Purpose: To explore the dynamics of consumption in American society and how it shapes the lives of women and men in different ways.
To understand how consumption processes at “home” have global reach and shape the lives of women and men in different ways in various parts of the world.
To reflect on the ethics of consumption and the social responsibility of individuals towards consumption---How should we approach consumption in order to ensure equity and the moral health of individuals and communities?
Readings: You may use any of the readings or films from the course syllabus. You will be required to use additional scholarly sources for your final paper. You will choose these sources based on the topic of your essay. Some suggestions are listed below.
Background:
It is timely that we take a close look at consumption in American society. We live in a society that is based upon mass consumption. We are surrounded by malls, department stores, commercial strips, supermarkets, and now numerous shopping opportunities on-line and on television. Some of us live to shop.
In the past decade or so, consumerism in the U.S. reached new heights as people were buying or striving to buy big houses, big cars, tons of brand name clothing, televisions for every room in the house, and lots of other stuff. Credit cards and loans were easy to get. People began living way beyond their means. We became a society of “overconsumption.”
As you know, things have changed in recent months. The United States is in an economic recession which is affecting the rhythms of the global economy. In the U.S., unemployment is super-high. Folks are losing their homes to foreclosure. People are struggling to pay their credit card debt. The downside to our enthusiasm for consumption is now being exposed. This is a sobering moment for American consumers. The time has come to rethink the meaning of consumption and how we participate in its processes.
But isn’t ANTH 308 is a course about gender and sexuality? How does consumption relate to these topics? Through the Shopping Blog assignment we will explore how gender and sexuality are intimately tied to consumption. To start thinking about the connections ask yourself: Who do we think of as the “shopaholics” in our society? But is it true that women are more into shopping than men? Why is sex such a popular theme in advertisements for cars, hamburgers, beer, soap and other things that have nothing to do with sex? How are women and men featured in these advertisements? How are consumers being disciplined to think about women, men, and sex as a result of these images?
What about how products are made for our consumption? Does this have anything to do with gender? For example, who is sewing designer jeans for us? Who is attaching the rubber sole to our Nike sneakers? Who is doing the data entry for the credit card companies that front the money for our purchases? You may be surprised to know that women in Morocco and Honduras make our jeans, women in China glue together our sneakers, and women in Barbados process data for our credit cards. How we consume in the United States, evidently, has its reverberations throughout the world, and, in fact, influences women, their relationships with men, households, and economic power. It goes without saying—as you will learn in this class—that these changes provide the foundations for definitions of femininity and masculinity in different cultures around the world.
This semester, we will talk about consumption in our lives and use our observations and experiences as material for analyzing how consumption intersects gender and sexuality. The Shopping Blog assignment provides us a structure of organizing our observations and thinking through the meanings of consumption.
The Tasks: There are five tasks involved in this project:
1) Shopping Blog Postings
2) Two-page reflection on the Shopping Blog and mention of paper topic
3) Researching and Drafting a 5 page Shopping Blog paper
4) Writing Workshop: Peer Critique of Drafts
5) Revision and Final Submission of Paper
I. Shopping Blog Postings:
You are required to post four (4) entries to a class Shopping Blog that is connected to WEBCT (pending technology…I’d be great if images could be posted…don’t know if students can do this in WEBCT…also I wonder about the compliance issues if I use other technology—help!). Each entry must describe a particular commodity that you think is interesting and that you would like to add to the class shopping blog for one reason or another. Provide a full description of the commodity and why you chose it. Address the following in your entry:
□ The name of the object
□ A detailed description of the object
□ Where to buy the object
□ The cost of the object
□ Important information about the retailer
□ Why you have chosen to blog about the particular object
□ Why others might be interested in the object
□ If possible, include an image of your object
You may comment on each other’s entries in your postings. And, you may use spellings, symbols, phrasings, and voices that are appropriate to blogging in an academic setting.
II. Blog Reflection:
By the deadline noted on your syllabus, you must bring to class a two-page reflection (double-spaced) on your observations of patterns in the Shopping Blog. Address the following questions in conventional academic prose:
□ What did you find compelling about the process of finding objects and writing about them for the blog?
