In the Introduction to Race After the Internet, editors Lisa Nakamura and Peter A. Chow-White re-approach and build upon Nakamura's earlier conceptualizations of race, identity, and the symbiotic relationship between the "real world" and cyberspace. Nakamura's Cybertypes: Race, Ethnicity, and Identity on the Internet articulated the ways in which the Internet serves as a space where "race happens" (111), a space where marginalized individuals are not afforded the safety or the luxury of anonymity or identity tourism, a space where marginalized bodies ultimately remain marginalized and "stable signifiers of otherness" (90) emerge and acquire meaning.
I wrote about this text and Nakamura's project rather extensively in my blog post last week, so I will refrain from re-stating all of that again here, but it is important to note that while Cybertypes mapped the terrain of cyberspace and its attendant hostilities towards "otherness" and "people of color," the Introduction to Race After the Internet seeks to offer relevant and potent spaces in which to respond to and challenge the limitations and xenophobia that characterizes cyberspace. Which is to say that despite how suffocating and objectionable cyberspace might be for "Others" and "people of color," Nakamura and Chow-White identify prospects for resistance and disruption of existing stereo- and cyber-types in online spaces.
By likening race to a technology in its own right, Nakamura and Chow-White embolden Nakamura's previous conceptualizations of the relationship between race, identity, and the Internet, placing a particular emphasis on "re-envision[ing] race as a form of encoding, rather than as a paint-by-numbers kit of stereotypes" (9). Though I would not go so far as to say that Cybertypes was more helpless, concrete, or deterministic in its approach to deconstructing stereo- and cyber-types, I would say that they do seem to strike a more pronounced and strategic contrarian attitude in Race After the Internet. Whereas Cybertypes mapped the terrain of Nakamura's argument, Race After the Internet serves as more of a guideline for actually navigating and perhaps "decoding" this landscape through individual practices. Indeed, Nakamura and Chow-White emphasize the relative malleability of these purported "stable signifiers of otherness," a view that empowers Internet users to "execute race" differently in and through the very medium that marginalizes them.
Doctor Kristin Arola's essay, "It's My Revolution: Learning to See the Mixedblood," in many ways dramatizes the tensions and anxieties around "executing race" and navigating an "unsympathetic" and "deterministic" landscape on the Internet. In this essay, Arola analyzes three user profiles of mixed-race Native Americans on the social media platform, MySpace. Much in the vein of Nakamura's critique of "menu-driven identities," she explores the ways in which all three of these individuals represent themselves and their racial identities in light of their "Mixedblood." In the "real world," these hybrid bodies exist in fraught and intermediary social, cultural, and political spaces, spaces that therefore do not necessarily "fit into" the "stable signifiers of otherness" or "menu-driven identities" articulated in cyberspace and particularly the options made available on MySpace.
Arola introduces the notion of "regalia," a term that refers to "the dance outfit one wears during a powwow" in order to interrogate the online performances that the aforementioned users engage in on MySpace, not as a neutral site for garb and costume but an "intimate expression of self," a profound and deliberate negotiation of identity (214). This "material expression of identity," she suggests, "encourages an examination of online identities as part of the complex ecology of meaning and not merely as an isolated snapshot of performance" (214). In so doing, Arola frames "regalia" as an important site for resisting dominant codes of race, ethnicity, sex, and gender, one that seeks to create space for and generate conversation around "Mixedblood" in both the "real world" and cyberspace.
Arola's project responds to prevailing attitudes in both the "real world" and cyberspace that, by design, attempt "[t]o unsee mixedblood, or to only see her in terms of Indian or non-Indian," a view that ultimately re-inscribes the sorts of binaries and "static categories" that stifle attempts to locate hybrid identities within an established or "legible" continuum of identity categories (217). Arola's observations of the MySpace user profiles for the three "Mixedblood" Native American subjects in her essay, however, pushes back against these ossified and ossifying codes and systems that demand a "one-size-fits-all" approach to racial identification. On the contrary, these profiles reveal a continuum of sorts in which these "Mixedblood" users might perpetuate or challenge existing stereo- and cyber-types.
