. Then again, by watching Veronica Mars it was obvious that a lot of TV writers seem to have no idea how higher ed actually functions.

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

A levels (18+) are still called A levels. O levels/CSEs (16+) have been combined to create GCSEs. GCSE have almost no impact on University entrance as long as you pass maths and English. Students normally take 3-4 A levels, which are single subject qualifications (like APs) each with a two year syllabus assessed by a combination of coursework assignments and traditional essay/problem based exams. None that I know of rely on multiple choice tests to any great extent. If Buffy’s scores were putting her within Ivy league reach I guess the English (Scotland does it differently) equivalent would be around AAB but entrance requirements vary a lot between subjects (most degrees are single subject, we don’t have an equivalent of majors/minors).

Joss went to Winchester before going on to Weslyan? He may have picked up the public school ethos that truly brilliant people can get top exam results without doing any work (and therefore being caught working is terribly non-U). All I got from Buffy’s test score was that they were obviously much higher than expected and also high enough that not following up on the advantages they offered would mean throwing away a unique opportunity, the equivalent of a place at Oxford or Cambridge. Anything lower wouldn’t have presented anything like the same dilemma. I suppose that it didn’t come across as making Buffy out to be academically gifted as well as the Slayer reflects my basic scepticism about how good any 18+ exams are assessing ability. I was good at tests, it always felt like some kind of trick.

[yourlibrarian]

Thanks for the explanation. I've heard those terms thrown around for some time and was never clear on what their function was and what achieving one meant! And now I see why the AP classes are looked at for entrance there. At the time I was in high school taking AP courses was a nice plus on the college application but the overall GPA was more important and the AP tests (especially taking a handful of them) was rather costly. They may be considered more important in U.S. college admissions now because grade inflation has made so many transcripts meaningless.

about how good any 18+ exams are assessing ability. I was good at tests, it always felt like some kind of trick.

*g* Maybe you're secretly a Slayer and don't know it. There's truth to the fact that tests measure school abilities and are not necessarily a mark of intelligence per se. But I actually took a Psych course a few years ago with a prof who's a leading researcher on standardized exams. And in general the scores are very valid predictors of achievement in school. They do not, however, predict completion, which is another thing that's a consideration when admitting (especially at the graduate levels). And clearly that was an issue in Buffy's case as well.

[shati.livejournal.com]

Having gone through both the SAT and GRE I can assure you passive absorption and good guessing is not enough to get a score of that sort.

Well, my SAT score was almost exactly Buffy's. With grades and levels of paying-attention-in-class that were probably comparable to hers. So I found her score entirely plausible, especially given the verbal skills being a Joss protagonist gave her.

I assumed the high scores were supposed to get her scholarship money at non-Ivy schools outside California, ones where her grades would be acceptable but not scholarship-worthy. As someone who didn't have the time or inclination to get good grades, or (presumably) the money for out-of-state, I could see the scores being necessary to give her that option. This part might be total fanwanking on my part, though -- I don't doubt that the writers thought SAT scores have a bigger impact on admissions than they do.

[owenthurman.livejournal.com]

Those SAT scores with Buffy's implied grades wouldn't even qualify her for Cal or UCLA much less a good out of state school. But that is because, as you imply, in the USA the grade average is very important and the SAT not very important in university admissions.

[aycheb.livejournal.com]

I suppose it depends quite how low her grades are implied to be. Or that in a world run by demons SATs have become more important in determining university admission. Because they're evil?