trascendent figurations

I think one thing that is important to discuss is the relation between the caption and artist statement and the image, and how that in turn relates to Jay Prosser's idea of the "real". , Jay Prosser he describes his piece "My Second Skin" as a palinode, a term that means a revisiting. Prosser revisits ideas and arguments about gender and [autobiographical] and the myth of photographic truth. The concept of palinode drives the whole of the piece and will connect us later with other concepts he develops. Prosser believes that in his previous work he had fallen pray to the false notion of the photographic truth and that somehow there is something inherently true and real beyond an actual photograph, beyond what it represents. How exactly is it that he fell pray to this in his own work? Previously he had developed several terms that explained our relation as viewers to the photographs we look at - in particular making references to his own self portraits. He also uses two terms to discuss the nature of photography and relate to its relevance in autobiographical trans photography. First, he talks about the studium which represents how what we are expected to look at/for in an image; the expected reading of the signifiers presented to us in that image. This studium, this reading, does not affect, change or challenge the status quo then, because it is expected. So how does the studium affect or relate to interpretations of autobiographical photos of a trans person? Originally, Prosser had argued - acceptably so - that because of the "myth of photographic truth" we looked for a "tell" in photos of trans folk, something that would give away their "transness". In his palinode, Prosser comes to realize that this very search of the truth beyond the photo, this marker of transness beyond the image given was in fact the studium; it was the expectation, the way society has trained us to read trans [people and images]. This of course, could mean that we are looking for a fake signifier, we are looking for something that does not exist. But what happens when somebody thinks they have found it? What if the image is telling us in a caption that it does exist? Prosser further develops his ideas by arguing that in looking for this mark he created himself. In other words, in searching for this real beyond the image we become so obsessed with "seeing" the real that we ourselves create the signifiers that identify it in the image.

This is were I think that captions come in play and in many ways condition the audience/viewer to reading and understanding cultural productions and photographs in a certain way. Artist statements work in similar ways, and also become very important for the artistic and political work of artists like De la Grace Volcano, Loren Cameron and Jana Marcus. Statements can help contextualize art, but do not have the same effect a a caption has. The work of Jana Marucs, for example, comes to mind. Where she has an art statement that explain the context and concept of the work so that we are aware of her intentions. How we understand the images and stories is for us to do, but she does have considerations she would like us to keep in mind. She created a series containing portraits of trans folk accompanied by their own personal statements about their own identity, the meaning of gender and performance. The images that she presents don't have captions but instead have individual statements. These pieces of writing work in similar ways as the artist statement, some are longer and more detailed than others, some are more theoretical, some are more day to day experiences. In general, none of the statements aim or point out "markers" that can help the viewer find where in their faces it says they are trans. I think that for this kind of work, words and statements are necessary if what the aim of the piece is to convey personal stories that can bring us closer to the marginalized group the art portrays. The focus is on the personal stories as seen through their own eyes, and their own understandings of identity and gender and what it really means/feels to be who they are. 

http://www.janamarcus.com/docus/TransPresentation/sld029.htm 

 

Looking for the Tell

The photographs which I chose to “read” are by Del La Grace Volcano. When I saw the photographs, I admit that my first thoughts were not the average ones—I had seen them before. I realized after several minutes that “Jax Back, London, 1991” and “Jax Revealed, London, 1991” were the front and back covers respectively of Masculinidad Feminina (the Javier Sáez translation of Judith Halberstam’s Feminine Masculinity). After putting this from my mind, I looked at the pair of photos again—always scanning “Jax Back” first, followed by “Jax Revealed” since it is in that order that the photographs are presented to the viewer.

“Jax Back” suggests to the reader that one is looking upon the body of a man—not only because of the muscularity of the body shown to us, but by the military-camouflage pants and shaved head which would generally imply maleness to the general public. The photograph is in black and white creating a sharp contrast between Jax white body and the pure black of the backdrop. The sharpness created in this fashion brings and even harsher (read: masculine) feel to the photograph in general.

In Gayle Salamon’s “Transfeminism and the Future of Gender” she discusses a New York Times article by Paul Vitello which employed the use of photographs of a transman named Shane Caya. Salamon discusses how in the first shot of Caya he is shown with “his ex-partner Natasha, and their three-year-old child. All three are smiling as Shane lifts the young child into the air.” (Salamon 128) Del La Grace Volcano’s photograph “Jax Back” reminded me a lot of this photograph. They both seem to just be set ups for the viewer. They seem to say “Look at this normal picture. Nothing here is awry or strange or queer or different. Just a happy family (Just an army man’s muscular back).”

“Jax Revealed” is meant to shock the viewer. This masculine body in camouflage pants has turned around and is in the process of taking off a shirt—but now we can see small breasts on the masculine figure. The photograph is also in black and white which still accentuates every white muscle against the black backdrop, but this time also emphasizes the outline of the subject’s breasts.

