I was not going to see Sucker Punch directed by Zack Snyder, as the trailer made me think that yet again Laura Mulvey coined term the “male gaze” was center stage in the movie. Baby Doll, the lead character, spends a majority of the movie dressed in the sexy schoolgirl outfit. And, in my opinion this plays to one strong, recurring male fetish within cinema.

Then, the trailer shows the cast of female characters dressed up in burlesque outfits and I rolled my eyes again. The fight scenes looked the most interesting, though reminding me of Scott Westerfield’s Leviathan or other steampunk novels. I assumed I would eventually rent the movie to check it out. Then, I read a movie review in the Vancouver Sun written by Katherine Monk, which you can find at http://tinyurl.com/4xjwmlx.

Monk compared Sucker Punch to Quentin Taratino’s Kill Bill Volumes 1 and 2. But, first she states that the movie “is told from a distinctly feminist point of view.” Now, when did having a movie told from a woman’s point of view automatically become a feminist point of view? This comment raised my eyebrows, so I kept on reading. I read the rest of the sentence and Monk refers to Tarantino’s characters as “schoolgirl ninjas and avenging rape victims.” Well, Babydoll is in a schoolgirl costume and ultimately she is defending her sister against their step-father.

The remainder of the review made me think that maybe I should give the movie a chance and see it. So, I did. My teen asked to accompany me and we saw the movie and talked about it on the walk back to the car and the drive home. We liked certain aspects of the movie.

What the movie did well—colors, lighting and great CGI. I enjoyed that the movie was in Babydoll’s head and that we didn’t have to see her sexy, trancelike dance that apparently sucked the male characters into. I’m also glad that the allusions to rape and sex work were not completed. They were assumed or referred to, but not gratuitously shot for the viewer. It’s bad enough to have to have women characters again set up as being victimized and raped by the orderlies and other men, but I don’t need to see it again in another movie. (Get more creative screenwriters!)

The women in the movie were real—vulnerable, strong, sassy, and flawed, while of course, beautiful and thin (this is Hollywood). They each fought against different villainous archetypes: warriors, zombies, monsters, dragons, and men. They had to work together in order to be successful and use fight skills and tech prowess in the process—all the while without messing up their make up or hair!

The movie was entertaining—no doubt. Was it a feminist story? I’m not sure about that, but it was worth the $20 to spend time with my teen and discuss feminism and the movie. She thought that since the movie was told from Babydoll’s point of view and they were fighting against power (not her words, but systemic forms of power—men), then maybe the movie was a little feminist or could be categorized by some as a feminist plot or story.

The movie clearly is about women needing to support one another and responding to abuse my men. There is a sense of responding to mistreatment of women. And, the mistreatment is not glamorized. The movie will make you think and cheer, as the women are mostly successful on their quest. So, grab your popcorn and watch the movie.

Here are some Twitter Stats culled from Tweetstats.com and Twitter Counter.com. Please note that most of the data is from Tweetstats and I note the TwitterCounter stats, which essentially notes the Twitter popularity ranking for that particular politician.

@M_Ignatieff  5,515 (via TwitterCounter.com)

400 tweets, 9700 following, 80k plus followers

1.2 tweets per day and 13 per month on average from Nov 2008 through March 2011.

Can follow him in Franch at @Ignatieff_M

5349 Tweets, 500 plus following, 3 plus followers

@pmharper  3,496the top twitter user (via TwitterCounter.com)

340 tweets, 12k plus  following, 117k plus followers

Harper averages 1.6 tweets daily and 11 per month from July 2008 through March 2011.

@jacklayton  6,250 (via TwitterCounter.com)

847 tweets, 11k plus following, 71k plus followers

On average, Layton tweets 1.9 times per day and about 26 tweets per month from July 2008 through March 2011 (Tweetstats).

@elizabethmay 25,509 (via TwitterCounter.com)

838 tweets, 4K+ following, 16+ followers

She tweets 2.6 times per day and 26 tweets on average between Sept 2008 and March 2011.

Also has a French account @mayelizabetth with 169 tweets, 268 following, and 392 followers.

@GillesDuceppe 9,169 (via TwitterCounter.com)

437 tweets, 7K plus following, 50k plus followers

Duceppe averages 1.8 tweets per day and 15 per month from roughly July 2008 through March 2011.

