marxism and cultural studies

I came across this website that was funny commentary about chick flicks and how the movies “hate” women.

http://www.cracked.com/article/194_7-popular-chick-flicks-that-secretly-hate-women/

As I was reading Henry Jenkins’s Textual Poachers, all I kept thinking was, Hooray! Here’s the subversion/resistance we tried to find in the romance novels but just couldn’t quite come up with. The other thing I thought of, more in the back of my mind, was, Why do I find fandom of the things Jenkins talks about (mostly sf, some action-adventure stuff) more legitimate than fandom of, say, Harry Potter? To elaborate a bit…

Much of this book celebrates fan culture, and one way it does so is to point out the subversiveness of that subculture. “Lorrah’s description blurs the boundaries between producers and consumers, spectators and participants, the commercial and the homecrafted . . . Fandom here becomes a participatory culture which transforms the experience of media consumption into the production of new texts, indeed of a new culture and a new community” (46). While as Jenkins discusses later the fans don’t have the power of the producers of the shows to truly change what is made, the community they create gives them their own sort of power. They are no longer just consumers and spectators, they are directly engaging with the works and producing their own works that interact with the original. Not only that, but the engagement with the shows includes engagement with vast numbers of other people—creating a very real community that lauds, critiques, and reinterprets the media they consume. The discussions of the shows are not only intelligent and show true contemplation of the given representations (rather than the brainless consumption assumed of the “masses” watching TV), they are often put in terms of academic arguments.

I think it’s wonderfully ironic that academia (at least up until recently) considered TV not worth its time for deep examinations and thought that people were ridiculous to read into TV shows what the academy interprets in great novels. Not only does this type of engagement with TV demonstrate the fans’ sophistication with such styles of text examination, but the academy’s assertion that it is still of low taste and low culture simply proves the existence of hegemony: the elite can’t handle their sophisticated and intellectual practices being used for new, alternative purposes. The fans reappropriate the materials, the shows themselves, and at the same time they reappropriate the tools used by the bourgeoisie. (Even more interesting, actually, is “the institutionalization of a ‘feminine’ approach to texts that differs radically from the more ‘masculine’ style preferred by the academy” [89], relating to the emotional closeness of the fan reader to the text.) Again, fans cannot usually make the producers do what they want for the shows; but they are very noisy about their demands (a kind of power in itself) and are also taking close looks at and discussing crucial aspects of culture and hegemony portrayed in these shows, raising their awareness of the issues that tend to fade into the background otherwise.

So why is it that I’ve always really really wanted to go to an sf convention (general, or specifically Star Trek), but I think Harry Potter fan fiction is ridiculous? The first reason is probably because I’ve been a fan (in the more general, passive sense) of sf a lot longer than I’ve been a fan of Harry Potter. I started reading my mom’s Anne McCaffrey books at something like age ten, and was watching TNG whenever my parents did since I don’t know when. Don’t get me wrong, I love Harry Potter as much as anyone else at Pomona. We grew up with those kids. They just weren’t my first love. Another possibility is that I think of Harry Potter fans as generally a younger crowd (even if people of all ages do actually enjoy the series)–which means they haven’t had as much education, and they can’t write as well as I, as an intellectual elite, have come to expect from writers across the board. And yet I’ve never read any sf fan fiction either . . . and I consider things like dressing up for movies just as legitimate for either crowd. I’d probably want to go to a Harry Potter convention at some point too, if they ever had one. So I don’t really know what my snobbery is when it comes to Harry Potter fan fiction. But still it remains. . .

This is about all the brain power I can muster towards a blog post. But here it is: http://teachmetonight.blogspot.com/2007/02/male-authors-of-romanceromantic-fiction.html

a blog about “male authors of romance fiction.

I found the idea of escapism in Radway’s Reading the Romance particularly interesting. Indeed it seems that escapism can be seen as a phenomenon itself. First, Radway notes how many readers describe reading romances as a means to escape from their daily lives of household chores. This seems rather benign at first, indeed Dot offers it as a better form of escape than drugs for example. But what does it mean that we need to escape from our daily life? Have humans always had this need? Or has it increased, and Marx might argue this, with capitalism and the inability of humans to reach a state of self-actualization under capitalist systems with increased division of labor?
Throughout the second half of the book, Radway begins to suggest that the escapism romances are actually escapades which reinforce patriarchal values and deter women from challenging the system: “…the romance functions always as a Utopian wish-fulfillment fantasy through which women try to imagine themselves as they often are not in day-to-day existence, that is as happy and content” (Radway 151). Thus, the romance is a particular form of escapism which allows women to fantasize about happiness and contentment in such a way that they allow themselves to be temporarily satiated with their position. It’s rather amazing how perfectly this works to both maintain social norms by preventing change-demanding resistance and to provide a great deal of money to romance publishing houses, because women are only temporarily satisfied by each novel and quickly require yet another formulaic novel soon after. This is a type of escapism that allows individuals to imagine themselves as satisfied human beings, thus encouraging them to ignore problematic aspects of reality.

