Did You Do Your Homework? | A Pop Culture Podcast
240 episodes - English - Latest episode: 20 days ago - ★★★★★ - 9 ratingsWe are educators connecting academic ideas to popular culture
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Episodes
Episode 36: Zombies as Metaphor
July 04, 2018 03:28 - 1 hour - 122 MBZombies are EVERYWHERE and now they're on our podcast, too. Join us and guest Austin to talk Warm Bodies, The Girl With All the Gifts, and the Newsflesh trilogy as we dive into what zombies stand for and why they're so pervasive in our pop cultural landscape.
Episode 35: Remixing the Bard
June 20, 2018 03:56 - 1 hour - 136 MBWe get down with Shakespeare in our newest episode! Reoccurring friend of the show Maren Hagman joins us to discuss interpretations of Shakespeare's work, including the seminal Ran by Akira Kurosawa; 10 Things I Hate About You starring Julia Stiles and Heath Ledger; and As I Descended by Robin Talley. Martha stans for Taming of the Shrew and everyone else is all in on Macbeth - check out this group of book nerds as we all get geeky over Billy Shakes.
Episode 34: PTSD
June 06, 2018 14:50 - 1 hour - 115 MBWe get personal with a discussion on PTSD in pop culture: different portrayals, how it effects character motivation, and how we can use pop culture to help work through our own trauma. Joel Kenyon from 40 Going on 14, The Coffin Joe Cast, and The Joel Happy Kpants Hour joins us to discuss Macbeth, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, and Jessica Jones.
Episode 33: Virtue
May 23, 2018 14:58 - 1 hour - 134 MBPart two of Vice and Virtue! We're joined by guest Sara Shaw to talk about the ways in which virtue is portrayed, exploited, utilized and embodied by a variety of different characters. Homework for the episode: The Crucible by Arthur Miller; Dogma, 1999 film directed by Kevin Smith; Peace Like a River, 2001 novel by Leif Enger.
Episode 32: Vice
May 09, 2018 14:15 - 1 hour - 129 MBWe continue our cross-pollination with the 40 Going on 14 crowd today with special guest Pat Whaley! Pat brings some real life experience to our discussion on Vice (don't miss our next episode all about the flipside, Virtue). Our homework for the episode: Repo! The Genetic Opera; the 1998 gambling parable Rounders; and the cyberpunk classic Neuromancer.
Episode 31: Anti Heroes
April 25, 2018 17:00 - 1 hour - 120 MBWe have a very special guest this episode - the oft referred to husband of host Martha, Bill! We discuss anti heroes, including some rousing disagreement on whether our characters of choice actually count. Our homework for the episode: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson, the 2012 action movie opus DREDD, and the genesis of the film noir genre, The Maltese Falcon.
Episode 30: Toxic Masculinity
April 11, 2018 13:28 - 1 hour - 148 MBWe're extra topical (and extra long) today as we're joined by friend of the show Caitlin Hofert to discuss toxic masculinity. Our homework includes two TED talks, the pilot of The Sopranos, and a YA novel titles Devils Within by S.F. Henson.
Episode 29: Niche Communities
March 27, 2018 23:13 - 1 hour - 128 MBJoin us and guest Austin Delmond as we discuss niche communities in all their grit and glory. Homework for the episode: Wolf in White Van by John Darnielle, Awesome Games Done Quick speedruns, and Fursonas, a 2016 documentary.
Episode 28: Awards Shows
March 14, 2018 03:29 - 1 hour - 127 MBWe're joined by returning guest Lizzie Buehler to dissect the 2018 Academy Awards, just like every other pop culture podcast in existence! But seriously, we all have feelings and you're entitled to 'em as we talk about the relevancy of the Oscars and award shows in general.
Bonus Episode! Academy Awards Chatter
March 03, 2018 16:12 - 7 minutes - 13.5 MBEnjoy this bonus episode! Pete and Martha have a quick, unstructured chat about some of the contenders for the Academy Awards. Martha had just seen "Phantom Thread" and "Three Billboards," so the discussion focuses on those two movies.
