Freud: The Secret Passion

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

You can all just stop the presses--I have found the greatest American movie of all time. 

You see, I've been scant around these parts thanks to the onerous task of finishing my Master's thesis (short version: it's on male hysteria in postwar narratives; yes, I managed to once again mention Paul Newman--twice!). And in the course of my research, I stumbled across this:

Spoiler: his secret passion is exposition!

That's right. Freud: The Secret Passion, made in 1961 and travelling through time to make your day. 




I now measure my life in two stages: from before I knew of its existence and after I learned about it; it's very much a  kind of a priori and a posteriori situation, except in this case there's no Latin dweebs around, just awesome bossy psychoanalysts who earnestly hypnotize people into arriving at simplistic but alarmingly accurate psychiatric diagnoses. 

Oh, Freud: The Secret Passion. How can I measure my glee?

You guys, it stars Montgomery Clift as Freud. Let me repeat that: Montgomery Clift, Method actor and closeted gay actor, AS SIGMUND FREUD. There are so many layers in this piece of information that I don't even know where to start. 




If that doesn't turn your crank, do let me go on with a numbered list of amazing. 


1. The screenplay is by Jean Paul Sartre. No, seriously. 


2. Related: Jean-Paul Sartre originally wanted Marilyn Monroe to play the role of Freud's hysteria patient, Cecily Koertner. Ohmygodwhydidthisnothappen. 


3. It is most commonly known as "Freud." Add an exclamation point to that and you've got a hit Broadway musical. Come to think of it, it's about two bars away from being that time when Joey Tribianni got his first singing role. 

4. It is directed by John Huston, best known for The Maltese Falcon, The African Queen and every boss movie ever the end. 

5. This film is basically a detective story about the human mind, and EVERYTHING IS THE MOST RIDICULOUS. The parts where Freud basically "arrives" spontaneously at stunning conclusions which in reality took him the better part of his career are a highlight (spoiler: this comprises all the parts). 

In all honesty, the screenplay actually does a fair job of explaining a lot of Freud's theories, but when these same theories are delivered while Monty Clift is pacing in his study while oh. so. thoughtfully. stroking his beard, it loses a great deal of its lucidity. 

Who am I kidding. I loved every single second of its 2 hours and 20 minute running time. I think I'm going to make my family watch this every Christmas, whether they like it or not. *single tear* It's what Freud would have wanted. 

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

Busby Berkeley Dreams

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

Editor's note: I'm presenting a paper on Busby Berkeley at a conference this week, so thought I'd shake this one off in his honour. Enjoy! 

Look, I know. But I can’t help but name it—I got a thing for the chorus girl.

It keeps popping up in my fiction, a stutter of a motif. It’s my own regrettable nostalgia, mostly wrapped up in what it conveyed rather than what it really was—the yesteryears of the enigmatic dancing girl, guileless in her power over men and brightly smiling under the stage lights. But it was never true, really. It's a hyperreal performance of womanhood, never the real thing. 

Have you seen these creatures? They’re unreal. Smiles glued to their lips, pushing their uniform bodies through space. They're girlish little women, or else womanly girls. Do they have an inner life, their own agency? You'd never guess.


Their kind echo throughout history—the swaying hips of the burlesque, the eternal girlchild of Victorian soap ads, the dazzling performance of femaleness of the Hollywood chorus girl. Eternally young and appropriately blank. 

But dancing girls exist only as a collective noun: who ever talks about one dancing girl? They only exist together; when dispersed, the effect evaporates. And so they travel in packs, trapped in the forgiving limitations of the evening show. Rather than stand alone, the dancing girls are the seams in the self-contained logic of their musical numbers.

From LIFE magazine, 1958. 

Dispel your misplaced notion that these women a) really want to be up there on stage and b) are just delighted to be dancing for you—yes, you!—as they kick, twirl, gesture and hoof in perfect uniformity, trained within an inch of their life to follow the next. Dancing until they die--or turn 35, whatever happens first.

