The way I read, write, view society and see the world has changed somewhat during the course of this semester. A lot of the way my perception has changed has come because of this English class and the essays we have been working with. I have noticed that how I have changed can be seen in my writing. However, even though each of my essays are different, each one can be seen to have a connection to the others. This connection, though, seems to get deeper and portray a better understanding of the whole picture of what the authors were trying to say with each essay.
At the beginning of the semester I had a closed mind and I wasn’t expecting to have my beliefs somewhat challenged. Then, with the first essay we read I wasn’t reading between the lines and it can be seen in my writing. However, I did try to incorporate some of the ideas my fellow classmates brought up that I hadn’t seen. I realized that the ideas that everybody in the room had, even if they were different than mine, deserved to be heard and with these essays there wasn’t an answer that was wrong. Our first assignment was to find a painting and ask questions about it and see how it speaks to us. Trying to see things through John Berger’s eyes and describe the painting using his ideas of the ways of seeing I got to work on looking at art not in the typical way I usually would have.
Finding a painting that spoke to me happened fairly quickly. I walked into the Fine Arts building and there it was. It had a little blue ribbon pinned to its corner and it was bigger than all of the other paintings I could see. It was also hanging by itself displayed right in front of the door as if to purposely draw attention to itself from whoever walked in. Just to make sure another painting didn’t call to me harder, I walked around the building scanning around. Yet, as I was scanning, I was already asking myself questions about that first initial painting making it hard to focus on any of the others. Who is the girl in the painting? Why did this painting stand out to me? Why was one of her hands on her forehead and the other holding a knife? Why was it the left hand holding the knife? Why did the girl look so unhappy? What is the purpose of the setting? Why is the girl alone? Having so many questions in my mind, I just had to go back to the painting and analyze it further. I needed some answers.
The main focus of the painting was on a girl around age nineteen who seems to be in the kitchen of a little hut. The background colors of light purple, blue, and white are faded together which made me want to look closer to make out objects. On the left side of the picture, in the bottom corner, is a small table with bread and vegetables on it. The young girl is holding a knife down by her waist level with the table in her left hand. She has wavy brown hair coming down the front of both her shoulders settling right above her waist line. Her face is soft yet has a look of, not pain, but perhaps of distress. Her eyes are closed, but not tightly, and her lips form a straight line. Putting the upper corner of her face in shadow is her hand which she has up with her pinkeye touching her eyebrow and her other fingers laying across her forehead. Covering the top of her hair is a blue bonnet which comes down over her ears and disappears behind her back. She has on a blue dress with long sleeves and a lighter blue sash is tied around her waist. Her right hand is the one touching her forehead and the left is holding the knife.
“The way we see things is affected by what we know or what we believe” (Berger 141). Why did this painting stand out to me? There were lots of others I could have chosen. It could have been, like John Berger talks about, because of its “market value” (Berger 152). Did I choose it because it had a nice blue ribbon on it? In our society today a blue ribbon means first place: it means it’s the best. At least to the judges it was the best; consequently, the rest of the world would view this painting as the best also. I’m not an art critic so who am I to pick another painting over this one? I knew, however, that I didn’t choose this painting because of the blue ribbon. I picked this painting because I wanted to experience it. Not experience looking at the first place painting, but experience the story the painting will tell anyone who will listen.
Who is the girl in the painting? Why did the girl look so unhappy? I got a better understanding of the painting when I finally looked at the name of it: Shade from the Scorching by Mordock Torgesen. The girl, to me, was just someone the author had thought up. Perhaps, the author had some special connection to her. Without the author’s input, I wouldn’t know for sure why this girl was special. I could infer, though, that the girl looked unhappy because something was “scorching” and she was trying to get away from it. Generally scorching is a word that would make us unhappy or distressed. This was exactly how the girl appeared. “The image now [illustrated] the sentence (pg. 155).” Just knowing the title of the painting changed the way I might have seen the painting if I hadn’t known it.
