Blackface Model Controversy in Numero Magazine

Link: Magazine sorry for model in blackface

I came across this video on the main page of CNN’s website today titled “Magazine sorry for model with blackface”. The video, linked above, talks about a recent spread in the French magazine Numero which depicts a white model in what appears to be blackface with the text “African Queen” next to her picture.

The reporters dialogue and the statements from both Numero magazine and the photographer who shot the picture remind me of the dialogue we had and heard about in class on February 6th regarding the Pete Hoekstra Super Bowl ad. If you recall, the Super Bowl ad featured a young Asian girl and was seen as offensive by many people in how it depicted a minority. The photographer for Numero states that it was never his intention to be offensive and he had a different goal for the image, and that the editors added the text without his knowledge. This argument sounds similar to some expressed about the intentionality of the Hoekstra ad and whether they meant to be offensive. We also discussed what responsibility the young actress had in the Hoekstra video, debating if it was her fault to have participated. In this video, the reporters cite the model’s young age and lack of awareness in her defense, two arguments also used to defend the Asian actress in the Hoekstra video.

Although similar events have happened with magazines in the United States, because this image was published in a French magazine, does this have any implications for race relations and how race is seen in France? I mentioned before in class that while living in France I saw students dressed in blackface to school for Halloween and no one responded at all to that, as if it is perfectly normal and acceptable, whereas a child in the United States would be punished and sent home from school. This makes me wonder what (if any) response there was in France to this spread.  As author Bai states in his article “Constructing Racial Groups’ Identities in the Diasporic Press: Internalization, Resonance, Transparency, and Offset” (reading from 2/6), “the media help to define what race is and what meanings the imagery of race carries” (p. 388). What does this image show about perceptions of race today?

The photographer (whether he is telling the truth or not we don’t know) said that the picture was meant simply to be a woman with tanned bronze skin and he was not aware of the “African Queen” text. If this is true, why did the magazine editors choose to include the tanned model and the “African Queen” text together? If it was really the intention of the magazine to have an image of an African queen, why did they not just use a dark-skinned model of African descent? Would the image have been a controversy if the text “African Queen” was not included? Would it still be considered blackface or would it just be an image of a tan model? Do you think the magazine and photographer's explanations/apologies for the spread are acceptable? Who is to blame in this situation: the photographer, the model, or the magazine editors? Or is larger society to blame for the prevalence of white models over models of color in magazines and at New York Fashion Week? 

The conservative backlash to Beyoncé’s Super Bowl show: Objectification and slut-shaming go hand-in-hand

Although Beyonce’s Super Bowl performance was fueled with girl power—all woman band and dancers—I still couldn’t help but to critique the stripping, racy outfit and over sexualized performance that also brought everything together.

I saw two conflicting identities of Beyonce on display at the Super Bowl:

An independent woman working the stage
A performer submissively appealing to a hyper masculine culture

Go ahead and call me ambivalent, as it’s hard to say where I stand—but I do know that from a critical feminist theory perspective, I refuse to jump the gun by saying that she “nailed” it.

In relation to the identity and media representation class lecture, we know that our identities are constantly changing and we act and morph those identities to sometimes align with the situations we find ourselves in. For Beyonce, it is apparent that her identity has also changed over time. That is, as a member of Destiny’s Child, I remember the days of the “independent” Beyonce. The lyrics read: 

The shoe on my feet, I’ve bought it

The clothes I’m wearing, I’ve bought it

The rock I’m rockin’, I’ve bought it

‘Cause I depend on me

But I can’t say that this is what I saw/felt about her Super Bowl performance. That is, how can you be so “independent”, so on top—yet so submissive? And as a woman, is she a role-model or a setback for all of us? To be precise, I would say that I agree with the feministing.com article:

But flaunting her sex appeal automatically undermines Beyoncé’s talent and credibility as “role model” for these conservatives. (Just as it did for Freeman, too.) Since there seems to be some sort of superficial agreement between feminists and conservatives that “sexual objectification” is bad, let’s pause for a second to talk about exactly what it is and why it’s bad. For conservatives, it’s generally because of the sex. For feminists, it’s generally because of the objectification. And, importantly, objectification is not about presenting yourself as as sexual being–or even as an object of sexual desire. After all, that is a normal and fairly universal human urge–who doesn’t like to feel attractive sometimes? Objectification is about being dehumanized by being reduced solely to a sex object.

