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November 14

In the readings from Leslie A. Hahner & Scott J. Varda’s “Yarn Bombing and the Aesthetics of Exceptionalism,” yarn bombing is explain as a “cute’ aesthetic that aligns with street art culture. In terms of street art, it is usually associated by minority groups, and is often thought of as vandalism by the professional world. In summary, yarn bombing has dealt with the politics of art– racism, gender, social class. While knitter have created communities, they have reinvented sharing art by tagging their names and  becoming “hipster,”(Hahner). I agree with Hahner that yarn barning is a form of artistic expression, Yarn bombers typically select projects based on the contrast between the connoted coziness of the yarn against the object being bombed. Street lamps and parking meters are covered with stockings, while statues are gifted with leg warmers. These projects emphasize the way domestic styling supposedly warms hard surfaces.,” (Hahner). Yarn bombing is intended to change public spaces, and goes back to feminist movements. “In this way, the aesthetic sensibilities of the middle class are valued for how they produce the pleasure and beauty of yarn bombing. Yarn bombing has become a form of activism: while giving the feeling go home and coziness, the labor of yarn bombing is taking place in urban communities where the artworks can be a political message. 

Via images: https://twistedsifter.com/2016/07/yarnbombing-stockholm-with-julia-riordan/yarn-bombing-stockholm-by-julia-riordan-2/

Via images: http://lomabeat.com/2017/11/yarn-bombing-around-plnu-campus/

In the article I provided, the conversations with yarn bombers shows their intent to beautify a neighborhood and create a statement. 

Source: http://theconversation.com/knit-one-purl-one-the-mysteries-of-yarn-bombing-unravelled-2346

Works Cited

Leslie A. Hahner & Scott J. Varda (2014). “Yarn Bombing and the Aesthetics of Exceptionalism” in Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies 11(4), pp. 301-321.

Samantha Close (2018). “Knitting Activism, Knitting Gender, Knitting Race” in International Journal of Communication 12, pp. 867-889.

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Paper 2:Midterm Election

It was the midterm election this past week, and across all 50 states voters casted their ballots. 🗳️. As a result, the Democratic Party 🎉won🏆 the House🏠 of Representatives while the GOP kept more seats💺on the senate floor🏛️.The Democrats won the 218 seats needed to affirm their victory over the Republicans. With this victory, the Democrats have more power than they did the past two years to order an investigation into the President, which might lead to his impeachment.  Many voters were pleased with the outcome of the Democrats, including a surprise senate win in Nevada, and gaining the majority seats in the House🏠 of Representatives. (Via image: http://coralnatura.tumblr.com) 

 The GOP has control over the senate– winning in Missouri and Indiana–, making it easier for President Trump to pass his bills and policies. Republican Ted Cruz beat his competition Beto O’Rourke, who gave a passionate concession speech, while also hinting at a possible campaign run for 2020. A new poll has found that O’Rourke poses as a possible leader for the Democratic Party, alongside Biden and Sanders. 

 Ted Cruz beats his competition Beto O’Rourke, which left Twitter in a frenzy: (via images:https://mashable.com/article/ted-cruz-win-memes-midterm/#DFlQU.nnzGqf).

Referring back to a well-known meme from the 2016 presidential race, Ted Cruz  had gotten a lot of heat on twitter after beating O’Rourke, leaving Democrats on Twitter enthusiastic about sharing their memes. (via image: https://www.gq.com/story/ted-cruz-loves-soup-zodiac-killer-maybe)Even with no experience, President Trump will have not have to deal with the Democrats getting in the way of his policies. That’s why Democrats were very passionate about marching to the polls in large droves, hoping to end the remainder of his term.

 In the wake of the 2018 elections, social media user created a meme for the midterms, explaining their feelings about marching to the polls: 

It was importune to the both parties that the voters on twitter spread the word to vote in the midterm elections. It was clear from the internet’s reaction that everyone felt passionate about voting in the election. 

