PS- subcultures project?

My subcultures project is on the left wall of the classroom. I think you had me down as not doing it but I did it way back in January. My subcultures included band geek, track/cross-country and fast tracked.

Kid Nation

According to the articles that we read, people are very concerned about the show Kid Nation. Many think that it is basically a show about capitalism, the children are being used or that the situations are all staged by adults. I found this show to be extremely interesting and enjoyable because showed how children internalize the dominant idealogy of class, gender and age.

In this show, the adults impose class divisions and have leaders above the others. It is interesting to note that the children believe that leaders must yell and push people around. The creators normalize the class structure by making a completely unfair pay grade, where some get a lot of money for doing nothing and others must slave all day for pennies. There is no resistence to the inequality in jobs or amount of money, showing that our culture has made kids used to our unfair class structure. With the money, work is now extrinsically motivated, as it is now for money, not for the good of the town.

Children also internalize ideas of gender. One girl dances for cash, showing that she knows that women get paid for dancing and that money is importance. She talks about the "three moves that will get you through life." Male children also internalize the jobs only men are supposed to do, such as saying its a "man's duty" to go rabbit hunting.

Like the myspace reading by Dannah Boyd, children internalize ideas of what it means to be an adult. Because of age restrictions and the dominant discourse in the media, alcohol is for adults. The producers, not the children, put the saloon in the town, showing this is an important part of adult living. The kids take "shots" of root beer, "partying on" because they "worked hard," chugged and even dropped shots into their mugs. This goes along with Boy's article stating that this is an imitation of adulthood.

I have to say that I am really interested in seeing new episodes. I think that it is hilarious seeing children try to act like adults and to see what behaviors seem important. I guess we will see if the hype is worth it.

Interview with a teenager

I decided to interview my high school neighbor, Julia, at the local cafe for some hot chocolate. I wanted to know what her experience has been like as a teenager in a college setting. She is a highly intelligent 17-year-old who has skipped 2 grades. She shed a lot of light on her feelings of alcohol, depression and current events. It is also interesting to note that she has been able to care for herself away from home for the past two years. For her, RIC has been “in one word, easy. This is the easiest work I have had to do…I don’t feel challenged at all, no one is pushing me!” She especially feels this strain in her art classes, where she and this student Andrew are “the only two good artists.” Her teacher does not give her criticism, so instead she and Andrew critique each other.

Julia has always been one to constantly push herself. She had a really difficult home-life, so I sense that she has used school to help her get through tough times. Her father is a severe alcoholic who can get violent during his drunken rages. Happily, her mother has since divorced him. As soon as her older brother went to school, she begged her parents to go. To compensate, her parents taught her how to read and do math problems. In second grade, it was her “big fantasy to skip a grade” because she was “already in third grade math and reading groups.” In 7^th great, her fantasy came true when she was given the choice to either skip a grade or go to a gifted private school. She chose to skip a grade because she already wanted to leave the house as soon as possible. Later, she did the same with twelfth grade, which is why she is a seventeen-year-old at a college.

Although she was gifted at both mathematics and reading, she always loved art the most. Her favorite show was “Pappyland.” She was also a really creative writer in elementary school. She had “horrible night terrors” where she would “scream until I woke myself up.” Her poetry reflected her terror, and she wrote “deep dark poems at the age of seven.”

Julia's father’s alcoholism and abuse had an even greater affect as she grew older. Once she hit her teens, she became extremely depressed. This period lasted until fairly recently. She felt “hideous” and “was lonely even though [she] had tons of friends.” Even though she had already skipped a grade, she felt older than everyone. What helped her get through these dark times was the internet. She said that she “loved the internet…and still talk to some people that I started speaking to when I was ten.” By going online, she was “first exposed to big Atheist ideas.” Before this point she had been deeply religious, but afterwards she began to see the “logical flow in the Christianity myth.”

Since she has been in college, she has “snapped out of it.” She states that being “an arrogant asshole is sooo much better than what I used to be…when I sucked at life.” I think that there is a great sense of humor behind this comment. She is able to shed light on a time in her life when her family had made her into a mess. When she talks about her bleak childhood, she discusses it with a dark humor not unlike Augustin Burroughs. (My favorite author who wrote Running with Scissors, Dry, Magical Thinking, etc). I would be interested to see if her writing, or even art, reflects this.

The hardest part for her at Rhode Island College is the drinking. Her statement of “I freakin’ hate drinking, I freakin’ hate drugs. Thirsty Thursday…that’s bullshit, why don’t you go and study, do something. I don’t party, I don’t get drunk…I like to socialize and remember it the next day!” definitely shows her annoyance with the drinking scene. She also humorously injects that she “needs all the inhibitions I can get!”

Julia has always assumed that she would go to college, but she recognizes that college is not for everyone. One of her goals is to graduate early, just like she did in high school and middle school. I hope that she does not do this because she strikes me as someone who loves to learn. . For now, college is a place where she can debate, do research, write and expand her art. It seems to me that college is the best place for her, no matter what her age.

