Samantha Pena

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Art Amongst War Gallery Note

Afghanistan and the United States have a complicated, intertwined, and volatile history encompassing decades of political, humanitarian, and military occupations of Afghanistan. Afghanistan and America have a hierarchal relationship, in which the “dominant view of Afghanistan is a war-torn, dusty, barren, cold, and broken land, a view constructed from images encountered in the commercial news media” (Hutton 8). These circulated images are a form of cultural imperialism, in which the ‘dominant’ American culture presents a one-dimensional representation of the ‘subordinate’ Afghanistan culture in order to silence and limit the voice and agency of the subordinate group. These visual representations of Afghanistan are thus a “cultural product [that] is shaped in distinctive ways by the dominant discursive regimes that structure the national public spheres in which they are received” (Fernandes 69). Western media representations turned Afghanistan into a social construction, evoking images of inferiority, poverty, and difference for the purpose of mobilizing an ‘Afghanistan’ that fits into America’s political agenda and justifies its military invasion of the country. The Art Amongst War Exhibit displays visual art that attempts to combat these normative images of Afghanistan for the purpose of “[expanding], [enhancing], and [problematizing] the way in which we see (and don’t see) Afghanistan and its citizen” (Hutton 6). The exhibit reveals a counternormative narrative of Afghanistan that defies a singular identity and instead creates a space for multiple voices that represent the vibrant identity and culture of Afghan people.

The photos, textiles, and the other forms of artwork displayed in the exhibit depicts a distinct and rich Afghan culture that exists because of and even despite the violence and multiple foreign invasions Afghanistan has experienced in the past several decades. Much of the artwork in the exhibit display juxtaposing images of life and death, violence and safety, and destruction and peace to show that ‘Afghanistan’ does not fit into a static mold and that its people are able to survive and flourish amidst all the conflict. For example, the “Colorful Life” photograph shows a dilapidated structure that looks like a state building in the background. At the center of the photograph is a man riding a bike tied with colorful balloons, and on the front side of the photograph is a young boy holding a pink balloon to his face (Akbar). The photograph does not shy away from the country’s physical ruins, but it also shows that the country is not defined by its suffering either; rather, the color in the photograph demonstrates resilience, life, and an unbroken human spirit.

Similarly, the war rugs show tensions between Afghanistan and its foreign invaders. The “Specular Mosque Rug with Vehicle Border” is particularly revealing; it is a vibrantly colored rug with a mosque prominently displayed in the center, and surrounding the mosque is a border of what appears to be war vehicles (WarRug.com). This rug is not just a work of art but also a form of political activism. The border of vehicles shows an implied and impending violence surrounding the mosques, and this image can be interpreted as representative of the danger of the foreign invasions to Afghanistan.

Both the photograph and the war rug, along with the other artworks, “invoke and practice a form of witnessing” in which the artists are “engaged witnesses, shaping and being shaped by the world they [write] about” (Fernandes 128). The artists are witnesses both to the violence in Afghanistan, but instead of remaining passive witnesses to it, they utilize their agency to actively define the landscape of Afghanistan and its modes of representation.

            Although a different artist created each piece of art, all the artworks were selected and thematically arranged in the exhibit by the students of the HON 370 course. Upon entering the exhibit and walking left, the theme of war emerges, as evidenced by the accompanying plaques to the wall about “Soviet Occupation & Afghan Civil War” and “The Taliban.” On that side, there are artworks that show the remnants of war that haunt Afghanistan, like Lida Abdul’s video In Transit, which shows children pretending a broken war plane is a kite, or Moshtari Hilal’s drawing Catch Me If You Can, which shows a woman caught in the grasp of a veiled figure that is presumably symbolic of the Taliban’s restrictive laws on women.

Moving along the exhibit to the right shows a different story, one of political resistance, emotional strength, and humanity amidst the violence. For example, Gulbuddin Elham’s Aftermath of Attack on U.S. Soldiers in Faryab shows an Afghan male citizen holding a video camera to a U.S. male soldier presumably telling the citizen to leave the scene, while in the background are bloody and fallen U.S. soldiers.

These artworks are part activism and part education; they seek to report on the state of Afghanistan from the perspective and lived experiences of Afghan citizens, but they also promote a reimagining of Afghanistan that moves away from Orientalist discourse. All the artworks in the exhibit evoke a strong emotional response of shock and disbelief, but only because “we never approach [an image] innocent, wholly neutral or unfiltered [but rather] through a preexisting framework constructed from the immediate viewing context and our collective cultural memory” (Hutton 6). Because these artworks are viewed within the context of the United States and TCNJ, which are confined and insulated spaces, the images displayed are atypical of the narrative Western discourse has constructed of Afghanistan. Though these artworks were selectively chosen with certain parameters in mind and deliberately arranged in the exhibit with a specific agenda of eliciting a certain response from its imagined audience, the exhibit does not advertise itself as depicting the ‘true’ Afghanistan. Rather, it is honest about its creation, opens up a space for multiple voices, and fosters dialogue about Afghanistan. 

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A Girl Was Kicked Off A Soccer Field For Her Hijab. So Her Team Scored One Against Intolerance.

Her teammates responded appropriately.

