Oil

Yes, Oil is my name. she/her. 21. Talk to me about dark academia, spilt tea, and what terrible things you have done to your mother.

[mayhemghost]

Just finished two books by Mona Awad and then went on here and was horrified to discover that the dark academia coquette girlies are romanticizing Bunny. no I don’t want to eat miniature food and murder homunculi with you well now that I’m saying it like that it sounds kind of fun maybe I see the appeal

[lets-throw-bacchanal]

My 2 fav book genres are: what the fuck richard and what the fuck andrew

[metamorphesque]

The relation between nature and human being: Agnieszka Lepka

[devotedlyluckyarbiter]

I was blessed with chaos after questioning everything around me in my life

[foxes-and-ghosts]

A study in drowning // Ava Reid

[inspiredbyabook]

a study in drowning by ava reid

What is a mermaid but a woman half-drowned, What a selkie but an unwilling wife, What a tale but a sea-net, snatching up both From the gentle tumult of dark waves?

[thickerthanthieves-deactivated2]

Dark academia, death and the will to live: an essay on Flatliners [1/2]

[This part is spoiler free]

The most inherently dark academic, and one of the most brilliant movies I've ever watched is Flatliners (1990).

It was directed by Joel Schumacher, the very same person who directed The Lost Boys (1987), (hence my tags). Both movies star Kiefer Sutherland in a main role and let me tell you, if you loved his charisma in TLB, his performance is equally incredible here.

And the rest of the cast is just as phenomenal. Note that it includes Julia Roberts, who is just as dazzling as always in the role.

Flatliners is one of those movies that keep on giving. The characters are good-looking yes (sidenote, being pansexual and genderfluid I was dying, if you know you know), but they're also multidimensional, relatable, endearing. The plot is engaging, the pace is a near perfect in-between of tension and action, and slower scenes almost in limbo, keeping the viewer on their toes and invested.

But this movie is also beautiful, aesthetically and theme-wise. It's one of those stories that I'd define as life-changing for me. Why? Because it's about death and more importantly, about life, in a way that I didn't know I needed. It's a wake-up call and a comforting hug all at once. One of those things you think about late at night, sleepless, in full-on existential crisis.

If with this alone I convinced you to watch it, great. Go watch. Shoo.

If you're curious, read on. Let me tell you more.

[Part 1]

Dark academia: it's not what you think

There is so much to say, but I'll start here. How does the movie fit the dark academia appellation in my opinion? Several reasons. I'll go from the most obvious, the wrapping, if you will. And then we'll go further.

I. The aesthetic

Dark academia and movies have this in common: they need to be a visual experience. The combination of the two ought to make sense, and with Flatliners, it really does. Schumacher's filmmaking has a lot to do with the aesthetic beauty of the movie. The camera movements, the coloring, and the choice of an atypical, very characteristic and vivid location - much like with Santa Carla in TLB - all contribute to creating the sensation of diving into a full-fledged world right from the start. And what a world. Dark academia lover, you'll get it all. Sepia tones of statues and paintings and long trench coats, late nights and early mornings, the city with a hint of antiquity and mystical elements. But that's just the surface.

Yes, dark academia is very much a trend, which means that part of it resides in the superficial. Compilation of beautiful pictures in online posts, romanticizing things that maybe shouldn't be, sticking to viewing the world through the lense of how we wish things were, we all know how problematic all of this can be.

But if you're like me, you know dark academia still resonates with you beyond this. Appearance is not all we want. We want layers, symbols, hidden plot twists. We crave a chance to fulfill our visceral need for a deeper meaning, a deeper understanding of life.

Well, enjoy dinner, we've been served with just that.

II. The themes

The plot revolves around a group of young med students playing god. Apart from the fact that they do practice surgery in an abandonned museum/historical monument of sorts, the fact that they are doctors-to-be is so very important. It allows the movie to introduce what I consider the most essential part of the story rather effortlessly.

The characters of Flatliners are students by status, and scholars by design. As future surgeons, they have a special connection to life and death, since the profession means they're always toeing the line between the two. But the movie goes further. The plot is about how their personal ambition and curiosity push the characters to ask one fundamental question: is there life after death?

