Hey Guys
Came across this article tonight. Thought it was a pretty good example of a government legislating for the 21st century and being proactive about an issue facing online communities and internet users.
Hope we are all having a great study break,
Luke
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Culture Jamming Tute Reflection Wk 9
Culture Jamming Tute Reflection Wk 9
Upon reflection of this weeks tutorial based on Culture Jamming and its aligned theories, the majority of discussion was based upon ideas of ethical trading, fair and free trade, token advertising, the green market, etc. Within this discussion, the tute seemed to establish two polar opposite, but yet inextricably linked theories. One hand the group argued that the boycotting of multi-national corporate organizations such as Nestle and Cadbury, which exploit children through slave labour, would aid in raising awareness of unethical employment. One the other hand, it was argued that the abandoning of such companies would in fact lead to a grater level of poverty within those already poverty-stricken countries. Another interesting binary that was raised in the tute discussion was the monetary price a consumer pays for ethical trading. Paradoxically, the consumer is guilt-ridden when purchasing products, and thus supporting companies, which endorse unethical employment and exploitation of their workers. This seems to be a complex catch22 situation, in which the consumer will constantly be trapped in. What role then, or what effect can Culture Jammer’s have on the limiting, or suppression of slave labour and exploitative means of production? Are programs such as Adbusters or PETA for example active in addressing foundational problems with capitalism, markets and multi-national corporations, or do they merely promote shock-value techniques such as Calvin Klein’s “Heroin Chic”?
A key point however, which was not addressed in the tutorial discussion for this week was whether or not we actually believe Culture Jamming effective forms of protest. What is it exactly that Culture Jamming seek to achieve? In Christine Harold’s 2004 article, Pranking Rhetoric: “Culture Jamming” as Media Activism, she suggests that Culture Jamming is “seeking to undermine the marketing rhetoric of multinational corporations, specifically through such practices as media hoaxing, corporate sabotage, billboard ‘liberation’ and trademark infringement” (p190) Harold further extrapolates “…pranking (the process by which Culture Jamming works upon) by layering and folding the rhetorical field – addresses the patterns of power rather then its contents. It does so by taking its cue, in part, from the incredible success of commercial rhetoric to infect contemporary culture.” (p209 my brackets) If we then assume that Harold is correct in her assumption of the ways in which Culture Jamming works, in what ways and to what extent do we belief Culture Jamming to be an effective form of subversion, inversion, prank or parody.
Cheers,
Blake Chitty.
Upon reflection of this weeks tutorial based on Culture Jamming and its aligned theories, the majority of discussion was based upon ideas of ethical trading, fair and free trade, token advertising, the green market, etc. Within this discussion, the tute seemed to establish two polar opposite, but yet inextricably linked theories. One hand the group argued that the boycotting of multi-national corporate organizations such as Nestle and Cadbury, which exploit children through slave labour, would aid in raising awareness of unethical employment. One the other hand, it was argued that the abandoning of such companies would in fact lead to a grater level of poverty within those already poverty-stricken countries. Another interesting binary that was raised in the tute discussion was the monetary price a consumer pays for ethical trading. Paradoxically, the consumer is guilt-ridden when purchasing products, and thus supporting companies, which endorse unethical employment and exploitation of their workers. This seems to be a complex catch22 situation, in which the consumer will constantly be trapped in. What role then, or what effect can Culture Jammer’s have on the limiting, or suppression of slave labour and exploitative means of production? Are programs such as Adbusters or PETA for example active in addressing foundational problems with capitalism, markets and multi-national corporations, or do they merely promote shock-value techniques such as Calvin Klein’s “Heroin Chic”?
A key point however, which was not addressed in the tutorial discussion for this week was whether or not we actually believe Culture Jamming effective forms of protest. What is it exactly that Culture Jamming seek to achieve? In Christine Harold’s 2004 article, Pranking Rhetoric: “Culture Jamming” as Media Activism, she suggests that Culture Jamming is “seeking to undermine the marketing rhetoric of multinational corporations, specifically through such practices as media hoaxing, corporate sabotage, billboard ‘liberation’ and trademark infringement” (p190) Harold further extrapolates “…pranking (the process by which Culture Jamming works upon) by layering and folding the rhetorical field – addresses the patterns of power rather then its contents. It does so by taking its cue, in part, from the incredible success of commercial rhetoric to infect contemporary culture.” (p209 my brackets) If we then assume that Harold is correct in her assumption of the ways in which Culture Jamming works, in what ways and to what extent do we belief Culture Jamming to be an effective form of subversion, inversion, prank or parody.
Cheers,
Blake Chitty.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
(Belated) Week 6 Presentation
(Again, posted it in the wrong place...sorry it's late!)
Breaking the ice:
• Who is a member of a social networking site?
• Which one? More than one?
• How did you choose? Why did you switch?
• Why did you join one to begin with?
• How often do you check your site? How do think it impacts your (social) life?
Why?
• To be “social” – irony of being by yourself considered being social
• “That’s where my friends are” – yet it’s not a physical place (they are at their homes, which IS a physical place, but they don’t go there)
• Issue of immobility: can’t get to their friends? (public transport, parents, people who have licenses etc.)
• Issue of convenience (don’t have to leave home, increasingly lazy/technologically advanced society, all about convenience – e.g. like fast food)
How?
• All about convenience:
• Computer laptops (portable computers) phones (smaller)
• If it’s only when you’re bored, then why do people do it whilst they’re ‘out and about’.
• There is a need to tell people hoe much fun you’re having – “I’m so drunk”, “going to the movies”, “hanging out with……”
Culture of Social Networking Sites: Private Space with No Privacy
• Ourselves: define our popularity, prove ourselves, create who we want to be, change certain things about ourselves, leave out the “bad bits”,
• Friends: how many are our actual friends, neglect real friends (time with them) to be on Facebook and that social life, accept people we don’t even really like, birthday messages
• Relationships: something intimate becomes public, public love + public heartbreak (god vs. bad), not official until it’s on Facebook, complicate complicated things (“it’s complicated with….”), defied by who you’re dating
• Language/jargon creates: LOL, ily
• “MySpace Photos”
• Facebook/MySpace Stalking
From the Readings:
• We want a space without rules (no govt., parents etc.) – yet there are so many “cultural rules” surrounding these sites.
• Have to go so often, can’t go on too much – much have certain amount of friends, not too many – photos –
• Music is cultural glue among youth – these sites can exploit/spread this fact.
• Power-play with Top Friends – too much drama, taken to be reality.
Also, I had 2 videos to show in my presentation:
1. Clip from Gossip Girl (Last Episode of Season 2: The Goodbye), where "gossip girl" asks everyone to meet at a bar where she will reveal herself, she then reveals that they are her - they send in the secrests that she posts - they create the drama they 'hate'.
2. Clip for Law And Order: SVU (Season 1, Episode 18: Chatroom) where Detective Stabler explain to his daughter that he is so protective about her using the computer because "Sometimes I bring my work home with me. I'm trying to catch a guy who goes after young girls. You know how I lock up the doors and windows?
[Maureen nods]Now they're coming in through here.[points to the computer]"
Breaking the ice:
• Who is a member of a social networking site?
• Which one? More than one?
• How did you choose? Why did you switch?
• Why did you join one to begin with?
• How often do you check your site? How do think it impacts your (social) life?
Why?
• To be “social” – irony of being by yourself considered being social
• “That’s where my friends are” – yet it’s not a physical place (they are at their homes, which IS a physical place, but they don’t go there)
• Issue of immobility: can’t get to their friends? (public transport, parents, people who have licenses etc.)
• Issue of convenience (don’t have to leave home, increasingly lazy/technologically advanced society, all about convenience – e.g. like fast food)
How?
• All about convenience:
• Computer laptops (portable computers) phones (smaller)
• If it’s only when you’re bored, then why do people do it whilst they’re ‘out and about’.
