A more ideal intersection of commodifying difference and cultural citizenship I can not imagine. (I really recommend watching ALL videos of the "Target: Women" series. They are hugely critical of the pervasive standards of womandom and its own "cultural citizenship" guidelines. They are also hilarious. Tragic, but definitely hilarious.) "Target: Women" is, in my opinion, a very intelligent exercise in analysing how media TARGETS women in most every way, including dating advice, how to diet, and how to deal with our doofy husbands.
In this episode, "Target: Women, a special on Ladyfriends", Sarah Haskins talks about media's role in constructing the way women have relationships with other women.
In "Toward a Feminist Analytics of the Global Economy", Sassen links the irony of menial labor being labeled as unimportant when it is actually the force that keeps the proverbial ball rolling. "In the day-to-day work of the leading services complex dominated by finance, a large share of the jobs involved are low pay and manual, many held by women and immigrants. Although these types of workers and jobs are never represented as part of the global economy, they are in fact part of the infrastructure of jobs involved in running and implementing the global economic system."
Given this claim--that women are part of the low paid demographic, doing menial tasks; I want to know what you guys think about these short clips that talk about media and women.
What is media telling women? What do you think about this?
How do the media' goals (and who makes up the media--corporations? the state?) relate to the commodification of "gendered" products?
And how is any of this an example of "cultural citizenship"?
(P.S. I gave you guys so many questions to think about, because I know that you are going to have SO much fun with these videos. I really encourage to watch as many as you have time for! There are at least 20 listed on the youtube related links...)
I so sincerely enjoyed those videos and really find that when spliced together as they wer, we gain a larger perspective on the media’s goals for our buying as women. These commercials depict women as needy (in every situation in life) and also dependent upon others, more specifically other women for the things that they require. However, the commodification of these various products is framed in the sense that in order to have full citizenship as a woman, not only do these products need to continuously be a part of your life, but also that they must be shared to continue this slightly disgusting little cycle.
ReplyDeleteInstead of showing a commercial where a woman buys a feminine product because she requires it to avoid daily embarrassment, the advertisements are laced with various forms of comfort and ease or the exchange values garnered after purchasing these various products. I also had a running question through my mind as I was watching the particular video listed: Because I don’t require candles or highly expensive shoes, am I not a citizen of my womanhood?
wow! Thanks for sharing this Olivia, I saw five of them!! They just make me want to mock "womanhood" even more. Is so sad the power the media has over us. The advertisements just keep projecting and perpetuating gender roles... the ones of the Doofy Husband and Laundry are targeting male and female audience using the public/private dichotomy that is very present in our patriarchal society to reiterate the space (place) of women. The cultural citizenship of womanhood is performed, and inscribe to specific places: the mall, the house, the body, the emotion... even worst it seems that womanhood as a "citizenship" is only possible if you own/have/buy/wear/smell.... those products, gendered products as you mentioned.
ReplyDeleteps...THANKS MEDIA WORLD NOW I KNOW HOW TO BE(COME) A WOMAN!!!!
Wow, thanks for sharing this Olivia. The first link made me proud because every commercial they showed were ones that have made me laugh out loud due to the presentation of womanhood and community, so I guess I'm on the right track.
ReplyDeleteDid anyone watch the Superbowl IXIVVXXVXVXVI commercials? Although I was more in-tuned to the Puppy Bowl on Animal Planet, I couldn't help but notice the extremity of cultural citizenship that the Superbowl commercials reinforced. Those commercials seemed to be right up Miller's ally- what sells, how do you commodify and perform cultural citizenship? A woman being put in her place commercial after commercial of course. But we shake it off and say "oh it's for the men," but who else is watching? Children, our future generations? Cultural citizenship and representation is powered through the commodity of commercial; like what Nibia said, "cultural citizenship of womanhood is performed." What a surprise that everything connects!
here's a spunky one too. hahaha.
ReplyDeletecopy and paste. it's called LAUNDRY. So it's obviously a CLASSIC!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7BEM7x9iVcc
I'd like to go back to Olivia's question regarding cultural citizenship. In many ways these commercials are such perfect examples of commodification -- with its erasure of the labor and materials required for the production of the commodities. Clearly the intent is to blur the line that Miller calls into question -- the line between citizen and consumer. So what are the consequences of blurring that line for feminism, for womanhood, for fair labor and wages, etc.?
