Gen and Pop Final Prep

The four understandings of gender

1. it is not natural, but social

2. it is a set of historical ideas that is attached to human bodies

3. it is a set of performances that gains power through repetition

4. it works alongside other systems and categories of power

ex - Gender reveals, queerness

Gender reveals: became real through trend, since then it is felt necessary to do gender reveal where blue is assigned to boy and pink is assigned to girl, this has been followed is almost all gender party reveals, the elites perform it extravagantly which influences the subordinates to perform gender reveal parties in a similar fashion

Queerness: celebrities have come forwards as queer which enables other who identify as queer to come forward in society, is social because it challenges societal norms on gender and sexuality, challenges traditional binary of gender and sexuality

• Gender as a set of historical ideas we attach to human bodies

  • In Middle Eastern women, veil on Muslim women

    • Western culture is that there is a desire to penetrate the veil

      • Veil became a metaphor for rape fantasy

Ideology

tool for maintaining hegemony, form of power which is characterized by leadership and manufacturing of consent rather than imposition and condition; becomes part of our “common sense”; goes unnoticed and is reproduced in popular culture’; dominant ones reproduce the social order (capitalism, patriarchy, racism, homophobia)

the ways in which dominant beliefs and values are presented and reinforced through media, entertainment, and other cultural forms; ex: Many media portrayals reinforce traditional gender roles, such as men as breadwinners and women as homemakers. 

sets of ideas and frameworks which people adopt which are used to justify a particular system

ex: as the opening of the western frontier was a unique and definitive moment in American history, so jeans were seen as unique and definitive American garment, possibly America’s only contribution to international fashion industry

Hegemony

set of ideas present in society to normalize a system, appear to be natural not because they are biological but because it is what society expects

exercised by ruling classes, but it is fragile and has to be constantly struggled for and maintained against challenges from the subordinate group

naturalizes power

ex - patriarchy

ex - The spread of American popular culture and entertainment globally, shaping tastes and trends, is often cited as an example of cultural hegemony. 

Essentialism

belief that men and women are inherently different beings who belong to separate categories. each category has a set of characteristics that sets them apart from other categories and their members.

ex - gender reveal parties: men (blue) and female (pink). men are dominant and women are submissive. women (nurture, housewife, irrational, emotional, modest) private roles. men (protector, leader, provider, wealth, can’t show emotions, logical, aggressive, physical strength). public roles.

Caster Semenya who was South African Olympic medalist where in 2019, she was banned from Olympics because she had higher testosterone levels (example of making the different categories stable through medical or technological intervention)

Popular culture

forms and activities which have their roots in the social and material conditions of particular classes; which have been embodied in popular traditions and practices

the collectivist mindset made up of ideologies and trends that are set by the social and material conditions of set classes

culture of the subordinated and disempowered and thus always bears within it signs of power relations, traces of the forces of domination and subordination that are central to our social system and therefore to social experience, it shows signs of resisting or evading these forces

ex - gender party, social media, style politics (zoot suits/jeans)

Prenatal gendered environment

conditions in the uterus affect the baby's development and can influence gender identity and roles. emphasizing gender before baby is born

how ultrasounds and blood tests were developed as technologies to monitor fetal health; this visualizes biological sex and then assigns gender before birth

Ex - nursery decorations, gendered clothing

Theatrical versus non-theatrical masculinities

masculinity as non-theatrical:

masculinity in white men often depends on a relatively stable motion of the realness and the naturalness of both the male body and its signifying effects; masculinity cannot be impersonated

ex: jeans bore meanings of naturalness and sexuality, jeans were seen as natural because they were worn by men who shaped the country in the west (jeans carry traces of labor), contrasted with “suits” in cities which is artificial

ex: zoot suit riots where white servicemen go around LA attacking zooters by cutting their hair and stripping them off their clothing → forced masculinization

Body reasoning

a Western attitude which assumes that “the body is always in view and on view. It invites a gaze, a gaze of differences, a gaze of differentiation - the most historically constant being the gendered gaze."

ex - social media: baby’s sex is confirmed at birth and reinforced via birth announcements and additional social media posts, making any later divergence in gender identification clear deviation from ‘factory specifications’

Ideographs

political slogans or labels that encapsulate it in political discourse

abstract ideas, values, and beliefs, often used in discourse to influence public understanding and action

An example of an ideograph in popular culture is the red circle with a diagonal line, which universally symbolizes "not allowed" or "no". This symbol effectively conveys a meaning without the need for language, making it an ideogram. Another example is the smiley face emoji, which represents happiness or joy. 