Salomon describes Caya in the second photograph (Shane Caya shirtless) used by the New York Times by pointing out “He sports a head of short, salt-and-pepper hair, an upper arm covered with tattoos, and a muscular, well-sculpted male chest.” She goes on to say “The caption of the photo reads: Shane Caya displays his mastectomy scars.” (Salomon 129) “Jax Revealed” reminded me a lot of the photograph which Salomon describes here—both asking the viewer to “read [the] body for evidence…the ‘tell’ that would give the lie to that maleness.” I do not know what gender Jax identifies as, however, regardless of whether she is a rather muscular (masculine?) woman or he is a transman, Del La Grace Volcano asks us through the title “Jax Revealed” to not only view the photograph of Jax as a person taking off clothing, but also as a masculine body revealing female parts.

This brings me back to Masculinidad Feminina. The viewer is clearly meant to approach the book and see first a man’s back. Then when one read’s the title they are to be confused and start looking for the tell. They turn to the back cover and the tell is revealed to them in the revealing of Jax’s female parts. I have to wonder how ethical it is to scrutinize every inch of the body upon which we gaze—even in critiquing I find myself feeling somehow uncomfortable with the concept of looking for “tells” even if I am asked to do so by the artist themselves.

Works Cited:

Salamon, Gayle. "Transfeminism and the Future of Gender." Women's Studies on the Edge. Ed. Joan Wallach Scott. Durham: Duke University Press, 2008. 115-36

http://www.dellagracevolcano.com/classics.html#5 10/29/10

http://www.dellagracevolcano.com/classics.html#610/29/10

Manipulation, Masculinity, and the Photograph

The photograph is pinnacle to the transgender community. Where in “real life,” people can look them over and search for the tell from different angles and in different views, a photograph is almost a blanket statement. The transgender subject can pose for a photograph; they control the lighting and position. They make you see what they want you to see. To the transgender subject, gender is not only the “cultural achievement” that Gayle Salamon notes (Salamon, 122), but it is a personal struggle. In the photograph, the transgender person does not have to be trans.

I was thinking about this idea while looking at Jana Marcus’s photograph “Aiden at 25.”

http://www.janamarcus.com/docus/TransPresentation/sld037.htm

Examining the shot, all I see is a man. He does not look twenty-five, but plenty of men do not look their ages. Aiden looks soft, but confident. He tattooed, but also well groomed. It is not until considering that “the punctum in the transsexual image is literally traumatic: the wounds of transsexuality, the scars from surgery or the physical traces that sustain this body as differently sexed,” (Prosser, 172) that I even examined the existence of Aiden’s scars. In reality, they are obvious. What caught my eye and held it, though, is the position of his hand.

Aiden’s hand is slid slightly down the front of his pants, which are sagging a bit and held up by a belt. As my punctum, the “wound [that] breaks through the studium that is strictly exterior to the structure of the photograph,” (Prosser, 169) Aiden’s hand exerts his masculinity. It showcases the hair growing on his stomach, and begs the viewer to think about what is in those pants. It does not, though, assume that what is there is out of the ordinary. I might even go as far as to say that the viewer, without knowing that Aiden is an FTM transsexual, would not be given that hint from this photograph.

There is a possible problem, though, with my reading of this photograph. I am genderqueer, and I am heavily involved in the trans community. I have to wonder if I am doing a pseudo-autobiographical reading of this photograph. I question myself as to whether I do not concentrate on Aiden’s scars, and instead pay attention to what does make him a man, because “‘autobiographical reading’…applies not only to writing about one’s life but to reading about it; reading for it; reading, perhaps in order to write about it” (Prosser, 168). For various reasons, the FTM transsexual is a topic close to my heart, and I feel like there is a possibility that I do not see Aiden’s scars because I do not want to. Aiden wants to be a man; he wants, not only to pass as a man, but to actually BE a man. I want that for him. Why shouldn’t he have it, if gender is a social thing anyway? Why should the scars on his chest have anything to do with it?

Like the photograph of Shane and his family in the New York Times, Aiden’s display is a general pose that is not telling of his gender, lack of gender, or transgendered position. I think that the photograph is beautiful; it is classic, almost like the kind of shot you’d see in a yearbook. I cannot look at this photograph and see “a violence done to femininity in order to achieve that masculinity” (Salamon, 131). Part of the reason that I don’t, I’m sure, is because the caption with the photograph does not tell me to, unlike the New York Times caption of “Shane Caya displays his mastectomy scars” (Salamon, 131).

We see violence in transitioning because we are told to. I feel that this is one of the innate violences of photography as a medium. A photograph is manipulated, in order to manipulate. What do I know of the truth of transition surgery? I know nothing, except what I am told. I know nothing, except that it leaves battle scars and solemn faces. I know nothing except that, to Aiden surgery helped him be “finally free to be myself—without question, without challenge” (janamarcus.com). To me…that’s good enough.

Works Cited:

Prosser, Jay. "My Second Skin." Light in the Dark Room: Photography and Loss. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2005. 163-81.

Salamon, Gayle. "Transfeminism and the Future of Gender." Women's Studies on the Edge. Ed. Joan Wallach Scott. Durham: Duke University Press, 2008. 115-36.

http://www.janamarcus.com/docus/TransPresentation/sld037.htm

Double Take

In Jay Prosser’s second book Light in a Dark Room: Photography and Loss, Prosser examines photography and revisits assertions he made about it in his first book. Prosser originally fell for the myth of the photographic truth – which asserts that what a viewer sees in a photo is real and unframed or untouched – in his first book. In his second work, Prosser realizes he did this and looks to critically analyze why and how he did this. Prosser looks to another scholar to figure out why he did this… and that scholar is Roland Barthes.

