1. Collective Identity:
Gender Theory
Judith Butler: “gender
performance”
Bell Hooks: “cultural
criticism”
2. STARTER TASK: Build a stereotype spider diagram- what are the first
things you think of when you hear the words “black man”? e.g.
“gangsta”, baggy jeans, white vest, snapback...
Where does this stereotype come from? Find two examples of this
stereotype being reinforced through filtered media representations.
Judith Butler
“Gender Trouble”
Butler states that gender, sex and sexuality are defined by sets of rules
decided by society and performed accordingly.
The very fact that people can say that they feel more or less 'like a
woman' or 'like a man' shows that ‘a gendered... cultural identity is
considered an achievement.'
3. Butler highlights the consistent linking of body type (male/female) with
socially constructed acts, for example it is “natural” that if you have a
male body, you are attracted to females, like sports, drink beer...
The crux of Butler's argument in Gender Trouble is that the coherence of
the categories of sex, gender, and sexuality is culturally constructed
through the repetition of stylised acts in time. These stylised bodily acts,
in their repetition, establish the appearance of an essential "core"
gender.
This is the sense in which Butler theorises gender, along with sex and
sexuality, as performative. The performance of gender, sex, and
sexuality, however, is not a voluntary choice for Butler, who states that
the construction of the gendered subject has its’ foundation within
societal norms and ideologies. These decide in advance what
possibilities of sex, gender, and sexuality are socially permitted to
appear as coherent or "natural”.
Gender is performed repeatedly and over a sustained period of time.
This repetition is not performed by a subject, it is performed by cultures,
politics, beliefs and values; this repetition is what enables a subject to
perform their chosen gender. ‘Performance' is not a singular 'act' or
event, but a ritualized production, a ritual reiterated under and through
constraint, under and through the force of prohibition and taboo, with
the threat of ostracism and even death controlling and compelling the
4. shape of the production, but not, I will insist, determining it fully in
advance”.
Ideologies contain within them disciplinary techniques which, by
coercing subjects to perform specific stylized actions, maintain the
appearance in those subjects of the "core" gender, sex and sexuality
the ideology itself produces.
GLOSSARY
“gender
performance”
“stylised acts”
“socially
constructed acts”
“cultural identity”
“coherence”
“socially
permitted”
“performative”
“ritualize”
“reiterate”
“prohibit”
“taboo”
6. Notes:
It is important to understand that rappers that portray these lifestyle choices
are doing so because they are aware it makes money. It is an insincere
performance, made to be packaged and sold to the consumer. (HEGEMONY)
Rappers are expected to glamorise a violent, deprived, uneducated
childhood and behave as if this background is the reason for their success.
The more this is reinforced, the more young black men from similar
backgrounds start to accept this representation as a true reflection of their
ideal self. (LACAN)
It is also important to understand that the target audience (the person that
will spend money on this representation, usually middle class and wealthy) is
not the same as the young black male audience who see these
representations and believe them to be a genuine reflection of their ideal
self. (LACAN)
When looking for audience members imitating these representations you
need to find examples of young black males from deprived backgrounds that
see rappers that have come from similar circumstances to them and turn
them into role models because they are now rich and successful.
Gender is tied into these performances at the most basic level. In rough
neighbourhoods black men have to behave a certain way in order to gain
respect and be seen “as a man”. They are expected to speak, dress, walk and
stand in a way that defines them as “heterosexual male”, and particularly as
rap music has become part of pop culture and become more misogynistic
FIND AND ANALYSE TWO EXAMPLES OF RAPPERS CONFORMING TO
BLACK GENDER STEREOTYPES, THEN RESEARCH EXAMPLES OF AUDIENCE
MEMBERS (DEPRIVED YOUNG BLACK MEN) IMITATING THIS BEHAVIOUR.