Why was one of her hands on her forehead and the other holding a knife? Why was it the left hand holding the knife? The girl is surrounded by food and holding a knife. I inferred that she was getting ready to cut vegetables then probably cook them. The girl wouldn’t be in distress from cooking, but maybe because it was a hot day and baking was making it hard to stay cooled off, especially in a long-sleeve dress. This could also explain why one of her hands was on her forehead. She could be reaching up to wipe her brow. Her left hand could be holding the knife either because the girl is left-handed, or she changed hands to use her right one to wipe her forehead.
What is the purpose of the setting? Why is the girl alone? As I thought about the title some more, perhaps the cooking itself was a way of getting shade from scorching. It could have been her release or her way of getting away from the world and its hardships. The shade was not the little hut she was in, the shade was something she loved: cooking. This is why she is surrounded by vegetables and in a setting where she can cook. She was trying to ease her mind first before she got started. Isn’t it easier to ease your mind when you’re alone? Nobody else may ever see the painting this way. This was my way.
Having described the way the painting spoke to me and looking back over what I wrote, I think I can say my experience was a way of how Berger wants us to start experiencing art again. This painting wasn’t from a well-known artist. It wasn’t painted over 500 years ago with people traveling just to witness seeing it. However, it is still special. It had a purpose, probably an important purpose, to whoever was painting it. Perhaps the author doesn’t even care that their painting is hung by itself with a blue ribbon on it. It did tell a story to me, as all paintings should, even if it wasn’t the story it was intended to tell. Berger wants us to look at painting and not just see colors and a picture, but actually see why the colors are there and why the picture is what it is. “We only see what we look at. To look is an act of choice. As a result of this act, what we see is brought within our reach… “ (Berger 141). When we look at a painting we are seeing it technically, but to really see it we have to look further. We have a choice to look further and looking further helps us discover the meaning. This meaning is what Berger wants us to find in paintings instead of overlooking it.
Berger, then, is seemingly talking only about art and I got that he wanted us to not see art through the eyes of society. However, after reading the second essay by Susan Bordo I started to see how his ideas could be put to use in more than just paintings. Bordo’s essay talked about advertising but after reading Berger I knew that this time I needed to be looking for something bigger than just advertisements and art but for some kind of connection between the two. From comments people made in class about mystification and the elite I tried to look more for these kinds of things and keep a more open mind.
What is a man? The stereotype answer for this question would be someone who is the provider, the penetrator, a hard-worker, aggressive and makes women feel good sexually. Women, on the other hand, would have a stereotype of being emotional, sexy, appealing, someone who shows off their curved body, penetrated and subjective to men. I have heard these stereotypes expressed, mostly when I was younger and hadn’t learned about this yet, from parents and church. They were trying to explain to me the differences between men and women. Being out in the real-world, experience, and seeing the many different viewpoints of society has definitely shown me that these stereotypes aren’t necessarily true. In the world today both men and women have crossed the lines that were once initially set for them. One of the ways to see this is in advertising.
Susan Bordo tells us in her essay “Beauty (Re) discovers the Male Body” about different ways that advertising was changing and the effects it was having on society. Written in 1999, Bordo starts out by saying how, like today, women were regularly advertised for their sex appeal. Sex does sell and this is clearly shown by how long women have been advertised being sexy. Even twelve years ago it wasn’t anything new for a woman to be shown nude. According the “Media Network Awareness” with the topic of masculinity in advertising they say, “… women tend to be presented as ‘rewards’ for men who choose the right product” (Craig). On the other hand, a type of advertising that is strong today but new in 1999 was when men started to be advertised for their sex appeal, instead of just women. Also, there was somewhat of a feminine side coming through in some of men’s advertisements. Calvin Klein is a good example of advertisements that depicted this. Taking it one step further, I would have to say that because we are now used to men and women both being shown nude today, something else had to be done. One of the biggest steps taken since Bordo wrote her essay would not just be that advertising is exposing men’s bodies, but that it is now exposing men with men, women with women, men acting as women and women acting as men.