And there's your connection to dark academia. I'll explain.

The notion of the quest for knowledge has always been somewhat central to our past civilisations, the Greeks and the Romans for example, but above all, the Renaissance. It was the age of exploration in Europe. It gave a new momentum to the arts and started geographic and scientific discovery far beyond what had been done before.

Valuing research, trying to understand the world and make the way it works make sense. Reminds you of anything? Yes, you guessed it. Dark academia. Knowledge is the core purpose of scholars, centuries ago and still nowadays. Therefore, the characters of Flatliners anchor themselves in essence to what dark academia means for some of us.

A conclusion halfway: where do we go from here?

I talked about ambition. Perhaps it would be more accurate to call it hubris.

And in that sense, Flatliners is a particularly interesting case study. It highlights some interesting points on dark academia, specifically, how the movement seems to shares some intrinsic characteristics with older concepts that can also be found in the movie, and that I'll discuss in part 2 of this essay.

I'll name one: memento mori.

[Part two coming soon!]

[hey-hermy]

home, how I love you

[peacefulandcozy]

Instagram credit: exploringedinburgh

[charisreads]

I had a gorgeous day being back home in Manchester. Ventured into town then stopped by a Black Sheep to get a chai latte and continue reading If We Were Villains. My copy is well loved, this is my second read through and I’m more than happy to break book spines.

[theartofdyingx]

'fuck you my child is completely fine'

Your child read dark academia books one after the other, and now they want a close friend group where they would cover up a murder together. Plus they have the urge to have a homoerotic romance with one of their friends, but none of them notices that they love each other, cannot full fill their love till it's too late.

[peacefulandcozy]

Instagram credit: opheliesz

[vibe-guide-deactivated20200417]

[thelogicofthetrance]

Night & day 🌓

[vida-imensa]

𝚂𝚊𝚟𝚒𝚝𝚛𝚒 𝚆𝚒𝚕𝚍𝚎𝚛

[ohevoyev]

why are british people always so mad when people make jokes about their accents. sorry you say yewchube. it’s funny though innit

[bees-and-mice-and-frogs-and]

This is something I’ve been dying to talk about.

There’s something called culture. People (especially USAmericans) think of culture as cultural dress, cultural food, cultural music. These are culture, but they are only the very superficial aspects of it. Like the icing on your cake. Far more deep rooted is the more meaty bits of culture: the attitudes, the ideas, the taboos.

There’s a guy on tiktok who has done a series that shows this very well, of Germans Vs Irish. In one video the German offers the Irish person two kinds of tea, green or black. The Irish person keeps putting off the choice with things like “Oh sure whatever is easiest”, “Which have you more of?” and, “Ah sure I don’t want to cause a fuss” whereas the German just wants a straight answer. This is a cultural difference of politeness.

Here in the UK, accents mark your class very openly. They let everyone know where you’re from (though this has become less pronounced in the last 50 years,) and what your background is. A lot of people (especially northerners, but also a fair contingent of working class southerners) face discrimination on the basis of their accents.

Some of us (myself included) even change register (though I believe USAmericans call it code switching) in and out of our regional accent and a close approximation of RP. We learn to do it because it makes us seem more intelligent (even though it shouldn’t) and helps us be taken more seriously.

Thus, our country carries a lot of baggage when it comes to accents. Especially those of the working class who have had their accents made fun of, or have faced discrimination based on it.

So when someone outside the country (usually USAmericans) makes fun of our accents they’re stepping on a lot of cultural taboos and boundaries. Especially because the “It’s Chewsday, gonnae wot-ch sum yewchube innit” is a working class accent.

Now, that’s not to say we can’t take a joke, but this is the kind of joke you share with someone who you have been friends with for a while. My boyfriend often will pick up on the way I say certain words, in much the same fashion I pick up on his idiosyncrasies of speech (English isn’t his first language so he says stuff like close the lights, which is adorable.) If we aren’t predisposed to liking you, then the joke you’re trying to make is more like an insult.

The way I like to think of it is if you were in a pub, and made those sorts of jokes to someone. If they knew you, and they liked you, they’d probably laugh along. If they didn’t like you or know you, they would punch you in the jaw.

