Sunday, October 28, 2012

Ch 8 Blog Post #3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuNIsY6JdUw

Last but not least is the music video for Taylor Swift's "You Belong With Me' song. In it, she starts off as an average girl who is in love with the boy next door. However, the boy next door has a girlfriend that does not appreciate him but is an alpha female in some respects (a cheer captain) and in the song Swift compares herself to her saying "she wears high heels, I wear sneakers, she's cheer captain and I'm on the bleachers". The normal girl is invisible and seen as just a friend by the object of her affection, until she decides to acquiesce to the responses she gets and goes through a makeover at the end of the video. Only then does she get the guy. She reworked her performance to conform to the view of society which says that the stereotypical idea of beauty is necessary to win a guy.

Ch 8 Blog Post #2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSee8On2lEQ

The above link is a trailer for a movie call Prayers for Bobby. I chose it because it is an example of the Chapter 8 idea of persuasion, rejection, harassment and maintaining. The story is about a Christian family with a strong Christian wife/mother whose youngest son reveals that he is gay. She tries everything in her power to change or convert him, but in the end decides to give up on him as her son. She would try to persuade him and her efforts were almost bordering on harassing. Through it all, her son chose to maintain who he was even though it was a very difficult decision to make. He chose himself.

Ch 8 Blog Post #1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ebaFd53yO40&feature=relmfu


Chapter 8 talks about the various responses to performance reviews. One of which is adapting. I chose part of the film My Big Fat Greek Wedding to demonstrate (even though it does not contain all the parts I would prefer). The protagonist, Toula, starts off the film as a 30 year old woman always being told by her very traditional father that she needs to get married soon because she is starting to look old. She describes herself as "frump girl". Later on, she meets a handsome guy and decides to turn her life around and get a makeover. The words and constant verbal attack from her father serve as motivation for her to change, or adapt. She modifies her performance by changing her outward appearance (and occupation) since she gets negativity from her father.

Ch 7 Blog Post #3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKZ9um4SRnA

Above is a link to a movie that is a family favorite, Too Wong Foo. This is a story about men in drag and how they change the lives of people in a small town they stop in. Chapter 7 states that your appearance and artifacts helps express your gender identity and helps others put you in a group and develops expectations a s a result. When these men arrived in a small town, they were all decked out in their woman attire complete with suitcases of clothes, shoes, makeup etc. Obviously the people of this town had no idea what to make of them and had seen nothing like it. They were skeptical. Many of them actually thought they were woman. They dressed differently than the woman in the town. They wore more expensive looking clothes with vibrant colors and jewelry. The townspeople didn't know what to make of them and just thought they were women from the city (which they were) that were going to wreak havoc on their sleepy town. But, they actually helped the lives of many of the women in the town.

Ch 7 Blog Post #2


Emo. It is a term used to describe people whose style looks like the picture above. Even though this appears to be a young women, you will often find that many "emo" guys can often look similar to (or be mistaken for) a woman. Chapter 7 says that your gender performance involves how you see you, how others see you, and how you fit into a larger culture. "Emo" people see themselves as outsiders or different from the regular type of young people (or "alpha youth" i.e. athletes, popular kids, etc). They refuse to buy into what young people are supposed to look like and rebel against it with bright colors, lots of black, and multiple piercings. They see themselves as individuals. On a cultural level, "emo" kids have their own sub-culture. There is even a genre of music now that is called "emo" (many refer to it as "wrist cutting music"). In mainstream culture, they are stereotyped by making it seem as though they only listen to bands that have a lead singer that screams ("screamo") and have emotional, dark lyrical content. Since this type of youth prefer to perform gender this way, they do face ridicule, judgment, bullying, stereotyping, etc.

Ch 7 Blog Post #1


This strange creature is a chameleon. I posted a picture of this because it relates to one of the topics discussed in Chapter 7 about how we have multiple identities and how elements affect our performance. Chameleons are known for being able to "blend in" to their environment to protect themselves from predators. As human beings, we all have a chameleon aspect to ourselves. We change or adapt our stories based on the setting, audience, and performer. I have discovered there is no such thing as being a "universal" person. Meaning, there is no such thing as being the same person consistently no matter the situation. Although it would be nice, we have not progressed nearly enough for that.