□ What patterns do you notice given the objects described in the class blog? What patterns do you notice about the commentary about products?
□ What observations can you make about gender and sexuality given the blog entries? (E.g. consider who the product is for, how it is packaged, how it is priced, how it is used, where it is sold, etc….)
□ What are your analytical thoughts about your observations? (E.g. why do you think people “need” this stuff? Why do you think, say, the majority of products are for women? Why do you think the majority of products are very expensive? Why do you think more than half of the products are packaged in pink? Etc….)
□ Include a statement at the end of your reflection that describes the direction you will take in your final paper. You may want to use the sentence starter, “Given these observations of the Shopping Blog, I will write my paper about…..”
III. Researching and Drafting the Shopping Blog Paper:
The purpose of this paper is to provide you with an opportunity to express your reflections on the relationships between consumption, gender and sexuality. The paper has a number of requirements:
□ It must be based in an observation you made from the Shopping Blog
□ It must discuss how consumption affects definitions of gender and sexuality or is generated by or informed by gender and sexuality, or has some other relationship to gender and sexuality
□ It must involve reference to a relevant scholarly source
□ It must take a stance on the ethics of consumption and discuss how consumption should be approached in our society in order to ensure equity and the moral health of individuals and communities ( Ex. What should consumers do? What should manufacturers do? Advertisers? The media? Community? The specific role of women and men?).
There are a number of other requirements related to conventional academic writing that must also be present in your paper:
□ Your paper must have a main point that it wants to push
□ The main point of the paper must be well-developed and supported with interesting examples
□ The narrative must be well-organized and easy to follow
□ References must be properly cited within the narrative and in a bibliography at the end of the paper
□ Conventional grammar must be used
□ Double-space; 12 pt. font; 1” margins; black ink—the usual…
Essentially, you will have to sort out a question that you would like to discuss and a reason for discussing it. Here are some paper topics to get you started. Other paper topics are welcomed but you have to run them by me first.
Paper Topic Suggestions:
1. The Mini-Ethnography Paper: Select an object from the Shopping Blog and explore why people (men? women? straight people? gay people?) think they need this object? Why do people see the object as a necessity as opposed to a luxury? What role do you see advertising, the media, or other social forces playing in shaping the definition of this object as a “must have/need” object?
Take a poll among 10 or more people to find out more specifically how this object is viewed (by consumers and non-consumers of the product). Include your informants’ responses in an appendix to your paper.
2. Advertising Images: Select an object from the blog and closely examine the advertising campaign that has been developed to sell this product (in magazines, television, the Internet, radio, billboards, etc.). Analyze the messages about gender and/or sexuality that are expressed in this product’s advertising campaign. What are the images saying about the nature of women, men, others, sexuality, etc. Include samples of these in an appendix to your paper.
3. The Producers Behind the Scenes: Select an item from the blog and explore the manufacturing side of the product. Find out where and how the product is made, who are the laborers, and what are social conditions of the laborers. Using secondary sources, investigate the working conditions of the laborers.
4. To be continued…..
Research Expectations:
I am expecting you to consult the views and knowledge of researchers who have also written about your topic. For some, this may mean gathering more background information about a product or company. For others, it may entail researching different points of view related to a particular debate. If you are unsure of what to look for, talk to me.
Below is a list of resources that may be useful.
The Pew Research Center (http://people-press.org/): Has polls on trends in consumerism in the United States among other issues.
The Harris Poll (http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/aboutpoll.asp) : Conducts public opinion polls on random topics (from pop culture to politics)
To be continued
IV. Writing Workshop: Peer Critique of Drafts
We will spend one class period providing feedback for each others’ papers. This will require you to submit three (3) extra copies of your essay in the class period before the writer’s workshop session (check syllabus for the date). These copies will be distributed to classmates who will read them and prepare comments for you in advance. On the day of the writing workshop, we will share comments and compare notes.
On the draft submission day be prepared with a thoughtful and complete draft (it is as if you were going to hand in your paper that day). Semi-drafts will not receive credit toward the final grade for the essay.
V. Revision and Final Submission of Paper
Consider the feedback that you have received from your peers and revise (possibly even rework) your paper.
Submit your final paper on time. The grades of late papers will be docked a whole letter grade for each day of lateness. Check the syllabus for submission due date.