When Bordo wrote her essay, Society was used to seeing women almost completely or completely naked, but not men. When this started to change people didn’t know how to react. Some critics even said, “…When is a nude not a nude? When it is male” (Bordo 197). Nevertheless, ads that portrayed men sexually seemed to appeal to all different kinds of audiences. Heterosexual and homosexual men were both attracted to the advertisements therefore creating a dual market. Men, because of always being viewed as being strong, confident and penetrators, were doing these advertisements as a way to perhaps get away from this a little bit and be the weak ones who get to enjoy sex too instead of just women. Men wanted to advertise sex too! “Women have been deprived not so much of the sight of beautiful male bodies as the experience of having the male body offered to us, handed to us on a silver platter, the way female bodies… are handed to men” (Bordo 197). Somebody must have figured out that if sexy women in advertising sell products, why wouldn’t sexy men in advertising sell products also? I think we can infer that this idea was new in Bordo’s time, but old in our society today. It isn’t shocking anymore to see a naked man. It is just the same as seeing a naked woman. But, also as Susan Bordo points out, as a result of when men started caring more about their looks instead of just women, this caused some problems like eating disorders to be more common in men than they had been before. Not only women, but men also, were getting surgeries and using creams etc. to make themselves look better, sexier and more appealing. Furthermore, if advertising has evolved from women being sexy, to men being sexy, and now we are somewhat used to both of these ideas, what comes next?
In 1999 it was “feminine to be on display” (Bordo 193). Now, in 2011, so many advertisements are out there that I don’t think society still thinks this at all. Even if it is feminine, the lines crossing boundaries between femininity and masculinity have been blurred so much that it is hard to perceive what exactly is feminine anymore. I’m used to seeing advertisements with just a woman or just a man showing off their body, but it is different to see the same sex showing off their bodies together. To answer my question before of, “What comes next?” this is it: since society keeps getting used to advertising and new ideas have to be thought of, the new ideas coming out today are being mysterious with not showing what sex the person in the ad is, and showing the same sex together, particularly female. This is what is exciting now. I think that it will be looked down on by some people and catch some people off guard, but it is the great new idea to sell products. I think that when society is used to this kind of advertising that men will then come in being sexual together instead of just females.
Comparing today with Bordo’s time, I would have to say that society is a lot more used to the ads she is talking about. However, I think that society is so desensitized to sex and sex appeal that ads depicting this aren’t a big deal anymore. We see things all the time on television and the news where guys have changed to girls and girls have changed to guys. It isn’t anything new to us. Even if we have grown up sheltered, it is impossible to not have been exposed to sex appeal ever with school, television and internet. It has just become a part of society today. I would also have to say, that no matter how much someone denies it, there had to be somewhat of a spark when they see an advertisement with sex that appeals to their sexual identity. It is just something we can’t control. The biggest step advertising has taken since Bordo’s time is, instead of just exposing men’s bodies, exposing men with men, or women with women, men acting as women, and women acting as men. It’s the next exciting thing.
Looking back at both Berger and Bordo I tried to see the bigger picture. I realized that both art and advertisements were things that could be seen. I was starting to see that a lot of how society sees these things is because of how the elite, like Calvin Klein, were telling society to see. Although it did take some time for me to accept some of the things these essays were saying, because they were things I had never heard or even thought of before, I started to see how they were connected. Even though art and advertising don’t seem to be connected they were in the sense that Berger and Bordo were talking in.
Are the ways we look at and experience art and advertising the same? How do we get to the point where we determine how we actually see art and advertising? John Berger and Susan Bordo have both written essays that are about seemingly two different topics of art and advertising. However, a main point they are both trying to get across is similar. Berger’s “Ways of Seeing” and Bordo’s “Beauty (Re)discovers the Male Body” both are dealing with how we see images because of certain factors. Images are seen depending on how they are used and who is using them and how we were raised or the norm in society also persuades us to see things a certain way. It is up to us to realize this is happening and to see things how we want to, not how society wants us to.