Disciplinary power

a form of power that regulates behavior and enforces norms through surveillance, training, and the establishment of standards, often seen in institutions like schools and prisons.

ex - panopticons: a central tower where guards can observe inmates in cells surrounding the perimeter; maximize surveillance with minimal staff, all prisoners feel like they were being watched because they are exposed: disciplinary power

ex: in court shows, judges serve as incontrovertible evidence of the legitimacy of American Dream and thus, a further indictment of those who have not “chosen” the same path; disciplining people like them in failing to achieve the American Dream

The four controlling images

Black women are undesired modes of femininity and are represented as “the other”, they have been associated with masculinity in ways which exclude them from the privileges of white femininity

1. mammy: by loving, nurturing, and caring for her white children and ‘family’ better than her own, mammy symbolizes the dominant group’s perceptions of the ideal Black female relationship to elite white male power. mammy knows her place as obedient servant and has accepted her subordination. she enjoys it.

2. matriarch: the stereotype of a strong Black woman who is often viewed as the head of a family or community, but is depicted negatively as dominant and controlling, reinforcing racial and gender hierarchies; stigmatized as being unfeminine

3. welfare mother: the stereotype of a Black woman who is perceived as lazy or irresponsible, relying on government assistance to raise her children; this image perpetuates negative racial stereotypes and reinforces societal biases against welfare policies.

4. Jezebel: the whore, or sexually aggressive woman. efforts to control Black women’s sexuality life at the heart of Black women’s oppression. [the stereotype of a hypersexualized Black woman who is portrayed as promiscuous and morally loose, often used to justify exploitation and discrimination. This image feeds into racial and gender biases, perpetuating harmful narratives about Black femininity.]

ex: dump particular social negatives to Black women, wasteful behavior (not paying debts), they did something wrong that led to the action; people rely on benefits because they are wasteful

Political economy of domination

the economic system of capitalism shapes political, cultural, and social life

the use of power to control and oppress individuals or groups, often through acts of humiliation, dehumanization, and violence, in order to maintain authority and suppress resistance within a society.

ex: mammy: by loving, nurturing, and caring for her white children and ‘family’ better than her own, mammy symbolizes the dominant group’s perceptions of the ideal Black female relationship to elite white male power. mammy knows her place as obedient servant and has accepted her subordination.

ex: matriarch: the stereotype of a strong Black woman who is often viewed as the head of a family or community, but is depicted negatively as dominant and controlling, reinforcing racial and gender hierarchies; stigmatized as being unfeminine; post WW1, black women refused to work as mammy and they engaged in collective work stoppages, and left the South and migrated north for new employment opportunities where in some places outpaced their male counterparts.

ex: welfare mother: the stereotype of a Black woman who is perceived as lazy or irresponsible, relying on government assistance to raise her children; this image perpetuates negative racial stereotypes and reinforces societal biases against welfare policies.

ex: Jezebel: the whore, or sexually aggressive woman. [the stereotype of a hypersexualized Black woman who is portrayed as promiscuous and morally loose, often used to justify exploitation and discrimination. This image feeds into racial and gender biases, perpetuating harmful narratives about Black femininity.]

Semiotic richness

jeans does not have a single defined meaning, but they are a resource bank of potential meanings

ex: Invasion of lifting of veil (Binary in Western Ideology)

• Veil is a symbol for oppression

• Unveiling is freedom

Incorporation

dominant culture absorbs the tools of the subdominant culture outcome: to stabilize hegemonic order

manages dissent by adopting the language of the subordinated; reinforces hegemony

ex - Beyoncé's use of a clenched fist during her Super Bowl 50 halftime show in 2016 was a nod to the Black Power salute used by Tommie Smith and John Carlos at the 1968 Olympics, according to The Guardian. Both gestures, while sharing the visual element of a raised fist, carried distinct political messages and contexts.; fight against racial discrimination

Excorporation

subordinate group makes their own rules based on the discourses provided on the dominant force; central to popular culture

done by subordinated people, aka, the working class, poor, “ordinary” people; expression of disagreement with mainstream; challenges hegemony

ex - Watts, LA (1966): prep style popularized by students at Ivy League universities; these people were affirming the supremacy of the culture whose clothes they had adopted; wearing ripped jeans is a way of disfiguring them becomes a way of distancing oneself from those values

