tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32554780744113523952024-03-13T16:48:59.031-07:00Cultural Media LiteracyThe primary focus of cultural media literacy is to illuminate the function of communications media and its technologies, its narratives and use with regard to people, society, what we do, how we think and what we think about, how we treat each other and the natural world in which we live. Media for media's sake is meaningless. Media for society's sake is a progressive and necessary endeavor.Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.comBlogger40125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-48960637729968555812016-08-06T15:54:00.003-07:002016-08-06T15:54:45.773-07:00Good Times for Portrayals of Africans in Television<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4gG9ZNebXyzc9CyyETpXhTNnz3JJ5jQdiuamf9gBWWIduojchUvqfoJyWdDFMpOaM4zDxVNGPSy1Qme2wv3fsEmOABBs8i1DkG44Z1GlEPMEqHEm1a7jETEChGYHyCoynki17NiLMfv0/s1600/GoodTimes-maincast-imdb_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4gG9ZNebXyzc9CyyETpXhTNnz3JJ5jQdiuamf9gBWWIduojchUvqfoJyWdDFMpOaM4zDxVNGPSy1Qme2wv3fsEmOABBs8i1DkG44Z1GlEPMEqHEm1a7jETEChGYHyCoynki17NiLMfv0/s200/GoodTimes-maincast-imdb_.jpg" width="193" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">from imdb.com</td></tr>
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Watching "Good Times", the popular 70's sitcom centered around the lives of an African family living a hard, but loving life in the housing projects of Chicago. Realistic and grounded in so much of its writing and performance, this important program regularly framed tough and not before seen televisual serial engagements of racism, sexism, gun violence, education, colonial politics, poverty, economics and African liberation. There has not been a show like or as good as "Good Times" since its run from 1974 to 1979.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBBU91DRXAiBtsoNy8BxOkmcGPfmuQweiwBd5rVqN63PPyWQml8_3rNaM_bXFbJt7NTB2YKp65T8K-h6jnnz89K7OmL2Ced-v1CAiOyfz1ocS5AfZRxznijwX-NNk0PZSnadDY3ytKEFE/s1600/GoodTimes-JimmieWalker-imdb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBBU91DRXAiBtsoNy8BxOkmcGPfmuQweiwBd5rVqN63PPyWQml8_3rNaM_bXFbJt7NTB2YKp65T8K-h6jnnz89K7OmL2Ced-v1CAiOyfz1ocS5AfZRxznijwX-NNk0PZSnadDY3ytKEFE/s200/GoodTimes-JimmieWalker-imdb.jpg" width="161" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">from imdb.com</td></tr>
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One of the key contradictions in the narrative of "Good Times" was the presence and character of Jimmie Walker's character of J.J. Evans, the eldest son of the Florida and James Evans, played respectively by Esther Rolle and John Amos. J.J. was ostensibly and persistently a problematic clownish Sambo character, complete with broad toothy smiles, overacted lines and a physicality that lent himself more to cartoons than the sophisticated "real life" drama going on around him. Some of the behind the scenes and contractual issues of the show were reported to have some from cast disagreement with the characterization of J.J. through so many of his "dy-no-mite" episodes. It is remarkable and worthy of a closer look that a show like "Good Times", as progressive and forward-thinking as it was, still found a need to frame Africanity, in part, in this demeaning and clownish way.<br />
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The deeper look into "Good Times" helps us reveal the positive and progressive ways televisual narratives can represent the actual dynamics of human life in an interest of helping us actually see our way to more compassionate and liberated futures. The problematic presence that J.J.'s character represented helps us to see that we must never let our media literacy guard down even in a largely positive and helpful narrative context. Looking at those contradictions in that context help us to locate and critique troubling and negative portrayals in other narratives and also in the larger society itself. Looking at these contradictions is part of the core work of cultural media studies that allows us to be better, more deeply literate around televisual and cinematic texts.Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-22544904205954151432016-01-16T19:37:00.001-08:002016-01-16T19:37:20.394-08:00Gamers Find Way to Rape Game Characters in Grand Theft Auto<p dir="ltr">http://m.nydailynews.com/news/national/grand-theft-auto-players-find-rape-characters-article-1.1902378</p>
Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-31275936508988714422015-11-16T01:45:00.000-08:002023-04-10T07:19:51.144-07:00EWTN Again: Thomas E. Wood & His Justificaton of Colonialsm & Religious Imperialism<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip21MilWk-QAYkUnYmsAfRRg9LqwbOprt4QORfNLmONvIRU6pQow57ZZtK37krLLU540Hf3Fqhz1CO_CL6cCbeMxuLG4UIv0p-DXj42AlnA-k4Nh1WWmWKb5SGWHFDHOmnrcymKd_jG_M/s1600/TomWoodsbookcover_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip21MilWk-QAYkUnYmsAfRRg9LqwbOprt4QORfNLmONvIRU6pQow57ZZtK37krLLU540Hf3Fqhz1CO_CL6cCbeMxuLG4UIv0p-DXj42AlnA-k4Nh1WWmWKb5SGWHFDHOmnrcymKd_jG_M/s320/TomWoodsbookcover_.jpg" width="233" /></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";">Suffice to say, I should have been in bed 2.5 hours
ago.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was drawn, as I regularly am to
scan subject matter in numerous television sources. I chose EWTN, the roamin
catholic channel again and heard one of the most reprehensible justifications
for European church and state imperialism in the western hemisphere as I had
heard in some time. The episode was on international law as part of series
called, "The Roman Catholic Church: Builder of Western Civilization"
based on a book by Thomas E. Woods who also hosts the show.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";">In addition to incredibly racist ideas about indigenous
peoples, Woods went on the give the catholic church a pat on the back for
asserting that they espouse treating all people equally whether they are
baptized into the faith or not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(long
pause)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And he was talking about the 15th
century.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(long pause)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The racist, imperialist papal bulls were
written in the 1400's.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(long pause)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That's the 15th century.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(long pause)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That's when the roamin catholic church decided it would reduce to
servitude any nation not already held by a christian prince. (long pause) This
boggles my mind that grown-ups say these things and have a 24/7 global tv
channel to say them on. </span></div>
<span style="font-family: "calibri";"><o:p><a href="http://ewtn.edgeboss.net/download/ewtn/audiolibrary/cathbuildciv_11.mp3"></a></o:p></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";"><a href="http://ewtn.edgeboss.net/download/ewtn/audiolibrary/cathbuildciv_11.mp3"></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";"><o:p><a href="http://ewtn.edgeboss.net/download/ew">http://ewtn.edgeboss.net/download/ew</a><a href="http://ewtn.edgeboss.net/download/ewtn/audiolibrary/cathbuildciv_11.mp3">tn/audiolibrary/cathbuildciv_11.mp3</a></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";">Here's more on Woods and his twisted historical
perspectives:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";"><a href="http://www.libertyclassroom.com/free-sample-from-trails-west-how-freedom-settled-the-west/">h</a><a href="http://www.libertyclassroom.com/free-sample-from-trails-west-how-freedom-settled-the-west/">ttp://www.libertyclassroom.com/free-sample-from-trails-west-how-freedom-settled-the-west/</a></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiGTXxrpQoG3A3BtgmrHd7JQ3vim9ObdQc87AXmeNc8OZ5x5CCBy3MIz2mC9u5E7SY3iY0rvJE1RsfmfUhtbyLytQo98Rkre6nhI7RWFqMkapwObbzhZuyzrtsXjxTxT4sxFaA1eIMuNA/s1600/TomWoodsEWTNscreencptr.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiGTXxrpQoG3A3BtgmrHd7JQ3vim9ObdQc87AXmeNc8OZ5x5CCBy3MIz2mC9u5E7SY3iY0rvJE1RsfmfUhtbyLytQo98Rkre6nhI7RWFqMkapwObbzhZuyzrtsXjxTxT4sxFaA1eIMuNA/s320/TomWoodsEWTNscreencptr.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: "calibri";">In this video lecture, amongst other things, Brad Birzer, a
libertyclassroom guest professor asserts that Sitting Bull was a catholic,
befriended and converted by a catholic missionary.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Interestingly enough, it seems Birzer nor
Woods reads catholic writing as catholicism.org writes that Sitting Bulls
vaunted catholicism was somewhat questionable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Suffice to say, Woods, his EWTN show and his website leave a lot to be
desired at first glance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "calibri";"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjryTy3B4xVDhyphenhyphenGI0PuyY4Lv21f7W94DZXP6bFlAnBs8_r3UXnhVwY0IA3NxiYyaNPEYflmkJ9I8IILNYRXjjZ_u8LWlmoYBkEGjvIRHoxwyP1oI0zPq0nV-GhDFJ27mmLbevuLoZNRhxQ/s1600/Tom_Woods_by_Gage_Skidmore_3-239x300.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjryTy3B4xVDhyphenhyphenGI0PuyY4Lv21f7W94DZXP6bFlAnBs8_r3UXnhVwY0IA3NxiYyaNPEYflmkJ9I8IILNYRXjjZ_u8LWlmoYBkEGjvIRHoxwyP1oI0zPq0nV-GhDFJ27mmLbevuLoZNRhxQ/s1600/Tom_Woods_by_Gage_Skidmore_3-239x300.jpg" /></a>At best, it's a body of questionable work that seeks to
rationalize European colonial exploitation and religious imperialism, glossing
exasperatingly over the pivotal role the church played in the genocide and
exploitation of indigenous peoples from north to south America and Africa and
glorifying the church's role as the source of western cultural genesis.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If Woods could actually draw a bead on what
that means, he might not want the church to take any credit for any of that.<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjryTy3B4xVDhyphenhyphenGI0PuyY4Lv21f7W94DZXP6bFlAnBs8_r3UXnhVwY0IA3NxiYyaNPEYflmkJ9I8IILNYRXjjZ_u8LWlmoYBkEGjvIRHoxwyP1oI0zPq0nV-GhDFJ27mmLbevuLoZNRhxQ/s1600/Tom_Woods_by_Gage_Skidmore_3-239x300.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><br /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">retrieved from <a href="http://harvardpolitics.com/interviews/getting-to-know-scholar-thomas-e-woods-jr/">http://harvardpolitics.com/interviews/getting-to-know-scholar-thomas-e-woods-jr/</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</span></div>
Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-85323365030422027402015-10-26T12:48:00.000-07:002015-10-26T12:48:41.938-07:00"The Blob" and the Answer to the "?" of Climate Change<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXyb2Y3GYh6JX9vJ1NBX8DWlxRygShCjuEOD0kue5N1E3lpnkMpEd15FjAVCuNfZuOODC8SxY_81DaKjUG3h9kk7dNXLxbsgktFQ4UImADBE-Q0HLv0APwbUBllLc2o8qOgb1HJhWdBW0/s1600/Blob+movie+poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXyb2Y3GYh6JX9vJ1NBX8DWlxRygShCjuEOD0kue5N1E3lpnkMpEd15FjAVCuNfZuOODC8SxY_81DaKjUG3h9kk7dNXLxbsgktFQ4UImADBE-Q0HLv0APwbUBllLc2o8qOgb1HJhWdBW0/s400/Blob+movie+poster.jpg" width="220" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051418/">http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051418/</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
"The Blob" is an interesting narrative that is slightly more than meets the eye as we watch the final scenes. The amorphous globulin blob has shown up to terrorize and consume a small semi-idyllic town. After oozing its way to dominating the townspeople, Steve McQueen realizes that the one way they can fight this menace is by freezing it. He notices it retreat when it is sprayed with a fire extinguisher, finding that the CO2's temperature puts it in check.<br />
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After calling up the powers of the federal government, they scheme to gather up the now extinguisher-frozen blob and parachute it onto the Arctic ice shelf from a plane named the GlobeMaster (hmmm...).<br />
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As McQueen hatches this simple plan with the town police chief, his final words of the movie are, "...as long as the Arctic stays cold". Needless to say, we may not be worried about an actual blob unfreezing itself as the Earth's Arctic region is gravely melting as we speak due to climate change, but we must be concerned not only with our assumptions about the inert effects of our industrial capitalist presence on the face of the earth, but our growing, though alarmingly slowly, of our awareness of how hard it has been to finally get it into our minds and hearts that the Arctic ice shelf is actually melting - a thing we never really thought was possible - and is increasingly revealing the dangerous domino-effect born out of the initial inceptions of colonialism's love for environmental exploitation and industrial over-production.<br />
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Modern industrial human presence on the earth has had and is having deleterious effects on every ecosystem on the earth. Modern industrialized humans have created a dangerous context for the earth and its citizens that show the ludicrous nature of the presumption of being masters of this particular globe. This movie was created at a time in which western society was reveling in its manipulative powers, maximizing its use of extractive industries, plastics, petroleum and artificial chemistries in colonial, settler-colonial and neo-colonial contexts. The very anti-cultural dynamics that were present during the creation of this film were exactly the elements that would answer the "?" in the final shot of the film as the blob gets gently dropped onto the ice. The anti-cultural context of this film was the undoing of film's narrative. The modern industrial world is still in the process of revealing if it's context will be humanity's undoing.<br />
<br />
"!"<br />
