A Monster of a Class

IF YOU WATCH ANY FRANKENSTEIN movies this Halloween, have a little pity for the monster. He's not what he appears to be. Look beyond his rough exterior and you'll find that his sex may be male but his gender is female.

"All he wants is to be loved and have a family, and he doesn't have the power to make that happen," says professor Keala Jewell. "He's domestic." And that's why the monster is worthy of discussion in a women's studies class.

Jewell's unconventional interpretation of Mary Shelley's gothic tale was part of her summer-term course "From Frankenstein to The Attack of the 50-FootWoman: Women and Monsters in Fiction and Film." The course is designed to help students think differently not just about gender, but about why people create demons.

"The course tries to articulate how cultures define humans and non-humans. How we think of ourselves has to do with how we think about others," she says. "Each culture has its own monsters."

From Dante's Divine Comedy to fairy tales on the Disney channel, women have been demonized as witches, sirens, enchantresses and hags, according to Jewell, editor of the scholarly volume Monsters in the ItalianLiterary Tradition. Jewell's favorite film, Rosemary's Baby, in which a woman gives birth to Satan's child, illustrates a deep-seated fear about the capabilities—and dangers—of the female body. Even Aristotle was guilty. "He viewed all women as monstrous," says Jewell. "He saw males as the norm and women as a

deformity." Even if her26 students signed up for the course just to watch monster movies, that's okay with Jewell. It proves that humans' age-old fascination with monsters is still going strong. But the professor thinks students are seeking more than entertainment. "They're searching to find their identities," says Jewell. Just like Frankenstein's monster.

This fall's entering class is one of the most diverse ever, as 342 of its members (31 percent) are students of color, the highest number in Dartmouth history, according to dean of admissions Karl Furstenberg. Here are some other facts about the class of '06: Applicants: 10,194 Admitted: 2,090 Matriculated: 1,073 International students: 55 High school valedictorians: 157 Mean combined SAT score: 1414 Admitted through early decision: 35 % Total financial aid: $II million