Gender race and class in media summary

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Copyright © 2015 by SAGE Publications, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Gender, Race, and Class in Media : A Critical Reader / editors, Gail Dines, Wheelock College, Jean M. Humez, University of Massachusetts, Boston. — Fourth Edition.

pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4522-5906-2 (paperback : acid-free paper)

1. Mass media and culture—United States. 2. Mass media and sex—United States. 3. Mass media and race relations—United States. 4. Social classes in mass media. 5. Mass media—Social aspects—United States. 6. Popular culture—United States. 7. United States—Social conditions—1980- I. Dines, Gail. II. Humez, Jean McMahon, 1944-

P94.65.U6G46 2014 302.23'0973—dc23 2013039084

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

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CONTENTS

Preface Acknowledgments

PART I. A CULTURAL STUDIES APPROACH TO MEDIA: THEORY

1. Cultural Studies, Multiculturalism, and Media Culture Douglas Kellner

2. The Meaning of Memory: Family, Class, and Ethnicity in Early Network Television Programs George Lipsitz

3. The Economics of the Media Industry David P. Croteau, William D. Hoynes, and Stefania Milan

4. Hegemony James Lull

5. The Internet’s Unholy Marriage to Capitalism John Bellamy Foster and Robert W. McChesney

6. Extreme Makeover: Home Edition: An American Fairy Tale Gareth Palmer

7. Women Read the Romance: The Interaction of Text and Context Janice Radway

8. Star Trek Rerun, Reread, Rewritten: Fan Writing as Textual Poaching Henry Jenkins III

9. Watching Television Without Pity: The Productivity of Online Fans Mark Andrejevic

10. Reconsidering Resistance and Incorporation Richard Butsch

PART II. REPRESENTATIONS OF GENDER, RACE, AND CLASS

11. The Whites of Their Eyes: Racist Ideologies and the Media Stuart Hall

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12. “Global Motherhood”: The Transnational Intimacies of White Femininity Raka Shome

13. Pornographic Eroticism and Sexual Grotesquerie in Representations of African American Sportswomen James McKay and Helen Johnson

14. Hetero Barbie? Mary F. Rogers

15. Transgender Transitions: Sex/Gender Binaries in the Digital Age Kay Siebler

16. The “Rich Bitch”: Class and Gender on the Real Housewives of New York City Michael J. Lee and Leigh Moscowitz

17. Big Talkers: Rush Limbaugh, Conservative Talk Radio, and the Defiant Reassertion of White Male Authority Jackson Katz

PART III. READING MEDIA TEXTS CRITICALLY

18. Pretending to Be “Postracial”: The Spectacularization of Race in Reality TV’s Survivor Emily M. Drew

19. Television’s ‘New’ Feminism: Prime-Time Representations of Women and Victimization Lisa M. Cuklanz and Sujata Moorti

20. More Than Baby Mamas: Black Mothers and Hip-Hop Feminism Marlo David

21. Political Culture Jamming: The Dissident Humor of The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Jamie Warner

22. Educating The Simpsons: Teaching Queer Representations in Contemporary Visual Media Gilad Padva

23. Resisting, Reiterating, and Dancing Through: The Swinging Closet

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Doors of Ellen DeGeneres’s Televised Personalities Candace Moore

24. “Sexy Like a Girl and Horny Like A Boy”: Contemporary Gay “Western” Narratives About Gay Asian Men Chong-suk Han

25. When in Rome: Heterosexism, Homophobia and Sports Talk Radio David Nylund

PART IV. ADVERTISING AND CONSUMER CULTURE

26. Image-Based Culture: Advertising and Popular Culture Sut Jhally

27. The New Politics of Consumption: Why Americans Want So Much More Than They Need Juliet Schor

28. Inventing the Cosmo Girl: Class Identity and Girl-Style American Dreams Laurie Ouellette

29. Sex, Lies, and Advertising Gloria Steinem

30. Supersexualize Me! Advertising and the “Midriffs” Rosalind Gill

31. Branding “Real” Social Change in Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty Dara Persis Murray

32. Nothing Less Than Perfect: Female Celebrity, Ageing, and Hyperscrutiny in the Gossip Industry Kirsty Fairclough

33. To See and Be Seen: Celebrity Practice on Twitter Alice Marwick and danah boyd

34. How to “Use Your Olympian”: The Paradox of Athlete Authenticity and Commercialization in the Contemporary Olympic Games Momin Rahman and Sean Lockwood

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35. Mapping Commercial Intertextuality: HBO’s True Blood Jonathan Hardy