More specifically anti-trump voters wanted to get a large turnout. and used memes to communicate how they felt about the President. After all, anti-trump voters were upset with the presidential election results, and Trump hasn’t been popular for voters.😡

The divide between Democrats and Republicans was evident in Georgia, where the race for govenor was extremely close. Many democrats accused Kemp of abusing his power as the chief officer, saying he used his position to influence the results. Kemp accused Democrats of hacking the election, even though the breach could not be proven. Still, the midterm elections broke many glass ceilings for women: Over 99 women won🏆, seats in the House of Representatives, with Ayanna Pressley became the first African-American women to join Congress from Massachusetts. Also, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez became the youngest  congresswomen ever. With two Muslim and Native American women joining congress, this midterm election has changed the dynamics on Capitol Hill.

Link to GIF: http://gph.is/2hAzwVv

Lastly, It’s important to share your voting experience on social media platforms. 

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November 7: Anti-Logos

In Christine Harold’s “Anti-Logos: Sabotaging the Brand Through Parody,” highlights the Adbusters magazine, which parodies advertisements and critiques our capitalist society. In many ways, Adbusters transformed their image from anti branding pioneers to “brand managers”.  Harold explains how “logos” translate in Greek  langauge as “logic” and “personality.” With this in mind, it makes sense that logos should be symbols of companies, and embody their ideals and values. Thus, when Harold mentioned how logos can relate to the audience through a meaningful message, I thought about advertisements that have left behind a iconic image. The attached link(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Abr_LU822rQ) is the commercial of Spike Lee’s ad for Nike.

 In this commercial, the Nike brand is appealing to the audience by setting the status quo of having Air Jordan shoes. The commercial uses Harold’s logic of the brand being rebellious, and creating a counterculture for sneakerheads. In the readings, The commercial is successful “in keeping with the dictates of Nike- style marketing, the sneaker is primarily a vehicle for the brand it distrib- utes. As consumer-culture analyst Rob Walker notes, “Often when a new brand or product is invented, its creators then make an effort to describe (or invent) its deeper meaning or Big Idea. Here the Big Idea came first, and it’s the product that’s being invented after the fact,” (Harold). This commercial proves Nike is one of the originators of creating a brand. Harold explains how other advertisements have failed to create a strong brand.  For example, Nancy Reagan's “Just Say No” Campaign was a failure because it didn’t resonate with the audience or their ideals: part of the problem is an inability of such rhetoric to affirm any alternative beyond endless cri- tique. It can only negate, only repudiate the status quo,”(Harold). Harold continues to explain that logos should inspire the consumer. Spike Lee’s commercial creates a breadth of coolness that is lost in other advertisements. In the readings, Harold explains that “Adbusters, exposes the inherently flawed logic of Hilfiger’s claim, by insinuating that mass-marketed rebellion produces conformist sheep that, despite intentions, do nothing more than follow the flock,”(Harold). An example of a original advertisement idea would be in magazines, which have multiple advertisements on every page. In this case, I agree that there needs to be a cleanup of ‘our littered mediascape” as explained by Harold: .https://www.pinterest.com/albertamagazine/magazine-ads/. Also there are many advertisements when exploring media today on our media platforms. In my opinion, the future of advertisements aren't in magazine or on billboards but are on our technological platforms. already, advertisements are flooding computer screens and serving as a new space for ads. adjusters are still exposing the false leads presented in advertisements, an example would be the Adbusters take on Absolut Vodka. In the multiple ads, they debunk the ads presented by Absolut in ads such as this one:

In many ways, Adbusters is boycotting Absolut vodka by creating an advertisement that exposes the negative social impacts of the product. The ads are “creating a dialogue” about how advertisements don't look after the social good of people. 

Works Cited

Christine Harold, “Anti-Logos: Sabotaging the Brand Through Parody” in OurSpace: Resisting the Corporate Control of Culture (pp. 27-69).