*

Busby Berkeley’s girls, meanwhile, didn’t even need that much: “I never cared whether a girl knew her right foot from her left,” he once said, “so long as she was beautiful.”

Footlight Parade, 1933

Berkeley, a man made famous by his unmistakable configurations of the female form in abstract space, was alarmingly unsentimental when faced with the legions of pretty girls that built his legacy. He’s not the first, either: look to the 1884 Electric Girl Company, a business model that supplied young girls whose bodies were outfitted in electric lights and ornaments. They were used for parties or as waitresses for the crop of modernity-obsessed restaurants, the perfect melding of technology and the human (female) body.

Then followed the usual suspects: the Rockettes, in the 1920s; Earl Carroll’s vaudeville revue “Vanities”; circus peep shows; burlesque shows that slowly showed more and more skin.

There is something beyond surreal in these chorus lines—the faces of these pretty young women, rather than approach uniformity, disturb me in the ways they are dissimilar; in other words, I am perturbed by the idea that I’m supposed to blend them all together and marvel at their sameness, as if someone in the costuming department expected the matching wigs and thematic outfits would erase anything unique or special about everything contained therein.

Earl Carroll was the creator of vaudeville’s “Vanities”, a precursor to the Berkeley chorus girl by more than a few years, had his own philosophy on the Platonic nature of these chorus lines:

“The following points of beauty are given careful consideration: color and texture of hair, brilliancy and size of eyes, regularity of teeth, general coloring, texture of skin, formation of hands and feet, posture and personality...”

But not even these high standards could always be met, as Carroll went on to note:

“There are times (and this was particularly true during the war) when it was necessary to engage girls who do not have all the necessary qualifications. We replace them when it is possible.”

There exists, if you’re curious, a record of the measurements of the “ideal chorine.” Gals, break out your measuring tapes—or, you know, roll your eyes. So the ideal chorus girl has:

-a six-inch wrist

-a twelve inch neck

-a nineteen and a half thigh

-a nine inch ankle.

Not to mention the highest standard of personal grooming. Rather than be repulsed at the blatant sexism on display here, I'm kind of charmed. I mean, they must have had their reasons, right? You can't blame anyone for having standards, even if those standards codify the female form into the gender expectations of an ice cube tray. 

Oh, wait. Never mind. I just remembered Berkeley’s stated goal when casting new chorus girls: his hope was that all the girls would be of uniform size, talent and comeliness—“just like pearls.”

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

"Bring me five more martinis, Leo, line them up right here."

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology


When I was a little girl, I was pretty sure I'd marry Nick Charles. 




Twenty years later, and my mind hasn't changed.

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

all work and no play

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

Welcome to my home. 

You know what they say...

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

Crafting and You: A Survival Guide

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

The yarn room--or, where I slept. Or, heaven. 

This past Christmas, the Mister and I headed up North to spend the holidays with his (adorable) family. A lot was crammed into seven days--lots of baking, lots of egg-nogging, and plenty of Nick and Nora Charles-ing (all in the the yuletide spirit, of course). Also--and this is the key to our little story here--his mother taught me how to knit. And with that, set off a chain reaction which vibrates still. 

Of course, it doesn't help that the Mister is an artist who comes from a family of the most prolific crafters I've ever met--I get lots of encouragement in that arena.  And don't be fooled, I'm no stranger to a crafty urge or two. My natural thriftiness combined with hoarder-like qualities towards certain goods (check: interesting bits of paper, weird buttons, all string) meant that I kept a well-stocked sewing kit and a modest collection of knick-knacks and stamps. 

But cross-stitch my heart and hope to die, that was all child's play compared to now. My little apartment looks like the frentic daydreams of Zooey Deschanel were woven into the vestiges of a Martha Stewart catalogue. My de-stressing routine most commonly involves a glass of red wine and a craft or two--it seems the busier I get, the more delight I take in homemaking. I made all my wrapping paper and gift tags for the year, using recycled cardboard and tissue paper. For my birthday this year, I got no fewer than four kitchen appliances as gifts. If you've reached the stage in your domesticated life where people think "cookie cutter" when your name comes up, you're doing something right. Or wrong, I guess, if you really hate cookies. This is but the tip of the iceberg; I have many projects ongoing. 

