EXTENDED COMMENTS & ARGUMENT: BALL, PART III

This post is in response to Diana’s blog post about Section IV and also functions as the author’s argument for section III.

Diana – You write that, “So when reading the article through the perspective of Ball I didn’t quite get it, until I realized how I was, and in some aspect still am, a part of the “Colonialism” of Hip-Hop.”

I think Ball would agree with that you are part of the “colonialism” of hip-hop. Ball writes about the colonization of Black America that is systemic not only within our country but is being perpetrated by our country throughout the world – even more so today than ever before because of the media’s use of technology. Because colonialism is systemic and wide-spread, all Americans perform their role within this colony: colonized and colonizer.

You also write, “…in the 80’s when…hip-hop started to become popular I really enjoyed it. It was the days of MC Hammer and The Sugar Hill Gang…I loved the beat and the lyrics…Then something happened, I am not sure what it was but I remember Rap and Hip- Hop getting a bad ‘rap’…I also felt like I didn’t want to listen to words about jail, and guns, and drugs, and poverty. Rappers were getting shot and I think this is when the ‘Colonialism’ may have started.”

I think Ball would disagree with you on when colonialism started. Ball is deliberate to use the word colonialism literally – in section 3 he helps to define his use of the word by quoting the French black philosopher/writer Frantz Fanon who wrote, “Colonialism is…the conquest of a national territory and the oppression of a people: that is all.” Throughout the four-part essay, Ball writes about colonialism in its most basic historical application – just as the citizens of India, Africa, the Caribbean, South America, North America, and the South Pacific were all colonists controlled and exploiated by their European or American colonizer – so too does contemporary Black America function as a colony within White America. He notes that Black America lives in spatially distinct neighborhoods and forms the basis of both America’s cheap labor and its raw materials (i.e. hip-hop! much of America’s raw materials today are cultural not natural).

Ball writes, “Black people must sell their labor cheaply and/or be willing to conform themselves to the needs and will of an elite in order to ‘succeed.’ Hip-hop, like every other cultural expression generated from this community, has over the last twenty years been grafted to this structural need to systematically produce what is conducive to this system’s survival” (AKA the powerful within white America).

Ball is not arguing that there is a lack of exposure to hip-hop. He in fact mentions the opposite – discussing hip-hop as a primary force within America’s popular culture. Ball argues that because of the colonial structure operating in America, the rich and powerful elite produce and disseminate hip-hop in a manner that benefits them. It is beneficial to the rich and powerful for Black America to make hip-hop about – as Diana succinctly wrote – “jail, and guns, and drugs, and poverty” because it perpetuates the colonial relationship of affluent white America to poverty-stricken Black America. In other words, the rich white men in charge of America’s media benefit from producing media that puts all other groups down and perpetuates their own authority. Black America and white America tune in to the message that being Black means growing up in urban projects, being raised by a single mother, doing and dealing drugs, with becoming a hip-hop celebrity the only means of escape.

Diana – Ball is very concerned with exposure to hip-hop, but he is concerned that there isn’t enough exposure to hip-hop that deviates from the above popular culture norm (that he considers 'fraudelent'). He notes two problems: smaller producers are unable to access the few conduits that are controlled by today’s high media conglomerates, but in the instances that they do produce hip-hop accessed by the public, the audience isn’t interested because it has been taught that hip-hop is about the impoverishment of Black America. Ball proceeds to cite eight examples demonstrating the ways in which American media (particularly in the D.C. area) adheres to the tenets of colonialism.

TALKING POINTS #6 // CONNECTIONS // GLEE

Glee is a show rich with characters outside of dominant ideology.

Applying Lisa Grinner's lens of analysis it is easy to identify those aspects to the show that fall outside of dominant ideology. The show is populated with characters outside the dominant ideologies of SCWAMP with identities that are:
-non-Straight (Kurt, Blaine, the bully Dave Karofsky, and Brittany and Santana to a lesser extent)
- non-Christian (Principal Figgins) but mostly Jewish (Jacob the newspaper editor, Puck, possibly Rachel, Artie and Tina)
- non-White (Tina, Mike, Mercedes, Santana, Principal Figgins)
- non-Able-bodied (in terms of physical ability - Arie the paraplegic, in terms of mental ability - Becky and Jean Sylvester both with Down Syndrome and Emma with OCD, in terms of physical attractiveness - Lauren)
- non-Masculine (many female lead characters and a few male characters inhabiting 'unmasculine' traits such as Kurt)
- non-Property holding (while there is some mention of money problems, this isn't a strong area of thinking outside the dominant box)

The show is also populated with characters whose identities do embody SCWAMP dominant ideologies:
- Straight (everyone except Kurt, Blaine, Dave)
- Christian (with the exception of Principal Figgins and the Jewish characters everyone can be assumed Christian and there are several members of the school participating in Christian-associated activities such as celibacy)
- White (Will, Sue, Beiste, Artie, Rachel, Quinn, Finn, Kurt, Brittany, Emma, Puck, Sam, Becky...)
- Able-bodied (everyone except Artie, Becky, Sue's sister...)
- Masculine (Finn, Puck and Sam are put forth as the the most masculine)
- Property-holding (there's quite a bit of money flowing - designer clothes, prep school...)