This, I feel is a more accurate representation of what I witnessed at the Super Bowl. That is, Beyonce’s performance became less about her talent and more about her dehumanization as a beautiful, black woman—which I found to be extremely unfortunate.

In reference to the Five Ways Rape Culture Exists Unnoticed and Goes Unchecked In Our Everyday Life class reading, I would also argue that there is a parallel between Beyonce’s performance and the perpetuation of rape culture through the objectification of her body (i.e. crawling on the floor, licking her thumb, stripping, etc.) at the Super Bowl, but also in other ads that she has appeared in, too (see photo above).

Every year I find it extremely difficult to watch the Super Bowl. Although I enjoy a good game once in a while, I cannot say that I enjoy the football culture. It bothers me that there is minimal representation of women, and when we are present, we appear as a piece of meat (a la the godaddy.com commercials), so I simply refuse to watch. How about you?

Glee

While I was living abroad, I was only marginally aware of the media that was thriving in America.  There are still movies that people reference now that came out while I was in the Philippines that I was previously unaware of.  The shows, movies, and trends that did reach me while I was abroad, did so because they generated enough buzz to sustain relevancy during the rare occasions I was able to access the internet long enough to plug in to the American media stream.  One of these shows, was Glee. I wasn't surprised by the widespread success of Glee; they do a reasonably good job of blending irreverent comedy with performing/singing/dancing, and do so while invoking nostalgia amongst their viewers by featuring some of the most recognizable songs of the last thirty years.  When I finally did get a chance to see Glee for the first time, I was less interested in the singing and dancing than I was in the disabled character, Artie.  I immediately began to wonder whether or not the actor who plays Artie (Kevin McHale) is actually disabled.  Hollywood has a long and unfortunate history of using non-disabled actors to represent disabled characters, and Glee proved to be no exception.

This article, from the Guardian, was written by a person with a disability and outlines the ways Glee has failed to accurately represent disability through Artie's character.  Not only did they miss an opportunity to cast a disabled actor, of which there are plenty who possess the singing and acting chops to play the Artie character, they also chose to represent disability in the same, tired ways it's typically been represented throughout mass media.  The episodes that are centered around the Artie character are meant to be inspirational and uplifting; Artie succeeds against considerable odds, constantly having to overcome his disability in order to achieve what is so much easier for the non-disabled characters to achieve.  His disability is never forgotten nor ignored.  Some episodes show him dreaming of what it would be like to be 'normal', a world in which he can sing and dance (out of his chair) just like everybody else.

Even if Glee possessed no intentions at approaching disability in a more accurate, socially progressive way, the most egregious decision they made was to cast a non-disabled actor.  It might be tempting to suggest that this casting choice demonstrates a level playing field; perhaps Kevin McHale was the best candidate for the job.  I'm more inclined to believe that their casting choice gave them the freedom to do episodes where Artie triumphantly left his chair, and his disability, behind.  I believe Glee missed a real opportunity to portray a disabled character with talent and charisma that is completely unrelated to his disability.

The Weird American: Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic

Throughout our class studies we’ve been talking a lot about intercultural communication, culture and the intersection these two concepts—how they relate, how they differ and how they influence each other. We’ve studied how different cultures have social structures that are different from others due to different communication techniques, social styles, and organization (Maletzky 2008) as well as how these cultural foundations shape our identities and ways of viewing the world (Martin & Nakayama 2010). However, it wasn’t until I read the following article that I realized that we have only conceptualized these concepts through a Westernized—mostly American—point of view of what constitutes the standards of culture and communication. The grand majority of social sciences research has been Western psychologists studying Western subjects to establish the “communal norms” about human behavior. Indeed this article entitled “Why Americans are Weird” reveals that:

A 2008 survey of the top six psychology journals dramatically shows how common that assumption was: more than 96 percent of the subjects tested in psychological studies from 2003 to 2007 were Westerners—with nearly 70 percent from the United States alone. Put another way: 96 percent of human subjects in these studies came from countries that represent only 12 percent of the world’s population.

