Gender Roles

Topic:  Gender

Source: I decided to use my recent trip home and observe how my family interacts with one another based on their gender. Specifically I am using my interaction with my 4 year old baby cousin and my observations at a family gathering.

Relation: After reading the Robbins text on the ideas of gender, I was able to relate my observations in various ways, such as language, and even the way you dress. The roles of a male and female have been constructed and placed and oppressed those who may not seem to fit into these categories.

Description: I haven’t seen my family in over a few months, so being home was full of great emotions of the things I missed and some of the things I didn’t so much. My family decided to have a welcome home gathering at one of my uncle’s house. While there I began seeing and hearing things such as, “No, that’s for girls” coming from my 4 year old cousin. Afterwards I just began to watch and see how my cousin interacted with his mother and his older brothers.  On one occasion, my cousin began to cry because he wanted something that he couldn’t have. So I decided to go over to him and pick him up and console him, telling him why he couldn’t have that toy he wanted. Then my aunt came up to me and told me that I needed to put him down because he needs to learn how to toughen up. “Toughen Up!?” I repeated to her and she said, “Yeah, he is going to be a man someday and he need to stop crying all the time, like a baby”. The sad thing about it, is that my cousin is a baby, and already is learning that it is not okay to cry as a boy because one day you will be a man.

Commentary/Analysis: When looking into the Robbins text, you learn how the construction of male and female start and end. I talks about how U.S. Gender assignments start from birth, where boys are given gender –appropriate clothing and spoken to in a gender-appropriate way. In the Robins text it states, “Parents and other caregivers then teach male children that it is manly to be tough and endure pain. Male children are discouraged from expressing discomfort and encouraged when they can withstand it”. This is something that my observation made clear to me when I able to watch this scenario with my cousin with a different view. I would have, in the past, agreed and would have told my cousin to not cry and that he is a big boy. My family is continuing to teach these normalized roles that we have created. So what we may see as being normal is quite harmful to the ones we force to put in these roles. We recognize a lot of “isms”, but fail to recognize the ones that we play and enforce.

Sex in College

Topic:  Sex                                                                      

Source:  On April 13^th 2010 I observed an auction held here on campus, in which people offer themselves up for a bid to be taken out on a date.  The auction was held in the green and gold room in the Founders Hall building. Those being auctioned off where students of Humboldt State as well as those who were purchasing them.

Relation:  I decided to talk about the sex in relation to how it is played out in college. College is filled with a lot of lustful sex and sex that is overly casual. In the text we learn about how sex is played out in different parts of the world. In some families sex is considered open and talked about amongst each other and in some cultures and in others sex is considered extremely private.  How sex is seen in the eyes of college students can tell how it is seen in the overall general society.

Description: A yearly auction was held on Friday by a well known community service outreach group named Legacy. Here they have people volunteer to be auctioned off for a bid, where whoever was being bid off had a chance to “strut their stuff” across the stage to promote a higher bid. I decided to sit in the front to see exactly how the bidders and the “bid offs” responded and interacted with each other. It was interesting to see males come off stage to only be shirtless 99 percent of the times. Once out they would begin to rub their body in sexual motions and motion those moves towards a female in the crowd. After they have spotted someone of their “taste” they would then grab them and put them on a chair and began dancing on them only using sexual movements and dance moves, specifically the “humping” moving as if they are participating in sexual intercourse. This usually got the bids to go up and the crowd to cheer. To me, I felt it was uncomfortable and inappropriate, but it was what triggered the crowd and what was seen as appropriate, that not only will you have a date, but you will also have a person willing to show you “his” moves. Another one of the males began to throw condoms out of his pocket and at the girl he was dancing around. This move got the biggest reaction and laughs of the whole night; he also was the male who received the highest bid.  When watching the girls come out, it was those who were presented in a more sexual manner on stage that received high bids. The males would occasionally shout, “Turn around and let’s see what you got!” Seeing if their behind side was a piece of their body they could work with. The ladies would then shake their behinds or shake their breast to attract the audience and receive a cheer. Whatever they did to appear sexually attractive or anything that represented how they could perform would be a crowd raiser.