PART V. REPRESENTING SEXUALITIES

36. That Teenage Feeling: Twilight, Fantasy, and Feminist Readers Anne Helen Petersen

37. Deadly Love: Images of Dating Violence in the “Twilight Saga” Victoria E. Collins and Dianne C. Carmody

38. The White Man’s Burden: Gonzo Pornography and the Construction of Black Masculinity Gail Dines

39. The Pornography of Everyday Life Jane Caputi

40. There Are Bitches and Hoes Tricia Rose

41. The Limitations of the Discourse of Norms: Gay Visibility and Degrees of Transgression Jay Clarkson

42. Sex Lives in Second Life Robert Alan Brookey and Kristopher L. Cannon

43. Queering Queer Eye: The Stability of Gay Identity Confronts the Liminality of Trans Embodiment E. Tristan Booth

PART VI. GROWING UP WITH CONTEMPORARY MEDIA

44. The Future of Childhood in the Global Television Market Dafna Lemish

45. Growing Up Female in a Celebrity-Based Pop Culture Gail Dines

46. La Princesa Plastica: Hegemonic and Oppositional Representations of Latinidad in Hispanic Barbie Karen Goldman

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47. Monarchs, Monsters, and Multiculturalism: Disney’s Menu for Global Hierarchy Lee Artz

48. Constructing the “New Ethnicities”: Media, Sexuality and Diaspora Identity in the Lives of South Asian Immigrant Girls Meenakshi Gigi Durham

49. HIV on TV: Conversations With Young Gay Men Kathleen P. Farrell

50. Video Games and Machine Dreams of Domination John Sanbonmatsu

51. Strategic Simulations and Our Past: The Bias of Computer Games in the Presentation of History Kevin Schut

52. “You Play Like a Girl!” Cross-Gender Competition and the Uneven Playing Field Elena Bertozzi

PART VII. IS TV FOR REAL?

53. Six Decades of Social Class in American Television Sitcoms Richard Butsch

54. Marketing “Reality” to the World: Survivor, Post-Fordism, and Reality Television Chris Jordan

55. Critiquing Reality-Based Televisual Black Fatherhood: A Critical Analysis of Run’s House and Snoop Dogg’s Father Hood Debra C. Smith

56. A Shot at Half-Exposure: Asian Americans in Reality TV Shows Grace Wang

57. “Take Responsibility for Yourself”: Judge Judy and the Neoliberal Citizen Laurie Ouellette

58. Television and the Domestication of Cosmetic Surgery

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Sue Tait

59. Drama Is the Cure for Gossip: Television’s Turn to Theatricality in a Time of Media Transition Abigail De Kosnik

60. Free TV: File-Sharing and the Value of Television Michael Z. Newman

PART VIII. INTERACTIVITY, VIRTUAL COMMUNITY, AND FANDOM

61. Pop Cosmopolitanism: Mapping Cultural Flows in an Age of Convergence Henry Jenkins III

62. The Political Economy of Privacy on Facebook Christian Fuchs

63. Showtime Thinks, Therefore I Am: The Corporate Construction of “The Lesbian” on Sho.Com’s The L Word Site Kelly Kessler

64. Reading the Romance of Fan Cultural Production: Music Videos of a Television Lesbian Couple Eve Ng

65. “Don’t Hate the Player, Hate the Game”: The Racialization of Labor in World of Warcraft Lisa Nakamura

66. Accidental Activists: Fan Activism in the Soap Opera Community Melissa C. Scardaville

67. Fan Activists and the Politics of Race in The Last Airbender Lori Kido Lopez

68. GimpGirl Grows Up: Women With Disabilities Rethinking, Redefining, and Reclaiming Community Jennifer Cole, Jason Nolan, Yukari Seko, Katherine Mancuso, and Alejandra Ospina

69. The Latino Cyber-Moral Panic Process in the United States Nadia Yamel Flores-Yeffal, Guadalupe Vidales, and April Plemons

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70. How It Feels to Be Viral Me: Affective Labor and Asian American YouTube Performance Christine Bacareza Balance

Alternative Contents Index

Resources and Media Activist Organizations

Glossary of Terms

Author Index

Subject Index

About the Editors

About the Contributors

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I

PREFACE

n this fourth edition of Gender, Race, and Class in Media, our overall goal remains the same as in previous editions: to introduce undergraduate students to some of the richness, sophistication, and diversity that characterizes

contemporary media scholarship, in a way that is accessible and builds on students’ own media experiences and interests. We intend to help demystify the nature of mass media entertainment culture and new media by examining their production, analyzing the texts of some of the most pervasive forms or genres, and exploring the processes by which audiences make meaning out of media imagery or texts— meaning that helps shape our economic, cultural, political, and personal worlds.1 We start from the position that, as social beings, we construct our realities out of the cultural norms and values that are dominant in our society. The mass media are among the most important producers and reproducers of such norms and values.