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advertising and Branding

Murray’s “Branding “Real” Social Change in Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty,” discusses the commercial and social implications of the Dove campaign, and the economic reasons the campaign was prompted by executives. The Dove campaign embraces feminism, but is simultaneously making money moves to “commodity feminism,” wherein advertisers attempt “to reincorporate the cultural power of feminism” (Goldman 1992, p. 130) and, in so doing, depoliticize the feminist message”(Murray). Advertisements targeted for women pull from the feminist movement to sell their product. In Dove soap campaign, they used visual images to connote that ‘real body’ comes in all body types, showing images of women with different bodies. The “real beauty” campaigns align with the corporate strategy to create a pro-feminist agenda. In Dove’s new commercial, the company celebrates body positivity, and shows the molds and formation of their body shaped bottles. Women’s bodies are replicated to look like soap bottles, for a limited time.

Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRiv2lgaX_U

In the class readings from Sarah Banet-Weiser, ““We Are All Workers”: Economic Crisis, Masculinity, and the American Working Class,” the crisis of American corporates finding the working class for economic reasons are explained as a strategy for building hopeful brands. This strategy of Levi’s jeans is to create an American brand that highlights the crisis of American values and visual imagery that has left the culture. For instance, Levi’s used snapshots of rural America, one that has built the countries foundation. The visual imagery accompanied with the text of America poem by Walt Whitman. In the advertisement, we see the working class images of men:“The male worker is thus positioned in these campaigns as (in part) a symbol for a nation under threat,”(Banet-Weiser). Advertisements target the male working class by displaying the lack of masculinity in our culture. In the image below, the advertisement clearly display’s how the company uses American ideology to sell jeans. In the second image, the jeans are worn by young adults, in a rustic area with a beaten car.

Works Cited:

Dara Persis Murray (2013). “Branding “Real” Social Change in Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty” in Feminist Media Studies 13(1), pp. 83-101.

Sarah Banet-Weiser, ““We Are All Workers”: Economic Crisis, Masculinity, and the American Working Class” in Gendering the Recession: Media and Culture in the Age of Austerity (pp. 81-106).

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Advertisements

In the class readings from Sut Jhally’s, “Image-based Culture: Advertising and Popular Culture,” advertisements are described as “ a discourse through and about objects,”(Jhally). Advertisements communicate to our families and our individual identities because they fuel the consumer culture and the values of the the institution that include “the good life.” Marketing campaigns tell us that happiness is attainable through commercial goods. In addition, ads create social norms: “ Images having to do with gender strike at the core of individual identity,” Advertisements provide readers with their understating of social norms, and perpetuate onto people the guidelines to achieve  perfection that is demonstrated in their advertisements.Markets are pursuing a portrayal of happiness, based on a image-system.The difference between advertisements and media programs is the lack of credits. Jhally has an interesting point: advertisements having control over citizens and their state of thinking. In summary, advertisements are often intertwined with political and socioeconomic theories: “ while messages can be read adequately, most people do not understand how the language of images works. Just as knowledge of grammar is considered vital in learning,”(Jhally).

In the image below, and advertisement for Always shows how the tone of the visual image tries to debunk social gender norms. The marketing team came up with #likeagirl asking young girls to demonstrate what it means to throw, fight, and run like a girl. In addition, a still of the ad campaign shows a young character with the simple question: “ What does it mean to do things #likeagirl?” With the marketing campaign playing during the SuperBowl, the visual  images stand up against the stereotypes that depict women in the media in a negative light.Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIxA3o84syY

In the readings from “ Showing the Unspoken,” Messaris explains that visual images correlate with visual pleasure that resonate with audiences through sexual connotations. In an example from the readings, Messaris describes the open protest against a Diesel ad that had two sailor men embracing in front of a crowd. With the crows celebrating the embankment of a ship during World War 2, an openly gay couple kissing in an advertisement was still not accepted by society at the time, which meant the advertisement pushed social boundaries. Messaris’ prediction of gays and lesbians in advertisements was correct, with social norms becoming proud and accepting of the gay community. Still, most advertisements include heterosexual couples and appeal to the heterosexual male more than gay men too. Also, art in advertisement use visual syntax’s of upper class connotations: The use of art to connote superior status has a long history in commercial advertising,” (Messaris). Advertisements use high art for cultural references that show an understanding of art. In the advertisement below, a child is sitting in the position of Auguste Rodin’s Thinker, selling the nutritional medicine targeted for children.