Prosser cites Barthes’ argument that a viewer is lead to read a photograph a certain way. This is called the studium. It is the obvious way we are supposed to look at a photograph. This can be determined by social conventions (what kind of photograph it is), the subject (who or what is depicted), the photographer (what s/he chooses to show), etc. Barthes and Prosser, however, are more interested in the punctum. The punctum, according to Barthes, is that which “pierces the viewer.” It is something in the photograph that catches your eye and might disrupt your initial reading of it. It gives you a connection to the image that is more personal than the studium.

Now to fully explore Prosser and Barthes’ ideas, let’s take a look at a few photos from artist Del La Grace Volcano’s portfolio entitled Classics. The first image I would like to take a look at is entitled “Jax Back.”

Looking at this image without any context information about the subject of the photo itself or the photographer that took it, one comes up with a certain perception. We see a body. More specifically, we see a muscular back of a body. The body has a short haircut and is wearing fairly baggy camouflage pants. There is no shirt. Looking at the photo, one assumes that the subject is male. (In fact, I asked numerous residents of mine – I’m an RA by the way – and every single one described the figure as a ‘he’ or as male.) The studium is that this is a male posing for a photo with his shirt off.

However, when we look at the next image in the series our perception of the first photo changes. The next photo is entitled “Jax Revealed.”

We see the same body in this photograph. We know this to be true because the body is wearing the same camouflage pants and instead of holding a short like in the last image, the body is taking it off. We also see that the body in the second image is the same size as the one in the first. Furthermore, the titles of the two link the images very strongly. Conclusion: it is the same body but seen at a different angle in a different pose. There is something, however, that goes against our first impression of the body. The body has boobs.

This image makes us go back and take another look at the first. Instead of focusing on the muscular back and broad shoulders, we now notice that the body has hips. And now, at least I do, instead of focusing on the muscles and the short haircut I’m noticing those hips. And I’m noticing the huge watch on the small wrist. The second photo served as a type of punctum for the first. And the second photo led me to notice other punctums in the first image (the watch, the wrist, the curve of the hip). “Jax Revealed” did in fact reveal Jax. It revealed that Jax is different than what was first assumed.

(Links courtesy of http://www.dellagracevolcano.com/index.html)

My perception is not your reality

I think that when I look at a photograph at first glance I absolutely have a bias approach. What I mean by bias is that I know the context of a photo normally before I get a chance to see it. When I am looking through a family photo album I am in search of revisiting a holiday or celebration that was documented. I want to remember all of the events about the night that allow me to revisit an emotion. When I look at photos other places like in a newspaper or magazine, they are normally paired with a caption that tells you what to focus on in the photograph. Although I felt like I was personally viewing these photos and focusing on what drives me emotionally I realized that that is not the case.

An interesting concept we reviewed in class was “how we look produces what we will see.” This phrase refers to the stadium, or the dominant way of seeing based on societal influence. The stadium would be the way a photo is staged or presented that influences how we interpret the meaning. There is another way of viewing photos which is the punctum approach where there is something insignificantly significant that “wounds the viewer” making it difficult to look at the standard stadium approach. When we viewed the Christmas card from class we were automatically inclined to think that this was a happy family enjoying a nice Christmas holiday together. As we allowed ourselves to “think outside of the box” there were other things in the photo that were important and could have told a completely different story.

So when it comes to Loren Cameron and other photos that are included in critical readings of photography that addresses the relation between trans/gender embodiments and the medium of photography I thought it was interesting that that Jay Prosser wrote a piece focusing on a palinode. He revisited the his previous critiques of certain photographs and made some adjustments and changed some of his arguments for some. I have no experience in critiquing photos, especially not in a trans/gender context, but I did notice some things in Loren Cameron’s photo that distracted me from focusing on other things in the photo.

citation

http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/episode/sexual-identity-2963/Photos#tab-Photos/0

http://www.radicalroles.blogspot.com/

The first photo that I looked at was the photo with Cameron injecting himself with a needle. Without knowing any background information on Cameron I would’ve taken him as a hetero- normative steroid injecting body builder. Cameron has a ripped body, and his body is presented in a way that body builders have used in a competition to display all of their muscles. Also I notice that Cameron has many tattoos which are also typical of someone that is into body building. In this photo Cameron’s genitalia is hidden so there is no way to tell if he has a penis or not. As far as this photo is staged I really do not see anything that could serve as a punctum. Unless there was a caption I again would not feel like this was a transgendered photo. However with that “frame” the photos changes its meaning a little bit. I would say that he may be trying to hide his genitalia instead of being proud and displaying his biological difference. Also I would say the picture is in black and white so that his mastectomy scars were less visible. I would also assume that the injection is testosterone or another male hormone. It is very interesting how knowledge can influence you about something that you are seeing with your own eyes.

This photo is different from the first because it shows Cameron with clothes on. He is standing in front of a motorcycle with his shirt off and has tattoos. I again would just think of him as a hetero-normative biker guy who is simply hanging out looking for a good time. Without any labels I wouldn’t look for an atom’s apple or a bulge in his pants. The focus of the photo may even be the motorcycle, without knowing that this photo was suppose to show a trans person.