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Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-82759731787560521682015-06-03T11:03:00.001-07:002015-06-03T11:03:45.192-07:00Thoughts on western movie narratives....June 3, 2015<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8INpMkqk4CacYSOcBCU_36NJujZv82ygB6Jj5dkjCSvZrct1wo9dDKZM_jYAAjVg01lx84G4caO8PO1rkhcZhnOm2UXJJkNZjCcamdsVqO4jYh60weraHVuDMdYHa7_x2qdnGwhAhGqA/s1600/INSP-SaddleUpSaturday+page+cptr.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="152" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8INpMkqk4CacYSOcBCU_36NJujZv82ygB6Jj5dkjCSvZrct1wo9dDKZM_jYAAjVg01lx84G4caO8PO1rkhcZhnOm2UXJJkNZjCcamdsVqO4jYh60weraHVuDMdYHa7_x2qdnGwhAhGqA/s320/INSP-SaddleUpSaturday+page+cptr.jpg" width="320" /></a>Spending hours and hours still, watching western movies, floored at the depth of the fantasies about masculinity and the on-going insults to injury against indigenous peoples, women and Africans. These films, old and new, are fetid oceans of violent male colonial misbehavioral replay after replay after replay of the worst narratives of Manifest Destiny laced unapologetically with christian biblism par excellence. It is amazing how these writers and producers created slickish stories to spank us into paternal acquiescence around ever entertaining the notion that there could ever be a Spirit or Goddess or god that could be mentioned in the same sentence as their biblical "G-O-D" of faraway desert mythology. There is constant shaming of Native-ness and scorn for the idea and presence of indigenous spiritual systems and a constant flow of ideological and visual violence against indigenous women...the "S-word" abounds, flows like polluted water. Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-91640915114723113692014-01-09T08:54:00.001-08:002014-01-09T08:57:15.388-08:00"Western Playset": Cowboys and Indians<p dir="ltr">I wonder what it is that goes through the head of the boy who asks for or receives this "play" set? What narratives will he play out? Researchers/academics in the documentary "Mickey Mouse Monopoly" assert that children play out the dominant cultural media narratives related to those toys, those characters, especially when they relate directly to the characters in the movie or tv show. So what narratives will they play out? Will the cowboys always "win"? Will the Indians always die horrific deaths at the hands and bullets of the settlers (cowboys)? Will colonial, manifest destiny narratives be reinforced by their play? Will any Indians be heroes? Will the cowboys be characterized as violent terrorists? Will they gain any insight into settler-colonial dynamics and the nature of imperialism? Will the boy be any closer to becoming a settler-ally to indigenous peoples?</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGvcFcrORivPl9RZdwd35YWRoIkn7BC2oY_s4qDLQHBn7T5RR0LC74Wuh-RkU885VkWE3KDbVYZPBXXFHE7-y8F3vagfAf08PS31RqlBVTM-pbejHVcpbAlhOucCf6OfB7cSms28YqGWk/s1600/IE-CML-Western%252520Playset%252520Pkg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"> <img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGvcFcrORivPl9RZdwd35YWRoIkn7BC2oY_s4qDLQHBn7T5RR0LC74Wuh-RkU885VkWE3KDbVYZPBXXFHE7-y8F3vagfAf08PS31RqlBVTM-pbejHVcpbAlhOucCf6OfB7cSms28YqGWk/s640/IE-CML-Western%252520Playset%252520Pkg.jpg"> </a> </div>Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-16408346718718680052013-12-08T09:20:00.001-08:002013-12-08T09:20:37.246-08:00"Classic": Retro-grade TV in Our Digital Age<p dir="ltr">One of the three old movie channels, digital channels of local network affiliates, has an ad professing testimonials of people so happy "real" tv is back again, that they feel good about tv again and that they can let their children watch without being worried about what they'll be exposed to. These are the channels that play movies from the 30's to the 70's and many made later. They are cheap to replay and bring in advertising revenue with films owned by particular studios now boughtbout by the media conglomerates that own the networks. These are the movies with the most racist and sexist images, characterizations and narratives ever produced, with some of the widest distributions of their time, now getting even more distribution - and a free pass on their socially and politically retrograde storylines...they're "classics". It's troubling to think that those testimonials might be real, at least that they might reflect many other people's idea of what 'good', 'safe' television programming looks like.</p>
<p dir="ltr">And yes, I just watched a bug-eyed Willie Best react in his "classic" stepinfetchit role to the idea of a ghost in a haunted Puerto Rican swamp while ferrying yellow-faced Peter Lorre in 1939's "Mr. Moto in Danger Island". It just doesn't get any 'safer' than that. Westerns also figure voluminous on these channels, most old, but many newer, very few with any redeeming, non-settler-colonial, non-genocidal qualities. "Safe", they say. Isn't it strange that this sort of story, much created before the bare beginnings of social and televisual/cinematice reforms of the 60's and 70's, is what they say we think is "safe"? </p>
<p dir="ltr">Oh, and with regard to those ghosts in the swamp, the USAmerican colonials....yes, colonials as in colonialism...were discussing the people that hold such ideas about Spirit beings and Ancestors and such. They chided such claims of "ghosts" as "superstitions of a dangerously ignorant people". (long pause) "Dangerously ignorant". Those are indigenous people and African descendants in those swamps. Those are humans, children, women and men, freedom fighters in those swamps. And don't let it slip by you that these anti-indigenous, anti-African, anti-woman narratives assume the ascendancy and presumptuous superiority of a colonial culture that deified a particularly "holy" ghost, but maybe merely a ghost nonetheless, albeit tied to a he-god and a so-called savior-son whose adherents would prove much more globally and ignorantly dangerous than any culture known to revere and keep intimate relations with their Dead.</p>
Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-8164732374270894512013-12-03T20:15:00.001-08:002013-12-03T20:15:11.581-08:00X-mess Quotes<p dir=ltr>Get in. Get more christmas. - <u>Kmart</u></p>
Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-61720005633188671602013-10-18T10:36:00.001-07:002013-10-18T10:36:18.797-07:00M-ad-ness.<p dir=ltr>"Swipe your card and the world is yours! Live rich!" - tv ad for Monopoly game with new credit card feature</p>
<p dir=ltr>"No fears...no limits...maximum speed" - Hot Wheels toy car tv ad</p>
Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-47630967102742688842013-09-06T08:56:00.001-07:002013-09-06T09:44:14.044-07:00Watching Where We Are Going<p><u><u>Young</u></u> man texting feverishly as he walks off train into station deep underground, maybe fifty of us all walking toward the longest escalators in the Boston transit system, usually two escalators working to get commuters up onto the earth's surface. In this moment only one is working. Text-Fever guy heads assumptively toward the escalator not moving, full speed afoot, blazing speed afinger. I spy with my little out of the corner eye his leg lift up in the air as if the steps are celestially predestined to always rise up to meet him. The analog world of blood, bone and mechanical contrivances is somehow a constant and regular bandwidth of experience in the digitized mind and body of this specimen of Post-Landline Man. </p><p>And his rudely awakened goin'-nowhere dance was stellar! An inebriated George Balanchine could not have produced such gross motor madness as this man stumbled back - if only for an embarrassed moment - into consciousness of a world that proves daily why our field of vision is actually about 180 degrees wide...or so I hope. His feet groped their way back to truth then sped him back to The Matrix for his "blue pill" cocktail. Thank goodness for him he lives in a world relatively "protected" from most semblances of natural realities like slimy snakes, scary bears, inconvenient trees and motivated stairs. The modern human did well to find a virtual place to hide from eye contact, embodied intercourse a la conversation, the perniciousness of soil and absolutely unncessary things like sacred naturo-spiritual energetic experiences and ritual that sustain our understanding of the primacy of nature and analog(ous), embodied experience as humans born into the Family of Being and Becoming (one large branch of hughly successful human cultural development calls it "All Our Relations"). </p><p>Our little digital, virtual, electronic pseudo-world is stumbling toward an implosion of sorts. </p><p>We are analog. We are frequencies. We are vibrations. We are waves. We are wind. We are rivers. We are rain. We are wings. We are fins. We are blood and we are bone. We are not reducible to bitstreams. We are not equal to the zerosums of data. We are not predestined to accept The Singularity. We need not take seriously the fantasies of the Terasem movement, though we must treat seriously the cultural implications. We needn't give in to the idea or reality of immortality through matricizing with humanoid android technologies.</p>
<p>And we should watch - much more carefully and critically - where we are going.</p>
<p>(images from a Panasonic exhibit at a Boston shooping mall)</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRKQhQaPo1S6wHE043uNgMha1vRfh1WU0fx-nbWdAlLn7yJLUJ3fs8Ptn5TQYnFeoHNaztLUypcHyicqMe07bjrNRM0Q1FzGMHEc7_-kcIEDQfh7is92ONdqMZLYmlXOWS1vJuOAxRreI/s1600/Panasonic%252520Mall%252520Display%2525204-13d.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"> <img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRKQhQaPo1S6wHE043uNgMha1vRfh1WU0fx-nbWdAlLn7yJLUJ3fs8Ptn5TQYnFeoHNaztLUypcHyicqMe07bjrNRM0Q1FzGMHEc7_-kcIEDQfh7is92ONdqMZLYmlXOWS1vJuOAxRreI/s320/Panasonic%252520Mall%252520Display%2525204-13d.jpg"> </a> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3-4HfSKM-1E60vmTg4iSM3jzTcs1gz7UpyxE2OAn8VoO07De4k9JvSesnofiROoh43cXJSNsFJAJea-It5nq_Td8aJhMPpRxajowLZ_wr523MqS1jyp62QO_2L_9wxe8JdMIEVeLY9MA/s1600/Panasonic%252520Mall%252520Display%2525204-13c.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"> <img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3-4HfSKM-1E60vmTg4iSM3jzTcs1gz7UpyxE2OAn8VoO07De4k9JvSesnofiROoh43cXJSNsFJAJea-It5nq_Td8aJhMPpRxajowLZ_wr523MqS1jyp62QO_2L_9wxe8JdMIEVeLY9MA/s320/Panasonic%252520Mall%252520Display%2525204-13c.jpg"> </a> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9Y80m4kzFhHA-W9BmeATAPKnPGyWk3YR2B2tQh8Hu_nR_XyQ5dQuQ0-w3JP08a9mGH2FgkTuVBxKP-sh8MpK4rIZOqj4FFQltc91m1FCcI7T2oBfjNfb20s9A5yMeqE1Ab7HyFkPhnx0/s1600/Panasonic%252520Mall%252520Display%2525204-13e.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"> <img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9Y80m4kzFhHA-W9BmeATAPKnPGyWk3YR2B2tQh8Hu_nR_XyQ5dQuQ0-w3JP08a9mGH2FgkTuVBxKP-sh8MpK4rIZOqj4FFQltc91m1FCcI7T2oBfjNfb20s9A5yMeqE1Ab7HyFkPhnx0/s320/Panasonic%252520Mall%252520Display%2525204-13e.jpg"> </a> </div>Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-72230525388166438772012-12-30T23:49:00.002-08:002013-09-06T09:23:33.424-07:00Death and A Double Tragedy: The Failures of Talk Radio<br />
[This is a reposting of a submission to the Franklin Pierce University "Pierce Arrow" blog, posted originally on Oct. 15, 2009]<br />
<br />
The following entry is written to help us gain perspective on some of
the media communications concerning the recent, horrific crimes
perpetrated in Mount Vernon, New Hampshire. It is shared with you to
contribute to a larger discussion that exists and should be engaged on a
wider basis about media and violence and how we engage the very
important issues of violence, crime and youth in this society. It has
been written knowing that this event is still fresh in the hearts and
minds of people not only in the communities of New Hampshire, but all
over the country. Communities, families, youth and individuals are
still shaken, questioning their safety, their family security and their
lives. It is out of respect for these communities, families, youth and
individuals that this entry is submitted for public review.<br />
<br />
This writer is aware that this situation is still fresh in our
consciousness and emotions and that the issues that arise from it are
important to have in correct perspective. This discussion about the
media handling of this crime is considered key in our on-going search
for clarity, resolution and healing.<br />
<br />
~~~~~~~~~~<br />
<br />
It happened a couple of sundays ago….and became the talk of the
region and beyond. A “home invasion” planned and executed by four teens
in New Hampshire, raising so many important issues of life, death,
safety, class, youth, eldership, respect, gender safety, gendered
violence, parenting, schooling, community, isolation, culture and more
that eludes my consciousness at this moment.<br />
<br />
The Keene Sentinel, in their Oct.8 edition, reported how fear has
changed to anger in the community, how, at least from one person’s view,
“..it’s just pure evil. There’s no explaining it” (page 6). Another
story presented the “what ifs”, questions of the closeness to other
families and homes, the unbelievable nature of this sort of violence in
this sort of neighborhood.<br />
<br />
Tragedy of this sort is devastating and life-altering among many
other undesirable things and calls for clarity, understanding, communal
embrace, patience and a rededication to compassionate ways of thinking
and cultural production. Tragedies such as these call us to look
deeper inside ourselves to find not only the sources of these
pathologies, why they exist in some and not others, but also to find the
cultural practices that remediate and decrease, if not extinguish,
these abominable acts. These tragic occurrences, that rend heart from
heart, family from family, wife from husband, sanity from mind,
challenge us to the core of our being and ask us to deepen our embrace
of all that is good, right and loving in us and in the world.<br />
<br />
We have seen countless numbers of situations from the Manson killings
to Columbine to Virginia Tech, to Mount Vernon and so many other places
and situations, where we are deluged with story after story about “why”
and “how” and the human cost of murder. The media have provided us
with information, perspective (to some degree) and statistics that at
once assuage our fears and feed them, too. Particular dialogues and
commentary in recent talk radio have created a dynamic that makes this
recent local New Hampshire tragedy doubly reprehensible.<br />
<br />
As I drove back and forth to the university last week, I scanned a
few radio stations as usual on my ninety minute trek and was challenged
by some of the problematic commentary from WTKK 96.9FM. The discussions
seemed to raise so many questions, suggesting so many of the underlying
problems of a society out of touch with its own humanity, yet afraid to
look itself in the mirror for clarity and honesty and the hope that
grows from an intimate knowledge of the resilience of the human spirit.
