As a senior, I feel like many of the courses I have taken thus far are similar. When I think back on classes, they all start to blend together. This is especially true in my Women's Studies classes, because so many share the same subject matter. However, I can honestly say that I will always remember many of the discussions we had in this class. Each topic we covered was engaging, and many of the other students had a ton of interesting stuff to say about it.
One thing our class discussions did was give me a name for many concepts that I use often without thinking about it. An example of this is the concept of looking for “the tell.” It is a common practice in our culture to try to identify everyone we see. When someone is different and doesn’t fit the mold, we search for something to explain them or give them an excuse for the way they look. I always hear people say things like “oh it must be a man, look at their hands” or “it has little teeth, it must be a girl.” I was always disturbed by these comments, and I assumed it was because of their reference to a person as an object. Now I know that that is problematic, but it is also because they feel the need to discover a determining characteristic to make the personal more “normal” to them.
The section I found most interesting was the readings on body traffic. As a communication student who has spent a lot of time talking about popular visual media, I have spent a lot of time discussing medical shows. Our discussion about how body traffic happens in real life as opposed to television life appealed to me. I am constantly critiquing things I see on television. I am also a big fan of medical dramas. When we discussed things from new angles, it gave me another perspective and reason to critique these shows, and I look forward to thinking about the bodies on medical dramas in a whole different way.
In the same way, I am generally interested in a lot of things about bodies in advertising. I have done many critiques of advertising techniques, and I have noticed some really interesting stuff about the way bodies are used to sell products. I am writing my research paper on this topic, and because it is so interesting to me, I do wish we could have talked about the subject a little more. However, I think we did cover a very wide range of topics. Reflecting back on our discussions, I noticed just how much we managed to discuss in only one semester. Everything from politics to paintings involves the body, and now I feel that I can think about the role that bodies in play in many aspects of study.
Despite all the great things that were said in our class discussions, I was pleasantly surprised to see how many more smart things people had to say on the course blog. One of my favorite prompts was number 9, about critiquing UPMC’s organ transplant site. I was amazed to see that everyone was able to find such interesting details about the website to critique using discourse about bodies and transplants. Everyone made a lot of interesting discoveries and connections beyond what I saw. I thought it was so great that we now have the ability to take something as simple as a website and critique it so thoroughly.
I agree with you that the UPMC critique was really interesting. It was especially so because for the most part, we paid attention to different aspects. I hope we're all leaving the class with a fair sense of the constructed difference between the real and the scripted. It was especially striking to me in the snippet of Three Rivers that we saw in class, just how different they are. I'm also glad I've had the chance to get a look at all the different facets we've discussed.
ReplyDeleteAs a senior, I too have a hard time remembering vast differences among past courses. Since freshman year, I can basically only recall two courses of substance. This is the great tragedy of higher education. We take classes to receive credit so we can graduate. We memorize, take tests, take quizzes, write papers, and forget everything within a month. If anything, this class also sticks out among the rest because it was looked at learning through a different lens. Sure there were deadlines and writing intensive projects, however they were interactive and made me consciously think. I wish more classes were revolved around similar theory.
ReplyDelete