• There is a need to tell people hoe much fun you’re having – “I’m so drunk”, “going to the movies”, “hanging out with……”
Culture of Social Networking Sites: Private Space with No Privacy
• Ourselves: define our popularity, prove ourselves, create who we want to be, change certain things about ourselves, leave out the “bad bits”,
• Friends: how many are our actual friends, neglect real friends (time with them) to be on Facebook and that social life, accept people we don’t even really like, birthday messages
• Relationships: something intimate becomes public, public love + public heartbreak (god vs. bad), not official until it’s on Facebook, complicate complicated things (“it’s complicated with….”), defied by who you’re dating
• Language/jargon creates: LOL, ily
• “MySpace Photos”
• Facebook/MySpace Stalking
From the Readings:
• We want a space without rules (no govt., parents etc.) – yet there are so many “cultural rules” surrounding these sites.
• Have to go so often, can’t go on too much – much have certain amount of friends, not too many – photos –
• Music is cultural glue among youth – these sites can exploit/spread this fact.
• Power-play with Top Friends – too much drama, taken to be reality.
Also, I had 2 videos to show in my presentation:
1. Clip from Gossip Girl (Last Episode of Season 2: The Goodbye), where "gossip girl" asks everyone to meet at a bar where she will reveal herself, she then reveals that they are her - they send in the secrests that she posts - they create the drama they 'hate'.
2. Clip for Law And Order: SVU (Season 1, Episode 18: Chatroom) where Detective Stabler explain to his daughter that he is so protective about her using the computer because "Sometimes I bring my work home with me. I'm trying to catch a guy who goes after young girls. You know how I lock up the doors and windows?
[Maureen nods]Now they're coming in through here.[points to the computer]"
The Fun of Anonymity
(I posted this in the wrong spot agesss ago! I'm so terrible at this blogging thing!)
Newbie!
Hi! My name is Caitlin (I see there is already another Caitlin), and I am an arts student, majoring in Psychology. I am in my final semester of my arts degree, and hope to go onto honours within Psychology.
I have never blogged before, but I like the idea that you have the freedom to express whatever you like, without anyone knowing who you are!
Following on from that idea, I present you with my favourite website; www.postsecret.com
PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a postcard - it's arty/creative and you get to read peoples secrets! They upload new posts every Sunday - and delete the old ones, so you have to read them each week or you miss out! It can become really addictive :)
Caitlin (Ede)
Newbie!
Hi! My name is Caitlin (I see there is already another Caitlin), and I am an arts student, majoring in Psychology. I am in my final semester of my arts degree, and hope to go onto honours within Psychology.
I have never blogged before, but I like the idea that you have the freedom to express whatever you like, without anyone knowing who you are!
Following on from that idea, I present you with my favourite website; www.postsecret.com
PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a postcard - it's arty/creative and you get to read peoples secrets! They upload new posts every Sunday - and delete the old ones, so you have to read them each week or you miss out! It can become really addictive :)
Caitlin (Ede)
Monday, September 20, 2010
Saturday, September 18, 2010
webliography
hi guys sorry this is a bit late, been sick then totally forgot...I hardly ever use the Internet and so handing something in written/writing something is normally as far as I go. Well there is still plenty of time before our next assignment so hopefully some of these may be interesting as they were for me.
My articles focus on the concept of relationship building through the Internet. I decided to look at the opposite opinion of my own for the fun of it and found some interesting articles that explore the positive aspect of social networking via the Internet for self confidence and relationships that extend into the real world. I also added two articles that show a negative opinion of the Internet and cyberspace, and one especially because i loved the concept of the article (all about cyber affairs breaking apart years of marriage!)
Enjoy.
1: Tranny Boyz: Cyber Community Support in Negotiating Sex and Gender Mobility Among Female to Male Transsexuals
In the article Gauthier and Chaudoir focus on the positive impacts of the Internet and its development of social networking sites for female to male transsexuals (FTMs.) The article researches the use of the internet for social networking by this minority group, and the impact it has had on FTM’s normally difficult ability to feel a sense of belonging. The article looks at the Internet’s ability to provide security, professional advice, aid for legal rights and friendships. Society in the real world may be rejecting of FTMs, however through the realm of the Internet their gender becomes blurred in a way that acceptance becomes more plausible. The article discusses the concept of what gender is; the physical appearance of the body and how one promotes their body. Although FTMs normally face problems with the physical side of gender acceptance, via the Internet this is no longer the case. The Internet provides a physical barrier which opens up new doors for FTMs. The article specifically focuses on the idea that the Internet is allowing the feeling of acceptance to those (not just FTMs) that would rarely experience it in the real world. The article uses conversations between FTMs from Internet chat sites to reinforce the hardships of being socially unaccepted because of socially developed rules. It focuses purely with a positive outlook on the Internet by using this less prominent gender figure. Use this link to download the pdf version of the article for free.
2:Pan-national Identities: Representations of the Philippine Diaspora on the World Wide Web
Tyner and Kuhlke look at the Internet’s ability to maintain the feeling of belonging for migrants. The article focuses on the Philippine migrants who have been able to maintain their ties with their culture backgrounds through the use of the Internet and social networking sites. The Internet has allowed the fracturing of once forced assimilation of migrants. The research focuses on the Philippine migrants due to their vast migration history in both developed and developing countries, with their migration to over 160 different countries. The article researched the effect of Internet interactions on real world spatial interactions. The networking programs differentiate between different migrant groups providing historical background, occupations and social support for migrants who face challenges in their new environments. download the article for free using this link without having to register or pay.
3:Causes and Consequences of Social Interaction on the Internet: A Conceptual Framework
This article focuses more broadly on why it is that the Internet and its use as a social networking site is growing so fast in popularity. Mckenna and Bargh look at who uses the Internet in this manner, as well as why people may use the Internet for social interaction. It looks at the future of the Internet; it may not be a necessity like other technologies such as the telephone and car, but it is slowly becoming that way, especially in our personal lives. The article researched the self related and socially related influences that would encourage people to use the Internet to find relationships. Self related issues discussed include; stigmatised identities and constrained identities. Social motivators discussed include social anxiety, loneliness and the practical motivator of lifestyle constraints. The article also focuses on the power of these relationships and how the informality and security of the less physical approach can lead to more meaningful and emotional relationships. Research in the article discussed the influences that time spent interacting on the Internet has on real world interactions and the onset of depression, with results varying greatly to the typical assumptions made about the Internet. Use the above link to download the article.
4:Journal of Couple & Relationship Therapy: Cyber Sex
This article by Atwood & Schwartz pinpoints a negative aspect of the Internet as it focuses on the ever growing popularity of emotionally explicit and sexual relationships that develop via social networking via the Internet between people already involved in real world relationships or marriage. Couple therapists discuss how common the problems with Internet based infidelity are becoming in modern societies. Cyber affairs are just as emotionally damaging and destructive as the common affair. The underlying problem is that the Internet affairs are becoming more accessible and easier to remain in secrecy than the typical affair. The article discusses the main causes for those who outreach to the net for sexual and emotional pleasures. It discusses both personal reasons as well as relationship based reasons. It discusses the allure of anonymity, differentiation of the self and Internet addiction as causes for the onset of Internet relationships. Furthermore it looks to the concept of the ‘mid life crisis’ and intimacy issues as leading influences in this behaviour. The concept of ‘cyber flirting’ is introduced with its innocent packaging uncovered for its dominant role in the onset of infidelity. We also look at why an Internet relationship is so intriguing? Concepts of the alluring ‘fantasy’ over the mundane ‘reality’ are discussed in relation to the increasing popularity in Internet affairs. Download this interesting article using the link.
5:Minding the Cyber Gap: The Internet and Social Inequality
In the article Chen and Wellman observe at the connections that the Internet usage patterns have with pre-existing inequalities relating to socioeconomic location, age, gender and ethnicity, focusing on what is named the ‘double digital divide’; geographical location and socio-economics. The article does not just focus on the general use of the Internet, but the founding reason for the Internet relating to using it for a meaningful purpose. The article also takes into consideration the difference between having access to the Internet compared to having the education to properly use the Internet. The article focuses on the irony that the advantages of the Internet for the disadvantaged are hindered because of the status of the disadvantaged. It looks at how the Internet, although not as easy to see in modern societies, in less developed countries is a source for the upper class and is only increasing the material gap between the rich and the poor. It focuses on the comparison between the USA, Britain and Africa. Patriarchal gender norms also enforce social gaps through the use of the Internet in relation to women’s rights and roles in underdeveloped countries. The article then asks, and looks for the answers, for the important questions about the role the net is playing in the future increase or decrease of social inequalities. Read more with the above link!
