Prof. Leyva Teaches 'Evolution of Batman' - and Shows Timeless Connection Between Pop Culture and Social Concerns
June 1, 2018
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Students in search of a stimulating blend of American storytelling and modern concerns may be interested in a Fall 2018 University of Baltimore class, "The Evolution of Batman." Steven Leyva, assistant professor in the Klein Family School of Communications Design, says the course will look at Batman's many interpretations through several decades, as well as the roles the character fills for readers, viewers, listeners and players of video games.
"He's a detective," Prof. Leyva says of the iconic superhero. "He's the greatest detective. He's an inventor. He's a great strategist. He reads like a noir story. And Batman is us—who we actually are when we stop pretending: scared, angry, extreme, driven, sometimes wildly intuitive, but also in such desperate need of family."
This isn't the first time Prof. Leyva has taught a class focused on a pop culture subject. This past spring, he taught "Anime and Animation," in which students applied literary and film criticism techniques to such films as Princess Mononoke and Grave of the Fireflies. Before that, he taught a class on the graphic novel.
"I think there's no sense in pretending that I'm not also a fan," he says. "Yes, it's a dream class. And hey, this is something that I care about, and I'm interested in what might be explored if we talk about it and discuss it in a rigorous way—but what I hope is that the underlying value is seeing that the things that you are nerdy about are worthy of not just being hobbies, but exploration."
Examining the things we love, and trying to understand why—it's worth our time, Prof. Leyva says.
"You may discover something about yourself that was previously hidden or just below the surface. That's valuable, too. It doesn't have to always be of value because it turns into something that you can do."
The importance of studying pop culture genres or characters is the development of what he calls "skills of interiority."
"If we accept the premise that something major in pop culture is already reflective of, or in a recursive relationship with us regarding what we think, feel, and do, then understanding that piece of pop culture is a way of understanding ourselves," he says. "It's the same premise as studying Shakespeare, to be honest. It's just that we perceive Shakespeare to be high art."
Which raises the threshold question: Is pop art ... art?
Recently, one of Baltimore's primary connections to this world, Geppi's Pop Culture Museum, announced both its closure and the donation of its holdings to the Library of Congress's Thomas Jefferson Building. This move could be seen as a public statement of legitimacy, acknowledging comic books and graphic novels as the important cultural works of art that many experts, including Prof. Leyva, say that they are.
"There is a settled debate over whether we should study art. I think the debate has become what is valuable art to study," Leyva says.
This brings us to Batman—the character, the storyline, the iconography. What's so great about it? To Leyva, this part of the story has become, in his words, inane.
"We've already decided that [the Batman story] is valuable because we keep adapting it, we keep presenting it. Batman has been in something like almost 800 issues. We're talking about something that's quickly approaching 100 years—something that I think would be difficult to argue is a fad."
But why is Batman worth looking at so closely now? According to Prof. Leyva, there is a clear parallel to be drawn between Batman's origin story—the murder of his benevolent parents by criminals, and his life-altering response—and contemporary concerns.
"His presentation as an obsessive, but also his motivations of justice, sound very similar to the debate we have right now over gun violence and school shootings," he says. "What could he do? His answer is a sort of bizarre, adventure-based answer, but his motivation is, 'This should not happen.' He takes it into his own hands. We all wish we could. We wish we were smart enough to do that."
Beyond the guns, the persona of Bruce Wayne, Batman's public-facing alter-ego, may have something to do with it as well.
"To be honest, it might be the desire to deconstruct the 'billionaire white man' in the current political climate."
In some ways, Batman represents stability.
"In times of great turmoil, looking at something that has persisted, but also contains multitudes, might help us to understand who we might be. Not every character can do that. I think some of it is just the fact that we've got a large body of work across different media. We've got television, different iterations of film, print, cartoons, video games. Is there an area of media culture that Batman hasn't touched? There's radio, also. There's a way in which Batman is part of the 20th century DNA."
The class, "The Evolution of Batman," is cross-listed as ENGL-333 and CMAT-333, and will fulfill both Communication and English requirements. For more information on enrolling in the class, contact Jennifer Taylor, academic program specialist in the Yale Gordon College of Arts and Sciences, at 410.837.5351, or email her at jtaylor@ubalt.edu.
Learn more about Prof. Steven Leyva and the Klein Family School of Communications Design.