 Commentary/Analysis: After watching and listening to the crowd and those being auctioned off, I notice the continuous mood in every sale, lust and sex. Sex sells, and we know this because it is portrayed constantly in movies, tv and music. In the example of the male using humping actions in showing how he could show, whoever bids for him, a good time. Showing that sex is okay to do casually and just seen as a fun and enjoyable thing. On the somewhat positive side of showing that sex is guaranteed to be great on the date is the fact there will be protection used. When one of the males through the condoms out, he showed that we will be safe and a good time. This shows that in our society safe sex is commonly practiced and it even promoted, while it doesn’t have to be kept secret like those in the Chinese families. It is usually talked about and promoted.

Campus Crusades for Christ

Topic: Interpretative Drift/Religion

Source: Various Friday Nights at 7p.m. on the HSU Campus in the Center of Activities building, where Campus Crusades for Christ members come together to worship the Lord.

Relation: During our Wednesdays  in class meet and  the readings from the Anthro  text, led me to believe that both Interpretative Drift and Religion work together by first interpretative drift and then the outcome, in this case, Religion. Like in Campus Crusades for Christ, students, religious or not, come to worship God or to find a faith in something greater.

Description: Every Friday students of all kinds, new, frequent attendees, seniors or freshman, come together to do one thing, and that is give praise to the Lord. There are many different denominations that come to worship and be a part of Campus Crusades. On Fridays those who arrive early, help build what would be the stage and the seating area by simply arranging the furniture and setting up the sound and projection screen. We all come together and mingle, talking amongst each other about classes, plans after the event and just asking how things are going. Once everything is set, we all come in the middle where the seating is and stand for the opening prayer. Prayer allows us to open and thank God for allowing us to be present, then we begin worship through song.  We usually go through about 2-3 songs. Once worship is over, we have our worship leader sit amongst us and began to talk about today’s “lesson” or subject. Scriptures are taken from the Bible to guide the lesson and participation from the crowd is always welcomed, whether it is joining the leader in the text through your own Bible or just nodding or saying “Amen!” The participation from the crowd is much needed. Once the lesson is done, we will end in a few more worship songs and closing prayer.

Commentary/Analysis:  Interpretative Drift and Religion work together where interpretative drift causes a ripple effect, that interpretative Drift happens first them creating a person to believe and practice a religion.  The definition of interpretative drift according to the Anthro text is, “The slow, often unacknowledged shift in someone’s manner of interpreting events as he or she become involved with a particular activity”.  Religion is a great outcome of this, someone who begins to read the bible and to practice the scriptures would soon begin to practice a religion. In my description, I talk about how we are encouraged to participate in the lesson, the lesson allows the audience, like me, to engage in the bible and better understand and make those connections from the verses to everyday life. Luhrmann from the Anthro Text explains that we don’t believe then practice but practice then believe.  This shows how participation in the church, allows you to see and be able to make those connections to the real world, thus allowing you to believe in more than just a coincidence. Interpretive drift continues to work when a person is then able to see their belief more as a truth than just series of events and it is more of a natural practice, then a person trying to seek out something greater. Luhrmann continues with explaining that once people except and adapt to a religion, they are then forced to stand up for it because of the contradictions and absurdities people see in it. This is true, and also a common conversation amongst members of campus crusades. We all were just people who did not know or understand the greater being out there, but through whichever way we came to Christ, born into a religious family, visited a church, or sought out by somebody from your community, we all have been through and continue to experience what Tanya Luhramm’s calls Interpretive Drift.  

Humor Has It!

Topic: Humor

Source:  Humor as we know is depicted in different ways throughout the world. I decided to see how humor was used in our everyday life by the use of my personal observation over a period of three days. I left Humboldt County to Seattle, Washington for an interview to a private university.  My trip took me approximately 30 hours to Washington and 30 hours back to Arcata because I decided to take the train and the bus.  Although, the train and bus is an experience I wouldn’t want to do again, it was the perfect place for an observation. As I sat on the train heading to Seattle, I listened and watched the various people I encountered from the trip. Whether I was handing tickets to the conductor or sitting in my seat, everything I could see and hear that relates to my humor topic would become part of my observation work.