The article is an insightful reminder that not everyone perceives the world through a “Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic" lens, but indeed questions, “what other certainties about ‘human nature’ in social science research would need to be reconsidered when tested across diverse populations?”

In the article, a group of social scientists began with standardized economic, cultural and habitual tests that have been proved again and again to be a “human standard” and conducted the tests on other cultural groups that weren’t Western (ex. the Machiguenga, an indigenous people who live north of Machu Picchu in the Amazon basin). The researchers found that Western behaviors, social inclinations, manners of thinking, and perceptions of reality are completely divergent from other humans on the planet, and that specifically “Americans were often the most unusual” concluding that “American participants are exceptional even within the unusual population of Westerners—outliers among outliers.” Given this fact, it becomes clear that standardizing human behavior on Western (mostly American) subjects is probably the worst group from which to draw these types of wide-ranging generalities.  The article uses a brilliant analogy saying that “researchers had been doing the equivalent of studying penguins while believing that they were learning insights applicable to all birds”.

I think this article brings up interesting points about the Western ethnocentricity of academia and social psychology in general, and there is much further research needed from alternative cultural perspectives in order to expand the widespread generalizations about human behavior that are so prevalent in social/cultural theoretical analysis today. 

Guns around the Globe

As we are all aware the debate surrounding gun control is becoming an increasingly hot topic in domestic politics, and for good reason.  As of today, more than 2000 people have been killed by guns since the Newtown massacre last December in the U.S. Such a horrendous act followed by a startling high volume of gun-related deaths calls for immediate attention.  But for a nation that is simultaneously enamored with shoot-em-up action films, first person shooter video games, and military action, how does our approach towards gun regulation look compared to other nations around the globe? What social variations influence different forms of regulation? And lastly can it be said that one form of regulation is superior to another?

Firearm advocates in the United States often refer to the Second Amendment for constitutional support, although many American legislators are reexamining this notion within a more modern framework in the hopes of reaching a respectful balance.  One such legislator in Colorado is Rhonda Fields who recently received death threats for her position on gun control.  Less than a decade after the shooting of her son, this threat serves to reiterate the need for more regulated measures such as more thorough background checks for gun buyers. 

Not unlike the traumatic event that ravaged Newton,  a shooting spree left nearly 100 dead in Norway.   Speculators have even claimed that the Newton shooter attempted to emulate the massacre in Norway.  If events like these can happen outside of war zones on opposite sides of the globe, what are governments doing to address this complex threat?

Well, for example, the European Union has passed tough new gun control laws that it"hoped to prevent Europe from becoming a gun-friendly culture like the United States," in the words of the International Herald Tribune.  In Singapore, gun owners must first acquire a license before owning a firearm similar to the law found in Kenya.  Japan in recent years has called for a rewriting of its constitution to address gun violence. In China, the civilian ownership of firearms is generally prohibited.

On the opposite side of the spectrum,  nations such as Russia permit the purchase of weapons such as smoothbore shotguns, gas pistols, or revolvers shooting rubber bullets. Safe use of one of the above weapons for five years allows for the lawful purchase of a rifle.  In Moscow alone, some 400,000 people legally keep 470,000 weapons.  Such gun culture resembles U.S. gun culture, though the degree of regulation is surprisingly different. Across the U.S. border, Mexican citizens and legal residents may purchase new non-military firearms for self-protection or hunting only after receiving approval of a petition to the Defense Ministry, which performs extensive background checks.  In a nation where the problem of gun violence is both pronounced and irrefutably connected to transnational factors, there may be something the U.S. can learn from its neighbors to the south regarding the need for tougher regulation.