Bibliography
Atwood, J. D., Schwartz, L., (2002) ‘Cyber Sex: The New Affair Treatment Considerations’, Journal of Couple & Relationship Therapy. Vol 1: 3. Pp 37-56. Available (01/09/2010): http
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a715724264~frm=titlelink
Gauthier, D. K., Chaudoir. N.K., (2004) ‘Tranny Boyz: Cyber Community Support in Negotiating Sex and Gender Mobility Among Female to Male Transsexuals’ An Interdisciplinary Journal: Deviant Behavior. Vol 25: 4. Pp 375-398. Available (01/09/2010):
Tyner, A. J ., Kuhlke, O., (2000) ‘Pan-National Identities: Representations of the Philippine Diaspora on the World Wide Web’ Asia Pacific Viewpoint. Vol 41: 3. Pp 231-252. Available (01/09/2010): http://www.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-8373.00120/abstract
Mckenna, K. Y. A., Bargh, J. A., (1999) ‘Causes and Consequences of Social Interaction on the Internet: A Conceptual Framework’ Media Psychology. Vol 1: 3. Pp 249- 269. Available (01/09/2010): http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a785351251
Chen, W., Wellman, B., (2007) ‘Minding the Cyber- Gap: The Internet and Social Inequality’ Blackwell Companion to Social inequalities. Vol : . Pp 523-545. Available (01/09/2010): http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/9780470996973.ch23/summary
My articles focus on the concept of relationship building through the Internet. I decided to look at the opposite opinion of my own for the fun of it and found some interesting articles that explore the positive aspect of social networking via the Internet for self confidence and relationships that extend into the real world. I also added two articles that show a negative opinion of the Internet and cyberspace, and one especially because i loved the concept of the article (all about cyber affairs breaking apart years of marriage!)
Enjoy.
1: Tranny Boyz: Cyber Community Support in Negotiating Sex and Gender Mobility Among Female to Male Transsexuals
In the article Gauthier and Chaudoir focus on the positive impacts of the Internet and its development of social networking sites for female to male transsexuals (FTMs.) The article researches the use of the internet for social networking by this minority group, and the impact it has had on FTM’s normally difficult ability to feel a sense of belonging. The article looks at the Internet’s ability to provide security, professional advice, aid for legal rights and friendships. Society in the real world may be rejecting of FTMs, however through the realm of the Internet their gender becomes blurred in a way that acceptance becomes more plausible. The article discusses the concept of what gender is; the physical appearance of the body and how one promotes their body. Although FTMs normally face problems with the physical side of gender acceptance, via the Internet this is no longer the case. The Internet provides a physical barrier which opens up new doors for FTMs. The article specifically focuses on the idea that the Internet is allowing the feeling of acceptance to those (not just FTMs) that would rarely experience it in the real world. The article uses conversations between FTMs from Internet chat sites to reinforce the hardships of being socially unaccepted because of socially developed rules. It focuses purely with a positive outlook on the Internet by using this less prominent gender figure. Use this link to download the pdf version of the article for free.
2:Pan-national Identities: Representations of the Philippine Diaspora on the World Wide Web
Tyner and Kuhlke look at the Internet’s ability to maintain the feeling of belonging for migrants. The article focuses on the Philippine migrants who have been able to maintain their ties with their culture backgrounds through the use of the Internet and social networking sites. The Internet has allowed the fracturing of once forced assimilation of migrants. The research focuses on the Philippine migrants due to their vast migration history in both developed and developing countries, with their migration to over 160 different countries. The article researched the effect of Internet interactions on real world spatial interactions. The networking programs differentiate between different migrant groups providing historical background, occupations and social support for migrants who face challenges in their new environments. download the article for free using this link without having to register or pay.
3:Causes and Consequences of Social Interaction on the Internet: A Conceptual Framework
This article focuses more broadly on why it is that the Internet and its use as a social networking site is growing so fast in popularity. Mckenna and Bargh look at who uses the Internet in this manner, as well as why people may use the Internet for social interaction. It looks at the future of the Internet; it may not be a necessity like other technologies such as the telephone and car, but it is slowly becoming that way, especially in our personal lives. The article researched the self related and socially related influences that would encourage people to use the Internet to find relationships. Self related issues discussed include; stigmatised identities and constrained identities. Social motivators discussed include social anxiety, loneliness and the practical motivator of lifestyle constraints. The article also focuses on the power of these relationships and how the informality and security of the less physical approach can lead to more meaningful and emotional relationships. Research in the article discussed the influences that time spent interacting on the Internet has on real world interactions and the onset of depression, with results varying greatly to the typical assumptions made about the Internet. Use the above link to download the article.
4:Journal of Couple & Relationship Therapy: Cyber Sex
This article by Atwood & Schwartz pinpoints a negative aspect of the Internet as it focuses on the ever growing popularity of emotionally explicit and sexual relationships that develop via social networking via the Internet between people already involved in real world relationships or marriage. Couple therapists discuss how common the problems with Internet based infidelity are becoming in modern societies. Cyber affairs are just as emotionally damaging and destructive as the common affair. The underlying problem is that the Internet affairs are becoming more accessible and easier to remain in secrecy than the typical affair. The article discusses the main causes for those who outreach to the net for sexual and emotional pleasures. It discusses both personal reasons as well as relationship based reasons. It discusses the allure of anonymity, differentiation of the self and Internet addiction as causes for the onset of Internet relationships. Furthermore it looks to the concept of the ‘mid life crisis’ and intimacy issues as leading influences in this behaviour. The concept of ‘cyber flirting’ is introduced with its innocent packaging uncovered for its dominant role in the onset of infidelity. We also look at why an Internet relationship is so intriguing? Concepts of the alluring ‘fantasy’ over the mundane ‘reality’ are discussed in relation to the increasing popularity in Internet affairs. Download this interesting article using the link.
5:Minding the Cyber Gap: The Internet and Social Inequality
In the article Chen and Wellman observe at the connections that the Internet usage patterns have with pre-existing inequalities relating to socioeconomic location, age, gender and ethnicity, focusing on what is named the ‘double digital divide’; geographical location and socio-economics. The article does not just focus on the general use of the Internet, but the founding reason for the Internet relating to using it for a meaningful purpose. The article also takes into consideration the difference between having access to the Internet compared to having the education to properly use the Internet. The article focuses on the irony that the advantages of the Internet for the disadvantaged are hindered because of the status of the disadvantaged. It looks at how the Internet, although not as easy to see in modern societies, in less developed countries is a source for the upper class and is only increasing the material gap between the rich and the poor. It focuses on the comparison between the USA, Britain and Africa. Patriarchal gender norms also enforce social gaps through the use of the Internet in relation to women’s rights and roles in underdeveloped countries. The article then asks, and looks for the answers, for the important questions about the role the net is playing in the future increase or decrease of social inequalities. Read more with the above link!
Bibliography
Atwood, J. D., Schwartz, L., (2002) ‘Cyber Sex: The New Affair Treatment Considerations’, Journal of Couple & Relationship Therapy. Vol 1: 3. Pp 37-56. Available (01/09/2010): http
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a715724264~frm=titlelink
Gauthier, D. K., Chaudoir. N.K., (2004) ‘Tranny Boyz: Cyber Community Support in Negotiating Sex and Gender Mobility Among Female to Male Transsexuals’ An Interdisciplinary Journal: Deviant Behavior. Vol 25: 4. Pp 375-398. Available (01/09/2010):
Tyner, A. J ., Kuhlke, O., (2000) ‘Pan-National Identities: Representations of the Philippine Diaspora on the World Wide Web’ Asia Pacific Viewpoint. Vol 41: 3. Pp 231-252. Available (01/09/2010): http://www.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-8373.00120/abstract
Mckenna, K. Y. A., Bargh, J. A., (1999) ‘Causes and Consequences of Social Interaction on the Internet: A Conceptual Framework’ Media Psychology. Vol 1: 3. Pp 249- 269. Available (01/09/2010): http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a785351251
Chen, W., Wellman, B., (2007) ‘Minding the Cyber- Gap: The Internet and Social Inequality’ Blackwell Companion to Social inequalities. Vol : . Pp 523-545. Available (01/09/2010): http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/9780470996973.ch23/summary
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Henson Debate Continues...