To understand how consumption processes at “home” have global reach and shape the lives of women and men in different ways in various parts of the world.
To reflect on the ethics of consumption and the social responsibility of individuals towards consumption---How should we approach consumption in order to ensure equity and the moral health of individuals and communities?
Readings: You may use any of the readings or films from the course syllabus. You will be required to use additional scholarly sources for your final paper. You will choose these sources based on the topic of your essay. Some suggestions are listed below.
Background:
It is timely that we take a close look at consumption in American society. We live in a society that is based upon mass consumption. We are surrounded by malls, department stores, commercial strips, supermarkets, and now numerous shopping opportunities on-line and on television. Some of us live to shop.
In the past decade or so, consumerism in the U.S. reached new heights as people were buying or striving to buy big houses, big cars, tons of brand name clothing, televisions for every room in the house, and lots of other stuff. Credit cards and loans were easy to get. People began living way beyond their means. We became a society of “overconsumption.”
As you know, things have changed in recent months. The United States is in an economic recession which is affecting the rhythms of the global economy. In the U.S., unemployment is super-high. Folks are losing their homes to foreclosure. People are struggling to pay their credit card debt. The downside to our enthusiasm for consumption is now being exposed. This is a sobering moment for American consumers. The time has come to rethink the meaning of consumption and how we participate in its processes.
But isn’t ANTH 308 is a course about gender and sexuality? How does consumption relate to these topics? Through the Shopping Blog assignment we will explore how gender and sexuality are intimately tied to consumption. To start thinking about the connections ask yourself: Who do we think of as the “shopaholics” in our society? But is it true that women are more into shopping than men? Why is sex such a popular theme in advertisements for cars, hamburgers, beer, soap and other things that have nothing to do with sex? How are women and men featured in these advertisements? How are consumers being disciplined to think about women, men, and sex as a result of these images?
What about how products are made for our consumption? Does this have anything to do with gender? For example, who is sewing designer jeans for us? Who is attaching the rubber sole to our Nike sneakers? Who is doing the data entry for the credit card companies that front the money for our purchases? You may be surprised to know that women in Morocco and Honduras make our jeans, women in China glue together our sneakers, and women in Barbados process data for our credit cards. How we consume in the United States, evidently, has its reverberations throughout the world, and, in fact, influences women, their relationships with men, households, and economic power. It goes without saying—as you will learn in this class—that these changes provide the foundations for definitions of femininity and masculinity in different cultures around the world.
This semester, we will talk about consumption in our lives and use our observations and experiences as material for analyzing how consumption intersects gender and sexuality. The Shopping Blog assignment provides us a structure of organizing our observations and thinking through the meanings of consumption.
The Tasks: There are five tasks involved in this project:
1) Shopping Blog Postings
2) Two-page reflection on the Shopping Blog and mention of paper topic
3) Researching and Drafting a 5 page Shopping Blog paper
4) Writing Workshop: Peer Critique of Drafts
5) Revision and Final Submission of Paper
I. Shopping Blog Postings:
You are required to post four (4) entries to a class Shopping Blog that is connected to WEBCT (pending technology…I’d be great if images could be posted…don’t know if students can do this in WEBCT…also I wonder about the compliance issues if I use other technology—help!). Each entry must describe a particular commodity that you think is interesting and that you would like to add to the class shopping blog for one reason or another. Provide a full description of the commodity and why you chose it. Address the following in your entry:
□ The name of the object
□ A detailed description of the object
□ Where to buy the object
□ The cost of the object
□ Important information about the retailer
□ Why you have chosen to blog about the particular object
□ Why others might be interested in the object
□ If possible, include an image of your object
You may comment on each other’s entries in your postings. And, you may use spellings, symbols, phrasings, and voices that are appropriate to blogging in an academic setting.
II. Blog Reflection:
By the deadline noted on your syllabus, you must bring to class a two-page reflection (double-spaced) on your observations of patterns in the Shopping Blog. Address the following questions in conventional academic prose:
□ What did you find compelling about the process of finding objects and writing about them for the blog?
□ What patterns do you notice given the objects described in the class blog? What patterns do you notice about the commentary about products?
