How We “Do Gender” with Paris is Burning.
In the 1990 documentary Paris is Burning, viewers are confronted with man themes including gender, race, class, sexuality, health polices and more. The director and producer, Jennie Livingston, received harsh criticism surrounding her filming style. Without getting into too much of my own criticism, I believe that she filmed in a way that upheld and celebrated whiteness. A scene that stuck with me was during a few interviews, there were clips of white people shown while the interviewers were talking about dreams and goals of wanting to be famous. Despite this skewed lens we watched this documentary through during class, we were still given a chance to see a glimpse of ball culture in the 90’s.
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Something interesting that came up in class discussion surrounding this was that everyone felt like the roles of the mother being the most important role of the household isn’t typical, and therefore the houses in Paris is Burning is atypical. I’m going to have to disagree because an intersection of class was left out. Typically women in poor households are the breadwinners, and I think that is what the houses resemble. The family structure that they are most familiar with. This intersection that was completely glossed over could have simply come from ignorance of how class status affects households, and thus gender roles. In Lober’s article, she mentions that “In poorer groups that have few resources, women and men are more nearly equal, and the women may even outstrip the men in education and occupational status”( Lober 1994). However, fails to illustrate how this plays out in a family
I chose this video because it raised my awareness by questioning the difference between positive role models, such as The Cosby Show, and positive images for all African-Americans. The issues discussed and comments made by the cast piqued my interest and helped change my perspective on the history of African-American representation in the media, especially in the realm of television. Color Adjustment contains more than just endless ‘talking heads’ – it has elements of fact, history, and professional opinion all blended together in an engaging format. It was extremely exciting to hear the TV producers like Hal Kanter and David Wolper talk about their own productions in retrospect. Most importantly to me, Color Adjustment changed my perspective on African-American representation in the media by challenging me to think about images...
“Blacking Up” is an inspirational and eye opening film that looks at racial identity through hip hop and its culture. The film explores the tensions that surround white identification with the hip hop culture. Typical white people identify hip hop with responses that are uncharacteristic. They are termed as a “wigger” or “wannabe” who think they can become part of a strong culture. The film clearly identifies these people as those trying to connect with others who usually won’t accept them. I have watched this film before for my Hip Hop class in high class and was happy to watch it and learn more about the hip hop community.
Throughout the book, many of the wives note how they wish that they were able to pursue their goals and dreams, but were unable to due to the fact that they had responsibilities as a wife. I think that by putting themselves in a position where they could be viewed as undeserving upper class members who did not work, it not created a dependency to their husbands financially, it portrayed them as women incapable of supporting themselves or their desires in life. “Upper-class women, like other women, experience dissatisfaction with their role as wives–with its expected mode of accommodation, unequal voice in family decisions, and sole responsibility for home and family”
...ent from the silent era of film, overt racism of ethnic minorities was blatantly apparent within the film medium. However, presently this overt racism however has shifted into a more subtle segregation of casting and racial politics within the film medium. It seems that both the problem and the solution lies in the Eurocentric domination within the Hollywood film industry – and it seems that it still remains challenged to this day.
Woll, Allen L and Randall M Miller. Ethnic and Racial Images in American Film and Television: Historical Essays and Bibliography. n.d. Print.
Over the course of approximately one-hundred years there has been a discernible metamorphosis within the realm of African-American cinema. African-Americans have overcome the heavy weight of oppression in forms such as of politics, citizenship and most importantly equal human rights. One of the most evident forms that were withheld from African-Americans came in the structure of the performing arts; specifically film. The common population did not allow blacks to drink from the same water fountain let alone share the same television waves or stage. But over time the strength of the expectant black actors and actresses overwhelmed the majority force to stop blacks from appearing on film. For the longest time the performing arts were the only way for African-Americans to express the deep pain that the white population placed in front of them. Singing, dancing and acting took many African-Americans to a place that no oppressor could reach; considering the exploitation of their character during the 1930's-1960's acting' was an essential technique to African American survival.