We have designed this as a volume to help teachers (1) introduce the most powerful theoretical concepts in contemporary media studies; (2) explore some of the most influential and interesting forms of contemporary media culture; and (3) focus on issues of gender and sexuality, race, and class from a critical perspective. Most of the readings in this book take an explicitly critical perspective that is also informed by a diversity of approaches, such as political economy, feminism, cultural studies, critical race theory, and queer theory. We have chosen readings that make the following assumptions, as we do: (1) that industrialized societies are stratified along lines of gender and sexuality, race, and class; (2) that everyone living in such a society “has” gender and sexuality, race, and class, and other aspects of social identity that help structure our experience; and (3) that economic and other resources, advantages, and privileges are distributed inequitably in part because of power dynamics involving these categories of experience (as well as others, such as age, ethnicity, ability, or disability). Our selection of material has been guided by our belief that an important goal of a critical education is to enable people to conceptualize social justice clearly and work toward it more effectively. For us, greater social justice would require a fairer distribution of our society’s economic and cultural resources.

Our book is situated within both media studies and cultural studies. When we started working on the first edition of Gender, Race, and Class in Media in the early 1990s, cultural studies was a relatively new academic field in the United States, although it had been popular for some time in England (where it originated at The Center for Contemporary Cultural Studies at the University of Birmingham). The cultural studies approach has now been dominant in U.S. media studies for

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more than a generation. Several other interdisciplinary fields concerned with social issues and representation, such as American studies and women’s studies, have been heavily influenced by cultural studies.

The field of cultural studies is actually multidisciplinary, drawing on insights and approaches from history, critical race studies, literary studies, philosophy, sociology, and psychology. Because of its progressive politics and because it offers a much broader and apparently more democratic definition of culture than was used in humanistic studies such as literary criticism in the past, many scholars and students particularly interested in race, gender, and class have been attracted to its theories and activist potential. (For a more extended discussion of the development of multiculturalism and cultural studies in the last decades of the 20th century, see Douglas Kellner’s reading in Part I.)

In this fourth edition, we continue to emphasize, with Kellner, three separable but interconnected areas of analysis: political economy, textual analysis, and audience reception. For Kellner, it is crucial to link all three to provide a full understanding of the entire media culture communication process, from production through consumption. Indeed, one of the initial goals of cultural studies was to contextualize the media text within the wider society that informs its production, construction, consumption, and, more recently, distribution along a range of media platforms.

Traditionally, political economy has looked at the ways the profit motive affects how texts are produced within a society marked by class, gender, and racial inequality. Who owns and controls the media? Who makes the decisions about content? How does financing affect and shape the range of texts produced? In what other ways does the profit motive drive production? These are central questions asked by political economists. Examining this economic component is still essential to an understanding of what eventually gets produced and circulated in the mainstream commercial mass media industries. However, with the advent of new media technologies that enable consumers to produce and widely distribute their own content, we must broaden our view of production, as many of the readings in this book do.

Media representations are never just mirrors or “reflections of reality” but, rather, always artfully constructed creations designed to appeal to our emotions and influence our ideas, and especially our consumer behavior. Therefore, to educate ourselves as consumers, we need tools to help us closely examine the ways all cultural texts—from TV sitcoms, dramas, or reality shows to fan-produced music videos—are structured, using complex combinations of words, sounds, and visual languages. Critical textual analysis provides a special focus on how to analyze the ideological significance of media texts—that is, to look at how, through the use of certain codes and conventions, they create or transmit meanings that generally

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support the economic, social, and political status quo.

Media studies has long acknowledged that audiences also have a role in creating the meanings of media texts, and for at least a generation, ethnographic audience reception research has focused on this dimension. By observing and talking with actual consumers of media texts—as opposed to critics—much has been learned about how we are active as we interpret, make sense of, understand, and use such texts within our everyday social and private lives. These studies have played an important role in complicating the older view of media audiences as passive, or even brainwashed, recipients of prepackaged meanings. Clearly, gender, race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, political beliefs, and age are important factors that can help explain the different meanings that various audiences appear to take away from an advertisement, movie, or sitcom. Studies of fans—those dedicated consumers of media texts who build community around their experiences of consumption—go even further in exploring how consumers of media texts can produce meanings quite different from those intended by the original text producers. With the advent of new media aided by the Internet, the debate over audience exploitation versus empowerment has only intensified.

However we conceptualize the media audience in the age of the Internet, it is still vital to study all three components of media representations—production, text, and consumption—to understand how such texts can and do strengthen—or perhaps in some ways undermine—our dominant systems and ideologies of gender, race, and class inequality.

In this fourth edition, we have maintained our thematic focus on gender (including sexuality), race, and class, since we believe that media studies need to address the issues of social inequality that continue to plague our society and undermine its democratic potential. Some of the readings in this book employ an intersectional analysis—that is, one that complicates each of these social categories by examining how they interact with one another. Whenever possible, we have selected articles that give voice to the multiple levels of analysis needed to make media studies a truly multicultural endeavor. We acknowledge the ever- intensifying interrelationships among media cultures globally while continuing to focus primarily on the North American examples of media texts that we see as most likely to be familiar to instructors and students working with this book.