ReplyDeleteOh, I just watched the laundry one...so good! These are quite funny, and you're right also tragic.
ReplyDeleteThe commercials in this particular video seem to tie questions of female citizenship, labor and consumerism. For one - it is obvious that domestic labor is in the realm of femininity. In fact, women LOVE to do laundry - or at least you SHOULD to be a real woman. What of women whose jobs it is to do laundry? Do they similarly love to get their socks super white? And do they just love to buy Clorox bleach? Or is it just the Kelly Ripas of the world who are the lovers of laundry?
A capable and responsible woman loves to do her family's laundry. And on top of that, she KNOWS laundry. This is because she legitimately likes to do it. This presupposes that she is a mother and a wife. She has time to care about her family's laundry, and she has the money to buy a fancy red washing machine. Oh, there is so much in this one clip!
Kelly Ripa doing the laundry was a pretty good representation of what the media wants to create out of women. That is, women are supposed to be perfection. Not only are we supposed to be skinny and look perfect with our hair just right, our makeup just right, and our outfits evoking sexy femininity, but we are supposed to look like this WHILE doing the laundry and cooking and running children from point A to B and B to A, while our “doofy husbands” go about their business! Pleaseeee. Media creates such unrealistic expectations of women. Representations of femininity, the ideal woman, and ideal beauty have real life implications. It would probably be abnormal for a girl to say, at some point in her life, she didn’t feel inadequate/unattractive/fill in the blank, feelings which stem from sociocultural pressures, ultimately discourse.
ReplyDeleteAs Miller discusses, the line between citizen and consumer has become blurred. It’s the same with media. Media and advertising have become inextricably linked, largely due to processes of convergence, consolidation, homogenization, hypercapitalism, consumerism, and yes, commodification. The blurring of these lines causes our agency, as critical citizen consumers, to be put to the test; for we are arbitrary citizens (what is the true definition of ‘citizen?’) consuming things (tangible and intangible) for often superficial purposes. What a mess! When women don’t realize they are an active, able-of-critical-thinking citizen, they merely attempt to match their desires with their ideal identity (of which is often a socially constructed, not realistic representation projected onto them by media, a socially constructed representation itself). Not being able to be self-conscious of your roles of citizen and roles of consumer causes confusion in terms of true identity, and secondly feeds the fire of our hyper-consumerist culture. In watching these videos, I thought of the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty, which tries to project the idea that women should accept themselves for who they are because they are naturally beautiful. However, these advertisements themselves are not depictions of real women. Where are the indications of cellulite, back fat, random bruises, dark circles under the eyes, etc? This makes me ask, what is a “real” woman? Also, there is now a Dove “Men+Care” campaign which projects what a “real man” should be like. It was interesting watching this commercial during the Superbowl with guy friends of mine who right after watching it said “No, thanks.” Media try to define what we should be for ourselves. However, a critical thinking citizen consumer of media has the agency to realize this and therefore the power to reclaim self-representation and self-identification in the authentic sense.
As Miller stated, the line between citizen and consumer has become very blurred. If being a citizen/woman requires me to cook, clean, purchase house hold goods or wear sexually enticing clothes. I will have to past! Because I don't fit the criteria, I say this because I don’t like to cook, but I do it, because it is apart of survival. I don't like to clean but I do it because I don’t like filth. By now you get the point! You don’t have to buy into these superficial expectations the media has created for women, in order to be a woman.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing all these wonderful and funny videos!
ReplyDeleteMiller examines the complexity and interrelationships between political, economic, and cultural citizenships. In a capitalist nation-state like the U.S., consuming is encouraged as it is considered to make the nation-state to become better. Advertisements try to convince people to buy the products that they may not need. What advertisements do are, on one hand, to create desires more than to tell you how good the products are; on the other hand, to create a discourse of what a female citizen should be - a gendered, heteronormative discourse of female citizenship. Do you want to be(come) a happy, successful, confident, and attractive woman in your relationship, family, job, and everyday life? This product can help you!
I feel like women citizenship is hardcore. First off, we already inferior by the patriarchal society and gender role. It seems like media wants more of us than we can handle. When some women see these different commericals they feels as if they have to do it because it's seen as the norm or the "American Dream" life of a woman. The media would do anything to convince you that this is the way to live as a woman if you don't you disqualify as a full citizen. Then you are looked as a more inferior woman in society.