Another thought-provoking post by Upworthy. Samah Aidah, a soccer player from Colorado, was banned from playing soccer due to an outdated safety rule saying that players are not allowed to wear a hijab or turban during matches. In support of Samah, her teammates all wore a hijab on the day of the match to protest this rule. FIFA likewise lifted this ban but did so only a month ago. When you really think about it, this is an example of the ways that certain ideologies become "common sense," that is when an ideology like Orientalism becomes so normalized and institutionalized that it's hardly questioned until moments occur like the one in Colorado that show the ideology's absurdity and discordances. 

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One of my friends posted this on her Facebook, and I thought this picture depicted Naber's main point of the importance of a counternormative narrative of Arab culture. In this particular case, these group of men seem to be at a public gathering, presumably protesting, and they are holding signs that challenge normative Orientalist discourse of Muslim men as being "abusive" and "oppressive" to women. Although I don't know the full story of the purpose of this gathering, where this is, or who these people are, it's still an evocative image that reveal the tensions between Western Orientalist discourse and Muslim people's agency to create their own story and identity outside of the norm. 

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Naber Chapter 3 Reflection

In Arab America: Gender, Cultural Politics, and Activism, Nadine Naber unpacks the cultural roles expected of “Arab Americans,” deconstructs the origin of Orientalist stereotypes attached with the identity, and explores the spaces of resistance and activism that Arab Americans occupy in order to subvert the normative representations of their culture. In her third chapter, “Muslim First, Arab Second,” Naber focuses on the younger generation of Arab Americans in the San Francisco Bay Area. Notions of an “Arab cultural authenticity” dictate the way the youth must appear and behave in order be accepted within Arab and American communities. These notions are closely tied with Orientalist, patriarchal, classist, and heteronormative discourses, which constrain their identity to fit into the mold of “Arab American.” However, their use of a “Muslim first” discourse within and outside of Muslim spaces “rearticulates Arab cultural authenticity as Muslim First, Arab Second, [which] challenges racism, militarism, white middle-class assimilation, as well as the limitations of middle-class Arab cultural politics and their Muslim communities” (Naber 113). By self-identifying as “Muslim first, Arab second,” they destabilize the norms of cultural authenticity while simultaneously opening up wider and more encompassing possibilities of Arab American identity. Naber’s purpose in this chapter is to prove that there is not a singular definition of “Arab American” but rather multiple identities possible. Naber thus exposes the younger generation’s attempt to bring about social justice for themselves and for their community through their own personal agency and public activism.

            According to Naber’s conversations with the youth, second-generation Arab Americans view “Arab” and “Muslim” as distinctly different and separate. They associate “Arab” with the rigid binary of “us” and “Arab” versus “them” and “American,” which leaves little room for any difference or negotiation. However, when they identify themselves as Muslim first, the youth are able to use Islam as a means of renegotiating their identity, thus reclaiming their agency and self-determination without completely alienating them from the Arab community. Naber uses gender as a main example of the way women use the “Muslim first” discourse to subvert patriarchal authority that is prevalent in the Arab community. According to Naber’s interlocutors, women are seen as “symbols of Muslim identity who must be protected in order to protect the group as a whole” (Naber 125). Arab women are expected to conform to the standards of cultural authenticity, namely chastity and modesty; therefore, there is more pressure for them not to deviate from these norms, because they are perceived as bearers of Arab culture.

However, a “Muslim first” discourse challenges androcentric representations of Muslim femininity and “reveals alternative possibilities for conceptualizing womanhood beyond the icons of victim or good wife/mother, and beyond patriarchal, classical definitions of what women should do or be” (Naber 128). Naber’s interlocutors cite passages from the Qur’an to mobilize their own personal political beliefs, while still remaining inside the parameters of Arab culture. For example, “others perceive women as foreign or as victims of misogynistic Muslim men because they wear the hijab” (Naber 136). However, for the Muslim women Naber spoke to, wearing the hijab is a private act of self-determination and a public act of societal resistance against dominant concepts about women in Muslim and American spaces. It not only creates a model of femininity that is not based on Western concepts but also allows Muslim women to combat sexism in public spaces. The women’s articulations of women in Islam effectively subvert dominant Orientalist and Arab concepts of gender by preventing the commoditization of women’s bodies and challenging cultural and nation-based racism and sexism.

By including passages from the interviews she conducted as part of her research, Naber makes a convincing case for her argument that second generation Arab Americans actively engage in social justice work. Although the bulk of her research uses people’s individual experiences, this method does not actually discredit her research as biased but rather gives greater legitimacy to it. Because the people she chose to interview directly experience the questions that Naber raises in regards to Arab American identity, I believe that they are in a better standpoint to question and critique the norms and ideologies that are shaping their lives; therefore, I am better persuaded by the argument she is making about second generation Muslim women. For example, Naber opens the chapter with an excerpt taken from her interview with a young woman named Rima, who describes one of the Arab sisters’ experiences with her father that exemplifies patriarchal control over Arab feminine identity. Rima details how the sister “[opens] the Qur’an in her father’s face” to try to convince him that marrying a Black Muslim should not be forbidden, as long as he is a “good Muslim,” but “[her father] wasn’t practicing true Islam” (Naber 111). By having this as the first interview excerpt, she effectively sets up her discussion of the gender and racial norms Arab women face and also the way some may use religion to talk back against the norms of cultural authenticity. Naber then supports this primary, experiential-based research with theories on Orientalism, nationalism, and patriarchy. By including these secondary sources, she further legitimizes her observations about Arab Americans.