It seemed that in the face of tragedy, talk radio was unwilling to be a
real resource, relinquishing what I would call its responsibility to be
a voice of reason, strength, maturity and hope.<br />
So many things were said, but touched on in shallow form and content,
seemingly as if they knew not of what they were talking about. Issues
of cities vs. the country/suburbs and what our expectations were of
these geographical icons, issues of class, implied race, capital
punishment and parenting all came out in a confusing collage of
emotional melodrama that at times chafed in juxtaposition to ads for
bedding or hot-tubs or some such product.<br />
Statements made on different days by different hosts seemed to
validate the same message of emotionalism and sensationalism beyond
compassion, of individualism beyond communal embrace and quick, violent
reactionism beyond that clarity that comes from true introspection.<br />
On October 7, while listening to Michele McPhee’s show, grand
statements were being bandied about vilifying “shoddy parenting” as
being the cause of the four youth embarking on their violent excursion.
Through caller after caller and in her long tirades (well-matched to
the horrific nature of the subject), the story of the failure of the
suspects’ parents was told over and over. Through the hours, the story
deepened as new ideas about why the parents of these four young men and
many parents in general fall short of even modest expectations for what
is necessary to raise a socially-stable child. There were more
indictments than solutions, it seemed, as the stridency of the discourse
narrowed the possibility for real understanding and engagement of a
core problem in USAmerican society – the support and development of
youth in this culture.<br />
<br />
Further into the evening’s exhortations, a 19-year-old woman called
in, claiming to know or know of one or more of the suspects in the
murder and assault case. This woman, named Sarah, reported that one or
more of the suspects had been seen days before the crime with
newly-shaven heads and shouting “free Manson”, a reference to Charles
Manson, a famous (infamous) and convicted murderer still serving time in
prison for his crimes. After claiming “breaking news”, McPhee
correctly asked about the responsibility of the school in reporting such
behavior in a world now informed by the dynamics of such events as the
Virginia Tech and Columbine shootings. McPhee correctly pointed to the
necessity of communal diligence in the face of such pre-crime behavior,
cleanly missing the point that she was beginning to contradict her
earlier statements that this kind of crime was solely or mainly about
shoddy parenting. McPhee was now suggesting, and rightly so, that there
is a larger social responsibility in being able to monitor and mediate
such anti-social behavior, especially where there are gross and outward
displays such as those reported by Sarah. Caught up in her own
momentum, it was apparent that clarity was giving way to narrow-minded
sensationalism. It always feels good at first, but never produces
enough of anything good to move us beyond the emotionality of our own
pain. And pain is what we should feel when someone is killed, when
ANYone is killed.<br />
<br />
Which raises another issue embedded in the histrionics of the show.
There were many statements made by host and caller alike of the
“unbelievable” nature of this crime. This kind of crime doesn’t happen
in places like Mount Vernon. Clearly, this kind of crime is not endemic
to Mount Vernon or other small towns. The assertions came through that
violence was not a product of country or suburban life, that violence
in urban areas is one of the reasons WHY people move to places like
Mount Vernon or other rural or small population communities. Inherent
in this type of account is the suggestion that crime and murder lives
and breeds and belongs in cities, not like Boston (still a
parochialized, balkanized and idealized municipality), but like Roxbury
and Dorchester, like Detroit and Newark and Southeast Los Angeles.
Nowhere in this broadcast was there a clear critique of class and race
that would have led us to a better understanding of the dynamics that
actually create crime and violence and why crime and violence SEEM to be
so prevalent in some areas and not in others. McPhee and others
suggested that there was no connection between the crimes in Roxbury
(talk of which seems to be relegated to 1090AM) and that in Mount
Vernon, that these crimes were urbanized, other-ized types of crimes
that just don’t, can’t and shouldn’t happen in their midst. There was a
suggestion that different kinds of people, different than McPhee or her
listeners, commit these crimes, that these suspects were merely and
heinously thugs that have no social or private history or precursor, but
their own evil lives. These suspects are connected to nothing, but
themselves and at best they are exhibiting behavior that, in essence,
belongs somewhere else….somewhere more crowded, dirty, with less trees
and less people who go to parent/teacher meetings and Whole Foods
stores.<br />
<br />
What McPhee and her show were communicating and cultivating was the
idea that these crimes happen in isolation of the larger, prettier, more
well-veneered society. McPhee and her callers refused to engage deeply
the inter-connected nature of urb and suburb, the connection of youth
to adult and that the failure of a set of parents is a failure of the
community of parents. We take credit as a city, state or nation when we
look to our own wealth, opulence and material comfort, how many Lexi or
Prii we have in our driveways and the sanctity of our greenspaces and
cleanliness of our streets. We claim that communally. It is a part of
our national jingoism, our fevered and immature patriotism in the face
of the international mirror, often held up to us by the fingers of
“third world” hands or the walls of “developING” nation political
structures. When we see the social structures fall apart in these
difficult and painful ways, we rarely take it on the chin as a national
pathology or even a localized , but, if not epidemic, then endemic
disease, at least from the standpoint of what is said in the media. The
show made no suggestion that when OUR children CONTINUE to display
anti-social and dangerous and pre-criminal or pre-dangerous behavior, we
ALL have a responsibility to notice, report and address these issues
BEFORE they become criminal and dangerous and horrific.<br />
McPhee’s statement that the crime had “nothing” to do with video
games, television or even society itself is short-sighted, narrow,
misleading and without the support of well-known research. Though
cultural production such as television programming and video games do
not directly cause (generally speaking) crimes and violent behavior, as
powerful effects theorists would suggest, they do contribute to cultural
and personal beliefs about violence and crime, of gender, race, class
and access, of personal and social expectation, to our levels of
self-esteem, agency and ability to project ourselves positively or
negatively into our lives, communities and futures. The violence and
anti-social behavior which seems to drive television programming and
many popular video games informs us and validates ways of thinking and
being in the world, creating cultural space conducive to such behavior.
Though there may be no television shows regularly lionizing Charles
Manson, you can not get through one night of prime-time programming
without hundreds of violent and anti-social acts across all the
available channels. When I ask my students of media studies and history
what the predominant communicative icons of peace and love are in the
media I am met with the same stark silence each and every time. Our
culture validates the presence of violence in its midst and its dominant
media are the standard bearers of this presence.<br />
<br />
On another note, the presence of the extreme validations of violence
can be easily seen in a music industry that regularly supports violent
and anti-social concepts in its lyrics. McPhee was notably surprised to
learn of the presence of “horrorcore” rap, a musical phenomenon that
aggrandizes concepts of violence, death and gore and reported as a form
of music listened to by the Mount Vernon crime suspects. Brought to the
forefront by another heinous crime allegedly committed by one of
horrorocore’s adherents, Syko Sam, a Washington Post story about the
crime highlights the “us” and “them” discussion that plagued the talk
radio landscape here.<br />
<br />
“FARMVILLE, Va., Sept. 23 — The town is what its name suggests, a
little crossroads burg swaddled in crop fields and pastureland for miles
around. God and country-western span the radio dial, the main street is
Main Street and the barber sells Lucky Tiger flat-top wax.<br />
<br />
Folks in Farmville figured that the town, population 7,000 or so, was
their haven, an oasis of quiet sanity in what a lot of them think is a
mixed-up, gone-to-hell world. That was before a 20-year-old Californian,
a rapper of luridly violent lyrics who billed himself as Syko Sam,
alighted in their central Virginia community last week.”<br />
<br />
(<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/23/AR2009092304781.html">http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/23/AR2009092304781.html</a>)<br />
<br />
The iconic descriptors of “little crossroads burg swaddled in crop
fields” and “pastureland” and “main street is Main street” and “God and
country-western span the radio dial” suggest that those of concern in
Farmville didn’t see this one coming. With all due respect to all of
Farmville’s citizens, it seemed as though it would have been extremely
difficult to extricatethemselves from their own cultural momentum to see
the onset of such a horrendous occurrence in which four people were
bludgeoned to death. But someone in Farmville invited Syko Sam into
their “oasis of quiet sanity”. And it seems it was their youth.<br />
Neither Syko Sam (officially named Richard Alden Samuel McCroskey III
and reportedly from California) or the four youth suspected in the
crimes in Mount Vernon created horrorcore rap or the idea of murder, but
those ideas lived strongly enough in the core of our young minds and
hearts in these country oases to manifest themselves in the hands of
their youthful perpetrators.<br />
What the above iconic descriptors also suggest is that the people in
these communities and beyond expect that crime belongs more comfortably
somewhere else and that, at least as far as the WTKK talk shows are
concerned, there is no credible connection between the communities that
the crimes happened in and the suspected perpetrators who lived in those
communities. There was in no plausible way any culpability on a larger
social level for the creation and support of people who might do
horrendous things such as these. The problem here, from the media’s
standpoint, is that the discourse leads us to scapegoating and
disconnection, rather than to a place of introspection and social
responsibility, where the initial impulse beyond our natural and correct
reproach of the behavior is remedial on the larger scale as opposed to
punitive in the narrow scale, as indicated by McPhee’s call to put these
young men to death. Admittedly, those same impulses to murder those
young people might exist in us all and the feeling that we should is
supported by our deep sense of hurt in the face of unconscionable acts
such as those perpetrated in Mount Vernon, Farmville OR “inner-city”
ANYwhere. We can kill these young men tomorrow, but will we have
figured out what the pathological precursors are that exist in our
society that validate and support this behavior beyond our own ability
as intelligent, somewhat empowered and concerned adults to abrogate?
What, in our hearts and minds and intuition and research and spiritual
knowing, is the key to preventing such growth and development of
anti-social, anti-human and anti-life behavior by these or others so
that this will not happen again or with such frequency?<br />
<br />
These were the questions never asked by McPhee or Jay Severin, the next day.<br />
Severin, host of a wildly popular talk show on the same station, did
ask his callers to weigh in on the issue of capital punishment. It is
an important question, given that we, as a republic, execute many
convicted criminals each year, so as a national aggregate, as a set of
states “united”, we condone such behavior. This sort of
legally-sanctioned behavior ought to be looked into with patience,
tenacity and diligence. What if we find that our legal support of
capital punishment is connected to the inference that violence is a
practical and functional way of getting your national, state or
privately-defined needs met? What if?<br />
<br />
Executions assuredly stop the back end of the crime. That is clear.
That person can never commit a horrendous act again. That is key to
the discussion, but the larger issue is not the stoppage of the
commissions of further crimes at that point in the continuum. We have
the technical ability to end the lives of every person in prison and
beyond (weapons of mass destruction notwithstanding….and is the support
of such creating socio-political culpability in the cultivation of
violence in USAmerican life?), but when do we dedicate ourselves to
eradicating the presence of violence in other pre-crime areas of
cultural life and production? When do we stand up as men and women and
community and decry the high incidence of domestic, male-gendered
violence and abuse and stop it? When do we stand up as men and women in
community and decry the high incidence of sexualized violence against
children by men (predominantly…remember that even in the Roman Catholic
church, where we also never saw the violence coming, it was priests –
men – who topped the criminal ranks) and stop it? Must we keep in mind
that even McPhee and Severin would agree that victims of such heinous
acts are indiscriminately peppered amongst the “criminal element” that
lives and breeds ‘somewhere’. So where in this talk radio melee do we
come to clarity or true resolution? If children are the fruit of the
adult tree, how then do we conveniently assert that the youthful
committors of heinous crimes have no connection to the tree that created
that criminal fruit? No, McPhee and many gate-kept callers did assert
the culpability of the trees from which those four errant fruit fell.
The underlying and unstated problem truly lies in the nature of the
forest. If those young men or boys are “scum” as Jay Severin called
them, then what does that say about the culture from which they come?
Is there no connection betweeen one tree and another? Do not their roots
comingle in the social amalgam? It is my assertion that we have a lot
of root work to do and that, at least in these situations, for this
story, talk radio failed us in getting to the root of our social
responsibility, our own necessity to not only engage punishment, but
engage youth and life and truth and how to support it and grow it in our
young people, in their very spirits, beyond strident exhortations of
being the “best and brightest”. Do the “best and brightest” have no
responsibility to the youth of the city, country or state or have they
earned the right to sit in veiled conceit beneath their “Severin
doctrine” laurels. If they do (and they don’t), then WTKK, McPhee and
Severin owe them more than verbal banner ads for emotionalism and social
separatism. These subjects and stories and issues deserve more than
passing disconnection driven by the need for higher and higher ratings.
