Extra Credit

       I thought that the diversity meeting was going to be a presentation, rather an involved campus activity. A bit nerve wrecking at first, but easy going in the end. Introduction were a little awkward, I almost skipped this part because I didn't have much on me that described who I am, so I chose my coffee and doughnut explaining my daily stop at kwik trip for caffeine and a snack, college life. To my surprise there were quite a few people who did not participate in the introductions, and even more in the activity discussion. Like most, I struggled with writing who I am, and who I am not. I had to ask myself what I wanted others to know about me. Do I want it to be personal? Or should I keep it simple? I am very open about myself and experiences, so the answer to that didn't take long, but it was WHAT I wanted to share. There wasn't much of a reaction between the people in my area that shared what they wrote. With this I felt that these individuals were open to whatever someone else said regardless, and accepting them as they are, or are not.
       I think the exercise brought up some valuable points within the group. One pointed that she felt it was easier to write what she isn't, which made sense. A lot of people want others to see them as they are, not what is perceived by images, so to make that clear could be easier for some. Another shared his area of residence and proceeded by stating he is not a hick. This was a great example of stereotyping and how they dont follow set rules because we are individuals, and images dont make us who we are. I pointed that the influence of friends and family can create social inequalities, and it is important to look past them; understand there's more to a person than what others say or think. Take a chance, step out of your comfort zone and sit with a new person in a class, get to know more people and learn from them. Media is another contributor of social stereotypes.
       Although the participating group didn't look like there was a lot of diversity, it was there. Culture, religion, socioeconomic class, educational status, etc. There is diversity in our history, background, upbringing, and more. The take away, is to be more accepting of others no matter where the differences are. 

EC Blog

One of the prompts for this blog was talking about a show that has a love story plot line.  The show I would like to analyze is Friends and the relationship between Monica and Chandler. This relationship is very complex, as they weren't a couple in the beginning of the show.  They went through many ups and downs to make it to their happily ever after at the end of the show.

One way I know this is a romance/love story is the fact that they have to over come obstacles that bring them to their happily ever after.  They start out in a group of friends where they are both dating other people.  At no point during this time do they have any interest in dating each other.  Throughout the years of being friends they go through a lot of break ups and heartaches.  But of course in the end they end up together, but it wasn't easy.

When they first realized they were attracted to each other they tried to hide it.  Resisted their urges and wouldn't want to be around each other.  Then, they eventually gave in but the relationship was basically "friends with benefits".  It took them a long time (many episodes) to become official.  So, in their own way, they had to overcome themselves and what they thought they wanted to be together.

Once they became a couple they didn't tell their friends because they were worried of what they might think.  Chandler is best friends with Monica's brother Ross and didn't want the friendship to be ruined because of it.  Well the truth eventually came out and their friends at first were confused with the whole situation, after all Monica and Chandler never seemed to have any actual interest in each other. 

Finally, after seeing how in love they were, their friends were very happy for them.  They had support throughout their whole entire relationship and of course during fights the girls would take Monica's side and the guys would take Chandler's side but somehow it always seemed to work out in the end. 

Monica and Chandler become the first people in the group of friends to become happily married.  Which is where stereotypes, and privilege vs. oppression really came into their relationship.

Monica is stereotyped as the girl who has been dreaming of her wedding since she was really little.  Making her seem over obsessed by trying on a ton of wedding dressing and wearing one around the apartment for a whole day.  As well as the over controlling woman who expects everything to be perfect because she has OCD.  It makes her come off as kind of a bitch and bossy towards Chandler in a couple of episodes. 

Oddly enough, I believe that Monica experiences a lot of privilege in this relationship.  She is the one who owns the apartment that they eventually live together in, has always kept a job/steady income, and is considered to be attractive.  She is also intelligent, able-bodied, and white.  She pretty much never loses her power as a woman throughout the entire show and more importantly, throughout their entire relationship. 

The one part of this relationship that I think she experienced the most oppression is when she found out she can't have any kids.  These kinds of things are looked down upon in society because if a woman can't have kids then what is she good for right?  Well Monica feels exactly like that and she becomes very sad, almost depressed about how she is "broken". 

Chandler is stereotyped as the guy who has never thought about his wedding until the decided to pop the question to Monica.  He is also portrayed as a dumb silly guy who doesn't know a thing about women.  He just wants to do manly things with the boys and not worry about girly things like planning a wedding, but when he hears about the cost he perks right up and doesn't hesitate to say how ridiculous it is to spend so much on a wedding. 

Chandler experiences privilege in many ways as well.  He is an able-bodied, college educated, white, handsome, and middle-class man.  Also, being in a relationship with a pretty girl gives him privileges because he has something that every man wants.  Society expects men to be with pretty girls.  Society wants men to want to be with pretty girls. 

He also experiences a lot of oppression too.  At one point he becomes unemployed and Monica has to provide for the both of them.  This isn't what men are suppose to do, according to society.  So he becomes the stay at home husband, who cooks and cleans for his wife.  His guy friends start to see him different when they find out how he has been acting/living and try to get to be more manly and masculine.  Gives him support to stop being a stay at home husband and look for a job so he can provide for his family, because that's what men are supposed to do.

