noifsandsorbutlers - Tumblr blog

[noifsandsorbutlers]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/cosmetics-line-called-out-for-cultural-appropriation-1.3597988

I don’t know how many people heard about the controversial MAC makeup line release a little while ago, with product names and colors inspired by Aboriginal culture, but I think it’s relevant to our discussions in class. In terms of colonialism and decolonization, I think this is an example of the “fantasizing adoption” and “settler nativism” modes of settler’s “move toward innocence.” 

The colors and prints and names revolving around Aboriginal culture were appropriated into mainstream culture for a profit. The makeup depicts a modern idea of “going native” by using products clearly denoting a certain cultural background, and sells it to the public without blinking an eye. I think it promotes the idea of “native culture coolness,” where all of a sudden it’s considered popular and mainstream to wear feathers and beads and use makeup called “arrowhead” to remediate the culture of a people without even asking, or perhaps even understanding what it means to do so. 

Ultimately, I think the line demonstrates the way our society neglects to take seriously the culture of other people, and that anything will go if there’s a chance of making a profit. 

-Shelby Carleton

[noifsandsorbutlers]

Here’s a example of equivocation in action: I found this image in Tumblr’s “decolonisation” tag. Kathleen Hanna is an American musician notable for her involvement in the Riot Grrrl scene and third-wave feminism in the 90′s. While her statement of the othering nature of oppressive power structures could potentially extend to certain oppressions beyond sexism, this quote is not commenting on nor representative of decolonization beyond the fallacy of the notion of all oppressions being the same.

Kathleen Hanna by Jacob V Joyce of the Queer Punk band Screaming Toenail 

[noifsandsorbutlers]

http://www.edmontonmapsheritage.ca/location/rossdale-burial-site/

When discussing the different injustices that have occurred against indigenous people, it’s easy to think that these happened far away in places like Ontario where they mad first contact. Or long ago, before any of us were born or were able to speak out against it. The truth is, however, that some things are still happening today right in our own city. While the city of Edmonton and EPCOR itself claim that they did all that they could to avoid the areas in which human remains were found, this point is still heavily up for debate in the Aboriginal community (Dwayne Donald). The structures that lie just outside of the EPCOR fence in Edmonton is that of a circle, which will only be enclosed when EPCOR makes up for the injustices against the Aboriginal people which have been carefully buried by the Alberta government. The injustices? Taking Indigenous remains and dumping them in the North Saskatchewan River (whose real name is the kisiskāciwani-sīpiy) so that they may remain in a place that works the best for them in order to save time and to save money. This all shows the ways in which the government is in need of a serious improvement (or dismantlement) before the offenses can be repaired, which proves that things like the reconciliation bridges are just moves to settler innocence.

[noifsandsorbutlers]

This article, as you can probably see from the title, appears to counter Butler’s main point of gender being performative. When I started reading it, I assumed it would be written by an angry cisgender person, probably male, asserting his confidence in his masculine gender identity. However, I was surprised to find out it was written by a transwoman, Julia Serano, with some very valid points about the reality of gender, its prevalence in society, and how our gendered experiences shape us. 

As a cisgender person myself, I have no desire or right to argue with Serano on the points of gender being a performance. It is easy to do so when I have had no trouble with my gender identity, which Serano herself points out many times, reminding cis people to check their privelege when engaging in conversations about the “fictional nature of gender”.

Yet I am forced to remind myself that performance and performativity as Butler describe them are different ideas. Performativity is rarely a conscious action, and so does not serve to invalidate or fictionalise anyone’s gender. In fact, it highlights how our performance of gender roles are based on what we perceive they should be like, which is a circular argument and thus based on no original. 

Someone in the comments section phrased it in a way that makes it easier to explain: “Perhaps living doesn’t feel like performance any more for the author, since she is now playing the correct gender role?” 