I read the latest MIT Report on the Status of Women with interest. To see the original report go to http://web.mit.edu/fnl/women/women.html. I remember reading the original report from 1996 that caused some shockwaves through higher education. For most women in academe, we are quite familiar with the “chilly climate” and pipeline issues. When the report came out, I was in graduate school but already researching women in Political Science with what would become my dissertation. I read the first report with keen interest and looked to MIT as being a “worst” case scenario, given that the institution was a preeminent institute of technology. At that time, I assumed that my home discipline of Political Science would be far better. So began my entre into work about the chilly climate.

For those not familiar with these terms, let me back up and explain. The Chilly Climate refers to “The Chilly Climate” articles (1982, 1984) by Roberta Hall and Bernice Sandler. Hall and Sandler first wrote, “The Classroom Climate: A Chilly One for Women?” in 1982 under the auspices of the Association of American Colleges (ACE). It was published by ACE in 1982 as part of the Project on the Status and Education of Women. In the article, they talk about the multiple ways that women scholars are made to feel as if they are imposters in academia by the institution, social mores, and overall gendered expectations. These points all translate into a different environment for women in the classroom. They note that women students are implicated in this by the lack of women faculty as mentors and as examples of role models who have “made” it. In 1984, they wrote, “Out of the Classroom: A Chilly Campus Climate for Women?” which was also published by ACE as part of the Project on the Status and Education of Women. In this report, they deal more explicitly with the multiple ways that women are treated or face the “chill” on campus with colleagues, administrators, and other institutional proceedings. In each report, the authors list recommendations to counter the chilly climate in the classroom and on campus. Simply put, their articles referred to the atmosphere in academe that women academics perceived as unfriendly to women, let alone their respective research. The articles covered the varied areas of concern in and outside of the classroom for both women students and faculty. Furthermore, women academics felt the chill more if their research examined women.

Particular to the women at MIT, they were dealing with a several concerns and some of the most visible ones were the dearth of women faculty in the sciences and engineering. The vast majority of the faculty were men. The environment was also one that did not view women faculty with the same level of respect at all levels of the pipeline—the pipeline refers to women pursuing study in the fields, graduate students, to the rank of the various ranks of professors. The culture at MIT was one that was not supportive of women and the study also found out that women faculty were underpaid compared to male faculty. I have quickly summarized the findings.

The latest report finds that women have made some inroads. In some cases the numbers of women faculty have doubled. But, we still see that in some colleges women are less than 20% of the faculty! I was reading the report and thinking of Virgina Valian’s book Why So Slow? The Advancement of Women (1999) and remembered that it is harder to change the hearts and minds of people. It can be easy to change policy, but to actually change normative opinions about people is the hard work. I am not going to discount the work that MIT has put forth, but it saddens me to think that incoming graduate students are whispering that women were accepted into the graduate program based on affirmative action. Unfortunately, these conversations also influence the ways in which some students and faculty look at women faculty—are you here to make the numbers better or do you deserve this job. This idle gossip feeds the culture that the Reports are attempting to respond to. The latest MIT Report then is another example of how our work is not done. We need to be vigilant and make sure that our own home campuses are treating women graduate students and faculty in a fair manner.

I love a comedy as much as the next person, but I really don’t want to watch another movie that focuses on mocking women or men. If you have read my blog previously, you know that I am a staunch supporter of women’s rights—I am a feminist. Lately, I have been climbing Mount Grading and I often will watch bad television as the “white noise” in the background.

I’m marking Gender and Politics papers and Feminist Political Thought papers, so feminism is really on my mind. And, because of this I find that I’m not laughing at the buffoonery on television. Dear Writers: Please try to expand the repertoire for male characters. Men don’t have to be the following archetypes: Jock, Nerd, Bad Guy, Cop, etc. And, in sitcoms they don’t have to be idiots. I know lots of wonderful men in my personal life and at work and they are capable, nice, intelligent people.

Yet, if I go by what I see on television, I should be surprised that they can even dress themselves and have coherent conversations with me! Now, we can go round and round about the stereotypes about women and the ways in which women are objectified. I agree. This post is about men, though. Let’s hear it for better representation for men. They deserve more.

And for any of you who are slack jawed wondering why I am not defending women—I’ll get back to that. Trust me. There is still lots to comment on about Pop Culture’s treatment of girls and women.

