Final thoughts on race, gender and media

Hey everyone! This is the last blog of the semester and it has definitely been very interesting! I have never taken a class where people expressed how they felt about sensitive subjects and it was an eye opening experience. I have never been one to speak my mind in the classroom, but I feel like this class really made me more willing to do that. Because this class is race, gender and media, the students got to hear from people that deal with all kinds of prejudice and stereotypes with those different topics in everyday life. Even the students in the class would tell stories from their own personal experience, which can sometimes be very difficult to do.


I never really knew much about race and gender in the media, but now I feel like I could go and teach a class about it. That's a little exaggeration on my part, but that's how much I learned in just this class alone.

One of my favorite parts of the class that I found interesting was the Asian American section and how they are the model minority. I never had any knowledge of this before and really never thought about it before this class. After we discussed it, I thought about the real world and how when it comes to a minority being the most "white" or being the most appropriate to interracially date/marry, Asian Americans stereotypically fit that category. For instance, I have noticed that people don't look down upon a couple when it is an Asian American male or female dating a white male or female, but when the scenario is a black male or female dating a white male or female it is just SO much different in some people's eyes. I don't really get it, minority is minority. Why is one looked down upon and the other isn't? What criteria makes one race or gender so much better than the other?



From the beginning of class, Professor Flippin-Wynn has talked to us about our toolboxes and what we have in our own. In the beginning I didn't really get the concept, but now I feel like there is tons in that little bitty toolbox. When we graduate and become professionals, we need to be able to handle situations that we deal with topics like stereotypes within the office. My group did a project on women and stereotypes within the workplace. We thought this was a great issue to discuss since we are all women and "might" have to deal with this in the future whether it be a circumstance where a man is making more money for the same job that we are doing or whether it be us or a co-worker being sexually harassed. People all over the world deal with these kinds of things all the time, and we really don't know the extent of it until we are actually out there in the workplace.

I really enjoyed the way we never tried to make each other feel pity for one another; rather we just wanted people to understand how we have been affected by our race or gender throughout our lives. Sometimes I feel like conversations about race and gender can turn into one big pity party, but this class was never like that and I really respect my fellow classmates for that. All kinds of races and genders throughout history have had awful things happen to them and their ancestors so we are all in the same boat. We are all human beings.

One day soon I will be a PR professional and I hope that some of the knowledge that I have from this class will help me deal with certain situations in the future.

Finally, I just want to touch on the topic of white privilege, which was one of the first things we discussed in the class. This was another one of those things that I had no clue about or maybe I was just oblivious to before. I see "white privilege" all around me now in everyday life and even with the model minority sometimes. I know many minorities that are smarter and more professional than some white people I know. When was it decided that "white people" would be the privileged ones? Doesn't made much sense to me.

I guess what I really learned in this class was that a lot of things about this world don't make sense are can be really aggravating when you think about it. Unfortunately the world isn't perfect and people aren't perfect so there probably won't ever be a day without stereotyping or judgment. No matter how hard we try I feel like we still find a way to judge others. I'll stop my preaching now, but I really enjoyed this class and all of the things that I can now say will be added to my toolbox.


I hope you guys have a great rest of the year and summer!

Hip-Hop and the Media

Hip-Hop to me is rap music with really cool, fun beats to go along with the chorus. Usually when I think of Hip-Hop I think of music that I would put on so I could dance. Hip-Hop music is almost like an African American music movement that changed music history.

Here is a list of five Hip-Hop artists I have never heard before now:
1) Madcon
2) Akrobatik
3) Pete Rock
4) Notes to Self
5) The Take Over




