Analyzing a Single Story--A ED Blog Post 4

Jeremy Todd

November 13, 2012

A ED Blog Post 4

            The film that I chose to analyze in this post is one of my all-time favorites, The Shawshank Redemption. The 1994 film starring Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman is a story about a wrongly accused banker Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins) who is sentenced to life in prison for the murder of his wife. While in prison he meets Red (Morgan Freeman) who befriends him and together they brave the corrupt world behind bars. With an ingenious plan, Andy outsmarts the warden and escapes from prison and exposes the corruption that was ever-present inside the walls of Shawshank Prison.

            I chose this film to analyze an example of a single story because throughout the film Andy is grouped with all the other criminals and treated as a murder even though he never killed anyone. In addition, the other characters in the movie all show remorse and personal change after being in prison, but the warden and guards fail to recognize the strides that most of the prisoners have made since being locked up. The single story that applies to Andy perpetuates the stereotype of criminals that in no way applies to the shy, mild-mannered Andy Dufresne. This single story provides a limiting view of Andy’s life, only the view of him as a vicious criminal. However, the film creates the plot in such a way that challenges this single story and shows that there is much more to Andy Dufresne than is described by this single story.

Gender roles and identity and their intended purpose-A ED Blog Post 3

   

            Following our visit to the Palmer Museum of Art, I carefully chose a place downtown in which I could similarly analyze the gender identities and representation and expand upon the ways in which the ideas of gender are both produced and reproduced in the chosen setting. The location I chose was the Starbucks Coffee store on the corner of College Avenue and Burrowes Street. I chose this location because of the abundance of artwork and advertisements, which contribute to the distinct visual culture associated with Starbucks, their featured product—coffee, and the appeal to women associated with each and every element of the store.

            The theme of the visual culture in the store aims to attract women and provide them with an environment that is comfortable and cozy for them to enjoy. Upon entering Starbucks, I noticed the logo that features a woman in the center. As I continued to look around and observe the many visuals that are presented to the customers after entering the store, I noticed that all of the advertisements for their current specials appeal to women. The ads all show women smiling while enjoying a sweet drink in a small cup.  These printed ads are in the form of tall, skinny posters with smooth thin fonts and they depict tall skinny women as if to market the ideal female shape. These colorful ads are for their featured seasonal drinks and pastries that are both sweet and are advertised in small portions. Along the same lines, the other products that are for sale are thermoses and bags of coffee to brew at home. Like the posters that I mentioned noticing when I first walked in, all of these products are tall and skinny shapes. As I went to place my order I notice the roles of the employees behind the counter. There were three employees working—two women, one man. The two women worked together to make the coffee and take the orders of the customers. I noticed that they were both friendly to me in an effort to make me feel comfortable and welcome, but I noticed that they were especially adept at conversing with the line of customers around me which were nearly all college aged women. They engaged in gossip and talked about their favorite drinks as they waited for the lone male employee to churn out their complicated order. The lone man behind the counter was assigned the role of making all of the specialty drinks which were primarily the orders placed by women. It struck me that, whether consciously or not; the employees were fulfilling the stereotypical mother/father roles. The man was the hard-worker, the provider while the two women were the comforting presence that made you feel comfortable and right at home. The last aspect of female oriented visual culture that I noticed was the specific effort put forth by Starbucks to make their store a cozy atmosphere like that of one’s own home. The tables were almost all two-seaters creating a private, intimate atmosphere. The music playing was smooth jazz or other soft music and one of the distinguishing factors of Starbucks is their free Wi-Fi Internet access. Nearly everyone in the store was on his or her laptop computer (including me). 

            All of this evidence clearly makes Starbucks a store geared toward women. The skinny cups, posters, and bags of coffee appeal to the idea that women are trying to maintain their healthy, ideal shape. The advertisements for their sweet drinks and pastries masterfully persuade women that it is acceptable for them to have, because all of the portions shown in the ads are very small although no option that small is available once you reach the register. The employees working also reproduce the feminine vibe to the customers by emulating the typical mother and father roles, consequently making the customer feel comfortable. And finally, the intimate seating, user-friendly technology, and the soft music all contribute to the cozy feeling that is meant to make women feel comfortable. While analyzing the visual culture in Starbucks to support the conclusion that gender roles are strictly followed in an effort to market their product to women I tried to think of a place where the opposite is true and the goal is clearly to appeal to men. The store I though of was 7-11. These convenience stores are famous for their large soda cups, their sugary frozen treats, and their blatantly unhealthy food choices. A place like 7-11, when juxtaposed with a place like Starbucks makes the gender roles, visual culture, and intent in marketing of each store easy to see.