Whatever the answer may be, I feel like this article is an interesting opposition to the assertion of gender being drag, because it comes from the point of view of one who has been forced to perform a gender they did not associate with, and were then accused of performing when they did come out in their true gender. As Serano points out, gender is a complicated mixture of social and biological factors and no one thing can be asserted as its true source. However, it is also important to remember the context in which Butler describes gender to be performative, and the complexity of its constant reiteration and repetition, despite having no original guide.

- Suwaibah

[noifsandsorbutlers]

Changing History

This article talks about how when we think about history and for example the Canada 150, “we imagine a grand structure, a national chronicle, a closely organized and guarded record of agreed-upon events and interpretations.”(  TheGlobalMail.com) This is what some people think without doing a bit of researching on First Nations peoples or other values of history. 

When Kent Moneyman creates his paintings such as “The Daddies” he docent create them to fit into the reality of what we call history, he creates his art to tell a story and to create  visual history for himself. He places Chief Eagle Testicles into the art to create a different outlook on the history and the painting itself. Moneyman likes to mess with what could be called the visual codes. 

“I wanted to deal with themes in my own life and my community, like colonization, the impact of Christianity and homophobia,”Said Monkman according to (TheGlobalMail.com) 

I thought this article was interesting because it breaks down some of Monkmans other painitngs if anyone is interested I think its great! 

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/canada-150/kent-monkman-shame-and-prejudice/article33515775/

-Cara Schamber 

[noifsandsorbutlers]

- Akosua Adasi

Recently there has been controversy surrounding the Whitney Biennial concerning a  painting done by the artist Dana Schutz, called Open Casket. Based on a photograph of the funeral of Emmett Till, the painting depicts the cadaver of an African American boy in his casket. He has lacerations in his face and although he is at rest, the curves and shadows of his face suggest turmoil. Till was a young African American boy who was killed in Mississippi in 1955 after he had been accused of flirting with a white woman. He was lynched and mutilated and at his funeral his mother insisted on an open casket. 

The painting has drawn much resistance from black artists and communities because Dana Schutz is a white woman. Hannah Black, a British artist, said that “it [was] not acceptable for a white person to transmute Black suffering into profit and fun.” When asked about it, Dana Schutz said that she was responding to shootings of black men by police as well as the racist rallies that have been dominating America in recent years. She said that she was coming from the painting as a mother understanding and sharing the pain, the horror. Strangely, Schutz recognized that there would be tension when her painting was revealed so it brings to question if she thought her own empathy was greater than the connotations of a white woman remediating a symbol of black history.

As I read about the controversy, I thought about our discussions in class, especially about Monkman’s artworks. His art remediates the histories of indigenous people in Canada, both as a response to the past and present. We discussed how he places himself within his pieces and in that way we see the connection between artist and art. What does it mean for Monkman to reimagine and remediate these scenes of indigenous histories? What would be the connotations of a non-indigenous person doing the same?  

I see that as settler move to innocence—a way to recognize and attempt to reconcile the experiences of indigenous peoples in Canada’s history. But as Tuck and Yang point out, that is not enough and it’s also not valid. It’s a way to alleviate guilt. Although the settler-colonial relationship with indigenous  peoples should not be equivocated with the race relations in the US, I feel like similar actions are taken by non-black individuals in the US in order to refuse their participation in the oppression of black individuals. By Schutz painting this photograph (or a version of it) she remediates a symbol that is important in the history of Black Americans and is seen as motivating the Civil Rights Movement. No matter her intentions, Schutz painting erases the importance of what Emmett Till’s death came to symbolize. 

[noifsandsorbutlers]

This week I decided to look at another one of Kent Monkman’s paintings that we didn’t get to explore in class.

With this painting it has a same kind of feeling as Monkman’s “Le petit dejeuner sur l’herbe, 2014″ because the Buffalo are no longer their original selves. Just like the female figures in the first painting, some of the buffalo are deformed and different, they are hurt or subjected to change. This symbolizes the fur trade and the buffalo hunting that went on when settlers first came to Canada. This image just like “Le petit dejeuner sur l’herbe, 2014″ symbolizes that the buffalo, just like the women are not the same post-contact. They have evolved and rendered in different ways, damaging their habitat and ways of life. 

