I teach English Composition at the college level. Each semester I work to develop a class that makes sense to me and engages the student base as well. This semester I returned to the Hero 101 mold and taught the class through super heroes and villains. Now I am nearing the endgame and the students are developing their super hero project. It is a simple project. They are supposed to design a super hero for the year 2021-22 and that hero has to have a life reflective of the now and a problem or antagonist reflective of the world we live in. That is simply said but less easily understood or done. I’m starting to wonder if the students are up to the challenge.
What does it mean to build a modern hero? Is Spiderman a ‘now’ hero? Batman? Superman? none of these heroes were created in the last 50 years, yet so much has happened in the last 50 years that these characters should be reflective of that. Somehow they feel like they are, even if they absolutely aren’t. That is the key here. I want to introduce the students to a way to be reflective of their own lives and safely develop alter egos in a way that acknowledges their lives and their worlds and their realities–which are so different than my own.
This project scares me because it is so ambitious and has such a high chance of being a complete mess. Still I try. I hope it goes amazingly well. I expect some of these students will succeed and others will fall flat. This is life. This is the way.