If anything, Arola's analysis of these profiles illustrates how suffocating and destructive these "stable signifiers of otherness" and "menu-driven identities" truly are for those of "Mixedblood," demanding in many ways that these individuals perpetually define and justify their hybridity and act as thralls to a white, heterosexual gaze that seeks to narrativize their lives and beings. Adam's MySpace in particular dramatizes the pressures and anxieties that emerge from responding to this gaze, as it conveys his "material discomfort with identifying as mixed" (221) and the absolute poverty of discursive spaces in which he might "'explain in full what [being Mixedblood] means to me'" (220).
While Adam's MySpace profile seems to represent the fatigue associated with projects that advocate "seeing Mixedblood," Erica's MySpace profile represents "Mixedblood" and hybridity as an "embodied visual act," one that blurs the lines between the "real world" and cyberspace by pushing back against the "visual expectations of the Indian" (224). Rather than disregard or avoid the discomfort of finding a place for "Mixedblood" and hybridity by identifying herself according to a stable gradient of identity categories, Erica occupies a "middle ground" between such identity categories, in a sense performing "Mixedblood" and hybridity in and through her regalia. In so doing, Erica's MySpace profile pushes back against this stable gradient of identity categories, instead embracing her intermediary position and its attendant "slippages," "slippages" that perform "the messiness of being situated in the middle" (225) and thus attenuate the demands of stereo- and cyber-types.
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Blog Post #3: Race, Disembodiment, and Privilege on the Internet
Lisa Nakamura's Cybertypes: Race, Ethnicity, and Identity on the Internet explores the ways in which racial and ethnic stereotypes that originate in the "real world" pervade and underpin the overall structure, content, and discursive space of the Internet. Nakamura offers a compelling and incisive argument that traces the Internet back to its origins, placing a particular emphasis on the notion that "people of color were functionally absent from the Internet at precisely that time when its discourse was acquiring its distinctive contours" (xii).
Cyberspace as we know it today was therefore created for people of color, whom Nakamura dubs "online roadkill" (xii), a space that ultimately did not favor, complement, or privilege those whom are already marginalized in the offline world. In this sense, marginalized individuals, including people of color, face a different and more fraught set of challenges when they enter and navigate the medium of the Internet. Indeed, Nakamura suggests that if "being raced is in itself a disorienting position," then "[b]eing raced in cyberspace is doubly disorienting, creating multiple layers of identity construction" (xv).
Nakamura locates and expounds upon this exacerbated feeling of disorientation in and through the idea of "identity tourism," which in many ways conceptualized the Internet as a space for anonymity, a space in which users might divest themselves of their identities (and, by extension, their physical bodies) in the "real world" and try on or perform new or different identities in the online world. However, while the prospects for this sort of "identity prostheses" purportedly claimed to create a purified space divorced from issues of race, sex, gender, and ethnicity, it did little to nothing to and for the plight of those marginalized individuals whom carried "the burdens of physical 'handicaps' such as age, gender, and race" (5).
Ultimately, Nakamura seems to ask what specifically might such "fluid bodies" be if not raced, sexed, gendered, and ethnicized? And if these "fluid bodies" are indeed coded in this manner, what is the relationship between the "real world" and its online counterpart? In what ways do these "fluid bodies" contribute to and/or extend existing racial and ethnic stereotypes and marginalized discourses?
Nakamura's argument is predicated on the idea that the capacity to assume "fluid identities" represents a privileged position, one that is not "much use to those whose problems exist strictly (or even mostly) in the real world" (11). Physical bodies do not cease to be raced, sexed, gendered, and ethnicized in cyberspace. If anything, Nakamura claims, the terms that constitute, police, and dictate physical bodies are exacerbated on the Internet. Indeed, the structure and design of the Internet is organized in and around "whiteness," a racial category that exists within the larger discourse of race in the "real world" yet remains "defined by its invisibility" and its capacity to assume a "default" racial position in cyberspace (105).
By allowing iterations of "whiteness" to lead, define, and manipulate cyberspace without recourse to its own stakes, motivations, and desires, the Internet functions as a "place where race 'happens'" (111), a place where racial and ethnic categories are crystallized and further corroborated. What emerges then, as Nakamura suggests, are "stable signifiers of otherness . . . [that] guarantee the Western subject that his position, wherever he may choose to go today, remains privileged" (90). "Whiteness," however, purports to escape the reach of these "stable signifiers of otherness," remaining elusive, disembodied, and, most importantly, "authentic" and "un-racialized."