And oh yeah: I have a yarn basket now. I keep it next to my knitting chair, which is across from my sewing nook. In other words, it's getting worse. 

*

But I'm not alone.

Mad Men Returns

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

Mad Men (finally) returns to the air on March 25th. It's been four years of awesome ad man antics...so why is this still my absolute favorite moment of the whole series? 

Oh. Right. Because Roger and Don are awesome. Not such a mystery after all. 

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

Culture Snaps: February 7th, 2011

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

WATCHING 

Pina (3D presentation at TIFF Bell Lightbox)

I'm not, by any means, a spokesperson for 3D technology. But Pina, presented in 3D now at the TIFF Bell Lightbox, seems to be one of those films that the technology is made for. Combining dance and documentary to create a fully realized portrait of the legendary eponymous choreographer. The film was originally designed to feature Pina Bausch prominently in the story of her career, but after her unexpected death it was reshaped into a tribute by her fellow dancers that is at times touching, haunting and ethereal, not unlike the woman herself. 

READING 

And The Band Played On, by Randy Shilts. 

Chilling and maddening in its accuracy, this history of the early days of the AIDS epidemic reads more like a thriller for which you wish you didn't already know the ending. 

LISTENING

"Somebody That I Used to Know," Gotye (feat. Kimbra)


Mostly, I just like the pretty. 

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

The Spielberg Legacy

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology


I've long been saying the same thing, like a broken record with no self-awareness: that Steven Spielberg is more or less the greatest working director of all time.

Okay, okay, I know. It's not the obvious film buff choice. He lacks the unknowable, distant prestige of Fellini or Altman, or even the bizarre legacy of devotees like Kubrick. He's perhaps a little too populist to be a director's director. He's, for fear of overuse, an audience's director, a visionary who, horror of horrors, considers audience attachment to the images we see onscreen. And I think that's why his critics feel that Spielberg's success comes at the cost of style without substance; quite frankly, if you manage to dislike some of his more successful outings (Catch Me if You Can, are your ears burning?), then congrats. You're the first cyborg in world history! His films are tailor-made to appeal to the tiny child that still lives inside of you; he bypasses our adult selves and goes for the gut, showing us the things we loved when we didn't know any better. Dinosaurs! Aliens! Good guys with white hats and villains with black ones! Tidy endings for all! 


But his commercial success isn't what impresses me most: it's his exhaustive versatility. He's worked in nearly every genre, had relatively few failed experiments, and manages to scare up healthy box office numbers even in these dark times. He's like the very best sessional musician: so annoyingly competent that you want to begrudge him such success but can't, because he's so earnest. 


I think it bears repeating: Spielberg still love making movies. Still. His films vibrate with a genuine awe of the medium, and a desire to push it to new heights. Uncanny valley aside, you can't say that The Adventures of Tintin is giving us a carbon copy of previous experiments in CGI. He's exploring new territory with the verve of someone who hasn't realized that there are limits to the human experience. These are what Spielberg's films embody for me: a lack of awareness that there should, or needs to be, a separation of reality and fantasy. It's child-like, almost, and precious in these modern times. 


To that end, I offer you two video essays that explore this legacy, one by longtime favorite critic Matt Zoller Seitz, and the other by new friend Kevin B. Lee. Lee's interrogation on the possibility of a 'Spielberg face' was a welcome little gift, featuring a particularly good reading of A.I's place in the canon. 



Magic and Light: The Films of Steven Spielberg (CHAPTER ONE)



The Spielberg Face 


Happy new year! I love starting fresh years with awesome cultural criticisms, don't you? 






ps. Also, just for fun, here are the Indiana Jones segments. If you're pressed for time, just watch these. I never left behind my inner 12-year old. Neither should you. 

