Friday, December 11, 2009
A thousand a day...8
Seeing as today is the 8th day and 8 is my favorite number, it's only appropriate that I woke up to this outside my window:
Thursday, December 10, 2009
A thousand a day...7
I found an opinion!
I have officially written for every section of The Pendulum. My final section, and in my opinion the most terrifying, was opinions. But this week, Morgan Little, the opinions editor, convinced me to find an opinion and write my first column. So, here it is...I found an opinion on "Twilight":
The "Twilight" series didn't invent the concept of women existing solely to find the men to marry and begin a family with. The series just perpetuates a theme that has survived in popular culture for decades. Author Stephenie Meyer even references the classic love stories of "Wuthering Heights" and "Romeo and Juliet" in her own story.
The readership of "Twilight" is the same general audience for Disney stories where the damsel in distress spends the entire tale seeking her Prince Charming. Young girls, who have never been in love before, are reading these books and gaining a false idea of what first love is like. Edward and his ilk set a high bar for men. Who wouldn't want the mysterious man with a classically tortured soul? He's beautiful, polite, refined, listens to classical music and sparkles in the sun. Any young girl would want that.
According to Box Office Mojo, "‘New Moon' distributor Summit Entertainment's exit polling indicated that 80 percent of the audience was female and 50 percent was under 21 years old." No matter how appealing the "Twilight" series is, and regardless of how many times girls devour the books and watch the movies, the negative connotations the themes have regarding gender roles in the context of romantic relationships cannot be avoided.
Women in popular culture are often portrayed as weak. Bella Swan "wins" in the end by getting the guy, but what she teaches her young female audience along the way lacks empowerment. When Edward leaves her, she falls apart and loses her will to live. Because of her full devotion to Edward, she has no friends to turn to in her time of need.
From the very beginning of the "Twilight" series, it's apparent that Bella's only goal is to be with Edward forever. She doesn't want college, she doesn't want a job and she doesn't even want children.
But it's not Edward's fault. Everything that drives Bella is about him. Edward pushes her to experience all those human things she would rather not have.
Any cultural production reflects the populace as a whole, and the themes in turn influence society. In the same way, it also reinforces how we perceive gender, said Lynn Huber, assistant professor of religious studies and the women's/gender studies program coordinator at Elon.
A practicing Mormon, Meyer is writing from a particular perspective with very clear thoughts on religion and sex. Beyond the theme of abstinence, Religion Dispatches cites the Mormon values of eternal marriage and family life as the strongest themes in "Twilight."
Rebecca Pope-Ruark, assistant professor of English at Elon, taught a vampire literature Winter Term class that included "Twilight." She said one has to take Bella for who she is: a 17-year-old girl who is bound to grow unhealthily attached to her first love. If Bella had been 25 years old, then she would be considered supremely weak. Like Bella, when someone we love leaves us, we seek validation elsewhere. When Edward left, Bella ran to Jacob Blake for safety and to seek that validation.
It's a puzzle as to why popular culture is ridden with weak female characters. When it comes to the best sellers and blockbusters, a damsel in distress sells.
"New Moon" brought in a $143 million opening weekend. Women today aren't weak, but for some reason, we relate to the weak characters in popular culture. Maybe our nurturing tendencies lend themselves to pitying characters like Bella. Or maybe those weak characters help us find that fulfillment we've been seeking in knowing we are stronger than them.
The "Twilight" series won't be the last to present its female protagonist as powerless. The themes of eternal love and finding a soul mate ring true because of what we've been taught: to be attracted to the mythical male savior figure. We want someone to take care of us and protect us while we, in turn, can take care of them. It's become so culturally ingrained that it's nearly impossible to step out of it.
When 'Twilight' loses its sparkle
There he stood like the Greek Adonis. There she stood several feet away, tortured by the desire to approach him and weave her fingers through his tousled bronze hair and stare into his molten gold eyes. When his gravitational pull inevitably draws her close enough to touch him, realization hits. He's too good to be true. He does not actually exist. She crumbles on the spot.The "Twilight" series didn't invent the concept of women existing solely to find the men to marry and begin a family with. The series just perpetuates a theme that has survived in popular culture for decades. Author Stephenie Meyer even references the classic love stories of "Wuthering Heights" and "Romeo and Juliet" in her own story.
The readership of "Twilight" is the same general audience for Disney stories where the damsel in distress spends the entire tale seeking her Prince Charming. Young girls, who have never been in love before, are reading these books and gaining a false idea of what first love is like. Edward and his ilk set a high bar for men. Who wouldn't want the mysterious man with a classically tortured soul? He's beautiful, polite, refined, listens to classical music and sparkles in the sun. Any young girl would want that.
