Things To Do In Shopping Centres

Behold West Edmonton Mall!
- Two pictures are needed capture this monster of a mall, which rumour has it owns more submarines, at least ones that work, than the entire Canadian military! In another article from Feminism and Cultural Studies, Meaghan Morris puts post-structuralism to use in her look at "the management of space vis-a-vis shopping malls . I'll just get out of the way the fact that this was one of the more challenging reads of the semester. Morris does not make my intellectual quest to engage with semiotics an easy one. The language she uses feels unnecessarily complicated, which frustrates me mostly because I could not understand points that seemed interesting and relevant, at least from what I could decipher. I know Morris looks at the changing functions of shopping malls. She tells us she is most interested in "looking at how particular centres produce and maintain a unique sense of identity, or a myth of identity" How she incorporates feminist analysis into this interest is confusing for me though. She seems to spend much of the article both defending, and defending herself from feminist analysis. While Morris's understanding of duality was easily conveyed either, I was reminded of Ang's, and Minn-ha's discussions of identity and double-consciousness. Miller calls the dual quality of shopping malls "a stirring and seductive tension" Though it's tempting for me to dismiss shopping malls as personifications of capitalism and alienation, Miller is quick to point out some of the ways in which malls foster community. She expands upon this this in bringing a gendered analysis of the private and public nature of women's work as well. "Things to do in Shopping Centres", is not the easiest of reads. It is a piece that I will hopefully go back to at some point with a better understanding of Miller's field. That being said, there were parallels I picked out between Miller's "Things to do in Shopping Centres" , and Ang and Minn-ha, as well as Kenway and Mullen.

On Not Speaking Chinese

In Ien Ang's "On Not Speaking Chinese:Postmodern Ethnicity and the Politics of Diaspora", Ang finds herself on a one-day tour of China's "so-called New Economic Zone". Though the experience Ang writes of is specific to her life, the experience of belonging, or not, easily cuts across language and ethnicity. Reading Ang's exploration of identity and "double-consciousness had a visceral affect on me, more so than most of the other articles we've read. Ang's heritage is Indo-Chinese. Her family's experience of having fled China to Indonesia has helped to define her sense of place and belonging. Neither Indonesian, Chinese, or Western categorically speaking, Ang's experience seems one of dislocation. She is both embarrassed for her Chinese tour guide, and a bit hurt when Ang's Chinese"ness" goes unacknowledged by her. Ang's experience of "not speaking Chinese" is obviously different than mine, but the experience of belonging, or not, is one that I, among most others can relate to. Ang's article speaks to my experience as a "middle-class" welfare recipient. Knowing that I have millionaire grandparents helped me preserve some of amount of personal dignity, in dealings with asshole case-workers, welfare officers, disapproving bank tellers, or grocery store clerks who knew it was cheque day when..., or food bank workers when it wasn't. I could always tell myself that I was better than not only others on welfare, but better than the case workers making $30,000 a year, and the minimum wage earning women at the bank and grocery stores looking down on me, and feeling sorry for my kid. This feeling superiority cultivated out of necessity I'd argue, was always turned completely on its head at fancy family dinners, which frequently ended in yelling matches between myself and family members who'd make derogatory comments about "those people". Those people that scam the system, that have no pride, that won't work, that have more babies to get more money, that take taxi cabs to the food bank... Though not steeped in language per say, there has always been a uncomfortable double-consciousness at work for me. Being in university complicated this identity even more, with my program of choice making it all the more ironic. Similar to Ang's feelings of embarrassment and rejection, my experience of being on, and getting off welfare and being university educated, has made for equal parts guilt and cynicism. It's embarrassing for me on one level, to write about welfare using concepts such as diaspora and social stratification. I resent impressing people. There's no way hell though I prefer cashing my welfare cheque with lowered eyes. This struggle for identity really is the heart of Ang's "On Not Speaking Chinese".

The Beginings of Cultural Studies

In the introduction of Feminism and Cultural Studies, Morag Shiach gives us a brief overview of the fields origins. My joint interest in cultural studies and women's studies makes sense given the parallels and backgrounds of both. That is to say that "there is no single story of cultural studies", or women's studies. Shiach does tell us however, that the field of cultural studies, in Britain at least, developed largely out of polytechnics and adult continuing education. Polytechnics according to Shiach, had "less of an investment in the sanctity of existing academic disciplines because they had less of a stake in the cultural hierarchies that supported them". She also argues that the student demographic was much more varied in terms of age and class than was typical of universities in the 70's and 80's. Does this not sound quite similar to women's studies? According to Shiach however, the field of cultural studies has been slow, and even hostile to feminism and women's studies. Given that Feminism and Cultural Studies was written close to ten years ago, an updated introduction would be interesting to read. The supposed present "crisis in women's studies", would make an update equally interesting. Given the reluctance of other fields, I should perhaps not be too surprised by the marginalization of feminist practice by cultural studies. Nonetheless, the marginalization seems odd, given the parallels. The introduction deals mainly the development of cultural studies in Britain, which is interesting given the growing popularity of cultural studies in the United Kingdom and Australia, despite the mind boggling closure of the Birmingham School (pictured above, and the declining popularity of women's studies in those countries. Almost the opposite however, can be said of cultural studies and women's studies in North America.