According to Messaris, words in advertisements appeal to audiences through controversial images of sexuality. In the Arby's ad, the visual image references sexual connotations through the women holding her chest, obviously trying to appeal to male customers. Arby’s persuaded customers through their written text: “We’re about to reveal something you’ll really drool over.” Notice Arby’s specifically chose reveal so that the women’s missing body parts would be the focus of the image.

Works Cited

Sut Jhally, “Image-based Culture: Advertising and Popular Culture” in Gender, Race and Class in Media (pp. 77-87).

Paul Messaris, “Showing the Unspoken” in Visual Persuasion: The Role of Images in Advertising (pp. 219-264).

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Digital Food Cultures

In Deborah Lupton’s Cooking, Eating, Uploading: Digital Food Cultures, she describes that food interacts with society on all levels of consumption. As mentioned in the article, new technologies have incorporated food through applications and social media. As new technologies are emerging, so are new trends in food culture. The food gaze is evident through the incorporation of food and hashtags.(See image below). As described by the readings, the images depict the food as a sensual image that share the “ geolocation of sites in which food is prepared, purchased, and consumed, and the quantification of food and bodies are brought to the fore in digital food cultures,” ( Lupton).

Erin Metz McDonnell’s Food Porn: The Conspicuous Consumption of Food in the Age of Digital Reproduction the readings cover  the role of food porn on social media platforms. Interestingly, Lupton argues that “ viewers, we participate in the social construction of an image as food porn through our own ways of looking, experiencing physiological responses to the food porn photo- graph in ways that parallel responses to sexual pornography, whether fascination, obsession, desire or actual embodied hunger,”(McDonnell). Social Media users share their food experiences, treating their visual of food as esthetics and apart of their identity on social media. With food porn, the aesthetics of food images are altered through editing practices: filters, zoom, crop, slow-motion(McDonnell). Food porn has become a subculture, with posts identifying socioeconomic status and trending with popular culture. The two images below depict the experiences at The Museum of Ice Cream which was designed specifically for sharing on social media platforms.Source:https://www.museumoficecream.com/  

Food posts do more than share your meal, they share your environment and cultural understanding of food. For instance, millennials today look for food as guidance on their experiences. The attached source is video of a vlog specifically about eating your way thought Disneyland, without even mentioning any of the other rides or activities. However, there are many their posts similar that share people’s food experience in different settings. This proves that food has become apart of of popular culture, and is a trending topic for millenials.  Source:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxYxAOAZ1hU&t=432s

Works Cited

Deborah Lupton, “Cooking, Eating, Uploading: Digital Food Cultures” in The Bloomsbury Handbook of Food and Popular Culture (pp. 66-82).

Erin Metz McDonnell, “Food Porn: The Conspicuous Consumption of Food in the Age of Digital Reproduction” in Food, Media and Contemporary Culture: The Edible Image (pp. 239-265).

