#case study examples

[justabookw0rm]

Collectivity and individuality in the ensemble of Les Misérables

Last year I wrote my bachelor's thesis about ensembles in musicals and in Les Mis in particular, so I thought it would be fun to post something about the conclusion of my research for this year's barricade day. I am currently writing another thesis (also related to Les Mis lmao), so I did not have the time to reformat it or anything, but I think my original conclusion of the case study + part of the conclusion of the thesis together make my point pretty well either way. I hope y'all find it as interesting to read as I found to research it!

The ensemble in Les Misérables constantly shifts between being seen as one, unified group and as a collection of individuals. As a group, they embody the collective voice of the miserable people of France, in the form of beggars and workers. They shift between groups as well, which are distinguishable by costumes and music. As a group, the ensemble is a lens for the audience to watch the action through. In this way, they are in charge of the focus and the pace of the narrative. They can isolate or embrace characters from their community, and they can grant authority to people. In contrast to their functioning as a group, the ensemble can also be seen as individuals. From the way that they have been written into the story, some ensemble characters have more space to express their individuality, while other parts are less set, giving more freedom to the performers to make their own characterisation. This freedom of interpretation is not guaranteed for big, corporate musicals. Other musicals are more strict in the way new actors perform the same roles. Within Les Misérables, individualisation comes from both the space that is made in the script and the freedom that actors get to interpret their own roles. Performers can take inspiration from Hugo’s novel too, which has the added benefit of certain audience members recognising the characters on stage, making it easier for them to be seen as individuals. This is less applicable for the women of the ensemble, as their parts generally do not have a counterpart in the book, which does give them more freedom over their own characterisation. While there is a lot of space for individualisation in the show, there is also a feeling of community among the cast. This is helped by most principal cast members having ensemble parts, making the performers feel that they are telling a story together, as one group.

Les Misérables has themes that relate to love, faith and sacrifice in particular, although the ensemble is mostly related to another theme, namely that of social injustice. This theme is prevalent throughout the narrative and affects all characters in one way or another, but it is the ensemble that really embodies it. They are themselves “the miserables.” They are both the people who fight against social injustice, in the form of the students, and the people who they are fighting for, as the poor, the convicts, the factory workers, and so on. While the principal characters represent the individual stories of people undergoing these hardships, the ensemble makes it clear that these are not isolated stories, only the stories that this particular narrative is focussing on. Having the ensemble be both a collective of miserable people, and having them be individuals in their own right, shows that there are numerous people who suffer under the same system and that they are worth fighting for. These are the people who Enjolras wanted to see rise, but also the people who did not join him in the end. While it is disappointing in the moment that the people do not rise, the audience has seen how difficult the actual individual people’s lives are. In “At the End of the Day” the factory workers have already made clear that “the children have got to be fed.” Still, the students show the audience that there are people who will fight for a better tomorrow, for all these faceless people who are actually not that faceless anymore. At the same time, it is a call to action for the audience, to “join in the fight that will give you the right to be free.” That is what gives the audience hope, and that is what makes Les Misérables such a powerful story. It shows that there are people who need someone to fight for them and it shows that there are people who will, and it is the ensemble that embodies both of these people on the stage.

...

A full performance analysis of Les Misérables needs to take into account the context of the show, the performers’ materiality, and the background of the audience member watching it. By focusing on the juxtaposition of the collective and the individual, it appears that the ensemble performers in this show differ in the amount of space and freedom they have for individualising their characters, while they are always a part of the collective group of “the miserables.” Every character in Les Misérables suffers under social injustice, most especially a lot of the ensemble parts, which makes this an important theme in the show. Through its narrative and through its ensemble performance, it shows that there are people who are worth fighting for, and people who are willing to fight for them. By presenting these people as individual characters through sung solos, costuming and silent acting – among other things – they are humanised and are no longer a faceless entity of miserable people. This makes the audience empathise with them, and possibly relate their own experiences to these characters.