Paris Is Burning is a 1990 American documentary film by Jennie Livingston about the the ball culture of New York City and the African-American, Latino, gay, and transgender communities involved in it. Shortly after the film was released, many criticized both Livingston and her work, including Bell Hooks and Jackie Goldsby. While Hooks and Goldsby both reach the conclusion that there are some things Livingston could have done differently, Goldsby's analysis is far deeper and less biased than Hooks’ which relies more on personal conjecture rather than factual evidence. I will first discuss Hooks’ argument about the issues of race as well as Goldsby’s slightly different argument about the terminology and imagery in the film. I will then discuss the similarities and differences between their arguments such as their focuses and their views on Livingston. Afterwards, I will conclude with my insight on both of their arguments and Paris is Burning.
The world of television can either completely hit or miss the mark when it comes to providing its audience a diverse cast/actors. "Girls" is a new HBO show about young, prosperous, and white New Yorkers in their twenties struggling to find their footing in the post-collegiate world. It is a poor example of representation of race, but the show in itself cannot be held responsible for the whole problem of racial diversity of media and popular culture. There has been a lot of controversy about the show's diversity since the first episode, seeing how it is set in the melting pot of NYC and Brooklyn, yet it is prominently white. The shocking part is that despite its meting pot nature, it is very easy to live a segregated social life in New York City, especially if you are a rich white person. The fact that the show is so white should not come off as unusual, yet it does because this generation is more willing to see that change happen in pop culture. Not everyone sees it that way and pop culture still does not represent races equally or at times even accurately. For example, when show do add in minorities they often make them extremely stereotypical to their race. The recurrence in the lack of realistic representation in the show highlights the “whiteness” of stereotypical roles that overshadows real life representation.
Society looks down on women when they don’t uphold to what they normally do. Furthermore, she talks about how men are not seen equally and there only social role is to work and come home and do nothing. In my opinion I realize that these social roles have changed for the better. Now both men and women are helping out with household work which I think would be less stress and work on women.
Due to the women having roles like men, this does not follow the patriarchal ideology that most stories do. To be specific, even in this day in age, most households are in charge by men and women do not have equal say, and in this story, it shows that the roles are being reversed. Although, it does not show complete gender equality because the husband is unemployed and just because his wife makes more than him, he is being disrespected. However, they are married she tends to be friends with males that her own husband does not like, and just because her husband is not unemployed she is taking advantage. To conclude, the women is being fully appreciated since she has a job and she is in charge of the household, but the women is oppressing her husband just how men oppress women these days.
In his documentary Classified X, Martin Van Peebles describes three areas where African-Americans could be receive some sanctuary from the racism that pervaded almost all Hollywood films. These three places were: the Hollywood version of an all-Black film, the church, and entertainment. Black culture and music is prominent in mainstream society, but the people behind this culture don’t always receive recognition and respect for their creations. Mainstream White pop culture excitedly consumes and appropriates Black culture, but disrespects the source.
In Paris is Burning, Jennie Livingston, a white lesbian film director, depicts the black gay
These six words in many ways defined the late 1980s and 1990s, encapsulating the rise of hip-hop, NIKE, Michael Jordan, and the racial-class narratives embedded in each of them. The problem of such ethos are highlighted in a music video from Seattle’s very own Macklemore and Ryan Lewis.
When applied to a family “the family works towards the continuance of social inequality within a society by maintaining and reinforcing the status quo” (Boundless). The family has become a sort of social arrangement that benefits the men more than women allowing the men to maintain positions of power due to the patriarchal nature of a family. By keeping the family in a caste system of sorts where women never have the opportunity to rise above the men inequality can persist in communities outside the family and thus on a greater scale as communities are built upon families. This leads to the perpetuation of the housewife
Gender is defined as the scopes of genetic, physical, mental and behaviour characteristics pertaining to, and differentiating between, masculinity and feminity, meanwhile inequality is defined as in a situation where there is an unfair situation or treatment in which certain people have more privileges or better opportunities or chances than other people. Thus, from the definition stated gender inequality refers to unequal or unfair management, treatment, or perceptions of persons or individuals are based on their gender. In a parallel sense, gender inequality can be said as the world in which there was discrimination against anyone based on gender. In this introductory, the general understanding of gender inequalities will be discussed further into three significant factors that influence the allocation of housework between men and women. Household chores can be classified as cleaning, cooking and paying bills. Division of housework serves as an important element in the continuation of the function of a family and it requires contribution from both spouses (Tang, 2012). However, current society’s perception on housework is based on gender, so the three major factors that influence the division of household chores within the couples are education level, economic resources, and time availability (refer to Figure1 in Appendix 1).