Thursday, February 14, 2013

Analyze This

Man, the authors were really stretching with the intro to the psychoanalytic chapter.  Other intros (especially the My So-Called Life bit) were much better.  Why not use something about how INSANELY pervasive incest is in movies?  (Gladiator, Star Wars, Back to the Future, Futurama, Django Unchained, Game of Thrones, Hellboy, and Yo Gabba Gabba) (Just kidding on that last one)

Warning: Phallic symbols ahead



Few topics bring out the academic in people more than the psychoanalysis of visual media.  Whether it's searching for phallic symbols or subliminal messages in the backdrops of Disney movies or the literal transformation of women into objects for advertising purposes, nothing makes the armchair critic rejoice like the search for the subconscious text.

Pictured: Happily Ever After


Daily David Foster Wallace reminder:  Read "E Unibus Pluram" for a pretty detailed analysis of the psychological addiction/downward spiral television has created.

Question:  Is the psychoanalysis of visual media so popular (in comparison to similar analyses of music or language-based text) because of male privilege placing more value on visual stimuli?

Discovery:  Metz, quoted on page 160, describes an argument I thought I came up with which basically connects Burke's concept with identification to the beauty of television.  Heartbroken, I am.

Summary:  Freud and Lacan provide the framework for a psychoanalytic perspective on media, which centers around pleasure, desire, and dreams.  This is heavily linked to feminism due to it being "nearer to the roots of our [women] oppression" (Mulvey, as found on page 163).  The majority of psychoanalysis deals with sex and its (un)likely bedfellow, family.  Modern theorists also approach the objectification of men, and the "gay gaze" which might look more at "performance and camp" than sexuality (170).

Exclamation:  DUDE is that Vanilla Ice in the Candie's ad on 172???

Transition:  Feminist chapter's introduction is slightly better.

Confession(s):  I used up most of my creative energy on the psychoanalysis chapter.  I like the Monopoly analogy on 179.

Digital Connection:  Isn't it crazy to think about how Facebook is set up in light of these chapters?  The only thing we can view on a private profile is the person's picture.  If we click on that picture, it takes us to more pictures of that person, not information about them.  The easiest thing to see on someone's profile are their pictures, specifically their profile and cover picture.

Probably not as cool as this guy's cover picture, though.


Self-justification:  I don't do much visual media.  Of the visual media I do consume, most of it is via video games.  Video games have a huge, huge problem with the stereotypes described in this chapter, and it puts me off from some of them (Firefall being the most recent example).

Seriously guys?  Seriously?

Exploration:  I think the biggest problem, though, are the more subtle ones.  Obviously the image right above is offensive and ridiculous--there is zero way to justify the two outfits next to each other beyond sex appeal.  Instead, I would say that movies which most people would not see the blatant sexism in are the more dangerous to society.  Allison Bechdel came up with an awesome test for creative works.  For a work to pass the test, it has to 1) have at least two named women in it, 2) they must talk to each other, 3) about something besides a man.  When you look to find movies that pass this test, the rate is abysmally low.  Think about Batman, Avatar, Inception... independent women are basically left out of blockbusters.

Moving on:  Queer theory is critical of the privileging of heteronormative behaviors and attributes.  This is one theory that I am so interested in seeing chapters on twenty years from now.  I've mentioned it in previous blogs, but I'm curious to see if shows like Modern Family and Will and Grace are seen as "straightwashing" their homosexual characters in the same way that the Cosby Show is accused of "whitewashing" African American culture.  I don't think the authors delved into questioning a variety of media enough--I wanted stuff on Rent and Angels in America.  I thought the John Mayer example on 212 belonged more strongly in the feminist chapter than here.

Disgust:  Fellow internet addicts--how often do we "hear" the following phrases online?  "OP is a fag" "I love you, no homo" "Gaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyy" (Thanks, Community, for that wonderful contribution to society).  The internet is such a frustratingly paradoxic environment because it's seen as so progressive in some respects, and yet every corner of it is overrun with anonymous sexist/racist/homophobic content.  Again, discussion on echo chambers and isolation go here.  Also, new term I found recently: brogressive.  Explains a lot of things you see.

I leave you with this.


4 comments:

  1. "This is one theory that I am so interested in seeing chapters on twenty years from now. I've mentioned it in previous blogs, but I'm curious to see if shows like Modern Family and Will and Grace are seen as "straightwashing" their homosexual characters in the same way that the Cosby Show is accused of "whitewashing" African American culture."

    You don't have to wait. The answer is yes. The yes is louder for Will and Grace, but it's still yes.

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  2. Oh I know it's going on in the blogosphere and stuff, I meant specifically to academic texts.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Still yes.


    https://docs.google.com/file/d/1NpZVCKgPOUJ16346spR932MPyT_lf_9Hw8t9MpPcvAGOOlLWAj57Ycsv8UmF/edit?usp=sharing

    ReplyDelete
  4. Answer to ! : Vanilla Ice it is not. As far as I know, that is Mark McGrath of Sugar Ray.

    ReplyDelete