Here are five Hip-Hop videos I have never seen before now:
1) Madcon- "Beggin" video. The focus of this video is that the two main singers are playing video games and when they start to doze off to sleep, they begin dreaming of actually being a part of the video game. Certain scenes include them trying to break out of jail, the two guards are both women which they end up handcuffing. The video has a 70s feel to it because the singers and backup dancers are wearing platform shoes and bell bottom pants.
2) Shwayze- "Buzzin" video. Basically this video consists of Shwayze and a guitarist performing on the beach with a bunch of girls in swimming suits dancing around them. That is really about all that happens in the video, oh and the guys throughout the whole thing are just looking at the girls.
3) Jamie Foxx featuring T-Pain- "Blame It" video. In the video it's Jamie Foxx and friends hanging out in a club and all they are doing is drinking, dancing and hanging out with really pretty girls all night long.
4) Mr. C- "Cha-Cha Slide" video- Throughout the whole video it is Mr. C and random groupings of people of different races and ethnicities doing the Cha- Cha Slide together in all different places throughout the country.
5) The Roots- "The Seed" video- The video consists of the band playing in a room the whole time while also flipping to footage of a little girl running throughout a huge house. Eventually at the end of the video the little girl finds the room where The Roots are playing and watches them finish the song.

Two radio stations that broadcast Hip-Hop music:
1) 92.1 FM, The Beat, in Tulsa, OK
2) 101.5 FM, KTBT, in Collinsville, OK

Three examples of music my parents listened to:
1) The Beatles- rock and roll
2) James Taylor-alternative rock
3) Frank Sinatra- classical, vocal music

Corporations the have used Hip-Hop to promote and advertise their products would be Boost Mobile and Pepsi (which is not a fast food corporation). Both of these corporations have used Hip-Hip artists and music to promote their products and have actually been pretty successful in selling their products because youth and many others are attracted to the Hip-Hop culture.



Another great example like bling being used in the media today would be the term "diss." For instance, if you said something rude to someone, then you would say that you "dissed" them. The word actually came from disrespect and rappers were the first to come up with this term. Another term that is widely used is "shorty" which is basically a woman that a guy likes. Rappers always say "shorty" in their song lyrics. I have actually heard people call a girl "shorty" before, whether they were being serious or not.

Reflection:
What I found interesting about listening to Hip-Hop artists that I've never heard before was that I actually enjoyed some of the music more than I do mainstream rap. The group Madcon was probably my favorite because they had a cool sound to their music. It was almost like a mixture of rap and blues.

As for the music videos, I watched a mixture of mainstream rap videos that I had never seen before and then I added some random ones. What I found with almost all of them was that they had girls in their video. I understand that might be what attracts people (guys) to watch the video, but as a woman I don't find that particularly entertaining. The only one that didn't have girls was The Roots, which had a little girl throughout the video.

After I looked at videos I tried to find Hip-Hop radio stations. I honestly couldn't find very many that were dedicated to just rap music. I'm from Tulsa and we do have a station here that is Hip-Hop music, 92.1. For the most part, not enough stations dedicate their airtime to strictly rap music. Most of the stations I found were country.

I asked my parents what kind of music they listen to, and sadly enough, I really like their music more than I do a lot of the music out there today. The Beatles and James Taylor are classic artists in the music industry and there music, to me, is timeless.

I know that words like "bling" that started with rap music are very common in the media today. When I started thinking of other words I couldn't really think of many, but I do know that there are many more.

When I looked for Hip-Hop promoting corporation's advertising, I found that this kind of music is really only promoted in the fast food industry, soda industry and cell phone industry. I think that these companies use rap music to promote their products is due to the fact that many young people like fast food, pop and cell phones and many young people can relate to rap music.

As I listened to Hip-Hop music that I had never heard before, I realized that the sound of rap music is changing. I like it a lot more because I feel like it is less of the gangster rap and more musically talented music. Now, there are good beats to the music and not all of the lyrics deal with hot girls and parts of their body. I don't find rappers that sing about that very talented. That's just my opinion though. New Hip-Hop music is definitely becoming one of my favorite genres of music.

Race and Gender in Advertising

Here are my findings from advertising in the media that deals with race and gender.
I chose these sources because these are what I look at on a weekly basis in comparison to others which I would never really look at unless I was bored.
US Weekly Magazine- celebrity gossip and entertainment magazine-
An advertisement for Three Olives Vodka that shows two woman making their O-faces. This is sexualizing women and there are no men in these advertisements.