Extra Credit Blog: Me Before You

Yesterday afternoon I watched a movie called “Me Before You”. The primary theme of the movie was a love story between a man and a woman. Although the relationship was heterosexual, there are a number of ways that I am able to apply our class concepts to the film in order to look at it from a feminist perspective.

                First off, I plan to explore how the social construction of gender plays a role in the movie. I feel as though the movie sticks to the idea of a “gender binary”, and each character is socialized to follow these norms. For example, the main character, Louisa is a young woman whom takes a job opportunity that requires her to care for a young man that had recently been paralyzed. This applies to the concept of the social construction of gender because caregiving is primarily a female role. Not only that, but Louisa’s father ends up taking a job for the same family that deals with being a maintenance man. Jobs that require building things, working with hands, and using tools are usually socialized to be masculine jobs. Lastly, looking at Louisa’s mother, it is easy to see that she falls into a stereotypical gender role as well. Her mother is primarily a stay at home mom that tends to the family’s needs such as cooking and cleaning.

                Another thing I wanted to explore about this movie was ways in which the characters were privileged and oppressed. For starters, Louisa’s family appears to be lower middle class, possibly even below middle class. It is obvious that the family is struggling to make money to pay for certain expenses. Louisa’s father had recently lost his job before getting the maintenance offer later on in the movie. Not only that, but Louisa herself mentions multiple times throughout the movie that she keeps her caregiving job merely because she needs the money, not because she enjoys it. With that being said however, her views do eventually change as her and the young man she is caring for become more fond of one another. Will on the other-hand, the young man she is caring for, comes from an extremely rich family. Will used to be able to take all sorts of extreme and exotic vacations (he pretty much had the world), but it all came to and end when he became paralyzed. Thus, he is privileged because he is rich, but is oppressed because he is not able-bodied anymore. This oppression also brings out his stubbornness. There are many things Will cannot do, but he insists on trying, or refuses to ask for help because as a fit young man, he does not like being dependent on others.

                Early on in the movie, Louisa finds out that in six months, Will has chosen to go the route of assisted suicide because he fears being a burden to others, and he claims that he wants all of his pain and suffering to end. He used to be on top of the world and now he barely finds the motivation to get out of bed in the moring. His family is not happy about this, and neither is Louisa when she finds out. She dedicates the rest of her time caring for Will to giving him all sorts of fun life adventures in hopes that he will change his mind about the suicide. (She does not inform him that she knows). The two end up going to horse races, a birthday party, a wedding, and lastly even on a full out vacation. During this time, Louisa and her current boyfriend break up because he realizes that she is falling for Will. She claims it is just work, but it is obvious that feelings are involved. In the end, they both have an incredible time together and Louisa does an amazing job at showing Will that he cannot let his disability keep him from living his life.

                Out of respect of the people that haven’t seen the movie, and maybe would like to, I am not going to go into detail on how it ends (I don’t want any spoiler alerts). I can say that it is a beautiful love story in which a young woman is willing to sacrifice her “normal life” in order to care for someone with a disability. Her love for Will becomes so strong that she is willing to take care of him for the rest of her life if she has to. It is incredible to see someone with this kind of courage, strength and love even though it was a fictional movie. It is also interesting to look at how each of these character’s lives intersect with one another to determine the experiences they have throughout the movie. 

EC Blog: HIMYM

So one of the prompts under the extra credit blogs where "Watch a film or TV show with a prominent love story and critique it using our disciplinary concepts.", which is awesome. I chose one of my favorite shows, How I Met Your Mother. Now, for any of you who have seen it, you know how it ends, does this count as a love story? Well, I'm not sure, SO I am going to critique several of the relationships shown throughout the series, I hope that is okay. Let's start out with one of my favorites- Marshall & Lilly
Their relationship has up's and down's much like any relationship of course. So, starting with a feminist stance, and how we see the gender roles played throughout their relationship. When the series first began, Marshall was going to school to be a lawyer (typical male job *groan*) and Lilly was a teacher...typical, right? But Marshall mentions in one of the episodes how bad he feels that Lilly was supporting him while he went to school, which I feel is not stereotypical for a female to do. Marshall is also a very emotional man, he has no problem crying and telling Lilly how he feels. He even sings her a goodnight song when she goes away for a trip. Although they do split up for a little while, there is no doubt that they were meant to be together.

Another stereotype the show has is Barney. He has a rule book and all the lies he tells women to get them to sleep with them, and I feel like they are trying to make him into a stereotypical man who only wants to hook up with women to have sex with them. However, there is a part in the series where he and Robin get together, and get married, which I feel like shows that even though he was a man whore, he was still able to settle down and find love for a little bit.

