For my post today, I focused on the Gate’s reading about the Real Housewives of Atlanta and also my final project topic: sexism and female athletes.\u00a0 These ideas combined with the key word “affect” led me to find media for my project that helps combine these ideas and touch on the sexism found within the media today.<\/p>\n
I clipped together photos of Serena Williams playing tennis, quotes from sport casters about her appearance, and finally a video of a Nike campaign of Serena and what it means to be a woman.\u00a0 I believe that paired together they help point out the issue our society has with strong and powerful women.\u00a0 I added in background music, because it starts soft and starts to build as I get to the ending and most poignant part of the video.\u00a0 This Nike campaign is fighting the stereotypes about female athletes, and I believe that Serena is the best face of the campaign because of her race, gender, and soaring success in her sport.<\/p>\n
In the Gates reading, he analyzes the Real Housewives of Atlanta and reality TV in general and how it is perceived by the audience.\u00a0 This particular show was an extension of the Real Housewives series, however, this was the first with a predominantly black cast.\u00a0 Typically, these shows star rich and privileged white women who are seen as simpletons and do not discuss any opinions about important topics within society.\u00a0 These typically white women fit the mold of the typical “woman” that media has created, and dim witted pretty woman lacking a sense of what is truly important in society.\u00a0 When the Atlanta show was introduced, it began to rub people the wrong way and received large amount of negative press in the media. The most famous, or maybe more fitting infamous NeNe Leakes, quickly became a controversial character within the show.\u00a0 Leakes is a outspoken, confident, and self-proclaimed “realist” that tells it like it is.\u00a0 Society is not used to viewing women that strongly voice their opinions about everything, quite like Leakes does.\u00a0 Much of the negativity in the media talked about Leakes personality on the show.\u00a0\u00a0Most of these comments centered around the women\u2019s femininity, speech patterns, and mannerisms.\u00a0 Each of these comments is saying that these women, namely Leakes, are too manly, too outspoken, or too garish.\u00a0 However, if this were a show about males, this would not be unusual for viewers.\u00a0 It is these molds that must start to be broken because of the affect it can have on society.\u00a0 The production of this show is good because it puts confident black women at the center of a television show for younger women to look up to and normalize the idea of a confident women.\u00a0 However, we must re-contextualize it so that viewers do not see it as uncomfortable or negative.\u00a0 These affects can be changed by changing the discourse that surrounds women like Serena Williams and NeNe Leakes.\u00a0 We should not be commenting on their femininity or their mannerisms, but their intellect and positive qualities.\u00a0 Also, because this is so called reality TV, viewer see an often negative portrayal of black people because the show is inherently meant to be more straight forward rather than a representation.<\/p>\n
Also, Gates discusses the affect that reality TV can have socially.\u00a0 Gates wants to get away from media as strictly negative or positive, and states “reality television thrives on the tensions that result from the multiple versions of \u201creality\u201d that circulate inside and outside of the programs. These realities emanate from the shows\u2019 narratives, the types of individuals cast to participate, and audiences\u2019 own lived experiences as racialized and gendered persons.”\u00a0 This analysis shows how the creation of reality within a show’s production can later affect the viewer.<\/p>\n
This connects with the keyword “affect,” because this word is used to describe the relationship between the media and the viewer and how the viewer feels when watching.\u00a0 Media outlets have become the primary medium to communicate and circulate ideas, attitudes and prescription of action among them.\u00a0 The most important part of all of this is the action that some media can invoke because it intensifies a feeling in the viewer.\u00a0 Much of this affect can come from reading the bodies of those within the media, particularly the face.\u00a0 Some scholars believe that putting a literal face to feelings, whether that is emojis or facial expressions evokes greater emotions than words themselves.\u00a0 These emotions can then lead to social collectives that end up changing the social landscape and ideologies that media produce.\u00a0 Clearly, NeNe Leakes and Serena Williams have evoked emotions from viewers and have publicly responded negatively to their success.\u00a0 These affects on the viewers are what the media has created by publicly allowing confident black women to dominate the media.\u00a0 This hopefully will also evoke positive emotions and allow viewers to normalize the idea of strong, outspoken, and confident black women.<\/p>\n
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Questions:<\/p>\n