Her data is original, because as she said in previous chapters, there is little to no research on the Arab American population in the San Francisco Bay Area. In addition, she effectively avoids making generalizations about Arab Americans, even if her research scope is taken from a very specific and localized context. When making a point about the way the Muslim First discourse is utilized, Naber makes it clear to show that she is extrapolating directly from the interviews she has gathered. For example, Naber includes an interview from a man named Tawfiq, who says in his interview, “there is no other system that gives women as much as Islam does” (123). Directly under this interview, Naber makes the point that “the framework Muslim First opens up possibilities for young adults such as Zina, Tala, and Tawfiq to destablize the norms of Arab cultural authenticity, to call them into question, and to create new forms of sociability” (123). Although Naber is putting forth a theory of the way young Arab Americans are using religious discourse to forward their political goals, she makes sure to ground her theories and suppositions using close-text analysis of her primary sources.

Although I have taken several classes that examine women in a global perspective, I have never focused specifically on Arab women and Islamic feminism; therefore, Naber’s book so far has been a fascinating study of a subject that is seldom discussed or analyzed, except in the context of the ‘problems’ occurring in the Middle East or the ‘oppression’ Muslim women face. In a way though, her third chapter validated views I already had about the Islamaphobia that exists in this country and the way certain “signifiers such as their names, physical features, or mode of dress led others to perceive them as ‘Muslim’ and therefore as foreigners and potential threats to ‘America’” (Naber 134). After having read Said’s theory of Orientalism and Abu-Lughod’s “Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving?” for this class and Anzaldua’s Borderlands and DuBois’s double consciousness theory for past courses on feminist and race theories, I was not surprised that the women Naber interviewed faced the double burden of embodying the hybrid identity of being Arab and female in a racist and sexist society. However, I was still shocked to read some of their first-hand encounters with Islamaphobia, particularly Tala’s testimony at having a “student [who] approached the [MSA] table and asked [her] if women cover their faces from the bruises they get after their husbands beat them” (Naber 137). While I know that the stereotypes of the abusive Muslim man and the subordinate Muslim woman exist, it is still shocking to read about how overtly these views are expressed in today’s supposedly more egalitarian society. These testimonies further prove that there are competing images of America: the imagined land of opportunity, equality, and diversity versus the real America where opportunity is determined by factors such as one’s skin, gender, sexuality, nationality, and religion.

Nadine Naber’s third chapter, “Muslim First, Arab Second,” is a fascinating linguistic study of the way Arab American youth in the San Francisco Bay Area use religion and Islamic discourse to create a counternormative narrative of their identity and their community. By analyzing the individual experiences of Arab American young adult activists heavily involved in social justice, Naber effectively problematizes Arab cultural authenticity while revealing her interlocutors’ individual agency against these social constrictions. Naber unpacks the ideologies of gender, race, sexuality and nation shape culture and the way they impact identities within and outside of the Arab community. In using a Muslim First discourse as a way to challenge normative concepts, the youth use language to not only shape their ideological representation but also their real-life situations. They are able to actively show their resistance to the restricting categorizations placed upon them by the outside world. Naber’s chapter thus subverts standard stereotypes of Arab American men and women and reveals the myriad ways many are active agents of their own lives.

Works Cited

Naber, Nadine. Arab America: Gender, Cultural Politics, and Activism. New York: New York University Press, 2012. Print. 

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Sigma Tau Delta International Conference Gallery Note

The 2014 Sigma Tau Delta International Conference was held this year in Savannah, Georgia and celebrated its 90th anniversary with the theme “River Current,” the image intending to evoke the constant ebb and flow of history and the ways in which societal changes influence language and literature. This year, the River Current theme is meant to get those who attend the conference to think about social transformations from 1924 to present-day, like the advent of consumerism, modernity, and the changing notions of the world in regards to race, gender, class, and sexuality. Founded in May 1924, Sigma Tau Delta – “Sincerity, Truth, and Design” – was created as “an order designed to promote the mastery of written expression, encourage worthwhile reading, and foster a spirit of fellowship among those specializing in the English language and literature” (Watson). Through its name, Sigma Tau Delta is establishing itself as an organization devoted to truthful and ethical analyses of literature; however, the very notion of ‘truth’ is complicated by the fact that multiple voices and narratives exist. Therefore, questions of (mis)representation arise when evaluating the conference and the way papers were written and categorized into sessions.