In response to the (what should be expired) debate circulating the photographic works of Australian artist, Bill Henson and the comments raised on the blog, I would like to start by saying that there have been and continue to be, far more aggressive, sexualized, pornographic and disturbing images/artworks then that of Henson's. For example fluxes performances of the 1960s group The Vienese Actionists, which involve men and women vomiting, ejaculating, masturbating and covering their naked bodies in paint. Or the work of Vitto Acconci, whereby he situates himself underneath the floor boards of gallery spaces and masturbates repeatedly into a microphone. Or the work of Carol-lee Schneeman's 1975 performance piece, "Interior Scroll" in which she pulls a scroll out from her vagina and recites its text to a live audience. Or perhaps the work of Eve Klein, in which many of his performances involve him conducting a group of naked female models, of whom are covered in blue paint, to sprawl themselves over a floor canvas while being orchestrated to a live philharmonic.
However in keeping with Henson's context - perhaps we should take a look at the work of American artist, Sally Mann - in which she photographs her young, adolescent children. Like Henson, Mann's subjects are naked. So what then marks the difference between Henson's images and that of Mann's? Arguably, the difference boils down to the fact that Hensen is male and Mann, female. And furthermore, mother.It is Hensons very 'msleness' which automatically positions him as a voyeur. So then if Mann and Henson's photograph's are of the same or very similar subject matter, it seems to be societies conditioning of the relationship between man and child which is the problem.
This is not an art Vs pornography debate. But rather a mere consequence of societies contemporary obsession with protectionism, pornography and fetichism. If anything, it is the compulsive desire of communities and governments to protect and hide which serves to heighten ones fascination with the erotic or thereby pornographic. That which is hidden, is often imagined, and that which is imagined in terms of men's, women's and children.s bodies, is often sexualized and fetichised. Porn is after all, at least to my understanding, designed to stimulate sexual excitement. And is this the intentions of Henson's photographs, I think not.
Blake.
However in keeping with Henson's context - perhaps we should take a look at the work of American artist, Sally Mann - in which she photographs her young, adolescent children. Like Henson, Mann's subjects are naked. So what then marks the difference between Henson's images and that of Mann's? Arguably, the difference boils down to the fact that Hensen is male and Mann, female. And furthermore, mother.It is Hensons very 'msleness' which automatically positions him as a voyeur. So then if Mann and Henson's photograph's are of the same or very similar subject matter, it seems to be societies conditioning of the relationship between man and child which is the problem.
This is not an art Vs pornography debate. But rather a mere consequence of societies contemporary obsession with protectionism, pornography and fetichism. If anything, it is the compulsive desire of communities and governments to protect and hide which serves to heighten ones fascination with the erotic or thereby pornographic. That which is hidden, is often imagined, and that which is imagined in terms of men's, women's and children.s bodies, is often sexualized and fetichised. Porn is after all, at least to my understanding, designed to stimulate sexual excitement. And is this the intentions of Henson's photographs, I think not.
Blake.
Dove
Hey guys,
Here are a couple of those Dove advertisements we were talking about today! Really interesting if you ask me and a really clever marketing technique. I for one know that I'm encouraged to buy Dove products, because I feel as though they're a good cause. This idea of embracing women of all shapes and sizes encourages me to see Dove as more of an organisation supporting women and diversity, rather than a brand, which I guess means they're doing a good job!
Pretty engaging, have a look!
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Tutorial Presentation Week 8
Gender and computer ethics by Alison Adams
A) Background
Computer ethics could benefit from feminine insights especially in the area of men and women’s online experience. EG Cyberstalking A report by US Attorney General Reno in 1999, states that cyberstalking is strongly gendered.
An explanation for this is women have traditionally had few rights to privacy and it is not always easy to see when their rights are violated. This leads to the reluctance of official bodies to see cyberstalking as a problem that affects women to the extent that they may need special measures to counteract it.
B) How can feminist theory be applied to computer ethics?
Three views
i)Possibility of countering the technological determinism inherent in views of computer ethics that see the trajectory of computer ethics as substantially different from other technologies and at the same time threatening and out of control.
ii) Continuing inequalities in power and how these are often “gendered” ie; experiences of men and women are often substantially different and are different in relation to their respective genders.
iii) An alternative, collective approach to the individualism of the traditional ethical theories encapsulated in computer ethics.
C) What it hopes to achieve?
Feminist ethics can offer help in exposing the power inequalities which exist, which traditional computer ethics renders invisible in its pursuit of mainstream ethical views and its lack of critique of professional roles and structures.
D) Cyberstalking
Cyberstalking has been coined to describe stalking behaviour perpetrated through some aspect of information and communications technology. It usually involves the use of the Internet.
Examples
Female Victims
EG i) Jayne Hitchcock
Author of children’s books. She contacted the Woodside Literary Agency and became a client. Realising she had been duped, she criticized the agency. Counterfeit messages of a sexually explicit nature were posted on the Internet with her contact details included. Eventually a friend of Hitchcock’s was able to gather enough evidence and prove it was Woodside’s work.
ii) Man from California
Got angry after getting spurned by a woman, assumed her identity and claimed sado-masochistic fantasies in her name. Resulted in men breaking into the victim’s home. Culprit got caught eventually.
iii) Stephanie Brail
Defended another woman who got verbally attacked by a number of men for her views on an alternate women’s publication. Drawn into a “flame war”. Became a victim of anonymous obscene postings with her personal details included.
Male Victim
i) Laurence Godfrey
A contributor to a newsgroup about the politics of Thailand. Anonymous postings containing “squalid obscene and defamatory” material were posted in his name. He sued internet service provider, Demon in the UK.
Effect of cyberstalking: Triggers real life stalking behaviour in others. ( Much like in Stephanie Brail’s case)
Conclusion: Despite the fact that both women and men can be victims of stalking and cyberstalking, the majority of reported cyberstalking cases involve women as victims and men as perpetrators. Validates the theory that cyberstalking is strongly gendered.
Solution: Three aspects protection should cover. The industry has to react to such issues fast. Self-protection, we need to protect ourselves and protection from the law.
F) Discussion
1) Experiences of men and women are often substantially different and are different in relation to their respective genders. True or false? Why or why not?
2) Online sexual harassment mirrors the levels of harassment women face in real life. What do you think?
3) Is privacy different for women and men? How can this difference be captured in legislation?
A) Background
Computer ethics could benefit from feminine insights especially in the area of men and women’s online experience. EG Cyberstalking A report by US Attorney General Reno in 1999, states that cyberstalking is strongly gendered.
An explanation for this is women have traditionally had few rights to privacy and it is not always easy to see when their rights are violated. This leads to the reluctance of official bodies to see cyberstalking as a problem that affects women to the extent that they may need special measures to counteract it.
B) How can feminist theory be applied to computer ethics?
Three views
i)Possibility of countering the technological determinism inherent in views of computer ethics that see the trajectory of computer ethics as substantially different from other technologies and at the same time threatening and out of control.
ii) Continuing inequalities in power and how these are often “gendered” ie; experiences of men and women are often substantially different and are different in relation to their respective genders.
iii) An alternative, collective approach to the individualism of the traditional ethical theories encapsulated in computer ethics.
C) What it hopes to achieve?
Feminist ethics can offer help in exposing the power inequalities which exist, which traditional computer ethics renders invisible in its pursuit of mainstream ethical views and its lack of critique of professional roles and structures.