□ What observations can you make about gender and sexuality given the blog entries? (E.g. consider who the product is for, how it is packaged, how it is priced, how it is used, where it is sold, etc….)
□ What are your analytical thoughts about your observations? (E.g. why do you think people “need” this stuff? Why do you think, say, the majority of products are for women? Why do you think the majority of products are very expensive? Why do you think more than half of the products are packaged in pink? Etc….)
□ Include a statement at the end of your reflection that describes the direction you will take in your final paper. You may want to use the sentence starter, “Given these observations of the Shopping Blog, I will write my paper about…..”
III. Researching and Drafting the Shopping Blog Paper:
The purpose of this paper is to provide you with an opportunity to express your reflections on the relationships between consumption, gender and sexuality. The paper has a number of requirements:
□ It must be based in an observation you made from the Shopping Blog
□ It must discuss how consumption affects definitions of gender and sexuality or is generated by or informed by gender and sexuality, or has some other relationship to gender and sexuality
□ It must involve reference to a relevant scholarly source
□ It must take a stance on the ethics of consumption and discuss how consumption should be approached in our society in order to ensure equity and the moral health of individuals and communities ( Ex. What should consumers do? What should manufacturers do? Advertisers? The media? Community? The specific role of women and men?).
There are a number of other requirements related to conventional academic writing that must also be present in your paper:
□ Your paper must have a main point that it wants to push
□ The main point of the paper must be well-developed and supported with interesting examples
□ The narrative must be well-organized and easy to follow
□ References must be properly cited within the narrative and in a bibliography at the end of the paper
□ Conventional grammar must be used
□ Double-space; 12 pt. font; 1” margins; black ink—the usual…
Essentially, you will have to sort out a question that you would like to discuss and a reason for discussing it. Here are some paper topics to get you started. Other paper topics are welcomed but you have to run them by me first.
Paper Topic Suggestions:
1. The Mini-Ethnography Paper: Select an object from the Shopping Blog and explore why people (men? women? straight people? gay people?) think they need this object? Why do people see the object as a necessity as opposed to a luxury? What role do you see advertising, the media, or other social forces playing in shaping the definition of this object as a “must have/need” object?
Take a poll among 10 or more people to find out more specifically how this object is viewed (by consumers and non-consumers of the product). Include your informants’ responses in an appendix to your paper.
2. Advertising Images: Select an object from the blog and closely examine the advertising campaign that has been developed to sell this product (in magazines, television, the Internet, radio, billboards, etc.). Analyze the messages about gender and/or sexuality that are expressed in this product’s advertising campaign. What are the images saying about the nature of women, men, others, sexuality, etc. Include samples of these in an appendix to your paper.
3. The Producers Behind the Scenes: Select an item from the blog and explore the manufacturing side of the product. Find out where and how the product is made, who are the laborers, and what are social conditions of the laborers. Using secondary sources, investigate the working conditions of the laborers.
4. To be continued…..
Research Expectations:
I am expecting you to consult the views and knowledge of researchers who have also written about your topic. For some, this may mean gathering more background information about a product or company. For others, it may entail researching different points of view related to a particular debate. If you are unsure of what to look for, talk to me.
Below is a list of resources that may be useful.
The Pew Research Center (http://people-press.org/): Has polls on trends in consumerism in the United States among other issues.
The Harris Poll (http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/aboutpoll.asp) : Conducts public opinion polls on random topics (from pop culture to politics)
To be continued
IV. Writing Workshop: Peer Critique of Drafts
We will spend one class period providing feedback for each others’ papers. This will require you to submit three (3) extra copies of your essay in the class period before the writer’s workshop session (check syllabus for the date). These copies will be distributed to classmates who will read them and prepare comments for you in advance. On the day of the writing workshop, we will share comments and compare notes.
On the draft submission day be prepared with a thoughtful and complete draft (it is as if you were going to hand in your paper that day). Semi-drafts will not receive credit toward the final grade for the essay.
V. Revision and Final Submission of Paper
Consider the feedback that you have received from your peers and revise (possibly even rework) your paper.
Submit your final paper on time. The grades of late papers will be docked a whole letter grade for each day of lateness. Check the syllabus for submission due date.
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