Sunday, February 3, 2013

Unlearning the Myths That Bind Us - Christensen

Reflection

Christensen's opening line "I was nourished on the milk of American culture.." sucked me in right away. America is the mother that we all learn from and it's media just is thrown in our faces from the beginning. The article reminded me so much of a piece we read last semester, "Cinderella Ate My Daughter" by Peggy Orenstein, (here's a NY times review of the book) it discussed how princess culture is so forced onto little girls and how colors like pink are the only way to describe a little girl. Did you know that before the 1920s newborn girls were wrapped in blue and that boys were wrapped in pink blankets at hospitals? When did society become so strict the roles we "need" to play that they had to assign colors to babies?! Christensen goes into the "secret education" that cartoons are teaching our youth. This education is "delivered by children's books and movies, instructs young people to accept the world as it is portrayed in these social blueprints. And often depicts the domination of one sex, race, on class, or one country over a weaker counterpart." These ideas need to be fed to us at a young age so we don't fight it, it's just accepted as what children watch and the meanings don't get uncovered until there's someone who brings up the idea. Christensen then asks her students if the agree that there is "secret education" and I completely agree that there is.

In the stereotypes section of the text Christensen asks a bunch of questions. "How does the film portray overweight people? What about women other than the main character? What jobs do you see them doing? What jobs do you see them doing? What do they talk about?.. What would young children learn about women's roles in society if they watched this film and believed it? What roles do money, possessions, and power play in the film? Who has it? Who wants it?..What would children learn about what's important in society?" All of these questions stuck me. I never thought about these questions while watching TV or a movie. When watching cartoons as a child I was just absorbed in the beauty of it. I can remember watching the princess movies, and just wanting to be like them. I probably understood that I wanted to be like them because they were pretty and they got the fairytale ending. I remember wanting to find prince charming too. But I never thought of the stereotypes that are placed upon characters. Like when Christensen's students point out that Ursula is ugly and smart, and envious of Ariel because she is pretty and young, and because Ariel is pretty and young she gets the man, even if that means sacrificing her true talents and giving up her voice. (This is also the Disney version of The Little Mermaid, in the original one, Ariel dies turns into sea-foam. We discussed this last semester too.) This would have never occurred to me as a child.





What picture is a child going to be more attracted too?


Christensen whole text brought up ideas that you don't necessarily think about, and her concern for the students she was teaching was great too. She didn't want these young adults to think they have to live in a society with such strict roles. I love when she says "I don't want students to believe that change can be bought at the mall, nor do I want them thinking that the pinnacle of a women's life is an "I do" that supposedly leads them to "happily ever after." She doesn't want this "secret education" to make them think that need to be like everyone else. We learn that we need to be like the images we see in the media, thin, beautiful, and fabulously dressed. Not everyone is like this and that education that we've been learning our whole life taught us this.

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