Since when has advertiser satisfaction transformed itself into social
invulnerability or safety from crime? Not only the nature of the talk
radio discourse, but the very nature of media-conglomerated and
corporate, advertiser-dominated media are in need of real critique and
overhaul if we are to seriously address the informational and emotional
and social needs of a society that is still plagued with horrific and
horribly frequent crimes like these that happen everywhere and, yes,
anywhere. It is not because these crimes only happen on the south side
of Chicago, not because they just can’t or shouldn’t happen in
Gloucester (as McPhee suggested in reference to another youth-crime),
but because they happen AT ALL. And these crimes are happening
everywhere. And if we are truly caring, intelligent and concerned
adults, then we take responsibility for youth in our midst and beyond
our midst if we hold the truth to be self-evident that this is a great
nation.<br />
<br />
We are a dysfunctional national family at best…but not without hope.<br />
Talk radio, in this instance and many others as I have noticed on
that station and not, has shown a keen ability to narrow discourse and
breed a support of parochialism far beyond that of normal men, but who,
in the guise of the talk show host, bring us to a point of witnessing
here, in the handling and packaging of this very difficult and painful
story of death and the destruction of life, security, safety and
happiness – and youth – a double tragedy. We are witness to an awful
commission of criminal behavior that behooves us to support the victims,
family and friends with renewed and deepened compassion, love and
vigilant engagement. They are deserving of that as any victim of such a
crime would be, no matter where they live. We are also witness to the
tragedy of a communications medium format that seemed unable to truly
provide a deeper insight into the human dynamic of violence beyond their
own predilection with feeding into the negative emotions that
understandably surface when things of this nature occur.<br />
<br />
The narrow discourse of this brand of talk radio obscures the growing
presence and importance of rights-of-passage programs, youth
leadership, spiritual and cultural intiation programs that immerse youth
in the understanding and manifestation of the interconnective nature of
human life and life beyond humanity, to all that is. We don’t hear
about men creating men from boys, women creating women from girls,
adults in vigilant leadership in their communities supporting concepts
of communal respect and personal responsibility beyond mere civics and
citizenship. Programs like the Sacred Fire community and the Rights of
Passage Council and the work growing out of the programs of East Coast
Village, amongst many others, many following forms of time-tested,
indigenous cultural tradition that help youth (and adults) not only
understand themselves better, but their place in the world, their
communities and society at large and find a validation of their personal
gifts, a real way to be seen and supported and then provide support as a
caring, loving and empowered member of communal society, the goal of
any enlightened nation<br />
How talk radio has packaged this issue raises contradictions that
exist between what is real and what we are comfortable with in our
minds. The contradictions in the apparent safety in the “country” or
“suburbs” vs. the problems ‘inherent’ in the cities, “inner” or
otherwise, obscure the responsibility that the society has in creating
the very cities that it decries in its media. This society created the
cities and the kind of violence that cities and our deep-seated social
pathologies engender. It takes no newspaper reporter to know that those
who support the social structures, corporations and cultural ideologies
that create and support “city” or urban areas live in small towns and
country homes, away from the hustle and bustle, nestled in their “oasis
of quiet sanity”. A focus solely on parents belies the reality that
solutions lie in the communal dynamics of the society, not merely the
personal family functionings of any young man, though the nature of such
is important and undeniable. If we simply kill those
boys-trying-to-be-men, we will kill our very own consciousness of the
resilience of the human spirit and consciousness of our neglected
responsibility for youth and who they eventually become, not only as
parents, but as interdependent, communally-empowered and supported
adults, never satisfied to stop short of available solutions because of a
band-leader only willing to play the catchy hook of a much deeper and
harmonious song.<br />
<br />
May our social values and our cultural, mediated communications be in harmony.<br />
May the victims of violence everywhere find love, support,
resolution, closure, healing in the dawn of the new day, the dawn of a
new embrace of and dedication to all that is good and correct in the
human spirit.<br />
<br />
May we find the courage to look into the mirror held up to us by the
very faces and lives of the children we adults have created – our
children.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong><em>Ukumbwa Sauti, Department of Mass Communication<br />
</em></strong><strong>Pierce Arrow Blogger</strong></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 15px;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 15px;">This entry was posted on Thursday, October 15th, 2009 at 2:42 pm</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 15px;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 15px;"><a href="http://piercearrow.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/death-and-a-double-tragedy-the-failings-of-talk-radio/">http://piercearrow.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/death-and-a-double-tragedy-the-failings-of-talk-radio/</a></span></div>
Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-16828324102595452592012-10-13T23:21:00.002-07:002015-10-26T13:04:28.628-07:00Christian Fundamentalism and The Western<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8INpMkqk4CacYSOcBCU_36NJujZv82ygB6Jj5dkjCSvZrct1wo9dDKZM_jYAAjVg01lx84G4caO8PO1rkhcZhnOm2UXJJkNZjCcamdsVqO4jYh60weraHVuDMdYHa7_x2qdnGwhAhGqA/s1600/INSP-SaddleUpSaturday+page+cptr.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="152" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8INpMkqk4CacYSOcBCU_36NJujZv82ygB6Jj5dkjCSvZrct1wo9dDKZM_jYAAjVg01lx84G4caO8PO1rkhcZhnOm2UXJJkNZjCcamdsVqO4jYh60weraHVuDMdYHa7_x2qdnGwhAhGqA/s320/INSP-SaddleUpSaturday+page+cptr.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Just a standard "Saddle-Up Saturday" at insp's cable<br />
christiancable channel. This particular one was<br />
Oct. 13th, 2012, complete with "High Chaparral",<br />
"Bonanza" and "The Virginian". That's a lot of<br />
settler-colonial propaganda for the christian<br />
right-eous,what with even more western<br />
fare during the rest of the week AND plenty<br />
more saturdays to go around.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Whilst scanning the basic cable channels for my joyous journey in daily VHS research captures, I ambled past "insp"1, once called the Inspiration Channel if I remember correctly. They were announcing their "Saddle Up Saturday" promotional teaser and it got my spurs a-jinglin' about the general settler-colonial love of the western movie/tv show (OK, do we really have to ruminate too deeply over that one?!) and how tremendously attractive these shows seem to be even in our highly-enlightened, "post-modern"2 society. With all the old, but oft-repetitive shows like Bonanza, Gunsmoke, Big Valley and Bat Masterson still crappin'...um....gracin' up our screens large and small, you'd think we were still wallowing....or pillaging...in the late 1800's, clearly an idyllic time in the history of the United States of America and in the lives of the indigenous Turtle Islanders and Africans who obviously had no substantive need to be jealous of anyone's freedoms what with the USAmerica being the land of the free(dmen) and the home of the brave(s).<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeU3EDDdvYbhHz0qyaf0nWkBw8IExsxbW-Nu-cvhs8LtrgQ0xrC1-v3oerB2hYmL2KGFBwxiqLVEZPNlqQAuKMwVqeDGMCf7P2UJ8fQ0nH01Mp2DffkJ5BGnp3V1Wh6NjpVmBNpvO5XyM/s1600/INSP-DrQuinnMedicineWoman.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="156" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeU3EDDdvYbhHz0qyaf0nWkBw8IExsxbW-Nu-cvhs8LtrgQ0xrC1-v3oerB2hYmL2KGFBwxiqLVEZPNlqQAuKMwVqeDGMCf7P2UJ8fQ0nH01Mp2DffkJ5BGnp3V1Wh6NjpVmBNpvO5XyM/s320/INSP-DrQuinnMedicineWoman.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Thank goodness they found a european guy to give<br />
the pre-Wolves Dancer performance of a lifetime...<br />
yeah, the buckskinned hottie that had to play red- <br />
(or pink-)face to be able to get all kissy-kissy with<br />
Jane Seymour. Ya gotta admit, it would have been<br />
unconscionable to have Iron Eyes Cody getting busy<br />
with Doctor Quinn.....right? Right?!?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
What really burnt my kerosene lantern wick was the lovely mixture of insp's christian fundie televangelical programming and this passel of cowboys and pseudo-Indians (oh, and a sweet variety of slavish Africanishes...gotta love their nod to cultural diversity.....heart succinctly warmed). In my mind of minds, it was no question that there was a direct connection between the settler-colonial extinctionist/ tokenist/dismissivist western fantasies dripping with a gentle holocaust sauce and the pop-media-cultural ministrations of the religiously right christian legacy of some of television's best performers known to man-, submit-to-your-husband-woman!- and deity-kind: Morris and David Cerullo, Todd Coontz (too good to be believed...but you will - BELIEVE!), Perry Stone (check out his stage design) and Dr. Mike Murdock amongst others.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyb60CiAIDfuyCbeUcatc23TOVRidPk10KZYMDQjQSiSNXeL8fKUBfC4AlU-tTInmn4bdldKa1SOJ7PEdHQZHlIbcfhoeGMJ64rlkD78iNFvA-0wjkxHGZ_kL672GpXiL8dktSumXMEq0/s1600/INSP-TheBigValley.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="158" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyb60CiAIDfuyCbeUcatc23TOVRidPk10KZYMDQjQSiSNXeL8fKUBfC4AlU-tTInmn4bdldKa1SOJ7PEdHQZHlIbcfhoeGMJ64rlkD78iNFvA-0wjkxHGZ_kL672GpXiL8dktSumXMEq0/s320/INSP-TheBigValley.jpg" width="320" /></a> </td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">(swooning....just like Bonanza, Big Valley pulls no<br />
punches about its aristocratic lead character family,<br />
but loves to play the we-see-it-and-will-spare-no-<br />
sappy-liberalisms-when-we-pimp-the-issue-<br />
of-race card. Who doesn't love a fine family of<br />
cattle-culture-capitalists who have a heart, a semi-<br />
spunky blonde-hottie daughter and -what the hell! -<br />
Lee freakin' Majors?! </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
I mean it's not like there is any direct connection between christian evangelism and missiology and settler-colonial machinations like Manifest Destiny or "the Ponderosa", right? What would bibles and crosses have to do with cowboys and Indians...or, well, a serious lack of Indians? Yeah, that settler-colonialism thingy keeps coming to mind. Just can't get it out of my head, that thing about genocide, holocaust, oppression, small pox blankets, scalping (no, the French supposedly "invented" that), reservations, oh, and those pesky massacres of Sand Creek and Wounded Knee. Yeah, that stuff keeps coming to mind even though christianity and christians in general, especially the roamin catholic church, seem to want to divest themselves from the sticky annals of imperialism's history - even though the christian and more specifically the roamin catholic cartel was directly responsible for giving the Judas kiss to the Tainos and Arawaks, that whole reduce-the-pagans-to-servitude-and-take-their-lands thingy. The Taino and Arawaks were/are native people, too. I know it's hard to believe; they didn't ride horses or throw tomahawks and say "ugh" (unless they were being kidnapped and had to eat the lovely Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria-esque cuisine).<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlomDmSyJRuEEMUbUjUSJ7TR1KUZNMGErj0s4VJeIhVjfR54y64oaaxRwH3BzZSmmPXx1RjubXXaWwM7OSmu4OM6RFnRSE4G9Wh4jOzD9Bh95vDwOoSHZ_T8zpAj8G4A4elWttO_PfDOw/s1600/INSP-TheVirginian.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="152" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlomDmSyJRuEEMUbUjUSJ7TR1KUZNMGErj0s4VJeIhVjfR54y64oaaxRwH3BzZSmmPXx1RjubXXaWwM7OSmu4OM6RFnRSE4G9Wh4jOzD9Bh95vDwOoSHZ_T8zpAj8G4A4elWttO_PfDOw/s320/INSP-TheVirginian.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">OK, so I'm having a hard time figuring why a guy<br />
with a gun who has never had sex before is an<br />
interesting premise for a western television series...<br />
What? What do you mean? You mean - ...<br />
OOOOOOOOOOH, the "VirginIAN"!!!! (blush)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
So, yes, there I was thinkin' again (dang me!), wondering why insp with its decidely christian righteous programming (ya know, sometimes that word just makes TOO much sense) would just come right out in the open and admit its undying love to the Destinal Manifestations of the western genre narrative. It's just that I've heard them try so hard, even as they dog paganism, the New Age and, generally, any indigenous cultural element or spiritual tradition to high heaven...or low hell...to divest themselves from that unseemly period of history when indigenous peoples from Turtle Island and Africa were displaced, terrorized, slaughtered, enslaved, raped, pillaged, whipped, flogged, flayed, drawn and quartered, starved, disemboweled - and other cool stuff - for the greater glory of the only settler-colonial and wonderfully patriarchal nation to have ever done it right - the good ol' U.S. of Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! (yeah, they play "Happy Days", too - shweet - no settler sentimentality or "greatest generation" nostalgia there.....noooooooo).<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsNkgESj84LcGKa50m62XY1fn-mJqDELLKPgJA37Gt62MdT2GiDw2TO5uy8tRTTw_riJxczxia_cchhH9TPfnPxAwYBqvuc8LRX8RgANvvkHYq3nb4smd9GNFYQkVPnzI4SgurCJvqKg4/s1600/INSP-TheWaltons.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="157" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsNkgESj84LcGKa50m62XY1fn-mJqDELLKPgJA37Gt62MdT2GiDw2TO5uy8tRTTw_riJxczxia_cchhH9TPfnPxAwYBqvuc8LRX8RgANvvkHYq3nb4smd9GNFYQkVPnzI4SgurCJvqKg4/s320/INSP-TheWaltons.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">OK, not a "western", but surely western and settler-<br />
nostalgic for sure. Goodnight, Crazy Horse....we'll<br />
be mining in the Black Hills and you just gotta move<br />
that teepee....John Boy's got a date and needs to park<br />
the ol' Model T on top of Mount Rushmore - yeah, I<br />
know, not historically sound, but you get the point.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
So maybe I really don't have to work too hard to make the point, maybe it's been made for me by the wonderful programmers at insp, the Inspiration Network. Maybe it's already clear to everyone that watches this scintillating channel full of televangelists exhorting us to "sow our breakthrough seed" (not a request for masturbatory semen, but for money, believe it or not....though one with a critical mind might clearly think just watching insp is an exercise in screwing oneself).<br />
<br />
OK, so we can easily make the connection between colonial oppression and christian evangelism. Criminal Columbus put the first nail in that coffin and the roamin catholic church, John Hagee, Mitch Pacwa and a hunk o' heapin' helpin' of all the rest of the Daystar, EWTN and insp televangelists and producers are filling in the rest of the hardware. It just needs to be said and said clearly. The legacy of anti-indigenous, anti-Native American and anti-African settler-colonial ideology and oppression is alive and well in current christian narratives, programming and...well...programming. Manifest Destiny never ended and the christian context is still on the hunt for previously independent souls and still deeply invested in the redux of the original imperialistic dalliance a la "a good Indian is a dead Indian" or at least a stereotypically televisual one, dominated by the idea that capitalist Europeans, in control of land and natural resources and "Other" cultures, hold the only viable context for the future.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqpAUmjlTUge1Llo6vxmdfFgxSsPXbStJrFTZpdAzNF-uXLtJ3yC0O5zMF5svJa-pPNOVHJ5X4f9BPk-pwyjNJv5w39ntV8fy2WkxKspLUgSidAj87dmYS5Yy9pHgSbNDgEUShv1XsisE/s1600/INSP-logo-itsanewday.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="96" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqpAUmjlTUge1Llo6vxmdfFgxSsPXbStJrFTZpdAzNF-uXLtJ3yC0O5zMF5svJa-pPNOVHJ5X4f9BPk-pwyjNJv5w39ntV8fy2WkxKspLUgSidAj87dmYS5Yy9pHgSbNDgEUShv1XsisE/s320/INSP-logo-itsanewday.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">What?! All this late 1800's and early 1900's<br />
programming and they call it a "new" day?!?<br />
What the hell?! "NEW"?! It seems like they<br />
want to return to say....the Victorian era...</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Talk to the Lakota, the Hopi, the Maori, the Huichol, the Kogi, the Zapatistas or the San and they may tell you something completely - COMPLETELY - different.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
A little too easy to say that insp is not only evidence of that "smoking gun", but they seem to broadcast those smoking guns as often as they can. Thanks insp. You just made it a lot easier to make a point that sorely needs to be made and understood.<br />
<div>
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2LeN_vhW5hJJs4SN_x0pglF-WpmSaWCc6HfMBqt7TSjVH5Kkta7YKjBlRImQbkqqHf5t9N0TGhA_fUckIGKoLgnkbCiqBy_0cfuenuRhvDRJgbLhVsTz-tChMvx5L7i9s2zxOTwcEXQI/s1600/INSP-PTCapprovalseal.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="194" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2LeN_vhW5hJJs4SN_x0pglF-WpmSaWCc6HfMBqt7TSjVH5Kkta7YKjBlRImQbkqqHf5t9N0TGhA_fUckIGKoLgnkbCiqBy_0cfuenuRhvDRJgbLhVsTz-tChMvx5L7i9s2zxOTwcEXQI/s200/INSP-PTCapprovalseal.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">OK, insult to injury, insp gets the<br />"seal of approval" by an<br />organization that says they give a hot<br />damn about what children<br />see or don't see on tv....<br />Settler-colonial narratives and oppression<br />rationalizations must be really healthy<br />for growing children.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
1 - insp seems to have gone the way of "TLC" and "syfy" that changed their names/logos in the face of a monetary need to diversify and massify and stupidify their programming content.<br />
<br />
2 - Once challenged to define my relationship to "post-modernism' on a scholarly level, I looked it up on wikipedia and, ok, in other resources and realized it was a fantasy, a confusion of ideas that no one could really agree on, an arrogant and adolescent projection of thought and behavior that would assume that the dominant populace was beyond the narrow-mind of colonial reality and capitalist ideological manifestations. We aren't that advanced. "Post-modernism" is as much a backward colonial AND modern fantasy as the western movie narrative.</div>
</div>
Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-39435083592317178822012-07-20T09:07:00.003-07:002012-07-20T09:07:42.476-07:00Drums = Cannibals = Racist Stereotypes = Disrespect of Indigenous Peoples/HumanityCarolyn Jones is upstairs playing a set of bongos with her shoes (to more voluminously bother the folks on the floor below) in a hotel room. Edward G. Robinson, downstairs, says, "What do you have up there? Cannibals?"<br />
<br />