ReplyDeleteI think that the commercials shown emphasize the importance of being a consumer for Americans, women in particular. This is a very clear example of Miller's Notion that consumer and citizen are becoming synonymous in recent times as the distinctions between the two are blurred. Miller uses an interesting Thomas Hobbes quote in his piece about cultural citizenship that I believe accurately sums up the intentions of the advertisements, "man is made fit for Society not by nature, but by training" (39). These advertisements are "training" women for what they should be. In the eyes of the advertisers, they should be concerned with the way they look, how clean their houses are, and what people think about their cooking. These women are defined not by who they are as people, but by what products they consume in the commercials. In this way, the line between citizen and consumer is actually being eliminated.
ReplyDeleteVery interesting videos! It really opened my eyes and made me aware of the ways in which commercials and advertisements are made...I find myself always analyzing commercials now...
ReplyDeleteWhat I noticed from the commercials presented in Lady Friends was how these advertisements are not real depictions of what life is really like...they commodify this idea of how a woman should be, put it in a commercial, making it seem like these woman have reached their full potential as a person through buying shoes, doing laundry, etc... As if they reached a state of true happiness. Which I saw through the signs of their happy and smiling faces. I saw this through the perfect houses that are shown.
Because of this and because of the all the other things people said, I do see this as a form of cultural citizenship. Because in order to be a woman, a happy one at that, having these lady friends and helping eachother out and doing laundry is what a woman must do to live that happy life.
These videos are great! Indeed, we have dual identities in the society. No matter perceiving myself as a citizen or a woman, I’m being a consumer all the time. Different women have different “womanhood”, and they are citizens of their own “womanhood”. Since things they desire and require vary, the exchange values of their favorable objects are also different from each other. I agree that the media and advertisers keep projecting and perpetuating gender roles, which create a lot of gender stereotypes. However, for me, it seems that so many women do fit in these stereotypical images, so the advertisers decide to use them in their ads in order to gain more affirmation and promote their products.
ReplyDeleteThese videos are great, although slightly inappropriate to be laughing out loud at while on the silent section of the undergraduate library..
ReplyDeleteI think your question about how the media' goals (and who makes up the media--corporations? the state?) relate to the commodification of "gendered" products is totally relevant. I think that Matthew's idea of the line between citizenship and consumer being eliminated through these advertisements interrelated to this idea. We are prompted to believe that enjoying domestic duties and using gender-specific, economically-specific products is the only acceptable way to be a productive member of society just like we're prompted by other ads to enjoy luxuries or to support a particular political candidate.
The media is consistently trying to persuade us into believing that we need to follow their commodification of the stereotypes we ascribe to and use their products in order to fit into our culture of consumption. The videos do a great job at pointing out how ludicrous this practice often is.
LOL!! I see these blurred lines of citizenship and commodification kind of coming out. I also see once again the male gender depicting women as they would like to see them. I mean why wouldn't a woman look that after birthing children, cleaning a house, doing the house chores, taking care of a family, and in 2010, working a full time job! Why wouldn't the perfect woman want the perfect washing machine? I mean if you're going to use the the most perfect and beautiful washing machine you might as well do it the right way and look perfect right?? Wrong!
ReplyDeleteBut one thing we have to stop and think about is, although we blame the male species as commodifying the female specie. But shouldn't address the women who see no wrong with being a sex figure and feeding into and promoting the stereo-typical american woman. I mean as women we do take time out to try to identify with what feel like we have to identify with (cultural citizenship) in society. Us women struggle to be the ideal women that the media depicts. Don't we end helping to commodify "womanhood"?
When I watched the Dating Advice segment, I saw that this woman was desperate to understand why she's feeling the way she does about being single. Furthermore, the need to be with a man for a sense of wholeness and completion is extremely sexist in the sense that it creates no alternatives and no room for a woman to be independent and still accepted by men. I agree with Patrick and bheath2 because we do place a lot of blame on men while women are, too, (sad to say) participating in this com modification of womanhood and citizenship as a female. WE are operating by means of internalized sexism that shows everytime we spend nearly thousands of bucks on outfits for one date. Ha! Let's think about it first lol.
ReplyDelete