D) Cyberstalking
Cyberstalking has been coined to describe stalking behaviour perpetrated through some aspect of information and communications technology. It usually involves the use of the Internet.
Examples
Female Victims
EG i) Jayne Hitchcock
Author of children’s books. She contacted the Woodside Literary Agency and became a client. Realising she had been duped, she criticized the agency. Counterfeit messages of a sexually explicit nature were posted on the Internet with her contact details included. Eventually a friend of Hitchcock’s was able to gather enough evidence and prove it was Woodside’s work.
ii) Man from California
Got angry after getting spurned by a woman, assumed her identity and claimed sado-masochistic fantasies in her name. Resulted in men breaking into the victim’s home. Culprit got caught eventually.
iii) Stephanie Brail
Defended another woman who got verbally attacked by a number of men for her views on an alternate women’s publication. Drawn into a “flame war”. Became a victim of anonymous obscene postings with her personal details included.
Male Victim
i) Laurence Godfrey
A contributor to a newsgroup about the politics of Thailand. Anonymous postings containing “squalid obscene and defamatory” material were posted in his name. He sued internet service provider, Demon in the UK.
Effect of cyberstalking: Triggers real life stalking behaviour in others. ( Much like in Stephanie Brail’s case)
Conclusion: Despite the fact that both women and men can be victims of stalking and cyberstalking, the majority of reported cyberstalking cases involve women as victims and men as perpetrators. Validates the theory that cyberstalking is strongly gendered.
Solution: Three aspects protection should cover. The industry has to react to such issues fast. Self-protection, we need to protect ourselves and protection from the law.
F) Discussion
1) Experiences of men and women are often substantially different and are different in relation to their respective genders. True or false? Why or why not?
2) Online sexual harassment mirrors the levels of harassment women face in real life. What do you think?
3) Is privacy different for women and men? How can this difference be captured in legislation?
Monday, September 13, 2010
TUTORIAL PRESENTATION WEEK 8: Internet Ethics
For this week's weblog posting I've spoken on both articles because they're both diverse and equally interesting for different reasons. Also, for the reasons Alison Adams states regarding the injection of gender studies sensibilities into cyber ethics; we see a connection with the application of moral relativism in pornography based on wisdom accumulated about the numerous shades of grey we've seen in modern times on issues such as abortion, assisted suicide and other moral minefields. **Please note that I'm unable to be at Wednesday's tute, so kindly read this and ruminate on it in my absence.. or just comment..or think about it as you drift off to sleep?
"Cyberstalking: Gender and computer ethics" by Alison Adam.
Summary: Article justifies why computer ethics could benefit from feminist theory by way of 'cyberstalking'-related examples.
In discussing the various ethical dilemmas emerging from technological development, the author has canvassed the dynamic issues of empowerment, novelty, and gendered dialogues that computer ethics shares with gender theory. Hence, it may be seen that three primary aspects of feminist theory may be of assistance in negotiating moralism on the internet, namely those offering a view to the:
1. applicability of existing discourses to rein in technology's;
"Cyberstalking: Gender and computer ethics" by Alison Adam.
Summary: Article justifies why computer ethics could benefit from feminist theory by way of 'cyberstalking'-related examples.
In discussing the various ethical dilemmas emerging from technological development, the author has canvassed the dynamic issues of empowerment, novelty, and gendered dialogues that computer ethics shares with gender theory. Hence, it may be seen that three primary aspects of feminist theory may be of assistance in negotiating moralism on the internet, namely those offering a view to the:
1. applicability of existing discourses to rein in technology's;
2. issues of empowerment and its relation to gender; and
3. an alternative, collective approach to theories of moral relativism.
There is really no doubt about the applicability of gender studies to the various dilemmas we see on the internet - what better way to address the conflict, diversity, contradictions and change of the internet than with post-structural tools of third-wave feminism? Still, this is by no means the only discipline that should inform our cyber-related discourses.
Considering the multi-focality of textual representations, we suddenly see the internet as nothing more than a really really really really really really big book. With audio/movie capabilities. Hence, we suddenly have at our disposal tools of structuralism helping us work out how the structures of blogs and forums and news sites differ, and how freudian readings of most Facebook posts aren't really that hard to make out. At all. Moreover, once we adopt this progressivist functionality we can see that - as discussed in today's lecture - issues of public/private divide have plagued celebrity and newsmedia for quite some time. Also, issues of virtual property are indeed similar to the intangibility of intellectual property. Suddenly, these heuristics we are all so familiar with make sense of it all in a way that doesn't (unnecessarily) compartmentalise a new section of our consciousness for 'the internet'. Of course 'porn' is a different issue. But we'll get to that..
Here I ask: what are the differences, if any that the internet introduces that may perhaps separate it from anything we've ever seen before?
Also, are we making the same mistakes again or are has the technology allowed us to make new ones?
"The Ethics of Porn on the Net" by Kath Albury
Summary: Analyses morality of pornography and its implications in modern society. Kath's own suggested resources on sexual ethics, sexuality/gender authors, and many others, also warrant a mention (as does the succinct Sydney Morning Herald article "Ethics of porn are in the eye of the beholder" Kath Albury penned for the Sydney Morning Herald).
Summary: Analyses morality of pornography and its implications in modern society. Kath's own suggested resources on sexual ethics, sexuality/gender authors, and many others, also warrant a mention (as does the succinct Sydney Morning Herald article "Ethics of porn are in the eye of the beholder" Kath Albury penned for the Sydney Morning Herald).
Everyone knows. The internet is for porn. (Please, click the link! It's not spam, it's not violent, it's not even porn - it's the Sesame Street characters explaining the universality of pornography in song!) Statistics on pornography are considerable - the porn industry reportedly having larger revenues than Microsoft, Google, Amazon, eBay, Yahoo, Apple and Netflix combined, not to mention that in 2006 Worldwide Pornography Revenues totalled more than $97.06 ( see here for these and more porn-related statistics). Furthermore, for a perspective into the diversity of porn, if you're interested, see Wikipedia's list of pornographic sub-genres (Note: this list does contain explicit material though no pictures). Here we further see the analogous nature of cyber-texts as a form of textuality and ways they may be conceptualised via interpretative methods of dynamic discourses.
Personally, I found it hard to conceptualise the porn industry's inclusivity as envisioned by Kath Albury, in the scheme of what was clearly fetishistic behaviour. One one hand, she states that people who were normatively 'too fat, too old, too kinky or just too "ordinary"' could be acknowledged as "unique sexual beings" (pg. 199) - I found this hard to reconcile with what I saw to be merely the patronising, obsessive, limiting fetishes the public have for these particular people. Sure, it's inclusive, but when you're included solely because of a characteristic and predominantly in a way that many people would view as demeaning rather than empowering, is this really meaningful inclusivity?
To this I also add the question: if you're being viewed or included because of your 'red hair' or because of the size of your breasts, etc. is this empowering and/or inclusive or, reversely, are you being reduced to that single characteristic in a way that ultimately denies every other aspect of your being?
Perhaps it is merely this aspect of you that is a commodity that allows you to be included in the cybersphere as a commodity? Moreover, pornography is primarily propogated as a capitalistic venture, in the way that newsmedia is founded on advertising dollars. Hence, is it perhaps for these capitalistic ends that you are included in the first place; i.e. rather than being included on any meaningful basis, your inclusion is merely in recognition of your ability to be sold on the market because of a particular fetish-based market. I definitely believe in inclusivity, but where it genuinely means something and has value. We have to pick our battles and I'm not sure that there are too many human-rights frontiers being fought for because there is a niche market for these varying idiosyncrasies.
What do you think? Do you think that it's good that people are just being included? Does it matter or not what type of inclusion this is? What type of empowerment?
Tutorial Presentation: The Ethics of Porn on the Net
Hey everyone,
In this week's tutorial I'm hoping to elaborate on the workshop discussion of virtual ethics by taking a look at the implications of pornography on forming identities and communities on the net. I will aim to discuss some of the issues raised Kathy Albury in her chapter 'The Ethics of Porn on the Net' as well as making some links to an additional article written by Jonathan James McCreadie Lillie called 'Cyberporn, Sexuality, and the Net Apparatus'.