Subculture

a community, organization, or group within the larger world of the dominant culture; consists of individuals whose experiences have led them to distinct worldviews; members of a subculture challenge and question the mainstream ideas about social hierarchy, status, and authority

ex - zoot suiters: subculture taken up by young Mexican-Americans; attire consisted of exaggerated shoulders, long coat, and ballooning trousers (pachucos: white masculinities that are theatrical and therefore more feminine), they create alternative identities and express resistance through unique styles and practices.

ex: pachucas: viewed as sexually promiscuous, but not in service of military men; betray the family and the nation during wartime by not being “responsible” women; an excessive and loud femininity; their race and class masculinize them; wearing pants

Style politics

an expression of difference via style or fashion choices that reflect identity and values, often used to challenge societal norms and expectations; commodities such as coats, lipstick, and trousers are not used in the ways that they are used in “more orthodox cultural formations”; form of excorporation

ex - wearing zoot suit is seen as unpatriotic/unAmerican because male zoot-suitors are perceived as lazy, choosing to party instead of enlisting to fight during WW1, flashing their wealth during wartime; refusal to assimilate into middle-class Mexican society

Commodity activism

tethers mythologies of resistance to institutions and practices of capitalism, ideas that seem rebellious or anti-capitalist are sometimes linked to or used within the capitalist system itself

ex:Nike promotion of Pro Hijab marketing, form of inciorporation, By constructing hijabi Muslim female bodies for the masculine American gaze, such images of Muslim hijabi women neutralize the threat of the shrouded Muslim woman while reinforcing the gazer’s heterosexual (and progressive!) credentials, making body secular (Even as it veils, the Nike Pro Hijab simultaneously unveils its weather, marking her as safe, moderate, compliant, and a willing participant in US safe-haven of sports)

ex: Black people were used as a people commodity to incorporate more Black community to buy Nike stuff when a Black person resistant in the FBL game kicked out leading them to think that they are not represented

Post-feminism

• Feminism” is taken into account, but only to be shown to be no longer necessary

• Pop culture uses ironic sexism that winks at its own problematic nature

• Female viewers have to “be cool about it,” to suspend their critical judgement

• Finally, the highest form of freedom is being able to choose to consume or participate in patriarchal practices, to be one of the guys

a way of thinking or culture that believes feminism has achieved its major goals, so now women can focus on individual choices, empowerment, and femininity - often within a consumer or media-driven society

ex: celebrilities like Beyonce or Cardi N framing sexual expression as empowerment; they reclaim sexual agency, a feminist goal, but do it in highly stylized, marketable ways that fit into the entertainment industry

The perfect

It is a heightened form of self-regulation based on an aspiration to some idea of the “good life, relies mostly fully on restoring traditional femininity, which means that female competition is inscribed within specific horizons of value relating to husbands, work partners and boyfriends, family and home, motherhood and maternity; reinforces hegemony (doing shared housework for themselves not at the behest of men)

• Gives the illusion that you are in control of your life

• You are constantly disciplining every sphere of your life

• This has been incorporated as the mode of feminism which the early feminism would not agree (they view body positivity as body oppression)

• a new feminism based on competition with other women

  • The two combine, an inner-directed self competitiveness which is in effect self-beratement about not being good enough or perfect enough, and outer-directed competition or antagonism towards other women.”

Ex: Beyonce wears style politics associated with rebellion, incorporation of feminism ideology and punk look

Microcelebrity

in the broadcast era, celebrity was something a person was; in the Internet, microcelebrity is something people do

• A visual representation strategy to gain attention

• Cultivating personal relationships with followers

• An aspirational lifestyle

• Microcelebrity often reinforces existing social hierarchies

  • Those successful at gaining attention often reproduce conventional status of hierarchies of luxury, celebrity, and popularity that depend on the ability to emulate the ideal iconography of mainstream celebrity culture

  • Ex - Charli D’Amelio

    • Teenager from Connecticut

    • Joined TikTok in May 2019

    • Became the most popular person in TikTok 2 months before her 16th birthday

    • Currently has 150 million followers

Trad-wife

fully restoring traditional femininity, which means that female competition is inscribed within specific horizons of value relating to husbands, work partners and boyfriends, family and home, motherhood and maternity

ex: stay in wife/mom influencers posting their daily routine that involves taking care of their husband and children; choosing this life freely because they see as empowering

Manosphere and incels

manosphere: an online subculture for men who have been “red-pilled” (excorporation), collection of online communities and websites where men discuss topics like masculinity, dating, gender roles, and sometimes express strong criticism of feminism or women in general.