"The Everyday Life of Queer Trauma", "Portraits of Grief"

Ann Cvetkovich's article "The Everyday Life of Queer Trauma" was a bit of a mixed bag for me, as was illustrated in the class discussion of the piece. At many points throughout her argument, Cvetkovich convinced me that we have in fact become a trauma and wound obsessed culture. Several years ago I recall a storm of controversy over the inclusion of "PMS" in the CPS (Compendium or Pharmaceutical and Specialties). When objections over this became loud enough, which didn't take long, PMS was declassified as an illness, and taken out of the CPS. Women it seems are particularly susceptible to trauma narratives in our culture. Childbirth is a prime example. Why hospitals run at you with wheelchairs if you walk through the doors and are pregnant is beyond me. They claim insurance, liability..., but it's indicative in my opinion, of a larger cultural perception about women's bodies somehow being inadequate. I might be totally off base here, but it could be argued that the trauma narratives of pregnancy entrench traditional values and nationalism, in much the same way that the trauma narratives of "911" has translated into nationalism and traditional values. Obviously these are quite different, but the everyday trauma of our bodies performing a task for which they were designed has become a substantial trauma that requires standard medical intervention.

Few would argue that "911" was not a major national trauma. It has permeated the American identity so deeply, that it now operates at the level of trauma in everyday life. Many would argue however, as both Cvetkovich and Nancy Miller do to varying degrees, that the national trauma of "911" has been tapped for gain, whether this be for the professional purposes of journalists and reporters, the profit-driven purposes of the media, or politically driven as in the case of Rudy Guilianni's crack at the White House, or most notably by those already in the White House. Journalist Susan Faludi has written about some of these dynamics in her book The Terror Dream. She contends that national trauma of "911" and the "War on Terror" has been used to re-entrench traditional family values by way of nationalism. Nancy Miller discusses the shift in journalism, which came with the day's events and and the aftermath of "911" in her piece "Portraits of Grief". She argues in fact, that a new genre of journalism and reporting has sprung from the disaster. This new genre seeks to both grapple with and export grief. "In the face of a collective disaster , whose scale strained the imagination, the anecdote was seized upon as a form suited to rendering the familiar acts of everyday life".
The complex media narratives which came out of the sea of posters and photographs of those missing from the World Trade Center, framed trauma in terms of the everyday lives of everyday people. The juxtaposition is disorienting however. In searching for an appropriate picture to include with this post, I found myself unable to rationalize putting pictures up of the events, its aftermath, or any of the portraits of grief.

Toy Theory: Black Barbie and the Deep Play of Difference

In this particular article Ann Ducille critiques the past and present ways in which Mattel presents race and gender by way of Ruth Handler's iconic Barbie doll. Not surprisingly Barbie has come under fire by feminists for many years now. Save for Pamela Anderson or Dolly Parton, the physical image of femininity that Mattel pedals is not one that of most women, or something many even aspire to. Although I did not own any Barbies while growing up, mostly on account of my family having been unable to afford them, I have come to the defence of Barbie on more than one occasion academically. To dismiss a doll that millions of girls covet as simply "bad" however could be regarded as quite conservative. Though this tends to both piss off and perplex some of my cohorts, her potentiality as a role model, despite her ridiculous physique, warrants a least a bit of consideration. As argued in class, Barbie could be seen to represent personal and financial independence, female camaraderie, and professional success. She's been a World Cup soccer champion, an astronaut, a doctor, and even a head of state. She is an utterly distorted physical representation of a woman. I'm thinking again of Dolly Parton; an incredibly talented singer, songwriter, and guitar player. She is however, a physical caricature and as such, taken less seriously than her talent warrants. Parton hilariously says of herself however, "It takes a lot of money to look this cheap."

In "Black Barbie and the Deep Play of Difference" Ducille is less generous in her assessment of Mattel as company, or Barbie as one of their many products. She has many reasons to call out both however. On top of reproducing stereotypes of Caucasion hyper-femininity, Mattel wades into the African American market by first producing a Black Barbie with the identical features of white Barbie. "Coloured Francie" would be hilarious if it wasn't bizarre. During the de-segreation upheaval of the 1960's, it seems plain silly that Mattel asked consumers to embrace Coloured Francie as Barbie's younger cousin. Nothing about the doll's commercial failure is surprising. Later attempts to mass produce stereotypical African American features were no less problematic. Ducille loses tract of the fact that Mattel is gigantic company competing in a cutthroat global market however. I agree with a great many of her arguments regarding race and gender. Her discussion of "Magic Earing Ken" practically had me rolling on the floor in fits of laughter. Despite all of this however, Ducille fails to adequately situate Barbie within a Capitalist market. Although the increasing spending power of African Americans is brought into the discussion, Ducille's analysis lacks a complexity that allows her to move beyond simply faulting Mattel as purveyors of White, patriarchal, Heteronormativity. In light of our ever expanding "global village/market" however, I would be quite curious to see how Ducille would frame the African Barbie series recently created by Mattel. The fetishization of the "exotic African" as is so obviously displayed with the above doll, would no doubt add to the complexity of an analysis and discussion of the (Neo) Colonialist "White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy".