Albury begins her discussion by demonstrating the ways in which the Internet has created an increased familiarisation with porn and has thus helped to break down societal taboos surrounding pornography by making once private acts publicly accessible. Albury presents a somewhat optimistic view of Internet pornography by describing the potential new avenues of enterprise for both men and women and the ways in which members of marginalised sexual identities are able to form online communities. She also discusses the ways in which such communities challenge heteronormative discourses and how women are able to safely initiate and engage in sexual activities.
Critiques of Internet pornography can be seen to stem from the fear that it can be accessed anywhere, at anytime and by anyone with the right amount of computer knowledge. One argument against Internet pornography is the perception that the female body is sexualised and commodified which leads me to ask the question:
How are pornographic images of women any different to images available though mainstream, advertising and media?
Is there a different set of ethics attached to the commodification of bodies in the mainstream media and pornographic images on the Internet?
McCreadie Lillie's article elaborates on Albury's discussion of pornography on the Internet and in many ways the two authors share a similar view of the Utopian potential for the exploration of sexual identity in the virtual world that is the Internet. McCreadie Lillie provides further consideration of Foucault's discussion of sexuality and he also provides a brief history of pornography. McCreadie Lillie discusses the notion of a 'post-pornographic era' in which sexualised images have been normalised through readily available access to pornographic images and the sexualised images found in pop-culture and the mainstream media. It would be interesting to know to what extent everyone agrees with this notion. Personally, I think that the distinction between mainstream media and pornography has been broken down to an extent. Clothing companies such as American Apparel use advertising campaigns which to me seen reminiscent of soft porn images, take for example this advertisement for socks. Do you think this sort of advertising has resulted from the breaking down of taboos surrounding the access of pornography?
One last question I wanted to ask is whether everyone agrees with the positive description given to Internet pornography by Albury and McCreadie Lillie? What do you think are some of the ethical implications of easy access to porn through the Internet?
Anyways will see you all in the tutorial on Wednesday!!
In this week's tutorial I'm hoping to elaborate on the workshop discussion of virtual ethics by taking a look at the implications of pornography on forming identities and communities on the net. I will aim to discuss some of the issues raised Kathy Albury in her chapter 'The Ethics of Porn on the Net' as well as making some links to an additional article written by Jonathan James McCreadie Lillie called 'Cyberporn, Sexuality, and the Net Apparatus'.
Albury begins her discussion by demonstrating the ways in which the Internet has created an increased familiarisation with porn and has thus helped to break down societal taboos surrounding pornography by making once private acts publicly accessible. Albury presents a somewhat optimistic view of Internet pornography by describing the potential new avenues of enterprise for both men and women and the ways in which members of marginalised sexual identities are able to form online communities. She also discusses the ways in which such communities challenge heteronormative discourses and how women are able to safely initiate and engage in sexual activities.
Critiques of Internet pornography can be seen to stem from the fear that it can be accessed anywhere, at anytime and by anyone with the right amount of computer knowledge. One argument against Internet pornography is the perception that the female body is sexualised and commodified which leads me to ask the question:
How are pornographic images of women any different to images available though mainstream, advertising and media?
Is there a different set of ethics attached to the commodification of bodies in the mainstream media and pornographic images on the Internet?
McCreadie Lillie's article elaborates on Albury's discussion of pornography on the Internet and in many ways the two authors share a similar view of the Utopian potential for the exploration of sexual identity in the virtual world that is the Internet. McCreadie Lillie provides further consideration of Foucault's discussion of sexuality and he also provides a brief history of pornography. McCreadie Lillie discusses the notion of a 'post-pornographic era' in which sexualised images have been normalised through readily available access to pornographic images and the sexualised images found in pop-culture and the mainstream media. It would be interesting to know to what extent everyone agrees with this notion. Personally, I think that the distinction between mainstream media and pornography has been broken down to an extent. Clothing companies such as American Apparel use advertising campaigns which to me seen reminiscent of soft porn images, take for example this advertisement for socks. Do you think this sort of advertising has resulted from the breaking down of taboos surrounding the access of pornography?
One last question I wanted to ask is whether everyone agrees with the positive description given to Internet pornography by Albury and McCreadie Lillie? What do you think are some of the ethical implications of easy access to porn through the Internet?
Anyways will see you all in the tutorial on Wednesday!!
Monday's ethics talk and workshop
I too had my curiosity aroused by this workshop. There were a few things that I hadn't really thought about so it really gave my brain cells a going over. On that note I'd like to pose another ethical question for the tutorial.
In the World of Warcraft, several years ago, there was a woman who played with a Horde guild (a group of like minded people who hang out together ingame) in America and became really close friends with the people in her guild. She then died of stroke. She lived in a different state from the rest of her guild, who were all over America, but they wanted to hold a memorial service for her that all could attend, so they decided to hold one ingame. They posted for everyone to read thay they would be holding a memorial for their friend, and could everyone please respect them and keep away, mainly for the Alliance players. This is on a PVP server where anyone from the opposite faction, Horde vs Alliance, can kill the other as and when they meet, if they want. About 50 people turned up for the memorial, wearing only decorative clothes that offer no protection from attacks. 30 odd players from an Alliance guild saw this as a good chance to get Honour points for killing Horde players, so rocked up and killed everyone in a surprise attack, getting many points really easily. They recorded it and it's been turned into a clip that has many versions, but I've linked this one. Don't watch this clip if you have an aversion to swearing, the beggining has a few quotes from people who were there during the attack.
Is this a justified, if mean, use of the game tactics to get honour for your guild? Or a horrible desecration of a farewell to a loved friend? What kind of repercussions would there be if this was in real life (obviously not the killing of everyone, but certainly the gatecrashing), and do they apply in this online situation?
In the World of Warcraft, several years ago, there was a woman who played with a Horde guild (a group of like minded people who hang out together ingame) in America and became really close friends with the people in her guild. She then died of stroke. She lived in a different state from the rest of her guild, who were all over America, but they wanted to hold a memorial service for her that all could attend, so they decided to hold one ingame. They posted for everyone to read thay they would be holding a memorial for their friend, and could everyone please respect them and keep away, mainly for the Alliance players. This is on a PVP server where anyone from the opposite faction, Horde vs Alliance, can kill the other as and when they meet, if they want. About 50 people turned up for the memorial, wearing only decorative clothes that offer no protection from attacks. 30 odd players from an Alliance guild saw this as a good chance to get Honour points for killing Horde players, so rocked up and killed everyone in a surprise attack, getting many points really easily. They recorded it and it's been turned into a clip that has many versions, but I've linked this one. Don't watch this clip if you have an aversion to swearing, the beggining has a few quotes from people who were there during the attack.
Is this a justified, if mean, use of the game tactics to get honour for your guild? Or a horrible desecration of a farewell to a loved friend? What kind of repercussions would there be if this was in real life (obviously not the killing of everyone, but certainly the gatecrashing), and do they apply in this online situation?
Ruminations on Virtual Ethics
Well, the workshop on Monday on virtual ethics got me thinking. I posed this as a question in the workshop but I thought put a link up to the real-world (or virtual world) event that inspired me. It is a nice illustration of the clash between real-world and virtual-world ethics.
Hope it gets you thinking.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7905924.stm
(edit: sorry I can't get the link to work properly right now, I will try and have it up properly tonight, for now just copy and paste.)
Hope it gets you thinking.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7905924.stm
(edit: sorry I can't get the link to work properly right now, I will try and have it up properly tonight, for now just copy and paste.)
Webliography
4. If science fiction is a genre that imagines our future, what happens to gender and race? (you can apply this question to literary of cinematic sf)
As Joseph Marchesani discusses in his article Science Fiction and Fantasy, the constructions of both gender and sexuality in science fiction are and have been replicated, and rarely challenged. Marchensani goes on to critcise how, as a genre, science fiction remains to include the same characters in texts over and over again. Marchensani examines many different authors, discussing how a genre like science fiction, with its “promise (of) more freedom than.. nongenre literatures” has the option to “imagine alternatives to the privileged assumptions of heterosexuality and masculinity that suffuse our culture”. Marchensani goes through the history of science fiction and fantasy writing to try and explain how such a free genre of writing constructed such stereotypes, and found that from boys' adventure stories of the late Nineteenth Century, the move toward “more easily accessible stereotypes” was made.