• Groups in the online manosphere

  • Men’s rights activists (MRAs)

  • Men going their own way (MGTOW)

  • Pick up artists (PUAs)

  • Traditional Christian conservatives (TradCons)

  • gamer/geek culture (although she says not all gamers are part of the manosphere)

• Characteristics of the manosphere

  • A transnational network

  • Visual and meme based

  • Can integrate seemingly conflicting ideologies (Ex: atheism and conservative Christianity)

  • Relies on emotion, mostly anger, to unite participants

  • Centers the victimhood of men and their feelings

• The lingo of the manosphere

  • Negging

  • Friendzoning

  • Alpha male

  • Beta male

  • Incel

• Manospheres are described as hybrid masculinity

• Man can adopt hegemonic masculinity when it is desirable; but the same men can distance themselves strategically from hegemonic masculinity at other  moments. Consequently, masculinity represents not a certain type of man but, rather, a way that men position themselves through discursive practices.

• Hybrid masculinity and homosexuality

ex: Red Pill forums (like on Reddit or old blogs):
These are spaces where men say they’ve "woken up" to the idea that modern society is unfair to men, especially when it comes to dating, marriage, or gender equality. They often believe that:

• Women only want rich or attractive men,

• Feminism has gone "too far,"

• Men need to take back control of their lives by being "alpha."

Incels: involuntary celibate.”
It describes a person (usually a heterosexual man) who feels unable to get a romantic or sexual partner, despite wanting one.

ex: No woman will ever date a guy like me unless I’m rich or look like a model. Women only want ‘Chads’ (hot, confident men).

• Andrew Tate: an incel microcelebrity

  • Has more than 10 million followers on Twitters

  • Arrested in Romania in 2022 for sex trafficking

  • Is facing multiple charges of rape and sex trafficking in the UK

Hybrid Masculinities

forms of masculinity that mix traditional "manly" traits (like toughness or dominance) with traits seen as more progressive or softer, like emotional openness, feminism, or style.

• May appear inclusive or progressive, but still keeps men in a powerful or central position.

• Often seen in white, straight, middle-class men who distance themselves from “toxic” masculinity without giving up its benefit

ex: Harry Styles wearing dresses or nail polish while still being celebrated as confident, cool, and desirable.

Hollywood Industrial Complex

a way to reference the political economy made up of the totality of Hollywood’s many sub industries and its laborers

• Encompasses film, television, music, radio, agents, managers, celebrities, and media producers at all levels in the labor hierarchy

• Promote and amplify the pressure for women to conform to certain physical expectations, while validating the male gaze of women in American culture

ex: Latinos and paparazzi work

• The field has become dominated by Latinos because formal barriers of entry do not exist for paparazzi

• This is their way into the Hollywood system, outside the hierarchies and elite spaces inhabited by others in the industry, such as celebrity reporters

• They become scapegoats for the larger media because they are blamed for celebrity media

• Paparazzi as invisible laborers in Hollywood

  • In this informal economy the originating producer of the image that leads to the final media product has a relationship with neither of the agencies that place his or her images nor the media outlets that ultimately publish them. Still, even paparazzi who sell their images formally do not receive any acknowledgment from the media outlets that rely on their images

  • In some ways paparazzi work is a service job, the janitorial work of celebrity media. And much like other low-end service work, it is rarely appreciated or respected

Star image

 the star is an intertextual sign made up of screen roles and obviously stage-managed public appearances, and also of images of the manufacture of that “image” and of the real person who is the site or occasion of it

ex: Britney Spears as star image

• Her blonde hair wasn’t just a style choice; it was a symbol that shaped her identity as a pop icon.

• It influenced how people remembered her and the kind of roles and music she was associated with.

• Changing her look (like when she cut her hair in 2007) became a huge cultural moment because it affected her star image

• But is it absurd to discuss her image from that time as though there was not an apparatus behind it, as though she existed in a vacuum where she was figuring out her sexuality on her own terms, rather than in an economy where young women’s sexuality is rapidly commodified until they are old enough to be discarded

Race and popular music as a social problem

the opposition to popular music derives from existing and political debates in the general society. The persistence of controversy over popular music forms part of a broader political and cultural debate over the moral order

ex: Early criticism of Jazz

• Aesthetic opposition to jazz comes from the musical establishment. Musicians, music critics, and educators opposed to jazz found the music of black Americans undisciplined, emotionally volatile, and performed by musicians without academic training.