I wonder whether this particular type of escapism which maintains the status quo by satiating individuals with “fantasy trips” is the only type of escapism. Indeed it seems to be a rather dangerous type of escapism because it replaces actual satisfaction with imagined satisfaction. Are all the forms of distraction which we use as dangerously deluding and inhibiting? Or, are there other types which allow an escape from reality without allowing the individual to a feel fake contentment that reinforces the norm? When we play games for example and become excited by winning are we merely distracting ourselves? Or, because the game is in real life and we are active agents are games not mere sources of escape. But what about video games? TV shows? Movies? Game shows seems like a prime example of escapes which reinforce social systems. As you watch another person on TV answer questions or race around the grocery store etc. and see them win large sums of money are you not imaginatively winning money and feeling perhaps momentarily satisfied and like a winner, and less likely to raise issue with the class system. I’d argue the escapism is a huge phenomenon which we all participate in. I need to think more how how this type of escapism is tricking me into feeling as though I’m in a state of satisfaction.

I was reading this article for another class, “Melodramatic Identifications” by Ien Ang who is a media studies scholar who did a similar study that Radway did but with women and their viewing of Soap Operas. Anyways, I think these two quotes especially related to our conversation in class today.

162- “fictional characters…cannot be conceptualized as realistic images of women, but as textual constructions of possible modes of femininity: as embodying versions of gendered subjectivity endowed with specific forms of psychical and emotional satisfaction and dissatisfaction, and specific ways of dealing with conflicts and dilemmas. In relation to this, they do not function as role models but are symbolic realizations of feminine subject positions with which viewers identify in fantasy.”

and

164- “the social display of forms of traditional femininity – dependence, passivity, submissiveness – can have quite detrimental and self-destructive consequences for women when strength, independence, or decisiveness are called for. In fantasy and fiction, however, there is no punishment for whatever identity one takes up, no matter how headstrong or destructive: there will be no retribution, no defeat will ensue. Fantasy and fiction then, are the safe spaces of excess in the interstices of ordered social life where one has to keep oneself strategically under control.”

I think Ang’s analysis of melodrama is interesting because many people who have studied feminist theory/race theory still enjoy media that portrays characters with blatant stereotypes that those same viewers are working to expose. By separating reality and fantasy, Ang allows us to explore this pleasure in a different way, maybe in a way that is not problematic from the start. Or maybe I am just trying to justify my own consumption of melodramatic media…

Reading The Romance begins with a heavy and complicated question that Janice A. Radway seeks to answer: (p.15) Does reading romance literature, with passive women characters, only confirm a patriarchal society? OR does reader satisfaction from choosing to read, against others wishes, act as a form of independence and opposition? Radway acknowledges the difficulties of answering this question when she states, “The struggle over the romance is itself part of the larger struggle for the right to define and control female sexuality. Thus, it matters enormously what the cumulative effects of the act of romance reading are on actual readers” (17). I think what makes this question even more difficult is that when talking about topics such as these (consuming romantic fiction, watching soap operas, etc) it is hard to articulate exactly what draws the reader or viewer in as well as what effects the consumption has. It is similar to asking someone if they are affected by mass advertising. Everyone likes to say no, when in fact everyone is, subtly or overtly.

The part we are reading for Monday does not answer this question yet, but it is interesting to see the results from Radway’s questions that she gives to her group of readers. Looking over the results, it seems that the average romance reader does it for relaxation as “me time,” likes a happy ending to a love story, and likes the hero of the love story to be intelligent, tender, and with a sense of humor. These answers seemed very predictable. The element of romance reading that most aligned with Radway’s assumption of the reading furthering patriarchy was that, “the romance’s short-lived therapeutic value, which is made both possible and necessary by a culture that creates needs in women that it cannot fulfill, is …the case of its repetitive consumption” (85). The book is similar to a melodrama television show that leaves the viewer unfulfilled and brings them back again next week in the hope of that fulfillment, only to repeat the cycle over again. One element that did seem interesting in her research is that the women liked to read historical romances because they felt they were able to learn something about the historical time period and impress their husbands and family with facts that they learned while reading. This attribute of reading the romances seemed the most aligned with Radway’s proposal that the reading could be seen as a form of empowerment. However, I feel that the act of reading in general is more of a form of empowerment. Therefore reading romance novels doesn’t necessarily seem like an act against patriarchy, but reading novels that teach some type of history align with reading in general as a form of gaining knowledge and therefore confidence in that acquired knowledge.

I have been looking at the viewing habits of “guilty pleasure” television shows as a form of research for my senior project. Women’s consumption of guilty pleasure TV shows has one major difference. The act of romance reading is mostly done solitary, as an individual activity, usually not with a romance book club. By contrast, guilty pleasure television is mostly consumed as a group activity. While the act of reading is seen as a legitimate activity because it is used as a deserved “me time,” watching shitty television is made legitimate by enjoying it in a group setting. Can the ways in which women consume television be used to answer Radway’s overall question of confirming or fighting against patriarchy? Or- is television consumption a different field entirely? I am not sure I can answer this question yet but I think demographics make this question very difficult. I do not think women can be grouped into one category. Consumption of media is very different for teenagers, young women, educated women, stay-at-home moms. Etc.