According to Box Office Mojo, "‘New Moon' distributor Summit Entertainment's exit polling indicated that 80 percent of the audience was female and 50 percent was under 21 years old." No matter how appealing the "Twilight" series is, and regardless of how many times girls devour the books and watch the movies, the negative connotations the themes have regarding gender roles in the context of romantic relationships cannot be avoided.
Women in popular culture are often portrayed as weak. Bella Swan "wins" in the end by getting the guy, but what she teaches her young female audience along the way lacks empowerment. When Edward leaves her, she falls apart and loses her will to live. Because of her full devotion to Edward, she has no friends to turn to in her time of need.
From the very beginning of the "Twilight" series, it's apparent that Bella's only goal is to be with Edward forever. She doesn't want college, she doesn't want a job and she doesn't even want children.
But it's not Edward's fault. Everything that drives Bella is about him. Edward pushes her to experience all those human things she would rather not have.
Any cultural production reflects the populace as a whole, and the themes in turn influence society. In the same way, it also reinforces how we perceive gender, said Lynn Huber, assistant professor of religious studies and the women's/gender studies program coordinator at Elon.
A practicing Mormon, Meyer is writing from a particular perspective with very clear thoughts on religion and sex. Beyond the theme of abstinence, Religion Dispatches cites the Mormon values of eternal marriage and family life as the strongest themes in "Twilight."
Rebecca Pope-Ruark, assistant professor of English at Elon, taught a vampire literature Winter Term class that included "Twilight." She said one has to take Bella for who she is: a 17-year-old girl who is bound to grow unhealthily attached to her first love. If Bella had been 25 years old, then she would be considered supremely weak. Like Bella, when someone we love leaves us, we seek validation elsewhere. When Edward left, Bella ran to Jacob Blake for safety and to seek that validation.
It's a puzzle as to why popular culture is ridden with weak female characters. When it comes to the best sellers and blockbusters, a damsel in distress sells.
"New Moon" brought in a $143 million opening weekend. Women today aren't weak, but for some reason, we relate to the weak characters in popular culture. Maybe our nurturing tendencies lend themselves to pitying characters like Bella. Or maybe those weak characters help us find that fulfillment we've been seeking in knowing we are stronger than them.
The "Twilight" series won't be the last to present its female protagonist as powerless. The themes of eternal love and finding a soul mate ring true because of what we've been taught: to be attracted to the mythical male savior figure. We want someone to take care of us and protect us while we, in turn, can take care of them. It's become so culturally ingrained that it's nearly impossible to step out of it.
Many men's trash, anyone's treasure
This is my final story as an editor at The Pendulum...and in true Ashley style, it's a feature story:
Melissa Kansky went along with me and shot this video.
In the back of the store, one can find melted and flattened green glass bottles in one corner and dolls made out of old T-shirts in the opposite corner. The main room is lined in plastic blue barrels filled to the brim with buttons, hangers, stockings, Burger King crowns and other random trinkets.
In the Artist's Marketplace, one can discover everything from an adorned Chinese checkerboard, a necklace made with spoon handles, purses, decorative buttons to a cardboard construction of WALL-E.
And that just scratches the surface of the layout of The Scrap Exchange in Durham, N.C.
The creative reuse center is a place for artists, children, teachers, collectors and anyone with an imagination. Its mission is "to promote creativity, environmental awareness and community through reuse."
The nonprofit is 90 percent self-sufficient, and it supplements all activities through fundraising, support from the city of Durham, different grants and foundations and individual donations.
The Scrap Exchange's materials come from different industries. The center specializes in industrial discards, but it has opened the door to residential waste. Businesses and manufacturers get rid of leftovers by giving them to sustainable stores like The Scrap Exchange.
The store receives more than 800 drop-off material donations per year in addition to collections from regular visits to more than 250 businesses around Durham.
"There's only 44 creative reuse centers in the country in 13 states, and we are the only one in North Carolina," Executive Director Ann Woodward said.
Since the store is a destination location for people looking for strange and unusual materials, Woodward said they attract people from across the state.
Chris Rosenthal, an immigrant who worked for a similar organization in her home country of Australia, started The Scrap Exchange in 1991. Rosenthal, along with her husband, got together with some other people interested in the project.
Woodward started in 1994 when she did outreach for a creative art service. She directed hands-on programming, drove to factories to pick up materials and helped with almost every job.
She minored in sculpture at Buffalo State College, where she found a particular passion for metal.