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Cartoon Realism

In the readings Mittell’s “Cartoon Realism: Genre Mixing and the Cultural Life of The Simpsons,” the changes the animated series made for the genre, which for a long time had been “ huggable saturday morning specials,”are articulated through the examples of The Simpsons and The Boondocks (Mittell). The Simpsons and The Boondocks creates such a web of intricate cultural reference, which enlist viewers in the process of making meaning from what happens on screen. In the readings Mittell’s “Cartoon Realism: Genre Mixing and the Cultural Life of The Simpsons,” the changes the animated series made for the genre, which for a long time had been “ huggable saturday morning specials” (Mittell). This is perhaps the series’ greatest draw; it makes hip, culturally aware viewers a part of the action,” (Krueger). In The Boondocks, the shows draws from a lot of Kung Fu films and Japanese anime, which are no doubt serious influences of the creators. Krueger mentions The Simpsons as a animated series that changed the genre, and opened doors  through its ‘situational realism’ because the characters and the storylines are more realistic and reflective of current events. Shows such as The Simpsons and The Boondocks have pushed television towards realism. Both cartoons are similar in that they pushed cartoons into becoming a mainstream that could tackle serious topics through quality plot and characters. Because the show is a “hallucination of a sitcom,” poking holes at the ideal American family that was the storyline for most sitcoms of the 90s. The Simpsons has been in touch with popular culture, that many of the series’ fans have noticed the similarities and references the show has made to be insightful for reality. In the following image, an image from The Simpsons show the creators were aware of the deals that were going to be made between studios, specifically Disney and Fox studios. The Disney and 21st Century Fox merger changed the landscape of Hollywood, and is a perfect example of the cartoon’s critique of current events.

In the following source are additional examples of when the television series made prediction in our culture, which have made fans very excited to keep uw with the Simpsons family. Source: http://time.com/4667462/simpsons-predictions-donald-trump-lady-gaga/.

The cultural life has also been parodied in cartoons that are being released today for a younger audience. Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7o8H0gRYsEI. In Mittell’s readings, the expansion of the genre which is “formed within the dynamic interactions between texts, industries, audiences, and historical contexts”(Mittell). 

Works Cited

Rex Krueger (2010). “Aaron McGruder’s The Boondocks and Its Transition From Comic Strip to Animated Series” in Animation 5(3), pp. 313-329.

Jason Mittell (2001). “Cartoon Realism: Genre Mixing and the Cultural Life of The Simpsons” in The Velvet Lightrap, pp. 15-28.

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VideoGames

In the class readings from Alexander Galloway, “Social Realism” in Gaming: Essays on Algorithmic Culture, I thought of gaming culture that imitates much of everyday life. Realistic video games like “ Sims” benefits the player that creates an alternate worlds that connects to the real world: “the conventional wisdom on realism in gaming is that, because life today is so computer mediated, gamers actually benefit from hours of realistic gameplay,”( Galloway, 70). Today, everyone is tuned into their devices, it makes sense that many video games mimic our reality, but Galloway states video games don’t benefit reality, even though social realism can be applied to video games: “ If these games are any indication, it would seem that gaming is a purely expressionistic medium with no grounding in realism no matter how high the polygon counts or dots per inch, or perhaps that gaming is one of those media wherein an immense chasm stands between empirical reality and its representation in art,”( Galloway, 73). In Vice’s article Faster in the Head: Can Video Games Make Soccer Players Better?, Blickenstaff argues commercial video games and soccer in reality have nothing to do with each other: “ commercial video games—as opposed to laboratory exercises—probably don't help.

Source:https://sports.vice.com/en_us/article/wn3vwz/faster-in-the-head-can-video-games-make-soccer-players-better

There's too much noise in a typical game of FIFA, too much going on to improve anyone's processing speed,” (Blickenstaff ). Still, the players are satisfied with becoming the best FIFA player, and even gloat about their abilities, despite the fact that they couldn’t play in real life. In Rory’s Smith piece for the New York Times, he mentions the realistic representation of the players is evident through the details of their sport teams, abilities personalities that are designed to each player. What makes FIFA interesting is the creator’s quest to make it as realistic as possible, with each new release mirroring your favourite players signature moves and appearance on the field (Smith). In “ How Videogames are Changing the Way Soccer Is Played Even professional soccer players have admitted their addiction to playing FIFA , for the video game has had an impact on the sport and the player like Messi, Pogba, and Hummels who have been caught playing the game in hotel rooms or in between matches with their teammates (Smith).