Gotta love "classic" films ("A Hole In The Head" with Frank Sinatra). One must ask really why we continue to keep these insulting moments and portrayals in such rotation.<br />
<br />
Might it have something to do with capitalism, conglomeration and the still deeply entrenched anti-cultural systems and structures of racism and colonialism?Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-53214048797471841952012-06-12T10:52:00.003-07:002012-06-12T10:52:30.688-07:00AMC Original Programming - General CritiqueJust an observation in the words of an incomparable philosopher and cultural critic:<br />
<br />
"White, white, white, white,white, white, white,white, white, white, white, white!" - Kat WilliamsMzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-29193487862113531592012-06-06T01:33:00.000-07:002012-06-06T01:33:02.903-07:00Sexual Orientation - Cultural Parameter Report<br />
<div style="font: 10.0px Times New Roman; margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 11.0px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">(from "Cultural Bias and Prime Time Telelvision", Pg.175)</span></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Sexual Orientation </span></b></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> 1) The only remarkable presence of anyone in the LGBT community was in <i>Will </i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><i>& Grace</i>, which marked homosexuals, particularly gay men as a foil for ridicule and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">hyper-sexualization without giving them the respect of portrayals that showed true loving </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">relationships, physical or emotional, implicit or explicit. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">The absence of portrayals of the LGBT community was troubling, but not </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">surprising given the supporting research available on the invisibility of this population in </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">prime time television. Hall reported, though, on one prime time program that regularly </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">raises LGBT issues in its narratives - <i>The Simpsons</i>, one of the longest-running prime </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">time animated programs in history. Hall asserted that The Simpsons, with its unique style </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">in thumbing its nose at the status quo, brought LGBT issues into the living rooms of the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">United States of America through a number of characters and narratives, including one of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">the lead characters, Homer Simpson. Hall claimed that Homer questioned our delineation </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">of what and who is homosexual or heterosexual as Homer reportedly was “‘flattered and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">intrigued’ when he thinks his ancient and shriveled boss, Mr. Burns is making a pass at </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">him...kisses his secretary Carl (voice of Harvey Fierstein) on the lips” (Hall, 1997, ¶ 12) </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">and “who sighs breathlessly one day ‘Ah, Oliver North, he was just poured into that </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">uniform’” (ibid). None of the programs in this study were as brave or creative. On the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">contrary, <i>That 70’s Show</i> almost ruthlessly upheld the banner of macho, heterosexism at </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">every turn, punctuated by Red, frustrated, exclaiming to Fez with disdain, “You are one </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">fruity kid” (Program Sample 02/#6). </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Jones, in an interview with Stephen Tropiano, author of The Prime Time Closet: </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">A History of Gays and Lesbians on TV, said, “A few seasons ago you couldn’t swing a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">small yappy dog without hitting a regular or recurring gay character” (2002, ¶ 1). The </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">situation had changed drastically by the time the 2002-2003 season previews were ready </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">for review. The networks made decisions to maximize their embrace of the middle-(U.S. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">of)American suburbia in its new shows, creating “a universe that writers and producers </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">aren’t so quick to put gay characters into” (Jones, 2002, ¶ 3). Tropiano claimed, “it all </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">comes down to economics. They’re trying to boost their ratings and make money” (as </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">cited in Jones, 2002, ¶ 5). The bottom line remained that corporate conglomerates were </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">making decisions that continued to segregate and balkanize audiences and prevented the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">cross-cultural, cross-sub-cultural content and meaning presentation and exchange that </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">marked times of better patterns of diversity in television programming. There were scant </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">and negative portrayals of the LGBT community and its needs, realities and issues in </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">prime time programming for aspirational teenage viewers to learn from or, at the very </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">least, to become tolerant of. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> An article published online by the American Family Association pointed out a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">troubling perspective on the reality of the LGBT community on television with worse </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">implicit outcomes for the LGBT community in society. Sharp, AFA Special Projects </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Director wrote that “prime-time television controls the moral climate of our nation” </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">(n.d.). Sharp went on to say the following: </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">“In 1985, when gay characters in prime-time television were infrequent, only 40% of Americans felt comfortable around homosexuals. Today, that figure has risen to 60% and by all indications, Hollywood wants those numbers to increase. The most influential market for promoting the homosexual agenda is clearlytelevision. Between 1989 and 1999, references to homosexuality during prime-time television increased an amazing 2,650%!” (n.d.)</span></blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Sharp’s assertions, though unsupported by research in the document raised a few </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">essential concerns pursuant to this study’s findings. First, research supports that gay and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">lesbian characters were quite prevalent in the 80’s (Sender, 1998), though the depth of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">their characters may not have been equal to some that showed up in cable productions, in </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">particular <i>The L Word</i>, seen on Showtime. Second, Hollywood, if the term can be used to </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">represent television programmers, was more than happy to exclude any substantive </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">presence of LGBT sub-culture in prime time broadcast television, at least in the recent </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">past, with regard to this study’s findings. Third, it was not known if Sharp codified all </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">references to homosexuality, positive and negative, which would have inflated the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">quantitative results, but decreased the qualitative result of his assertion that Hollywood </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">was indeed supportive of a ‘gay America’. Fourth, Sharp insinuated some collusion with </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">the “recruitment” theorists who believed heterosexuals could be ‘convinced’ to become </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">homosexual through nurture methods as the corollary, nature, might have been </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">unthinkable. Fifth, any reputable writer with the audacity to report a number as high as </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">2,650% (complete with exclamation point) should have been willing to cite the source of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">their mathematics. Sixth, this researcher agreed with Sharp in the implied statement that </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">the new LGBT-focused cable channel, Logo (Viacom), might not be a good thing in </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">general. It will be a definite and positive addition to the LGBT community as long as </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Viacom allows the narratives to be created by LGBT writers and producers so as to </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">sustain realistic portrayals and decrease the negativities of stereotypes. That said, if </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">current trends of segregated viewing continue, the larger society’s ability to learn from </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">the LGBT community’s narratives and stories will be gravely curtailed. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Huntemann and Morgan asserted: </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> “Few groups in society experience such strong tensions over sexuality as gay and </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">lesbian teens do. In a cultural climate that is still largely hostile to homosexuality, </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">the paucity of positive role models in the media is disturbing.” (2001, p. 315) </span></blockquote>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Past representations of gay, lesbian and bisexual characters could be seen in </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">programs such as Roseanne, Golden Girls, Picket Fences and Soap (Sender, 1998).</span><div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">These prime time portrayals have been few and far between since, with bright spots and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">dim dispersed throughout. The children polled in the Children Now study said it was </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">important to see images of people who look like them on television (1998). The lesbian, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">gay, bisexual and transgender teenagers, no less aspirational in their viewing behaviors, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">no less important in their need for personal self-esteem and social validation, might have </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">also thought it was important to see images of people that looked, lived and loved like </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">them on television. </span></div>
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</div>Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-23555152055158594652012-06-06T01:13:00.003-07:002012-06-06T01:13:59.391-07:00Age - Cultural Parameter Report<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">(from "Cultural Bias In Prime Time Television", Pg.178) </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Age </span></b></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><b> </b>1) Younger characters showed great momentary implicit and direct authority over </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">older characters, usually at the expense of Culture/National Origin/Race dynamic. </span></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> a) Detective Morris (African-American) raises voice disrespectfully to his </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> wife (African-American) in defense of younger (White) Halliwell sisters.<br /> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> b) Young female (White) character in Smallville disrespectfully addresses </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> older male (African-American) in order to distract him and allow friends<br /> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> to breach a roadblock.<br /> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> c) Teenagers in That 70’s Show vandalize the home of their British high </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> school music teacher. </span></blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> 2) Teens showed some semblance of respect to elders in a small number of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">programs, partly due to the lack of teen focus and main and/or recurring characters in five </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">of the programs. A teen character, Keiko, was verbally disciplined by her mother, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">essentially validating Keiko’s ability to persevere in the face of adversity in Gilmore </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Girls (Program Sample 05/#5). In the same episode, Rory cried on her grandfather’s </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">shoulder for support after she found herself in a challenging personal relationship. Rory </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">was generally close to her mother throughout the program samples. Clark, in <i>Smallville</i>, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">sought the council of his mother and father with challenging social situations at school. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><i>7</i><span style="font: 8.0px Times New Roman;"><i>th</i></span><i> Heaven</i> displayed the highest quality of teen-parent respect, with a high degree of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">respect and love being placed with the children, in the Camden family and out. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Mediascope reported, “<i>7</i><span style="font: 8.0px Times New Roman;"><i>th</i></span><i> Heaven</i>, <i>Gilmore Girls</i>, and <i>Smallville</i> all provide models of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">warm parent-teen relationships” (2004, p. 128), but also stated, “the parent-teen </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">relationships on <i>That 70’s Show</i> are also extremely close” (ibid). Mediascope’s analysis </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">in this area with regard to <i>That 70’s Show</i> conflicted sharply with the findings of this </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">study. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> 3) Elderly people were rarely present and were never featured as main characters, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">indispensable to the storyline or with any substantial level of authority with regard to </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">younger characters or peers. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> Johnston stated, with regard to the elderly: </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> “This affluent segment of society may not switch brands as often as the young<br /> folks, but they are an empowered group of people who learned the ways of the<br />world by crusading for the Civil Rights movement, stopping the war in Vietnam,<br /> inaugurating the movement for women’s equality and initiating the environmental<br /> protection movement.” (2002, p. 71). </span></blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">The elderly had valuable experience to share with teen viewers looking for guidance and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">cues for how to manage life in a modern world; who better but the people who created </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">the world teens lived in. The reality of prime time television was less than welcoming to </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">this marginalized segment of society. “The elderly also are used as symbols of death and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">decay, a topic that often frightens people” (Johnston, 2002, p. 71). Johnston described </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">the prevailing stereotypes of elderly people that included the ornery, crotchety elder, the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">“doddering, old senile fool” and the eccentric and incompetent characters (ibid). </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Johnston stated, conversely, that too often many older men, usually white men, on news </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">and talk shows...are portrayed as experienced, wise and trustworthy” (ibid). Johnston </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">punctuated his discussion of elders in television and stated, “The elderly have a wealth of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">stories, both entertaining and informative, to share with the society. What do we gain by </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">screening this out and making them just a bit less than eligible for human equality?” </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">(2002, p. 73). </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> 4) Teenagers were featured in only half of the program samples and comprised </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">dominant numbers of in the cast in only three of those. They were more likely to be cast </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">in sexual situations than any other relational dynamic. Secondarily, they showed great </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">concern for their own or other peers’ looks and physical attributes and/or social standing </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">(i.e., popularity, notoriety), especially in <i>That 70’s Show</i> and <i>Smallville</i>. <i>7</i><span style="font: 8.0px Times New Roman;"><i>th</i></span><i> Heaven</i> </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">showed much more depth in issues embraced by teen characters and portrayed in a much </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">more realistic fashion, without the sensationalism of <i>Smallville</i> and <i>That 70’s Show</i>. