Adorno and Shahn

I am using Theodor Adorno work to analyze a Ben Shahn painting. When I started doing research for this paper I immediately saw some similarities in both of their works. Both men believed in socialism.

Adorno was known for being a member of the Frankfurt School of social theory. He spoke heavily on the socially critical aspect of philosophical thinking. He was very outspoken about social issues. Adorno reminded me of the painter Ben Shahn because his paintings deal with social realism. They reflect politics and he lets people know his standpoint through his work.

Both men are realist and their work shows it. Ben challenged peoples thoughts with his outspoken work. His big dream was that diverse people would come together and unite. He wanted people to understand his messages and the best way he knew how to make his voice be heard was through his paintings. He had so much to say and expressed his views through his art.


This Ben Shahn painting stood out at me. You can see in this painting both, Shahn and Adorno’s views. The idea of the painting is social and political. He is urging people to speak their minds so that they can make a difference like both men did.

Response Paper to Superbad

Superbad was made in 2007 and is a Comedy film. This movie is about two best friends that are in their last few weeks of high school and decide to go out in a big way. They both want to loose their virginities to two popular girls that they like and are about to go to their first high school party. The problem is, is that their not very popular, they get picked on by the jocks. Their other friend got a fake I.D. and they told him to get them beer to bring to the party to impress the girls they want to have sex with. Their friend “Mclovin” befriends two cops and get into mischief before heading to the party. Throughout the night the cops display mind-blowing acts that portray real cops in a horrible light by stealing beers, shooting their guns at signs and run through lights with their sirens for no reason. They end up setting their cop car on fire for fun and ask Mclovin to sign a paper saying it was an accident and he gladly does it for them.


The two best friends Evan and Seth stop at another party to steal beer. Seth starts dancing with a girl and after they are done grinding a few guys ask him what the stain on his pants is. He freaks out because the girl had her period. It got on his pants and the guys begin to make fun of him and bring other people around to join in.



This movie reminded me of the chapter “Jokes and the Unconscious” written by Freud. He describes a term called smut. Smut is the intentional bringing into prominence of sexual facts and relations by speech. This whole movie revolves around smut humor. Those are the parts that get the biggest laughs. For example Seth gets paired with the girl he likes in cooking class and he stands behind her and makes sexual jesters. His friends are watching him and start laughing at him. Another part of the film shows Seth as a young boy and he is drawing dicks on his notebook. He said he became obsessed and couldn’t stop drawing them when a girl caught him. She was grossed out and told everyone and they all made fun of him, which is an example of smut humor.





Hostility jokes come up in the movie many times as well. The main character Seth is not popular and is angry about it because he cant get the popular girl so he takes his anger out on his best friend and their other friend “McLovin.” He makes himself feel better by putting other people done. He makes other people feel small and enjoys the outcome of his harsh humor. His friends take the harsh jokes and only in the end of the movie is when we start to see the friends stand up to Seth. They call him out on being a jerk and tell him that don’t like his harsh humor.

The cops in the movie have brutal humor. They do through in jabs at other races and religions. They are both Jewish and make fun of themselves. Just like Freud explains on page 133 for example Jewish people do make fun of their own group of people. It is self- criticism and they make up jokes about their characteristics.




The two best friends remind me of Alex from Portnoy. They are just like him, all they think about is sex and girls. You don’t see any masturbation in this film but they do try their hardest to get laid but end up failing miserably.

5 ladies against 1 lazy

this week we started group presentations. my group was the first to go and we were going to discuss Portnoy and tie the book into Woody Allen. there were 5 group members, all girls and we immediately clicked. we had very little time to get our project together, only one class period. i got out paper and started making an outline for our group. everyone picked the subject that they wanted to discuss. we talked about every single detail and i took the outline home and typed it up. i emailed it to everyone so they would know the order of the presentation. we were nervous because we had one day till the presentation but knew we could pull it together. i brought candy so that we could make the presentation interactive with the class. it worked pretty well some people talked during the presentation.

we did have one problem. a major problem. a person who fell out of the sky and decided on that day that he was going to come into our group and said "he was ready." i dont even know what he name is and it really doesnt even matter because he did not do anything. not one thing. all of us girls have hectic lifestyles. one was even sick but still called and emailed the group to do her part. no emails. no calls. nothing from this guy and he thought he had the right to have his name on our project. he asked one of the girls to see her notes that she worked so hard on so he could read it. then he tried a few times to take the candy that was for the class discussion.

i thought the girls and i pulled our project together well. we worked very hard and got along great. everyone did there part and i would hate for some lazy guy to take a grade that he did nothing for from all of us. oh wait, i forgot, he did contribute something. he was texting the entire presentation. great work everyone!