White Privilege at PSU

            In addition to the twenty-six examples that Peggy McIntosh delineates in her anti-racism article “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack”, another example that I notice in my everyday life applies to our school, Penn State. The university is often hailed as a “world-class university” and ever since the scandal that rocked State College last November, this phrase has been used even more as a sort of qualifying phrase when talking about the scandal and the school in a negative light or as an unwavering approval from alumni and other supporters of the school. So this got me thinking about what constitutes a world-class university and then how white privilege applies in my situation as a student who currently attends a world-renowned, world-class university.

            The condition that I would add to McIntosh’s list of white privilege advantages would be that I can attend a prolific, world-class university anywhere in the United States and be sure that people of my race will be widely represented across all areas of study, both students and faculty. This is an example of white privilege, because although there are some historically and predominantly black schools in the U.S. such as Alcorn State and Morgan State, they pale in comparison to the major universities like Penn State and others of its kind. Young, black college-bound students find themselves at a disadvantage that white students never have to face. As McIntosh states in her article, “My skin color was an asset for any move I was educated to want to make.” For me and for other white students like me, this couldn’t be more true, for no black or Asian or Indian or any other person of a race other than white could look at their race as an asset for a move like going to college. That is why this condition represents white privilege.

Culture Shock--A ED 225 Blog Post #1

             "Normal is just a setting on a washing machine...because being normal always depends on where you are." -Brooke, A ED 225 classmate
             In that moment, I was far from normal. If anything, I was permanent press--because seriously who uses that? The moment was over four years ago now, it lasted six weeks, and the experience that I gained then still benefits me to this day. It helped mold my behavior in unfamiliar situations and although I was just 15 years old at the time, it was preparing me for countless similar encounters that I would some day have here at Penn State.
             The moment was a summer work program at Providence Hospital in northeast Washington D.C. My dad worked there at the time and had been there his whole life, 36 years, from the time he was just sixteen years old, that was his home away from home. His address changed, his title changed, his life changed; but his place of work remained the same. As you can imagine, after working at one place for 36 years you would get to know a lot of people, but even more people would know you--especially if you were one of the senior directors. So consequently when the extra-wide, automatic sliding doors opened and I entered the old, plain, brown brick building where I would be working for the next six weeks, a lot of people quickly realized that they knew who I was.
              It was kind of cool at first, everyone coming up to me all with the same thought on their mind, "Are you Mark's son?" (as if there were only one Mark). So I would quietly nod my head and surprisingly they all had the same response to that too. "I remember when you we're this big!", gesturing with two hands in excitement. I wondered how they could all know me when I knew none of them; it made me feel like I stuck out from the crowd, after all not everyone was Mark's son. But this was not the most distressing part of working there that summer, it was the fact that all of these people who somehow knew me we're of a race other than white. This was not totally new to me; after all I used to live in P.G. county, right outside of D.C., but never before had I experienced such a diverse collection of people from cultures and countries all around the globe. I felt like the most common question that I asked my dad that summer besides, "Are we leaving soon?" was "Where are they from?". I became so curious to learn more about all these different kinds of people. At first I was very timid when talking to new people who were different from me, but in no time I was having lengthy conversations with surgeons from India, nurses from the Philippines, anesthesiologists from Germany, and nursing assistants from Ghana.
             In six short weeks, all of these people from all over the world became, to me, not only people who knew me because of my dad, but friends and co-workers from whom I gained invaluable, real-world experience in approaching and interacting with people who we're simply different from me. That experience still helps me today to interact with people of other cultures here at Penn State, a multi-national and multi-cultural university. The biggest thing I realized during my stay at Providence was that no matter how much was different between my co-workers and I, there was far more that we had in common and had I not overcome the initial alienation that I felt, I never would have come to that realization.