"Twerking 101?" "The Semiotics
of The Tongue as a Metaphor for Social Discourse?" "Highway to Hell:
How Starring on a Disney TV Show May Possibly be a Prelude to Rehab?"
No, April Fool's Day hasn't come early this year, despite our early-morning attempts at humor.
But Miley Cyrus is about to make her way into the hallowed halls of academia.
Not
Cyrus herself, of course, whose current concert tour will keep her on
the road through mid-June and whose interest in higher learning thus far
seems to apply more to perfecting the art of rolling joints, preferably
with her own official Bangerz rolling papers.
Visiting Assistant Professor of Sociology Carolyn Chernoff will teach the 251-level special topics course.
"I
was teaching a course called 'Youth Culture' in and out of School, and
the 2013 MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs) became the 'twerk heard ’round
the world'," Chernoff told The Saratogian newspaper Wednesday. "I showed
that video to my class, and the students had so much to say."
Yes,
many tongues were wagging after the VMAs, which was precisely Cyrus'
goal (either that, or she just wanted to exact revenge upon her dad,
country music veteran Billy Ray, for his inane rap-remake of "Achy
Breaky Heart," which was released earlier this year).
All joking aside, Chernoff plans to use her course on Cyrus to probe some provocative issues. They include:
Race
and cultural appropriation: "Miley is white but wants to appropriate a
black sound. She doesn’t discuss her white privilege," Chernoff told The
Saratogian.
Sexuality as a
marketing tool for former Disney TV stars: "They’ve all had to re-brand
themselves as wild, crazy, sexual beings. This ties into the whole
virgin/whore dichotomy," said Chernoff, who added: "Miley is a lens into
cultural conflict."
Cyrus,
meanwhile spent a day off from touring earlier this month to team up
with La Jolla Playhouse collaborators Flaming Lips to record a new
version of The Beatles "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds." Lips frontman
Wayne Coyne documented the session by posting an Instagram photo of
Cyrus rolling a joint.
Coyne
and fellow Lips member Steven Drozd joined Miley Cyrus onstage last
month at her show at the Staples Center in Los Angeles for a version of
the Lips' 2002 song, "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Part 1," which
debuted in 2012 as an eye-popping musical at the La Jolla Playhouse. As
best we can recall, the Playhouse production was twerk-free.
