Put a Ring on It

Put a Ring on It
I did a short writing project with my class last month, where we listened to “Independent Women part 1” by Destiny’s Child, and then “Can’t Hold Us Down” by Christina Aguilera. Then we watched the videos. The questions were: What does it sound like? What is it about? Is it a feminist song?

The results were fairly mixed, but generally shifted from “yes, feminist” to “no, not feminist” after watching the videos.

My favorite part of this assignment though was the last part: playing “Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)”, Beyoncé’s new single, and addressing the same questions.

Here were some responses:

Horrible song. Says not only that men should possess women, but sends a message, maybe to the men listening that all women care about is a ring on their finger.

I love this woman. She can seriously do no wrong in my eyes. It has a good beat, you can dance to it, and honestly, I think it has a pretty awesome message.

Man makes me whole? The beats are awesome! Not really a feminist song, but COME ON!

Sounds kind of awkward, like I kind of want to dance, and I kind of want to leave the club. Get married? It is all we want? If you are sexy then guys should be clamoring to marry you and you should go for it. At a time when we are moving more and more progressive toward a secular country, I don’t understand whey a song about marriage would be popular: “Cried my tears for three long years”? Eeww.

It’s about how dumb her last man was for losing her b/c she’s so awesome.

Hypocritical, out of touch?!

It is saying if I don’t have you it’s ok because I have him. Whatever happened to standing on your own? Well that’s the opposite of a feminist song.

She just got married didn’t she? It sounds like a video game. Get married? I want to dance! I am not sure if this a feminist song or not. I am undecided.

The song is about how single ladies should show their men that they should put a ring on their finger if they want to keep them or else they will find a new man. The song sounded upbeat and I wanted to dance. The song is not a feminist song. Why do women need rings?

Way to go Beyoncé! The song is about moving on and getting on with your life after you break up with someone. She sings about women recognizing her own value and worth.

Beyonce, ½ of the world’s wealthiest couple. Sounds like putting a ring in a cow’s nose. She mentions her mom’s brand of jeans. A ring, a chastity belt, genital piercing, about ownership and women’s worth through a man’s physical possession.

Man makes me/takes me. The title, “Single Ladies” sounds like it will be an empowering anthem. It is not.

I love this song but not for specifically feminist reasons. I think that this sort of song often encapsulates a feminism that is an everyday experience rather than a purely theoretical one.

This song sounds like a ring commercial. This song is about single ladies and men who missed out. This song is not really feminist, it has traditional values about worth being associated with marriage.

The Loaded Surfaces of Life

I have my class read “Subculture: the Meaning of Style”, just the intro and the first chapter, to get an idea about what culture is, and subculture, and some intro semiotics, and some investigation into the ideas of “ideology” and “hegemony.”

At the end of the first chapter, Dick Hebdige writes:

Jean Genet, the archetype of the ‘unnatural’ deviant, again exemplifies the practice of resistance through style. He is as convinced in his own way as is Roland Barthes of the ideological character of cultural signs. He is equally oppressed by the seamless web of forms and the meanings which enclose and yet exclude him. His reading is equally partial. He makes his own list and draws his own conclusions:

I was astounded by so rigorous an edifice whose details were united against me. Nothing in the world is irrelevant: the stars on a general’s sleeve, the stock-market quotations, the olive harvest, the style of the judiciary, the wheat exchange, the flower-beds, . . . Nothing. This order . . . had a meaning – my exile. (Genet, 1967)

I try an experiment tonight, where I say to the class, ok, what is your list? What is on it? The things that order your exile. I say, I don’t want to imply that you are homosexual thieves, but I do know that there is a list in all of us. I had them write five things, first, and then give me three. Here’s what they wrote:

Messed up teeth, southern accents, working class
Time, space, degree
Forced/expected motherhood, television, expected consumerism
Consumerism, apathy, conformity without question
Aging, body image, teeth, loss of optimism, acceptance/success as returning student
Perfect wrinkle and scar free skin, large houses
Financial institutions, subjective beauty, corporations
Stock market, politics, money, fashion, hair, conversation, drugs
Leering men in public, sexist advertising, need to get married to be legitimate/have kids
Not feeling safe on the street at night
Language barriers, motherhood/reproductive rights/class in relation to who your father is
Men “outing” me in public, clowns (happy face with unknown meaning), jealousy
Body image, economic standing, language barriers
My gender, my culture, experience
Adult and Family Services, child welfare, fashion
Appearance, education, money
Self-acceptance, money, time
Minimum wage, bras, cars, meat consumption
Skinny women, war, politics
Sexism, ignorance, negative attention
People, being white, sexism
Fear, class, religion
Woman, young, in college (expected to pay for everything, but not able to have a career)
Religion, ignorance, lipstick
Female, young, unable to support myself financially w/o help
Woman, young, appearance/body
Church pews, aluminum siding, entitlement
Wanting to not have a schedule
Being reduced to a piece of ass b/c of my looks
The sucky economy
Fashion changes, money, fitting into the social norm, racism

This order . . . had a meaning – my exile.

