12. Xtranormal Cartoon: Gender Inequality in the Workplace (AMC's Mad Men)

                         

For the Xtranormal assignment, I recreated a scene from the series Mad Men. I choose this scene which is from the episode, "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes". I felt like it really captured what female gender roles were in the late 1950s. What is even more interesting about this scene is that the character Joan, is giving into sexism rather than a male. 

11. Working With Inforgraphics: Representations of Women in the Media

I decided to focus my info graphic on how women are represented in the media. I broke the graphic into three section: representation of women in advertisements, television and film and the demographics of women working in the media. 

So my thoughts on working with an info graphic?  It was pretty fun. I initially tried to work with infogram.am, but their templates really didn't capture what I was trying to convey. I did some research and discovered Pikt0chart, and really like the layout of the template and there is a lot more effects and graphics you can use with this program. 

The Male Gaze: Funny or Dies "Forehead Titates"

I always find it important to shed light on satirical depictions of gender inequality in the media. Funny or Die, is a comedy website founded by Will Farrell and Adam McKay. In this video, acteress Marion Cotillard discusses the male gaze and the fictional product, "Forehead Tittaes" which promotes men to finally look at women in the eyes. 

A blog created by Hunter College's Women and Media Class discuss the message of this video. 

"I believe this Funny or Die video actually satirizes the idea of women being on display for men. It not only makes it funny, it illustrates the ridiculous sexist issues that exists. While it is still a comedic video, you can tell it wasn't just made for male viewers, but also female views as well. It address the problematic male gaze in a way that is relatable to both men and women. It satisfies women because it isn't just all about the tits and men's attraction to them, and it doesn't turn men away because its too preachy/feminist. I love this video not only because I love Marion Cotillard, but it also gives me some hope that there is a way to have this conversation, bringing the male gaze into consciousness while still engaging both male and female."

This video from Funny or Die would be great to show in the classroom to spark debate from both sexes on the objectification of women and the male gaze. It is also interesting that Marion Cotillard still isn't getting the full respect and has to put on 'forehead tittaes' to get someone to look her in the eye. I can see Bell Hooks  and Mulvey's viewpoint of the male gaze being infused in this discussion  Its important to have videos likes these, they neglect the negative name calling and create a satirical depiction that can spark debate. 

Resources: Funny Or Die, Hunter College's Women and Media Class Blog

The Male Gaze and Sexual Objectification in the Media

How many times have you seen the male gaze in the media? The slideshow above shows various advertisements that are conveyed under the male gaze and are very sexual in its representations. Some of these photos were found from Sociological Images and my own research. Now, I must warn you all there are some explicit ads of how women are depicted  in the slideshow and what is even more bothersome is that all these advertisements were shown in magazines and billboards. 

The male gazed is defined as, "Refers to the frequent framing of objects of visual art so that the viewer is situated in a 'masculine' position of appreciation." Mulvey (1975) states that the male gaze is composed of three characteristics:

1. The gaze of the came on the female (often sexualized) body, which is often from the male point of view. 

2. Male characters and identities that gaze upon female bodies in the narrative. 

3. Male spectators who gaze at female bodies on the screen. 

A lot of the American Apparel advertisements in the slideshow above were the most shocking to me. Furthermore, the Duncan Quinn tie ad which depicted a women on the hood the car, barely clothed with a tie around her neck and a man behind her holding it as a leash. Unfortunately women depicted like this has been going on for many decades. The video below  by Allison Arachea, discusses the historical context of the male gaze in the media. 

There are critics who claim that there is a female gaze as well, how can we not forget the latest theatrical release, Magic Mike? Which is a film about male strippers and on its opening day there were massive amounts of women who went to go see the film. However, there are various critiques of this 'female' gaze in the film. The Antenna Blog of the University of Wisconsin critiques the female gaze in the film, "Though the movie claims to be (and was certainly marketed to be) a film all about flipping sexist tropes and celebrating the female gaze, it can't help falling back into problematic mainstream patterns: the male gaze; virgin/whore dichotomies, and the vilification of female pleasure."

Photo Credit: Warner Bros. Pictures

What are your thoughts on the concept of 'the male gaze'? What do you think about this new concept of 'female gaze', do you think there are still aspects of the male gaze such as the comment The Atenna Blog addressed?

Resources: Feminist Aesthetics, An Introduction To Sociology: Feminist Perspectives, Sociological Images, The Antenna Blog of the University of Wisconsin 

Body Image Campaigns: Calling To Action The Unrealistic Depiction Of The Female Body

Our culture predominately conveys women in the media as slender, their makeup, hair and clothing up-to-date with the latest fashions and all of this is achieved with little to no effort. Of course, this image is unrealistic, and distorted. Even though a little outdated, The Dove Campaign calls to action this distorted depiction, "The campaign started a global conversation about the need for a wider definition of beauty after the study proved the hypothesis that the definition of beauty had become limiting and unattainable. Among the study's findings was the statistic that only 2% of women around the world would describe themselves as beautiful." The video above shows a women makeup-free and the steps it takes for her look 'perfect' for an advertisement. 