Relating this to Millie Taylor’s theory of the ensemble musical as a depiction of a utopian future, Les Misérables becomes an embodied display of the realities of contemporary society. One might say that this is not possible, as it is situated in 19th century France, but the struggles that people face in Les Misérables because of social injustices are still true nowadays. Victor Hugo himself prefaced his original novel by saying that similar books will be needed, as long as there is still misery on earth. The musical is a reminder of that. Its popularity comes from its necessity in showing people that there is injustice in the world, while simultaneously giving them hope for a better tomorrow. The ensemble plays an important role in this message. If not for them, the world of Les Misérables would be barren and the collective people would not have a representative on the stage, which would, in turn, weaken the power of the show’s message. The ensemble is needed to give the ordinary people a face, separate from the extraordinary principal characters.

In conclusion, the ensemble of Les Misérables contributes to the meaning of the musical by embodying both the miserable people of its title as a collective entity, and as individual people. This bolsters the show’s message that social injustice has to be fought. Hence, the ensemble is indispensable. Through individualising minor characters, it becomes apparent that all those who suffer have their own stories and are worth saving. The story then becomes an analogy for real world suffering. Ultimately, the hope is that the audience will take this message to heart and rise to fight injustice, in the way that the people of Paris did not do in 1832.

[hunxi-after-hours]

"...Andor is a story in which we know exactly what is going to happen, eventually, because we’ve already seen Rogue One, which left many of us with several questions about how exactly Cassian Andor got where he ended up. Wicked, the book, is a story in which we know the ending (the musical, well, that’s a different story). Game of Thrones walked familiar territory for many of us, up to a point. Every retelling, to some degree, is a story in which the reader knows the ending, depending on their familiarity with the original tale (and the liberties the author does or doesn’t take). Arthur dies. Greek gods and goddesses get up to countless shenanigans. The evil queen/stepmother/witch is defeated. Can you spoil those? Is a spoiler different than basic story knowledge? "I don’t actually want to argue about spoilers. Especially not the week after Marvel gleefully spoiled its own movie in a way that implied that if you were a real fan, you would have gone to said movie already and thus not been spoiled. Spoilers exist, but they’re different for everyone, and a detail is not a spoiler. I think my definition of “spoiler” might be something like “a thing that, once you know it, changes how you experience the whole.” Not necessarily a twist, or a reveal, but a thing you can’t shove back out of your brain. Is it always a thing the storyteller presumably didn’t want you to know? Is the element of surprise part of it? Can that thing still be interesting, even without the surprise? "You can only experience a story for the first time once. But maybe there’s too much emphasis on the relative purity of that first time. It comes back to that impossible question of what each reader wants to know about a book before reading it. I’ve had moments where I had no interest in a book until someone told me a specific detail or angle, unmentioned in the cover copy or reviews, that was right up my alley. I know I’ve had this moment. But whatever book that was has just become part of my mental library, the details forgotten. It mattered at the time. It’s irrelevant now. Details are weird like that."

—Molly Templeton, "It’s Okay to Know Where the Story Is Going"

[danishphoner]

one thing that really fascinates me about alex is his devotion to art – and more specifically, how he chooses to get some inspiration from scientific works of what he aims to implement in his art. every time one gets to examine some of his lyrics, or even how he explains these lyrics in an interview, they can be greeted by some bits of actual scientific information. an example is how he named his taquería on the moon with the term “information-action ratio”, coined by the critic neil postman, and referenced it in the song four out of five, something that might also indicate an interesting articulation with postman's concept. the line “cute new places keep on popping up”, for example, can express his well-known sardonic discontent regarding the flood of information being generated and transmitted over and over and, as much as it seems visually appealing and does give the idea of benefiting from advanced technologies, it doesn't really add anything substantial to the receiver's critical thinking – and worse, it distances the information receiver from the sender in a communication channel, according to postman.

what i'm saying with this interpretation is, it's known that alex is enamoured with the idea of gathering a bunch of references and condensing them into a mixture of metaphors in his writing, but it's so thrilling how, at times, we can find some bits of science inside of it – and it's even more exciting, just like playing a puzzle game, to find these references and analyse them by doing a similar research to what he did to create his works.

