As our society becomes increasingly technological, I love stories that remind us of the value of simpler ways to solve problems, like a faux bus stop to catch escapee nursing home residents or dogs that are trained to sniff out cancer (both stories here).
This weekend we were treated to another such story, this time by Google. The company has announced a plan to bring internet to the whole world… with balloons. The very first launch of a gas balloon was in 1783. Two hundred and thirty years later, the company aims to deliver what is arguably the defining feature of our age — the internet — with helium-filled balloons. That technology will then bring almost countless other technologies, such as medical advances and agricultural information, to people who are largely excluded from them now. A fantastical plan.
@plouie01 snapped these two pics of the suggested gifts for Mother’s and Father’s Day at Chapter’s Bookstore in Vancouver. You might notice an interesting difference:
Yep, that’s right. Men get books, interesting books even! And women get… pink stuff. Mostly paper products, but without words and ideas on them, and also candles and soap.. You know, pretty good-smelling things meant to please the daft. Forgive me, perhaps I’m being overly harsh towards stationary. All I’m saying is, not a single book for ladies at the book store? Alas.
A new symbol to represent people with disabilities is being introduced in New York City. The symbol, designed by a team at Gordon College, looks like this:
We’ve posted previously about the politics of the symbol and its history. The notable changes here are the moving of the arms to the wheels of the chair, suggesting that the person is pushing themselves, and the forward-leaning angle, suggesting active motion. It tells a story about independence and ability, instead of dependence and disability. A very nice change.
Teen pregnancy, like obesity, is often framed as an “epidemic.” As such, both the “epidemic” of teen pregnancy and the “epidemic” of obesity can be understood through the lens of what sociologist Stanley Cohen popularized as a “moral panic.” In Cohen’s words, moral panics are “condensed political struggles to control the means of cultural reproduction”; additionally “successful moral panics owe their appeal to their ability to find points of resonance with wider anxieties.”
“The Real Cost of Teen Pregnancy” — a public health information campaign launched by the Mayor and Human Resources Administration of New York City in March 2013 — features babies and toddlers, primarily children of color, chastising their teenage mothers. Launched at a time when teen pregnancies have actually declined, primarily due to the availability of safe and affordable reproductive health care, the accusatory “shame and blame” narrative of these images is not only out of proportion to the “problem” it seeks to address, but is weighed down by its obvious cultural narratives about teens of color, poverty, gender and sexuality.
Having a pensive toddler of color next to the slogan “Honestly Mom… chances are he won’t stay with you. What happens to me?” and a weeping boy of color next to the words “I’m twice as likely not to graduate high school because you had me as a teen,” serves to re-stigmatize single teen mothers, encouraging wider social senses of moral outrage, hostility and volatility toward young, predominantly impoverished girls of color. Not unlike cultural narratives about “welfare queens,” the campaign plays into racist and classist fears about sexually active girls of color and teenage mothers who use social services. The message just under the surface here is about the need for social control of “unruly bodies.”
These 4,000 posters, put up in buses and subways, cost a reported $10,000 per year for the city, and have already drawn harsh critique from many. Haydee Morales, vice president for education and training at Planned Parenthood of New York City, for instance, has reportedly suggested the campaign has got it backward. In her words, “It’s not teen pregnancies that cause poverty, but poverty that causes teen pregnancy.”
According to Samantha Levine, a spokesperson for New York’s Mayor Bloomberg, “it’s well past the time when anyone can afford to be value neutral when it comes to teen pregnancy.” Public health campaigns are never value neutral. They communicate social beliefs about normalcy, productivity, desirability, and cultural worth.
An additional cost of the unexamined acceptance of this new teen pregnancy campaign is accepting yet another narrative about individual choice over systemic change. Placing responsibility on the shoulders of the individual, such campaigns silence more complex conversations about accessible and affordable reproductive health care, anti-poverty campaigns, and gender and social justice work. Instead of buying into the “moral panic” of teen pregnancy, perhaps the mayor’s office might look into more long lasting and less stigmatizing possibilities of structural change to improve the lives of young women in New York City.
“Shame and blame” has rarely gotten public health anywhere. In the words of researcher and speaker Brené Brown, “Shame diminishes our capacity for empathy. Shame corrodes the very part of us that believes we are capable of change.”
Earlier on SocImages, Lisa Wade drew attention to the tourism industry’s commodification of Polynesian women and their dancing. She mentioned, briefly, how the hula was made more tourist-friendly (what most tourists see when they attend one of the many hotel-based luaus throughout the islands is not traditional hula). In this post, I want to offer more details on the history and the differences between the tourist and the traditional hula.