Although literature is interdisciplinary and can be analyzed through different theoretical lenses that attempt to expose various hierarchies and social inequalities within a written text, the institutionalized nature of literature within academia creates the danger of reproducing the very social structure it is attempting to deconstruct. The conference does linguistically attempt to subvert the norm by creating paper categories like “Original Poetry: Diverse Voices.” The deliberate naming of this session and the poetry placed into this category, however, show how “scholarship within such fields often conceives of itself in discursive opposition to structures of power” but in reality show how “interdisciplinary scholarship is located within institutional networks that are indirectly or directly connected to the state (Fernandes 138). This “Diverse Voices” category is meant to be a space that allows those whose voices are silenced or subdued in society a chance to speak about and share their experiences. However, there was only one woman who wrote about racial identity in a collection of poems entitled “Qisas: Stories from Islamic Tradition,” in which she refashioned the stories of people from the Quran. Her poetry brought to life characters that are not seen in mainstream culture, which necessitated her having to distribute a handout with the identity of the characters she used in her poetry. Every other person in the panel aside from the one presented poetry, however, had little to do with diversity. It was so obvious that one of the audience members asked them how they thought they fit in the category of “diverse voices,” which none was able to answer clearly except for the one woman who wrote “Qisas.”

Because the conference only accepts papers produced within an undergraduate academic arena, the papers that were presented are subconsciously part of an institution through which normative notions of race, gender, class, sexuality, and other such social categories are inadvertently produced and reproduced. There were four moments in the conference that starkly revealed subconscious and overt flashes of patriarchal ideology. The first was during the Scholarship and Awards Ceremony. A presenter was announcing the winner of a Sigma Kappa Delta award and said that the reason this woman won the award was because of her “devotion to her students and, most importantly, her family” (“Sigma Kappa Delta”). Secondly, the author of a conference paper wrote, “women can certainly understand Anne’s fear of the biological clock ticking” (Queenberry). Thirdly, a presenter’s analysis of the gender politics in Fifty Shades of Grey dichotomized women’s roles strictly to professionalism and motherhood, valorizing workingwomen while disparaging motherhood (Godard). Lastly, during the “Bad Poetry Contest,” a social event hosted by the conference, some of the men presented intentionally ‘bad’ poems that appropriated and mocked women’s sexual experience. One poem was told from the perspective of the vibrator getting stuck in a woman’s vagina while another poem said, “Bad sex is like pizza. Only the girl cares.” In all cases, all the speakers were producing patriarchal ideology through their language and presentation, and the audience members were reproducing this ideology through their laughter and applause.

In the first instance, during the awards ceremony, the winner’s family values were presented as equally important as academic merit in the judges’ decision to give her the award. In the second instance, there was an implicit assumption that all women can sympathize with Anne’s desire for having children. In the third instance, the woman used a very Western feminist lens to analyze the female characters from the novel and dichotomized women’s roles, consequently creating a hierarchy of femininity. The last instance was just plain sexist packaged as clever humor – degrading jokes made at the expense of women. Through the patriarchal discourse used, both presenters perpetuated a traditional feminine gender role that places women in the domestic sphere and “inadvertently disciplining and territorializing the boundaries of interdisciplinary knowledge in ways that may reproduce rather than move beyond the U.S. nation-state” (Fernandes 167). In these four moments, there was a fusion of seemingly ‘objective’ academia with subjective moral values and culture mores. The language choices of the people in the conference perpetuated certain stereotypes about women, bounding the conference in a specific cultural microcosm that reproduced a patriarchal social order but presented as unbounded and all-inclusive. There was thus an interesting tension underlying the conference between subjectivity and objectivity, truth and falsity, national and multicultural.

  Works Cited

  Fernandes, Leela. Knowledge, Ethics, Power: Transnational Feminism in the United States. New York: New York University Press, 2013. Print. 

Godard, Nicole. “All a Woman Has to Give: Sister Carrie to Fifty Shades.” Images of Women. Sigma Tau Delta International Honor Society. Marriott Riverfront, Savannah. 1 Mar. 2014. Speech.

Queensberry, Alexandria. “Minx or Martyr: The Fictional Portrayals of Anne Boleyn.” Pop Culture Royals. Sigma Tau Delta International Honor Society. Marriott Riverfront, Savannah. 27 Feb. 2014. Lecture.

“Sigma Kappa Delta.” Scholarship and Awards Ceremony. Sigma Tau Delta International Honor Society. Marriott Riverfront, Savannah. 28 Feb. 2014. Speech.

Watson, Sidney. “Convention Theme: River Current.” Sigma Tau Delta 2014 International Convention. Sigma Tau Delta International English Honor Society, n.d. Web. 3 Mar. 2014.

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Dr. Paces Lecture Reflection

In the lecture today about feminism in Eastern European countries, particularly in the Czech Republic, Dr. Paces discussed the history of nation states and unpacked the idea of the "nation" and the ways in which women's bodies are used to mobilize and promote a unified national movement. She talked about the French Revolution and how its ideals of "fraternity, liberty, and egalitarianism" spread throughout Europe, promoting the new idea of the "nation" as an embodiment of these ideals. However, the very concept of "fraternity," or brotherhood, creates this idea that males embody the identity of the "national citizen." These concepts attached to nationhood thus become distinctly gendered, and when the "citizen" - the subject of the nation - is gendered male, it means that he becomes the active participant, integral to the building of the nation. Implicated in this is the construction of the rest, the Others, as passive observers whose role is either to observe or to support nation-building without being in control of it.