Marie Claire Magazine- women's magazine-
An advertisement for GAP which is called "27 Colors" and it has a diverse group of women from all different races fashioning the same kind of t-shirt in many different colors.

Cosmopolitan Magazine- women's fashion and entertainment magazine-
An advertisement for CoverGirl which features Rihanna and she appears to be lighter skinned than she normally is probably due to photoshop.

US Weekly Magazine- celebrity gossip and entertainment magazine-
An advertisement for Nic's Sticks Paint and Go Nail Lacquer that features three girls from high school musical in order of race starting with a white girl, hispanic girl and then a black girl.

Cosmopolitan Magazine- women's fashion and entertainment magazine-
An advertisement for Calvin Klein which shows three people a female and male African African and then a Asian woman. The Asian lady is off to the side while the African American couple is gazing into one another's eyes basically completely ignoring the other person in the ad. They are portraying an same race relationship instead of an interracial relationship when it could have been just as easy to make it a relationship between the Asian woman and African American man. Although CK probably didn't do this on purpose, it still makes me feel like they are too scared to show an interracial relationship.

2009 commercial for Carl's Jr. with Padma Lakshmi-
2009 Commercial
This commercial shows Padma, which is of a foreign tropical ethnicity, licking her fingers and licking the burger very sexually while also lifting her dress higher to make sure she doesn't get sauce on her clothes. So they are showing her in a very over sexual way eating a burger and afterwards they say the line "more than just a piece of meat" and you really don't know if they are referring to her or the burger. I, myself, thought this was a very degrading commercial.

PC commercial for Windows with the four year old Asian girl-
2009 Commercial
In this commercial it shows a four year old little Asian girl editing pictures on a computer program, which used to be so much more difficult in the past but now it is so much easier. What is interesting about this commercial is that it is an Asian girl and they have been known to be stereotyped as nerdy and this commercial kind of makes it the little girl to appear that way. Obviously, she is just a child and it is supposed to be cute, but if it was an older Asian female or male the stereotypical Asian nerd might be more obvious.

Dolce and Gabbana Commercial featuring Adam Karst of Cannon Karst Products-
2009 Commercial
In this commercial is shows Adam watching a Hispanic woman dancing on a stage. She is just dancing around is a sexual way while he is just sitting back and fantasizing about her. At the end of commercial, all that the show is just a pair of shoes that the girl was wearing laying there as if they are trying hint to the audience that something sexual might have happened between the Hispanic woman and the Caucasian male.

PETA commercial 2009-
This commercial shows three Caucasian women in barely anything licking vegetables with captions below them saying that if you become a vegetarian you will have better sex. This ad was eventually banned. Once again, like many other commercials and advertisements, I believe that this commercial demeans women and makes them look like the only thing they are good at is representing a sex symbol for men.

Mastercard 'Priceless' Commercial called "Meet the Family"-
2008/09 Commercial
This commercials shows an interracial couple, a white male and Asian female, discussing what will happen when their two opposite families realize that they are getting married and what their reactions will be. Many people had an issue with this commercial because mainstream media in this day and age are still portraying Asians and Asian women as "exotic" and un-American. I thought this commercial was great because the couple, although they need their families might have an issue with them getting married, they didn't care because they were in love and really didn't care what other people thought in the end.

People always say that sex sells, but I don't think that this is still the right way to go about advertising. Too many people are only worried about money and how they can get more money, especially through advertising, and this is just really makes me sick to my stomach. Money seems to make the world go round and I wish I could do something to change that, but sadly enough, I don't think anyone will ever be able to. It was really hard to find ads that had women or men of other races besides Caucasian. When I thought about it, I realized that many ads that have people of other races in them, they are usually the role of the best friend or sidekick of the main Caucasian role. There are also unlimited amount of commercials that show women as the stay at home mom that caters to her children and husband and that is all she really does with her life. Men in commercials usually play the single, bachelor role or the "bring home the bacon" to the family role. Obviously, these are not politically correct in every case, but that is all that is ever advertised. In general, I'm not a big fan of advertising because it is so revolved around just making money.