[sergeifyodorov]

i think i know the article you're talking about, but i didn't read it because anything that smacks of sincere "these white cis men are the true victims and main characters of misogyny" just sets my teeth so thoroughly on edge. it really makes it sound like the author doesn't understand how misogyny *is* a deep part of male hockey culture, just... embedded in the other, usual way. *women* are casualties of direct, violent misogyny in hockey and acting like it's the opposite is almost insulting...

as much as i think there are angles to take in that vein that could pan out (for example: "how does homophobia and or the fear of being clocked as feminine help to reinforce misogynistic attitudes in these men"/"what are the underlying processes behind 'babygirlification' in fandom spaces about men"/"the intersection of misogyny and xenophobia in hockey") there's either a complete ignorance to these questions or, in the case of the last one, an explicit refusal to examine it. i also think that basically any other way to slice it -- including these questions, by the way -- means you have to address women both in "inner" hockey circles (female players, female coaches, female employees, wives and girlfriends etc) and in fandom spaces. which, as with everything else, is either sparingly touched on (re fandom spaces) or not at all

[neversetyoufree]

God it just hit me.

Names are power in VnC. We call the piece of the world formula that defines a vampire their "true name." Learning and altering a vampire's true name gives you near-absolute power over them. Vanitas hides his old name as part of his "Vanitas" persona—a defense mechanism to hide his vulnerable self.

And names are an axis of discrimination too. The main way we've been examining discrimination against the dhampirs is through the lens of vampires refusing to call them by their names. And Luna, the perennial outsider, seems not to have been given a real name. They certainly didn't have a name that they liked or identified with for most of their life.

So with all that context, even more than it might be in another series, Teacher's whole name shtick becomes such an insane power move. He changes his name constantly and will brutally punish anyone that gets it wrong. Nobody has the power that would come from knowing whatever his first/true name was. He has the physical and social power to punish and correct anyone that doesn't call him what he wants to be called. He is in complete control of how people address him, or at least close to complete control, which is such a big deal within this story.

[chaos-in-one]

Honestly? Opening the syscourse tag to see anti created systems shit lately has just made me feel more and more tempted to try & see if I can create a new headmate intentionally.

Only reasons I haven't is concerns that (if it works, since I don't know if I can do that due to how I function as a CDD system + I've never tried before) it could make our functioning worse, or end up upsetting/hurting the new person in some way. But man is it looking more and more worth an attempt with how big of assholes people have been about it lately.

[hollowwhisperings]

"is he autistic or rich?"

(or traumatised?)

so there's a phenomena that exists - irl and in fiction - where it can be difficult to identify whether someone is 1) autistic-coded; 2) extremely rich; or 3) extremely traumatised.

why?

because ALL three detrimentally affect social skills and hobby interaction.

in fiction, where autistic-coding is typically unintended and where rich protagonists are "humanized" via giving them extreme trauma, this identification system can be made more difficult still by the existence of "unsocialized" characters.

that's your literally "alien"s: your exaggerated foreigners, your robots, dragons, gods, your extremely olds, and literal aliens.

here are some characters i've felt personally challenged by the question:

"ARE THEY AUTISTIC, EXTREMELY RICH, EXTREMELY TRAUMATISED, or A LITERAL ALIEN?"

ADV. TIME: princess bubblegum.

BLEACH: uryu ishida, the hat guy, kuchiki byakuya, kuchiki rukia, zaraki kenpachi, the captains in general, [etc].

DEATH NOTE: yagami light & L.

DC¹: bruce wayne, tim drake, damian wayne, pamela isley.

GENSHIN²: albedo, diluc ragnvindr, jean gunnhildr, kamisato ayato, the raiden shogun, sangonomiya kokomi, cyno, neuvillette.

HSR: dan heng, silver wolf, bronya, herta, ruan mei, dr ratio, argenti, rappa³, yunli, [etc].

MDZS: lan wangji, wei wuxian, jiang wanyin, jin rulan, nie mingjue.

NARUTO: hatake kakashi, uchiha sasuke, nara shikamaru, gaara, sai, [etc].

OURAN: suoh tamaki⁴, ootori kyouya, the nekozawa sibs.

PERSONA 5: akechi gorou.

STAR WARS: obi-wan kenobi.

WHO: the doctor⁵.