Description:   So it all started with me just being noisy and joining in listening to the conversations going on around me. Most of my observations were done on the train to and from Seattle from Sacramento. As I was sitting and getting settled in, I began listening into a conversation of a an older man and a younger women behind, although I don’t have the whole conversation scripted, I can remember many of the points that related to my topic , in my opinion, of humor.  The man began describing his life story, explaining the various drugs he had tried, from eyes drops, to shots, while the women compared her own stories of taking mushrooms.  They laughed as they told these stories, explaining that how they couldn’t remember much of anything while they were on drugs, while engaging in laughs. One would explain their story, pause, then they would both laugh, the pause is what struck me the most as something underlining the conversation.  Once at the school I traveled to visit, a mother made some jokes in regards to her daughter’s admission.  Her jokes were just surrounded around whether her daughter would become admitted into the school or not.  While on train ride back to Sacramento, there was even some “dirty” joking by a younger man and older women.  When it became nights out time on the train, the women had mistakenly taken the comment from the man as a pass at the women. The man said he was somewhat offended by the joke but since they were on the topic, the women should consider it.  The “mistaken” comment soon turned into a joke. There were many laughs throughout the trip, jokes and that were thrown around, and general statements made by various people who came together to make their trips across the states.

Relation/Analysis: In the Robbins text on page 103 it states, “But social scientists, beginning with Sigmund Freud, have long recognized jokes as expressions of anxieties, doubts,   and uncertainties. After reading this I was better able to recognize why it is we joke, in the story of the two joking about drugs the pause was something more than just a sudden silence. Sigmund Frued would most likely put the pause in the categories of the anxieties, doubts and uncertainties. The joke containing the mother and the daughter’s admission would stream along the lines of uncertainties. The mother was uncertain if her daughter was going to get accepted so she used a joke to make that situation more comfortable.  In the last joke, of sense of humor that was used I would find it hard to categorize it within the anxieties, doubts and uncertainties.  The Robbins text continues with saying, “The switch in interpretation may also overcome some anxiety of fear”, I believe this would better fit the situation for the mistaken comment. I would say this because when you look at the situation the miscommunication became a fear, because the communication created an awkward environment the humor allowed that feeling of awkwardness to be surpassed by the humor.

Avatar: The Last air Bender in America

Topic: Globalization/Localization (Because we know they work together!)

Source:  My observation was conducted and continues to be every time I turn on one of my favorite Nickelodeon shows, Avatar: The Last Air Bender. On February 20^th 2012, I decided to take a deeper look into my favorite show the Avatar, the episodes are about 20 minutes long and I had watched about an hour’s worth that night, about  three chapters of the series.

Relation:  The Avatar is set in an Asian influenced world, where Chinese mythology is altered for the enjoyment of American entertainment, specifically the audience of children.  In our Wednesday lecture when we covered the ideas of Globalization, Anthropologist Arjun Appadurai proposed the idea that globalization is the flow or exchange of cultural forms across landscapes. Appadurai said that this is done through various carries, such as technology, finances, media, ideologies, and religion. In this case, the certain carrier is the media.

Description: Avatar: The Last Airbender is an American animated television series that aired for three seasons on Nickelodeon from 2005 to 2008. The series was created and produced by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko. Avatar is set in an Asian-influenced world where some of the characters are able to manipulate the classical elements by use of psychokinetic variants of Chinese martial arts known as "bending." The show combined the styles of Chinese anime and American cartoons, and relied heavily upon various images from East-Asian, Inuit, and South-American societies. During week six we focused on globalization and localization and I wanted to use that knowledge while watching one of my favorite T.V Shows.  As I watched the Avatar and its character I wanted to first see how they were portrayed with an American lens. In the episode from book two, I watched the behaviors of the characters where honesty and loyalty was above all the most important quality in a character. When reading into the history of Chinese mythology, being honest and loyal are also important. So while the characters attitudes are still consistent, how the media localized this show is very apparent. This is mainly shown through the language used by the characters.  The characters often use words like, “stupid”, “dumb” and for the funny moments, “check it!”  These words and expressions not well known, if at all, to the old Chinese mythology.  While in the past times of the Chinese mythology, women carried no rights to “bending”, the female characters were allowed to practice bending. In one of the episodes Kutara, a water bender, arrived to a town where women were not allowed to use water bending unless it was for the use of medicine and healing.  Kutara challenged this law and in the end was able to practice her bending for fighting showing how in American Television women were allowed to challenge ideas and fight, which we know from American history that that was not always the case.

