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But What Does It Say?
California State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Created: July 5, 2008
Latest Update: July 5, 2008
jeannecurran@habermas.org
takata@uwp.edu
patriciaacone@yahoo.com
Introduction People ask everyone they know what they should do about getting married, getting a divorce, dealing with their children, things that worry them where there are no "right answers" because we're all different, and what's right for me may not be right for you.
An example of what's wrong with "personal experience" as data. We forget that I'm only one person, and we mistake me for a "sample." That means that we make the mistake of believing that we can expect my experience to be the same experience as that of others, forgetting how unique we all are. . . . how to predict, when we can, and when we can't. And that's called sampling.
Backup of On screen, she was America's smiling, singing darling. But off screen, her husbands weren't Rock Hudson and her life was no light romp.
By Susan King
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
Copyright: Source Copyright.
Included here under Fair Use Doctrine for teaching purposes only and for archival preservation when old papers are dropped from existing websites or when websites and/or their archives cease to exist. This happens more often than you may realize. jeanneThis backup copy is to be used only if the original site on the Web is not accessible. It is meant to preserve the document for teaching purposes, when sometimes the URLS are changed when sites are updated, or sites are eliminated. Please be certain to give credit if you refer to this material to the original URL: http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/movies/la-et-doris5-2008jul05,0,2172089.story. Original URL, consulted by jeanne on July 5, 2008.http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/movies/la-et-doris5-2008jul05,0,2172089.story
From the Los Angeles Times
A new biography looks into the shadows and 'Untold Story' of Doris Day
On screen, she was America's smiling, singing darling. But off screen, her husbands weren't Rock Hudson and her life was no light romp.
By Susan King
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
July 5, 2008
Highlights and commentary by jeanne.
HER LIFE on screen played like an American fairy tale.
Blond, bouncy and beautiful, Doris Day captivated mid-20th century moviegoers in a series of rollicking romantic comedies with her favorite leading man, Rock Hudson, including "Pillow Talk" and "Lover Come Back," as well as the western musical "Calamity Jane," Alfred Hitchcock's thriller "The Man Who Knew Too Much," the musical drama "Love Me or Leave Me" and many more.
A former singer with Les Brown's band in the 1940s, Day also was a bestselling recording artist whose trademark songs -- "Sentimental Journey" and the Oscar-winning "Que Sera, Sera" -- seemed to epitomize her upbeat spirit. During her years in the spotlight, Day was always portrayed as happily married -- to third husband and manager Martin Melcher -- and loving mother to son Terry.
But the real story couldn't be further from the truth, according to David Kaufman's expansive new biography, "Doris Day: The Untold Story of the Girl Next Door." captivated Instead it's a sad story -- partially told in the actress' 1975 autobiography -- of a talented woman who was unloved by her father, pushed by an ambitious stage mother, with four failed -- and mostly loveless -- marriages, who never got what she wanted: simply to have a happy home life.
"What is even sadder to me and what I have learned in the course of researching this book, interviewing people and from quotes from her own autobiography is how insecure she is about her looks and about her talents," said Kaufman, a theater critic and author.
Note that this description could have fit the role of the average "girl next door." Compare this to Dove's new ad campaignfor Real Beauty. They have a special fund for giving girls more confidence that "they're pretty," and for changing the definition of beauty. Interesting coincidence that the campaign has just been launched as this story about Doris Day comes out.Some of the gender roles of the 1950's are still with us."Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose." (The more it changes, the more it's the same thing.) jeanne
Now 86, Day has lived in Carmel for nearly 30 years and spends her time rescuing abandoned and wounded animals and overseeing the Doris Day Foundation for Animals. She doesn't do interviews and wouldn't talk with Kaufman.
"I did try to talk to her," he says. "I went into this project expecting that even if I would get to talk to her, she would not talk to me about her past because it is my understanding that she will not talk about the past. I think one of the reasons is the only way she could put some adversity behind her was by leaving the past and walking away from it and devoting all of her energies to pets. That is the only thing she wants to talk about."
Kaufman believes the reason the actress won't talk about her life is, "and this was the biggest surprise to me, is because she feels so completely disassociated from who 'Doris Day' was."
That's why her friends call her "Clara" -- a nickname bestowed upon her by one of her costars, Billy DeWolfe, years ago. "She signs her notes as Clara," Kaufman says. "She answers the phone as Clara."
. . . .
Unlike the brassy blonds of the 1930s and '40s, like Jean Harlow, Mae West and Betty Grable, Day was more the girl next door, both tomboyish and sexy. She fit perfectly into the zeitgeist of the 1950s -- a decade of prosperity, hope and wholesomeness. "She hoped to suggest that the world was OK," wrote David Thomson in "The New Biographical Dictionary of Film." "She was the home fire that refused to admit the Cold War. Above all, she was optimistic."
. . . .
Kaufman interviewed several of Day's closest friends, including actress Kaye Ballard and choreographer Donald Saddler. He was aided in his efforts when columnist Liz Smith devoted a column to the book three years ago. "She basically declared this is the definitive book and that led to people . . . and they led to other people and it was like the house that Jack built."
This is a wonderful example of "snowball sampling." Start with a few people whose iseas on the subject intrigue you, then follow with people whose ideas intrigue them, and follow with people that each of them identify as people whose ideas intrigue them. If you start out this way with exploring peoples' ideas about an issue that matters to us all, like the economy, and if you listen to each person in good faith, and if you categorize the ideas and count the number of people that make similar statements, you'll begin to see patterns. Seeing patterns is the beginning of analyzing information.Then you might try to see if there are any commonalities in the patterns. Does age, gender, where they live, where they go to school, what their favorite pastimes are, etc. seem to make a difference in how they see the issue?
Now talk to each other about that. In the process, you might begin to see some of the complexity of the issue and how it affects different groups differently.
This whole process is a way of turning your everyday conversations into discourse that can make important issues real to you and to your community. Maybe you'll discover questions to which you'd like to find answers. This is where DEar Habermas will try to help by identifying different sources that might help you decide how you feel about the issue. Then, VOTE whenever and wherever the issue comes up. NO Election just now? Then TALK about what you've learned, direct others to sources that might help them decide how they feel. An educated electorate means better answers, better neighborhood and community understanding, and better governance. jeanne
. . .
susan.king@latimes.com
- Discussion Questions
- QUESTION
Consider WHAT JEANNE WAS THINKING ABOUT WHEN SHE WROTE THE QUESTION. AND LINKS TO SOURCES YOU MIGHT WANT TO CONSIDER IN ANSWERING THE QUESTION.
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