Transbodied Photography: A Melancholic Turn In On Our Own Skin

In Jay Prosser’s chapter titled, “My Second Skin,” the author performs a palinode in order to respond to his own “errors,” that he argued in his previous book. A palinode is a method, or a “return that realizes that realization could only come with loss from the original,” and thus he argues that he recognizes something he did not the first time around (Prosser, 163). In this instance he critiques a perception he had on transbodied photography. He admits his faults in saying, “I read the linguistic-like codes in the photographs, the studium and never the punctum, responding to where the photographer, or the textual context, would have me look in my haste to close out anything accidental, anything that might stop my narrative. This is especially obvious when my reading was determined wholly by the captions of photographs, as it most often was” (Prosser, 167). The studium he speaks of is in reference to a term coined by Barthes, and can be explained as, “the study of that which is most obvious about a photograph. These features constitute the ‘connotation procedures’ through which the photograph connotes its message” (Prosser, 167). The studium is “the tell.” This “tell” in photography (especially about transbodies) could be troublesome, because in only seeing the obvious message in the studium, we can miss the punctum, or the “accidental” interruption of how we’re supposed to see the image. Thus we can overlook perhaps another message embedded in the photograph, which is why Prosser did a palinode to revise what he missed.

In arguing to look beyond the normative message presented in transbodied photography (“the tell” that indicates the body is “trans”) let us critically analyze a transbodied photograph in the collection titled “AIRPORTFORMANCE,” by artist Del Lagrace Volcano. At first, reading the studium of this piece may show three bodies seemingly religiously dressed, posing in an airport. In further reading of the studium, we can notice the caption, “Heathrow Heathens, Hethrow Airport, London. 2004.” In fleshing out this caption, one could be determined to see “heathens”— “irreligious, uncultured, or uncivilized person[s]” inhabiting the space of the Heathrow, London Airport in 2004. (“heathen”) This caption indicates that although the bodies are religiously dressed, “the tell” in seeing the bodies as “trans” could be categorizing these bodies as “heathens”— they are literally faking their appearance by dressing as religious. Another “tell” could be in the title of the collection of the photography, “AIRPORTFORMANCE.” This indicates a performance is taking place, which could relate to how transbodies perform a sex, which they are not. Our analysis should not end here, because as Prosser argues, we should then look for the punctum, or that which disrupts the narrative of the photograph.

Looking beyond “the tell” of this photograph, we can notice other bodies inhabiting the frame. Behind the transbodies, we see four bodies dressed in gender-specific uniforms that are all holding signs. The body which is second to the right, who is wearing long pants and masculine boots, is holding a sign that reads, “Mr. Kip.” Mr. which in 1447, was an abbreviation of master, represents a surname of respect, power, and possession. (“mr.”) This surname is a normative title given to men. Looking on, the body on the far right wearing a skirt, stockings, and pointed feminine shoes, is hold a sign that reads, “Miss A. Bed.” The title “Miss” is often given to an unmarried woman or (school)girl. After getting married, a woman normally takes upon the surname “Mrs.” followed by her husband’s name. This is a title of respect for a married woman, and more interestingly a title of property for her husband. (“miss.”) It’s striking to see that these bodies are also performing heternormative messages, as they are dressed a certain way, and literally carry signs that denote messages of gendered power. Because this “norm” message is placed behind “the telling” transgendered message in the photograph, we can analyze the layers of power going on as a loss that transgendered bodies may feel in a society that violently advertises a binary set of gender presentation. Prosser writes about this “melancholic loss” as, “Refusing to accept the loss of something we never had—a real sex; and this refusal brings transsexuality closer to melancholia than mourning—we turn in our own skin.” (Prosser, 171) The transbodies in this “Airportformance” are representing a message that will always coexist with the dominant norm, because in essence, transgenderism reflects inwardly a perspective of a norm that is being resisted, accepted, challenged, etc. The punctum for me in this photo is the visual advertisement of something that haunts transgendered people everyday. In the background, lower level, of their conscious lies a troubling referent.

Work Cited:

Prosser, Jay. “My Second Skin.” Light in the Dark Room: Photography and
Loss. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2005. 163-81.

Del Lagrace Volcano. “Heathrow Heathens, Heathrow Airport, London. 2004”

http://www.dellagracevolcano.com/airport.html#10

"mr.." Dictionary.com Unabridged. Random House, Inc. 29 Oct. 2010. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/mr.>.

"miss." Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition. HarperCollins Publishers. 29 Oct. 2010. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/miss>.

"heathen." Dictionary.com Unabridged. Random House, Inc. 29 Oct. 2010. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/heathen>.

Can a Picture be Worth Less than a Thousand Words?

In our society, we are socialized to look at bodies a certain way. There are norms for viewing female bodies, male bodies, elderly bodies, children’s bodies, etc. In these bodies, we know what we are supposed to be looking at and how we are supposed to be looking at them. However, as Jay Prosser writes in his chapter “My Second Skin”, the norms for viewing transbodies are very different. Prosser uses Roland Barthes’s idea of the studium, or the dominant way of seeing. For transbodies, the studium is “the tell”, or the part of the body that shows that the object has been altered in some way. This concept is most easily found in photography. When we view a picture of a transbody, we search for a sign such a scar or a particular body part that will help us “figure out” the body.

