Wst Blog 7

Ok, so this week I think I may have broken my brain (is this possible?) over the midterm plus illness is resulting in a very fuzzy head. Anyways, I have been trying to think about how the articles pertaining to pop culture we have been reading relate to feminism, and for some reason i've been thinking about Mr. Louis Althusser. Althusser says that the state apparatus reproduces the conditions of production through the repressive state apparatus and the ideological state apparatus which includes includes religion, culture, education, etc. For feminists, the ideological state apparatus is something which can be interrogated, because it is encompasses so many aspects of society. Education particularly can be examined because it is a major influence on individuals in our society, and this portion of the ideological state apparatus can be said to reproduce conditions of production in several ways.
I guess what got me thinking about all of this was the ways that sexual education is taught in our schools. In elementary school, I was taught that sexual education meant that a man and a woman who "really loved each other" got together and made a baby. This form of education reinforced heterosexual norms in society, and in my school there was never any mention of family structures that were different. Also, 'sex ed' surrounding sexual abuse or assult often centered around telling children that if they were touched innapropriately, this constituted an offence and they should report it. However, there was little mention of other forms of sexual assult, such as verbal abuse or controlling behaviour, and the perpetrator was most often male. This served to propagate the male as 'dominant,' and sexual abuse as something which occurred in the private realm. As I got older, sex education focused on abstinence, and I witnessed several presentations which painted a picture of youth who had sex too early as being abnormal or 'bad.' This seems to reinforce some kind of a hierarchy where the kids who are having sex are the 'bad kids' or those from the 'wrong side of the tracks' and the kids who aren't are 'good' and have been properly educated by their upper class parents. This also generally applies to girls, because girls who have sex early are labelled 'sluts' whereas if menI am of course, basing a lot of this on personal experience and what I witnessed in school.
Anyway, in this example the methods of sex education serve to reinforce the conditions of production (where what children are taught to normalize certain relationships while abnormalizing or 'othering' others, as well as normalizing social hierarchies of class).

WST Blog 6

This week I have been thinking about Mimi White and the television viewer as both consumer and commodity. Maybe it is just because I watched television for the first time in awhile last night, but I found myself wondering why I was subjecting myself to an experience which essentially abstracted me into an object of exchange value, as Mimi claims. In order to watch a program I might be interested in, or something to just numb my brain a little, I am also subject to a barrage of information on products that is necessary in order to support the station. This thought made me kind of bitter, as foolish commercials for things like lawn mowers flashed across the screen. Of course I have to admit that every once in awhile there would be something I really wanted, like that new lipstick I just HAD to try. But this made me even more bitter because all of a sudden, Adorno and Horkheimer crept into my head, saying "Heather, it's true, you are just a pawn of capitalism. You are being manipulated by the culture industry as you lay there on your couch, passively accepting these commercials and thinking about fulfilling all of your false needs." Then I thought to myself "Oh A & H, why did you have to march in and ruin my lovely evening of nothing? Now I am supposed to be searching for my true needs? Who NEEDS things like genuine happiness when I can have nice shiny lipstick? Auuggghhh!!!"
Clearly I am in a pissy little mood today which could be a result of a number of things. My hangover, the fact that the weather is absolute crap, or maybe my broken feet from stompin far too hard during our feministeppin'. Anyways, hopefully these grey skies will clear up ASAP.

WST Blog 5 (Baudrillard and Kipnis)

This week's class was good, because it really started to tie together all of the theorists we have been looking at thus far, and at the same time completely spun my head around. There were some interesting points, such as Baudrillard's claim that significance requires reflection, and that our society does not reflect enough to have a history. This got me thinking about my own history, and whether or not I spend enough time reflecting on things that have happened in my lifetime. However I would like to focus my thoughts for this week on the Kipnis article, specifically her rejection of modernism, and her argument that in order to be effective, we need to take all of the interpretations and analysis of high culture and transform them into a plan of action. Her claim that by continuing to re-interpret popular culture, the left involvement has limited it's ability to effect change is a strong argument, and I like that she chooses to call feminists into action in this way. It therefore poses the challenge to us, the reader.
This "call to action" got me thinking about method of action that I have observed, such as the radical feminist cheerleading. This is something that Kipnis could certainly have considered in her article (if she had known about it at the time) because radical cheerleading seems to me a very effective way to transform the goals of feminism into an action plan. Another method of action which came to my mind is the work of playwright and feminist Eve Ensler, who's now well known "The Vagina Monologues" has become the face of the V-day movement, which aims to stop violence against women. And to be sure, another form of action will take place next week, when groups of feminists step and chant their political messages to........ well.... the entire Tory Atrium.

WST Blog 4 (Benjamin and Fiske)

This week's class got me thinking about the difference between "high art" or the original work and reproduced art, as discussed by Benjamin. I can agree with and understand the argument that high art offers a distant and a-social viewing experience while reproduced art is more of an absorbing, social experience. However, I am struggling with the concept of the loss of the aura of art during reproduction. I think that it is important to consider the context in which the reproduction piece is being viewed, and to consider the life experience of the person viewing that reproduction. While viewing the original Mona Lisa may be a "wow" moment for most people, we must also consider that viewing a reproduction in certain contexts may also be a "wow" experience for others.
For example, my grama is old now and she hasn't really travelled much in her life. My parents and I have had the opportunity to see "authentic and original" pieces of art in the world (such as the Taj Mahal). Whenever we view one of these things, we always send her a post card or bring back a souvenir replica of what we saw. For her, she can view that postcard or that replica with the same kind of awe, and it will have the same kind of aura as the original. For her, there is no loss of awe between the two, and the reproduction has not been liquidated of it's original value. Therefore, I think that Benjamin's piece needs to account for the context in which different people will be viewing these original and reproduced pieces.