Another point to build upon in this painting is Miss Chief Eagle Testickle’s role within this image and how he is riding on a crotch-rocket that symbolizes the change within the hunt, and within the original hunt-live lifestyle of the Indigenous population. 

Thirdly, the fact that the buffalo are running through the streets rather than plains which is their original habitat demonstrates that the planes that were once their home are now settled and used. Through the use of Chief’s motorcycle it shows that the road that was once on the plains is now more accessible for road vehicles rather than original hunting equipment and access. 

All in all, the painting ties in effectively with our in class discussions of how exactly Monkman’s work demonstrates the struggles and drawbacks of decolonization and remediation within this concept. 

- Anna 

“The Chase,” 2014 by Kent Monkman (Cree)

[noifsandsorbutlers]

I came across this while blogging on my personal tumblr page and couldn't believe how much this resonated with me. This class has opened my eyes to so many things- how much of our world is heteronormative and how much gender and sexuality is socially constructed. We are not offered much freedom to express who we really are, so much to the point that we might not ever even explore some parts of ourself because in some way, it may be easier to simply go with what the world has deemed “normal.” To go away from the societal norms, in some individuals, may instil a sense of guilt or shame, whether that be from their families, their culture, etc.. I look forward to becoming even more educated and educating others from what I’ve taken away from this class! 

-Justyne Boehm

[noifsandsorbutlers]

#week8 #gradedpost March 25th/2017 - Arthur Zubrack Oliver

What does it mean “to be a man”? Well, today, it would mean to perform as masculine. How does one perform as masculine? Well, THAT’S a broad category. I talked to some friends, and asked them what qualities it takes to be a guy, and generally, i got the same responses; Strong, tough, big, forward, etc. What people didn’t say, is how much of masculinity defines itself; by performing especially not feminine. This scene from friends is a great example. Joey is a regular dude who just got a new roommate. He didn’t see anything wrong with the way his apartment had female attributes, and was therefore affecting his performativity of being male. It was Chandler who saw the problem. Chandlers version of masculinity performativity requires an anti feminine sentiment - one can not have any feminine attributes whatsoever, and further, that very same performance is pushed onto others, by telling Joey unless his performance is the same, he will not be masculine at all. This is toxic masculinity. This is a remediation of a specific type of gender performativity.

[noifsandsorbutlers]

When Dr. Luhman said in class that she was not familiar with the artist of the Massacre of the Innocents that Monkman’s piece refers to, I did a quick Google search and was surprised to find it was Peter Paul Rubens, a very famous, infuential Dutch/Flemish painter in the 17th century. The original piece depicts a Biblical scene, the Massacre of the Innocents, an infanticide prompted by the Roman-appointed King of the Jews, Herod the Great. Fearing the loss of his throne to a newborn said to be the new King of Jews (Jesus), Herod had male children, 2 years old or younger, in Bethlehem killed.

The original context for the piece was the massacre of thousands of Dutch people in Antwerp, as the Spanish (Catholic) army sought to repel Protestant armies. The religious content of the piece makes Monkman’s choice to use it’s title even more interesting: it was often Catholic/Christian people how slaughtered the indigenous people in the name of God. Monkman’s piece comepletely inverts these roles; in Rubens, it is the Jews/Christian people being slaughtered, and in Monkman, Christians do the slaughtering.

The beaver in Monkman’s piece takes on the role of the innocent child in the biblical scene, slaughtered for white man’s benefit. Miss Chief EagleTestickle, cowering behind a tree and clutching a beaver, becomes a mother figure, hiding her child. She could also be thought of as the Virgin Mary, who escaped Bethlemhem with Jesus.

Certainly, Monkman’s choice to use Massacre of the Innocents as the title of his piece is a fascination remediation: with it comes an entire Christian and anti-Christian narrative, which is especially interesting considering the role Christianity has played in the slaughter of indigenous peoples.

