Week 6
An assumption that was challenged by this weeks reading for me the thought of women as declining in aging. I never them as incapable or not of knowledge. I have laways looked to my grandparents for wisdom or advice. Either Grandma or grandpa. Dinnerstein account of women and aging through the two views of Fonda and Bush really points out just how apprent this binary is. I was already fully aware of our societies obsession with a youthful appearance and how negativly it affected aging for women.As Foucault was used in this article he states that, ” cultural definitions of femininty act as a “discipiline” regulating women’s bodies.”
The idea of social control and the female body is so true in our culture. I also had no idea there was even a thing such as ageism. I always thought people looked up to their elders. Futhermore I defintely have witnessed those women who are the Fondas of aging. It is so sad that they try so hard to maintain an unrealistic style of beauty at any age! Another part that bothered me in this article was how the women who did decide to age “naturally” was looked upon as though she was deviating from trying maintain beauty. The Barbara Bush was seen as someone who failed to meet standards and therefore MUST be inadequate. This is ridiculous in that aging is a fact of life, something that can’t be reversed. Women need to embrace it but the majority will not be able to because of our obsession with beauty and consumerism. I can hoinestly admit that it affects me too. I do not look forward to aging at all. If I could I wouold remain young forever. But that is just not an option.
Something that resonates with these readings is my own homelife. I have a mother wh ohas managed to saty looking atleast 20 years younger than she realy is. However, now that she is getting to late sixties she is starting to become obsessed with youth and appearance. She is so bitter and nasty all the time. She is never happy. I believe it has alot to do with her aging and her priorities of looks. She gets stuff out int her lips, and even got a facelift two years ago. I try and talk to her about it and tell about society but she doen’t care. It’s like she has been brainwashed so badly that she only wants what she wants. And if she doesn’t get it everything is to blame. I have watched aging for my mom in the last 5 years become a horrific event.
I can only learn how or try not to be like that when I am older. I know what is to come and can’t win the battle. Her misery later in life is due to societies fals consciousness with conecting women and appearance. I’m sure my mom isn’t the only older woman to feel this pressure, as a matter of fact I know she isn’t. Some big event has got to happen to change all this. I don’t even know where to start. To uproot this completely is such an almost seemingly impossible task. It makes me sick to think about how shallow our culture is and how much of puppets we are to the consumer capatilisitc way of life. I”m beginning to understand why some other cultures might not lik e the U.S. I feel like the only thing to do is wipe the slate clean and start again knowing what we know now. People are much to selfish and most women are much to into vanity to begin to see what is happening before their very own eyes. Thank you Lisa for all the reading and things we talked about. All of these concepts I was fully aware of but jsut couldn’t quite put it into words. I will continue my quest in womens studies. Maybe someday I can find a way to make a difference in woemns lives one way or another. Something has to give, somethings got to change.
Add a comment July 10, 2009
Dualism project: Aging Vs. Bodies Nonsexual vs sexual
Why are so, so many women scared of aging? It’s looked at like a plague or something in this country. My guess and current knowledge thanks to a women studies course about the female body is that it is a deeply rooted outcome of a culture obsessed with looking young. Everyone sees young pretty girl as vibrant, sexual and worthy. Older women are left out in the cold as declining and asexual. I’ve seen them and I know you have too. Those poor souls who are 55 or 60 or so that have their hair bleached, too much Botox, fake boobs and you get the point. Thing is, they are fighting in a battle they can’t win. Getting older is fact of life and we should embrace it. I do not see men fighting it like women. Which brings me to another idea. Once again there is a double standard here that isn’t in women’s favor. Go figure. For men it is seen as good to age because with their grey hair comes wisdom, knowledge, possibly sexiness and more stable sense of self. Women how ever are seen as declining and asexual. This is due to the fact that our culture says, Nope! Women should have to not only maintain an unrealistic beauty but also at every age. How ridiculous.
We are all familiar with the term cougar. And we are all familiar with our Grandma’s who age “naturally.” But my question to you is, is there a happy middle ground? Is this what we should search for. How in the hell do you even begin to change a system that is so set in its ways? It feels hopeless. The whole beauty image concept in this country is way wrong and overboard as it is, there is no need to try and ruin women lives anymore especially with age. There needs to be some way that this double standards is erased and older women are seen for who they truly are. They are smart, they are capable, they valued members of society, and they are all the things that people think of older men and maybe some more. Changing the beauty image for young women is one thing but it has to be changed so that later stages of life are enjoyable. Women have got to come with grips with facts of life and embrace their inevitable future. As long as our society only places value on a woman for her attractiveness, body, and her sexuality (hetero of course) instead of her minds and soul then they have complete control over us and our being.
