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Frankenstein Meets Maslow.

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Abstract

"Frankenstein Meets Maslow" details the academic exchange between colleagues (an English and a Nursing professor) when an English student writes a cross-disciplinary analysis of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, within the framework of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Once the dialogue begins, academic boundaries blur, pedagogy blends, and innovative insightful discourse ensues.

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Those of us who teach literature-based developmental English often read our student essays in an almost semi-conscious, if not an auto-pilot state, fully expecting the traditional approach and 'freshman' interpretation of the steady, well worn classics we assign. Therefore, in literature survey courses or undergraduate baseline genre courses, we expect the pedantic evaluations that border on plot review with the insipid, stock, biographical references that may or may not be relevant. We have also come to expect the obvious interpretations that are conducive to the respective text, ones that may be absolutely accurate, but quite predictable, those repetitions of character, theme, landscape, or treatment that offer no thought or imagination but present merely what 'they' think we require. But once in awhile, there is that innovative essay that offers more than the obvious, one that transcends not only the assignment and its genre but the designated course of study, one that takes the student essay to a new level of thought, and one that encourages academic exchange between colleagues. Once in awhile there is that one student essay that inspires, illuminates, and yes, teaches the well-worn teacher.

In my Summer 2002 English course (sequential composition that incorporates thematic literature), freshman students were asked to submit an in depth interpretation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Predictably, most students rushed to examine:

1. The 'mad' scientist--Dr. Frankenstein who creates a being from body parts of assorted dead beings and who is so engrossed in his project that he withdraws from society and systematically deteriorates physically as well as emotionally. This perspective may also include an ethical look at religion vs. science, the scientific ego, and the God-complex.

2. Isolation--clearly in one level of the novel, the protagonist, Dr. Frankenstein is isolated within his realm of creation; also isolated are the characters left at home: Dr. Frankenstein's family,...

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