Feel free to post responses to any of the material we read and view for class here. Some questions to get us going:

which texts do you find to be problematic and why?

in what ways do you see the body as a rhetorical space (one which conveys a message)? (note: the body can be made into a rhetorical space by the owner of the body or by others)

do you believe the female body is inscribed with a gender-specific value in popular media today?

do you feel implicated in any of the pieces we've read (as if the writer is hitting a little too close to home for you)?

I read the pieces that we were suppose to read and I really enjoyed both of the writings. I think that they helped me out with writing my paper and gave me some new opinions about the toys that we play with when we were younger and how it affects us today. I really enjoyed the different types of barbies that she thought of. I was even thinking of some others barbies that they should market. I also really enjoyed the other article. When I was younger I defintely bought every subscribtion to Seventeen and YM and didn't even think twice about how the articles were affecting me. But now I realize how distastful the magazines are.

I agree with you Jennifer, I loved the writings. The Barbie one was especially insightful. I'm sure that people may deny playing with/loving Barbies when they were little, but I will say that I had one of the biggest collections on the block. And I did want to look just like her. I remember wanting that long blonde hair but more than anything I wanted that figure. Barbie was successful (ie. she had Ken, all the cars, the house, even the RV), what more could I want? I could be a princess one day and then a rock star the next, I felt like she had the perfect life. Little did I know that I would grow up to despise what she represented!
I loved the writer's suggestions for new barbies; it made it easy to think up your own. What new Barbies did everyone else think up?

I heard one time, in an anti-barbie rant that if a woman were to bear the exact proportions of a barbie, she would have to walk on all fours. How completely gross is that?! ok, thought i'd throw that out there.
   I think the female body is definitely represented in a rhetorical context in almost all of the ads that I have seen. It's message is one of prescription, of telling us what to do and what not to do w/ our bodies, of telling us if we measure up or if weve got work to do. People have always used their bodies as a means of self-expression, but now more than ever, womens bodies are being used to literally keep a lid over all of us. our bodies control us in this society. when will women ever be truly free when we are bound by the limitations of our very own skin?

I enjoyed the readings too. I laughed reading the last part of the barbie article when she named all the barbies they should make. Alot of people would freak out if they made a barbie like one of those. I agree with what was said because girls want to become what they play with. Like when girls have the plastic high heels, jewelry, crown and all that goes with being a princess, they begin to believe taht they will become one. But i do have to say that i played with barbies when i was little but i never compared myself to them, that may have been because they all had blond hair. but i guess it depends on how you were raised

the body as rhetorical space: I think we use our bodies to make statements more than we realize: by the clothes we wear, by our hairstyles, whether a woman chooses to wear make-up or not, whether a guy chooses to cut his hair or not. It's interesting to observe people crossing our culture's traditional gender lines with their bodies. For example, not that long ago, the only man who wore an earring in public was Mr. Clean. Now it's not uncommon to see a lot of men in public sporting an earring or two. Perhpas there'll come a day when neither sex will feel compelled to "other" themselves by following artificially established rules of how to make themselves look "nice" but will free to express themselves via their body image by what just comes naturally to them. If we could just resist the constant media barrage around us and convince ourselves that we really don't need to make ourselves look any better than we already are.

i wanted to comment again on what mckibben said in class about how sometimes kids draw genitals and nipples on their dolls because the dolls dont come w/ them. whats the point of keeping these realities from kids? i mean, we all have these parts, and i just dont get why kids arent supposed to see that. every child is curious about their bodies and those of others at some point, and eventually they discover, often on their own, what these parts look like on other people and what they are all about. so whats the point of making them feel ashamed about it? i remember doing that to one of the cabbage patch dolls i got for xmas one year, partly because i hated it and knew i didnt give a shit how badly i defaced it. but since when should drawing anatomical parts onto a doll that it should already have be defacing it? can someone help explain this to me??

I really liked what shannon said about studies of how barbies are used by children (could you post the author on here?). It made me think about how my sister and I used to play. We were extremely creative. My parents hated GI Joes, and I think they had their reservations about Barbies as well. We HAD to have them, though, cause everybody else in class had one. I had to by all my war toys with my allowance money, but my sister got some barbie gifts, I remember. My parents were reluctant, but when we got the toys and were actually playing with them, we weren't strict at all about society's standards of how to play. We would combine GI Joes and Barbies in our play. My sister's kitchen set smelled like artificial vanilla, but the stove was cool, the way it came apart in little bits. We played some version of house with Dusty (in his desert combat gear) and Barbie, but the poor feller had to do a vault to kiss his wife goodbye for the day. (gawd this is long and pointless).
      I guess my point is that "nothing is good nor bad but thinking makes it so." barbie could be a really fucked up thing if you felt like you had to cut up your body to look like her, but for me and my sister, she was just another toy ( I think).

In response to Dianne's last post: I totally get you. Why should there be a taboo? But in light of the insecurities we just talked about in class in repect to barbies; what sort of effect could you forsee if we were to standardize and plasticize genitals and nipples as well. I could see some even more intense insecurities emerging from that. What do you think?

  I have to say that I really enjoyed the readings. I liked the Barbie one because it put forth several ideas that I never thought about. The one thing that scared me the most was when I thought about my twin girl cousins who live in Indianapolis. They will both turn 15 on Christmas day. When they were younger they loved barbies. Every year when my extended family got together on Christmas the majority of their gifts were something or other barbie related or make-up or hair or clothes related. No one really knew what else to buy young girls, especially ones that lived so far from everyone else.
  I liked barbies when I was little, but they never really affected me the way this article talked about. (It was more of something to do with my friends when they came over, not so much something I did cause I thought it was cool.) I think it was because I had so many other interests and I just preferred playing with my brother's Ninja Turtles more than my Barbies. But I worry now that my cousins, as they have just started their freshman year of highschool will be more effected by roles of the media, and magazines and the portrayl of Barbie, and it might have a seriously negative effect on their lives. I just wish I could take back all of the presents my parents, grandparents and aunts and uncles bought them.

hermaphraditic dolls: you can't construct the figure of a human in plastic and not dismiss a certain type of people. obviously. but there a millions of barbies, why not make them more diverse? nice and good and i agree, but what about siamese twins or people born with 12 toes or albinos? toy makers will always be leaving somebody unrepresented. mass production has its problems, but i'm not going to blame any of my insecurities or deficincies on a decision maker at matel.
Still those barbie nazis are part of an enormous chain of influencing imagery that really should be stopped. another d-day perhaps.

in response to beckie's post on the body being used as a rhetorical space, i agree completely. i feel that one of the quickest and easiest ways to make a statement is through what you wear or do to the outside of your body. what is really important about people is what is on their inside, but that is not what people see first. i have approached many people (and made many close friends) by being interested and/or attracted by something in their appearance. for instance, the person could be wearing a shirt with the name of a band i like on it, or they might have a really unique piece of jewlery on, or maybe they are sporting a patch or button on their bookbag that tells me something they are interested in....the list can go on forever. maybe this is why i don't view makeup etc. as such a terrible thing if used with the right intentions. i see cloths, makeup, hair dye, etc, all as ways to express yourself as an individual and to create a "shell" that you feel you best belong in.
do u guys agree/disagree???

Bethany: YES I AGREE!!! As a psych major, I know that people make judgements about others in a split-second kind of way. The way you present yourself on the outside is a good way to try and influence that snap judgement that others will make about you. Maybe even make them want to get to know you by your personality. You made a great point. Unfortunetly, I think some people don't understand that their outward apperance is just that, something on the outside. They also don't get that they should still cultivate what's on the inside.