![]() Adidas promotes sexism in their "all in" campaign Tags: gender, inequality, marketing/brands, sports, commercial, femininity, masculinity, 00 to 05 mins Year: 2011 Length: 2:00 Access: YouTube Summary: This Adidas commercial is from their recent "all in" advertising campaign. It is an excellent short clip for getting students to think about how binary gender, masculinity, and femininity are constructed in popular culture and sports. For example, the male athletes are depicted in more physically aggressive/extreme and high contact sports, and while female athletes are present in the video, they are vastly under-represented and their bodies are almost always sexualized (e.g. in cheerleading or dancing). Possible exercise: have students write down descriptors of the men and women in the video then share with the class and discuss. Possible topics of discussion include how these stereotypes/portrayals are harmful to men and women, objectification of men and women's bodies, and heterosexism and sexism in the media and sports industry. Using commercials in this manner offers several benefits, including a quick assessment of student understanding of key concepts. Submitted By: Anya Galli
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![]() Tags: gender, inequality, organizations/occupations/work, prejudice/discrimination, dual labor market, occupational sex segregation, sexism, sexual harassment, 00 to 05 mins Year: 2008 Length: 1:20 Access: YouTube Summary: This video is an advertisement for Mad Men, a television show about ad executives in 1960s New York. True to the time, women in the show are either housewives, or generally relegated to low-paying, low-skilled jobs. This clip satirically illustrates gender inequality in the workplace by offering three rules for success: dress for success, be attentive, and watch your figure. These pieces of advice clearly objectify women, suggesting that a woman’s place at work is to stay out of the way and serve men. Later in the video the announcer says, “because women are unable to engage with men on an intellectual level, it’s extremely important that they stay in shape to hold a man’s attention.” Again, it is the physical appearance that matters because women are not useful for any purpose other than being desired by men. The video can be used to discuss the role of power in gender discrimination and how occupational sex segregation reinforces gender inequality. Explore similar issues of gender inequality and discrimination in the workplace in another Mad Men clip or this 1980s film, and challenge students to think about how gender socialization has or has not changed using these videos. Submitted By: Abby Kaye-Phillips and Meredith Hills ![]() Robert Reich explains the problem with the economy Tags: capitalism, class, economic sociology, inequality, marx/marxism, class consciousness, 00 to 05 mins Year: 2011 Length: 2:38 Access: YouTube Summary: In less than 2 minutes and 15 seconds, Robert B. Reich explains the problem with the economy by "connecting the dots" and illustrating the bigger picture. He raises 6 basic economic points that students can easily follow. (1) While we have experienced a rapidly growing economy since 1980, wages have remained flat. (2) Rather than resulting in increased wages, these gains in the economy went to the super rich, which (3) allowed them to leverage more political power and thereby cut their own taxes. (4) With less tax revenue, the economy has experienced huge budget deficits, resulting in cuts to public services and the social safety net. (5) This has lead to fear and division among the middle class and, rather than collectively coming together to fight for better wages and policies, people are competing for individual scraps. (6) Without the purchasing power they had in the past, the middle class is unable to jumpstart the economy, resulting in an "anemic recovery." This short clip would be useful in a class lecture on the economy, income inequality, or a discussion about our country's policy approaches to economic booms and recessions. It might also be useful in a lecture on Marxism and class consciousness, for Reich argues that a lack of class consciousness among working people contributes to class divisions and ultimately an anemic recovery. For another clip on The Sociological Cinema that uses illustration techniques so that students can easily follow a complex argument, click here. Submitted By: Valerie Chepp ![]() Tags: disability, gender, historical sociology, lgbtq, media, prejudice/discrimination, race/ethnicity, sex/sexuality, war/military, ableism, collective memory, homophobia, media literacy, propaganda, public memory, racism, remix, representation, revisionism, transgender, subtitles/CC, 00 to 05 mins Year: 2008 Length: 5:32 Access: YouTube Summary: (Trigger warning: this clip depicts violence and includes explicit language) One of the criticisms sociology instructors occasionally field from students is the accusation that we are over thinking a particular issue or reading too deeply into some phenomenon. Similarly, when we draw attention to, say, the racist subtext of a fictional film, one common response is that the film is mere fantasy, the audience knows this, and therefore, there is no harm done. In this remix of the film 300, Craig Saddlemire and Ryan Conrad powerfully illustrate the way morally corrupt characters and those with deep flaws unfailingly match a type. These "bad guys" are often characters with disabilities. They are typically played by Black and Brown actors, and in many instances, the characters are gay, transgender, and/or effeminate men. As