FOOTNOTES

¹IRL, some studies estimate that up to 96% of the world's prison population (adult and juvenile) has ADHD. unmanaged ADHD leads to poor impulse control and poor time management: the ingredients for petty crime. ADHDers are additionally vulnerable to addiction, unemployment, and homelessness... all of which lead back to criminality. institutionalize racism (and medical sexism) takes any and EVERY opportunity to criminalize POC (and non-men) for things white men wouldn't even get charged for. so... as in life, so too in comics.

(there's less science than i'd like on it but i'd assume that co-morbid AuDHD only worsens how vulnerable someone becomes to "criminal" identification. that is why i find the "are they autistic or rich/traumatised/alien" game important to teach: knowing what neurodivergence looks like can save lives)

²fischl, al haitham and freminet are canonically [neurodivergent]: fischl's a chuunibyou played sympathetically; haitham wears noise supressing earphones; 自闭症 "loneliness syndrome" is a CN term for autism.

³rappa reads a bit like a commentary on this very trope, tbh, being a chuunibyou child soldier and all.

⁴EVERYONE (other than haruhi) in the host club is rich but tamaki compounds the "autistic or rich/traumatised/foreign" issue by actually being a [queer] european. wealth + childhood neglect + illicit love child status + european-in-japan = teen boy who started a not-technically-sexwork club at his school = ???

⁵all of them but especially thirteen, who's probably helped a whole new generation of girls with getting their ASD formally recognized, and that's on top of their being largely-intentional ADHD rep!

[fideidefenswhore]

Mary wrote to Cromwell on 26 May [1536]. Even if this were in response to Lady Kingston's visit, the speed with which Mary sought reconciliation with Henry demonstrates her genuine belief that it had been Anne keeping her father from her. According to Chapuys, the letter in no way resembled the draft Cromwell had drawn up. Mary apologised for her bad handwriting, saying she had written very little for over two years and was only able to do so now, because Lady Kingston had given her means. Since we know she had communicated regularly with Chapuys, she was either lying, or her messages to him were verbal. We also know she had sent letters to Mary of Hungary and Gattinara [...]

The King's Pearl: Henry VIII & His Daughter Mary, Melita Thomas

[gh0stcav3]

case studies my beloathed

[al-mayriti]

one thing about classicists, we never fucking learned dates

[tojiscrack]