Both Berger and Bordo talk about who is in charge of these images we see. For Berger the art critics and museums were the ones to say which images were the best and which weren’t. He gives an example of this by showing how a piece of art wasn’t even considered important to society until somebody deemed it important. “A few years ago it was known only to scholars. It became famous because an American wanted to buy it for two and a half million pounds” (Berger 150). This piece of art wasn’t worth anything until somebody tried to buy it. Bordo’s advertisements were considered important by designers who were looked to by society to say what is “hot” and what people should be buying and looking like. At first, only women were allowed to be sexual; however, when designers started displaying men being sexual in advertisements it gave the ok for this to change in society too. “Calvin Klein, Versace, Gucci, Abercrombie and Fitch not only brought naked bottoms and bulging briefs onto the commercial scene, they present underwear, jeans, shirts, and suits as items for enhancing a man’s appearance and sexual appeal” (Bordo 208). This is one example Bordo uses telling how a man couldn’t have sex appeal until the designers brought it up. Even if it did offend some people at first, it still took enough effect on the world to change what advertising was and what became popular. All our lives we have been told that these elite people, critics and designers, are the ones who are right about images that we have come to believe that it is true.
What is the purpose of art? What is the purpose of advertising? The logical answer would be to make money. Art is put into exhibits to get people to pay to come and see them. Advertising is meant to interest people that if they buy this product, they will look like these models essentially. Further, coming back to the elite who control the images, it is only because of them that these images mean anything to society. But, is this how it should be? If society would look further, the images actually could be saying more than, “I am making money.” Art needs to be viewed as being of worth for what it is and what it meant to the author when they were creating it. Advertising needs to be viewed as why these models are actually doing it. Perhaps some are in it for the money, but with Bordo having men being the focus, maybe they are doing it now to get away from the stereotype they have been placed in. They want to be able to seduce people too. Men want to be able to expand their sexuality. However, they weren’t able to do this in the first place because of hidden assumptions, one being the theory of the elite having control, which we all have.
“The way we see things is affected by what we know or what we believe” (Berger 141). We all have been taught certain things since we were little. We are never really able to change our views on these things we were taught until we get away from it. College can be a good way to experience things differently but that also might just be depending on where we end up. Whoever isn’t in this English class may not even think twice about art and advertising like we will now. Bordo gives a couple examples of what society has for male stereotypes that we have been taught as a hidden assumption. “Full-fledged male citizens, on the other hand, were expected to be ‘active,’ initiators, the penetrators not the penetratees, masters of their own desires rather than the objects of another’s” (Bordo 207). A lot of people believed this stereotype. But, especially because of how advertising is, we all should know that this isn’t all that makes up a man. Berger’s essay deals then with hidden assumptions about art. With the development of the camera and with art being reproduced there is a hidden assumption created because we now see art everywhere. But, we still need to be able to pick out what art means to us. We all have these hidden assumptions, but we have been learning that we should see images without relying on these assumptions.
If we only rely on assumptions and what the elite say, it then lets images be mystified. Berger states, “Mystification is the process of explaining away what otherwise be evident” (146). Our job, then, would be to not let the images we see be mystified. We need to ignore their market value and try to understand what the image’s real purpose is. It can be hard sometimes to try and look at images with purpose and really experience them because there are so many images around the world. Art and advertising are widely known and there are so many varieties of them that it may be difficult to pinpoint exactly what each is saying. We have figured out that this depends a lot on who is using the images and how they are used. Also, hidden assumptions we all have can determine how we see something. Maybe this is why society just goes with the flow of what everyone else is thinking. This seems to be easier to do. However, we need to let ourselves see images for more than what society has pinned on them.