Dr. Paces discussed extensively the figure of the "New Woman" -  a woman who embodies the contradictory images of warrior and mother simultaneously. She is a woman who fights for the new nation but also produces and nurtures the next generation of the nation's citizen. She is both progressive and traditional, and she is essential to the construction of the "nation" as a concept and as a reality. Just as the citizen becomes coded male, the nation itself gets coded as female, reinforced by the language that use feminine adjectives to name "nation." This "New Woman" (read "New Nation") then becomes something to be defended, protected, raised up, taken care of, brought to life, and the connotation of the nation as woman means that it falls upon the woman to accomplish all of these tasks all at once. However, if the citizen is male and the nation is female, what are the implications of that on the ground level, in regards to male and female social relations and governmental policies? 

As it turns out, Eastern Europe had plenty of social movements that could fall under the umbrella of "feminism."  For example, in Russia, there was the notion that there could be no progressive society unless they have women's equality. Therefore, a lot of laws were passed that could be considered gains for women's rights, like the legalization of divorce and abortion, pay raises for women, greater educational and professional opportunities, and paid maternal leave. Socialism and communism made similar promises in that they touted that in a socialist society, there will no longer be an unequal relationship between men and women, husbands and wives, because there would no longer be property or a business for the men to own. Instead, the state will hold property and absorb all the domestic services traditionally carried by women, which would theoretically lessen the load for women. All of these policies that nations passed align with Western notions of feminism, and more importantly, women's advancement.

However, as Siklova analyzes in her essay "Are Women in Central and Eastern Europe Conservative?," the promise of greater equality in the construction of the nation and the rise of socialism did not translate into actual reality. Instead, women acquired the "double burden," and though women's paid employment increased, "it did not lead to women's equality at work but an asymmetrical gender segmentation" (Slovak 75). Women earned half the pay as men for doing the same job and women were silenced instead of empowered. Therefore, the idea of the cohesive and progressive "nation" was not concrete reality but rather just an imagined reality intended to create and mobilize the nation at the expense of women. In addition, Slovak says that men had a closer link to politics, which meant that their career advanced further than that of women. This might be connected to the notion that the "national citizen" is codified male. 

Because the promise of equality and women's rights were advanced in the creation of a nation and the rise of socialism but was not actually a reality for most women in Eastern Europe, Slovak says that women associate "feminism" with negative connotations and opt to stay at home in the private sphere. However, assuming that this 'retreat' into the home means that the "[women] are returning to patriarchy" does not take into account the specific cultural and historical connotations embedded in "feminism" in Eastern Europe (Slovak 76). In addition, it attempts to superimpose Western ideals about "feminism" onto other cultures, which is counterproductive since "freedom takes on different forms" (Slovak 76). Therefore, when talking about Eastern European feminism in a trans-national context, the specific political and social history must be considered, lest we run into potentially excluding Eastern European women's commitments to women's rights because of our own Western biases. 

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A TV Star Had To Explain Why A White Man Killing A Black Kid Is An American Problem, Not A Black One

Jesse Williams' perfect answers and unimpressed face make this Dunn trial interview a must-watch.

I saw this interview today and was reminded of our conversation on Monday regarding the Michael Dunn trial. I think Jesse Williams raised a lot of valid points about race relations and privilege in America. Just in the first minute, he unpacks the "fantasy" surrounding the black body (particularly the black male body) in America and the real life consequences this fantasy has on people of color. He says, and correctly so, that "feeling threatened is not the same thing as being threatened." Towards, the end, Williams raises a thought-provoking question surrounding what on the surface was the trigger for the shooting: Would this still have happened if Jordan Davis was not playing "thug" music? If he instead was playing, say, Bon Jovi? 

Take a look!

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Women in Power in Global Perspective Timeline

Women in power from 1950s to present-day who advocate for women's rights.

My group and I documented women who achieved political power and pursued, advocated for, and furthered women's rights legislation while in office. We sought to represent women from all over the world so as not to privilege one area over another.

These women have done amazing things, enacting real change not just within their respective country but also trans-nationally. Some of the women we have on the timeline combat against gender stereotyping, some advocate for better education for women and girls, some focus on developmental and ecofeminist concerns. However, most of the women were the first female leaders of their country and all sought to increase and enhance women's roles in society. 

Check out our timeline! There are short clips of the women speaking about women's rights attached to each description so you can see them in action.

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Said Reflection Paper

In his book Orientalism, Edward Said challenges the supposed objectivity of ‘truth’ by exploring the ways in which knowledge production about the “Orient” and the “Occident” not only creates a dichotomous relationship but also maintains hierarchal systems of social, political, and economic power between the two regions. Said first acknowledges that there is a geographical distinction between the East and the West, in that they are two regions separated by physical boundaries. However, he argues that starting in the early nineteenth century, a linguistic shift occurred that turned the East into the “Orient” and the West into the “Occident,” embedding in these terms supposedly ‘true’ definitions of each region’s identity, culture, and people. By tracking the specific time this shift occurred, Said makes his main point that the “Orient is not an inert fact of nature”; rather, “European culture was able to produce the Orient politically, militarily, ideologically, scientifically, and imaginatively” (12, 11). In short, the “Orient” is not based on any a posteriori knowledge about the East. Instead, the Orient is a Western discursive construction that assumes a holistic understanding of the East and is then artificially manufactured through systematic representations about the Orient.