The effectiveness of any nation's gun control measures are certainly dependent upon both international and intranational factors, making the task of regulation particularly challenging.  No one set of measures is universal or superior, nor will one set of measures ever be adopted by all diverse societies and nations around the world.  A topic that is based upon a multi-billion dollar industry, varying notions of freedom and protection, and overall social stability will continue to remain complex.  Though one thing is clear, gun violence is a global issue, and it will take both a national and global perspective to confront it.

Learn a Foreign Language in the Womb!

The first time I came across this article in my quest for something to write about, I dismissed it rather quickly, but after the second and third time of it appearing in other searches, I started thinking. Babies can learn languages in the womb. Now in this article they highlight that babies, once they reach thirty weeks, have fully developed their hearing, which allows them to absorb certain elements of the language. In the study presented in this article, 

“A total of 40 newborns about 30 hours old were involved in the study in Tacoma and Stockholm. They all listened to sounds in their native language as well as foreign languages while in nursery.

The researchers were able to assess their reaction to sounds by measuring how long they sucked on a pacifier for. Short sucking was associated with familiar sounds while long sucking was associated with unfamiliar sounds. This means that the newborns can differentiate what they hear in utero.

The babies were found to suck on the pacifier for a longer period when they heard foreign languages as opposed to their native language.”

Personally, I find this almost to be a little silly and a bit far-fetched. However, it has been shown time and time again that children are much better at learning languages, as opposed to trying to learn when you are an adult. I can’t begin to count how many times I have wished that someone had started teaching me French from the time I was born, instead of the struggle I went through learning it in college. So, whether or not we find this article outlandish or not, it made me question why it is that the United States puts such little effort into having our people learn a second language. If this study is correct then it would seem much more economical and beneficial to start right from the beginning.

I’ve been doing research for Christof over the last two quarters. He has been interviewing different families, like his own, who have been raising their children bilingual in German and English. In the interviews he asks each family the reasons why many, if not most, Americans don’t feel the need to know any other language than English. He also asks them if they even should learn a second language if everyone else is in the world is learning English. There have been many different answers to both of these questions and all have been quite interesting. What are some of your reactions to these questions?

Anzaldua says, “ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic identity – I am my language.” I think as Americans, we know how important our language is to us. Why else would be insisting that it is the only one we need to know – heck it’s the only one anyone needs to know. So why is it so hard for  many of us to see that other countries could feel the same way? To an extent I can see why there are people in the United States who will never feel the need to know French or Spanish (or any other language for that matter). Yet, it seems that in this global world and how much easier it is becoming to be in contact with other cultures, that knowing the language of other people would only make sense. While language might not be everything to a culture, it sure is a lot, so how can we ever accurately be making relationships with other people if we can’t even say hello in their language?

And if it’s so easy a baby could do it – then why aren’t we? 

Signs to Correct a Racist Language

After hearing Martha Raddatz speak or rather, see her two American Sign Language (ASL) interpreters translate, I wondered what type of signs they were using for the countries Iran, Iraq, Israel and Afghanistan. At one point, I saw one of the interpreters pull her hand down from her chin to form a beard. And, at another time, I saw one interpreter make a motion from one cheek to the other, as if forming a veil. So, just out of curiosity, I looked up the signs for these countries.

[Click on the words or numbers to see video of each sign; taken from http://aslresource.net/CountrySigns.html]

Afghanistan – 1) "V" bounce on head at temple, palm touching head, 2) Bent "V" (palm out) taps in middle of forehead, 3) FATHER (spread "5") handshape touches forehead at thumb and draws a line straight across forehead (from TALIBAN), 4) "A.F." taps on chin stating at the left with "A" then moving to the right with "F", 5) extended-thumb "B" hand pulls across the face into an "A" touching the other cheek with the thumb (reminiscent of women formerly covering their face but now freedom to reveal the face), 6) like BASE/FOUNDATION, tap "A" at the wrist then move down the forearm to tap "F" on the elbow, 7) palm-back "B" hands make a mask and only show eyes, tap face twice,
8) palm-up “C” hand moves down from the chin