The biggest thing we as women can do is to educate ourselves about the intricate system of hegemony, patriarchal views, androcentrism and even science woven so ingeniously around and in our lives. If know how they control us the new can take a step back, reassess a situation and decide if our decision to act (like wear a skirt or take a diet pill) is truly ourselves or the forces of society at work. This self-education so to speak, that all women should at least be aware of, will allow us to call out the system and maybe not act in the ways it expects. Their needs to be more than one ideal standard of beauty for women at every stage of life. A woman needs to not be judged solely on her looks. We are a diverse world with diverse languages and people; there is simply no room for binaries and dualism that oppress people. I have to say that this just popped into my head. Our structure of control through hegemonic expectations and androcentric views maintain ”ignorance is bliss.” As long as we don’t know what’s going on we can continue to be used as tools in a huge game or play.
Here’s a portion of lyric from a song a love, “No one is free when others are oppressed.”
http://www.niapublications.org/quiz/index.php This website is a self-quiz on aging that I think might be a fun activity for someone interested in their own aging.
Add a comment July 9, 2009
Week 4
An expectation or assumption I previously held that has been challenged by this weeks assigned readings. Elaborate on this assumption through citation or paraphrase.
An expectation that has changed for me has to do with the article by Hill Collins on black sexual politics and the mention of a sexually repressed society by Patricia Jung. I suppose I never noticed just how animalized black females were in our culture. After reading this article I am more aware than ever of this problem. I knew fully that women of all races are totally objectified. I feel bad for being so blind when this is right in front of my face. The most important things to me that Collins pointed out is how new stars such as Destinys child portray themselves in a similar sexual light as SArah Bartmann and Josephine Baker once were. The difference here is that these stars have a choice in how they are visualized in society. Sarah and Josephine really didn’t seem to have a choice. I say this because any woman back then could not experience the full freedoms we now have today. To actually make their own money and have jobs must have been liberating, even at the cost of their bodies. Do these stars know this? If they did, would they still portray themselves in this way?
Patricia Jung makes it very clear that our society is so so hyper-sexualized but behind closed doors where it counts the most in families and children no one, and she meant NOONE talks about it. There is this echoing silence, especially when it comes to females and sexuality and pleasure. This is no challenge to my thinking. The only thing, again, is that I feel I have noticed it but not to its full potential. I am constantly exposed to all this sex and advertising and images. I never fully realized that there was a mass silence in American homes. My parents always talked open with me about issues of all sorts. Further more I already knew just how much hold the church intends to take on people. I was raised Christian for many years. I realized the hard way that they were hard core, hard core hypocrites and liars. Their standards were so high that they couldn’t even live up to them. As a result I chose to be spiritual but not to have to attend a church every sunday to be get into heaven. My point here is that (as Jung told us) the driving force behind women’s devaluation of pleasure was religion. It infiltrated almost every home and polluted minds right along side of androcentrism. What a shame… Again I question societies obsession with sex, sex ,sex and the idolization of female bodies by asking, If it is going to be all about the female as an object, if we turn everyone on so much, shouldn’t we know exactly how our bodies work to their fullest extent?
I have found a website that belongs to a female photographer who clebrates the female ody and sexual repression through photos. She has a great pic of a woman in a box looking confused and some hands with a mouth and eye ball in the palms.
Photography http://www.digitalphotoacademy.com/Home/Instructor/params/object/267/default.aspx
Something I did, read, happened, witnessed, or was involved in this week that resonated with the readings/discussion/film/topics from this week’s class.
I would like to talk about is this concept of female sexuality. I feel like when these articles were written things were much different. As I look around and listen to my generation it seems like these issues in the articles aren’t quite as prevalent. Yes men are still in charge, yes they call the shots and yes they are selfish as hell when it comes to women’s needs. The thing is that the majority has shrunk some. It is a big enough difference to notice that the stereotypical male is no longer so abundant. Guys for the most part are more attuned to women’s needs and how they are wired different. I find among my males friends that they do stuff all boys do but they also are aware of the fact that girls are their equals and can do things just as good or are just as smart. Hey! what a concept. I may be hopeful but it seems as though the typical asshole is not the norm. I’d like to think I have a clue as to what’s going on around me. I am also hopeful that the times are changing and women’s work is getting noticed.
Add a comment June 26, 2009
Week 3
An expectation or assumption I previously held that has been challenged by this weeks assigned readings. Elaborate on this assumption through citation or paraphrase.