Although Said argues that the “Orient” is merely a social construction, he also points out that discourses about the Orient have very real effects on global political, economic and cultural relationships. This discourse about the Orient is rooted in a “cultural hegemony” that perpetuates “the idea of European identity as a superior one in comparison with all the non-European peoples and cultures” (Said 15). Said contends that the purpose of creating and perpetuating discourse that portrays the Orient as subordinate to the Occident is so that Western identity becomes aligned with superiority, modernity, and power. Therefore, an intractable and ultimately unequal dichotomous relationship is created between the East and the West, placing the Occident over the Orient in every aspect of society:  politics, economics, culture, knowledge, academia, history, and morality. These representations about the Orient are then presented as ‘fact’ and then reproduced throughout time, thus turning the constructed discourse about the Orient into a tangible and ‘true’ reality.

Orientalism is thus a mode of control that simultaneously produces and maintains Western power. Because the West “makes statements about [the Orient], authorizes views of it, describes it, teaches it, settles it, rules over it,” the Occident linguistically and physically dominates over the Orient (Said 11). In short, Said argues that the West’s assumption that the East is subordinate entitles the West to speak about and represent the East while the East is kept silent; therefore, the Orient’s agency is stripped from them, giving the power to the Occident. Western countries are then in a position of power, because they have the ability not only to define the Orient and the Occident but also to disseminate their definition as more influential and ‘true’ than all other representations. As these notions are reproduced throughout history, “Orientalism deepened and even hardened the distinction between Western superiority and Oriental inferiority” (Said 50). Because knowledge does not exist in a historical vacuum, the false and incongruent nature of Orientalism becomes more and more coherent and ‘true’ with every reproduction of the hierarchal ideology. This effectively preserves Western dominance.

In the first chapter, Said makes compelling arguments using speeches from the West, and these primary source texts about the Orient that are given by men from the Occident substantiate Said’s claims about the ways in which linguistic representations perpetuate Western domination over the East. He closely analyzes a speech given by Arthur James Balfour regarding British occupation of Egypt by pointing out that “supremacy in [Balfour’s] mind is associated with ‘our’ knowledge of Egypt” (Said 40). Said deconstructs the coded and underlying meanings in Balfour’s speech by adequately making the connection that British knowledge about Egypt justifies its occupation of Egypt. Inherent in British knowledge is the assumption that their information is not only completely based on ‘fact’ but that they are also morally right in believing that Egypt requires external help from the British. Through this careful analysis of text, Said proves that there is power in representation and that linguistic representations of the Orient have material consequences in the world. By discursively constructing Egyptians as having no autonomy over their fate, Balfour consequently defines Egypt as subordinate to England and thus conquerable.

Although Said raises thought-provoking points regarding Western hegemony, he failed to fully delve into the homogenizing aspect of Orientalism. In doing so, his analysis assumes that knowledge is not multidirectional and that its distribution flows solely from the West to the East, never the other way around. By excluding any historical evidence of Eastern resistance against Western imperialism, he thus closes any possibility that countries from the East have any agency. By attempting to prove his point about Western domination, he falls into the same linguistic trap of portraying the East as completely helpless and ignorant, when historically, countries in the East have not only fought against Western colonialism but also have been a major cultural, political, and economic actor in the global sphere. Though his first chapter does specifically use Egypt and England as examples, one case is not nearly enough to fully prove his theory, especially when the ‘Orient’ encompasses vast and diverse regions of the world. Therefore, this lack of specificity weakens Said’s moral authority, because he is doing the very same thing that the West is doing. In addition, his point that linguistic representations “rely upon institutions, traditions, conventions” necessitated another source that support his claim that ‘truth’ is not a reflection of reality but rather just a coded representation of societal norms (Said 30). He could have used Baudrillard’s symbolism theory to further support his claims about language, especially since both he and Baudrillard make the same argument about the subjectivity of ‘truth.’ A simple reference to Baudrillard would have lent Said more credibility and authority, especially since this point about discourse is such an integral part of his theory.

            Despite the small weaknesses in his argument, I wholeheartedly concur with Said’s points about the hierarchal relationships that seems to exist between the East and the West, at least in the way Western media tends to portray many Eastern countries and people. I was not surprised by any of the points that Said made. I have learned about institutionalized systems of oppression in previous classes, in which we have analyzed East/West dichotomies and the inherent subjectivity and failure of language to represent ‘truth’ accurately. Aside from my academic knowledge about this topic, I have also encountered personal and cultural proof of Western hegemony everywhere I turn. Based solely on the representations that exist about the Orient, it is very easy to assume that all countries and people from the East are poor, undeveloped, backwards, ignorant, and all other characteristics associated with “Third World, developing” countries. Western news portrays only disasters and civil unrest in Eastern countries. In addition, if they even represent “Oriental” people at all, Western cultural media usually represents people from the East – like Asians and Africans – as groups always marginal to the white person. For example, in movies and TV shows, “Oriental” people are typically supporting characters and/or are caricatures of their ethnicity. Similarly, in books, unless explicitly stated, the assumption is that the characters are Western. Asia and Africa cease to be continents comprised of many individual and diverse nations but rather become one homogenous country. These representations have the wholesale effect of turning the East into the “Orient” in a totalizing way, because they make political, economic, and cultural assumptions about the identity of individual Eastern countries and generalize them to encompass every single nation in the East.