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Two popular past teen shows were <i>California Dreams</i> (1992) and <i>Saved By The </i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><i>Bell</i> (1989). They reached near cult status with good-looking ensemble casts, fun teen </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">storylines and safe subject matter. <i>Saved By The Bell</i> spun-off two other shows entitled </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><i>Saved By The Bell: The College Years</i> and <i>Saved By The Bell: Then New Class </i>(Saved </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">By The Bell, n.d.). Both shows were set in California and featured stereotypically sunny </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">weather, bikinis when possible and as much pop music as could be generated. <i> California </i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><i>Dreams</i> revolved around a band of the same name populated by the lead characters, in </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">which most of the characters sang their own songs (California Dreams, n.d.). <i>Saved By </i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><i>The Bell</i> revolved around the relationships of its main characters that included a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">stereotypical dork character named Screech that survived all three versions of the show. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Both of these shows were more fluff than serious studies in teen life and challenges. This </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">was best typified by the show theme songs. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> </span></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The following are partial lyrics in the <i>Saved By The Bell </i>theme:<br /> If the teacher pops a test<br /> I know I'm in a mess<br /> And my dog ate all my homework last nite<br /> Riding low in my chair<br /> She won't know that I'm there<br /> If I can hand it in tomorrow, it'll be all right<br /> It's alright 'cause I'm saved by the bell (Saved By The Bell, n.d.) </span></blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> The following are partial lyrics in the <i>California Dreams </i>theme:<br /> Surf dudes with attitudes (Kinda groovy)<br /> Laid back moods<br /> Sky above, sand below (Good vibrations)<br /> Feelin' mellow<br /> Won't give it up<br /> Don't wanna stop<br /> Don't wake me up<br /> Don't wake me up if I'm dreamin'<br /> California dreams<br /> Just let me lay here in the sun<br /> Until my dream is done (California Dreams, n.d.) </span></blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Both theme songs gave a look into the stated purposes of both shows. No viewer was </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">challenged by any of the storylines. The messages were ‘take it easy’, ‘go with the flow’ </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">and ‘don’t dare ask me to do anything that I don’t want to do, especially anything </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">academic or that requires initiative’; in other words, ‘leave me alone and let me be - a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">stereotypical television-watching teen’. In actuality, the teens on these two shows were </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">somewhat ambitious, at least where cutting class and getting the best of adults was </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">concerned. The <i>California Dreams</i> characters were always hard at work practicing and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">getting gigs at squeaky-clean burger joints. The process message remained the same with </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">regard to the viewer: We’ll entertain you and you won’t learn anything positive. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">These presentations almost guaranteed a validation of a culture of consumption. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Even the stereotypical nostalgia-heavy <i>Happy Days</i> was reportedly more valuable than </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">this type of approach to teen television or, at least, television with teen characters. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Desmond reported that after an episode featuring Fonzie, a lead popular character, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">making a trip to a library, “a sudden increase in library card applications followed” </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">(2001, p. 41). <i>Happy Days</i>, though, was as safe as <i>Saved By The Bell</i> and <i>California</i> </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><i>Dreams</i>. The <i>Happy Days</i> cast wasn’t challenging or gritty, lacking the “edgy” nature of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">today’s teen television. Bogle reported that their “exploits were puerile enough not to be </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">offensive” (2001, p. 218). Shows like <i>Leave It To Beaver</i> were sterile constructions of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">the stereotypical, faultless White nuclear family. “The Beave’” got into trouble on a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">regular basis, but was never used as a foil to attack the typical presence of sexism, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">classism or racism inherent in the United States of America in the 1950’s. This was a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">time of struggle for many citizens and television was not addressing the realities that </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">many people lived with, nor that plagued the country as a whole. Teens were </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">stereotyped for the benefit of the advertiser, to keep up appearances for the sake of the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">polite company of the general viewing audience. The late sixties brought a shift in the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">form of <i>The</i> <i>Mod Squad</i> (1968-1973) that “reached young viewers by touching on the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">new social/political landscape” (Bogle, 2001, p. 156). The three lead characters had all </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">fallen into trouble with the law and were recruited to work undercover for the Los </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Angeles Police Department. “Their assignment: to weed out criminals preying on the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">young of America” (Bogle, 2001, p. 157). <i>The Mod Squad</i> presented a new configuration </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">of characters for young United States of America: an African-American man (Clarence </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Williams III), a White woman (Peggy Lipton) and a White man (Michael Cole), </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">providing “a mix of action adventure and liberal politics” (Bogle, 2001, p. 157). Bogle </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">went on to say: </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Young audiences liked the idea of seeing young rebellious edgy heroes, arguing with one another, questioning each other’s motives, and usually fighting for the underdogs. The producers also shrewdly decided early on no to bite the hand that fed them: the series could not offend the delicate sensibilities of its young audience.” (2001, p. 157) </span></blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">The “edge” was officially introduced into the televisual mix, though, as Bogle went on to </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">say, “Despite its counterculture appearance, <i>The Mod Squad </i>was still a cop show” (2001, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">p. 157). Other shows in the 70’s, like <i>Laverne & Shirley</i>, <i>The Brady Bunch</i>, <i>The</i> <i>Waltons</i> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">and even <i>Welcome Back Kotter</i>, betrayed that new edge. <i>All In The Family</i>, which </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">featured younger characters Michael Stivic and Gloria Bunker, retained the social </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">edginess in grand style, much to the chagrin of many and the joy of many more (Dates & </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Barlow, 1990). </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> The 1980’s brought shows like <i>Head of the Class</i>, <i>Webster</i>, <i>Small Wonder</i>, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><i>Family Ties</i> and the teen favorite, <i>Facts of Life</i>, all featuring young, teenage characters or </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">casts, mostly clean-cut shows, but with more of the heart that would typify later </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">renditions of teen and youth oriented television. The 1990’s presented shows as </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">seemingly polarized as <i>Full House</i> and <i>Married...With Children</i>, both shows that </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"> </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">revolved around the household and the comings and goings of the warm and the loving or </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">the cold and the belligerent, depending upon which show you were watching. Neither </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">show provided any refreshing or deep insights into the human condition, though Marcy </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">D’Arcy was the lone lesbian in <i>Married...With Children</i>’s suburban Chicago world. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">The expanse of television shows featuring teenagers and popular with teenagers </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">are telling in their social depth and breadth. There were not many like <i>The Mod Squad</i> or </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><i>New York Undercover</i> (featuring African-American and Latino lead actors Malik Yoba </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">and Michael DeLorenzo), popular for gritty portrayals and situations, again both police </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">shows. The “edgy” quality of the current program sample belied its lack of embrace of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">serious socio-political underpinnings. The aspirational teenagers had little to learn from </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">depictions of themselves and lacked any regular presence of eldership in the narratives </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">for perspective. The contradiction of the edgy, but shallow cultural presentations was </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">typified in the lines of the theme song to the popular show <i>Diff’rent Strokes</i>: </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Everybody's got a special kind of story <br />Everybody finds a way to shine, <br />It don't matter that you got not alot <br />So what, <br />They'll have theirs, and you'll have yours, and I'll have mine. <br />And together we'll be fine.... <br />Because it takes, Diff'rent Strokes to move the world. <br />Yes it does. (Classic TV Theme Songs, n.d.) </span></blockquote>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">There were problems in the world, but they were of no real, practical concern. It didn’t </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">matter that there was socio-cultural inequity in the world. This was the world of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">advertiser-driven television. Serious cultural issues were not going to be addressed, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">especially with aspirational teenagers. Corporate media conglomeration made sure of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">that. Yes it did. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<br /></div>Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-13641466935209623502012-06-06T00:52:00.001-07:002012-06-06T00:52:11.999-07:00Will & Grace - General Critique<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">(from "Cultural Bias and Prime Time Television", Pg.114)</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>Will & Grace</i> presented some challenging narrative elements and contradictions </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">within the cultural parameters analyzed in this study. While <i>Will & Grace</i> depicted at </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">least quantitatively increased representation of homosexual issues and, to some degree, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">some elements of female self-determination, authority and power, it also presented a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">trivialization of homosexuality to its more base level of expression. Most of <i>Will & </i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>Grace’s</i> references to homosexuality referred mainly to sexual activity, dating and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">physicality, excluding the serious issues of social acceptance, political power and long-<span style="font: 12.0px Helvetica;"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">term, monogamous homosexual relationships. Promiscuity was apparent in all of the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">sampled episodes, usually through some kind of dialogue reference and was </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">unaccompanied by any discussion of safe sexual practice or substantial discussion of </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">societal ethics with regard to dating, romantic, sexual relationships or marriage. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The issue of homosexual promiscuity was consistent with heterosexual </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">promiscuity references in other sampled shows, particularly <i>That 70’s Show</i>. Both shows </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">and other programs outside of the programs sampled in this study viewed by this </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">researcher generally focused comedy on situations referring implicitly to promiscuous </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">sexual contact whether with the lead or supporting characters. Mamaluth and Impett </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">identified that most sexual situations in prime time occur between unmarried characters </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">(2001). The difference between <i>Will & Grace</i> and other shows about heterosexuals lies </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">in the improbability that the characters will ever discuss monogamous relationships or </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">marriage with any depth or regularity. The petty and confrontational flavor of the writing </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">gave no indication of any abiding level of healthy embrace of generally accepted social </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">mores that tend to be understood in this society. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> No teenagers were featured in the program samples and rarely, if ever, appeared </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">on any other episodes seen by this researcher. Considering the aspirational viewing </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">component in the teenage consumer of these narratives, it presented a challenge for </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">young people to try to figure out what their relationship should or could be with </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">homosexuals in their own lives, whether the viewer was homosexual or not. If they did </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">not see characters that were like them in age having positive or any relationships with the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">homosexual characters, then teenagers were left with the need to extrapolate their own </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">behavior from how the characters treated each other. Therein existed a larger challenge as </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">none of the programs in this study showed positive, supportive or healthy sexual, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">romantic and/or loving relationships during the majority of the show. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> There were always life issues that presented themselves in the narratives. For </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">example, Will and Grace looked into the depth and future of their relationship (Sample </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">01/#5). In another episode, Grace dated two men and Will tried to deal with the growing </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">closeness of Jack and Grace when he left to spend time away (Sample 02/#5). Also, Will </span></div>