*I’ve included both versions of Ruben’s Massacre of the Innocents here. The first was done in 1611-12. The second was done in 1636-38.

[noifsandsorbutlers]

Watch the original Robert Palmer “Simply Irresistible” video that inspired Ingrid’s version here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrGw_c… Original Director: Terence Donovan Original Choreographer: Jeff Thacker

A note from Ingrid on the video: “Girls Chase Boys started out as a break up song but took on a deeper meaning as I continued writing. More than just being about my experience, its focus shifted to include the idea that, no matter who or how we love, we are all the same.

The video takes that idea one step further, and attempts to turn stereotypical gender roles on their head. Girls don’t exclusively chase boys. We all know this! We all chase each other and in the end we are all chasing after the same thing: love”.

osnapitzjano1: “It’s really ironic how upset people are getting over this video. In case you didn’t read the video, this music video is a homage to Robert Palmer’s music video for Simply Irresistible. This music is an exact replica of the music video for Simply Irresistible apart from the genders that are being exploited are reversed. Ingrid is showing how we, as a society, are okay with females being used as sexual icons (like they are in Palmer’s music video) but as soon as males are seen as feminine or sexual icons (like they are in Michaelson’s music video) there is a massive uproar. This music video is pretty genius if you ask me and my respect for Ingrid Michaelson has only just increased”.

So if you haven’t caught it already Ingrid Michelson has remediated Robert Palmer’s video ‘Simply Irresistable’. We have a very specific and stylized feminine gender performance, from men and women alike in this video. Everyone in the video is of a specific body type; all are lean, the men are very muscular, everyone (men and women) have the exact same style of make-up regardless of gender or race. I love it. Great job Ingrid!

-Jennifer Zubrack Oliver    WEEK 8

[noifsandsorbutlers]

I came across this review of Amir Hussain’s book Muslims and the Making of America. The title of the review is “There Has Never Been an America Without Muslims”, which lies in direct disagreement with our class readings and discussions of decolonization over the past two weeks. According to the review, the book tries to ensure that Muslim Americans are not “reduced to outsiders or defined as newcomers”. Though the books addresses “the relationship between domestic structural racism and the global militaristic adventures of the United States”, settler colonialism is absent from Hussain’s account of American history. Muslims and the Making of America is an example of how academic work, even that which might be viewed as progressive, perpetrates settler colonialism by erasing the existence of indigenous populations. Asserting that “there has never been an America without muslims” reinforces the idea that “America” began when the settlers arrived. Though Hussain tackles the dynamics of race and belonging in America, he does so in an examination of the settler-slave dynamic, ignoring the final component in the settler-native-slave person triad.

[noifsandsorbutlers]

In the presentation that we had last Thursday, Two-Spirit and the different gender roles that exist within North American Indigenous cultures were mentioned briefly. For another class, I was able to do a project on the effect of colonization on gender and this map, made by PBS when creating a documentary about Two-Spirited people, shows just how diverse world genders originally were. I love this map because of the way that it so quickly disproves essentialism and points out that our performances of gender are based around social constructs - just as we’ve been talking about in class. It’s entirely devastating that our societies have continually repressed and destroyed much of these cultures but I see so much hope in the way that these marginalized groups are reclaiming their culture. I appreciate artists like Kent Monkman which use their bodies to highlight struggles and to reclaim identities. 

[noifsandsorbutlers]

Culture

I remember seeing this poster for the first time in my first year of university. Back then at first glance, I couldn’t see what the big deal was. At the time, I remember being confused, thinking it wasn’t a big deal because it was Halloween and Halloween involved costumes, and why shouldn’t someone be allowed to wear a costume? 

Well, first-year-university-Shelby, there a few reasons. 