Charlie Rose Interviews Toni Morrison about "the absence of race"
Junot Diaz discusses white supremacy and narrativizing the world (starts 14:20)
Cyberspace as we know it today was therefore created for people of color, whom Nakamura dubs "online roadkill" (xii), a space that ultimately did not favor, complement, or privilege those whom are already marginalized in the offline world. In this sense, marginalized individuals, including people of color, face a different and more fraught set of challenges when they enter and navigate the medium of the Internet. Indeed, Nakamura suggests that if "being raced is in itself a disorienting position," then "[b]eing raced in cyberspace is doubly disorienting, creating multiple layers of identity construction" (xv).
Nakamura locates and expounds upon this exacerbated feeling of disorientation in and through the idea of "identity tourism," which in many ways conceptualized the Internet as a space for anonymity, a space in which users might divest themselves of their identities (and, by extension, their physical bodies) in the "real world" and try on or perform new or different identities in the online world. However, while the prospects for this sort of "identity prostheses" purportedly claimed to create a purified space divorced from issues of race, sex, gender, and ethnicity, it did little to nothing to and for the plight of those marginalized individuals whom carried "the burdens of physical 'handicaps' such as age, gender, and race" (5).
Ultimately, Nakamura seems to ask what specifically might such "fluid bodies" be if not raced, sexed, gendered, and ethnicized? And if these "fluid bodies" are indeed coded in this manner, what is the relationship between the "real world" and its online counterpart? In what ways do these "fluid bodies" contribute to and/or extend existing racial and ethnic stereotypes and marginalized discourses?
Nakamura's argument is predicated on the idea that the capacity to assume "fluid identities" represents a privileged position, one that is not "much use to those whose problems exist strictly (or even mostly) in the real world" (11). Physical bodies do not cease to be raced, sexed, gendered, and ethnicized in cyberspace. If anything, Nakamura claims, the terms that constitute, police, and dictate physical bodies are exacerbated on the Internet. Indeed, the structure and design of the Internet is organized in and around "whiteness," a racial category that exists within the larger discourse of race in the "real world" yet remains "defined by its invisibility" and its capacity to assume a "default" racial position in cyberspace (105).
By allowing iterations of "whiteness" to lead, define, and manipulate cyberspace without recourse to its own stakes, motivations, and desires, the Internet functions as a "place where race 'happens'" (111), a place where racial and ethnic categories are crystallized and further corroborated. What emerges then, as Nakamura suggests, are "stable signifiers of otherness . . . [that] guarantee the Western subject that his position, wherever he may choose to go today, remains privileged" (90). "Whiteness," however, purports to escape the reach of these "stable signifiers of otherness," remaining elusive, disembodied, and, most importantly, "authentic" and "un-racialized."
Charlie Rose Interviews Toni Morrison about "the absence of race"
Junot Diaz discusses white supremacy and narrativizing the world (starts 14:20)
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Blog Post #2: Education, Social Justice, and Digital Technologies
The final five chapters of T. V. Reed's Digitized Lives: Culture, Power and Social Change in the Internet Era provide less of an overview of the general landscape of digital technologies in the 21st century than a more nuanced analysis of some of its constituent parts. Reed explores the political implications and liberatory potential of digital technologies; the role that violence ("militainment") and sexuality play in video games; the ways in which digital technologies are used in the classroom; and issues of accessibility and representation on the "world wide web" and "the real world."
Reed's project seems to be predicated on the idea that those who employ digital technologies most effectively and creatively ultimately determine their uses, perceptions, and efficacies. Which is to say that there are certainly advantages and privileges associated with, well, accessibility for one, but also advanced digital or technological literacies as well. However, Reed seems most concerned with conveying the idea that digital techologies are not so much agents in themselves as tools or mediums that might be manipulated and mobilized in aid of any number of different purposes and ends. And it is an agent's prerogative, not the digital technology itself, that determines these purposes and ends, which in turn constitutes how digital technologies are defined, understood, and used.
