Day 13- Reading Response

Today’s class was really interesting.  It talked about how women have been objectified though out  most of time.  The first article that we read, “Ways of Seeing, Chapter 3” talked about how even in the Middle Ages women were objectified.  They were painted to be an object of the male audience and they were painted looking away almost as if they were allowing themselves to be stared at.  The article talked about the difference between nakedness and nudity.  I thought the difference that was given between the two was really interesting. The way the article described how a nude is a to been seen naked by someone else and to be naked is to be oneself.  The way that the author described the differences was really interesting.  I never really looked at nudity that way before.  But I guess that it makes sense.  The article also talked about how the women in the paintings were an object of the male viewer.  I found this really interesting.  I never really thought of the women in the medieval paintings to be owned but I guess that is exactly what they were. 

 

The lecture/video that we watched was really interesting and really got me thinking about how we have been influenced by the media and advertizing for most of our lives.  I never really realized how much advertizing that I blatantly follow every single day.  It was interesting to look at the way we are “told” to behave from a young age.  Women are always shown that they need to change themselves to be beautiful and that they can’t just be happy with whom they are.  I never really realized how much pressure is put on me to be perfect and to live up to the expected stereotypes.  I also didn’t really realize that men aren’t subjected to this striving of perfection.  They are taught that they are fine and that they don’t need to worry about what others think of them.  It was an interesting way to look at things.  I think that the title, Killing Us Softly, is perfect for the movie.  Advertizing  really is killing us softly. 

 

Finally, the male pin-up was really interesting.  I didn’t realize how much men showed dominance in their pictures.  Males when posing and being models are looking at the camera or are being portrayed as doing something while females are portrayed as passive and being looked at.  Also the idea of the phallic symbol in the male pin-up was an idea that I hadn’t really every thought of or noticed.  The piece really made me look around my room and look for instances where men are portrayed as strong and muscled.  I thought that the idea of how a man looks at you, or looks occupied in what he is doing in a picture as opposed to the female looking away was really interesting.  I never really realized that we objectify women as much as we do in advertising.