Now, focusing more on how society is being conformed in each essay we moved onto another essay in class by Kipnis where she was talking about love and adultery. Even after I had made some progress of trying to get the bigger picture I really only read this essay with my mind set on exactly what she was talking about…love. However, after talking in class and seeing other’s perspectives on the essay I once again started to see how the elite was taking its place in society again just like the elite did in Berger and Bordo’s essays. I decided to look at what Kipnis was saying in terms of gender. I did this because we had talked a lot about gender previously with Bordo’s essay. This really made it easier to tie these essays together and see how these authors were using a lot of the same ideas just in different words. Kipnis wasn’t only talking about love and adultery, she was talking about the elite making up their own ideas and that protesting against these ideas was wrong. There is even research going on about how to get kids not to want to be transgendered and there is a diagnosis for it called gender identity dysphoria (GID). “Treatment of GID is highly controversial. Some experts believe that the best way to help children and teens is to convince them to accept their bodies and not undergo the therapies that will cause dramatic physical changes” (Staley). In this sense, kids wanting or acting like the opposite gender is considered wrong and they are trying to be “convinced” to like their own bodies. Why is it considered wrong?
Society has been placing people in classes for a long time now. This has been going on for so long that most people don’t even consciously know it is happening. The classes that I am talking about are the ones that are social norms: the ones that most people wouldn’t even consider having a different choice in than what was expected of them. Basically, if people do find a way to protest against society they are viewed as doing something wrong. But is it really wrong or are we just persuaded all our lives to believe it is? If we really stop and think about it, there are many things that society has caused us to conform to. One big thing today would have to be gender.
Gender doesn’t have anything to do with biological and psychological factors of being male and female but rather socially constructed behaviors, roles and activities that society thinks is appropriate for being masculine and feminine. The stereotypes of masculinity would be the provider, penetrator, strong, aggressive and makes women feel good sexually. The stereotypes of femininity would be emotional, penetrated, sexy, appealing, curvy and subjective to men. On the other hand, we do have the protesters, who a lot of people don’t approve of, who refuse to follow these assumptions and roles that society has placed upon them. These protesters aren’t the people that are just the little things like boys having longer hair and earrings and girls not liking to wear skirts. Protesting against societies views of gender are the cross-dressers and trans genders. These people have totally transformed themselves to be the opposite gender with dress, action, voice, and behavior. This has nothing to do with the sexual identity of a person though. Just because a man is more feminine it doesn’t determine his sexual identity as homosexual. However, society would probably perceive this because of the way they view gender and how they ‘think’ a male should be masculine and a female feminine.
From the time we were little most parents have dressed the girls in pink and the boys in blue-girls go to ballet and boys play football. Based on how we were raised our hidden assumptions about gender start to form. Then, a lot of religions give us their definition of masculinity and femininity. The thing is, we can know these definitions because yes there is a difference; however, being a male or being a female shouldn’t single us out to follow only one of these definitions. Yet, society believes that we should be a certain gender because of our sex. Where does society get these ideas of gender though? Now we get them through the media, books, parents and schools. Everybody wants to do what they are told and be ‘normal’ so each generation believes what the previous generation told them. Do most of us even have a reason other than ‘we were told to be this way’ to describe the gender we are? We do have those brave though, the protestors, who choose to appear as a different gender than what society first tried to convince them to be. The best example of this would be a man named RuPaul.
Notice I said man; however, a lot of society would refer to him as a woman. RuPaul has created his own reality television show that is called RuPaul’s Drag Race. The ‘racers’ or contestants are all drag queens that do feminine contests, like runway walks and lip syncing, to become the next drag superstar. RuPaul is definitely testing the social norms of gender by challenging them on live television. I’m sure that some people don’t approve, but the majority of society loves this and finds it fascinating and entertaining to watch. Just like the media has been trying for so long to get us to conform-like the advertisements of women having these perfect bodies-this show is media that is convincing us to go away from the norms and explore. Good, somebody has found a way to protest against gender and not really get criticized for it, however RuPaul and his reality television show are conforming to society norms in different ways. Only drag queens are allowed on the show not drag kings. Also, aren’t these drag queens just trying to appear to be the best at being feminine by what standards society has said are the best? Even though they are protesting one thing, they are just conforming to the next social norm.