"Science fiction... is more hyperbolically concerned... with the question of difference... the politics of race and sexual orientation”. Constance Penley openly discusses how although science fiction seems to merge gender and race, it also excludes it. People tend to see science fiction as a genre that is “typically posed as that of the difference between the human and the nonhuman”, however, Penley is concerned with the differences and the exclusions it assumes through presenting the same white males.
Penley refers to science fiction's fascination with the mother, and the body of the mother in regards to questions of reproduction and the representation of the maternal. The constant and ever changing depiction of the cyborg/alien/monster/robot which is consciously and unconsciously constructing new categories of “masculinity and femininity, paternity and maternity, through the shifting, ambiguous, and contradictory sexual status” it gives this cyborg/alien/monster/robot.
Mary Ann Doane examines the films Aliens and Blade Runner in reference to gender in science fiction and, much like Penley, discovered profound anxieties in regards to the female body and its ability to reproduce, and create unscripted life. Doane found that the discussion of the feminine/maternal was one of the underlying constructs of both films. While reviewing Aliens, Doane found that the use of technology, as opposed to biology reproducing gender challenged concepts of what it means to be human, to be gendered, as the decision of gender in humans today does not lie in anybody's hands, while, obviously it does technologically."In the case of some science fiction.. technology makes possible the destabilisation of sexual identity as a category, there has also been a ...history of representations of technology which work to fortify- sometimes desperately- conventional understandings of the feminine” (Doane). Doane also identifies the constant tension between the potential for liberation and the tendency for it to be reproduces in science fiction by reinforcing gendered and racialised stereotypes.
Sarah Zettel, a science fiction and fantasy writer herself, sees the portrayal of gender and race in science fiction much like Doane, Penley and Marchesani. Although a conscious or unconscious attempt has been made to remove it from science fiction, Zettel sees the constant differences in science fiction texts for more historical reasons.
As context has a great influence on writers, the time of which something was written often reflects beliefs and values of the time. Zettel, while reviewing these 'things that don't go away', notices historically, that the longest running fiction magazine Astounding Stories, under the name Analog Science Fiction, which printed science fiction had, and to this day may still have strict guidelines. In order to be printed in the magazine, “you could not have a name that was female, or too 'foreign'” (Zettel). So Catherine Moore was to became C.L. Moore, take a male pseudonym or not be published. The ability for the press to control race and gender in this way also implies that the content of the texts would too be gender and racially controlled.
While many more guidelines stood in the way of free writing (for Astounding Stories, anyway) Zettel notes that other publications eventually led to accept female writers, and that there was a “small but existent body of science fiction literature in the African American press.
Elizabeth Bear, another female science fiction author, sees, from a writers' perspective, the ease of creating a niche in which a writer presents the same characters the same ways in science fiction. The portrayal of gender and race in science fiction is, obviously, down to the writer and she came up with guidelines to ensure that the inclusion of 'The Other', a term Bear uses for non white, American males, is represented, and not seen as 'The Other'. An interesting approach, as Bear wants a diversity of characters, but can only refer to them as 'The Other', as they have yet to be properly represented.
Bear writes about the same repetitive white male characters presented in science fiction, and goes on to say “stop thinking about this person you're writing as The Other. Think of them as human, an individual. Not A Man. Not A Woman. Not A Chinese Person or A Handicapped Person or A Person With Cancer or a Queer Person. A person. Stop trying to make them universal” (Bear).
References:
Bear, Elizabeth, “Throw another Bear in the Canoe” <http://matociquala.
Doane, Mary Ann, “Technophilia” <www.yorku.ca/jjenson/
Penley, Constance et al “Close Encounters: Film, Feminism and Science Fiction” <http://books.google.com.au/
Marcesani, Joseph, “Science Fiction and Fantasy” <http://www.glbtq.com/
Zettel, Sarah, “Things That Don't Go Away: Race and Science Fiction” <http://www.bscreview.com/
Webliography
Question 3: “These machine/organism relationships are obsolete, unnecessary” writes Haraway.
In what ways have our relations to machines been theorised?
Dualism
Brenda Brasher’s article, although mostly an account of the cyborg in religion, provided significant insight into the cyborg dualism suggested by Haraway and others. Brasher began with a history of the cyborg from the subject of cultural imagery (namely science fiction books and films such as Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein), to the scientific coining of the term by NASA scientists Clynes and Kline, to the cultural cyborg suggested by Haraway in her Manifesto. This was useful as it provided a broad perspective on the forms a cyborg can take; and as such, the ways in which our relations to machines have been theorised. Her “Postscript on the Cyborg” recognised that: western identity is built upon dualisms (male/female, human/beast, self/other); and, “the cyborg incorporates dualism within itself by insisting upon an integral identity between people and their material environment.” Thus, Brasher asserts Haraway’s challenge to dualism, providing further evidence that traditional machine/organism relationships are obsolete.
Cyborgs in Cultural Imagery
In his article, Daniel Pimley extends Haraway’s cyborg identity into the future, likening it to the Cyberpunk genre. He states that Cyberpunk is the “disintegration” of boundaries; this evokes similarity with Haraway’s idea of “boundary transgressions” (p. 37). Our relations to machines have been theorised through cultural imagery (embodied by the media) to the extent that a new genre has been created. gives examples of this genre in several different text-types: the novel Crash by J.G. Ballard, wherein the convergence of machine and organism arises through sex; the anime feature film Akira, which explores the dangers of this convergence; a second film, Ghost in the Shell, “considering the psychological implication of becoming a cyborg”; and, Björk’s music video for All is Full of Love, exploring the possibility of a cyborg with an absent biological form. Pimley’s examples provide significant evidence of the ways our relations to machines have been theorised through fictional media.
Transhumanism
Machine/organism relationships extend from fiction, as in Pimley’s examples, to real-life. This is well illustrated by the Transhumanist movement, which Nick Bostrom’s article provides very useful information about. Bostrom asserts that Transhumanism is a philosophical and cultural school of thought that aims to use science and technology to expand the boundaries of human existence, beyond the natural; to create post-humans. This is also resonant of Haraway’s suggestion that cyborgs “transgress boundaries” and implies that the Transhumanist post-human is perhaps the ultimate cyborg. Bostrom explores some hypothetical technologies and the resultant post-human forms: namely, artificial intelligence and mind-uploading. He says that the continued advancement in artificial technology (AI) could lead to the creation of machines that could think in the same way as human beings. There are philosophical arguments both for and against AI, but Transhumanism tends to hold that it is possible. Further, the improvement of AI could radically change humanity. This idea, known as the singularity hypothesis, is summed up by Vernor Vinge’s quote that Bostrom includes: “Within thirty years we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended.” The singularity hypothesis seems to be almost identical to Haraway’s summation of cyborg imagery: “It means both building and destroying machines, identities, categories, relationships, spaces, stories.” Mind-uploading is another example of a hypothetical machine/organism hybrid. It is, according to Bostrom, “the transfer of a human mind to a computer.” This process would have the following implications: virtual reality – where the uploaded mind, now a software, could exist in an entirely virtual realm, abolishing the need for any bodily element of the cyborg; or Robot bodies – where the software could be embedded in a robot body, once again annihilating the need for a body. AI and mind-uploading are extreme examples of how our relations to machines have been theorised. However Bostrom notes some examples of the Transhumanist dream as permeating our reality through the use of biotechnologies, nanotechnologies and the like. These include: cosmetic surgery; sex change operations; prosthetics; anti-aging medication; and genetic engineering.