            Though I agree with Said’s analysis of Orientalism, I am equally frustrated by it. He presents no possible solution or implementable plan to break the East/West binary, and as someone who has been on the receiving end of Orientalist assumptions about my identity and thus has a personal stake in the problem, I am left with a feeling of part helplessness and part energy. Although Said’s Orientalism theory is useful in seeing the hierarchal relationship between the East and the West, merely analyzing our historical and visual culture will not actually solve the problem. In fact, it is difficult to create a solution for such a comprehensive and institutionalized system that has been ingrained into our society for centuries. In addition, Said’s theory is also dense and is aimed at academia, which means that only a select audience will actually be able to read and understand his work. Therefore, his findings, no matter how integral, will not create widespread social change without other people applying his theory to real life. However, I do think that his theory is capable of breeding the right amount of enthusiasm to enact change, if not socially, then at least personally. His theory pushes me to be more vigilant of my own personal thoughts, to be critical of the ways in which I interact with and view the world, and to push back against normative discourse. 

Works Cited 

Said, Edward W. Orientalism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., 1978. Print.

[micdotcom]

Meet Jordan’s Queen Rania, the “Princess Diana of the Middle East”

Often dubbed the “Princess Diana of the Middle East,” Her Majesty Queen Rania Al Abdullah of Jordan is well known for her philanthropic work, elegant fashion sense, fierce advocacy for education and women’s rights and efforts to encourage cross-cultural dialogue between the East and the West.

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[sampena16]

This really hits on a lot of what Abu-Lughod was saying in her article, "Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving?" Like Queen Rania so articulately said, we cannot assume that an Arab women (ie a "Third World" women) require saving, because then, that assumption merely reproduces the hierarchal power dynamic that exists between the East and the West. 

[sampena16]

"But the fact that people are outraged about this ad is outrageous itself, people indignant that others would have the audacity to sing 'America, the Beautiful' in a language other than English, when America was built on opening its arms to the world?"

Brenda Wood, a news anchor from WXIA in Atlanta, completely nails the problem with people's outrage about the Coke Superbowl ad. Her commentary links back to what we discussed last class about "imagined communities." America has created an image of freedom, diversity, and inclusion about itself and has built its reputation on these ideals. However, this identity is clearly imagined and reveals itself as a false construction at these times when Americans slam the doors on anything that might disrupt the invisible norm (aka white, Western hegemony) that underlies the social, political, and economic structure of the US. 

[sandandglass]

[elytra-blog]

constant danger of slippin’ out

[sampena16]

Because this is a fun gif about reactions against feminism and the dichotomy that still seems to exist between "masculine" and "feminine" gender roles. 

[sampena16]

Hakuna Kama Mama: Challenging Hegemonic Discourse

The Hakuna Kama Mama Photo-Voice Exhibit challenges normative Western conceptions of the “Third World African woman” by showing the multiplicity of narratives that exists about maternal health and women’s experiences. According to Chandra Mohanty, “Western” feminism tends to classify women of the “Third World” as a monolithic subject, viewing the “‘average third world woman’ as ignorant, poor, uneducated, victimized, etc” (80). This conception not only homogenizes women all over the world as having the same experience regardless of differing socioeconomic factors but also uses discursive constructions of the “Third World.” However, by using the photo-voice method, the Hakuna Kama Mama exhibition effectively represents the voices of women that may have previously been excluded from hegemonic discourse, because it allows the participants to take control of the medium and content of representation. Because the women were the ones who held the camera, they controlled their own narrative, choosing how they appear and what they want other societies to know about their culture and lived experiences. In addition, the photos are unedited, further proving that the story of maternal health in Zanzibar belongs to the women of the community. The exhibit showcases the women’s agency, thus subverting the discursive construction that “Third World” women are without power or autonomy to enact change in their lives.

In addition, the methodology of the project is an example of a global women’s movement, because it reveals the transnational network between advocacy groups in New Jersey and Zanzibar. The 120 participants from Nungwi and the 10 students from TCNJ worked together in a 3-day workshop to learn more about the other’s cultures, facilitating a better understanding of problems affecting women in a global context. The collaborative nature of the project “forges transnational feminist solidarities” and also allows the flow of information and activism about women’s issues to be “multidirectional” (Desai 15). Because the exhibition is also being showcased here, TCNJ community members of the Global North who otherwise might not have access to these women’s stories can gain a greater understanding of the issues in the Global South. Thus, the project fits the characteristics of a women’s movement outlined by Antrobus. It has “diversity,” because it contests the hegemonic narrative through the displayed pictures (Antrobus 15). It is a form of “feminist politics” (Antrobus 16). The women in Nungwi are aware, at least subliminally, of a structural gender inequality that is preventing the local government to improve their maternal healthcare, and it is this awareness that energizes their desire to create change through activism. Lastly, the project has “global reach,” because the project participants from Nungwi and TCNJ were able to move past their “separate identities along the prevailing axes of North-South” and instead work together around the common issue of maternal health (Antrobus 17). In this project, the cultural differences between the Nungwi and TCNJ community are seemingly not paramount, as evidenced by one picture in the gallery that contains members of both communities mixed together in one cohesive group.

