Dancing Around Objectification Summary
In the article Dancing Around Objectification by Victoria Merlino, the author discusses the different perceptions people have for women who project their body in public. Although these perceptions can’t be changed, the women being perceived can at least have some right to defend herself only if she is white. In this piece, Merlino puts forth a contrast between Claude McKay’s main character in The Harlem Dancer and Ralph Ellison’s party entertainer in Invisible Man. Even though both women are being objectified and sexualized in a very similar way, what distinguishes both cases is that Ellison’s dancer has some sort of “agency,” since she is white, to fend herself from white men who are above her (men below her, such as black men, don’t have any right to even speak about her). While, on the other hand, Mckay’s Harlem Dancer has barely any social rights since she is black, therefore, she is “forced to bow to the weight of her audience’s perceptions.”
Intersectionality 101 Summary
The reading Intersectionality 101 explains how different aspects of our identity interact and forms a “systematic social inequality.” This is also known as the theory of intersectionality. The primary focus of this theory is the minority group rather than the majority group which further helps the audience understand why these minority groups have been labeled as troublesome or the “others” in the western culture. To better understand this theory, approaches such as the “Interlocking Matrix of Oppression” (explains how oppression based on gender, race, class, sexual orientation, age, etc, is interconnected) and the “standpoint theory” (societal knowledge is gained through one’s own personal experiences) are extremely helpful.
The Urgency of Intersectionality Summary
In this Ted talk by Kimberlé Crenshaw, tries to explain her theory of intersectionality in the most simple words. In her view, many social justice problems overlap, like racism and sexism, resulting in the creation of unidentified levels of social injustice. To further expand on this, Crenshaw shares an anecdote of a woman she encountered whose claim for gender and race discrimination at a hob hiring was dismissed in court because the company she sued hired both men and woman and people of all colors. But the real problem the court failed to see was that woman of color weren’t offered the same job due to their race and gender. In other words, Crenshaw emphasized the fact that “if we won’t be able to see the problem, we will never be able to solve it.” Intersectionality is just a tool that helps broaden our frame through which we see the social injustice around us.
The Bechdel test
The main purpose of a Bechdel test is to identify the “gender inequality in fiction.” It is named after American cartoonist Alison Bechdel in whose comic this test first appeared. The only requirement of this test is that a dialogue takes place between two women whose point of conversing is not about men. So, in simple terms, the test evaluates how women are depicted in fiction. An astonishing fact about this test is that only half the films actually fulfill this test which shows that most of the movies we watch are gender biased.
Response
In this modern era, I feel that we are judged only through an extremely small and impartial lens called “intersectionality”. After reading all these articles and listening to Kimberle Crenshaw, I am confident that most of the people nowadays look at the identity of the person and then his credibility or his/her accomplishments. In doing so, they have an opinion about them that is already prejudiced. In other words, intersectionality defines who we are and determines the oppression we are going to face. To make matters worse, the more diverse one’s identity is, more prone he/she is to facing severe oppression. In my opinion, intersectionality is the most important lense which is why I feel like in my analysis, I will focus on it the most.
Connection
In connection, intersectionality can be best used to describe the male-female stereotypes that were discussed in the reading we went over in class, The Egg and the Sperm by Emily Martin. The whole point of the reading was that men are stronger in every way when compared to women. The intersectionality part comes in when the gender is combined with our culture that allows such imagery to prevail in silence. Eventually, letting the male-female stereotyped to influence our society.
Question
Is there a limit to how far can we go in defining intersectionality?