Back for More/Oprah

I have not posted on this blog in four years. I posted right when I got cancer and thought that was going to be enough to propel the blogging. It was not. Maybe if it had been more painful or protracted. It was really too boring to blog about. Here I am, alive, four years later.

I have a tiny photograph in Oprah Magazine, in this month's November issue. It was because I won an essay contest and went to New York for a conference called (and I am not kidding) "Women Rule!".

To give you a sense of how strange this whole experience was, I refer you to the "sound bites" which are on the Oprah website. (Thanks to Casey for pointing this out, btw).

My sound bite: "[At the the girls rock camps] we're giving them an opportunity to really kick ass. We want to differentiate ourselves from 'rock camps' where girls learn how to pluck their eyebrows or try to be the next Mouseketeer."

Typical of other sound bites: "Women Rule! was like drinking pure, clean water after biking to the peak of a mountain. I feel validated, having taken in knowledge, wisdom, and inspiration to quench my thirst for success and leadership."

If only it were that easy!

Here is a note I wrote to a communications expert about it. She had some questions, and I had answers.

One thing is this: I work with the Girls Rock Camp Alliance, which is the international coalition of rock camps.

This is about the thing in Oprah this month which does not feature me or the GRCA, but I'm in there, participated in this thing, so Sarah Stephan from the Pyramid Communications place is trying to help me and Sue Hildick who runs the Chalkboard Project on leveraging this publicity into something...I think that's right. I'm not really sure there's much to leverage except to blog about it.

1. Leadership and women: how do you feel about the topic?
Although I believe Sarah Palin has injected a toxic element into this topic, I am a progressive feminist and believe that it does not matter if women are in leadership if they are steering the wrong course. There is nothing inherently awesome about women as leaders.
2. How did you start working with young women?
I am a professional musician and a teacher, and started working with young women in both capacities through the rock camp. I also teach college and work with homeless young people at p:ear now.
3. If it wasn't a rock camp, what would you have done to help young women?
Literacy/education
4. Do you want to see more mentoring? What's next?
More mentoring for whom? I could use a good mentor. I work as a mentor daily.
5. What national publications have featured you or the camp in the past?
NY Times, Venus, Oprah, Bust, Bitch, Curve and other ones.
6. Can I get a quick list of all previous pubs and reporters who've interviewed you?
7. How does this recognition compare to the others that you've already received?
8. What did you want out of the White House Project experience?

To answer all of these questions in a lump: I myself, Sarah Dougher the Musician, has had much publicity in the past. I do not want publicity for myself, but rather for the project. It is run collectively by people all over the world, and I did the White House Project thing to draw attention to the project. Because of the non-hierarchical leadership structure, it does not mesh very well with the White House Project model, which is frankly kind of conservative. It is a more complex story than "Sarah is a woman ruler and she runs this great organization." That is not the case. I mean, I'm a ruler in some ways, most of them private, and I am certainly not the LEADER of this organization. It feels a little like there's only room for one ruler at a time.

I'm not sure how to leverage the publicity of this Oprah thing. Or even if that is interesting.

Books, Praying and Food

Today in the mail I got three books from a friend:

1. What To Eat Now: The Cancer Lifeline Cookbook
2. The Macrobiotic Cancer Prevention Cookbook
3. The Chemotherapy & Radiation Therapy Survival Guide

The first looks by far the most promising. It is small and contains recipies I would actually cook. The second is very 70's looking and contains recipies like "grated daikon," although it is by the guy who invented macrobiotics, for what that is worth.
The third has a very distinctive smell, and not a good one, and came with a little note in it which says:

I promise to always be fair with my pricing and honest with my book descriptions. My goal is to honor God and let Him bless my endeavors. May God bless you and your family today and everyday. Diana

And then handwritten:

I pray for your healing --

which I have to say even though it feels wierd to have strangers praying for you, it is better than having strangers cursing you. When I consulted my friend Stosh on the matter of spirituality and cancer, she suggested that having as many people praying for you as you can is a good idea. Like many ideas that seem new to me with cancer, I think that it is easier to just believe this than to not believe it.

I do, however, believe this list, which are the top ten super foods for an anti-cancer life, according to What To Eat Now:

1. Cruciferous vegetables (cabbage family)
2. Garlic
3. Carotenoid-rich foods (dark green/deeply colored veggies)
4. Yogurt, nonfat, I prefer Nancy's
5. Beans
6. Soybeans
7. Citrus Fruit
8. Fiber-rich foods
9. Fish, the fattier the better
10. Mushrooms -- shiitake, reishi, maitaki.

This is sort of a non-hierarchical, general well-being way to pray, eating these foods.