News and the Media

Hey guys! The topic of conversation today is the media and how it manipulates the public. There are about six major media conglomerates that own all kinds of newspapers, magazines, television channels, radio stations and movie studios. These conglomerates include Disney, Viacom, Time Warner, News Corp, Sony Corp and Vivendi. In the video Minority Media by Bill Moyers, it showed how the FCC is wanting to make it possible for these conglomerates to own even more media outlets than they all ready do making it even harder for other people, who are not as capable to purchase them, to be able to have their voice heard. This is a big issue for minorities. They feel as if they are not having their voices heard and the topics that they find important on not being covered by these huge conglomerates who only air what they feel is news. Obviously news is very biased and many media outlets portray minorities as inferior or "thugs, hoes, pimps and gangsters". There are plenty of white people out there that could be stereotyped with those terms as well, but you don't ever see it because most of these conglomerates are owned by white people. I believe that the news has become a lot more open on airing news about minorities since the election of a half black president. Just electing a half black president was a huge step for America and it helped us to realize that this world does not revolve around just the white community. I feel like many news outlets are so hypocritical because what is big news 10 years ago is looked at now and barely even publicized. For instance, the huge protest against the war in Iraq that took place in six of the United States big cities. Back in the 1960's opposition to war was a huge story and thousands of protestors sat outside of the Pentagon trying to make it known that war needed to end in Viet Nam. Why was it news then to show these protests? Why isn't it now? These conglomerates are pretty much unstoppable and there will never be a time where we can make them broadcast what WE want them to broadcast. What we can do is write letters to the FCC, state legislatures and even to these huge conglomerates telling them what WE DO WANT TO HEAR about in the news and hope that they listen the public's voices. Although the interests of people of color are everyone's interests, it is good that people of color get out there and create their own media outlets because it looks like it will be a long time until the media conglomerates make minority news a major part of what they cover. Like WVON in Chicago, although they are not some huge company, they broadcast stories that many people want to hear in many communities and listeners are very grateful for it. They say that if you want something done you have to be proactive about it. If you just sit around hoping that one day things will change, it won't. Just like the Civil Rights Movement and Martin Luther King Jr., people made history and changed major things in communities nationwide just by being proactive and going out there everyday trying to make their voice heard. One little voice can make all the difference if they care that much about a topic. For instance, many people wanted the war in Iraq to come to an end, so we elected a Democratic president who also wanted the war to end and now there is a light at the end of the tunnel. People wanted change and they got change, but they didn't sit around on their butts complaining about it, they went out and did something about it. If there is one thing I hate the most is someone that sits around and complains about issues and doesn't try to do anything to make the issue better.
As for the media nowadays, they have done a pretty good job of showing coverage of Proposition Eight news. Even though most of the events were taking place on the East and West coasts, we still heard all about it in Oklahoma. It was newsworthy and people needed to hear about it, and it was heard nationwide. The one thing that I think made it so widely known was the celebrity opposition to it. I feel like once a celebrity is thrown into the mix everyone wants to know more about the event. I believe that the media was beneficial to the Civil Rights Movement. If there hadn't of been that much coverage I don't think there would ever have been any progression in the seeking of rights for the minority groups. The media was always showing interviews and speeches of Martin Luther King Jr. and I think that if they hadn't of aired these events, the United States might be completely different today. I feel that if the Civil Rights Movement didn't get the coverage that it did, there still would be segregation and all the other bad events that went along with the events of that time period. Media coverage can be a great thing IF and WHEN they do their job correctly. Being biased and hypocritical never did anything good for anyone.
In one of the videos we were supposed to watch it talked about how at the beginning of the war the media was urged not to show a lot of coverage of what was actually going on in Iraq. I think that we need to see everything that goes on. I think that although a lot of it may be hard to handle, we cannot grasp the seriousness of what is actually going on overseas and until we REALLY know we don't have a right to sit back and give our opinions that may not even be correct. People have a lot of opinions and I feel like a lot of the time they need to just keep them to themselves.
I feel like you have heard my thoughts now even though it all might sounds like a bunch of jibberish, but these are my thoughts even if they may not be your own. Everyone has the right to their opinion (to an extent). Ha ha.