Another relationship we could look at would be Ted and his wife, who ends up dying in the end, can we even count that as a happy ending? I don't think so. BUT Ted does fall in love with Robin, and it shows throughout the whole series, he may be on the lookout to find his true love, but from the very first episode, he was all about Robin. He hosted a party just so that he could see her again, he stole a blue french horn for her. Ted was a romantic, and I feel like that is opposite of the normal gender stereotypes.

So throughout the series, I feel like they challenge and also support several gender stereotypes.

Also, pretty salty that they took it off Netflix.

E.C. Blog

This past week I had the opportunity to attend an event called Diversity Dialogues. I wasn't sure what to expect when I went but in the end it turned out to be insightful and an eye opener. In particular, one activity that really made me think and take a step back and examine who I really was as a person. This activity had us divide the paper in two columns and on one side it had I am and the other side I am not. As I was going thinking of what to write, I realized that it was quite hard. In a way, the only things that I could think of for the I am not was all stereotypes that I as an asian American face. We all were suppose to come up with five, and I could barely think of three. I think being female and asian definitely made me think of things that I didn't want to put on paper to share with others. The more I think of it most of them were quite negative and did follow the social construction of gender. Don't get me wrong, I do love myself and embrace my ethnicity, but these stereotypes do create obstacles that make others think of you differently. I left this activity really thinking who I am as a person and thinking, these things don't define me as a person. My decisions and choices that I make shape me to be who I am.

I am a fighter, I am not a quitter.

I am not, but who am I?

I'll be honest, I was really nervous going to the meeting in the library, and what really pushed me past that was the promise of extra credit. Honestly, how could I pass that up?
I wasn't really sure what to expect, so I was surprised when we were actually directly involved in the discussion. We made a list of "I am"s and "I am not"s, pointing out traits about ourselves and the stereotypes that can easily follow. Most of the things I chose were surface level, and I couldn't bring myself to share, but some of the things people said were really interesting. That they were a tomboy, but didn't have lots of guy friends, or they were outdoorsy but not a redneck. Thinking about these things brought up the question of why we feel the need to justify ourselves so much, to act in opposition of those stereotypes just to show that we don't fall under them, if our own behavior or what we share is so heavily influenced by these that it causes us to close off a part of ourselves. It was a perspective that I had never thought of until we participated in that activity, and though I doubt I'll have the courage to act on it anytime soon, gaining a new way of seeing things is always something worthwhile.

Extra Credit Blog

The movie that I watched was Daddy's Little Girls. It is a movie about a man named Monty who is black and his story of trying to get his girls back & his love story.  The movie starts out with us seeing Monty working at a shop where he repairs cars for a living. He is a hard working man just trying to do best for his girls. Next we see him go to his ex- girlfriends mom's house ( she is the mother of his children) and he is dropping off food for the girls. I think it's very interesting that in this movie they stereotype the area by having people outside gambling and loud music playing making the area look sketchy and not welcomed. Long story short the ex-girlfriend's mother went to the courts to have Monty get custody of the girls because she felt her daughter wasn't a fit mother to the girls. The grandmother then ended up passing away. Monty had to get another job and was working one night when his oldest child ( 12, then 7, and 5) set fire to his apartment and the girls were placed with full custody with the mother. He gets this lawyer who was the passenger in his cab job ( they weren't friendly to each other in the beginning). She was in the back of the cab and said she wanted to find a nice black man who could use proper English and protect her and just be a gentleman. Monty is nothing like that, he is himself a man who is from the "bad side of town" and a hard working man who wants to protect the ones he loves. There relationship gets more serious the more they work on his case together. The director places Monty as a tough man who works with his hands, but at the same time a lover and almost a romantic. Julia ( the lawyer he hired) is an uptight woman who has high standards and puts every black man into a category. One thing I found interesting about this movie is that they are always labeling each other like Julia says that Monty is like every other black man just wanting his kids for the money state help ( when he really doesn't she's just being judgmental). He takes Julia to a bar down town and she feels unsafe and he says I will protect you. He is telling her what she wants to here ( like she said earlier someone who will protect her) in the bar she labeled as too white when she isn't white she black. Monty's daughter say she has a wig and has a white ladies name.
Their love story increases after this they make it clear to each other that they like each other. one term we learned in class is 9 elements of romance. one of those elements works here because she's taking a risk on him. People judge him because hes from the wrong side of town and she is a lawyer. but they take the risk and work on it. And other element would be takes hard work. She tells him she doesn't want to be in this relationship alone and tells him what happened to her in her past. This is showing hard work and another example would be when she found out in court while trying to defend him that he went to jail for rape- she wouldn't even ask if he did it or not, but the fact that he was put in jail was a no-no for her. ( he didn't do it by the way). In the end, this movie is a male lead movie and the guy gets the girl. She basically " can't live without him" " she's the one who has to say sorry for what she did" and they show him having "power" by Monty t-boning the ex-girlfriend and her boyfriend for the boyfriend forcing the 12 year old daughter to sell weed. In that moment he has the power and she comes running in and kisses him. In the end he opens his own shop up and that's the happily ever after. He got his kids back and he got the girl.