Another thing that society doesn’t even realize is that, like Kipnis says about love, is that trying to stay to our assigned gender is work. We have to be constantly worried about if we are appearing or acting as feminine or masculine in our everyday activities like getting dressed in the morning, shopping at the mall, and even signing up for clubs at school. Anybody would agree, yet there would be a lot to disagree if they knew the work was referring to gender. The only reason they would disagree is because they want to follow society! Are the elite in society, the people that everyone looks up to, creating these restrictions on us for power? Or do we just keep teaching the same assumptions over and over again because somebody decided one day this is what gender is and this is how we will follow it and society just wants that little spot to fit in with everybody else? The latter one would seem more realistic now because it’s hard to see who would be getting power from males being masculine and females being feminine. So, being people with faults, we unconsciously are at a fault with just trying to be like everybody else even if there is no reason for it. There isn’t a reason why somebody can’t be a different gender. Yet, society will still view cross-dressers as not fitting in.
Like everything else in society that can be viewed as a critical practice, society follows this practice just to conform to what the norm is. If we then can view gender as a practice and not a theory, then there should be many acceptable ways to do this practice. However, society still views it as a theory so there is only one socially accepted way. It can be funny to think that most of the time, even for the people who are really trying to follow their assigned gender, they do have traits that cross the lines that they don’t even realize. It would be extremely hard to only strictly be feminine or masculine. Therefore, cross-genders and trans genders have to really go out of their way to become a different gender because femininity and masculinity are mixed in so many people anyways. But if it’s unconscious then it’s not considered wrong. The people protesting are known to be consciously going against societies’ views on gender then so society views it as wrong. However, is there even a way to protest that goes completely against society norms? Even if you are protesting one way, you are conforming to the norms still just in a different way. When a man wants to be seen as feminine, he is protesting gender, yet his feminine side goes completely to the norms society has for femininity. There is no way to get away from it.
After reading Berger, Bordo and Kipnis, Foucault summed up what they were all trying to say—the elite are controlling society. I was able to broaden my perspective and really see what Foucault was saying because of the examples I saw in the previous essays. To me it now seemed that in my essays I was using the same ideas again but in different words. Berger talked about the elite controlling society through art, Bordo used advertising, and Kipnis used love. Foucault now just expanded this idea more but wasn’t as subtle. The previous essays seemed to be focusing on one idea and we were then expected to think about their terms in a broader sense but Foucault talked about society as a whole and in general how there was a controlling force. This controlling force comes from those who have acquired power. Without us even knowing about it we have following those with power. Why? In fear of being different from society, disciplined and we know that those with power will try to conform us back to the ‘correct’ way of thinking if we go astray. The elite have power over our minds. Michel Foucault has showed us how this idea of power works and where it came from in his essay Panopticism.
We are given an explanation of Bentham’s architectural figure of the Panopticon. It is in the form of a prison. The prison has been structured so that the cells are all in a circle so the prisoners can see somewhat across the room, but they have no contact with prisoners to the side of them. In the middle of all these cells is the guard tower. The interesting thing about the guard tower, though, is that it can be seen out of, but nobody can see inside. Therefore, the prisoners never know if they are being watched or not; yet, they do know that there is always the possibility of themselves being the one targeted.
The idea that we are always watched, always in a position to make a wrong choice which ends in discipline is the main focus. Therefore, panopticism is a mechanism of power—power over mind. For example, going back to the prison and the guard, a guard doesn’t even have to be in the guard tower for the prisoners to behave. Because the prisoners can’t see in, they have to assume that they are always being watched—total visibility. Because they are always being watched, they don’t do anything wrong because they don’t want to get in trouble. Discipline, then, would be what panopticism is built upon. Foucault then goes on to tell us a time line of where discipline actually came from. He gave examples like the military, hospitals, factories and schools where rules were made. Then, if these rules were broken, the same people who made the rules enforced the discipline for going against them.