Source:https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/14/sports/soccer/the-scouting-tools-of-the-pros-a-controller-and-a-video.html

In Matt Sawrey (2013). “The False Economy of Photorealism” in Thunderbolt Games, Sawrey ideas of creating a new reality can be applied to FIFA because of how they surpassed reality. Sawrey explains “ games don’t have to, and for the sake of a healthy, varied medium, many shouldn’t, concentrate on being realistic. But if wooing us with a life-like simulation is a developer’s primary aim, then photorealism isn’t the be all and end all of their investment,’ (Sawrey). FIFA displays reactive realism through the realistic reactions between player’s interactions. 

 The combination of systematic and thematic realism made players surpass the players they’re imitating. In Eugene Lee writings from Entropy Magazine, “Papers, Please: Exploring a Hopeless Dystopia Through the Mundanity of Mechanics,” she states realism in gaming is about a relationship between the game and the player. Not a causal relationship, as the Columbine theory might suggest, but a relationship nonetheless,” (Lee, 2014). The arguments discover the fascination players have with playing realistic video games like FIFA, are the endless possibilities that are unattainable for game players to achieve in reality because of what they’ve been through or the time it would take to get over life’s problems.

Sources:

Smith, Rory. “How Video Games Are Changing the Way Soccer Is Played.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 13 Oct. 2016, www.nytimes.com/2016/10/14/sports/soccer/the-scouting-tools-of-the-pros-a-controller-and-a-video.html.

Blickenstaff, Brian. “Faster in the Head: Can Video Games Make Soccer Players Better?” Sports, VICE, 9 Oct. 2015, sports.vice.com/en_us/article/wn3vwz/faster-in-the-head-can-video-games-make-soccer-players-better.

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September 26

In the readings from Magnet’s “Representing Biometrics” in When Biometrics Fail: Facial Recognition Technology and the Culture of Surveillance,” introducing new technologies that incorporate our visual identity can improve the security lock on our iphones, while being practical for users. Biometric software has changed our technology culture: “representations of biometrics have as much of an impact on the growth and expansion of biometric as do technological developments in biometric science,” (Magnet, 134). With Biometric technology increasing convenience and providing strong authentication, the new technology has negatives associated with race, class, and gender. New forms of surveillance produced by biometric “technologies are tied both to the violent disembering of bodies marked by racialized, gendered, classed, and seualized identities to pleasure in having anxieties about security resolved by biometric surveillance,”(Magnet).

When the security of a group is threatened, we see a spike in surveillance, and as a result, biometric software is being adopted by large corporations to protect their customers. For instance, Google’s Abacus Project can track how you operate on an iphone– your voice, your typing patterns, and all your other habits to make sure a human being is using the device instead of a robot. This biometric technology is represented as objective, but that's not remotely true. In photographs and examples of media in our culture, we see how their are biased towards minority groups, often blurring the lines between ethnicities, associating their identity to social class and gender. Just the other day, I watched a comedy sketch that asked Americans on the streets of New York City the “ difference between sikhs and muslims.” A person that looks remotely Arab are often questioned at TSA or harassed on the streets (The Daily Show).

Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RskvZgc_s9g

In Gates’ writings, “Finding the Face of Terror in Data,” we see the emergence of racial profiling. Facial recognition after post 9/11 was supposed to protect our nation’s security against radical extremists, but Gates argues the algorithms created a “technology for making up terrorists,” and the evidence points to a database that is dependent on racial profiling, (Gates, 102). By shaping the perception of minority groups in our culture, biometric technology has created an identity through photographs stored in databases used for facial recognition. The biometric discourse produces new forms of scopophilia– pleasure in looking.