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

Classic Films and the Myth of the Good Old Days.

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

Casablanca--a classic by any other name.

A dear friend of mine recently took to Facebook to ask for nominations: what recent films, she asked, do you think will stand the test of time? In other words, what are we watching now will be watch later? What contemporary movies will age into ripe old classic status? 


Fantastic question. The answers she got, however, is what prompted this post. 


Classic--was ever a word more fraught with meaning for those in the know? In literature, it speaks to tradition, giving the books labeled as such an air importance and, more precisely, relevance; in music, preferring classic rock will, depending on the audience, telegraph either a refusal to keep up with the times or a finger on an ironic, backdoor pulse. 


But when we're talking films, classic means so much more. In the more traditional definition, calling something a classic is almost a shorthand for 'old'. Which means a film can be a classic in part by simply surviving---Casablanca, Vertigo or Citizen Kane are 'classics' not just because they are splendid examples of storytelling, but also because despite their age, they thrive with life even 50, 60, 70 years later. They're timeless, they're outside the medium, they're modern even in their age. 

In order: Scott Pilgrim vs. the World; The King's Speech; The Social Network; Up: are any of these modern classics? 

But, and this is what I noticed as people began to chime in on my friend's thread---classic has become another word for 'favourite.' This becomes especially true when the entry is decidedly niche--one astute friend on the above thread suggested Scott Pilgrim vs. the World as a classic, and, as a terrifically entertaining piece of cinema immortalizing the Nintendo-tinged youth of a generation, it's already achieved classic status in some circles. But...there's a but. 


But it feels premature to even presume this more traditional label of 'classic' to anything post-millennial, and a little naughty even when using it around a beloved John Hughes film. It's all a game, in the end, a way of trying to predict our own inadvertent cultural time capsule. And sometimes, we as a society will never know what is a classic, well, until it is. A film should earn its stripes by surviving even when the societal minutia has dissolved any immediate ties to relevancy. 


That's it, isn't it? The real power of a film is to trap its culture in vivid motion; it acts as a little cannon shot into the future, stuffed with politics, beliefs and life as we knew it. So maybe a real classic film doesn't just entertain its audience. It, in many ways, ought to represent them.  

*

And all of this led me, as usual, to the idea of the good old days. This grand myth that before this wretched modern world came along, folks really knew how to make a car, a song, a novel...a film. Anyone who doesn't like the fare at the box office can look to an earleir period, where theaters had real films on their roster: Gone With the Wind! Taxi Driver! The Third Man! 


It's a ripple I've noticed throughout a lot of cinema and media studies that looks back a little too often--hell, as a scholar of postwar American film, I can't say I'm immune--with dewy, wistful sighs, as if the old days didn't produce any schlock. 


To these people, I offer this as a comfort: the 1960s is a decade seemingly embarrassed with cinematic riches: releases included Easy Rider, Bonnie and Clyde, The Graduate, In the Heat of the Night, Cool Hand Luke, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid---all in all, a banner decade. 


But the list doesn't stop there: the 1960s also saw the release of not one but two Gidget sequels, Valley of the Dolls, western/musical Paint Your Wagon (your rare chance to see Clint Eastwood sing!) and the truly troubled production Doctor Dolittle (which, tellingly, nabbed its 1967 Oscar nod largely due to studio sweet talk). This isn't counting all the Godzilla movies or inflated studio cash-grabs trying to replicate past successes. 


What am I trying to say? Maybe it's just that we've always been making schlock; the democratization of Hollywood means this happens in greater numbers, but studios have always catered to that lowest-hanging denominator. 


The difference is the schlock doesn't usually survive. All we're left with are--you  guessed it--the real classics. 

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

Girl, look at that body. No, seriously.

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology




You know you've been in academics too long when you watch the following trying to parse whether or not a pop song by a almost-fake band is a progressive commentary on the complications of reversing of the male gaze. Man, what happened to me? I used to be cool.* I mean, they're joking around, but...they're also kind of serious, aren't they? 