Devouring Theory

Devouring Theory looks at the beginnings and steady rise of consumerism in the West. At what point did we start buying things just for the hell of it, rather than out of necessity? According to Jane Kenway and Elizabeth Bullen, this new consumerer ideology was facilitated by the industrial revolution, the printing press,and the opening of Paris's Bon Marché in 1869 (pictured left). Bon Marché was seen as both "a reflection of an encroaching bourgeois culture and a vehicle for the construction of a modern culture of mass consumption which would increasingly affect all social classes" Department Stores and shopping malls helped to usher in era, which gives life meaning through consumable "things"

Kenway and Bullen further their discussion in elaborating over the contentious concept of high culture. While I'm unsure as to whether or not they see the concept of "high culture"as problematic, there are others, such as bell hooks who have taken issue with the term. I'd like to expand upon an earlier post I wrote on second-hand style in response to their understanding of high culture. Kenway and Bullen argue that high class is a matter of good taste. To have good taste they contend, is to move away from the body, away from things of necessity. Cultivating the fine distinctions of taste however, "is a disciplined and difficult educational process. So too is learning the unemotional and detached bodily department, which accompanies the performance of good taste."
Devouring Theory looks at the beginnings and steady rise of consumerism in the West. At what point did we start buying things just for the hell of it, rather than out of necessity? According to Jane Kenway and Elizabeth Bullen, this new consumerer ideology was facilitated by the industrial revolution, the printing press,and the opening of Paris's Bon Marché in 1869 (pictured left). Bon Marché was seen as both "a reflection of an encroaching bourgeois culture and a vehicle for the construction of a modern culture of mass consumption which would increasingly affect all social classes" Department Stores and shopping malls helped to usher in era, which gives life meaning through consumable "things"

Kenway and Bullen further their discussion in elaborating over the contentious concept of high culture. While I'm unsure as to whether or not they see the concept of "high culture"as unproblematic, there are others, such as bell hooks who have taken issue with the term. I'd like to expand upon an earlier post I wrote on second-hand style in response to their understanding of high culture. Kenway and Bullen argue that high class is a matter of good taste. To have good taste they contend, is to move away from the body, away from things of necessity. Cultivating the fine distinctions of taste however, "is a disciplined and difficult educational process. So too is learning the unemotional and detached bodily department, which accompanies the performance of good taste." Tom Wolfe and Angela Carter, argue that dressing second-hand style subconsciously/consciously patronizes the working class and poor who dress second-hand out of necessity rather than style. I can't say I disagree with Wolfe's or Carter's assessment. The discussion of high culture by Kenway and Bullen however, has me wondering what else might be at play with respect to second-hand style. If cultivating good taste is a disciplined and difficult educational process, could it be that second-hand style-middle-class-high-culture kids are trying to connect, to break out of the unemotional, detached bodily department inherited from their parents? Style is a way of constructing person hood, and maybe second-hand style is a means of trying to break out of an already constructed person hood. Kenway and Bullen go on to discuss the idea of race as style,and argue that "white culture's nostalgic insistence on Black authenticity blocks Black people's claim to the economic capital, which again has me thinking about the above. Kenway and Bullen conceptualize Black culture as more community oriented than the private practices of white culture. While bell hooks speaks forcefully about the white commodification of Blackness in her article "Eating the Other", I wonder how much the middle-class consumption of rap music has to do with also trying to break out of the restraints of high culture:isolated individualism, and unemotional detachment.

"Remembering Well": Sexual Practice as a Practice of Remebering

Kate Bride's article on sexual practice as a practice of remembering looks at the Cawthra Park AIDS memorial in Toronto's 519 district.

"The AIDS Memorial is for the naming of names. The devastations of the epidemic can get lost in statistics. The Memorial, while only listing a small proportion of the people who have died, stands as a symbol of the fight against AIDS, particularly within the communities hardest hit. The AIDS Memorial is a place for grief, healing and remembering. It counters the silencing and denial, the isolation and rejection, that so often marks the experience of People Living With HIV and AIDS."(www.the519.org)

At night, the park in which the memorial is built becomes a venue for public sex, particularly among gay men. Because of much of the public’s awareness and disapproval, the park is a heavily policed in both its design, and by police and concerned neighbourhood resident. Spotlights have been added, and trees and bushes cut down in attempts to discourage public sex in the park. Bride explores the political meanings of the AIDS memorialization, the park's policing, and the practice of the predominantly gay public sex. She explores the gay communities response to the trauma and loss of HIV and AIDS, and suggests that the practice of public sex by the gay community, and even the practice of unprotected public sex, may in fact be a way of remembering. Similar to certain critiques of memorials to the holocaust, Bride asks whether or not memorial sites diminish our memories in that they remember for us. Ultimately Bride argues that no they cannot.With respect to the AIDS epidemic, Bride asks us to ask what it is "we want to remember and how". Public sex may very well be one of these ways.