In today’s society, we also have other people to make rules for us to follow: to decide what is right and wrong. Then, the same people who make up these rules get to discipline us if we break them. Our total visibility now comes in ways of internet, cameras, wire-tapping and other technologies that can trace everything we do. Cameras put up to catch people speeding don’t even have to be working; however, it will stop people from speeding because they ‘think’ they are being watched and if they are being watched and caught speeding—which is considered wrong—then they will be disciplined. Knowing this, it then can bring on the question, why are these rules even rules? Is there a point where rules start not even making sense but we follow them anyways in fear of being disciplined? Are we even capable of making decisions for ourselves? This idea of panopticism has been going on since the beginning of time so it’s hard to answer these questions. Yet if we realize we are imprisoned in this mechanism of power and we try to escape it, society will send us to therapy to try and normalize us to fall back into the system. Because Foucault has brought into light the idea of panopticism as a mechanism of power and how it has expanded beyond the original Panopticon, we are able to wonder about how that power is being used today. Also, we question how much agency, or ability to choose for ourselves, we have in decisions we make in society today. We question this because of the elite, ones with power, that all of society believes and follows with or without completely knowing it. The essays by Berger, Bordo and Kipnis give use hints at how the elite play a part in this mechanism of power and how it is controlling our lives.
First, Berger’s essay Ways of Seeing talks about art and how people perceive it. He claims that the way we see art comes from previous assumptions that we have learned. The biggest assumption that we have, however, is the one about society believing that certain pieces of art are ‘better’ than others or worth more just because the art critics or the elite say so. How do these people become the elite though? Who is to say that they know more about art than the rest of us? Art should be able to be special because it has a meaning that touches someone. Yet, if somebody thinks a piece that is not deemed as important by the elite is in fact important to them will not get a good reaction from the rest of society. “The drawing is behind bullet-proof Perspex. It has acquired a new kind of impressiveness. Not because of what it shows—not because of the meaning of its image. It has become impressive, mysterious, because of its market value” (Berger 150 & 152). The elite are using this idea to make money for themselves. They have persuaded society to believe they are right. Going even further, people who aren’t part of the elite could use this idea to make money by pretending the elite have said a piece is important. Even if the elite really aren’t in the picture, society is told they are and therefore believe anything they are told about art that they ‘think’ is coming from the elite. Just knowing that a certain piece of art is important before you actually see it, can change the way, when you do see it, that you actually would have perceived it without first being told it was important. Therefore, this takes away from our agency in thinking or seeing things for ourselves.
Next, Bordo’s essay Beauty (Re)discovers the Male Body talks about advertising and the effects it has on society. She mentions how new ads are sometimes a shock to society but do end up catching on because, like Berger says, ads are made from the elite and therefore must be right. Also, in her essay Bordo expounds on the uprising of eating disorders in women as well as men because of how ads portray men and women. Ads with men and women having slender, sexy bodies is the norm in society and this makes society want to be like the people in these ads. This idea is giving all the power to the advertising companies, or more specifically in Bordo’s essay, Calvin Klein. Now, if somebody isn’t trying, at least, to look like advertisements society outcasts them. “Women are supposed to care very much about fashion, ‘vanity,’ looking good, and may be seen as unfeminine, man-hating, or lesbian if they don’t. The reverse goes for men” (Bordo 213). This is what the elite have said. If society would just forget about ads and do their own thing then really there wouldn’t be anything the companies could do. Yet, society still follows what they are saying because of that fear of being different. If you are different, then society disciplines you for it. This shows how idea of panopticism is not only people being afraid of the elite disciplining them, but also of other members of society disciplining them also because they want to be the ones viewed as normal and disciplining the abnormal…just in case the elite are watching.