(On a total side note- I found Radway’s analysis too narrow. I would be interested in seeing her proposed project of researching working, educated women and their consumption of romance fiction.)

If anyone is considering writing their own romance novel, I found a nifty title generator. Just in case you’re low on ideas.

http://facstaff.unca.edu/pbahls/TitleGenerator.html

Having thoroughly enjoyed Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique and my fair share of trashy fiction, I found Janice Radway’s Reading the Romance to be a pretty incisive and lively read. She illustrates a fascinating female re-appropriation of cultural materials which, by all accounts, support patriarchy and rigid mainstream concepts of sexuality and fidelity. Her most important assertion is that romance novels may not be the mini-ISAs they appear; rather, through the constant re-contextualization given to them by female readers, their allegorical meanings take on a distinctly feminist bent.

But what kind of feminism is Radway referring to? I saw Sarah Haskins speak a few nights ago and remembered her distinction between a feminism that directly critiques gender performance and psychology, and the “You go, girl!” kind of empowerment which ends up re-affirming many patriarchal notions of a proper woman.

In the chapter “The Readers and Their Romances,” Radway explores the work and goals of Dorothy “Dot” Evans, whose expertise in the romance genre guides countless devoted readers to the most satisfying books. On page 54, Dot claims that readers interpret the best romance novels as tales of “female triumph” despite their grounding in traditional gender roles and male physical dominance. Because the heroines imbue their men with more feminine qualities, like tenderness and understanding, they have used their womanly wiles to perfect an “equal” relationship with emotional give and take. Dot says that “independence and marriage are compatible, not mutually exclusive.” Because the heroines are so secure and strong in their womanhood, they enter into a love connection and not a master-submissive relationship.

I read this interpretation as problematic (much as I read Friedan’s approach as slightly troubling) as it comes off as an illusion of agency and not a declaration of reclamation of material. Dot seems to buy into the notion that female strength lies in complete mastery of her feminine characteristics and desires, which have of course been constructed by a hegemony and a cultural history which caters to male power. A woman may find pleasure in imagining an all-night roll in the hay with Fabio; in the end Fabio still possesses her, and represents masculine ideals of bravery, power, and emotional control – all of which she believes she is uninterested in accessing as a consequence of her gender.

This book really caught my interest as I can remember some of my early reading memories, sneaking my grandmother’s Barbara Cartland’s book in the bathroom to read. It was forbidden for me as young girl to read these books as they contained “inappropriate” material, yet I would see the way my grandmother would devour them in one sitting.

In Reading the Romance Janice A. Radway applies the anthropological method of ethnographic research to attain a general (though not completely holistic) understanding of the complexity of reading romance books for women in the Midwest.  Radway conducts a series of interviews to provide a Geertzean approach to the study of the “native’s” point of view, and avoid speaking for the informant. Yet, I wonder if the limited scope of her ethnography can really grant her an understanding of this complexity (which I cannot know until I read the entire book). It seems as though her sample size is very small and relevant to just one region of the U.S., the community of Smithton. By this I don’t mean to discard her pooints, as the points raised in her book do apply to the various reasons the women in my family and I had for engaging in these readings. I felt that I could really relate to the “escape” of the monotony of housekeeping and childrearing duties as part of motherhood. I also understand the need for a romantic fantasy which is sometimes lost after being married for a long time (I’ve been married for sixteen years!).

This is a difficult topic to address in a general sense but Radway raises an important issue centering on “a recognition that romance writers and readers are themselves struggling with gender definitions and sexual politics on their own terms and that what they may need most from those of us struggling in other arenas is our support rather than our criticism or direction… Our segregation by class, occupation, and race, once again, works against us” (18).  Despite this book being written almost three decades ago, these issues of gender inequality and sexism still apply today.

The first chapter actually contained much statistcal data which seemed a bit irrelevant. It wasn’t until I got to chapter two that I felt drawn into the ethnography. I was interesting to learn about the women who participated in her research, particularly Dot. She seemed like a matriarch of her community. She seemed like a mixture of Gramsci’s organic intellectual and Carrie from Sex and the City, a critic of Romance literature who could extert consumerist power over a community of followers. One aspect I found interesting and a bit surprising was table 2.3 (74) where the responses were not what I would expect in regards to themes which should never be included in a romance. As I read it, I though rape would be the first one on my list, yet it was third. The first one was ‘Bed-hopping’ which I think was a reflection of religious beliefs and social values in the 80s from this community. The second one was actually a ’Sad Ending’! I can’t believe that these women would prefer to read about rape over a sad ending. These statistics and the overall interviews are very important in understanding the values and attitudes of this community of women in the U.S. It would be interesting to conduct this research today and see how much things have or have not changed.

After our little talk about postmodern art sensibilities and how I thought they were straying from the “right or wrong” of modernism, and becoming more accesible to “low” culture, I came across this…

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/11/arts/design/11museum.html?_r=1&ref=arts

Patrons decide what is good. Saatchi etc. And people like Koons and Hirst ride thier coatails. Nothing has changed.