Commentary/Analysis: During week six we focused on Globalization and Localization, and a lot of the readings talked about this topic as well, like Hip-Hop in Japan.  I enjoyed the topic and wanted to view Avatar in that way. The more and more and watched episode after episode, I noticed that they all kept the mythology ideas, the spirit world, and bending but it was just how the characters portrayed the Chinese ideas. That is what Localization is, where we have Globalization happening carried over through the media. The media takes the general culture, pictures, clothing, and traits, generally the ideas that made up the Chinese Mythology. These ideas are then transcended into more Americanized ideas, what we make different to fit the views of the American audience. I don’t know if I would have enjoyed Avatar as much if it wasn’t transitioned over into a more American version. Localization allows countries to use other ideas from around the globe and to make it into something the people of that country or time can enjoy.

Whats in your Closet?

Topic: Material Culture

Source: Observations conducted in Arcata, California in various locations within the city. I started by taking a look into my closet as well as one of my friend’s closet, while also looking in women’s magazines. I also analyzed one of my recent trips to the Bayshore Mall in Eureka, California.  I recalled the information from this trip to allow me recognizes how Americans view on clothing and we are built around having so many material items in our possession

Relation: Observing the clothing in itself, and how it is portrayed and sold to us consumers. In the Robbins text on page 18 and 19 is an article, “Anthropology at the Mall”, where behavior is observed by the shoppers. How the stores present a product and increase or decrease it selling rate. The various stores, Victoria Secret, Rue 21, Wet Seal, and even my Women’s Health magazine all have similar styles in which they portray their clothing. Understanding why we buy the clothing we do, can better help us understand why it is we rely so many material things, in this case, clothing.

Description: When I began rummaging through my closet, the first thing I noticed was color, and this stands true to my friend’s closet. I remember walking into Wet Seal and seeing this vast categorized color section. In one corner they have clothing surrounded around the color blue, another pink, and for the consumers awed by animal print, a cheetah print section. The store was greatly brightened with white backgrounds, allowing the clothing to paint the walls with its color. To my surprise this does not stand true with both Victoria Secret and Rue 21. These two stores have bright energetic colors on the walls and also both carry a clear separation between which sides the consumer would belong on. In Rue 21, there is a clear separation from the male and female side. The male side of the store is painted deep blue whereas the girl’s side is painted with more lively colors. Victoria Secret separates their consumers experience by not your gender but your age, which even allow their consumers separate entrances. On the left side is for women who are past their teen years and this is shown with the deeper red, pink and deep black shelving, showing a more mature presentation. Where on the other hand, bright pink, yellows and white shelving is directed towards a more younger crowd.  Once I was able to recall this shopping experience I began noticing a pattern from the clothing that hanged in my closet to the clothing on all the racks at the stores. The quantity of the clothing, within my closet I had many of the same style shirts but just in various colors, such as a simple V-neck, I had one in white, black and red. While rustling through my friend’s closet she had much of the same idea of clothing, same style different colors. My friend and I’s closet of recently bought clothing had the current “in” style, which was either semi see through shirts or half cut off shits . The clothing that we purchased allowed us to showcase our wealth because we were wearing clothes of the right fashion at the right time. We are able to present that our shirts and pants showcase our wealth. Those two categories of shirts were presented in various parts of the magazine, indicating that these styles are what’s “in” at the moment and the shopping centers such as the ones at the Bayshore mall help reinforce that style.