I think there are two major things going on with Glee and dominant ideology identity...

1) Most characters (whether possessing dominant ideology identities or not) embody stereotypes associated with their identities. All of the SCWAMP students play football and are homophobic. All of the SCWAP students cheer for the football team. The student characters that aren't Straight, Christian, White, Able-bodied and Masculine? None of them play football or cheer. The only exceptions - and they are slight considering the whole matrix - include Puck (non-Christian but otherwise SCWAMP), Santana (non-White but otherwise SCWAMP) and Mercedes (non-White but otherwise SCWAMP who used to cheer.) The two Asian characters are tech-savvy, rebellious against their parents, and dating one another. The main gay character is obsessed with fashion and musicals. The cheerleaders are boy-crazy and blonde with one exception. The football players are girl-crazy and dumb. The Jewish brunette is driven and bitchy. The black girl is a diva with the strongest voice, too 'fleshy' to be anything other than the token fag hag. To be bluntly honest - I don't necessarily have a problem with this. I think it's great that there is a show with a bunch of teenagers that are straight and gay, white and Asian and Black, able-bodied and in a wheelchair, teenage dreamy and overweight, etc. The characters are stereotypes - but I also have met many people in my life that embody such stereotypes.

2) Much of the show's plots are stories about these stereotyped identities. As the primary gay male character, Kurt is almost exclusively involved in plotlines about his gay identity. As the African-American female character, Mercedes is involved with plotlines about getting along with her white club members - especially the other females. As one of the primary SCWAMP character, Finn's plotlines are about overcoming the limitations of SCWAMP - being less homophobic and more caring towards the women in his life. As the two Asians, Tina and Mike talk about their Asian relationship and their Asian activities.

So no - I really don't criticize Glee for having tech-savvy Asian characters, a diva African-American, and a gaggle of ditzy blonde Cheerios.

I DO criticize Glee for plotlines that doesn't often escape these identities - for not letting its characters that proudly embody non-dominant identities to engage in real stories. For anyone with an identity that falls even slightly outside of SCWAMP ideology, that sense of 'outsiderness' is at its most amplified during the teenage years. So I understand Glee's focus on the teenage identity - but that's why it's unfortunate that for a show about teenage identity, it chose a myriad of cliches to represent.

TALKING POINTS #5 // ARGUMENT & HYPERLINKS // WESCH

MICHAEL WESCH From Knowledgeable to Knowledge-able: Learning in New Environments

For today’s University student, the value of a professor’s content-based knowledge has decreased as her ability to instantly access the same content increases. Not only does today’s student have broad access to content but she also possesses sophisticated technological capacity to disseminate, define, and create content.

Wesch notes the “massive transformation” (P 4) that University classrooms have undergone as they become saturated with recent generations of students so adept with transformative Web 2.0 technologies that Wesch argues the technological developments are secondary to what he considers a social revolution.

Michael Wesch argues for a pedagogical shift away from teaching and learning methods that focus on the content of knowledge towards methods that encourage knowledge savviness: the ability to “find, sort, analyze, share, discuss, critique, and create information.” (P 4)

Wesch doesn’t mention “information literacy” or “media literacy” but his text is imbued with these concepts that predate Web 2.0 technologies.

No singular organization promotes or defines information literacy, but the concept gained momentum within the library community – particularly academic libraries – in tandem with increasing internet access during the 1990s. The Association of College and Research Libraries defines Information Literacy  - in part – as “the set of skills needed to find, retrieve, analyze, and use information.” Understanding that information would become increasingly more accessible, librarians along with University faculty and other educators sought to establish their continuing roles during this “Information Age.” The concept of Information Literacy focuses not on the subject matter a student endeavors to learn, but on the student’s ability to locate and isolate pertinent information, to understand its source, and to critique its validity, authenticity and usefulness.

I think Wesch doesn’t reference Information Literacy because he likely sees it as out of date with new media technologies and as a grab by educators for authority over the texts they teach. Information Literacy presumes a hierarchy of valuable sources and leaves out a couple key concepts that Wesch highlights such as the contributions to be made by the student to the common body of knowledge and the interactivity that Web 2.0 technologies promote – not only amongst students but between student and educator alike. Wesch discourages educators from being threatened by the abundance of information available to their students and instead encourages educators to teach tools that will help their students navigate the vast world of information.

The concept of Media Literacy gets closer to Wesch’s idea of knowledge-ableness. The Center for Media Literacy is an agency “dedicated to promoting and supporting media literacy education as a framework for accessing, analyzing, evaluating, creating and participating with media content, (and the agency) works to help citizens, especially the young, develop critical thinking and media production skills needed to live fully in the 21st century media culture.”

I believe Wesch would appreciate the concept of Media Literacy going beyond Information Literacy by at least a couple of steps: it values the skills of creation and participation, particularly within today’s digital world.

Wesch uses this idea of Media Literacy – without saying so – to provide a framework for University educators to incorporate Media Literacy values into their classroom.

Watch the video from Michael Wesch's Introduction to Anthropology class, illustrating the teaching methods advocated in his article.