Episode 27: Fairy Tales
February 28, 2018 04:39 - 1 hour - 132 MBToday Martha's friend and coworker Lauren Maxwell joins us to talk about the wide and wonderful world of fairy tales! We look at the old, the new, and the remixed - Neil Gaiman's modern take on Sleeping Beauty, The Sleeper and the Spindle; Mike Mignola's supernatural investigator Hellboy in his third collection, The Corpse and the Iron Shoes; and Guillermo del Toro's masterpiece Pan's Labyrinth. We talk about their cultural pervasiveness, their impact on our media landscape, and it's only tow...
Episode 26: Body Image
February 14, 2018 02:35 - 1 hour - 111 MBThis episode gets a little sensitive (hence the content warnings) as we delve into different portrayals of body image, eating disorders, and other self-image topics. We are joined by returning guest Maren Hagman to discuss Hairspray, Zoolander, and The Art of Starving by Sam J. Miller.
Episode 25: Formative Media
January 31, 2018 13:11 - 59 minutes - 108 MBWe use the words "formative media" so often on the podcast that we decided we'd better to an episode about it so we could explain what exactly we mean by that. Today we're talking about the stories and media that helped shape who we are as media consumers, and we do so with an expert on pop culture nostalgia: welcome guest Josh Brown from the podcast 40 Going on 14!
Episode 24: Better Together: Teamups
January 17, 2018 04:47 - 1 hour - 112 MBCalee's back for our one year anniversary episode, which is all about Teamups ! With the insane popularity of comic-based film right now, pop culture is pretty saturated with teamups. For our homework today we looked at the Big Two from the Big Two, and Pete threw us all a welcome curve ball by introducing a real-life teamup in the form of the pop supergroup The New Pornographers.
Episode 23: Top 10 of 2017
January 03, 2018 01:24 - 1 hour - 118 MBEpisode 23: Top 10 of 2017 by Did You Do Your Homework? | A Pop Culture Podcast
Episode 22: Moments of Character Transcendence
December 20, 2017 02:08 - 1 hour - 116 MBWhat exactly do we mean when we say "moments of character transcendence"? It's a lofty phrase, but what are we talking about? The characters we're examining - a witch-in-training, a lost and damaged super genius (and her various protectors), and a pair of feisty demon hunters - all have a moment that crystallizes who they are, what they stand for, and what their stories are trying to say.
Episode 21: Transformation
December 06, 2017 13:19 - 1 hour - 145 MBFriend of the show Sarah Caputo joins us today to talk TRANSFORMATION and all the ways it changes us. We have some feelings about character agency, the virtues of self-driven transformation vs. the non-consensual kind, and the use of metaphor, among others. Our homework for the episode: Uglies by Scott Westerfeld, The Wicked + the Divine: The Faust Act by Jamie McKelvie and Kieron Gillen, and the 1985 horror masterpiece Fright Night.
Extra Credit 20.5: Holiday Faves
November 22, 2017 12:55 - 38 minutes - 70.2 MBHello and welcome to our holiday break episode! Thanksgiving is tomorrow and we're all super busy making pies or eating turkey or watching football, so we have a nice light episode full of our favorite holiday media for you. No homework required!
Episode 20: Masks
November 08, 2017 04:41 - 1 hour - 118 MBWe're talking about MASKS, both literally and figuratively, with guest star Mark Rhomberg! We examine plot and character elements, and there may or may not be a round of patting each other on the back for not assigning any straight forward superhero stories (although we still manage to talk about Batman, because, well, duh). Remember, we are who we pretend to be, so fake it till you make it and listen to our episode.
Episode 19: Sound & Music
October 25, 2017 03:30 - 1 hour - 122 MBWe get technical this week as we examine the ways that sound, music, and silence are used in various forms of visual media. Our guest for the episode is Dan Karlin, of SOOL Radio fame, who joins our discussion as we get into, amongst the other things, diegetic music, creating tone with sound, and how Martha gets anxious when a movie doesn't have any score at all. It's no accident that we're talking about yet another Ryan Murphy joint, or that all of our media happens to be surreal in nature -...