In this week’s readings from Browne’s “B®anding Blackness: Biometric Technology and the Surveillance of Blackness,” Browne traces the roots of enslaving Africans and their mistreatment by institutions. The treatment of slaves as a commodity meant  “blackness” was apart of identifying an enslaved Africans and a repercussion of racism. Browne argues that branding slaves was a form of surveillance to keep in databases, therefore abusing the slave’s body for capital gain. I thought about what Browne said about the relationship between blackness and commodity. In today’s culture, blackness can be translated through fashion that relates back to slavery. Nike signed football player Colin Kaepernick to star in their advertising campaign, sparking controversy among shoppers. Colin Kaepernick symbolizes a brand that rejects the socioeconomic and political rhetoric that has been created through biometric surveillance. Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hIc_epqfI0

When I think of Browne’s analysis of biometric history, I realized our culture is through the same lense that has suppressed ‘other groups’ and has surveilled their bodies and communities. Thus, our commentary has been shaped by how biometric technology has been represented in our popular culture.

Sources:

Simone Browne (2015). “B®anding Blackness: Biometric Technology and the Surveillance of Blackness” in Dark Matters: On the Surveillance of Blackness (pp. 89-129).

Shoshana Magnet (2011). “Representing Biometrics” in When Biometrics Fail: Facial Recognition Technology and the Culture of Surveillance (pp. 127-148).

Kelly Gates (2011). “Finding the Face of Terror in Data” in Our Biometric Future: Facial Recognition Technology and the Culture of Surveillance (pp. 97-124).

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September 19th

The medical gaze has become apart of the mainstream culture, as the human anatomy has been explored through the lens of media. When looking back at Annie Leibovitz’s Vanity Fair cover, the cover shoot with Demi Moore’s pregnant belly in the middle stirred controversy on the popular media. “ The pregnant body– even clothed– is a source of abjection and disgust in popular culture: the woman is represented as a awkward, uncomfortable, and grotesquely excessive,”(Stabile, 191). I searched through the bookstacks for literary analysis’ of women in media, and representation of the pregnant body. I discovered Barbara Creed’s Film, Feminism, Psychoanalysis. Creed’s readings explain the popular media and culture creation of a archaic mother– one that exists secondary to the fetus. “She is the generative mother, the pre-phallic mother,” (Creed, 20). In summary, Creed explains that the pregnant body is existing in the narrative for the unborn child, and portraying the archaic mother in media reestablishes the patriarchal ideology that denies women’s rights for their own bodies. We see the media establish this narrative, and I attached images of  the HandMaid’s Tale, a dystopian future where women are stripped of their own rights. The series tackles issues which echo our own media landscape with Women’s Marches on Washington and abortion laws being passed in states( images of Texas court attached). The Handmaid’s Tale is great because it shows when government interference means control over the pregnant body.In our readings, Stabile explains “the pregnant female body has been the object of medical scrutiny and surveillance, as well as a mystical( if unrepresentable) reverence and awe in Western culture,”  linking politics and the media’s representation of the pregnant body.  Related to Stabile’s readings about motherhood and how femininity is portrayed with an ‘innocent’ within the female body, also there is still the need to govern the pregnant body as the article mentioned. I thought the television series related to the class reading because it imitates how in life anti-abortion groups try to dehumanize the mother’s choice, and feminist will have to fight hard to seperate motherhood from pregnancy. Pregnant women are still monitored during pregnancy through the medical gaze, dependent on their socioeconomic and historical environments. 

Personally, i think that Stabile’s argument have faults because many women find the pregnancy to be both beautiful and natural cycle of bringing life into this world. More and more women are putting to display their experiences with pregnancy and our changing the tone surrounding past examples of pregnancy in films and media.

Cited Works

Creed, B. (1993). The monstrous-feminine : film, feminism, psychoanalysis. London : Routledge. Print.