The readings this week for the most part coincided nicely with the way I think and feel about sex, beauty and women’s bodies in our mainstream culture. Right now I can’t say if anything really jumped out that challenged my assumptions. I did spot something of interest to me in the Ussher piece called “Fantasies of Femininity.” If the world is a stage and everyone merely plays their parts then Ussher broke down some of the ways women act and feel in their playing “woman.” She talks about being girl, doing girl, resisting girl and subverting femininity. At first I though I fit into the doing girl role until I read the resisting girl role.
The doing girl was cool because those women use their looks or their power to lure in men but never falling for them. They are independent and don’t get attached. I was this way for a few years. Then I found resisting girl which is where I totally fit in. I enjoy being feminine at times, working out at times and wearing make up at times. I totally have little interest in massaging mens egos, totally! I do not define myself by sex or femininity yet I am in a positive relationship with a guy and have been for two years. He respects my thinking, matter of fact he loves it. The resisting girl just yearns to be treated as an equal to men. The rituals of feminine beauty are not the center of my focus but I do enjoy them fully at times. I always try to please myself in this department rather than others. My skills most certainly are not to attract or keep a man, they are a pain in the ass. Ussher did have one thing that doesn’t match my thinking. She said, “But it isn’t about a reversed sexism or a desire to do to men what over time the centuries has been done to women.” I strongly feel (with some immaturity) the opposite. Strongly…
Something I did, read, happened, witnessed, or was involved in this week that resonated with the readings/discussion/film/topics from this week’s class.
The prevailing idea here comes from all this talk about fantasies of beauty, supermodels and all that stuff. I had a hell of my time and still partially do with self-esteem. I wonder what it would be like even for a day to be so gorgeous. Like eye catching pretty where people always look twice. I consider my self average. But why is that? Well our limits on beauty and the images society puts out there has had an effect on my thinking of myself. No matter how hard I try to fight it, it always finds room in my head. As a girl I did grow up on those Disney films like we talked about in class. I looked up to Jasmine and Belle (Beauty and the Beast) the most. The idea of beauty didn’t really hit me until teenage years. Of course I had bad acne and all that wonderful stuff. So for a while it was hard, hard trying to understand why I wasn’t “lucky” like some other girls. As time went I learned to accept. Now I know better but some times still wonder. My pojnt here is that this constant bombardment of advertising is crazy especially to teenagers. These poor girls, and I mean sad, see this shit so much it becomes imbedded in their psyche. It’s crap I tell you. I am so fed up, so tired of this society and its way with women I don’t know what to do. That’s my reasoning behind wanting to make most men feel what they have done to us or my female ancestors.
Add a comment June 19, 2009
Week 2
- An expectation or assumption I previously held that has been challenged by this weeks assigned readings. Elaborate on this assumption through citation or paraphrase.
I want to start by saying that both Suzanne Pharr’s and Adrienne Rich’s pieces were very well written. Rich put so many things that I think of into the perfect sentences. I knew what she was saying, just not how to say it so eloquently and down right truthful. I guess you could say that my assumption challenged this week was more of an eye-opener, something I never correlated before. In “Homophobia; A Weapon of Sexism”, Rich makes many points touching on the fact of the relationship between heterosexism and homophobia. She states that, “Heterosexism and homophobia work together to enforce compulsory heterosexuality and that bastion of patriarchal power, the nuclear family.” It was right in front of me the whole time yet I never connected the two. I have lesbian friends and gay friends. I love them all. I never would have looked down on them for their sexuality. The fact that girls are taught to form a dependency on a man in life is no surprise to me. I have a new understanding of this battle against sexism. WE are to fight for equality of all women, not just white heterosexual ones, if we are to get anywhere in this fiasco.
A second assumption I noticed was from Pharr’s piece on Compulsory Heterosexuality. She talks about all these articles or books written by feminists that do not take into account the lesbian’s problem or how and why they exist. She means a real definition and not just the one that stereo typically puts, “Lesbian existence as a form of nay-saying patriarchy.” Her point about the mother contact as a first form of eroticism is right. From there on girls are taught compassion and all the attributes you can list that make this world a better place. It is NO WONDER that women have saught attention from other women through out history. And with great reason, Why in the hell would you want a man’s attention when you could have a females whose connection is way more close to her own? Rich hits it on the head by mentioning all the ways that men make this world shity, especially for women. I am very aware of this and don’t know what to do to “fix” it. I feel like we are so far gone that there is no hope. I also have visions of excitingly and brutally wiping out men and starting over. But ssshhh, You didn’t hear that. Plus it’s not very lady like, is it?
2. Something I did, read, happened, witnessed, or was involved in this week that resonated with the readings/discussion/film/topics from this week’s class.
