Cates and Bug talk about the role of the monomyth and The Invasion as a hero's journey.

Transcript here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/en9i88bltmvkoqa/Fandalite%20Academy%20Transcript%2001%20-%20The%20Invasion%2C%20AKA%20Not%20Your%20Grandfather%27s%20Heroes.pdf?dl=0

1. The Invasion, AKA Not Your Grandfather's Heroes

Aliens, monsters, and school administrators, oh my!  In this episode, Bug is cynical about the U.S. government's policies on learned helplessness and Cates is cynical about the world of children's book publishing.

Transcript here: https://fandaliteacademy.tumblr.com/post/179450123250/fandalite-academy-transcript-02-the-visitor-aka#notes

2. The Visitor, AKA The Past is an Unknown Land

Cates is critical of children's lit review journals and wonders if it still counts as a liminal space if you never actually leave. Bug explains how humans' capacity for empathy increases when we see something of ourselves in the recipient, before waxing poetic about the Yeerks' bathroom facilities.

Transcript is here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/qxxbo41pw864lky/Transcript%20Fandalite%20Academy%20Episode%203%20The%20Encounter%2C%20AKA%20Always%20Read%20the%20Fine%20Print.pdf?dl=0

3. The Encounter, AKA Thresholds, Flights, and Liminal Spaces Full of Dead Rabbits

Tune in to this week's episode to hear Bug talk about metacognition in dolphins (no, seriously) and Cates talk about song, dance, and the power of friendship.
Transcript is here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/rm8jjgzcnq42r3u/Fandalite%20Academy%2C%20Episode%204%20The%20Message%2C%20AKA%20Welcome%20to%20the%20Island%20of%20Misfit%20Toys%20.pdf?dl=0

4. The Message, AKA Welcome to the Island of Misfit Toys

Cates and Bug talk about the ways that Marco — in a refreshing contrast from a lot of sci fi and fantasy heroes — provides a window into issues of class, mortality, and nontraditional family structure.  We continue to celebrate the awesomeness of K.A. Applegate in light of (lack of) adolescent mortality salience and narratology theories of identity.

5. The Predator, AKA Tales from Outer Suburbia: Maternity, Mortality, and (Im)Maturity

In this episode, Cates and Bug discuss how alien abduction really complicates the question of narratology, how K.A. Applegate deliberately undermines the Ideal Victim Myth, and how stories about brothers have been around since the dawn of time.

6. The Capture, AKA He Ain't Heavy, He's My Jungian Shadow

Bug and Cates use The Stranger as an excuse to go into the broader context of Animorphs.  They talk about the importance of seeing oneself represented in fictional characters, both from a Media Psychology perspective and through the lens of the We Need Diverse Books movement.

7. The Stranger, AKA Define "Normal"

In this week's episode, Bug and Cates debate what makes a human a human--is it free will? A brain? A soul? A body? More importantly, who gets to decide? Bug discusses how the Chee would fit into the theory of extropy and gives a brief history of science fiction, while Cates breaks down the logical fallacies inherent in the Chee and wonders if Applegate was aware she was writing a post-humanist text.

10. The Android, AKA Do Animorphs Dream of Electric Chee?

In this week's episode, Cates discusses why she finds many modern portrayals of fate and destiny rather lacking, and why she thinks this book handles it well. Bug discusses the Existential Crisis of the Jam Aisle, or the fear and pressure that comes from having too many choices.

13. The Change, AKA Always Read the Fine Print: Fate and Verbal Overshadowing

In this episode, Cates and Bug both talk about what makes the veleek such a scary monster for the Animorphs to fight, Cates from the perspective of ecocriticism and Bug from the perspective of the evolutionary psychology of easily conditioned phobias.

More about Honey, our podcast mascot, here: https://fandaliteacademy.tumblr.com/post/179316635690/honey-catess-chihuahua-mascot-for-our

Megamorphs 1: The Andalite's Gift, AKA Beasts of the Southern California Wild

In this episode, Bug and Cates discuss toilets and the US government (that can't be a coincidence, can it?) Cates talks about how the book covers are a liminal space where we see our own disgust and disquiet with adolescence reflected back at us. Bug discusses the persistence (or lack thereof) of memory and how intelligence isn't nearly as cut and dry as getting good grades in school. Near the end, Cates also says that Breitbart is a far-left publication and Mother Jones is a far-right publication...strike that, reverse it!

