Tuesday, November 13, 2007

HW 30b: Citizenship Symposium

On Thursday, November 8, I attended "Animation as Political and Social Constructions", which was held in the Redfern Arts Center, as part of the Keene State College Citizenship Symposium. There were three speakers at the event, all who were Keene State College professors, including Jiwon Ahn, Sander Lee, and Mark Timney. Jiwon Ahn was the first speaker, but unfortunately i had just been arriving from another class, while he was wrapping his speech up. Sander Lee spoke next, as she spoke of the actual art of the Anime designs and drawings, and the ways that you can perceive it and understand the nature of the art. She described the flat style that is used in Anime art, which describes the woman's body's that are used as a symbol, rather than the negative perspectives that can be derived from the art. The woman's bodies used in art, as she went through a slide show of various pieces or art that I found quite interesting, were displayed through provocative clothing, "school-girl uniforms" as Lee described it, or no clothing at all. The woman were displayed in nature and many were displayed with violence. One piece of art that stuck out to me was a woman who was naked, with a large knife to her neck, with blood coming out from everywhere. These images that she showed us were presented to challenge the views that are characterized through the Western culture. The last speak was Mark Timney, who spoke of WWII cartoons, and Walt Disney's objective to portray and incorporate the Holocaust Studies into the television shows. He showed us a clip of a Disney cartoon that featured Donald Duck in a factory in Germany, as a Natzi citizen. The purpose of this cartoon was to show the audience the effects that the hard labor of making bombs all day long adapting to Hitler's demands have a psychological effect on Donald Duck, and many of the once Natzi's under Hitler's control. Donald Duck becomes increasingly stressed throughout the span of the clip as he continually screams "How Hitler" and awakes from what I believe was a dream, if I interpreted the clip correctly, to being surrounded by US symbols of government. Timney explained that this clip expocates Germany and their only thing more powerful than German acts is another stronger state, in this case the US. Mark Timney also showed us a clip from South Park, which h as been aired on television since 1977 which expresses vulgarity, attacks on religion, exploitation on sensitive issues, and blatant sexual content. I found interesting when Mark Timney explained that "shit was once used in South Park 163 times in the span of 30 minutes". Mark Timney showed us a bit longer of a clip from South Park that was based on the issues of 9/11. This show that is most viewed by 18-24 year olds, is willing to get involved, showing good citizenship even though it shows citizens willing to hurt each other through violence and bad words. South Park presents moral issues regarding crime, science, public health, etc.

1 comment:

Tracy Mendham said...

You captured a lot of the talks quite well, especially Mark Timney's, quite well. Jiwon Ahn was actually the woman who talked about anime, and Sander Lee the man who talked about the Warner Brothers and Disney cartoons, but your confusion is understandable, since you had to get there just after it began.