One common convention that advises how we should look at a photograph is the caption. Jana Marcus’s project of photographs of transgendered bodies titled “Transfigurations” includes slides of images of transgendered people, each with a large caption and personal statement from the person. The pictures alone are beautiful, but the addition of words adds a whole new depth to each photograph and person. While the words are there to “illuminate who transgendered people are”, I think they also tell us how to view each photograph. The photo I am most interested in is of Jack, age 26: Jack is a female to male transgendered person whose photo caption reads “I am the best of both worlds”. He goes on to explain that he still has the female intuition and qualities with the persona of a man such as his father. When I initially looked at the picture, I saw a tough looking man with thick eyebrows and facial hair who looked anything but nurturing and compassionate (as he describes himself). After reading the caption and text, the figure in the image took on a whole new persona. I could see gentleness in his eyes that resembled the qualities he described in the caption. I believe that in this case, the punctum, or thing in the photograph that interrupts the dominant way of seeing, is the caption. The studium in this case is to view the man with thick facial hair and dark eyes as tough. However, the caption tells us a different story and gives away the true character and persona of the person.

Another interesting thing about this particular man is his body position and clothing in the photograph. Many of the other people in both this project as well as Prosser’s “Second Skins” are shown without clothing so that the tell is something we can see on their body. Surgical scars from mastectomies or a lack of a penis clearly tell the reader something about that body without using words. In this image, without the caption, we wouldn’t know that he is a transbody. Jack is wearing a business suit and tie, and we can only see the top of his shoulders and his head. This says two things. The first is that we often rely on seeing the whole body (and a naked one at that) to understand a person. It also emphasizes the “intelligent” and “well respected” qualities of his father that he desires to possess. For Jack, the transformation from woman to man gave him the opportunity to be like his hero, his father. Jack, rather than using a photograph to tell the story of a transgendered person, he is showing what the transformation has allowed him to become.

http://www.janamarcus.com/docus/TransPresentation/sld006.htm

Prosser, Jay. “My Second Skin.” Light in the Dark Room: Photography and
Loss. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2005. 163-81.

Blog Prompt 8: Trans Photography, Palinodes, & Medium Specificity

By 9 pm on Friday October 29, please post a 600-word response to the following prompt:

Gayle Salamon's chapter "Transfeminism and the Future of Gender" and Jay Prosser's chapter "My Second Skin" both offer critical readings of photography that addresses the relation between trans/gender embodiments and the medium of photography. Drawing on one or both of these texts, choose one or more photographs from the following artists and provide your own reading of it:

Del La Grace Volcano
Loren Cameron
Jana Marcus

Link to or embed the photograph/s that you are analyzing, and be sure to think about how the medium specificity of photography is at work in the image that you chose.

What Not To Wear? ...more like 'What I'm Not Allowed To Wear"

Earlier this year, I attended my cousin’s wedding. In the weeks and days (I happen to be a pretty bad procrastinator) before I had one huge question on my mind: What the hell was I going to wear? Now, I’m going to be honest. I’m not a very feminine lady, but I’m not a very masculine one either. I haven’t worn a dress or skirt in 4-5 years and I feel like I’d be able to live without ever wearing one again. I joked around about getting a suit to match my brothers, but I feel like the family wouldn’t have appreciated this (My cousin told me that if I wanted, I could be in the wedding… but only if I would wear a dress. I feel like if my same-ish aged cousin was into the gender presentation binary, the rest of the folks attending would be too). So when I came across this Threadbared post I could completely relate.

In the post, Mimi Nguyen engages with some quotes from Krista Benson about “the oldest queer girl story in the book.” This particular story happens to be about gender presentation. The text talks about how there is so much focus on “all variations upon femininity and femme-ness” in the fashion world and how its quite difficult to find clothing for the un-stereotypically woman. Blogs, magazines, tv shows, etc all focus on the feminine side of things. Rarely, if ever, is a reader or viewer able to come across a female model or person who puts out a less feminine, but not too butch appearance. It’s even harder to find good clothing in stores that accomplish that as well.

It seems to me that no matter how hard people try, popular culture (and the vast majority of the contemporary population) is going to promote these binary gendered presentations. For an example of this, let’s take a look at a clip from the tv show What Not To Wear.

We can see right away from the title of the video (“Tough Chick Tone Down”) that the person receiving instructions is going to way be too masculine for Stacy and Clinton’s liking. Within the first 15 seconds, Clinton describes Christine – the tough chick – as having a “tragic tomboy style.” Furthermore, when they try to get her to wear a dress she says it is not her style. Stacy negates that statement with a “you don’t really know who you are” remark and then talks about how “looks can help improve your life” (around the 1:20 mark). Well Stacy, looks can improve someone’s life. But unfortunately, those looks have to fit into what society as a whole deems appropriate.

Towards the end of the video, the gruesome two-some gets Christine into a dress and she says something along the lines of “I feel more like a woman.” But she feels like a woman by whose standards? Stacy and Clinton’s? Was she not a woman when she was wearing pants and button downs instead of dresses? Does she actually feel more like a woman? Or does she feel more like what she thinks a woman should be?