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</div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">struggled with whether to tell Grace that Ben, Will’s boss and Grace’s partner, was </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">cheating on her with another woman (Sample 02/#6). Though each of these situations </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">seemed standard and realistic in nature, the narratives revealed a mean-spirited, snide and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">sarcastic character to the relationships in all program samples. It was important to </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">reiterate that the show was a sit-com and derived its character from basic comedic </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">conversational and situational setups. Nonetheless, there was no time, other than the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">brief and random afterthought, in which any of the characters made any substantial </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">attempt at true understanding of another’s feelings nor did they make any attempt to </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">mediate any of the situations with any deep or abiding discussion of the on-going social </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">or personal effects of the behaviors displayed through the narratives. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Inherent in each episode, along with the above “standard” and “realistic” </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">situations, was an equally outlandish, sometimes risky or decadent social or personal </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">situation that got played out in an exaggerated way. In Sample 01/#5, Karen enlisted </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Jack’s help to teach her how to cook so that she can avoid having sex with her husband, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Stan, who she regularly spoke negatively about in deeply sarcastic and disparaging ways </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">and who the audience never saw. Sample 02/#5 presented Rosario in an awful situation. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Rosario, Karen’s embattled Latina maid, was arrested and jailed, accused of smuggling </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">items from another country that actually had been stolen by Karen. Karen ultimately got </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Rosario out of jail, but not until after a scene in a limo on the way to the jail in which </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Karen leveled a barrage of insensitive jokes at Rosario, Latinos and people who occupy </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">the lower economic class. Even at the suggestion of getting Rosario out of jail, Karen </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">responded by saying, “I’m not going to Queens! There are people living in cabs down </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">there” (Sample 02/#5). </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> Seemingly less risky, but still questionable behavior, in two out of three programs </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">sampled, food was suggested as a way to soothe and console the spirit. In Sample 02/#5, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Jack offered Grace the idea of food so that she can feel better, though not for a physical </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">concern. Worse yet, in Sample 02/#6, Grace suggested to Will during a hard time that he </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">have alcoholic drinks and Krispy Kreme donuts. It was noted that none of the above </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">characters mentioned have an ounce of fat on them. Some might consider Grace too thin. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">If this was a regular behavior of these characters, it would be highly unlikely and grossly </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">unrealistic that they would have had the body types portrayed by the actors in the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">program. The program samples did not necessarily show the characters engaging in the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">suggested behavior, but it may be significant that the behavior, in and of itself, is </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">condoned by the main characters, at least in two out of three episodes viewed for this </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">study. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>Will & Grace</i> regularly presented negative expressions about the characters on </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">many levels. Sample 01/#5 featured Will and Grace on a visit to a beloved high school </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">teacher of theirs. They were very excited to see him and idolized him since they were his </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">students years ago. He was a writer and was openly homosexual, which was of great </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">importance to Will as a gay man and to Grace as someone who fancied herself a writer at </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">one time. Mr. Dudley, the teacher, and his best friend, Sharon, were shown as having a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">similar and not so healthy relationship as Will and Grace. In one instance, Sharon, a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">heterosexual, calls Mr. Dudley “a miserable old fairy”. They spent most of the scene </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">fighting, bickering and back-biting, a pattern which gave Will and Grace pause to </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">consider their own relationship, a rare moment of psychological, emotional and relational </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">insight in the programs sampled, other viewed episodes and television programming in </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">general. In another instance, Grace says of Mr. Dudley, “He’s the one that made me </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">want to write”, to which Will responds in a disparaging tone, “You don’t write”, to which </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">she acquiesces, “But I wanted to”. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">In a separate scene of this program sample (01/#5), Karen, while being taught </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">unsuccessfully by Jack to cook, became attracted to Ben, Will’s boss played by Gregory </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Hines, an African-American person. Upon his entry to the apartment, Karen, who said to </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Jack, “Sorry fruit, you’re out of the loop!”, and then began to flirt with Ben. <i>Will & </i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>Grace</i> was replete with moments in which characters made hurtful or disrespectful </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">statements toward each other or others not present, like poor Rosario, languishing in jail </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">for the crimes of her boss, Karen. Though it was understood that disparaging statements </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">have been a part of comedy and humor on and off the small screen, it presented a </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">substantial concern of this researcher for the viewers of <i>Will & Grace</i> and especially the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">target audience of this study’s focus, teenagers. As aspirational viewers, teenagers </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">looked to television characters to help them define how they should conduct themselves </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">in the world, in their society and how to put into perspective the many cultural offerings </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">that they see from day to day. <i>Will & Grace</i> offered no positive references or even trends </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">in thought or behavior that this researcher could find in any of the program samples. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Taking the above findings into account, NOW’s overall rating of <i>Will & Grace</i> as </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">a B+ (2002, p. 10) raised some question, if not only an eyebrow. The show also garnered </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">an A- in the category of Social Responsibility (2002, p. 14), which further confused not </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">only the issue, but also this researcher. <i>Will & Grace</i> did not show up in any of the Best </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">or Worst of the categories of Gender Composition and Diversity, Violent Content or </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Sexual Exploitation, which gave rise to the extrapolation that it fell into the B+ to C- </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">range in those areas, having been neither a standout on the positive cutting edge or the </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">most negative of television’s representatives. The National Organization of Women </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">presented only one other indirect suggestion of any positive or progressive elements in </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>Will & Grace</i>’s regular narrative. “Sadly missing is a strong, high-profile comedic </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">character in the tradition of I Love Lucy, Murphy Brown, Mary Tyler Moore or </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Roseanne. Do the characters of Rachel (from Friends), Grace (from Will & Grace) or </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Reba qualify to fill that role?” (NOW, 2002, p. 4). Interesting that NOW asked the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">question with regard to Grace, but did not see fit to answer it for us. Even the National </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Organization of Women could not find enough about <i>Will & Grace</i> to report positively </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">and definitively about, at best regarding <i>Will & Grace</i> of moderate substantive value. </span></div>
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<br />Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-57690785764373686542012-06-06T00:42:00.002-07:002012-06-06T00:42:37.168-07:00Gilmore Girls - General Critique<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">(from "Cultural Bias In Prime Time Television")</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><i>Gilmore Girls</i> presented a rich, modern and complex mix of social and personal </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">elements, cultural and intellectual mores and intergenerational and inter-gender </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">relationships. Smart writing and quick dialogue patterns peppered the narratives and </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">provide a pacing that kept the show lively and mobile. References to Joseph Stalin </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">(Sample 05#5) and Noam Chomsky (Sample 05#4) were <i>Frasier</i>-esque in their </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">assumption of the character’s intelligence and immediately, though fleetingly, gave an air </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">of intellectual competence and literacy to the characters. This dynamic was refreshing </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">considering that most of the main and supporting characters were women, relatively </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">intelligent and in reasonable control of their lives. The Watch Out, Listen Up!: 2002 </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Feminist Primetime Report rated <i>Gilmore Girls</i> with a solid “A” as an overall s</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">core covering several socio-cultural parameters (National Organization of Women [NOW], </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">2002, p. 10). </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> Program sampling revealed a great degree of female self-determination expressed </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">usually with raised voices in the presence of women, men and people of differing ages. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Emily, for instance, was highly suspect in moral character (which will be explored later), </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">but displayed a high level of fortitude and deliberation. In one scene, she let her mildly </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">estranged husband know that she was now going to live a more independent life since </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">their marriage was deteriorating. She announced to Lorelai and Rory at one of their </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">many lunches and dinners together that she was separating from Richard (which was no </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">surprise to Lorelai and Rory, which was of some surprise to Emily) and that Richard was </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">moving out of the house - and into the pool house. During her loud conversation with </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Richard earlier in the episode, she notified Richard that she was going to travel to Paris </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">by herself and take her life into her own hands. She accidentally got locked in the </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">basement and while climbing out of the cellar window, much to the also loudly expressed </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">chagrin of Richard, her skirt got caught on something and she wriggled out of it, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">continuing her Richard-focused tirade out on the front lawn in her blazer and stockings. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">She never missed a beat even though she ended up missing her skirt (Sample 07/#5). </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> Lorelai and Rory also displayed great self-determination and independence, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">though tempered nicely by their friendship and familial bond. Lorelai always spoke her </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">mind, never seeming to equivocate where she thought an important idea, emotion or </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">viewpoint must be shared. She got into trouble with Mikhail after he read an article that </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">was written about her in a magazine in which she made an irresponsible remark about </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Stalin. Mikhail stormed out of Emily’s house. After being convinced to come back, </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Mikhail explained how Stalin called for the deaths of many from his hometown in </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Russia. Lorelai was extremely apologetic and admits to speaking out without thinking to </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">smooth things over with Mikhail and Emily, who was hosting him at her home as an act </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">of charity for the local dance company (Sample 05/#4). </span></div>
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<br /></div>Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-64923229421846150142012-06-05T22:54:00.001-07:002013-09-06T09:18:21.534-07:00Reply to WGBH's "Civilization" written and narrated by Niall Ferguson<br>
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Reply to WGBH's "Civilization" written and narrated by Niall Ferguson</h3>
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(originally posted June 4, 2012 on "Indigeny & Energetics" blog: http://indigeny-energetics.blogspot.com)</h4>
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I am surprised that such a "sweeping" documentary series on westernism, capitalism and imperialism lacks a more functional and empathic critique of exactly those elements in the face of the gently implied irksome nature of environmental degradation, cultural destruction and outright holocaust of aboriginal people of Turtle Island and Africa. Not only was the documentary highly dismissive of the fundamental nature of indigenous humanity and sensible connections to history, but "Civilization" seemed to do nothing more than semi-gently and semi-cleverly champion the support of a struggling, though still ideologically powerful economic and cultural system, completely minimizing the social effects of some of his "killer apps" (aptly put, I'd say; i.e., consumerism) and the fundamental dangerous nature of empire as expressed by Europeans seeking nothing more than a beneficent (sorta) hierarchical dominance in a world quickly running out of food, water, natural resources, biological diversity, cultural diversity and sense - precisely because of Europe's, the west's particularly pernicious form of "civilization".<br><br>One of the greatest mistakes humanity, at least those humans in dominant, western, highly-militarized "civilized" nations being made is underestimating the wisdom and technological culture of indigeny. It is precisely the indigenous cultural perspective that has been warning and resisting the "civilizers" and their destructive nature since the initial introduction of criminal Columbus to the Tainos and Arawaks on the islands of Amerique. At the very least, Ferguson puts a pretty face on one of the most destructive and oppressive cultural mistakes known to humankind. At the most, he seeks to convince us that there is no viable, worthwhile challenge to this destruction and oppression.<br><br>I suggest he tell it to the Awa of the Amazon, the Kogi, the Lakota on the Pine Ridge Reservation AND the Azanian people in the peacefully, wonderfully and harmoniously westernized (aka "civilized") settler-colony of South Africa. If their stories are just an inevitable part of the deification of Euro-everything, then I want no part of "Civilization" or civilization.<br><br>This is a disappointing piece of work especially for WGBH (an insult to the producers of the likes of Independent Lens and POV) and has the same understated and dismissive arrogance as Robert Barron's "Catholicism", but that's another story - well, actually, it's pretty much the same.<br><br>(All right. WGBH's interface isn't uploading my comments yet and is not indicating that there is any moderation on such. Hmmmm....)</div>
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<a href="http://www.wgbh.org/programs/Civilization-The-West-and-the-Rest-With-Niall-Ferguson-1879/episodes/The-West-and-the-Rest-with-Niall-Ferguson-Part-1-38457#comments">http://www.wgbh.org/programs/Civilization-The-West-and-the-Rest-With-Niall-Ferguson-1879/episodes/The-West-and-the-Rest-with-Niall-Ferguson-Part-1-38457#comments</a></div>
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<br></div>Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-5553941244742996942012-06-02T11:08:00.002-07:002012-06-02T11:08:26.328-07:00Thought for the TV Day - 6/2/12Remember when TLC had something to do "Learning" and Sy Fy something to do with "Sci"(ence)?Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-9134952267141328412012-03-31T09:40:00.002-07:002012-03-31T09:45:07.627-07:00AMC Originals....hmmmmmm....."Walking Dead"<div><br /></div><div>"Mad Men"</div><div><br /></div><div>"Hell On Wheels"</div><div><br /></div><div>"The Killing"</div><div><br /></div><div>"Breaking Bad"</div><div><br /></div><div>All "good" productions...social value still to be determined....just noticing the nature of the titles. Hmmmmm....</div>Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-27191933659645567112011-12-18T13:16:00.000-08:002012-01-09T14:29:30.893-08:00FPU - Media and Culture - LinksTraditional Religion/Spiritual Systems and Modern Fears:<br /><br /><a href="http://egregores.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-exactly-is-it-about-traditional.html">http://egregores.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-exactly-is-it-about-traditional.html</a><br /><br />Star Wars A Religion in Czechoslovakia:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/18/star-wars-a-religion-in-czech-republic_n_1156516.html">http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/18/star-wars-a-religion-in-czech-republic_n_1156516.html</a><br /><br />Climate Change's Brutal Truth:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.grist.org/climate-change/2011-12-05-the-brutal-logic-of-climate-change">http://www.grist.org/climate-change/2011-12-05-the-brutal-logic-of-climate-change</a><br /><br />Occupy Boston - Statement of Solidatiry with Indigenous Peoples:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.occupyboston.org/2011/10/09/occupy-boston-ratifies-memorandum-of-solidarity-with-indigenous-peoples/">http://www.occupyboston.org/2011/10/09/occupy-boston-ratifies-memorandum-of-solidarity-with-indigenous-peoples/</a>Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-40137248384845803672011-12-18T12:59:00.000-08:002012-01-09T11:57:59.980-08:00FPU - Gender and Media Representation - LinksOccupy Boston Women's Caucus:<br /><br /><a href="http://twitter.com/#%21/@OBWomen">http://twitter.com/#!/@OBWomen</a><br /><br />Diva-licious:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.slideshare.net/RedHeadedDivaK/embracing-your-inner-diva-cool-confidence-created">http://www.slideshare.net/RedHeadedDivaK/embracing-your-inner-diva-cool-confidence-created</a>Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-47260871781030132892011-11-30T20:30:00.000-08:002011-11-30T20:51:52.393-08:00Strange Doin's in TV LandI just walked into my media center (!), turned on the tv and saw Don Rickles dressed in a wide-brimmed black southwestern-style Native American hat with fake black hair and long braids in an indescribable woody interior store decorated garishly with Native American clothing and "war bonnets". A few scenes later, Betty White made reference to having lived on a reservation, delivering veiled innuendo about "wild horses".<br /><br />I can only imagine what cultural madness led up to these strange televisual moments on the TV Land original sitcom, "Hot In Cleveland".Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3255478074411352395.post-77867670565226286152011-11-06T22:00:00.002-08:002013-08-02T18:13:47.586-07:00"Hell On Wheels"<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlEFRbPzb_XkpHiXHeLPnCBgtnwBhQF4SwXRtsMrUnaWhspKFjGxLRyozg-n6d6qOfMg3GGAgxprF-Flhvp4Fzs4EOQE3aKX5wJ39WQMpFtXur7vlKQ53-wMn3VLxo569GhvSUKrPmWnE/s1600/HOW_101_2425.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5672141272822994306" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlEFRbPzb_XkpHiXHeLPnCBgtnwBhQF4SwXRtsMrUnaWhspKFjGxLRyozg-n6d6qOfMg3GGAgxprF-Flhvp4Fzs4EOQE3aKX5wJ39WQMpFtXur7vlKQ53-wMn3VLxo569GhvSUKrPmWnE/s400/HOW_101_2425.jpg" style="cursor: pointer; float: left; height: 282px; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; width: 400px;"></a>AMC has been cutting the edges of television with shows like "Breaking Bad", "Mad Men" and other original programming. This fall has seen the start of the moody macabre "The Walking Dead" and a deftly crafted, but largely disappointing "<a href="http://www.amctv.com/shows/hell-on-wheels">Hell On Wheels</a>". Their offerings look amazing on the screen, but their edge is getting a bit dulled with the hollow "Hell On Wheels".<br>