is true of 300, the hero's story is one typically told from the perspective of a powerful white man. By exposing these stereotypes and the way they are drawn upon to create the familiar characters that populate Hollywood films, the remix reminds us that movies can reinforce a worldview which values people differently based on race, sexuality, disability, and gender. At the two-minute mark, the remixers introduce the additional argument that "300 follows in a long tradition of US military propaganda," and to visually make this point, the remixers splice together scenes from Frank Capra's famous WWII propaganda films, which sought to answer the question of "Why we fight." Capra's answer was to save democracy, but instructors could provocatively ask students to consider the influence of propaganda and its depiction (demonization?) of the enemy. Submitted By: Lester Andrist ![]() DJDave raps about consumption at Whole Foods Tags: art/music, class, consumption/consumerism, environment, food/agriculture, health/medicine, marketing/brands, theory, conspicuous consumption, privilege, thorstein veblen, 00 to 05 mins Year: 2011 Length: 3:55 Access: YouTube Summary: In this rap parody, DJDave (aka David Wittman) raps about his frustrations shopping at Whole Foods, which includes over-priced grocery items, loud shoppers on I-Phones, and over-crowded parking lots. To illustrate useful sociological concepts using this YouTube summer sensation, instructors can begin by simply asking students: Why is this video funny? Instructors can facilitate a conversation about middle- and upper-class consumption practices; specifically, the clip might be useful in a class discussion on Veblen's notion of conspicuous consumption, whereby upper-class consumers carry out very specific consumption practices in an effort to wield social power, whether real or perceived, thereby conveying a particular social status. The video's portrayal of a "typical" Whole Foods shopper involves a host of recognizable consumption patterns, including the foods they eat (organic chicken, kale salad, pinot noir, gourmet cheese, quinoa, kombucha tea), the cars they drive (e.g., a hybrid, Prius, Mini Cooper), the health practices they engage (yoga, cleansing diets), the gadgets they use (I-Phones), and even the social justice initiatives they are financially able to support (e.g., the environment, natural/organic/sustainable foods). A critical perspective might involve a conversation around whether health is a class privilege, pointing to the high costs associated with a healthy American lifestyle. Instructors can further unpack the humor of the clip to illustrate sociological insight by pointing to the choice of musical genre deployed. Given that rap music's origins are largely rooted in a form of social commentary on the struggles of poor and working-class urban communities of color, the "struggles" that Whole Foods shoppers endure while purchasing groceries is clearly cast tongue-in-cheek. Like other clips featured on The Sociological Cinema, this rap parody shows the ways in which art can provide a useful medium for social commentary, as well as sociological insight (e.g., see here). Submitted By: Valerie Chepp ![]() Tags: children/youth, crime/law/deviance, gender, masculinity, 00 to 05 mins Year: 2011 Length: 2:20 Access: YouTube Summary: This YouTube video from CBS News discusses the controversy behind the J.Crew advertisement showing a mother with her young son and his neon pink toenail polish. The image has sparked a debate, which has been discussed in terms of "appropriate" gender identities and the role parents play in cultivating such identities for their children. Marysol Castro interviews a number of parents for the report and finds that many have mixed feelings about the advertisement. CBS News discusses the significance of this advertisement and suggests that it might be indicative of changing ideas about gender. Note that this video is similar to a growing number of other videos on The Sociological Cinema, which draw attention to the policing of masculinity (see here, here, here, and here). This particular clip works nicely with Tony Porter's recent Ted Talk (here), where he reflects on his role as a parent who actively policed the boundaries of masculinity for his young son. Submitted By: Beatrice Sorce ![]() Tags: organizations/occupations/work, theory, weber, george ritzer, iron cage, irrationality of rationality, mcdonaldization, rationalization, subtitles/CC, 00 to 05 mins Year: 2010 Length: 1:45 Access: YouTube Summary: This is a clip from an episode of “I Love Lucy,” where Lucy and her friend Ethel are working in a candy factory and are tasked with wrapping bite-sized pieces of chocolate as they move along a conveyer belt. They begin fine, however, the belt speeds up and the candies start coming too quickly, leaving Lucy and Ethel desperate to keep up. Instructors can use this clip as a humorous way of beginning a discussion about Ritzer's turn of phrase, "the irrationality of rationality" (which is tied to Max Weber's notion of the "iron cage"). In his popular book, The McDonaldization of Society, Ritzer explains: "Most specifically, irrationality means that rational systems are unreasonable systems. By that I mean that they deny the basic humanity, the human reason, of the people who work within or are served by them." In the clip, the worker's need for the conveyer belt to move at a "human" pace is subordinate to the demands of a rationalized production process, which seeks to employ the smallest number of workers possible to wrap a lot of chocolates. Students can be encouraged to