In keeping these particular ideas at the forefront of his project, Reed seems to be responding to both proponents and detractors of digital technologies, identifying with the liberatory potential of digital immersion while remaining firmly situated in the real world and its multitude of social, cultural, and political inequalities. In many ways, Reed celebrates uses of digital technologies that pander to both of these "worlds," truly symbiotic assemblages of the digital and the real that engage in advocacy and social justice. Indeed, he suggests that the efficacy of "digital protests" rests on the notion that "it is close connection to 'real world' away-from-keyboard sites that makes online netroots activism most effective" (134).
I tend to agree with Reed on a number of fronts here, particularly the zeal he expresses regarding constructing more bridges to the real world. For this reason I found Chapter 8 really compelling and engaging because it spoke so directly to many of my own interests and anxieties regarding using digital technologies in the classroom. Whereas detractors of this marriage, condescendingly dubbed "edutainment," seem to denigrate the ways in which "online spaces may be undermining our ability to think linearly, to pay attention to long narrative storylines, and to grasp complex sustained logical arguments" (170)--and I suspect that Reed is NOT in this camp--I would say, that learning is taking place, that something is being absorbed. In fact, a lot of things are being absorbed. In what ways all of this information is relayed or compartmentalized is perhaps a more interesting and plausible line of inquiry. No matter the answer, it strikes me that the extent to which digital technologies have certainly transformed information and learning dramatically, in my mind, exacerbates the need to engage these technologies in the classroom.
Yet Reed makes a very astute and important distinction in this chapter between using and integrating technology in the classroom (169) that I feel is important to any pedagogy that employs digital technologies in any way. I was particularly taken with his unrelenting commitment to matters of social justice and his unwillingness to equivocate from the "[r]eal concerns about digitizing education," which always seem to gravitate around "issues of social fairness, equality and digital inclusion, as linked to creative teaching" (171). Which is to say that there is likely a world of difference between screening a movie like Crash with minimal, superficial, and stereotypical gestures to race as an abstract concept and using a song like Chamillionaire's "Ridin' Dirty" as a point of entry for discussing Michael Brown's murder in Ferguson, Missouri and/or issues of whiteness in the surrounding community.
The difference lies in our capacity as instructors to enter different ideological and cultural spaces, not so much to make such spaces palatable to an existing space. Over the course of the last few years I've really taken to the idea of "making the familiar strange." Oftentimes that work has been rather intimidating but immensely rewarding. And I guess in the spirit of that mantra I ought to consider what a classroom WITHOUT digital technologies might look like and how I would navigate that space. Food for thought.
Chamillionaire - "Ridin'"
Reed's project seems to be predicated on the idea that those who employ digital technologies most effectively and creatively ultimately determine their uses, perceptions, and efficacies. Which is to say that there are certainly advantages and privileges associated with, well, accessibility for one, but also advanced digital or technological literacies as well. However, Reed seems most concerned with conveying the idea that digital techologies are not so much agents in themselves as tools or mediums that might be manipulated and mobilized in aid of any number of different purposes and ends. And it is an agent's prerogative, not the digital technology itself, that determines these purposes and ends, which in turn constitutes how digital technologies are defined, understood, and used.
In keeping these particular ideas at the forefront of his project, Reed seems to be responding to both proponents and detractors of digital technologies, identifying with the liberatory potential of digital immersion while remaining firmly situated in the real world and its multitude of social, cultural, and political inequalities. In many ways, Reed celebrates uses of digital technologies that pander to both of these "worlds," truly symbiotic assemblages of the digital and the real that engage in advocacy and social justice. Indeed, he suggests that the efficacy of "digital protests" rests on the notion that "it is close connection to 'real world' away-from-keyboard sites that makes online netroots activism most effective" (134).
I tend to agree with Reed on a number of fronts here, particularly the zeal he expresses regarding constructing more bridges to the real world. For this reason I found Chapter 8 really compelling and engaging because it spoke so directly to many of my own interests and anxieties regarding using digital technologies in the classroom. Whereas detractors of this marriage, condescendingly dubbed "edutainment," seem to denigrate the ways in which "online spaces may be undermining our ability to think linearly, to pay attention to long narrative storylines, and to grasp complex sustained logical arguments" (170)--and I suspect that Reed is NOT in this camp--I would say, that learning is taking place, that something is being absorbed. In fact, a lot of things are being absorbed. In what ways all of this information is relayed or compartmentalized is perhaps a more interesting and plausible line of inquiry. No matter the answer, it strikes me that the extent to which digital technologies have certainly transformed information and learning dramatically, in my mind, exacerbates the need to engage these technologies in the classroom.