Last, Kipnis’s essay Love’s Labors, on the outside, is based on how society believes somebody is a bad person for being an adulterer and being a protestor of love. However, her essay can be thought of going much farther than just love. “If without love we’re losers and our lives bereft, how susceptible we’ll also be to any social program promoted in its name” (Kipnis 398). Therefore, it can be compared to anything that is considered a norm in society and then people finding a way to protest it. Some examples could be gender and education with the protesters, who society will try to conform back, being cross-dressers and drop-outs. Like Bordo, Kipnis explains how society disciplines the protestors for being different than everybody else. One of the disciplines she mentions is therapy. Yet, who gives therapists the power to say to someone exactly how they should be? This is taking away our agency on being who we want to be or behaving how we want to behave. We are now considered to actually have something mentally wrong with us if we don’t want to do what everybody in society tells us to do. Is there something wrong with this? Of course there is. The elite have once again created this set of rules of how everybody should be and we are expected to follow.
Our society now is totally driven by power and the idea of panopticism is everywhere! We are constantly watched by everyone. Everybody is watching everybody else trying to catch someone being different. With ‘different’ being defined as what the elite say. Then, if someone is caught being different, society turns them in to be disciplined. Therefore, they are protecting themselves from being disciplined by turning others in. Anyone seeing the Panopticon as a prison would for sure see the connection of internalizing always being watched and therefore behaving to not be disciplined. However, very few in society actually do realize panopticism in their everyday lives as a mechanism of power that is being controlled by the elite.
Everything I have ever learned came from parents, church, friends, school and the media. Everything they have learned came from the same people. However, I really do think now that these ideas first came from the higher classes or elite making up the rules they wanted us to follow and that we now should not break them or we are bad and therefore disciplined. That sentence just brought together all of the essays. Berger explained that everything we know is based on assumptions we all have from parents and so forth. Bordo said how the elite in media have decided how we society should be and all of society believes this and follows what the elite say. Kipnis shows how, because of assumptions and the elite, there are some things that you just do not protest and if you do you are outcast from the rest of society and sent to therapy to try and ‘correct’ our thinking. Last, Foucault says how we always are afraid or aware of the elite watching us so we do what they say so we aren’t disciplined. All of these authors are speaking to each other and connected one with another with their ideas of the elite and the role it plays in society. After reading all of these essays I really do see myself watching television and being on the internet and thinking about what these authors have said and seeing it in the media. Also, I catch myself telling friends and family, with certain things they say, that they only think that because they are conforming to society. I don’t think that my life is drastically changed because of these essays. However I do think that I won’t be so quick to judge others, I will be willing to see things from another’s perspective, that I’ll read more between the lines and it will always be in the back of my mind wondering how much of me is really me.
Cheyanne Kirby
Works Cited
Berger, John. “Ways of Seeing.” Ways of Reading: An Anthology for Writers. 9th ed.
Eds. David Bartholomae and Anthony Petrosky. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 139-165. Print.
Bordo, Susan. “Beauty (Re)discovers the Male Body.” Ways of Reading: An Anthology for Writers. 9th ed.
Eds. David Bartholomae and Anthony Petrosky. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 187-233. Print.
Craig, Steve. “Masculinity and Advertising.” Media Awareness Network | Réseau éducation Médias.
2010. Web. 13 Dec. 2011. <http://www.media-
awareness.ca/english/issues/stereotyping/men_and_masculinity/masculinity_advertising.cfm>.
Kipnis, Laura. “Love’s Labors.” Ways of Reading: An Anthology for Writers. 9th ed.
Eds. David Bartholomae and Anthony Petrosky. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 388-412. Print.
Staley, Roberta. “When Boys Would Rather Not Be Boys.”
Maclean’s 124.32, 2011. 44-49. Business Source Complete.
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