Iran – tip of thumb taps in middle of palm
Iraq – ASL: 1) modified "C" taps on chin at fingertips, 2) "Q" fingertips tap on center of palm; indigenous: index finger of "B" taps center forehead
          Baghdad– index points in circles at palm-up hand
Israel – 1) "i" touches chin on the left then on the right, 2) palm-back "U" fingertips touch at chin then swoop down into palm-forward "U" (indigenous), 3)JEWISH (bent "5" fingertips grasp chin then pull down into flat "O" as if stroking the beard)
          Jerusalem– 1) Claw (bent fingers of "5") come down on palm down on "B", 2) "B" palm touches lips then out to kiss wall, 3) (ASL) "J" + TOWN (fingertips of "B" hands touch with palms facing each other and twist at the wrist as if showing several rooftops) 

Afghanistan and Israel had signs that could be considered offensive. So, I dug a little deeper and came across this video, which happens to be comedian Russell Peters performing three signs for Jew. While probably not the best reference for ASL, he is in fact “not making [it] up”, except for that last one (might be slang, but I couldn’t find a credible source for it).

In the video, you will see that there are three considerably racist signs for Jew: 1) the sign forming a beard; 2) the sign forming a nose; 3) the sign forming money. While Russell Peters seems offended by these signs, he then proceeds to make up his own racists signs for Arab and makes fun of the deaf community. To ASL’s credit, they are working toward political correctness. As reported in the South China Morning Post in1994, ASL did drop four signs for Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Thai. In addition, ASL created a new sign for “African American” and “gay”.  

This makes me think about two class discussions. One, we briefly touched upon racism in comedy when Travis brought up the example of Dave Chapelle and the moment where making fun of his own race in blackface was no longer okay to him. So I raise the question again, is it okay to use racism and even joke about a disability, all for the sake of a few laughs? 

And, two, our class discussion with Julie Reiskin about disability culture made me wonder, is it okay to be racist because of a disability? We talked in class about how within the disability culture persons with disabilities may use terms with each other that might otherwise be offensive if used by someone without disabilities. What about the deaf community? The created they’re own language out of necessity. Do you think that the deaf culture has a free pass for these types of signs? Or should they be treated the same as any other racist term?

China's "Leftover" Women

A previous blog post written by Maureen highlights the Forbes Most Powerful Women in 2012. I found it interesting that there was a category entitled “Businesswoman are booming in Asia” highlighting powerful women CEOs and entrepreneurs in Asia. We’ve discussed how stereotypical femininity traits (nurturing, soft hearted) and masculinity traits (ambitious, bold) through the Martin and Nakayama readings about identity, and these powerful entrepreneurs clearly challenge the dynamics of gender identity norms as well as power struggles and inequality for women.  However, I began to wonder how—if at all— Asian professional women were subject to additional cultural struggles or prejudices as opposed to white professional women.

Throughout the Flores reading, she refers to the different stereotypes about minority women and White women when it comes to sexuality. Flores notes that minority women are often “depicted as highly sexualized” and “primitive sexualities” (Flores 386). When looking specifically at powerful Asian women in China, the following article seems to claim the opposite.

The article China's leftover women, unmarried at 27 describes the high number of unmarried Chinese professional women and explains a few reasons for this imbalance. The country has a national gender discrepency caused by selective abortions due to the one-child policy that has led to the fact that there are now about 20 million more men under 30 than women under 30, according to the National Bureau of Statistics data. Also, the article indicates that “Chinese men tend to ‘marry down’, both in terms of age and educational attainment”.

The most striking part of this article was the fact that it isn't just family pressures for women to get married at a young age, but also state-run media seem to be purporting the cultural attitude that women over age 27 who are unmarried are “leftover” women. See this excerpt from an article titled, Leftover Women Do Not Deserve Our Sympathy posted on the website of the All-China Federation of Women in March 2011. I find the language to be painfully blunt and disturbing.

"Pretty girls do not need a lot of education to marry into a rich and powerful family. But girls with an average or ugly appearance will find it difficult.”