Here are some videos that I like that you might enjoy as well!

*BONUS* My reflection on years to come in my life

To begin, six months from now I can see myself almost three-fourths of the way done with my bachelor’s degree at the University of Oklahoma. It will be September and I will be back in school for my senior year. I hope to have an internship during the year in Oklahoma City. I would like to have a boyfriend by then, but I tend to be picky so that might have to wait until after graduation when I have time for this. I can see six months from now will be a very anxious time in my life because I will be so ready to graduate by then. I feel like I will be living the same kind of life that I am now, but I will just be a little older and a little more ready to be out of Norman living in the real world.

In 3-5 years from now I will for sure be graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a bachelor’s degree in Public Relations. I would hope to be attending law school and be on the brink of graduating so that I would have a law degree on top of my bachelor’s degree. If law school falls through, I hope to be a new resident of NYC and offered a job at a magazine like Vanity Fair or at an event planning company of some sort.

It is hard to think about what will happen in 10 years and incredibly difficult to place myself 20 years from now and how much my life will have changed. In 10 years I will be 31 years old and most likely I will, if things go according to plan, I will have graduated and hopefully also graduated from law school. I also hope to be living in Manhattan with my husband and if I have anything to do with it, I would love to have at least one child. My plan is to be married by the time I’m 28 and have a child by at least 30 so that I will be financially stable and ready to start a family. I want to have a job either working for a Conde Nast magazine or to be working in law firm in NYC as a family attorney or doing commercial law. If there were not a child in my future, I would love for my husband and me to travel throughout Europe by the time I’m 35.

Twenty years from now I will be 41 and by then I hope to be running my own public relations event planning company and doing pro bono law work on the side just for something extra to do. My child, if I have one, will be 11 by then and hopefully we will be living in the Upper East Side of NYC so he or she will attend a preparatory school. I can see my family living a very fast paced life, but also there will be plenty of down time so that we are a close- knit family. By the time I’m 41 I want to have at least 3 different homes including one in Manhattan, another in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and the other in Vail or Aspen.

This would be my hypothetical life, but I know that life is very unpredictable and can lead you in many different directions causing plans to change.

**Race and Gender Stereotypes in the Media**

Here are my findings from the last couple of days!

2-19-09 7:55 p.m.
Friend’s apartment- Crimson Park
Tropic Thunder Movie
Scene with Robert Downey Jr. trying to act like a black man
Racial Stereotype


2-20-09 6 p.m.
Personal Conversation with my roommate Marisha at Pad Thai
We discussed why Asians are almost never the lead parts in movies or television shows. Asians are always stereotyped as the very intelligent, nerdy characters.
Racial Stereotype

2-21-09 4:30 p.m.
Friend’s apartment- Crimson Park
Deception- movie
The main character Wyatt Bose basically rapes his girlfriend. Because his character is all ready very dominating, I believe he was trying to show his power over her.
Gender Stereotype

2-24-09 5:45 p.m.
A shirtless Hispanic man was walking down the shirt and I observed a woman actually pull her purse closer to her as he walked towards her as if she thought he was going to rob her.
Outside by Gaylord Hall
Racial Stereotype/Assumption

2-24-09 8:30 p.m.
I was at Wal-mart and I actually watched a Caucasian Wal-mart employee suspiciously watch an African American couple look at movies in the movie section.
601 12TH Avenue N.E.- Wal-mart Location
Racial Stereotype/Assumption

2-25-09 4:23 p.m.- MTV Network
Britney Spears Fantasy perfume commercial
-The commercial actually states the man as the “hunter” and the woman was the fragile “goddess”.
Gender Stereotype


2-19-09
PR Research Class discussion TR 4:30-5:45
We discussed how there are more women than men that graduate with a public relations major, but it still seems that more men than women are top PR executives.
-It makes me feel like people who are hiring for these companies feel like they need to hire men for executive jobs because they are more capable of doing the job, and obviously this is completely not true.
Gender Stereotype