First, Wade states that, while female dancers take center stage for tourists, the traditional hula was “mostly” a men’s dance. While it has not been determined for certain if women were ever proscribed from performing the hula during the time of the Ali’i (chiefs), it seems unlikely that women would have been prevented from performing the hula when the deity associated with the hula is Pele, a goddess. Furthermore, there is evidence that women were performing the dance at the time of Captain James Cook’s arrival in Hawai’i.
Second, while the traditional dances were not necessarily sexualized, they were very sensual. The movement of hips and legs that are seen as sexual by some visitors, and showcased as such by the tourism industry, certainly existed in early practices.
In fact, the supposedly lascivious and blasphemous nature of the hula prompted missionaries to censure the public practice of hula, and in 1830 Queen Ka’ahumanu enacted a law prohibiting the public performance of the hula. This law was highly ineffective, however, and when King Kalakaua ascended the throne he actively encouraged public hula performances and other expressions of Native Hawaiian culture, earning him the moniker “Merrie Monarch.”
Eventually, a modernized dance emerged that did not incorporate much religiosity and employed modern music rather than chants. This is closer to what you would find at a hotel luau, but differs drastically in costuming and lacks the uncomfortable cloud of objectification associated with hotel-style hula (that is, the focus is on the dance rather than the dancers). Below are some examples of the evolution.
Hula (men’s dance, traditional):
Hula (contemporary):
These examples of hula, and other Polynesian dances, are vastly different from what one finds in a hotel’s “Polynesian Revue” luau.
Hula (hotel):
In conclusion, it is true that the hula dances, and other dances of Polynesia, have been usurped by the tourism industry and commodified. The culturally authentic forms, however, still thrive. Native dances are impressive enough without the ridiculous costuming and disrespectful bending of the islands’ histories seen at hotel luaus; unfortunately, it is difficult to find any culturally sensitive displays of Polynesian culture due to the huge influence of tourism over these locations.
*The information in this post was gleaned from various courses I’ve taken at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa. For more information on hula and the commodification of the Hawaiian culture, see Haunani-Kay Trask’s From A Native Daughter.
Sarah Neal is currently working on obtaining her M.A. in English at North Carolina State University.
Most of us familiar with Down‘s Syndrome know that it brings characteristic facial features and delayed or impaired cognitive development. People with Down, however, are also more vulnerable than the general population to diabetes, leukemia, and infectious and autoimmune disease, and about 40% are born with heart defects.
For most of history, then, the life expectancy of people with Down was very low. But, with advances in knowledge and access to health care, life expectancy has risen dramatically… especially for white people:
The Centers for Disease Control explain that severity of Down does not vary by race, so most likely the cause of the gap in life expectancy is differences in the quantity and quality of health care.
Possibilities include differences in factors that may be associated with improved health in the general population such as socioeconomic status, education, community support, medical or surgical treatment of serious complications, or access to, use of, or quality of preventative health care.
The phrase “rape culture” refers to a way of thinking that systematically trivializes, normalizes, or endorses sexual assault. We’ve collected over 60 concrete examples at our new Pinterest board and we thought we’d share some additional examples that readers have sent in recently.
(1) Topping the list, Clair let us know that University of Maryland students successfully organized to oppose a hand stamp used at a local bar. The stamp reads “Shut Up and Take It”:
Jesse Rabinowitz set up a change.org petition opposing the stamp to get the bar’s attention. In response, management has agreed that the stamp is inappropriate and has pledged to run a public apology and do some sexual assault awareness education, perhaps including the introduction of a “consent is sexy” stamp.
(3) Sent in by V, a Rohypnol gag coffee mug (the substance is famously used to drug targets of sexual assault into unconsciousness):
(4) Dominos Pizza joshes about sexual assault with their play on the reminder that “no means no” (thanks to Dolores R. and YetAnotherGirl for the tip):
(5) Katrin sent in a British anti-rape poster that blames the victim, holding her responsible for preventing “regrettable sex or even rape.” “Don’t leave yourself more vulnerable,” it explains:
(6) In 2011, the Exeter University’s Safer Sex Ball ironically included this piece of humor in it’s leaflet (thanks to hp for the image):
Sociological Images encourages people to exercise and develop their sociological imaginations with discussions of compelling visuals that span the breadth of sociological inquiry. Read more…
As our society becomes increasingly technological, I love stories that remind us of the value of simpler ways to solve problems, like a faux bus stop to catch escapee nursing home residents or dogs that are trained to sniff out cancer (both stories here).