I used to love watching What Not To Wear and other tv shows like it. But ever since I started taking Women and Gender studies courses I can’t stand to watch them. No matter what woman comes on the show, they tend to get forced into this narrow style box that excludes anything that isn’t easily identifiable as feminine. As a female who doesn’t wear dresses and doesn’t fit into that box, it drives me crazy.

(Threadbared link courtesy of http://iheartthreadbared.wordpress.com)

(What Not To Wear video courtesy of tlc.discovery.com)

fake can make you feel REALly good...appearently

Because the post that I chose to bring in and discuss during class was not a post from Threadbared, but was actually a link to another site I would like to focus on the site counterfeitchic.com.

Firstly, My post came from a series of blog entries from the site counterfeit chic written and compiled by Susan Scafidi. I was interested to hear what others had to say from a fashion standpoint when it comes to designers being copied and recreated for a cheaper price. I learned about the IDPPA, which stands for the Innovative Design Protection Piracy Act. The act is an amendment to chapter 13 of the copyright act offering a 3 year term of protection for new and unique designs. The rest of the blog talked about specific instances were designers products were replicated like the Louis Vuitton LV monogram and specific bridal gowns remade at a more affordable price for the normal consumer. For consumers this is awesome because they can look like a million dollars without really needing the money to do so. I relate this back to our visual culture class because image is everything, especially in the United States. When I think back to all of the images I’ve seen in this class, the persons clothing or uniform played an important role in how they were/are perceived. For example, the poster with the three white male able bodies, they were in police, fireman and military uniform. This has a very important influence over how you feel about these individuals because it perpetuates a certain stereotype. In this poster, these three uniforms made the audience view the individual as meritous. Comparably, the movie Menace to society showed the stereotype you black men in baggy clothing. They were perceived as gangsters and violent incapable bodies.

I found this article/site so interesting because I had to consider why does one’s apparel matter so much that they would buy fake clothing of poor quality jut to appear on a higher social status. In, the lives of middle class Americans people aspire to be as successful as possible and a way to display that is through your physical appearance. People do this in many different ways depending on the environment and what promotes status. In the black community wearing a lot of jewelry promotes status. I have seen many people wearing fake diamond necklaces and earrings to make themselves look more wealthy than they truly are. This is deceptive but it works for that person and attracts the attention they want. In the military one’s ranking in sewn on your uniform. I suppose someone could replicate that or even a purple heart to reach a higher status and get the benefits from that. So we see how counterfeit apparel can have positive affects on the consumer. However, this hurts the economy.

With over 200 billion dollars lost on replicated goods sold in the black market, government officials have tried to crack down on replicating any and everything from movies to fashion. I personally feel like wearing fake designer clothing doesn’t make a person look any better or more wealthy, but some people feel like they need to do this.

The last point I want to add is how much more concerned with designer labels people appear to be internationally. My experience in China this summer was overwhelming because of the amount of fake products that were sold. In China there is no law forbidding people to sell burned dvd’s or real designer merchandise. Although, the quality was bad, there were so many young Chinese people wearing replicated designer apparel. My guess is that they want to keep up with popular western styles and culture and this is a more economically way to do so. I just felt like they took it overboard with a Burberry headband, a Louis Vuitton belt and Gucci shoes, all bought on a street corner.

http://www.counterfeitchic.com/

Body Dysmorphia, Queerness, and the Femme/Butch Closet

“The history of my discomfort with fashion is bifold (sic) and it’s the oldest queer girl story in the book (or one of them, at least); it’s about gender presentation and body dysmorphia” (Benson, qtd. in Nguyen).

The previous statement is why I chose to discuss the blog post “GENDER/QUEER: The oldest queer girl story in the book.” As a self-identified queer bio-female, currently dating two rather femme looking women, I struggle daily with the idea of “fitting in” the world of fashion. I’m not talking about fashion in the sense that I’d like to vogue my way down the catwalk—I’ll leave that to my diva guy friends. I’m talking about fashion in the sense that I can’t even walk into my local Target without wondering if I’d be better off shopping the women’s section or the men’s. This problem is further exacerbated by the norms of class and social position. As I am from a middle-class, pseudo traditional (but growing more progressive every moment) family and I attend the University of Pittsburgh rather than, say, CCAC or Kaplan, I feel the weight of social, gender, class, racial, age, professional, size (and the list goes on) norms with every move and purchase I make.

In fact, all other norms aside, the melding of size and orientation norms tell me one thing: I am big, so I should be butch. This is completely supported in one of my relationships, where my girlfriend is very slim and slight, soft-spoken with long hair and soft facial features. She doesn’t need makeup or a dress to look feminine. Yet, we go places, and I am the one who looks awkward wearing a skirt and shiny boots.

What I find particularly interesting here, though, is that I look exactly like many of the women in my family. The large frame, facial features, and obesity that I face when I look in the mirror are seen in about 75% of the Italian women I am related to. Those women have never had to wonder about their femininity, or if they should be wearing jeans and a t-shirt instead of the polka dot dress and pantyhose. I’d also be willing to bet that they don’t get sniggered at, walking down the street with a couple of their female friends, all dressed differently, and asked offensive questions about what they’re “packing.” Queerness puts a serious spin on the way a person is seen in the public eye. As Cavallero puts it, “Often, the ‘ideal’ is only the ideal for certain people, it only fuels limited interests” (Cavallero, 101).