"These girls hope to further their education in order to increase their competitiveness. The tragedy is, they don't realise that as women age, they are worth less and less. So by the time they get their MA or PhD, they are already old - like yellowed pearls."

What does this say about gender equality and power relations between men and women in China? How does the media in China represent powerful Asian women? Pretty Asian women? What stereotypes does it perpetuate? 

If I have one leg, is it ok to call myself a cripple?

I recently attended Ignite Boulder - an event held every three months in which twelve selected speakers are given five minutes to present on any topic of their choice - think of it as TED talks on speed.

The last speaker of the evening gave a profound speech on the need to stop using the word "gay" outside of someone's sexual orientation or when describing something as "happy." Her opening statement was, "Hi I'm (name) and I'm gay!" From there she went on to talk about how words like "gay" "cripple" "retarded" "fag" etc. have been thrown around too much in our day-to-day speech and often are used to described something as bad, wrong, pointless. Recognizing that the community of Boulder is overall known for being accepting of differences in lifestyles she encouraged the audience to be leaders in changing the way in which we use our words and express out feelings so that others who do not understand or recognize the hurt words can cause may begin to think and talk differently.

I attended this event with a friend and climbing partner who only has one functioning leg. A decade ago he was in accident that damaged his spine causing him to be paralyzed for five years following. In the recent five years he has retaught himself to walk and stand up although now with only one leg. His left leg remains 90% dead and so he walks with crutches and has a very noticeable limp.

I thought is was interesting the reaction he had to her talk. When she threw out the word "cripple" he was instantly convicted of using that term a lot to describe himself and some of this friends who too have lower body injuries. On the other hand he admitted that he couldn't stand when anyone outside of this disability culture used that word, but he never really cared if he or another disabled person threw it around.
He went up to the presenter after the event and told her from now on he was no longer going to use derogatory terms about disabilities and just couldn't stop telling me how wrong he felt for ever finding it acceptable. I asked him if it made a difference, or he found it more acceptable, to be ok with using the word himself because he is disabled and he quickly answered, no.

When we had our guest in for our class on disability culture, Julie Reiskin, she made mention that what was ok for her, or someone with disabilities, to say was not ok for someone outside of that culture/community to say. But what changed for my friend at Ignite was that if he expected others to respect and change their language then he should set the example by too changing the way he talks about himself and other people with disabilities.

Although this isn't connected to any one article, I thought it was interesting enough to share as we look at cultures and discuss what is right and respectful, and what isn't. In my own personal experience I have a mentally challenged sibling. I do not and will not ever use the word "retarded" to describe him or anything else even if its completely unrelated to a human's mental ability. That word is often used to describe something as stupid, pointless, not right etc. And that is not how I feel about my sibling. Even though I may have some leeway in the culture because of my family situations, I still would never find it ok to use that word or for anyone in this community to use that word.
And I wonder if the same should be considered within ethnic groups who use racial slurs with one another but find it offensive if those words are used by another outside of the culture. Like the presenter at Ignite said change must begin with those who are want to make a difference and it must continue by the example we show. So she asked her GLBT community to not use the word "gay" of "fag" outside of its rightful meaning. And my friend voiced that he couldn't and shouldn't call himself a cripple or a gimp if he wanted to ask the rest of society to stop using it.

Silly example but its what I was reminded of in the conversations that followed the Ignite Event with my friends. In the movie, Mean Girls, Tina Fey is talking with the female teenagers in the auditorium about the need to stop harassing and judging one another. And she throws this out.. "You have got to stop calling each other sluts and whores. It just makes it ok for guys to call you sluts and whores." Is this true? Do we unknowingly make it ok for words to be used against us if we're ok using them ourselves?

So to sum this up, my challenge is to rethink the way in which we talk to each other in our own cultures before we can expect others to change the way they talk to us. Now I'm all about jokes and making light of something, but at the end of the day our language is filled with a billion words so there's a ton of options to chose from so let's exercise our minds and vocabulary to use words more appropriately.

They haven't uploaded her speech yet to their youtube page, but when they do I think it's worth taking a look at.. http://www.youtube.com/igniteboulder