Endless Possibilities
In Lawrence Hagerty's book, he introduces the term cyberdelic space: “the mental realm in deep cyberspace that coincides with deep psychedelic space and which provides a portal for entry into entheoscape.” Cyberdelic space is another way our relation to machines, specifically the internet, has been theorised. From this it seems that any cultural aspect of humanity, any symbolic representation of what it is to be human, can be combined with machine to create a cultural cyborg. He states: “It is as if a bond of some sort exists between the psychedelic and computing communities.” He is suggesting here that our relations to machines are not merely individual, but collective. Stemming from this idea, he continues to assert that the cyberdelic is a part of the evolution of global consciousness. It is interesting to note that he denies the notion of the cyborg: “I am in no way implying that the Internet will turn is into some form of Borg.” However, he unconsciously asserts Haraway’s notion of the cyborg in his utopian vision of “an elevated human consciousness”.
Craig McMurtie reports the development of the world’s first synthetic, self-replicating cell. The creation of this synthetic life “began on a computer”. Life, an organic process, has been made from software on a computer, a physical example of machine/organism relationships as obsolete. An example of the advancements in science and technology that are enabling the progression of Transhumanism.
References
Bostrom, Nick. ‘A History of Transhumanist Thought’ Journal of Evolution and Technology, 14:1, (April 2005) <http://jetpress.org/volume14/bostrom.html> (accessed 8 September 2010).
Brasher, Brenda E. ‘Thoughts on the Status of the Cyborg: Technological Socialization and Its Links to the Religious Function of Popular Culture’ Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 64:4, (1996) 809-830, <http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=404> (accessed 6 September 2010).
Hagerty, Lawrence. ‘Chapter 2: The Internet and the Noosphere’ The Spirit of the Internet,
< http://www.matrixmasters.com/spirit/html/2a/2b/2c/2c.html> (accessed 9 September 2010).
McMurtrie, Craig. ‘Scientists create synthetic life’
< http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2010/05/21/2905640.htm> (21 May 2010, accessed 9 September 2010).
Pimley, Daniel. ‘Cyborg Futures: Cyborgs, Cyberpunk and the future of the body’ http://www.pimley.net/documents/cyborgfutures.pdf> (2003, accessed 6 September 2010).
Webliograhpy-Chris Gerritsen
If science fiction is a genre that imagines our future, what happens to gender and race?(applied to literary or cinematic science fiction)
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K. McGinnis, ‘Gender Performance, Transgression and the Cyborg in Battlestar Galactica’
McGinnis’ critically engages the science fiction genre and how it represents gender and the cyborg. McGinnis criticises science fiction as a genre which has great potential to transgress and develop new ideas of gender. However she argues that most television or cinematic science fict argument is that female characters in Battlestar Galactica resist this representation, and provide an ‘oppositional performance of gender’. She makes reference to Donna Harraway’s ‘A Cyborg Manifesto’ and to the placement of the cyborg (from AI to those with prosthetics) as ‘the other’ in many works of speculative fiction, and in our everyday society. She goes on to analyse two of the Battlestar Galactica characters, President Laura Roslin and Lieutenant Kara ‘Starbuck’ Thrace, who both transgress patriarchal gender structures. She concludes that works of science fiction like Battlestar Galactica make the genre a site of liberation, where many other works of the genre still fall into using traditional gender binaries. This article provides some excellent source material for answering, the question. It is furthermore very suitable for use as a reference, as it is an academic article (if by an undergraduate) and thus subject to peer review.
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J. Marchesani ,‘Science Fiction and Fantasy’
Marchesani provides criticism of both science fiction and fantasy as a genre. His focus is the constructions of gender and sexuality in the broad ‘speculative fiction’ genre. He also provides a brief genealogy of the genre. His criticism is that frequently science fiction and fantasy use stereotypical characterisations of both gender and of sexuality. His article covers a huge range of different authors including Ursula K. Le Guin and Samuel R. Delaney. Marchesani gives many examples of transgressive constructions of gender and sexuality in science fiction. The constructions he references include depictions of entirely one-gender or one sexuality communities, sexual relationships between clones, anti-patriarchal female characterisation and homosexual relationships between a male human and male android. Marchesani’s article provides and wealth of information on the topic of gender and sexuality in science fiction and would be a useful reference in answering the guiding question.
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Jones’ article covers in some detail the politics of race in the genre of speculative fiction. It is however news article and primarily engages with people, not theory. Jone’s interviews several African-American science fiction authors, who articulate varied and interesting perspectives on the politics of race in science fiction. They discuss the genres potential for new politics of race, and a reconstruction and deconstruction of the idea. Jones’ also articulates their disappointment with traditional science fiction author’s very ‘colonial’ conceptions or race, usually writing narratives of planetary colonisation or where a different species (be they aliens or orcs) take on the other and are vilified. However Jones’ article is non scholarly and offers little in the way of deconstruction or literary and cultural theory which puts limit on its use. It does though, remain a useful reference purely for its engagement with racially typed ‘speculative fiction’ authors, and the politics of race in the genre.
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T. Atkinson, ‘Dealing with Dragons: gender and sexuality in manga’
Atkinson blog post explores the ideas of gender and sexuality that arise from the manga comic genre. The post was inspired from a discussion held between two librarians on the topic of manga. The ideas that are regularly presented in manga, suggests Atkinson, are those of any good young adult fiction, that of self identity, gender and sexuality. Atkinson further suggests that for many of its teen readers manga can become a vehicle through which they can experience varied interpretations of the world around them. The comic genre deals with heterosexuality, bisexuality, one’s place in society and interpretations of gender. Atkinson closes the entry by referring back to the librarians’ discussion, where they left the debate open ended as to whether the genre would help to redefine gender and sexuality amongst young adults, or simply act as escapism. While Atkinson’s post is not a scholarly resource, many of the ideas and issues that arise in it are relevant in some way to the guiding question. The genre of manga arguably sits within the broad spectrum of ‘speculative fiction’ (in many cases science fiction) and the blog post remains interesting and potentially worthy of mention.
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Race In Sci-Fi/Fantasy’, Parabasis,
In this blog post the authors of Parabasis explore the translation of George R.R. Martin’s Song of Fire and Ice into a television series. The authors suggest that many aspects of the book will become hard to portray on public television, due to sexuality explicit and transgressive material, such as a mutually satisfying sexual relationship between a 13 year old girl and a middle aged man. Furthermore the story initially characterises one of its human communities as ‘the other’ and they are slowly humanised over the series. The authors lament the fact that typically the science fiction genre has one dimensional depictions of race, referencing the alien species in Star Trek. They go on to discuss the works of Samuel R. Delaney and Ursula K. Le Guin as exceptions to this general trend of racial representation. The authors highlight that the complicated social dynamics of Song of Fire and Ice could prove uncomfortable to the series’ audience. While this is a blog post, Parabasis has quite some fame amongst journals and newspapers, and is edited by several authors, and posts on a range of cultural subjects. This mitigates in part the fact that it is not a scholarly article. The post does have a couple important things to say about race in science fiction. While the post is not suitable for extensive analysis and formulation of an answer to the guiding question, it is useful to expand on ideas and issues that may come up, and to provide some interesting quotations.
Bibliography:
Race In Sci-Fi/Fantasy’, Parabasis, 2010, retrieved 8th of September 2010, <http://parabasis.typepad.com/blog/2010/06/race-in-scififantasy.html>
Atkinson, T, ‘Dealing with Dragons: gender and sexuality in manga’, TOR.com, 2009, retrieved 8th of September 2010, < http://www.tor.com/blogs/2009/02/ya-and-manga>
Jones,V.E., Race, the final frontier: Black science-fiction writers bring a unique perspective to the genre, www.boston.com, 2007, retrieved 8th of September 2010 <http://www.boston.com/ae/books/articles/2007/07/31/race_the_final_frontier/?page=2>
Marchesani , J, ‘Science Fiction and Fantasy’, www.glbtq.com, 2002,<http://www.glbtq.com/literature/scifi_fantasy.html>
McGinnis, K, ‘Gender Performance, Transgression and the Cyborg in Battlestar Galactica’, Occulus, Vol. 1, No. 1, 2010, retrieved 8th of September 2010, JUROSonline.com <http://www.dsq-sds.org/index.php/juros/article/viewFile/1256/1267>
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