Why Youth Heart Myspace

According to the ideas of most adults, myspace is a dangerous cultural phenomenon. There is the idea that myspace causes young girls to pose naked and to destroy people's lives through gossip. Of course this seems to be an idea that is only seen with females. Others see it as a cultural phenomenon to be studied. My favorite article was Identity Production in a Networked Culture; Why Youth Heart Myspace because it sought to explain the phenomenon but not to simply condemn it. In this article, she discusses that teens live in both the digital and physical world. In the physical world teens have controlled, public and private spaces. Today, teens have less private, hanging out time, sans adults because of increases activities and restrictions. For teens, myspace is equivalent to hanging out. It is a way to create that private space. The problems come when teens mimic adult behavior. Because of age restrictions and the way it is portrayed in the media, alcohol and sex makes one an adult. These teens are simply mimicking adult behavior, which is an idea that is not new. Now, there is simply hard evidence of it.

This reminds me of Rose's essay Don't Believe the Hype because it discusses how teens try to be who they are not, ie the suburban youth acting "gangsta" or the inner city youth having expensive clothes. She claims this somehow causes a "loss of innocence." Although I am still wrapping my mind around the word "innocence," I saw much of this exposure on the myspace files I looked at. Although many of the teens were generally good kids, many tried to portray an opposite, cooler image of themselves. One really shy girl who is really involved in band had only pictures of her drunk or posing half-naked for the camera. The person she portrays in the digital world is completely different than that of the physical world. It gives her the chance to be someone that she feels she cannot be at school. Unfortunately, this can leave her open to gossip and worst, pedophiles. Also, most of her life includes going on band trips, doing homework and quietly hanging out with her friends. She lacks pictures of these more numerous moments in her life. Her profile shows her to be everything that she is not, and that may very well be the point.

My power point presentation that I didn't have time to show in class

Choice #2

How Much Affection (1958)




How to Say No: Moral Maturity












Many people, especially conservatives, look to the 1950s as a moral golden age. The doting, cookie-baking mama stayed at home raising 2.4 kids, while the stern father worked to keep "up with the Jones."The 1950s was a time when image was of utmost importance. In a time of McCarthyism, people were afraid to stray from the norm, so spent their time mass consuming and trying to fit in. Although many conservatives like to use the 1950s as a model time for "family values" these are based on superficial images, not on reality.

One important example is teenage sexuality. The idea today is that people in the 1950s did not have sex until married, and because of family values, there was no problem with teenage pregnancy. This could not be further from the truth. In fact, teen pregnancy was at an all time high; 50% higher than today. About 39% of unmarried girls had gone all the way before they were twenty years old. The average woman married at 20 years old, so, unlike today, did not have to wait long before having marital intercourse.

According to Ann Fessler, author of The Girls Who Went Away, "birth control was tightly restricted, and abortion proved prohibitively expensive or life endangering. At the same time, a postwar economic boom brought millions of American families into the middle class, exerting its own pressures to conform to a model of family perfection." Caught in the middle, single pregnant women were shunned by family and friends, evicted from schools, sent away to maternity homes to have their children alone, and often treated with cold contempt by doctors, nurses, and clergy. A girl who found herself "in trouble" had virtually no power over her life when her family either pushed her into a speedy marriage or to hustle her out of town to have her baby far from the sight of all who would condemn her. "In one of the strictest forms of banishment," Fessler writes, "high schools and most colleges required a pregnant girl to withdraw immediately." Therefore, although the 1950s had the highest case of teen pregnancy, the idea was to hide it. So not only were many of the consequences of teen pregnancy hidden, but there was a complete lack of education beyond "control yourself." This is especially evident in the two health education videos that I have posted.

In the video, How Much Affection (1958), a young woman comes home very upset because she keeps having these "warm feelings" when she was with her boyfriend. The advice of her mother was to not get into situations where she would ever be alone with him, and to think of distractions such as "ask him if he wants a sandwich." She tells her daughter that anything beyond that causes boys stop falling further in love with her. The end of the film shows the young couple dancing, her thinking of what her mother said and asking her boyfriend what kind of sandwich he would want.

In the second clip, How To Say No; Moral Maturity (1951), a group of teenagers sit together, wondering what is the best way to say no to petting, smoking and drinking without "looking like a chump." During the part where they discuss about "the problem with boys...their HANDS, you know?" (6:25 into the film) The only situation they discuss is when "its early enough to stay outside at the end of the date" which is unrealistic sexual situation in the first place. Their advice was to "simply not get into a situation like that" or distract him by saying something like "Hey, how was that track meet last week?" This media gives the impression that teen girls were not interested in sex and that males are always the aggressors. It also discourages honest communication between couples on what the two are comfortable with. Finally, like in How Much Affection, it denies that both partners might desire intercourse, while completely ignoring the birth control issue.

In the real world, statistics show that teenagers desperately needed real advice on how to prevent pregnancy and STDs. Like the way many conservatives believe should be enacted today, sex education consisted of "just say no!" These conservatives only have to look at the 1950s to see the disaster that abstinence-only education creates.

§

I am almost done with my blogs, but I need to take what I have on Microsoft Word and put them on my blog, add my powerpoint from class and add a few other clips. Can I possibly have this done tomorrow night? I will email you the posts that I have on Microsoft Word that I have not attached. I understand if you need to take points off, but I would rather hand in something I am proud of late.

Thanks, Leona