Course Description

At the core of the course is the question how feminism has become a demonized and ridiculed “F-word” in an age when issues of gender and sexuality are at the center of constant, often explosive political debates. These debates often connect media representation and political representation but tend to do so in simplistic ways that bypass or distort decades of sophisticated feminist theory and practice. We will trace back such representations through the decades around case studies that encompass film, video, television and new media practices. The case studies come from the United States and beyond, taking into full account the global interconnectedness of media production and consumption as well as the transnational travel of feminist ideas. The main goal of the course is to evaluate how useful feminist thinking is to understanding the relays between media and political representation; and to develop a lasting critical apparatus to analyzing the politics of gender and sexuality in the media.


Monday, October 14, 2013

Homophobes need to be able to see themselves on TV

I loved every word of the Walters article we read last week, but I'm going to refrain from quoting it at length and just get to the last paragraph that really got my attention: "What you mostly see on television is the 'problem' of homosexuality without the cause. Homosexuality is not an intrinsic problem, any more than heterosexuality is...but if television only shows us homosexuality as a problem, it participates in the erasure of the real problem of homophobia." When I was about 13, I started watching Degrassi, a show that aired on The N (now TeenNick) because of all the ads I saw for it when I watched the Daria reruns on that channel. I quickly realized it was a soap opera aimed at teens. And, of course, I immediately became obsessed with the sprawling ensemble and their web of intricate and dramatic story lines (Degrassi. It Goes There.) "Going there" of course means having a gay character, namely Marco, but Marco is no Matt from Melrose Place. His life is just as full of drama as his classmates', but what I think I took for granted at the time that I saw it was the homophobia which is addressed. One of Marco's best friends, Spinner, is horrified to learn Marco is gay. He is in denial, then disgusted, and becomes a bit of a bully. He uses slurs and tries to out Marco to other students. When Marco gets beat up just for walking by a gay club, Spinner basically tells him it's his fault and to "just stop being gay!" "Sure, Spin. I'm just gonna go do that." Spinner wasn't just some random character, and this wasn't all resolved in thirty minutes. He was an integral character on the show (and quite a popular one at that), and his homophobia storyline was carried out through several episodes. Watching this as a 13-year-old kid, I saw in Spinner who I might become. I never heard over the pulpit or really even my home that being gay was bad - the rhetoric wasn't out in the open at that time, at least for people my age. So I'm not sure where that feeling came from of "wait, Marco is gay? Should I still be watching this show?" But I asked myself all the same. Seeing Marco stand up for himself to Spinner was key, but it also helped me to see their other friends respond to Spinner's homophobia (who could forget Drake in his pre-rapping days saying, "Your friend is gay. Stop hating and just deal."). While Spinner is obviously being criticized by the show, he isn't entirely vilified - and I think that's to the show's credit. It makes it credible when he cures himself of his homophobia and welcomed back into his fold of friends. Anyway, the show offered me a safe place to have a dialogue with myself, if that makes sense. It gave me a much-needed vocabulary and showed me (in its own Degrassi, melodramatic way) the repercussions of words and actions, which all start as our thoughts. I'm grateful to that show for taking on homophobia (not to mention a wealth of other important issues) with a central character, unblinking and upfront, really showing impressionable audiences what a truly damaging problem it is.
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1 comment:

  1. UnknownOctober 18, 2013 at 7:33 AM

    I think your commentary on having homophobia in the context of a television show is an interesting one. Those that make the show never really identify, the homophobia as the problem, but rather being homosexual. And I think for a show with young individuals watching and trying to understand which way to lean, there needs to be a more defined line for younger viewers. Moreover, as a fan of Degrassi also, I just always had a problem with their tagline being "It Goes There" like being homosexual or having this "foreign" portrayal of a gay character will make there show much edgier. With the amount of examples that are in film and television about homosexuality being disgraceful, the balance of being homophobic rather than just accepting needs to balance the amount out. So which one of you brave film students are going to make that happen?

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