I was searching Youtube for videos linked to “butch lesbian,” and this video struck me like a Mack truck (mostly because I fall into the “stereotypes” that the poster is trying to fight against). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Um1jWWoF9h4 (Tuna Talk: What not to wear—Butch Edition). One of the commenters called her condescending, and I would completely agree. So what if I wear plaid shirts on occasion, and clip my keys to my belt loop? I don’t quite understand how one would be “fighting” stereotypes if they purposely dress against those stereotypes. To me, that is more like giving into the normative society that created those stereotypes, and not at all empowering.

I feel the same as Nguyen, in that “there are so many times I hate this thing Fashion for its complicities, both mundane and avant-garde, with colonial racial classifications, predatory capital, class stratification and class slumming, able-bodiedness and rehabilitation imperatives, gender and sexual norms , biopolitical measures of health and beauty (my italics), militarism and imperial statecraft” (Nguyen). I could wear my most feminine attire, makeup and jewelry, but I am still an “out” queer, and (especially to other queers) femininity does not bode well with the image of a fat lesbian. So, I end up walking out of the house on a daily basis, mixing feminine and masculine like some kind of genderqueer Picasso. I queer it up a little more by cutting my hair off, but I femme it up by getting highlights. I’ll wear women’s jeans with a men’s belt. My shoes are from the women’s section, but they’re actually really masculine. My clothes are fitting, often times without being baggy, but that means that they show my masculine frame. My clothing and makeup are usually dark or BRIGHT! (never pastel—yuck) This brings me to a new point, though. Queer, gender, and size norms are obviously not all I come in contact with on a day-to-day basis.

Let’s add in the other most obvious norms that we face—race, age, SES, education (including major, year, location), and professional path. As a 21 year old white, upper-middle class senior year psychology student, planning on going to grad school and currently working at a non-profit organization with AIDS patients, I am expected to dress differently than my mother; a white, 52 year old accountant working in the business for 25 years. This is made abundantly clear by the fact that my mother and I buy our plus-sized women’s clothing (we are the same size, in fact) at different stores, owned by the same parent company. Lane Bryant markets themselves as a clothing store for the young plus-sized professional. Catherine’s does not market themselves as a store for the middle-aged plus-sized professional (as being above 30 is some kind of taboo), but the difference in the clientele, sales people, and merchandise is obvious. It is, though, all important to perception and performance.

As Butler put it, “...a performative is that discursive practivce that enacts or produces that which it names” (Butler, 241). The performance of queerness, gender, class, etc. is one that we participate in daily. It is so important to our identities as such, that we even attempt to educate ourselves on the “how to” of that performance This video is from the perspective of gay men, where the poster has been asked by a 16 year old gay male the pinnacle question, “Is being fat and gay a fate worse than death?” (; relative material is from 48 seconds-2:05 or so:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2YVnO2IzWXE (Fat and Gay: a fate worse than death).

Obviously, I can’t speak as a gay man, but I can say that all of my gay male friends look like the poster, and all worry a ridiculous amount about their weight. This is because they, as 19-25 year old gay men, need to fit into the stereotype of the fit, built, skinny, twinkboy who is ready for love and eager to please. This is a stark contrast with the over-25 bitter queen. Those are the guys at the bar who wear button-down black shirts and blue jeans. They have shaved heads, to hide the fact that they’re balding and call everyone “honey.” They still fit into a clean-cut gay category, though. There are so many queer categories, you’d think it would be easy to find your niche, but for many, it really is not.

I feel that in popular media, whether it be primetime TV, Cosmopolitan magazine, the blogosphere, Youtube and the like, “Especially because of the increasingly pervasive cultural authority of fashion and style bloggers –on both individual and industrial registers– it’s critical that ideological categories as well as corporeal configurations of race, gender, sexuality, et cetera, are subject to ongoing contestation at these sites” (Nguyen). It is the constant contestation, molding, re-vamping, stereotyping, and attempted brainwashing that make it so difficult to find your “place” in queer/gender/class/education/SES/etc. norms. How is anyone supposed to figure out where they fit, though, if the puzzle is being cut differently every day?

Works Cited:

AskAJAnything. "Tuna Talk: What Not to Wear--Butch Edition." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Um1jWWoF9h4

Butler, Judith. "Bodies that Matter." Feminist Theory and The Body: A Reader. Eds Janet Price and Margrit Shildrick. New York: Routledge, 1999. 235-45.

Nguyen, Mimi. "The oldest queer girl story in the book." Threadbared. http://threadbared.blogspot.com/2010/02/genderqueer-oldest-queer-girl-story-in.html 2 February, 2010.

Phunkybrats. "Fat and Gay: a fate worse than death." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2YVnO2IzWXE

Cavallaro, Dani. The Body for Beginners. New York: Writers and Readers Publishing. 1998.