• Central to these criticisms was the fear that white, Protestant, middle-class life was under assault by ethnic immigrants, black migrants from the South, and the rapidly changing social scene

ex: Social problem #2: rock n’ roll

• Antirock crusaders focused on the music’ origins in black America, its alleged negative effects on the values and character of young people, rock’s link to drugs, uts antireligious qualities, and its use by Communists bent on destroying political and social fabric of America

• Ex: Ed Sullivan Show refused to show Elvis Presley below the waist because Presley’s movements were thought to be sexually suggestive

Ex:

• How racial stereotypes are tied to rap music

  • Responses were significantly more negative when the lyrics were represented as rap, revealing, to quote Fried, that “the same lyrical passage that is acceptable as a country song is dangerous and offensive when identified as a rap song.

• Assumption: rap reflects the true thoughts, beliefs, and character of the person performing it

  • Ex - Drake amends defamation lawsuit against UMG to include Super Bowl LIX performance

  • One of the underlying assumptions of “rap on trial”: that rap music, unlike any other musical genre, somehow reflects the true thoughts, beliefs, and character of the person performing it

The features, function of, and the “characters” in a moral panic

Moral panic - moments where conditioned person or group emerges as a threat to social order

• Moral panics redirect political and economic instability towards fear of scapegoated social group, building support for punishment while turning people away from analyses of structure

• What are the features of a moral panic which are present here?

  • Scapegoat: queer or teaching queer stuff, moral entrepreneur: the author,, American people: children

scapegoat: blames certain groups for larger anxieties (ex: youth, immigrants, subcultures)

entrepreneur: individuals or groups (like politicians, media figures) who raise alarm and push for action

American people: target

ex: In the 1990s, violent video games were blamed for corrupting youth.

scapegoat: parents

moral entrepreneurs: politicians calling for bans

American people: children (teen gamers)

Anxious displacement

Refers to the overloading of negatively codifie social differences and symbolic excess onto figures and relationships that surround LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) characters. This symbolic intervention manages the cultural anxiety generated by LGBT issues and themes by normalizing gay characters and channeling cultural anxiety away from them

It’s when a show avoids dealing directly with uncomfortable issues, so it shifts the tension onto a different topic, group, or character onto something “safer” or more socially acceptable.

ex: Modern Family show

In a family sitcom, a gay couple might be shown as funny and lovable, but the actual conflict in their storyline focuses on something else—like a difficult neighbor or parenting troubles—rather than on society’s homophobia or their struggles being accepted.

• The show avoids making viewers too uncomfortable with real discrimination,

• But still includes a “diverse” character to seem progressive.

Sex and the mastered/fortified self

• Sex: where the mastered self breaks down

  • Sex may thus be the site where the belief in a coherent, individuated self breaks down

• Halberstam - mainstream fictions of fortified male masculinities

• Male penetration as a loss of power

  • In a famous essay written in the midst of the HIV/AIDS crisis titled “is the Rectum a Grave?” literary theorist Leo Bersani argued that the revulsion toward gay sex was driven is part by the feeling that “to be penetrated is to abdicate power.”

  • In other words, gay sex opens the idea that masculinity is not fortified.

Queer youth sexuality and the figure of the child

• Representations of queerness: the 2000s

  • Queerness has been normalized and desexualized

• A suspicion of the incorporation of queer politics…

  • Queer theorists have argued against a political focus in gay marriage and families in ways which ultimately reinforce heterosexuality as the norm.

    • They call this “homonormativity”

• Gitizen’s argument: depictions of the sexual pleasure of queer youth work against panic and normativity

• Children are the horizon of politics

  • Things are often done in name of the children

• To thus represent queer sex is to give voice to a population either co-opted by adult voices or essentially voiceless. It is also meant to counteract or complicate the barrage of panic and policies that restrict queer youth and identities mentioned at the start of this piece.

Society sees children as innocent and non-sexual, so when queer youth express sexuality or identity, it often makes adults uncomfortable or leads to backlash—because it challenges the idea of what a “child” should be.

Ex: When people oppose LGBTQ+ inclusive sex ed in schools by saying:

“Let kids stay innocent,”
they're using the figure of the child to block queer visibility, based on the belief that any mention of queerness is automatically “too adult” or “sexual.”

But:

• Straight romance in kids’ movies (like Disney princess stories) is seen as “harmless” and allowed.

• Queer youth, on the other hand, are often told their identity is inappropriate or confusing—even when it's just about love, not sex.