“Smart Power,” The Handmaid’s Tale. Hulu, Los Angeles. 11 Jul. 2018. Television

In David Johnson Thornton’s Brain Culture: Neuroscience and Popular Media, our public discourse of the brain have been influenced by popular culture’s visualization of the body part. Thornton describes humanity's’ obsession with brain behavior and toxic external factors, afterall, the brain “causes all of our successes and failures.” The visuals of the brain in our culture influences the social economic programs which stress the importance of bettering the brain for self-improvement and also economic gain. I think the public’s increased fascination with the brain has roots in our history and culture beginning as early as the renaissance period. In fact, Michelangelo would sneak into the morgue regularly to understand the anatomy of the brain, which influenced his work. The visuals of the brain have even bring brought again in Ariana Grande’s music video, representing the visuals compared to ideologies, culture, and rhetoric.

source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHLHSlExFis

 I found fascinating Thornton's explanation of how the brain is able form “new hubs” and be “rewired for more optimal function.” We see the visual of a brain “lighting up” commonly in our popular culture, suggesting that brain activity correlates to increased connectivity. Scientist study the connections between our brain activity and the lighted areas in our brains, using fMRI technology. I agree with Thornton that the public’s fascination with the brain is growing, but more specifically I think the public rhetoric influences the study of the connecting neurons inside the brain and how psychiatric studies are influenced by the visualization of the brain through our language, public policies, and ideologies. I think the visuals of the brain imitate the vocabulary used  in the socio political landscape.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHLHSlExFis

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Laura Mulvey’s theory of the male gaze was introduced in her readings “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” In the class readings, Mulvey explains how the male patriarchy is reinforced because females appear to the audience controlled by the patriarchy. Females are turned into objects, making them hyper-sexualized for the male spectator. In the text, Mulvey explains “ scopophilia as one of the component instincts of sexuality which exists as drives quite independently of the erotogenic zones.”  The female character exists only for the male gaze and audience, notice she never looks directly to the camera, but the camera snapshots her as an object with different angles and close ups, and other male viewers are able to gaze upon her like an object. For examples, the first image depicts a scene from Hitchcock’s Rear window(1954) where the female character is viewed as an object of desire for the onlooker. Recent examples might include advertisements, music videos, and films as we discussed in class.

I think the ‘female’ gaze is more prominent in media today, largely in part because of the growing media landscape( peak TV, subscription services, cable television). It is a direct response to the male gaze, and is being seen more. In television shows like Handmaid’s Tale and Insecure, Mulvey’s theory is applicable to both series that have been given life on modern platforms. From being a Youtube channel and a show adapted for Hulu Originals, both shows are constantly telling the narrative through the lens of women. All of this opportunity has allowed for female narratives, which means more women have been involved behind the scenes. Take for example the international phenomenon Wonder Woman(2018) because the film deliberately protests the male gaze and Freud’s ideas on scopophilia. In this scene, the protagonist played by Gal Gadot looks back to the camera and is able to return the gaze instead of being looked upon. The film continued to break boundaries for getting rid of the male gaze: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TusjbjpbzRg)

In “ The Oppositional Gaze” Bell Hooks talks about the power behind the gaze, and how there is “power in looking.” Growing up, Hooks talks about how she and her family “ we laughed at television shows like Our Gang and Amos ‘n’ Andy, at these white representations of blackness, but we also looked at them critically.” Black female spectators must deconstruct their stereotypes and images being represented on the screen by interrogating the visuals for pleasure. Hooks critiques films with an oppositional gaze instead of accepting the visuals of black females. In Hollywood films where the black female is represented in the same stereotypes, the media has perpetuated a singular image which Hooks explains must be met with the oppositional gaze. In the attach hyperlink, examples of the oppositional gaze prove that there are still film directors that are pushing against the mainstream ideas of black females that are meant to degrade and undervalue the importance of the black female’s role in the film: https://xuengl359.wordpress.com/home/theoryguide/the-oppositional-gaze-bell-hooks/

One of my personal favorite examples of the oppositional gaze would be Jackie Brown(1997). If you pay close attention to the opening credits of the film (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gs1_ndm3r4) we see Jackie Brown introduced without any stigmas or stereotypes. The movie continues to play tribute to the oppositional gaze with polar characters and the choice of costume design. Jackie Brown outsmarts all of the antagonists. https://xuengl359.wordpress.com/home/theoryguide/the-oppositional-gaze-bell-hooks/