"(I) just realized there is a lot of power in found objects and found materials, and I'm very interested in how things fit together," she said.
Bethany Yoder has been to The Scrap Exchange on several occasions, but was there for a particular reason this week.
Along with her 4-and-a-half-year-old daughter Lily, Yoder was searching for materials to make Christmas gifts for her nieces and nephews. She wanted to make fuzzy little critters with eyes and noses, flags, wands or caterpillars. In the past, Yoder has come to the store to buy rugs for her home, materials for sewing projects and supplies to make birthday gifts.
The store hosts more than 70 birthday parties on- and off-site per year. Laura Conner brought her older daughter to the store for a birthday party with her school friends.
"It's very neat," Conner said. "Kids like it a lot. It's a good way to recycle things."
In addition to birthdays, The Scrap Exchange offers hands-on creative arts programming at festivals and big fairs, visits schools to host creative arts workshops, trains teachers on how to use the materials in their curriculums and leads corporate teambuilding workshops.
School visits cost $1.75 per child.
Woodward came to Elon years ago to lead a professional development course with students training to be teachers. She brought materials and gave an introduction about where they came from.
Woodward said her goal in leading workshops like these is to explain how the process of reuse centers work so the participants know there are resources out there.
"It's like teaching people how to farm," Woodward said. "If they know how to find the materials, they can use that for the rest of their life."
Woodward said her favorite materials in the center are the fire extinguishers and the construction and demolition waste, especially the metal.
"People bring in their collections of fabric, which I think is one of my favorite things that happens," Woodward said.
One woman was making saris with fabric she collected from the 1960s and 1970s and brought in her leftovers. The Scrap Exchange is well known for its fabric and for what it sells from the blue barrels. The barrels are filled with random items with which patrons can fill a bag for a set price.
The Scrap Exchange also has a "Green Gallery," where it exhibits more than 100 artists per year.
"The gallery promotes artists who are using reuse materials in their artwork," Woodward said.
Woodward said the center has a no-glue policy. When people don't use glue, they begin to think about the properties of the materials, Woodward said.
"You're not sitting around waiting for the glue to dry," Woodward said. "You're actually having this vibrant, active conversation about what you're doing with the materials.And you're creating community. You're talking to the person next to you."
The education students Woodward works with have to make something and do a critique at the end of the workshop to talk about what they made and why.
"I like function," Woodward said. "I'm a big form and function person. I want things to be beautiful that you can use on a daily basis."
Exhibit A was the orange flower pinned to her chest. It was made out of a smashed aerosol can top.
"I just think collecting and disseminating used materials should really be a part of the future because we really need to conserve resources," Woodward said. "We can't keep cutting down trees. We need to keep what is valuable out of the landfill and put it in the hands of people who can use the materials."
Melissa Kansky went along with me and shot this video.
In the Artist's Marketplace, one can discover everything from an adorned Chinese checkerboard, a necklace made with spoon handles, purses, decorative buttons to a cardboard construction of WALL-E.
And that just scratches the surface of the layout of The Scrap Exchange in Durham, N.C.
The creative reuse center is a place for artists, children, teachers, collectors and anyone with an imagination. Its mission is "to promote creativity, environmental awareness and community through reuse."
The nonprofit is 90 percent self-sufficient, and it supplements all activities through fundraising, support from the city of Durham, different grants and foundations and individual donations.
The Scrap Exchange's materials come from different industries. The center specializes in industrial discards, but it has opened the door to residential waste. Businesses and manufacturers get rid of leftovers by giving them to sustainable stores like The Scrap Exchange.
The store receives more than 800 drop-off material donations per year in addition to collections from regular visits to more than 250 businesses around Durham.
"There's only 44 creative reuse centers in the country in 13 states, and we are the only one in North Carolina," Executive Director Ann Woodward said.
Since the store is a destination location for people looking for strange and unusual materials, Woodward said they attract people from across the state.
Chris Rosenthal, an immigrant who worked for a similar organization in her home country of Australia, started The Scrap Exchange in 1991. Rosenthal, along with her husband, got together with some other people interested in the project.
Woodward started in 1994 when she did outreach for a creative art service. She directed hands-on programming, drove to factories to pick up materials and helped with almost every job.
She minored in sculpture at Buffalo State College, where she found a particular passion for metal.
"(I) just realized there is a lot of power in found objects and found materials, and I'm very interested in how things fit together," she said.
Bethany Yoder has been to The Scrap Exchange on several occasions, but was there for a particular reason this week.