For one thing, these people posing in the poster are sending a message. They’re saying they’re not comfortable with their culture being appropriated the way it is, and if someone says “no, I don’t like this,” I think we as a society need to understand that they mean it. We shouldn’t get to say “that’s too bad you don’t like this, because I do, so I’m going to do this anyway.” We should be standing up for each other, not putting each other down. Especially over something as small as a costume you wear for a single night one day of the year. 

[noifsandsorbutlers]

I don’t know what I can say that Knott hasn’t already said, in a much more informed and articulate way, but I’d like to share this video anyway. As an international student, I have to stress how very limited my knowledge of indigenous peoples and their issues is, to the point where I don’t feel qualified to even make this post, preferring instead to listen and learn. But having said that, I recognise my position as one of a settler, as one living and studying on stolen land, and the duty I have to educate myself on these issues so immensely saturated within Canadian culture and so central to the progression (or move towards it) of the society; I recognise that in learning I need to be active, and be able to have these discussions. 

I have only watched one other collaboration between Savard and Knott, and I feel that they are vastly important works in understanding the injustices faced by Indigenous people, and the need for decolonisation. Unfortunately, as this video shows, the struggle for protection of Indigenous peoples and their rights is still ongoing, let alone the move towards decolonisation beyond the metaphor. In fact, the Site C dam project highlights the continued erasure of Indigenous voices speaking out against the injustices they face, and the continued stealing of their land, despite these protests.

Knott’s brave and powerful delivery emphasises the way settlers continue to exploit and benefit off of colonialism, and that it is not a thing of the past. As I said before, she says it better:

“So if you want real change, you can’t give half-measures and only kind of oppress, only kind of continue to violate treaties, only kind of continue to colonise. So please, don’t promise anything, if you’re not even willing to try”.

- Suwaibah

[noifsandsorbutlers]

While reading the essay, Decolonization is Not a Metaphor, I was reminded of this photo of Hilary Duff's Halloween costume appropriating indigenous culture. The picture puts the concept of "playing Indian" into a real aspect. Though the celebrity has since apologized, culural appropriation is still very prevalent in our society.

Cultural appropriation separates cultural identity and works to eliminate the profound concept of culture. Specific practices of culture are devalued and stripped of its meaning. Furthermore, negative stereotypes are enforced when indigenous culture is remediated in this form.

While some seemingly forms of cultural appropriation can see as innocent,  even those will have a negative effect. Perhaps increased awareness of to the negative effects appropriation and will help us to eliminate it from our society.

[noifsandsorbutlers]

This is cool! My friend forwarded me this interview with a philosopher called Catherine Malabou, who has been doing some interesting work (at least it seems so, based on the very minuscule amount I’ve read), merging deconstruction with the neurobiological principle of neuroplasticity. Neuroplasticity is a pretty big topic right now - it refers to the brain’s capacity to alter its wiring after exposure to new experience. It’s believed that neuroplasticity plays an enormous role in our capacity to learn and produce a concept of self - including identity!

I should offer a disclaimer here that the only thing I’ve read that she references is nothing. She references Derrida, Heidegger, Foucault, and a bunch of their buddies. Haven’t read any of them. But from what understanding I have been able to muster, it seems like she uses the connections between neurology and psychology (our thoughts seem to be very physical) to further examine the self and how the self is produced. What you experience alters you and a lot of what you are becomes a product of your environment - this helps us to draw interesting conclusions with Judith Butler - something that (I believe?) she referenced in a text in class - as gender is experienced as a way in which things simply “are”, that becomes an inseparable (or nearly inseparable) part of a person’s identity - experiences produce the framework through which we experience our surroundings and society - including our notions of the genders of others and those around us. This could also be applied to the work of Bolter and Grusin - our notions of gender are constantly being altered (ever so slightly!) as our pasts and experiences alter our thought patterns. As a result, new notions of gender are always experienced in ways that smell slightly like the ones that came before. (Think of how “androgynous” clothing tends to turn towards “masculine” clothing!) 

Anyways. My analysis of this philosopher is obviously not very developed right now, but she seems really neat! Thought I’d toss it out there.