Even the way the exhibit is structured shows the overarching theme of local and transnational community. Upon entering, directly to the left of the door is a picture of three women linked together. Further exploration of the exhibit shows more photos of people joined together in a circle, hand-in-hand, and these pictures in the exhibit become a symbol of unity, very much like Antrobus’s symbol of a wheel for global women’s movements. For Antrobus, a global women’s movement, like a wheel or a circle, is “comprised of interlocking networks that come together as appropriate” (22). Similarly, the exhibit shows the community’s collective effort to educate others about their issue and also to create social change on a local level, making the exhibit also a form of advocacy. Together, the project participants brainstormed the characteristics necessary for a good maternal clinic, like “comfort, good hospital conditions, location from the village, good midwife, good/new equipment, and emergency traveling accommodations,” and this list is shown in the picture of the blackboard as a symbol of the women’s social agency. The women are fighting for a “practical interest,” addressing women’s “immediate and perceived needs (Basu 4). By coming together, listing the things they need to change their society positively, and taking this project directly to health workers in the community, the project participants are taking an active role in social change and using art to advocate for their right to better healthcare.

In addition, though the project highlights the collaboration amongst the community members, the photos also reveal the importance of the diverse narratives of different individual community members. There are pictures to the right of the exhibit that are portrait style of one woman or a couple of women engaging in day to day activities, like buying food, cooking, caring and washing their children, getting water, and making things. These pictures are starkly honest in their depictions of the women in the community. The photos are direct and unapologetic. They place each woman at the center of the lens, each picture telling a story of survival and of kinship. The pictures depict the women’s reality, or at least as much as a picture can accurately convey truth and experience. However, the meaning of the pictures isn’t that the women are defined by their struggles. Rather, presenting the women at the center of the portraits simply living and also having a khanga with the words “Love is the light of life” sewed into fabric on display show that despite their hardships, there still exists hope and power for social change in the community.

Sources:

Antrobus, Peggy. The Global Women’s Movement: Origins, Issues and Strategies. Dhaka: University Press Ltd, 2004. Print.

Basu, Amrita. “Introduction.” Women’s Movements in the Global Era: The Power of Local Feminisms. Ed. Amrita Basu. Boulder: Westview Press, 2010. Print.

Desai, Manisha. “Transnational Solidarity: Women’s Agency, Structural Adjustment, and Globalization.” Women’s Activism and Globalization: Linking Local Struggles and Transnational Politics. Ed. Nancy A. Naples and Manisha Desai. London: Routledge, 2002. Print.

Mohanty, Chandra Talpade. “Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses.” The Women, Gender and Development Reader. Ed. Nalini Visvanathan, Lynn Duggan, Nan Wiegersma, and Laurie Nisonoff. London: Zed Books, 2011. 79-86. Print.

[nayyirahwaheed-deactivated20180]

decentralize yourself. in the same way that i can not roll up and participate in an indigenous peoples ceremony, or Japanese theatre, or anyone elses culture, you can not participate in mine, just because you want to. appreciate. it’s that simple. decentralize and simply appreciate. the assertion that i do not want non poc engaging with my work is false, I do not want non poc appropriating my work/my culture/my experiences/ my heritage/ my people. i do not want non poc using it for something. I don’t want salt. to be exploited, exoticized, or an educational manual on who we are. if you are not a poc, i simply want you to appreciate and honor it as someone else’s truth. remove yourself from the equation and appreciate someone else’s reality. not for what it can give you, but for what it is.

nayyirah waheed (via nayyirahwaheed)

[sampena16]

Here is a video that relates to feminism in the global scale, particularly the terms we talked about a little bit in class today like neoliberalism and the global financial institutions. In my "Women of Color: A Global Perspective" class I took last semester, I learned about the garment industry that are set up in "Third World" countries by "First World" multinational corporations. Although to a certain extent, the garment industries in these countries are needed in order to create more jobs and to stimulate local economies, the problem is that the heads of the corporations take advantage of the cheap labor and continue paying their workers extraordinarily low wages (in many garment factories, workers gain close to $2-3/day). In addition, most garment factories tend to hire women because of the myth that women have "nimble fingers" and are "naturally" better at making clothes, a myth that is grounded in a patriarchal social construction. Notice that the video features women, evidence that there is a disproportionate amount of women workers in the garment industry. The result? The female factory workers are paid much less for the work they do, because their work is considered a "low-skill" job that requires less training, thus justifying a lower wage. Although I find parts of this project mildly problematic in terms of who is telling the story and the project's central purpose, I do think it's a really important issue that deserves attention. Take a look and let me know what you think!

Source: http://www.upworthy.com/heres-your-chance-meet-the-women-who-make-clothes-like-yours-day-in-and-day-out?c=ufb1

[sampena16]

Hi everyone! I am a senior English major with minors in Women's and Gender Studies and African American Studies. I'm a proud feminist and tend to get very vocal and opinionated about the topic, but I love having ideological discussions and debates about it. I am looking forward to hearing all of your opinions!