Of course, these guys are still in control of the gaze, even as become (arguable) objects of lust. As Richard Dyer noted in his (baller) 1982 essay "Don't Look Now: The Male Pin Up", the guys in this video are all active and athletic even as they display their bodies--dancing, strutting, even lifting weights and apparently wielding a baseball. No coy or helpless objectification here. Um, okay. I'm reaching. But I don't know, it feels like there's something here! At least I'm not trying to convince you that LMFAO's earlier works are a commentary on the perils of tying ourselves to modern conveniences. OH WAIT JUST DID BRAINWOOOORM. 


On another note entirely, why am I obsessed with knowing more about the dancing robot? He's a fascinating creature of mystery. Who is this robot, and from whence did he emerge? He's half-human, half robot, so was he a dancer that became a cyborg or a normal human whose desire to party rock is entirely digitized? I also learned today he was played at least once by playwright Daniel Kanengieter. There are so many layers to this enigma, I fear my thirst for knowledge will be forever unquenched. 


That's right, the dancing robot is moonlighting as a playwright. To sum up: will the robot be my wife? 




*This is untrue. 

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

Quasi Review, X-Men: First Class

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

"Adaptation is repetition, but repetition without replication." -Linda Hutcheon

Faaaassbender! Let him entertain you. 

So I basically just saw the new X-Men movie, X-Men: First Class. In a nutshell, I didn't leave angry, which is real progress! I wavered on the decision to see it, because I was so angry about the state of comic book movies in general and X-Men in particular. 



But comic book movies have long suffered from the very thing that draws people into the theater: the coolness factor. I blame CGI, mostly: much of what happens onscreen in modern comic movies have only been possible in the wake of recent computer imaging technology. So you fill the screen with marvelous displays of impossible superpowers, a dazzling lightshow of nifty graphics that overshadows most everything else. At the cost of what, though? X3 managed to ruin the Phoenix Saga, which is really like the pizza of the Marvel universe--it's such a terrific story that it boggles the mind how you could screw it up. You put cheese on bread and melt it! You give too much power to a character that will later go crazy and require her own sacrifice! It's like basic math, people. 


But all this takes away from the fundamentals of the superhero mythos that draws young kids into the comics: the battle of being your best self versus the easiest, the struggle of difference, the burden of exception. There's a resonant cultural importance in comic books (Doubt me? read this), and most of the superhero films that get made completely bypass this altogether. People start reading for the nifty powers; they stay for the humanity of it all. 

*

So First Class.  You see, there's a lot about the film that's just...awkward; aside from the scenes between Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy, much of the story felt like a second draft revision, and the final product was still an edit or two away. 

The film lands as a grossly uneven creature-- the transitions between great thematic importance and haywire levity are jarring, to say the least, and play out like wandering between the annoying, high pitched fracas of the kids' table in the kitchen while the grown up are talking sensibly and importantly in the dining room. Tonally, that makes for a confusing two hours. 

Where First Class succeeds is surprising, because it has nothing to do with the title premise. The 'first class' of the title, the kid mutants that will make up Professor X's first students at his Institute for Gifted Youngsters, are a largely lackluster bunch. It's these scenes that lost me--which is too bad, because if the franchise continues, perhaps some thought should have gone into choosing a class that was, I don't know, interesting outside of their allotted ten minutes of CGI wizardry. I mean, they're cute, but they're not the real first class, you know? Where, I ask, is the rich playboy disowned by his father for his deviation? The orphaned Alaskan boy who turns his pain into stoicism? The requisite Smurfette? 

Suckas, this is the only First Class my heart will acknowledge. 