Yet Reed makes a very astute and important distinction in this chapter between using and integrating technology in the classroom (169) that I feel is important to any pedagogy that employs digital technologies in any way. I was particularly taken with his unrelenting commitment to matters of social justice and his unwillingness to equivocate from the "[r]eal concerns about digitizing education," which always seem to gravitate around "issues of social fairness, equality and digital inclusion, as linked to creative teaching" (171). Which is to say that there is likely a world of difference between screening a movie like Crash with minimal, superficial, and stereotypical gestures to race as an abstract concept and using a song like Chamillionaire's "Ridin' Dirty" as a point of entry for discussing Michael Brown's murder in Ferguson, Missouri and/or issues of whiteness in the surrounding community.
The difference lies in our capacity as instructors to enter different ideological and cultural spaces, not so much to make such spaces palatable to an existing space. Over the course of the last few years I've really taken to the idea of "making the familiar strange." Oftentimes that work has been rather intimidating but immensely rewarding. And I guess in the spirit of that mantra I ought to consider what a classroom WITHOUT digital technologies might look like and how I would navigate that space. Food for thought.
Chamillionaire - "Ridin'"
Wednesday, September 3, 2014
Blog Post #1: Photo Leaks, Victim Blaming, and the "Grotto"-ization of Sexual Expression
Amidst my reading of the first five chapters of T. V. Reed's Digitized Lives: Culture, Power and Social Change, something happened. Something happened that brought a number of the themes and anxieties expressed in Reed's book to the forefront of news outlets, social media, and popular culture: nude photographs of a bevy of Hollywood actresses and celebrities were leaked on the Internet. Though there is still no confirmation about how these photographs were acquired, reports have suggested that someone (or a group of people considering the sheer breadth of individuals and photographs exposed in the leak) likely hacked into or had some access to the smart phones or cloud services of these Hollywood actresses and celebrities.
I am here making a conscious ethical and rhetorical choice not to name these individuals, particularly in light of the ways in which these photographs have been described by journalists, newscasters, and on message boards and social media. Not to mention, the hacker(s) remain anonymous as these photographs continue to be copied, re-posted, and otherwise circulated throughout the World Wide Web.
In the interest of putting all of this into conversation with Reed's book, I would like to take a moment to provide a brief summary of his project in Digitized Lives. Simply put, Digitized Lives is designed as a survey of sorts of the impact of digital technologies, namely the Internet, upon the ways in which we communicate and relate to one another. Throughout the book, Reed places a particular emphasis on the notion that "digital devices are never culturally neutral" (13), thus implying that the production, consumption, and use of digital devices have far-reaching social and political consequences that in many ways implicate users and provide the interpersonal scaffolding that forms the cultural landscape we navigate on a daily basis. That's a mouthful, I know, but stay with me.
Reed contests earlier conceptualizations of the World Wide Web as a "place beyond race, sex, and gender" (54), pointing to the ways in which the vectors of race, sex, gender, class, disability, environmentalism, social justice, and geographical location inform and/or are altogether disregarded by mainstream (read: Western, white, heterosexual, male) establishments. Salient to the overall project in Digitized Lives is the role that bodies and embodiment play in constructing and/or deconstructing the bridge that binds online and offline identities and milieus. While Reed identifies strains of the post-human in online efforts to somehow assume or "tour" a new or different identity, he also forecloses the prospects of divesting oneself of their bodily existence offline. Indeed, he makes it a point to suggest that "merely touring an identity is very different from profoundly inhabiting a body that is frequently subjected to discrimination" (55).
Having now provided more of a foundation for what Reed is attempting to accomplish in Digitized Lives, I would like to return to the matter of the leaked photographs. Over the last few days since the photographs were leaked, I have encountered a number of articles and messages that describe them as "raunchy," "naughty," "scandalous," or in some way indicative of the "dirty side" of the Hollywood actresses and celebrities that were exposed.
