Sex Politics And Religion In Star Wars

In 1977, Star Wars blazed across the screen to become one of the highest grossing and most beloved movies of all time, spawning an unprecedented merchandising phenomenon. It was followed by two sequels and three prequels, all of which became blockbusters. Comic books, novels, graphic novels, and magazines devoted to the films added to the mythology of George Lucas’s creation. Despite the impact of the franchise on popular culture, however, discussion of the films from a scholarly perspective has not kept pace with the films. In Sex, Politics, and Religion in Star Wars: An Anthology, Douglas Brode and Leah Deyneka have assembled a provocative collection of essays exploring some of the more intriguing aspects of the Star Wars phenomenon. Contributors to the volume tackle such hot topics as race and racism in the Star Wars galaxy, Judeo-Christian and Eastern religious themes, homosexual romance, and philosophical and political implications—both earthbound and otherworldly. These essays interpret the Star Wars universe from a variety of perspectives—including feminist and Freudian—offering insights from writers who bring a new passion to the subject. A companion volume to Myth, Media, and Culture in Star Wars, Sex, Politics, and Religion in Star Wars is an authoritative anthology incorporating scholarly analysis with engaging insights. It will engross readers, both fans and scholars alike.

This book provides the first detailed and comprehensive examination of all the materials making up the Star Wars franchise relating to the portrayal and representation of real-world history and politics. Drawing on a variety of sources, including films, published interviews with directors and actors, novels, comics, and computer games, this volume explores the ways in which historical and contemporary events have been repurposed within Star Wars. It focuses on key themes such as fascism and the Galactic Empire, the failures of democracy, the portrayal of warfare, the morality of the Jedi, and the representations of sex, gender, and race. Through these themes, this study highlights the impacts of the fall of the Soviet Union, the War on Terror, and the failures of the United Nations upon the ‘galaxy far, far away’. By analysing and understanding these events and their portrayal within Star Wars, it shows how the most popular media franchise in existence aims to speak about wider contemporary events and issues. The History and Politics of Star Wars is useful for upper-level undergraduates, postgraduates, and scholars of a variety of disciplines such as transmedia studies, science fiction, cultural studies, and world history and politics in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

George Lucas spoke about the didactic role of cinema and about his own work being presented through the "moral megaphone" of the film industry. A considerable body of scholarship on the six-part Star Wars series argues (unconvincingly) that the franchise promoted neo-conservatism in American culture from the late 1970s onward. But there is much in Lucas' grand space opera to suggest something more ideologically complex is going on. This book challenges the view of the saga as an unambiguously violent text exemplifying reactionary politics, and discusses the films' identity politics with regard to race and gender.

Bringing critical attention to a particular set of science fiction and fantasy films—Larry and Andy Wachowski’s The Matrix, George Lucas’ Star Wars saga, and Joss Whedon’s Avengers—this book utilizes a wide-ranging set of critical tools to illuminate their political ideologies, while also examining any resistant and complicating turns or byways the films may provide. What they all have in common ideologically is that they—or at least the genres they belong to—tend to be regarded as belonging to politically conservative frames of sociocultural reference. With the Star Wars saga, however, this idea is shown to be superficial and weak.

Understanding Religion and Popular Culture 2nd edition provides an accessible introduction to this exciting and rapidly evolving field. Divided into two parts, Issues in Religion and Genres in Popular Culture, it encourages readers to think critically about the ways in which popular cultural practices and products, especially those considered as forms of entertainment, are laden with religious ideas, themes, and values. This edition has been thoroughly revised and includes five new chapters, updated case studies, and contemporary references. Among the areas covered are religion and film, food, violence, music, television, cosplay, and fandom. Each chapter also includes a helpful summary, glossary, bibliography, discussion questions, and suggestions for further reading/viewing. Providing a set of practical and theoretical tools for learning and research, this book is an essential read for all students of Religion and Popular Culture, or Religion and Media more broadly.

While previous work on the Star Wars universe charts the Campbellian mythic arcs, political representations, and fan reactions associated with the films, this volume takes a transmedial approach to the material, recognizing that Star Wars TV projects interact with and relate to other Star Wars texts. The chapters in this volume take as a basic premise that the televisual entrants into the Star Wars transmedia storyworld are both important texts in the history of popular culture and also key to understanding how the Star Wars franchise—and, thus, industry-wide transmedia storytelling strategies—developed. The book expands previous work to consider television studies and sharp cultural criticism together in an effort to bring both long-running popular series, long-ignored texts, and even toy commercials to bear on the franchise’s complex history.

Speculative science fiction, with its underlying socio-political dialogue, represents an important intersection of popular culture and public discourse. As a pop culture text, the animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars offers critical commentary on contemporary issues, marking a moment of interplay whereby author and audience come together in what Russian philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin called collaborative meaning making. This book critically examines the series as a voice in the political dialogues concerning human cloning, torture, just war theory, peace and drone warfare.

In 1977, Star Wars blazed across the screen to become one of the highest grossing and most beloved movies of all time. It was followed by two sequels and three prequels, all of which became blockbusters. Comic books, novels, graphic novels, and magazines devoted to the films have added to the mythology of George Lucas’s creation. Despite the impact of the franchise on popular culture, however, discussion of the films from a scholarly perspective has not kept pace with the films. In Myth, Media, and Culture in Star Wars: An Anthology, Douglas Brode and Leah Deyneka have assembled an intriguing collection of essays addressing the influences that shaped the films, as well as the impact the franchise has had on popular culture. Contributors to this volume discuss the Star Wars universe and what its connection to various cultural touchstones—from fairy tales and Joseph Campbell to Disneyland and Marvel comics—mean to viewers. Essays examine the films in the franchise as well as incarnations of the Star Wars universe in video games, comic books, and television programs, including the films’ influence on new generations of filmmakers. A companion volume to Sex, Politics, and Culture in Star Wars, Myth, Media, and Culture in Star Wars is a diverse collection of criticism that investigates the dynamic force that Star Wars has become in popular culture, from every imaginable angle.