2-23-09
The Bachelor Mondays 8-9 p.m. on ABC
The bachelor is seen as a man looking for love, while many believe the women who try to compete for his love are either desperate or slutty because they are sharing him with many women
Gender Stereotype


2-23-09
The OU Law School
Race, Gender and Media on Mondays 6-8:50 p.m.
Took a tour of the Law School with the dean of students and before even going I thought the dean would be male and didn’t for a second think it would be a female. Secondly, I thought he would be a white male and Dean Evans is a black male.
Gender Assumption/ and Racial Assumption

2-25-09
Daily 10 on the E channel at 6 p.m.
The show hosts played a clip of a guy who discussed ads where white people rap to sell their products and how it can be racially offensive to some people and funny to others. The reason behind the segment is due to the fact that more people have been rapping in advertisements recently.
Racial Stereotype/Assumption

2-26-09
The View on ABC at 11a.m.
I feel like this show stereotypes women as just big complainers who have too many opinions on "mostly" not so serious topics. I feel like it makes women look bad, but this is just MY opinion.
Gender Stereotype


Reflection--
I can honestly say this was a very educational assignment for me because I realized things that I normally wouldn't even let phase me. I knew that there was a lot of stereotyping in the media, but when I'm just watching it without having to do an assignment about tracking it, I didn't realize the extent to which stereotyping dominates media outlets. I was in no way surprised with how much I saw and I came away from this assignment not wanting to watch television as much as I usually do. The day that I was walking down the street by Gaylord and noticed the woman pulling her purse closer to her as the shirtless Mexican man walked by, I was disturbed as to how our community automatically judges people just because of the stereotypes that they are feed to by the media daily. This man could have been a guy that just took a jog and got hot so he took his shirt off and just because the guy looked a little rough the woman all ready categorized him as as dirty Mexican who might swipe her purse. The sad thing is, I have noticed myself doing the same kind of stereotyping before. I remember I was in a really bad part of town before and I locked my doors and didn't feel safe in any way because I was by myself at night in a well-known bad part of town. Nothing happened, but I automatically took the precautions that something could have happened.

When I was watching that Britney Spears commercial, which I have seen a million times before, I never noticed how they describe the girl as so innocent and goddess like and the male was a hunter and very tough looking. It is true how the media stereotypes the male and female personas. I definitely see how the constant stereotyping that the media does has a great affect on the representation of ethnic groups and gender. I, myself, noticed that I have stereotyped people by the part of town that they live in. This is wrong and I know it, but because of what people have told me as I have grown up and the things that the media have shown me, I formed preconceptions about people.

Obviously, stereotyping is never going to end, but there are ways that we can make them less effective. My generation is the first step to stopping the stereotypes from affecting our future children the way we have been affected and the way that our parents and grandparents were as well. From my different findings, it feels like I found way more gender stereotypes and assumptions than I did racial stereotypes. Another thing that seems interesting to me that in our RGM class is that the girl to guy ratio is about 7:1. I wonder why more guys are not enrolling in this kind of class? Maybe because they aren't as interested in the topics we cover? Also, I also wonder in comparison to our class what the girl to guy ratio is in a class like Sport Public Relations? I bet I could all ready guess that there are probably more guys than girls. This is an example of me stereotyping just because guys are usually more inclined to enjoy learning about sports. I also wish that there were more women sportscasters on ESPN, but it is definitely a guy dominated channel and I don't think that will ever really change. I feel like from now on always going to notice stereotypes when I'm watching TV and movies. That is all for this week! I hope you all have a great weekend!!

-Christy

Big XII Universities and Race-based Admissions

Here is what I found!

1)University of Kansas- ethnic background doesn't affect your admission-- it is optional
2) University of Colorado-ethic background optional
3) University of Missouri- gender/ethnicity/multiracial is optional
4)University of Texas (Austin)- ethnic background was completely optional, this goes for every other Texas university too
5)Kansas State University- ethnic background information was required
6)Oklahoma State University- it allowed for gender, ethnicity and tribal affiliation to be optional

I think it is smart for the university to make ethnicity and gender optional for the student and makes more people willing to apply.

-Christy Ferguson