Commentary/Analysis: The way in which all of these stores and magazines all directed its sells in a directions and attitude that clothing is plentiful. We buy more than we need because of its targeted sale to its consumers. By having the clothing illuminated by the lighting at Wet Seal, draws in its buyers, like me, to make a purchase. One of the biggest thing all companies have done, from clothing to IPods, is come out with something better, to have that product continually sell. Like in my case, a specific skirt is made only in one style until they come out with a new line that may have added a zipper for example replacing the button, simple consumer steady buying ritual. Are wealth is many times promoted through our clothing, if we are dressed nice, and age and sex appropriate we are looked at differently by others in our society. So my friend and I have clothing in our closet that may not even represent who we are, but how we unconsciously believe we should represent ourselves. With the idea of material wealth, clothing does not seem to be in short supply of either the stores or the closet.  The magazines allow those bargain shoppers to still have a closet of shopaholic, and stores with their displays allow it to become more than accessible. By simply dissecting the bits and pieces of how clothing is portrayed and how it is illuminated by magazines and venders, you’re able to recognize how our wealth as a society is primarily based on our material things we posses.  

Looking at Cereal, as a cultural Text!?

Topic:

Food

Source:

 I decided to go to all the cafeterias and markets located here on HSU's Campus. I even decided to take a look in my own cupboard! Being able to relate to the topic I was able to look at my personal experiences within my own family and conversation with others.

Relation: 

Many would ask, "How could looking at Cereal be a cultural text?” Well, by doing more than just looking at the cereal, if you take the time to notice the packaging the expressions on the circle and even when and how it is consumed. A Cultural Text is simply stated by Robbins on pg 20 as, “a way of thinking about a cultural as a text of significant symbols-words, gestures, drawings, natural objects- that carries meaning. So why can’t we take a food, like cereal, that appears to be a necessity in most  American homes and look at it in a way that would provide us with more information of our own cultural. Let’s start by just examining cereal on a whole. The texture of cereals can be smooth or rigid, but they all have the same hard consistency. Looking at Americans diet on a whole, you can see that we consume a lot of fried food. The crunch of the cereal can relate the crunchiness found in fried foods. Fried foods are usually associated with fast foods restaurants, why do people go to fast foods? It is convenient and on the go just like cereal. Cereal comes in many, many varieties, ranging from kid friendly cereal, like Fruit Loops and Cocoa Puffs to adult cereals like Kashi, and Special K. Cereal has been made to fit everyone’s needs, like healthy cereals, rich in whole grains and nutrients and gluten and sugar free cereals to help those with certain food restrictions. Looking more into cereal we know that they are all processed.  Processed foods in America equal less time. Parents feed their children cereal in the morning if there is no time to prepare a fresh breakfast. I remember when my mother didn’t have time to prepare food, my siblings and I resulted in, and you guessed it, cereal. Now cereal has more than one role of just being a breakfast alternative, it has become a snack, desert, and even dinner. As I was sitting in the cafeteria around 6:30 pm, one of my friends sat next to me with a bowl of cereal in his hands. “Cereal for dinner, huh?” I asked him. “Yep, I need to eat then run.” The use for cereal at dinner is the quick alternative to what was available at the cafeteria at that time. This can tell us that Americans are based on time efficiency and are always busy, busy people and we base our diet on what’s convenient. While eating cereal for dinner is one thing, what about cereal as a snack and desert. Cereal as I have seen has been placed in bags and used as a dry snack, without milk, when I asked why; I received the same answer, “Didn’t have time this morning!” As for cereal as a desert, well that’s easy, many times cereal boxes have various different ways you can use cereal than just with milk at breakfast time. Cereal is more than a just a box filled with grains, it is a cultural text, how we eat and prepare it can show a lot about yourself and your culture, even society as a whole.

Description:

Over the last two weeks we have been introduced to anthropology and different sub areas within anthropology. What stood out the most was the topic of Cultural Text. Observing life as a cultural text is such a great way to be able to literally read into someone else’s culture.

Commentary/Analysis:

It is safe to say cereal is a cultural text; a box of cereal contains all the descriptions of what a cultural text entitles, symbols, drawings, words, and obviously food. The way they package the food in a box, with vibrant colors drawing the customers in, not like the cereal aisle is every skipped, but they cereal also uses words like delightful, crunchy, crispy, tasty goodness, famous slogans like, “A mouth full of joy!” All of which are things that help explain our cereal consuming society. Others can take these cultural text pieces and put together ideas in a way that would explain why cereal is so important in a typical American diet.