consider other examples, such as the way rationalized food preparation practices have resulted in less nutritious food. This irrational outcome from a rationalized food preparation system is contributing to large scale health problems. Submitted By: Elizabeth Majchrzak ![]() Tags: crime/law/deviance, psychology/social psychology, breaching experiment, ethnomethodology, harold garfinkel, norms, 00 to 05 mins Year: 2008 Length: 2:22 Access: YouTube Summary: Over 200 people freeze in place on cue in Grand Central Terminal in New York. This is one of over 100 different missions Improv Everywhere has executed over the past nine years in New York City. In this video, people freeze at the exact same moment in Grand Central Station in order to seek out non-participants’ responses to determine how people understand and define reality. Note that many of the non-participants desperately try to make sense of the situation and construct meaning. The clip can be used in class to demonstrate a typical example of an ethnomethodological breaching experiment, which is typically associated with the sociologist, Harold Garfinkel. As is the case with the "frozen Grand Central" performance, breaching experiments refer to moments when social norms are intentionally disobeyed for the purpose of examining people's reactions. Typically, when assumptions about a situation are breached (i.e., norms are broken), people tend to look for explanations, which reaffirm the continued existence of the original assumptions. Thus when a person freezes in a busy space and engages in "doing nothing," non-participants will attempt to define what is happening in a way that rescues the violated norm, and in this case, reasserts that people should do something in the middle of Grand Central. Another clip on The Sociological Cinema, which examines what happens when people do nothing in public spaces, can be found here. Submitted By: Ahn ![]()
Tags: art/music, consumption/consumerism, environment, gender, knowledge, marketing/brands, media, social mvmts/social change/resistance, culture jam, détournement, guerrilla semiotics, sociology of culture, subvertising, 00 to 05 mins
Year: (1) 2007; (2) 2008 Length: (1) 1:20; (2) 1:27 Access: (1) YouTube: "Onslaught" (Dove) (2) YouTube: "Onslaught(er)" (Greenpeace) Summary: The pair of clips above by Dove and Greenpeace are excellent examples of commercials which appear to transcend the narrow concern of increasing market share and actually aim to promote social justice. However, more cynical viewers will likely protest that, at least in regards to the Dove spot, the appearance of corporate social responsibility is little more than a sophisticated marketing ploy. By attempting to raise public awareness about the role visual media play in rigidly defining what counts as attractive and truly feminine, Dove is actually attempting to position itself as a responsible brand. In response, Greenpeace created a spoof of the ad, but unlike the original version, viewers are not urged to talk to their daughters before the beauty industry does; rather, they are urged to talk to Dove about Dove's use of palm oil and its role in the destruction of Indonesian forests in order to harvest this oil. The Greenpeace clip can be understood as a practice of détournement, which is a concept originally developed by a Paris-based group of radical artists known as the Letterist International. Détournement refers to the practice of "finding" an artifact, then reconfiguring or re-situating it with the goal of making it newly relevant. The reconfigured artifact typically suggests ideas, which are in opposition to the those promoted by the creator of the original artifact. Thus a commercial about a caring company which bravely invests in exposing dangerous media messages about feminine beauty standards is reworked to expose the caring company's role in the destruction of Indonesian lowland forest. This post is just one in a growing number of posts on The Sociological Cinema, which feature examples of détournement or what is sometimes called culture jamming (see here, here, and here). In the sociological classroom, the clip might work well as a way to discuss what sociologists mean by culture and cultural resistance, which often involves the transformation of meanings and meaning-making practices. Submitted By: Lester Andrist ![]() Tags: children/youth, inequality, knowledge, methodolgy/statistics, prejudice/discrimination, psychology/social psychology, race/ethnicity, social construction, essentialism, experiment, racial socializaiton, internalized racism, stereotypes, white bias, 00 to 05 mins Year: 2010 Length: 5:15 Access: YouTube Summary: This clip from Anderson Cooper 360 shows an experiment where a child is given a line-up of children with light to dark skin and is asked to point to the bad child, good child, nice child, and so on. The child, who associates positive characteristics with the lighter skinned children and negative characteristics with the darker skinned children, is asked why he responds that way. He simply states that it is "because they are white" or "they are black." Cooper's guests comment on the experiment, including discussing how the child has developed these racial biases (e.g. his exposure to racial minorities in his neighborhood and school) and the importance of talking to children about race. Students can be encouraged to think about how children internalize conceptions of race, where these conceptions come from and how this may lead to the development of stereotypes and racial inequality. Submitted By: Paul Dean |
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