Revealing an Ironic History of Invisibility in Hipster Racism

Featured two years ago in NYLON’s music issue, this picture of Beth Ditto is one from an eight-page editorial on the fashion icon. Besides winking and flaunting a winning hand, we see Ditto dressed a certain way that could allude to a westernized “Geisha” look. Digressing from the stereotypical performance of racialization, what’s more interesting about this photo is what we don’t see— in this case the woman of color housekeeper. In Mimi Thi Nguyen’s blog “Background Color,” presented on Threadbared, the use of a person of color as landscape in fashion editorials is examined. Nguyen is most concerned about how the background woman, “who may or may not be a real housekeeper at the motel at which this editorial was photographed,” represents a thick history of fantasy imagery in which “exotic locals,” are adorned in “traditional and time-bound” clothes, while being set against “colonial regimes of power and knowledge.” As Ditto is vibrantly dressed, she powerfully gazes at the camera representing control, while woman of color, dressed in a drab uniform, expresses a, “weary… and guarded expression,” as she gazes at Ditto. Besides being denied power, the woman of color is also denied a story. In studying the picture Nguyen wonders:

“…she has just been forced to play cards with a guest — not because she wants to, but because she could lose her job if she doesn’t. Nor does the game even feel like a break from her domestic labor; this sort of affective labor is no less taxing. In her mind (in the story I imagine about this editorial), she calculates how much longer she’ll have to stay and clean in order to meet her day’s quota.”

The point is: besides not knowing the woman of color’s story, we aren’t supposed to care, let alone acknowledge her presence at all. Existing only to make the white woman’s privilege become more relevant, the woman of color becomes a landscape. This image is not new, as Nguyen writes in a later blog. She states, “I think it’s clear that the aesthetic conventions of the NYLON editorial are both jarringly new and disturbingly the same.” Take Edouard Manet’s Olympia (1863), for example:

In comparison, the Ditto editorial now represents an, “example of the long duration of racisms and their entanglements with other vectors of power, including gender, sexuality, empire and labor.” Besides recreating this message, what I find most troublesome about Ditto’s editorial photo is the medium in which it’s presented— NYLON. How could a magazine deemed “hipster/alternative,” and that’s read by, “fashion-forward," and “in the know,” readers convey such a inherently racist image? Besides pointing out the “world of NYLON [as] glaringly white,” Nguyen argues that this picture in such a magazine, “reinforces the distance between the presumed viewer and the housekeeper who is not included in this wink, and who is not imagined to share this same base of knowledge.” With this said, I began to leaf through the piles of NYLON magazines I have showcased on my home bookshelf. Out of the twenty-some issues I have from the past two years, only four feature a woman of color on the front page: Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam (M.I.A.), Zoe Saldana, Lily Allen, and Jessica Szohr. In a similar blog on Threadbared titled, “Letter to the Editor” Nguyen includes this letter issued in one “Denim Issue” of NYLON:

Dear Nylon,

Your ass history piece in the April issue is fucking laughable. You can give props to Applebottom Jeans all you want; the only ladies of color in the magazine were in the street fashion spread.

Olivia – Urbana, IL

Igniting an investigation in my favorite magazine’s rhetoric, I then started coming across similar messages. For example, this article emphasizes, “while black magic is evil, white magic is always good.” While that article can be seen as a stretch, I ponder: is NYLON conveying a different sort of “racism”— a “hipster racism”? Reading up on “hipster racism” makes me wonder are the messages and photos in this “alternative” magazine, “meant to denigrate another's person race or ethnicity under the guise of being urbane, witty (meaning "ironic" nowadays), educated, liberal, and/or trendy”? In saying this, perhaps those in charge of Beth Ditto’s photo shoot were well aware of the “deeply embedded” racisms of the image, and did so to play on the themes in an ironic way.

The trouble with this sort of alleged "hipster racism," is that the irony is assumed by those still in power, and thus the joke is still on the invisible oppressed. The irony imposed by the "hipster" is that they are "not" racist, and obtain the knowledge to recognize a racist image/message as wrong, so thus can redistribute this image/message as funny, because of their "in the know" original disposition. How ironic. How witty. How troublesome, because when the viewer (or more importantly the oppressed body) isn't "in on the joke," then the image is just really racist. Just look at this allegedly witty cover of The New Yorker.

Again we see an "satirical" image of the Obamas, where as Howard Kurtz said, “I talked to the editor of The New Yorker, David Remnick, who tells me this is a satire, that they are making fun of all the rumors." This "Hipster racism" is still racism, and makes us ask, how can the bodies that matter, be the only bodies "in the know"? The real irony with the Ditto editorial is the body of the housekeeper (or those bodies who also associate with her gaze) are still not in on the joke, and again this image is packed with, "disturbingly" similar rhetoric.

What are your thoughts?

Work Cited:

Definition and critique of "hipster racism" found on this blog:http://meloukhia.net/2009/07/hipster_racism.html

Critique of "hipster racism" in The New Yorker found on this blog:http://www.racialicious.com/2008/07/14/the-new-yorker-and-hipster-racism/

Threadbared blogs referenced:http://iheartthreadbared.wordpress.com/2008/07/19/background-color/

http://iheartthreadbared.wordpress.com/2008/07/31/background-color-redux-ii/

http://iheartthreadbared.wordpress.com/2008/07/24/letter-to-the-editor/