Episode 18: Tabletop RPGs
October 11, 2017 03:46 - 1 hour - 121 MBWe are leaving our three-media homework model to the side for a moment to try something different! This ep, we share our experiences with tabletop roleplaying games, and discuss the values we think they have, particularly in an academic and educational environment. We share games that are particular favorites, what we grew up playing, why we enjoy them - and how we've passed that on to the students we interact with.
Episode 17: Ambition
September 27, 2017 03:25 - 59 minutes - 109 MBSpecial guest host Lizzie Buehler joins us to discuss not throwing away our shots, toxic masculinity, and the musical stylings of Glee. Ambition is our topic of the hour: is it a good thing or a bad thing (in general and for our main characters), is it different from having drive or passion, and how do our featured stories treat it differently when the ambitious character in question is a gal or a dude? Homework for the episode: the soundtrack to Hamilton, There Will be Blood, and a couple ep...
Episode 16: You Can't Go Home Again
September 13, 2017 03:29 - 57 minutes - 105 MB"Home" is a nebulous concept that is, by its nature, constantly redefined. We attempt to make sense of what it means to our main characters, and in the process get to talk about format and world building a whole lot. Home is pretty deeply tied to identity for all of our main characters, so we end up looping a little bit back to our very first topic for the show as we explore the struggle to define oneself by an idea that is constantly shifting.
Episode 15: Forgiveness
August 30, 2017 03:40 - 1 hour - 127 MBWe dig deep into semantics here, and it may be the first episode where that's a good thing! Across all three media, we encounter characters who are seeking forgiveness in some capacity or another: from their loved ones, from themselves, on behalf of themselves. Are they successful? What defines success? Is, perhaps, the act of seeking forgiveness enough to warrant it? We also get meta and look at what role we as an audience have in being able to forgive characters.
Episode 14.5: Summer School
August 16, 2017 03:28 - 1 hour - 135 MBThe podcast is undergoing some changes, so we're taking a quick restructuring break to talk about what pop culture we've been consuming this summer: what's been awesome, and what has been...less so. We're joined by the first of what will hopefully be a long line of awesome guests, Maren!
Episode 14: Leaders & Leadership
August 02, 2017 04:24 - 1 hour - 122 MBLeadership plays a strong role in most narratives, and it behooves us to take a closer look at the strengths, weaknesses, and character traits of some of the many leaders we find in media. We generate a list of characteristics we appreciate in our leadership, Martha gets salty about Superman and Mark Millar, and we have a lot of fun talking about rats. Some sensitive topics are broached re: our current political state, but for the most part this is a bipartisan episode. (J/K our president is ...
Episode 13: Fandom in Media
July 19, 2017 03:58 - 1 hour - 112 MBToday's episode is brought to you by fanculture everywhere. Join us as we take a deep dive into fandom and how media portrays it, from the perspective of male and female fans and even a bit from the creator side.
Episode 12: The Hero's Journey
July 05, 2017 13:54 - 1 hour - 125 MBToday we're getting academic with an in-depth discussion of that age-old storytelling convention, the hero's journey. Using Tolkein, Shrek, and an animated celebration of the Day of the Dead (The Book of Life, hey-o) we talk about the elements that make up the archetypal hero's journey and why it's important to understanding the way we have and continue to tell stories.
Episode 11: Grief and Grieving
June 21, 2017 14:00 - 1 hour - 137 MBGrief is something that everyone experiences in some shape or form during their lifetimes, and pop culture can help us develop the tools to deal with and overcome it. We thread our way through three stories that show us how characters overcome their grief, and also how an artist can use his art to express it. Things get kinda heavy.
Episode 10.5: Extra Credit
June 07, 2017 11:56 - 38 minutes - 70.9 MBThis is not a full episode of our podcast! Due to personal reasons, we were unable to fully prepare to give our listeners the best episode they deserved, so we're pushing the schedule back a week. In the meantime, we give you an extended Credentials episode, that's really just an excuse for us all to talk about Wonder Woman a whole lot.