What's so disturbing about this sort of vernacular is that it detracts in many ways from the actual criminal act that has taken place. Indeed, it becomes unclear whether the aforementioned adjectives pertain to the act of the hacker(s) whom violated the privacy of several young women and, frankly, engaged in sexual assault, by illegally circulating these nude photographs; the act of the Hollywood actresses and celebrities in recording themselves in "compromising" sexual situations; or, most troubling, the act of the Hollywood actresses and celebrities for being in "compromising" sexual situations to begin with.
This is not an issue of "semantics" or "rhetoric." In fact, these purported deflections away from the matter of the actual photo leak might suggest in some ways that those whom had their nude photographs leaked actually share and/or shoulder the responsibility for how they were represented within multimedia that was seemingly not at all intended for the World Wide Web. By using terms like "raunchy," "naughty," "scandalous," "dirty side," or gesturing in any other way to sexual deviance in relation to these leaked nude photographs, these "reports" tacitly attach this terminology and its attendant implications to the Hollywood actresses and celebrities--the victims--themselves.
Victim blaming of this sort not only undermines many of the prospects for engaging in a compelling and important dialogue about privacy measures in the digital age, it aspires to police and circumscribe what constitutes sexuality. And, more specifically, it perverts and "grotto"-izes a pretty benign form of sexual expression. Listen, every human being ever has been naked at least one time in their lives. I don't say this to minimize what has taken place here, but to perhaps caution those who might discuss this matter in any detail or forum against using terminology that might implicate any of the victims of this crime and deflect attention away from the crime itself. No matter how you identify in terms of sex and gender, there's actually quite a bit at stake in the ways in which sexuality and sexual expression are communicated.
And, fellow dudes, please ruminate for a moment on the male-female ratio of leaked photographs now or ever. Meditate for a moment on the fact that pretty much 99.9% of the time, it is women who are targeted in photo leaks of this sort. So, it might be a drag to consider how the rhetoric surrounding this photo leak and, of course, the photo leak itself, contributes to divisions of power, limitations upon the prospects for self-identification, the prevalence of rape and sexual assault, etc., but it's your responsibility. So do it, and for God's sake, please understand the difference between sex and gender.
I am here making a conscious ethical and rhetorical choice not to name these individuals, particularly in light of the ways in which these photographs have been described by journalists, newscasters, and on message boards and social media. Not to mention, the hacker(s) remain anonymous as these photographs continue to be copied, re-posted, and otherwise circulated throughout the World Wide Web.
In the interest of putting all of this into conversation with Reed's book, I would like to take a moment to provide a brief summary of his project in Digitized Lives. Simply put, Digitized Lives is designed as a survey of sorts of the impact of digital technologies, namely the Internet, upon the ways in which we communicate and relate to one another. Throughout the book, Reed places a particular emphasis on the notion that "digital devices are never culturally neutral" (13), thus implying that the production, consumption, and use of digital devices have far-reaching social and political consequences that in many ways implicate users and provide the interpersonal scaffolding that forms the cultural landscape we navigate on a daily basis. That's a mouthful, I know, but stay with me.
Reed contests earlier conceptualizations of the World Wide Web as a "place beyond race, sex, and gender" (54), pointing to the ways in which the vectors of race, sex, gender, class, disability, environmentalism, social justice, and geographical location inform and/or are altogether disregarded by mainstream (read: Western, white, heterosexual, male) establishments. Salient to the overall project in Digitized Lives is the role that bodies and embodiment play in constructing and/or deconstructing the bridge that binds online and offline identities and milieus. While Reed identifies strains of the post-human in online efforts to somehow assume or "tour" a new or different identity, he also forecloses the prospects of divesting oneself of their bodily existence offline. Indeed, he makes it a point to suggest that "merely touring an identity is very different from profoundly inhabiting a body that is frequently subjected to discrimination" (55).
Having now provided more of a foundation for what Reed is attempting to accomplish in Digitized Lives, I would like to return to the matter of the leaked photographs. Over the last few days since the photographs were leaked, I have encountered a number of articles and messages that describe them as "raunchy," "naughty," "scandalous," or in some way indicative of the "dirty side" of the Hollywood actresses and celebrities that were exposed.