14. The Unknown, AKA Heavily Guarded Andalite Port-A-Potties: Your Tax Dollars at Work

Tune in to this week's episode to hear Cates talk about Marco's use of situational and irony, Bug argue that Marco really is intelligent under all the bad jokes, and both of us debate the meaning of metaphor as it relates to Marco's sharklike nature.

Apologies for the delayed posting, and for Bug's occasional cold wheezes on the recording.

15. The Escape, AKA Isn't It Ironic?

Tune in this week to hear Cates talk about the importance of Animorphs and other children's books adopting a childist perspective, while Bug talks about groupthink in the Animorphs' decision making and why it's actually important that the strict category of "groupthink" is no longer in use.

16. The Warning, AKA Defying Categorization: Children Aren't as Simple as We'd Like to Think

In this week's episode, Bug explains why the Trolley Problem is useless in empirical studies, and Cates covers such light-hearted topics as WWI poetry and how a misunderstanding about cleaning schedules kicked off the French Revolution. Cates feels that this book's ending leaves too much unanswered, while Bug thinks leaving everything unanswered is the answer.

17. The Underground, AKA Rationalism is Neat, Reality is Messy

In this episode, Bug talks about biculturalism (and no, mosquitos don't count as their own culture.) Cates talks about the differences between individualist and collectivist cultures and concludes the Leeran are the ultimate collectivists. Both Cates and Bug share their disappointment that the frame story takes so much time it cuts into the adventure on Leera, especially the part with the cave of falling snakes. (Bet you didn't even remember that was a thing!)

18. The Decision, AKA If You Wanna Be My Captain, You Gotta Get With My Friends

It's our longest episode to date, and our episode with the worst sound quality to date. We tried recording over Skype. We're not trying that again. 

Anyway, in this episode Cates and Bug look back at the Dinosaur Renaissance (it's a thing) in the 1990s. Bug explains how humans process different situations in different ways, and why you don't want to overthink yourself in a survival situation. Cates talks about hunter/gatherers vs agriculturalists, and concludes that the Mercora went extinct because they spent too much time growing their broccoli.

Megamorphs 2: In The Time of the Dinosaurs, AKA Cretaceous Park is Frightening In the Dark

In this week's episode, Cates describes the ways that Cassie uses the Ethic of Care to break the mold of what it means to be a hero (in the Western, masculine, Campbellian sense) through defeating her enemies by making them friends.  Bug argues that the Mere Contact theory would suggest there's more logic to back up Cassie's decision to befriend Aftran than a lot of fans give her credit for, and that this book does a better job of portraying mental health than the overwhelming majority of SF depictions of post-traumatic stress.

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19. The Departure, AKA A Radical Defense of the Power of Love

In this episode, Bug uses the Dark Triad--the personality traits of Machiavellianism, Psychopathy, and Narcissism--to analyze the Animorphs and David. She argues that while David is definitely a bad guy, his presence also reveals to the reader why the Animorphs aren't always the good guys. Cates adds helpful (sometimes) commentary about why David fails at recruiting Marco as his minion, if there are any saltwater amphibians (turns out there are,) and why unplugging a computer to stop an online sale isn't actually as hilariously implausible as it seems.

20. The Discovery, AKA All My Friends Are Heathens

Welcome to the Fandalite Academy, your source for all the psychological and literary theory behind Animorphs that you neither wanted nor needed.  We post episodes on alternate Sundays, so tune in once every two weeks to hear us gush about Animorphs.

Bug is a Ph.D student in Social Psychology who researches narrative persuasion and reads too many sci fi novels.

Cates is a PhD student in Children's Literature who researches depictions of trauma and recovery in children's fantasy novels. She is owned by a chihuahua with delusions of cat-dom.

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