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Led by a fiendish and historically dramaturgical Colm Meaney, embattled and festering Dominique McElligott, tortured hunk Anson Mount and Common as the more-than-stereotypically-uneloquent Common as the color commentary for the 1865 manifest destiny redux, "Hell On Wheels" is sure to please the audience niche that is hungering for yet another funkified soap opera with just about any backdrop premise to throw sepia-tone televisual paint on.<br>
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One will be, as I was, highly disappointed if one is to assume "Hell" will reveal a new way of looking at post-Civil war social politics complete with raiding injuns, who like in most backward depictions of indigenous people, say nothing to each other, relegating them to savagery and no sign of intellect. As the Native American attack on the settlers begins, the man (no, the Native American guy) who would kill McElligott's surveryor-speculator husband hunts the pair down in the woods moving like a caricature of a very graceful C3PO with a tomahawk. This show seems to have nothing new to say and the horrid point is that it simply has a lot of old things to say. HOW comes across as yet another opportunity to have a vehicle to say the word "nigger", run Native peoples through the white privilege lens and give culturally anxious viewers a cathartic opportunity to engage in what Toni Morrison calls "race talk", racial discourse without social decisiveness.<br>
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Not that modern television has ever been known to be a largely socially responsible proposition (Kardashians notwithstanding), but HOW has the chance to engage some of the most vexing challenges of past and present USAmerican society. Even though the script feels mature and the cinematography luxurious, the content is horrendously non-functional for anyone other than those committed to 1986 high school text book history, those for whom white privilege goes down like a piece of baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet.<br>
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So far, just fresh out of episode one, HOW looks like a socio-political dud, even though Common, playing an African ex-slave, freed as it were, gets to slit the throat of a thoroughly unlikable European work gang boss...and with a very big, sharp knife. But that's just really good cherry glaze on a very old and dry cheesecake. If you're looking for a textural duplicate of "There Will Be Blood" <span style="font-size: 100%;">(sans the black gold, texas tea)</span> , you're on your way, but the story lacks the pathos and grit to hold enlightened attentions.<br>
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But my trusty VCR will be watching it for the next three sundays. Unluckily, I just might have to watch it, too.<br>
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<a href="http://www.amctv.com/shows/hell-on-wheels">http://www.amctv.com/shows/hell-on-wheels</a><br>
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Episode 3: Clearly a teleplay filled to the brim with the warm remembrances of manifest destiny's finest fantasies, HOW continues to disappoint, but never fails to be unsurprising in it's sameness with old high school history text books. HOW continues to break no new ground, but reveals itself to be an eighteen-hundred and something soap opera with a few interesting presentations. Like many non-functional narratives of this ilk, the issues of racism, slavery, anti-indigeny, religious imperialism, etc,... are raised, but never fully expounded upon, as if the wrtiers don't have any political and cultural perspective or they've only read old high school history books or....well....they include no members from indigenous, African, non-christian/monotheistic or female populations. An assumption here is that people steeped in white privilege are again released upon their laptops to write stories about people who are not them, who they do not understand and who they are not qualified to advocate for - if that is even an intention in this time-consuming bit of pre-industrial programming.<br>
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A christianized Native man, Joseph Black Moon played by Eddie Spears, agonizes over the revelation that his brother is responsible for shooting an arrow or two into a lone European settler-woman. His noble pastor/minister/tormentor counsels him sternly to sublimate this truth and "tell no one". We later hear an impassioned speech by Colm Meaney's character, Thomas "Doc" Durant, in the canvas chapel about the ultimate righteousness of the christian path and the hopeless nature of the Indian pathology as Spears looks on penitently. HOW drags us through a brickish moment as Common's character, Elam Ferguson, attempts to claim his American dream of equality by seeking to solicit the services of one of the camp prostitutes. He is summarily laughed at by the European men who challenge his presence there and the prostitute who, post-laughter, seems to soften to the suggestion of the intention of possibility of the idea of the struggle for Black liberation - but maybe when everybody's not looking.<br>
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Unless this televisual bucket of maple syrup in the mid-February forests of New Hampshire (I had to retool the old tome of molasses in winter as this show is cliche' enough, another cliche would have been too much) finds its reason for living by episode seven, I'm not so sure that HOW has a chance in, well, hell to find, well, a reason for living at all.<br>
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Episode #next to last (phew!): Beginning with a melodramatic rout of the "renegades" that were frustrating the efforts of Big Iron to ply its way across the plains, the power of the cinematography and writing starts to pale in the subsequent encore showing of this episode. Backed by an ambiguous soundtrack song, probably felt to be highly clever in post-production, the slick, slo-mo shoot-em-up leaves the band of First nations warriors lying dead strewn across the soon-too-be-exploited earth. Yes, that's probably how, generally, those battles might have gone, but the editorializing of the history seemed to do nothing for viewers in a world challenged by decades of stable stereotypes, narrow-minded history and a currently hidden legacy of continued exploitation of Native American nations across the breadth and depth of Turtle Island.<br>
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Deepening the storyline a few inches under the surface, the christianized Black Moon ends up killing his brother, the same person that shot McElligott's character in the shoulder in an earlier episode. Hmmmmm. That one's too easy to return fire on. After a rare scene of inter-generational intimacy in a Native American family, Black Moon returns to the railway encampment to find the minister's daughter waiting for him to return, having done so every night since his departure. It seems AMC is hot on pressing cultural taboo in the sexual realm without having the iron railway...well....balls to fire harder salvoes at the pathology of capitalist manifest destiny and cultural genocide. Black Moon's return gets truly trippy as he begins to share his regret and mourning for the killing of his brother at his own hands - quickly cut short by the kisses of the minister's daughter. Called that one.<br>
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On that note, a little earlier, we see Common's character laying in social sin with the Native American prostitute (um.....sin because the European workers at the camp consider <span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">all</span> the prostitutes to be their property and privilege - which earned Common an unsuccessful hanging/lynching in the earlier episode...in case you were wondering ) whom he entreats to be his steady girl. Again, this is not an occurrence that would have been unknown to the widening Western swath being ripped into the western plains. The issue that is given rise here is the location of the native American and African ( = post-slavery slaves as per AMC) women. Part of the definition of a stereotype, and particularly cultural (aka racial) ones, is the absence of supporting cultural communities and most often intra-cultural partners. Hell On Wheels is no better than Bonanza, The Andy Griffith Show or Friends at deepening the characters of their cultural tokens.<br>
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To make matters worse, HOW hit an interestingly dissonant note when it made a rousing event of the successful completion of the first section of the railway. Given the deep pathos and challenging cultural grit that AMC thought they were creating, one might think that the soundtrack and the narrative treatment of that moment might have some of the dark tones that they paint across most of the rest of the series. It was all too easy and exposed the possibly unconscious validation of European cultural and economic exploitation that it seemed their contrived slickitude sought to evade.<br>
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Even this"deeply" ( = shallowly as per this writer) into the series, Hell On Wheels continues to disappoint, underwhelm and beg for cultural contrition and gives us nothing more than hell on reels other than the standard, normal machinations of the viral spread of the Machine Nation.<br>
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Final Episode: (this is cause for celebration)<br>
Common's "Elam Ferguson" character (remember, Ferguson is a "freed" African who was formerly enslaved): "You told me something once, the only thing that set me free, 'You gotta let go of the past".<br>
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This, one of the defining lines of the series, undergirds the larger context of colonial apologetics and denial of modern, current presence of oppressive socio-political systems. It is the perfect, classic white privilege script establishing (over and over, again and again) the abdication of responsibility around the legacy of racism, cultural genocide, enslavement, colonialism and imperialism.<br>
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Only seconds later, after the above tidbit of psycho-social wisdom, Ferguson told his fellow African rail worker that he needed to take care of his "own self" as opposed to confirming the request of that worker to have Ferguson's leadership shared in a communal context, providing guidance for the (historically) beleaguered displaced indigenous Africans now turned into day-laborers for land and rail barons. Ferguson walks away from his people and affirms the freedom-making words of the European enslaver, turned foreman (Anson Mount's "Cullen Bohannon" character). This is not a subtle message and it is a common one. This is standard regressive western cinema genre fare. This narrative is directly unusable by a society that is in the need of transformation.<br>
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And it seems that HOW's last word about Native people is that the unprodigal son of the native nation gets to dance with the now mad, homicidal preacher's daughter? It was entirely anti-climactic to have the last episode provide this narrative coda for what could have been a promising presence of characters indigenous to Turtle Island - the christianized Native American man gets to embody genocidal complicity, removal, assimilation and the payoff of self-hatred in his intimate dance with the European daughter of the decidedly pathologically unstable preacher.<br>
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Hell On Wheels has been nothing if not simply a story about European colonialism on Turtle Island with African and Native Americans as backdrop. This is nothing at all new and that is a shame as it makes HOW a nice-looking social wast of time and a pat retelling of retrograde narratives that steep us further into the status quo.<br>
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Worse yet, Hell On Wheels has been re-upped for yet another most likely horrendously laborious season in the fall of 2012. AND...then there's the encore presentation immediately after the final episode - just in case you hadn't seen how bad the show was the first time around.<br>
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In the larger context, western movies can be generally read as a stable and recurrent narrative of colonial retrenchment and apologetics, marked by deep and clear dismissals of the stories and realities of the oppressed, particularly Native Americans, First Nations peoples, the first and best residents of Turtle Island. The dismissals and disrespect, though, are generously shared with African characters, African peoples when they do appear in these narratives. How generous are our colonial "masters".<br>
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The amazingly crafted and enlightening documentary, "Reel Injun", makes it clear that the portrayals of Native American peoples have been largely problematic, narrowly drawn, misleading, disempowering, distracting, while sometimes transforming and recently being formulated and expressed by more and more Native American peoples. One of the troubling points the documentary illuminates is how the visual portrayals have all been lumped under the guise of the Plains nations. The clothing that the characters are wearing functionally strips Native peoples of their real identity as everyone is seen wearing buckskins, headbands and war bonnets. It is said that this is tantamount to stripping <span style="font-style: italic;">all</span> Turtle Islanders of their identity, the ultimate act of colonization.<br>
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"Bonanza", one of the most popular and lasting stories of colonialism and settler-colonialism, is a perfect example of this oppressive and dismissive narrative. Peppered with the presence of the doting Chinese Hop Sing (and other odd and sundry Asian characters), random and noble mercurial Africans (with varying relationships to freedom and enslavement) and an unending passel of Banocs (the bad bad guys), Paiutes, "injuns" and half-breeds as the whipping boys and objectifying girls of the redemptive and de facto systems of manifest destiny.<br>
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One could spend pages upon pages upon pages describing the repetitive nature of the "injun" caricature and the other attacks on indigenous and disenfranchised peoples, but the wider story is one of disempowerment and resignation for the viewer. Ward Churchill (...) has pointed out how the temporal balkanization of Turtle Island's indigenous peoples has created a surreality that exists only in the late 19th century, relegating Native culture and waning power figuratively and literally in the past, Hollywood never committing itself to more revolutionary, redemptive, complex or current portrayals and storylines. There is no American Indian Movement, no Native American scholarship, no linguistic and cultural restoration, no burgeoning cultural art, no reconciliation and recovery from the brutal horror of christian missionary boarding schools, no Winona LaDukes or Wilma Mankillers, No Gitz CrazyBoys or John Mohawks, no Vine Deloria, Jr.s, no UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, no indigenist politics, no dry native humor.<br>
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This only serves to submerge the very functional life of Turtle Island indigeny, any chance for substantive political alliance (as there is no one to ally with or any reason to do so in the first place) and to give the de facto nod to any and all political and economic attacks on land, natural resources and cultural sovereignty. What a better way to continue the Peabody Coal rape of Navajo and Hopi land than to convince the settler-colonial populace that the Navajo and Hopi losses were inevitable anyway (indeed, has anyone ever SEEN a Navajo or a Hopi?). What a better way to assure that the resistance to Tar Sands oil extraction will be minimal and lacking in sustained resolve. What a better way to continue the trend of biopiracy, theft and continued possession of cultural artifacts ( http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ indigenous_peoples_ literature/message/19495 ) and distract the larger world community from caring about the abuse of Native peoples during the 2008 Olympics in Canada or the rampant disappearances of Native and aboriginal women.<br>
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The western movie genre represents, in general and in effect, an outmoded, racist, colonial/imperialist set of oppressive narratives that serve no better purpose than to continue the hundreds of years old genocidal story of settler-colonial European holocaust meted out upon the once multitudinous peoples of Turtle Island, of Amerique. To continue to rehash this terroristic and now tragically tiresome stereotypical story is but a nod to continued cultural destruction. <br>
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I thought we knew better than that. Maybe due to the wild and almost ubiquitous popularity and pathological persistence of the western genre and narrative accoutrement, we simply <i>are</i> no better than that. After all, old movies and many new ones make good money for already rich media conglomerates. Genocidal holocaust, a la USAmerican settler-colonial propagandistic television and cinema, is alive and well on our screens and in our politically immature hearts.<br>
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<u style="background-color: #ea9999; font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><b>Spoiler Alert on Season 2</b></u> due to start its ride into brimstone on August 12, 2012:<br>
Read everything above this Spoiler Alert.Mzee Ukumbwa Sauti, M.Ed.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11424977300062238841noreply@blogger.com0