Today’s Times Colonist ran an article about the sexual assault of a University of Victoria student last Friday night. Apparently, she was picked up at the intersection of Cedar Hill Cross Rd and Cedar Hill on Friday night and was assaulted over the course of the next few hours. In the article ( http://tinyurl.com/47tw3a7 ), Stephanie Capyk, who is an employee of Victoria’s Women’s Sexual Assault Centre, noted that 10 sexual assaults have taken place during the last ten day.s

I read this article, while I was having my breakfast this morning. I had to stop eating and re-read the article. First, my heart goes out to the survivors of each of the ten plus sexual assaults. We need to acknowledge that these numbers are low, as so many will not report the crime. Secondly, I want to tip my hat to Katie DeRosa, the Times Colonist reporter, who made a point of including the following quote by Capyk, “”It’s about educating men to challenge the core beliefs that allow sexualized violence to occur.” The rhetoric about sexual assault is usually one that makes only women responsible and we often forget that men are culpable here. I’m not setting all men up as the evil perpetrators. No, what I mean is that we need to educate men about sexual assault, so that they are allies in dropping the numbers.We need more people to understand what constitutes sexual assault and that jokes about violence against women are unacceptable. What I am suggesting is reframing the way we think about violence, sexuality, and sexual assault.

The data in the US and Canada demonstrates the vast majority of sexual assaults are not the “stranger” rape situation, but instead fit the date rape or acquaintance rape designation. That is, most girls and women are assaulted by someone who they already know. The term is about to end and the grad parties are coming up as well as other parties. I hope that the students on campus and young people throughout Victoria are safe. Together we can make a difference. Take care of yourself and be on the watch for those around you.

“.

The Culinary Coquette
(Writers On Food )

The Culinary Coquette is seeking salacious and spicy prose, essays, recipes, poetry and short stories by writers that explore, celebrate, analyze all things food. Some topics you might consider when submitting your work for review; food and the erotic, food and ritual, Soul Food, Food Not Bombs, Veganism, gender roles and food, food for gods and goddesses, Biblical foods, sexual symbolism and food, ethnic foods, communal gardening, communal gatherings, feasts, organic food, GMO (genetically modified) food, seductive foods, aphrodisiacs, magical cooking( food spells, healing foods), Kosher foods, food politics, addiction to food, why we are obsessed with cooking shows, exotic foods, potlucks, ode to a certain food, and the old adage “the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach” These are just examples of what to consider when submitting to The Culinary Coquette. Be creative and send what you think might be ideal for the anthology.

Essays and prose should be between 500 to 2000 words.
Short Stories 1500-3000 words
Send submissions to jackiejoice@yahoo.com
Please send document in an attached file and in the body of email in .doc or .rtf format

Include your first and last name, email, daytime phone number, and mailing address in upper right hand corner of your submission.

Deadline for submissions June 1, 2011

Jackie Joice is an essayist, CNC (certified nutritional consultant), spoken word poet, photographer, and mom. Her work has been published in Shout Out: Women of Color Respond To Violence ( Sealpress 2008) Joice contributed to The Women’s Movement: An Encyclopedia of Thirdwave Feminism ( Greenwood Press 2005). Joice was selected as a 2004 participant in the Hurston/Wright Writer’s Week at Howard University. She occasionally writes for Blade Magazine and maintains the blog theculinarycoquette.blogspot.com

Please contact the wonderful Jackie Joice about this great opportunity!

I heard Elizabeth Denham, Information and Privacy Commissioner  for BC, Canada, speak last night at the University of Victoria #UVic. I live tweeted from the event. You can find the tweets via the hashtag #BCCommDenham Here I am going to post some points she shared on her PPT slide show.

1. Think before you click

2. Know who your friends are

3. Read and understand privacy policies

4. Pay attention to your privacy settings

5. Avoid disclosing your location

6. Do not share your password, update it regularly,  and use different passwords

7. Be careful with your Social Insurance Number

8. Protect your email address

9. Protect your privacy and your friends’ privacy

10. Be discreet

I think that the ten points all make sense. For those of us on Facebook it might be a good time to revisit your profile and your privacy settings. I know that I’ve had to request that family/friends not use my kids’ full-names on Facebook or other sites.