Along with her 4-and-a-half-year-old daughter Lily, Yoder was searching for materials to make Christmas gifts for her nieces and nephews. She wanted to make fuzzy little critters with eyes and noses, flags, wands or caterpillars. In the past, Yoder has come to the store to buy rugs for her home, materials for sewing projects and supplies to make birthday gifts.
"It's very neat," Conner said. "Kids like it a lot. It's a good way to recycle things."
In addition to birthdays, The Scrap Exchange offers hands-on creative arts programming at festivals and big fairs, visits schools to host creative arts workshops, trains teachers on how to use the materials in their curriculums and leads corporate teambuilding workshops.
School visits cost $1.75 per child.
Woodward came to Elon years ago to lead a professional development course with students training to be teachers. She brought materials and gave an introduction about where they came from.
Woodward said her goal in leading workshops like these is to explain how the process of reuse centers work so the participants know there are resources out there.
"It's like teaching people how to farm," Woodward said. "If they know how to find the materials, they can use that for the rest of their life."
Woodward said her favorite materials in the center are the fire extinguishers and the construction and demolition waste, especially the metal.
"People bring in their collections of fabric, which I think is one of my favorite things that happens," Woodward said.
One woman was making saris with fabric she collected from the 1960s and 1970s and brought in her leftovers. The Scrap Exchange is well known for its fabric and for what it sells from the blue barrels. The barrels are filled with random items with which patrons can fill a bag for a set price.
The Scrap Exchange also has a "Green Gallery," where it exhibits more than 100 artists per year.
"The gallery promotes artists who are using reuse materials in their artwork," Woodward said.
Woodward said the center has a no-glue policy. When people don't use glue, they begin to think about the properties of the materials, Woodward said.
"You're not sitting around waiting for the glue to dry," Woodward said. "You're actually having this vibrant, active conversation about what you're doing with the materials.And you're creating community. You're talking to the person next to you."
The education students Woodward works with have to make something and do a critique at the end of the workshop to talk about what they made and why.
"I like function," Woodward said. "I'm a big form and function person. I want things to be beautiful that you can use on a daily basis."
Exhibit A was the orange flower pinned to her chest. It was made out of a smashed aerosol can top.
"I just think collecting and disseminating used materials should really be a part of the future because we really need to conserve resources," Woodward said. "We can't keep cutting down trees. We need to keep what is valuable out of the landfill and put it in the hands of people who can use the materials."
A thousand a day...5 and 6
I fell desperately behind on my photos because I pulled an all-nighter doing a final project and creating a video for our Pendulum end-of-the-year party. It's been an emotional past couple of days, for sure...especially since today was my last official day as online editor-in-chief of The Pendulum. Sadness aside, here are my photos:
Tuesday, Dec. 8
This is an epic foosball battle among some of our favorite professors during our Pendulum party: Dr. Hatcher, Colin, Dr. Makemson and Dean Parsons.
Tuesday, Dec. 8
This is an epic foosball battle among some of our favorite professors during our Pendulum party: Dr. Hatcher, Colin, Dr. Makemson and Dean Parsons.Wednesday, Dec. 9
Monday, December 7, 2009
A thousand a day...4
I'm in the warm Pendulum office again with my darlings Rachel, Alexa, Sunshine and Pam, and the moon and snowflake lights outside are just perfect for the cold and near-snowy atmosphere we're experiencing at Elon today. I put off my photo of the day until now, which gives you an idea of how insanely busy this pre-finals week is going. I'm going to try to do better as soon as life calms down. Thanks to my Sunshine with helping me decide on a photo again...the pretty snowflakes just outside the office.
Saturday, December 5, 2009
A thousand a day...3
Friday, December 4, 2009
A thousand a day...2
I came across this puddle between the pavilions and the Truitt Center when I was on my way to get Pam and Sunshine for our "family dinner."My final Luminarias
To complement my first "thousand words" post, here are a few other photos from tonight's Luminarias...my final one. It's one of those things I love so much I would consider coming back to Elon just for the Luminarias every year.
A thousand a day...the first
In the Pendulum office this morning, my friend David Wells decided to launch something called "A thousand a day..." where he takes a photo each day. He asked Alex Trice and I to join him on this project to motivate one another, so we all decided to make this a special new addition to our blogs. We're bringing photography back to what's most meaningful in life, not setting out to take award-winning photos, but trying to capture the single moments that say a thousand words.
My first photo is from tonight's Luminaries, one of my favorite Elon traditions. I thought this particular photo would be appropriate for our new project since this is one little light among thousands.
My first photo is from tonight's Luminaries, one of my favorite Elon traditions. I thought this particular photo would be appropriate for our new project since this is one little light among thousands.
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