Episode 10: Pop Culture Perceptions of Mental Health
May 23, 2017 23:33 - 1 hour - 120 MBEpisode 10: Pop Culture Perceptions of Mental Health by Did You Do Your Homework? | A Pop Culture Podcast
Episode 9: Strange Bedfellows
May 10, 2017 15:26 - 51 minutes - 94.3 MBWhat exactly do we mean when we say "Strange Bedfellows"? We're talking weird character matchups between people who have absolutely nothing in common - or DO they? We get down and dirty on the subject of odd couples, weird matchups, character growth and something Pete has dubbed "Radical Empathy." We take you from ghosts to the apocalypse, from the Cold War to first generation Russian immigrants, and from the idyllic English countryside to 1960's Rome in our search for commonality. What we fi...
Episode 8: Caring (Or Not) For the Natural World
April 26, 2017 13:24 - 1 hour - 117 MBIn this era of EPA rollbacks, what role should pop culture play in raising awareness? Is capitalism the source of all environmental evil? Is Avatar actually a really racist movie? All this and more is on the table as your phenomenally nerdy cohosts dig deep into the conservation warnings broadcast by their homework. Discussion points include sources of environmental destruction, the role of consumerism in environmental deterioration, and more that's sure to leave you perky and upbeat and not ...
Episode 7: Alternative Facts or, How We Relate to News Media
April 12, 2017 16:42 - 1 hour - 126 MBMartha uses the podcast as a thinly veiled excuse to watch Shattered Glass again, and to plumb the depths of Slate to read about the real world scandal. Pete is way more politically savvy than anyone else in the room (natch), and Calee keeps us all grounded by reminding us that teenagers really are the future of the resistance (a thematic callback to Episode 2, even if we all forgot to point that out!). Martha ALSO awkwardly shoehorns in a discussion about superheroes and news coverage of vig...
Episode 6: Sacrifice
March 29, 2017 03:55 - 1 hour - 125 MBIt's another perky episode where we somehow manage to have a good time, despite our weighty topic. Martha takes a victory lap when Pete admits that one of these items is his most favoritest homework he's been assigned yet (which one may surprise you), we argue intent of story versus intent of character, Calee feels skeptical about deconstructed magical girls, and we once again forget to talk about Logan even though it's apparently relevant to absolutely everything we're doing anymore.
Episode 5: The Hero/Sidekick Relationship
March 15, 2017 04:45 - 54 minutes - 99.5 MBHave you ever wanted to put the relationship between Batman and his many, many sidekicks under a microscope and really get to the bottom of them? Good news! In this week's episode, we dig into the hero/sidekick relationship in all its forms, including a rough history where Martha asks Pete to show his work and he doesn't immediately strangle her with her headphones cord. We talk a whole lot about Star Trek and never come to a conclusion about whether or not it's relevant! All this AND MORE. ...
Episode 4: Reboots & Reimaginings
March 01, 2017 05:04 - 59 minutes - 109 MBIt's our fourth episode, which means we've officially been doing this for over a month! Hooray! This week, we dive into the concept of remakes, reboots, reimaginings and adaptations and Martha realizes that each of these concepts could probably be their own episode? What makes a good reboot, motives, and purpose are all discussed, and we all unanimously agree to strike the phrase "[X] ruined my childhood" from our cultural vernacular.
Not All Wounds Are Visible
February 15, 2017 05:59 - 1 hour - 138 MBIn our third episode, the hosts of Did You Do Your Homework discuss BULLYING in all its ugly forms! Homework for this week: Dazed & Confused, Hjordis mini-series, and Th1rteen R3asons Why by Jay Asher.
Episode 2: Welcome to the Resistence
February 01, 2017 04:48 - 54 minutes - 100 MBIn our second episode, we all get real fired up about the current political climate, while also DEEPLY admiring the role that people of color, teens, and especially teenage girls are playing in our resistance. We talk about music for the first time! Warning: this episode is deeply biased and reveals the biases of all your hosts (spoiler alert: our biases influence the things we love and how we react, and thus will always be an inherent part of our podcast).
Episode 1: Who Am I? Identity As a Story Tool
January 18, 2017 05:39 - 56 minutes - 51.3 MBIt's here! Our debut episode, in which we discuss how identity functions as a narrative tool, get used to the flow of conversation in a podcast, and Martha gets a little cranky about what people see as "feminist" narratives. The homework for the episode: Martha: Sense8 holiday special (Netflix streaming) Pete: The VVitch (film) Calee: The Orphanage (film)