What's so disturbing about this sort of vernacular is that it detracts in many ways from the actual criminal act that has taken place. Indeed, it becomes unclear whether the aforementioned adjectives pertain to the act of the hacker(s) whom violated the privacy of several young women and, frankly, engaged in sexual assault, by illegally circulating these nude photographs; the act of the Hollywood actresses and celebrities in recording themselves in "compromising" sexual situations; or, most troubling, the act of the Hollywood actresses and celebrities for being in "compromising" sexual situations to begin with.
This is not an issue of "semantics" or "rhetoric." In fact, these purported deflections away from the matter of the actual photo leak might suggest in some ways that those whom had their nude photographs leaked actually share and/or shoulder the responsibility for how they were represented within multimedia that was seemingly not at all intended for the World Wide Web. By using terms like "raunchy," "naughty," "scandalous," "dirty side," or gesturing in any other way to sexual deviance in relation to these leaked nude photographs, these "reports" tacitly attach this terminology and its attendant implications to the Hollywood actresses and celebrities--the victims--themselves.
Victim blaming of this sort not only undermines many of the prospects for engaging in a compelling and important dialogue about privacy measures in the digital age, it aspires to police and circumscribe what constitutes sexuality. And, more specifically, it perverts and "grotto"-izes a pretty benign form of sexual expression. Listen, every human being ever has been naked at least one time in their lives. I don't say this to minimize what has taken place here, but to perhaps caution those who might discuss this matter in any detail or forum against using terminology that might implicate any of the victims of this crime and deflect attention away from the crime itself. No matter how you identify in terms of sex and gender, there's actually quite a bit at stake in the ways in which sexuality and sexual expression are communicated.
And, fellow dudes, please ruminate for a moment on the male-female ratio of leaked photographs now or ever. Meditate for a moment on the fact that pretty much 99.9% of the time, it is women who are targeted in photo leaks of this sort. So, it might be a drag to consider how the rhetoric surrounding this photo leak and, of course, the photo leak itself, contributes to divisions of power, limitations upon the prospects for self-identification, the prevalence of rape and sexual assault, etc., but it's your responsibility. So do it, and for God's sake, please understand the difference between sex and gender.
Greetings and Disclosures
First and foremost, I'd just like to take a second to thank you for checking out my blog. I've been interested in blogging (though not active, but I'll get into that in a moment) for some time, but haven't really gotten much traction in the smattering of abandoned blogs I've started in the past. The circumstances that prompted me to start this blog, however, will certainly give me the space, forum, and structure to be more consistent and (hopefully) engaging with my approach to the genre.
I am a first-year Ph.D student in Rhetoric and Composition at Washington State University in Pullman, Washington. I am currently taking a seminar, ENGL 597 - Studies in Technology and Culture, that asks students to respond to the readings we do in class through an independently-run blog. The instructions are as follows:
"You are responsible for writing a summary for each book we read in class. The summary is due by classtime and must include:
With all of that said, I'm going to work on my first blog post, which covers the first five chapters of T. V. Reed's Digitized Lives: Culture, Power and Social Change in the Internet Era (Routledge, 2014). I will put many of Reed's ideas in conversation with recent events involving leaked nude photographs of celebrities. Please feel free to read, comment, share, etc. Thanks again for giving my blog a gander.
I am a first-year Ph.D student in Rhetoric and Composition at Washington State University in Pullman, Washington. I am currently taking a seminar, ENGL 597 - Studies in Technology and Culture, that asks students to respond to the readings we do in class through an independently-run blog. The instructions are as follows:
"You are responsible for writing a summary for each book we read in class. The summary is due by classtime and must include:
- the book's main argument summarized in your own words,
- three direct quotes from the book that you feel are important to the overall argument,
- a description of two issues the author raises that you find compelling (you may be compelled because you agree or disagree),
- one image, video, or song/soundclip, that you feel is somehow related to what you took away from reading the book (this is VERY open)."
With all of that said, I'm going to work on my first blog post, which covers the first five chapters of T. V. Reed's Digitized Lives: Culture, Power and Social Change in the Internet Era (Routledge, 2014). I will put many of Reed's ideas in conversation with recent events involving leaked nude photographs of celebrities. Please feel free to read, comment, share, etc. Thanks again for giving my blog a gander.
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