Based on her talk, I was really surprised how Canada pushed back against Facebook–the social networking hegemon! As Denham noted, the investigation took 14 months and their findings exceeded 100 pages. Ultimately, it took Facebook a year to change and update privacy settings. And, we can thank law students in Canada who were instrumental with getting the investigation placed onto Denham’s desk!

During the last week, I’ve been working on writing final exam questions for two of my three classes. One of the first things I do is re-read my syllabus and sketch out the concepts that seem the most relevant to include on the exam. The next thing I do is re-read my old- final exam questions and see if any of the old questions are worth recycling or augmenting for the exam at hand.

Then, once I have an array of questions put together I think about the class. What has attendance and participation been like for this section. Did the class demonstrate that they have paid attention to the material. Yes, a really strong class can benefit with the possibility of an exam geared for them. I am certainly not saying an easier exam, but maybe one less question than I would normally assign.

Attendance and participation is an important component in my classes, so I will include a question or two that requires notes or memory from an in class discussion or lecture. And, the students who attended class benefit from this particular question. Regardless of the exam or the group, the marking will not change. I have my expectations for what constitutes a strong, good, satisfactory or poor response and most terms the bell curve is good. During the last year or so, I have offered a take home exam option and most of the students appreciate this. The only negative (according to them) is that my expectations are higher with the take home exam. The win for me is that the exams are typed and easier to read.

I have to stagger my grading between the three classes. My expectations are markedly different for a first year course response compared to a third or fourth year, so I have the grading for one course done before I move to the next course. It is just the way I work. I started marking first year papers last week and will get to third and fourth year exams at this week’s end. Then, the next week papers in the advanced classes. I am really looking forward to the students’ exams and papers. Why? I get to see how the students have engaged the course materials. And, for the most part, it is gratifying to read their assignments.

I’m also on BlogHer and I’m posting on here one of my BlogHer posts. You can find the original post at http://www.blogher.com/touchy-subjects-thinking-about-race I added an additional paragraph here on the WordPress version.

I’m closing in on seven years of living in Victoria, BC in Canada. Prior to this I had pretty much lived my entire life in Southern California–most recently San Diego. Besides missing my family terribly, I really miss the racial and ethnic diversity. I need to add that I am Mexican-American and self-identify as Latina. My family has been in the US for three generations. My partner and I joke about how we are a NAFTA family, as he is Canadian. Our two girls have citizenship in both countries. Victoria is a predominantly homogenous community and we knew that when we relocated here. I grappled with this fact, when I think of how I grew up or the current diversity in San Diego.

During the last year I have noticed that some new acquaintances really want to talk about race with me, but it’s always done in really condescending way. At work in the university environment this is easily dealt with, since part of what I teach includes race and conversations are more giving and are usually contextualized around a reading or event.  However, I’m finding that in non-work space, I’ve been a bit perplexed with some well-meaning community members comments about race that attempt to tell me what I should be feeling as a Latina. Mind you, for some of these people I might be one of a few Latinas that they’ve met outside of a trip to Baja. My Latinidad is unique to them and perhaps something that they don’t quite understand.

What I have done—smiled, listened, and responded politely and changed the subject. I already know that the community I live in is not diverse—especially in the way that I’ve previously been accustomed to. I’m also keenly aware of the overt forms of racism in my community. When I first moved here, I had to get used to being asked if I was part Native or Meti. I’m not and would first ask why I was being queried. People usually responded with—I can’t place you. I would explain that I’m Latina and move to the next topic at hand.

Another issue that I’ve noticed is that some folks have their own idea of what it means for me to be Latina and somehow this holds lots of stereotypes. By not having a Spanish accent, I’ve heard that I apparently am not really Latina. Really? I’d like to know when this speaker became the all-knowing person who can designate who is Latina and who is not. If anything, these sorts of comments are offensive. Am I more authentic with a thick accent and a sombrero? No, I would just be meeting another person’s “learned” caricature of what a Latina should look like or sound like. Not all of us sound and act like Charo, Salma Hayek or Sofia Vergara.

I work for social justice at work and also have ample opportunity to discuss these important issues. What I don’t want is to have a well-meaning person feel sorry for me for being Latina and point out how oppressed I am. These moments come off as highly problematic and mark me as only a victim and strip away my agency as a person. I might be marked by race and gender, but I know that I have education and class privilege—please don’t attempt to put me in a box—as that is oppressive.

Twitter: @janniaragon