The only topic I can strongly relate to here is the one of male dominance over female sexuality. Here we go. I can not tell you how much it disgusts me that prostitution, porn, TV, and the list goes on, are so abundant in our culture. As one comedian put it, We have flooded the market with tits and ass. I, on one hand am so appalled but on the other I want to see more men naked if it has to be this way. It might as well be equal. Any who, this resonates with Rich’s idea of lesbianism in our society. How can these men flash fake, beautiful unrealistic women damn near everywhere and expect women to “prefer” heterosexuality? I mean come on! If they crave females so bad because their beauty can’t be denied then why the hell wouldn’t women do the same? The fact that the lesbian woman is looked at a defiance to male control is a joke. Again our culture, thanks to men, is obsessed with the female body. I know I see it everyday. Men shouldn’t be naive to think their public obsession won’t trickle over to women enjoying other women. This is a topic I could go on and on about but I can’t quite write so clear as Rich does in her piece on compulsory heterosexuality.
Another point I heard in the reading: Men control women for “fear of women.” You damn right. It might just be true, that we hadn’t been forced into heterosexuality we might not prefer men at all or very little. Who knows how it would have turned out. As long as men control this earth we are all doomed, even other men who are good guys. If these so called intelligent men would just think without denial for one second then they might see how logical it is for a women to seek another women for camaraderie rather than a man, especially after analyzing mens’ actions toward women since the beginning of time, maybe they would change it by changing their actions. I’m sorry but I highly doubt it. They are creatures who are to easily corrupted.
Add a comment June 12, 2009
Week 1
I identified with nearly something from every reading we had this week. The one that came the closest to challenging an assumption I had was during the Bornstein piece. Growing up I never questioned my sexuality, I always knew I was a girl and a “normal” girl at that. Besides being a tomboy, I enjoyed girlie activities immensely. Into teenage years I found I was straight like the rest of the kids in my small town; I liked boys. The concept of a “real woman or real man” never really crossed my mind like the way Bornstein brought it up. Well I will admit the thought of a “real man” entered my mind quite a bit during my dating days, but what the hell is that? J/K
The author (Bornstein) has really great concepts when she mentions this real man or real woman.It is not like I think there is only one way to be. I do realize that there are a variety of ways a woman can be real. But Bornstein’s discussion brings up the idea of gender and all its preferences. To look through the eyes of a transgendered person is truly a special thing. I always just thought it was those two categories, that dichotomous system growing up. By calling herself a non gender Bornstein has created an alternate category. An important necessity in this incrediblydiverse world of ours. My new found idea thanks to Bornstein is that there more than just male and female. There are people who aren’t neither and people who feel they are both and maybe more I do not know about. Who are we to limit someone’s feelings and tell them they don’t belong simply because they don’t fit into societies standards? I have a problem with how much limitation our culture puts on so many things and the negative connotation that goes along with it for being outside the box. Through first person Bornstein taught me that there is indeed other mind sets when it comes to gender identity. EVERYONES view should be taken into account in this “land of freedom” we call America.
One things really stood out in my mind that happens all the time from Navarro’s La Mujer in the paragraph Honk if your Horny. This was recently, in the past and I’m pretty damn sure ,unfortunately, gonna happen in the future. Navarro talks about all those dumb-ass guys honking at her as she walks down the street taking a pice of her self-esteem with her every honk. I know exactly how she feels, especially asa teenager in high school. Well my feelings aren’t quite that low because I never was raised like her. It just urks me that they guys go around hollering and honking at women. I used to think “Why the hell do they gotta do that to me?” I used to just ignore it, then for a while give dirty looks or the finger. Now I just smile or wave or ignore depending on my mood. I related to the author here because I didn’t believe I deserved all the attention simply because I was or am female. Can’t these guys get their heads out of their ass and quite acting like fools?
Most women would take it as a compliment. But those of us who don’t like it see it as harassment or a threat. It effects the self esteem as a young woman because you are learning your expected place in society and you are learning who you are as a person and whether the two agree. Navarro took it hard by trying to cover up her God given body parts. I never did that. Even to this day I prefer to run on a treadmill then around the neighbor hood because of stupid men hollering. Maybe it’s time I get an ipod or something to drown them out. No really, its not always that bad. I related to the author here in many ways because this is like harassment in public places. The worst part is it’s alright by the guys doing it. I mean they get props from friends for being idiots. I never see women go around doing that sort of stuff. I’m not saying some do, I just never see it. I am confident that almost evry girl has experienced this. I’d be interested to know how it made them feel at the time.
1 comment June 5, 2009
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1 comment June 1, 2009
