"Dublin Core:Title","Dublin Core:Subject","Dublin Core:Description","Dublin Core:Creator","Dublin Core:Source","Dublin Core:Publisher","Dublin Core:Date","Dublin Core:Contributor","Dublin Core:Rights","Dublin Core:Relation","Dublin Core:Format","Dublin Core:Language","Dublin Core:Type","Dublin Core:Identifier","Dublin Core:Coverage","Item Type Metadata:Text","Item Type Metadata:Interviewer","Item Type Metadata:Interviewee","Item Type Metadata:Location","Item Type Metadata:Transcription","Item Type Metadata:Local URL","Item Type Metadata:Original Format","Item Type Metadata:Physical Dimensions","Item Type Metadata:Duration","Item Type Metadata:Compression","Item Type Metadata:Producer","Item Type Metadata:Director","Item Type Metadata:Bit Rate/Frequency","Item Type Metadata:Time Summary","Item Type Metadata:Email Body","Item Type Metadata:Subject Line","Item Type Metadata:From","Item Type Metadata:To","Item Type Metadata:CC","Item Type Metadata:BCC","Item Type Metadata:Number of Attachments","Item Type Metadata:Standards","Item Type Metadata:Objectives","Item Type Metadata:Materials","Item Type Metadata:Lesson Plan Text","Item Type Metadata:URL","Item Type Metadata:Event Type","Item Type Metadata:Participants","Item Type Metadata:Birth Date","Item Type Metadata:Birthplace","Item Type Metadata:Death Date","Item Type Metadata:Occupation","Item Type Metadata:Biographical Text","Item Type Metadata:Bibliography","Item Type Metadata:Player","Item Type Metadata:Imported Thumbnail","Item Type Metadata:Referrer",tags,file,itemType,collection,public,featured "Genre: Control or Chaos",,"

This episode of Westworld had me at its title, ""Genre."" I have been thinking about genre as part of my academic work since my dissertation, which became my first book, on contemporary (post-1980) neodomestic fiction, and most recently in my work on the contemporary (post-1970) American adrenaline narrative. So, as I sought a moment of escape from home and work via immersion in the alternate reality of a popular television series, my work and entertainment worlds—as so often happens in the humanities—collided.

While the shift from thinking about the American home to extreme sports to a futuristic world may initially strike one as nonsequiturs, our current social distancing reality highlights the distinct and blurred lines between such genres. Our lives are shaped by shifting and competing narratives about home, risk, and our control or lack of control of the future. We engage narrative—via family stories, the news, fiction—to make sense of the chaos. Yet, as the episode from Westworld demonstrates, knowledge may also produce panic, if not pandemonium. Laurence Gonzales in Deep Survival claims, ""We think we believe what we know, but we only truly believe what we feel"" (64). This is the power and danger of narrative.

",,"Westworld, Season Three, Episode 5, Genre",,"April 12, 2020","Kristin Jacobson, Professor of American Literature, Stockton University",,,,,,genre-control-chaos,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,email,"Emotional Experience,Genre,Home,Professors,Television Series,Westworld",https://humanitiesmoments.org/files/original/371/george-coletrain-ZtSl6qxcgus-unsplash.jpg,Text,,1,0