HOWEVER: I recognise this post as a joke. I don’t personally find these jokes offensive, but then no one really makes fun of me or considers me stupid because of my accent.

[badolmen]

Oh that actually makes a lot of sense! It’s like how it’s assumed in media that the southeastern Appalachian (‘hick’ or ‘redneck’) accent is audible shorthand for ‘this American character is stupid.’ That sentiment reinforces negative stereotypes about that region which has historically been home to a large working class population that has suffered from an underfunded education system and other systematic abuses. It is ultimately an underhanded joke, but not everyone from America (or even the region necessarily) considers it to be offensive despite its classist nature.

[mighty-meerkat]

yes, that’s basically it! it grinds my gears when certain Very Online Americans will quite rightly say that europeans have no right to mock the us’ lack of healthcare/gun control and working-class accents…but then turn around and act like working-class british accents and foods are hilarious and should be mocked ‘bc of colonialism and the bp oil spill’ as though all british people are directly responsible for the oil spill. and then some of them conveniently forget that there are in fact british people of colour - in the wake of brexit, a smug american blog defended saying that british people upset by the referendum were getting ‘karma’ for the british empire, even when british poc pointed out that they were the ones most likely to be negatively affected by brexit, by saying ‘obviously i don’t mean you’, to which said british poc responded ‘THEN WHY DID YOU SAY BRITISH PEOPLE’

[stormclouds-chainmail]

The hatred, by the privileged of England, towards Scotland and any Scottish accent was so pervasive that my mother wouldn’t let my brother and I develop a Scottish accent. She was born in Jamaica but her family moved to London when she was 11. She moved to Scotland when she was pregnant with me. Both my brother and I were born in Scotland and spent out entire childhood there. Mum was adamant that neither of us would have the local accent. It was “common” and “low class” and “would hinder us in the future”. She used to fine us half our pocket money if we used any Scottish slang or said anything in a Scottish accent. I got bullied at school for having a “posh English accent” but she thought my job prospects were more important than a modicum of happiness at school. My outsider status was doubled by that. I was brown and “English”.

Even now, after decades in Scotland, I still don’t sound Scottish. The English hear a slight lilt but that disappears as soon as I spend any time with them.

I feel alienated on two fronts now, skin colour and accent. And one of those was avoidable if it hadn’t been for the prejudice against against perceived lower class accents. Even in Jamaica Mum learnt to speak in an English accent like the white girls at her school. She could switch between the two. Jamaican with her parents, posh English everywhere else. Why couldn’t I have had that?

[amuseoffyre]

The fact that a lot of regional actors are expected to code-switch their accent patterns the a kind of neutral English accent in Britain shows how pervasive the classism is.

When Christopher Eccleston was cast as the Doctor in Doctor Who, people were surprised that he used his own northern accent, instead of performing with an accent like every Doctor before him. That was only 15-ish years ago.

Even now, this still happens - James McAvoy made a very vocal protest a couple of years back about a critic who complained about the use of Scots accents and only applauded the “plummy English” accent of one character in a play.

Regional and working class accents were used as joke accents for decades in British media. Look up old broadcasts and notice how many people only speak RP English (ie. the formal pronunciation that smacks of elocution lessons and enunciation). As media accessibility and productions expanded, there have been more regional accents showing up, but it’s still a big problem.

[sillyjimjam]

Putsimply when you mock “innit” you’re mocking poor people and often people of colour. Boris Johnson doesn’t say “innit bruv”.

[jessthecheesewitch]

All of the above.

I SHOULD have a working class “cockney” accent, having been raised by people from Londons East End, EXCEPT- I was born with a very bad lisp and stammer, and the solid decade of one on one speech training I had as a child left me with the RP (received pronunciation) accent, which is considered a very upper class accent. It also left me with a very over developed vocabulary, both of which led to a great deal of bullying and very real trauma for me living my teenage years in a rural county where everyone had another, different kind of working class accent (broadly Somerset, what some people call a “farmer” accent) mixed in with more middle class types. Even among them, my way of speaking stood out like a sore thumb.

[medstudentblues]

dark academia mornings