Amanda Czerniawski of The Society Pages, praises this advertisement and critiques how this image of the 'perfect' women in the media creates many social implications in that a women can look 'beautiful' if she has enough money for cosmetics, surgery and the latest diet fads. Czerniawski states, "We invest in and manipulate our bodies and engage in body regimes to cultivate our physiques, often towards unattainable goals of perfection. We become subjects (in the Foucauldian sense) to our own projects of becoming, as we police ourselves and internalize a normalizing gaze." To add on to this, it also shows that there is an issue of health inequality to obtain this image. Many individuals are too busy working (may even have multiple jobs), being a parent and other stressors that eating healthy and exercising isn't on the top of their list. Furthermore, it is very expensive to eat healthy, 'organic' foods. 

Girls Scouts of the USA released a body image campaign in 2010. The campaign was created after the Girls Scouts Research Institute study found, "Some alarming things about how images of fashion models and other media representations of women's bodies affect the self image of the girls consuming them." Furthermore, the campaign believes that the representations of women in the media will not change until we change our cultural ideas about what is considered beautiful. 

I found this campaign more important and speaks to the most important demographic, young girls. Girls are constructing their gender roles and images in the media seem to have a stronger effect on girls than older women. Jennings et al (1980) research examines influence of televised commercials on women's self-confidence and independent judgement. From a social psychology perspective  the research found that, "By college age, women have already internalized the traditional feminine stereotypes  which are ubiquitous in our culture...this research strongly implies that even if women do not buy the advertised products, they buy the implicit image of femininity conveyed by the commercials, whether they know it or not." (Jennings et al, 1980: 204)

Resources: The Society Pages, The Dove Beauty Campaign, Girls Scouts of the USA, Feministing, Jennings et al. (1980)

2012 Election: Progress for Women

Photo Credit: PolicyMic

I know all of you are probably tired of hearing about the election, I was up late last night waiting to hear President Obama's victory speech!:) I must say, I am so unbelievably proud and its amazing the amount of women that got elected into office and the various demographics they come from. The Huffington Post reported, Tammy Baldwin, of Wisconsin is the first openly gay women to serve on the U.S. Senate. In New Hampshire, it is now the first state being held by all female delegation (meaning a female governor, two female senators and two Congresswomen). In the U.S. Senate, 20 women elected and 81 women in the U.S. House. Tulsi Gabbard, was the first Hindu elected to Congress. Mazie Hirono of Hawaii was the first Asian American women elected to the Senate.

This is definitely some amazing news!

Resources: Huffington Post

10. Digital Storytelling Outline

Photo from AMC Series, Mad Men

My digital storytelling video will adhere to the concepts of gender roles and patriarchy.  I will discuss two digital storytelling ideas that I have brainstormed and the following:

• The kinds of people I might include as interviewees.
• Challenges that I may encounter as I pursue these stories.
• If I may encounter these challenges, then address how I will overcome these obstacles.

The first digital storytelling idea would examine women discussing their experiences they have encountered with patriarchy and the pressure adhering to gender roles. I would start the video discussing for about a minute and an half on gender inequality in America (this would be done by voiceover with images of women in American society throughout the decades), then would transition into the interviewees and what they have to say. I would try get keep each interview under two minutes. I would select about three to four women; have them talk about their experiences with patriarchy and gender inequality they have encountered in their lives. The challenges that I may encounter are trying to work around the interviewees’ schedules. I would overcome this challenge if I got the okay to follow through with project and would begin immediately conducting interviews.

Brief Overview of first digital storytelling idea:

•     Examine women and their experiences with gender inequality and patriarchy.
•     Keep each interview under two minutes.
•     Start the video discussing briefly about gender inequality in America. 
•     Then transition into the first interviewee, second and third.

The second digital storytelling idea I have come up with is addressing individual’s viewpoints of the representation of women in the media. This will be done by going in the field and showing a media clip that embodies gender inequality to both men and women. Then videotape each interviewee’s viewpoints on the clip that was shown. First, I would discuss briefly about how women are portrayed in the media and show the clip that I would show to my participants. The clip would be from a television show or some other form of media that shows gender inequality. Then I would record their viewpoints on the clip. The challenge that I may encounter is getting individual’s that would be willing to be filmed. I was thinking about interviewing on campus, but I would possibly encounter noise issues. I am thinking of contacting some individual’s I know and asking them if they would be willing to be interviewed.

Brief overview of the second digital storytelling idea

• Video would examine men and women’s viewpoints on gender inequality in the media.
• I would show my media clip to my participants via my iPad.
• I would start the video discussing briefly gender inequality in the media and the short video clip I would show to my participants.
• Then transition into the first interviewee, second and third.