CMM3119. Case Studies in Communication. Body Culture. Semester 1, 2009. Dr Rod Giblett. ECU Mt. Lawley.
Journal
Week Four
This ‘season’s contemporary fashion image (fashion by Dior, using famous tragic new, young artiste – played Edith Piaf), above, seems to me to recreate a situation; it is a metaphor; a direct, although warped, circumstance arising out of an historic basis, namely the famale part of the tradition of human roles of gatherer = female ( as versus hunter = male). In this image the female has her ‘dilly’ bag protecting her body (in particular the reproductive organs and the area where the ovaries are housed), she appears to be apprehensive, in danger in a precarious and dangerous situation (out on a limb), has put herself in danger while she is actively seeking ‘something’ …. ? – another ‘essential’ commodity by Dior, or running from the dinosaur/bird of prey – whilst stealing it’s eggs for her offspring?
The female historically identifies and scavenges all and any useful or edible matter they can find, often at great risk to themselves (this still happens when the need is great, – see refugee camps, overcrowded India, remote communities in New Guinea). In this process a huge (generally unwritten bank/store of knowledge is developed, and handed down, generation to generation – still).
This drive is primarily motivated by the wellbeing and safety of the family, especially the children – how to feed, clothe and shelter them – and herself – so that she can continue to maintain them. In affluent, modern societies this very strong drive, which was idling has been deliberately warped, and the media has the major part in this, into empty compulsive consumption patterns, particurlarly for ‘designer’ and ‘brand-name’ goods
This has been able to be effected, as in our time when there are few direct threats in the lives of middle-class and working –class western citiizens, the hunter/gatherer drive/s have not gone away – how can they – the major impetus of preotection of the young human being so closely linked to the primary drive of procreation. In addition, there is a great deal of leisure and very little danger, so there is constant needs to be met – recreation and stimulation
So in modern society, we see a situation today where the male = hunter drive is still primarily positive. The drive is now channelled into activities external to the male, outward-looking. The goals set are generally attainable with hard work , which the drive provides the impetus for. The re-directed drive allows the opportunity to develop a secure personal position, ensure an asset base to provide for his, and his partner’s old age, and thus maintain his self-esteem, and enhance his position within his community and society, no matter how old he gets.
In the female, however, there is a deliberate warping (via the media) and opposite occurs, a negative situation has developed. The female = gatherer drive is turned into a narsissistic, inward-looking, preoccupation with attempting an impossible goal, that of maintaining a depreciating asset, the woman’s youth and beauty.
Baudrillard explores the ‘silent’ protest of the masses to ‘culture’ and it seems to me possible that NOW – women are – albeit slowly – turning this empty use around, still locked into their conspicuous consumption, yet they now form a silent protest against the society and those that cause them to become these empty vessels .
Try to find the article on the current, (fairly young) woman feminist (not lesbian) who tries to find patterns in society that show these things – Canadian. The New Yorker magazine (month?) 2008
http://www.ecologypapers.com/list.html
Modern Society’s Contempt for the Natural World
[ send me this paper ]
This 5 page report discusses the ways in which contemporary society has evolved to have an attitude of contempt regarding the natural world. The writer argues that such an attitude is the basis for adverse conditions now faced by humanity. Bibliography lists 5 sources.
Filename: Conature.wps
Below are quotes from
Stuttles, G. D. (1968). The Social Order of the Slum: Ethnicity and territory in the inner
city. Chicago: University of Chicago Press
‘Implicit in this concept of natural man is the conviction that moral restraints and ideal standards of behavior have little real power in a situation in which they contradict man’s natural impulses’ (p. 104)
‘dwelling unit as a woman’s world’ (p. 76). ‘separation of male and female world’ (p. 76).
‘Males almost never take an opportunity to introduce into [a household] furnishings or upkeep any sign identifiable as their own’ (p. 76)
‘Clothing, grooming and personal display add another area in which [people of the slums] can look for and find ethnic differences’ (p. 67).
Giblett chapter 1 – ‘active and passive’ (also preface 2008) – female passively absorbs all the messages, addiction, the female actively acts out the necessary traditional ‘gatherer’ functions gone mad. In this way the masculine in our society disarms the feminine.
Baudrillard speculates this is positive in a way, and inevitable, age-old ritual. Gane, M. (1993). Baudrillard Live: Selected interviews. New York: Routledge
In today’s societies those families who form the ‘upper’ class, are invisible, the masses no longer ‘see’, there is no interface now to know how this most powerful part of the culture works and lives. Deliberately obscuring this, and superimposed onto the class system is the cult of fame, with individuals generally chosen from the working or middle class, who have been formed into today’s popular culture royalty, to distract the masses into falsely believing this group are the most powerful and influential group, when they are (unwitting – or complicit?) puppets of those above. (Berman?)
Gane interviewing Baudrillard ‘Fashion is a grand game, a beautiful game. But there is really no history of fashion, it is a recurrent circulation of forms.’ ‘Increasingly, art has become fashion in the profound sense of the term.’ ‘It is more a survival among the remnants than anything else’. (1993, p. 95)
Page 3 of 4 Susanne Harford student number 10043898. Baudrillard,, Gane, Berman,
susanneah 