bro im genuinely gonna tweak out my average used to be99 in social 💔 like i reached my peak i got 100s and 95s on every single assignment TELL ME WHY I GOT AN 85 ON MY PAPER WHICH ISNT EVEN THAT BAD AND MY AVERAGE WENT DOWN TO 91 BRO MY TEACHER LITERALLY TOLD US THE PAPER WAS PRACTICE AND THAT HE WASNT OGNAN MARK TAT AND HE LITERALLY DID AND I GOT AN 85 AND APPARENTLY MY GRADE DROPS 8 PERCENT HOWWW IN THE WORLD IVE DONE 15 PROJECTS SO FAR THIS SEMESTER. LOCEKD IN FOR EVERY SINGLE ONE..A DN THE PROJECT PAPER HTAT I GOT AN 85 ON LOWERED ME DOWN????I CANT WITH TSHI TEACHER I HAVE SM TEA ON HIM BUT ITS LTERALLY 4AM RIGHT NWO AND IVE BEEN CRASHING OUT FORF LIKE 10 WHOLE HOURS LIKE A 91 AVERAGE IGNT BAD BUT HOWWW THE FRIGG DID IT GO DOWN THAT MUCH FROM ONE PAPER THAT WAS SUPOSED TO BE A PRACTICE LIKE AND THIS MAN REALLY GAVE ME AN ONE SENTENCE FEEDBACK IFT WAS LITERALLY JUST "Love the detail and writing style, excellent work! Format is wrong" HOOO YO LITERALY GAVE ME A PAPR WITH THE FORMAT AND I WROTE IT ACCORDING TO THE FORMAT BUT EH LITERALLY SAID ERRR I FORGOT TO SAY YOU SHOULD DO ANOTHER FORMAT THEN HOW IS THAT MY CLASS'S FAULT U FORGTO TO SPECIFY THE FORMAT OMFFF IM GENINELY GONNA CRASH OUT AND ALL HE TALKS ABOUT IS HIS JAPANESE WIFE AND HOW HE STUDIED IN JAPAN FOR 5 YEARS LIKE OKAY WE GET IT UR WHITE AND FAT BUT U SECRETLY KNOW JAPANESE WE GET IT.. AND LIKE HE LITERALL MENTIONS JAPAN EVERY DAY AND HES LIKE "oh i ate ramen yesterday! haha, i bet you guys call it ramen, but i call it lah men" HO SYBAU TS PMO FR RN TS CNT BFR U GNNGN MKE ME TWK O OI IA EEO EEAE BROOOOO AND I LITERALLY SAID I DABBLE IN ANIME AND AFTER THAT HE KEEPS ASKINGME ABOUT ANIME AND LIKE WHICH ONE I LIKE BUT NOT INA NICE WAY IN LIIKE A TESTY WAY.. LIKE HE WAS LIE OHH ER U LIKE ANIME BUT I BET YOU ONLY WATCHED JJK RIGHT AND I WAS LIKE OH IVE WATCHED OTHERS TOO AND HE STARTED SPEAKING IN JAPANESE AND ASKE ME SOMTHING LKE HO IM NOT JAPANESE TF DOES THAT MEAN AND HE WAS LIKE ERRR U WOULD KNOW IF U WATCHED ANIME IN JAAPNESE DUB BUT IG U DONT, YOU SHOULD START WATCHING ANIIME IN THEIR ORIGINAL DUB BECAUESE ANIME IS JAPANESE CULTUE AND UR DISRESPECTING THEIR CULTURE BY WATCHING ENGLISH DUB LIKE BROO I LITERALLY DO WATCH IT IN JAPANESE DUB I NEVER SAID I WATCH IT IN ENGLISH DUB AND LITERALLY WHATS WRONG WITHT HTAT TOO??? AND MIND U THIS IS MY TEACHEF IM JUST TWEAKING OUT RN AND IVE BEEN REREADING LIARILRA RIGHT NOW AND IT LIKE GENUINELY CALMED ME DOWN BUT LIKE BY 3 PERCFENT THATS HO W MUCH IM TWEAKING OUT LIKE BRO U CAN TELL BY HOW I HAVE SPEKLING MISETAKES AND INCORRECT GARMMAR AND YAPPING PARTS WHERE IT DOESNT MAKE ANY SENES IM GENINELY SO DONE HOW DID IT GO DOWN THAT MUHC LIKE IM NOT EVEN ADDING IN ANY OF MY GOOFY REACTION PICS BECASU THATS HEO MUCH I AOJEWAFOIJZOIFSUNGJFXDXIP

S'F;AZFAZSDFESWEFGH32

ewww ur teacher’s a weirdo and in dire need of a shower ewwww 😭

why’s he fetishising japanese people like that wth 💀

the crash out is valid girl, dww 😤

[sugaroto]

I remembered the time when my mom had noticed my friend was toxic but didn't say anything cause she didn't want to ruin my view of him since we had known each other since kindergarten so she didn't say anything until I pointed out his behavior

Also, apparently my tutor teacher had said something about it too to my mom

She saw the dude once interacting with me and clocked he wasn't good

Mind you my teacher and the dude were like distant cousins

[broke-on-books]

Days since last cried in class: 0

[pochapal]

they're studying omelette route in undergrad english classes

[alexbutrandomthoughts]

Don't you think it's funny cause actual canon gay characters in BL manga will say "I love you" but only the shounen bromance can spew out some of the most romantic shit akin to a 19th century poet writing a letter expressing his surpressed love for his lover 😭.....

You know what they say. Noone writes the gays quite like a straight man thinking he's writing friendship.

It's like that one copypaste. Gay rep is like “kyaaaaaah!!! i like a boy but… i’m a boy >////<?!?!” meanwhile queerbait be like [insert any and all male "friendships" in anime]

From "Love is the most twisted curse of all" to "You used Corruption believing in me? How beautiful." To whatever the fuck is happening with Lawlight

[genccide-archived]

me & kuseno both want to be happy for genos when his life with Saitama & his duty as a hero help him get away from all the vengeance & hatred eating him alive but also letting go is a very difficult thing to ask. it's like asking tanjiro to forget what muzan did.