No, where First Class succeeds is as an entry into the much larger and longstanding discussion that rattles through the bones of all comic book movies--the question of adaptation versus accuracy. X-Men: First Class largely succeeds as an apology to the franchise, after the wet-blanket flavouring of X3 and the responding thud of Wolverine: Origins. First Class stands as an anomaly, of sorts, given the devotion of most comic book fans and their derision towards adaptation: I think most who saw it remember the odd feeling of watching Watchmen on the screen a few years ago, and realizing that in trying to replicate Moore's vision exactly (and attempt to appease its fans) all the audacity and thrilling verve of that same vision came out in the wash. There's such a thing as being too faithful. 


Let me tell you, as a former X fangirl, there's very little of this film that resembles its comic origins. But is that what matters? First Class is a tidy distillery of the comic book's message about tolerance and its opposite, fear, and I quite frankly never get tired of that. What I love about the opposing world views of the X universe is that if anyone with a critical mind can see the merit to both approaches: while Charles Xavier would reinforce the much less radical view of integrating his charges into the society that hated them, Lehnsherr took the more reactionary (but understandable) defense mechanism of an eye for an eye. It's Malcolm X versus Martin Luther King Jr., though I guarantee I'm not the first to draw such parallels. And in First Class, both viewpoints are given equal screentime, much to the film's benefit: one look at Michael Fassbender's Magneto (mmm, yes please!) and you entirely understand how he evolves into a human-hating hot mess. And Charles, well, he even start talking with that calm, wizened patronizing tone that the real Professor X uses, so there's that too!  


It's for that reason this needs to be said: First Class is at its heart, one of the finest bromances put to film. Let me just say this: the film features an extended montage wherein Xavier and Lehnsherr go on little road trips to find other mutants to recruit into their little club. It's cute, an all too brief bright spot of pure win in a tonally-confused two hours. "More tea, vicar?" OMG that was awesome. 

theirloveissopure. 

And no joke, if the entire movie had been two hours of mini-Professor X and baby Magneto going on little mini-adventures and drinking champagne and wearing mod suits, smirking at each other (AND MAYBE MORE???) while hep music played in the background, that would have been the most rad. I would watch that movie at least eight times. In theaters. And also on Blu-Ray. Theirloveissopure!

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook. 

The Rock

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

In planning my upcoming pilgrimage to San Francisco, I've been pulled in the direction of visiting Alcatraz. Why? I honestly have no idea. The very idea of being trapped inside a prison during a riot is on my list of all-time heebie-jeebie inducers, along with berserk Victorian ideas of medicine and disasters that happen on New Year's Eve (especially if no one cleans up the party favours).*. Seriously. I hate prison riots, or even the implications of one. You know that scene in Natural Born Killers, when Robert Downey Jr. the journalist gets taken as the hostage when the prison goes nuts? Well, I don't. It could have cut to twenty minutes of puppies getting manicures, but it doesn't matter. It hinted at the inescapable, locked-in terror of being involved in any way with the madness of a prison riot. 


So why I suddenly got the urge to sail across a boat to an island I could not easily escape, Scorsese-style, and confront the source of my fear was beyond me. Sure, because there's really a dearth of thing to entertain your hipster tendencies in the greater San Francisco area  I mean, COME ON! 


Then I realized. This is practically a textbook formula for my brain. 



You take my fond, confused memories of that one scene in Dog Day Afternoon...


+



...my inexplicable love of aftermaths...


-



... residual anger at the ending of Shutter Island... 




divided by 





...the fact I still haven't seen The Rock...


= 


my subconscious is trying to fire me. Thanks a lot, Id. This is what I get for letting you have macrons, delicious delicious macrons? Serves me right for trusting a Freudian impulse. 

...again.










*But to be fair, trying to pick the one element of Bioshock that chewed on my fear-making center is impossible. Take one part Ayn Rand, one part crazy people trapped underground, with a generous helping of Manifest Destiny, and you pretty much have the one thing I had to watch between my fingers as other people played. Well-played, sum of all my fears. Well-played. 

Have a suggestion for a future Ampersandology topic? Got something you’d like to say? All feedback welcome! Shoot us an email at ampersandology@gmail.com, or follow Ampersandology on Facebook.