Sex and the City as Open Cultural Product

Small detour from talking about Denmark and Europe...

Every review of the second Sex and the City movie has been excoriating. Many of them took issue with the inevitable march toward conventionalism -- finding Mr. Right/Big, getting married, having kids, settling down.

So it was refreshing to hear this video of a Emory University sociologist explaining the impact and contradictions of SATC in a more nuanced way.

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Excerpts from the video:  

It's a very ambiguous show. It's got some notions of liberated women but it also has these traditional notions of women focusing on romance and finding the right partner, which is the flip side of being independent and self sufficient. 

Because you can interpret it in different ways, it's what we call an open cultural product, meaning that many people can look at it and enjoy it for different reasons. Those are usually the cultural products that are most successful,ones that aren't trying to impose some meaning on the audience but lets the audience take the meaning that they want. 

I've only seen scattered episodes of SATC so I can't comment on the development of the show's themes and throughout the seasons and the movies from what I've watched but from these reviews, everyone thinks there is a noticeable shift in the characters' preoccupations. What do you think? Have the girls become frumpy old women? Is it inevitable that we all settle down? And will we be happy when or if we do?

Choice Words: Twilight vs. Buffy

I think this post, which first appeared on July 29th, is particularly relevant because New Moon has just been released.

July 29th, 2009 by Chen
 
I haven’t been living under a rock, so I know that the Twilight book/movie/pop culture phenomenon is hugely popular. Almost as big as Twilight’s fandom is the amount of discussion about Bella and Edward’s relationship. Everyone’s got an opinion. I guess I’m not that qualified to review Twilight since I have not read the books or seen the movie, but I have been reading the blogosphere debates (flame wars?) about vampire guy/human girl relationships. I defer to this YouTube video and its accompanying explanation by its creator. I think it best shows that not all vampire/human relationships and male/female romances have to play out Stephanie Meyer’s way. And it’s funny.

Jonathan McIntosh of Rebellious Pixel, created this video and explains the reason for making it:

In this re-imagined narrative, Edward Cullen from the Twilight Series meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It’s an example of transformative storytelling serving as a pro-feminist visual critique of Edward’s character and generally creepy behavior. Seen through Buffy’s eyes, some of the more sexist gender roles and patriarchal Hollywood themes embedded in the Twilight saga are exposed – in hilarious ways. Ultimately this remix is about more than a decisive showdown between the slayer and the sparkly vampire. It also doubles as a metaphor for the ongoing battle between two opposing visions of gender roles in the 21st century.

Before seeing this video, I have read critiques of Twilight, contrasting it with Buffy the Vampire Slayer, such as this review from Salon.

Comparisons to another famous human girl with a vampire boyfriend are inevitable, but Bella Swan is no Buffy Summers. “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” was at heart one of those mythic hero’s journeys so beloved by Joseph Campbell-quoting screenwriters, albeit transfigured into something sharp and funny by making the hero a contemporary teenage girl. Buffy wrestled with a series of romantic dilemmas — in particular a penchant for hunky vampires — but her story always belonged to her. Fulfilling her responsibilities as a slayer, loyalty to her friends and family, doing the right thing and cobbling together some semblance of a healthy life were all ultimately as important, if not more important, to her than getting the guy.

Jonathan McIntosh writes a longer expose on Twilight/Buffy called What Would Buffy Do?
 
There are readers and moviegoers who simultaneously object to Bella and Edward’s antifeminist relationship and enjoy the series. I may be even be such a fan, if I ever watch more than the movie trailer or the Amazon.com book review. But I don’t think I will pick up the books because if I’m in the mood for the vampire genre, Buffy is the more palatable choice.

 

Choice Words: Teen Pregnancy on MTV

Teen Pregnancy on MTV
June 29th, 2009 by Chen

Last week I wrote about Young, Single and Pregnant, in which a 22 year old young woman was unexpectedly pregnant and shared her decision to have an abortion on a New York Times blog. This got me thinking about discussions of abortion on TV. MTV has a new show called 16 and Pregnant. It is a one-hour documentary following a teen through her pregnancy as she deals with her family, her friends, and the baby’s father. So far three episodes have aired and I am guilty of having watched two of them. (It’s summer… I got time to watch TV…)

On the one hand, I applaud MTV’s efforts to engage in discussions of sexual behavior in young people through a public information campaign called IYSL, It’s Your Sex Life. The campaign is a pretty good one. It’s in partnership with the Kaiser Family Foundation, so I know it’s got reputable people behind it. The campaign encourages several things: talking to your partner about sex, getting tested for STDs, and how to protect yourself. Overall, it’s a lot of good information. If you’ve watched MTV, you may have seen the PSAs broadcast during commercial breaks. I’ve definitely seen them.

For a one hour TV documentary that had to compress footage from almost a year, “16 and Pregnant” is pretty good in that it shows many of the hardships of parenthood, if somewhat formulaic. Gossip runs rampant at school, the pregnant girls have to change their lifestyles to accommodate their babies, they have to talk to their baby’s fathers, they have to deal with their own parents.

Watch full episodes of 16 and Pregnant here. The trailer to 16 and Pregnant is here.

16 and Pregnant is used as a part of the It’s Your Sex Life campaign. IYSL.com has clips of the show and uses it as a starting point for discussions about teen pregnancy. Either MTV is massively promoting its own shows or trying to give teens good sex ed information, or some combination of both. The MTV website for the show has links to its IYSL campaign.

All this talk of teen pregnancy via a public information campaign and a new TV show leaves me feeling that we have left out a rather large part of teen pregnancy: teens who terminate their pregnancies or put their children up for adoption. After the trials and tribulations, each teen mom in the show ultimately comes away with optimism and a cute little baby. The show allows us to see these difficulties of motherhood and it also demystifies teen motherhood. I think it’s demystifying that makes it more acceptable. I don’t think that the difficulties of motherhood will necessarily dissuade young girls from becoming parents because people have a great capacity to overcome these difficulties and every mother regardless of her age has to get up in the middle of the night for the baby. It makes me wonder if “16 and Pregnant” has a “war movie effect”. Most war movies glorify war because they emphasize camaraderie, patriotism, sacrifice, and victory. In the same vein, does 16 and Pregnant glorify teen motherhood? And cute babies and loyal soldiers make great television.

The materials on pregnancy in It’s Your Sex Life campaign do talk about abortion and adoption, but MTV’s programming lacks any serious discussion of these options. In 16 and Pregnant, all the girls have decided to raise their babies because that’s the concept of the show. I wish MTV had explored want to explore the decision-making process. Or maybe even have a show that featured girls who had abortions and adoptions. Not that I think for a minute that this will happen, since abortion is a censored word on TV, and MTV isn’t doing anything to demystify adoption or abortion.

Facts about my childhood

Little known fact about me (now more widely known):
I am a fan of The X-Files.


I had an X-Files calendar of stills from Season Seven. I believe there is one person out there who can name my favorite episodes. You know who you are and I love you. I dressed up Agent Scully for Halloween once in high school.


I was very happy to see that this cultural relic of the 1990s resurfaced. I guess there are still some X-Philes (X-File fans) out there:



But I have to add that there was an episode where it was implied that Scully and Mulder spent the night together. They have also kissed, I believe, once. And another time but Scully was playing a different character. Yeah, it's complicated.