Chloe

Reflection on Antigone in Ferguson (Feminism & Race)

Because I lived in Korea, the only exposure I really had to American news is if I actively sought it out because people weren’t really discussing news about America nor was I seeing it on my television or social media back at home. So, even though I’ve been aware for a while about the conflict between the black population and law enforcement, I’d never heard specifically about what had occurred in Ferguson. This made me a bit confused initially as I tried to familiarize myself with the context, but overall, I do think I took a lot away from the performance and post-discussion: each race has their own problems that they deal with – Blacks, Asians, Latinos, and Caucasians, too. You can argue that each race’s respective issues differ in magnitude, and that’s definitely a valid argument. But, oftentimes, humans are ultimately self-centered beings and will focus on their own issues first and foremost. For example, even though I would see videos on my Facebook newsfeed about police shootings, I would choose to focus on the articles detailing the presidential scandal and corruption in my country that led to daily, nation-wide (literally, everyone in the nation all came to Seoul) protests and eventually, the Korean president’s impeachment. I would grow angered by the injustice inflicted on the Korean comfort women who still have not received a proper apology and compensation for their forced sex labor during the Korean annexation by Japan. It’s really easy to simply care about problems that I associate with my own identity, and a lot of them aren’t even those that really directly impact me. But, I identify with these people, so I can understand what panelist Samantha was saying when she said, “That’s my brother.” I wholeheartedly agree that all races should make more of an effort to familiarize themselves and empathize with the black community and their ongoing history of struggles. This idea should not only be applicable to the current Black Lives Matter movement, but to past and future issues for all races, not to mention the feminist movement, as well. This is not easy because it requires a conscious effort to be informed, but I believe it’s incredibly important in order to become more empathetic beings.

Women in Action & Hijas de Maíz (Feminism across Cultures)

One thing that struck me how was proactive Ana was. You hear about all these historical figures who were able to spur so much movement and reaction in a certain setting, but to meet one in person who is so genuinely impassioned by her beliefs despite opposing forces. In film, we watched a movie called “City of God” about people living in the slums and followed this very patriarchal, gang-infested society. A lot of the scenes reminded me of Ana’s story regarding the woman whose husband was trying to kill her due to the Women in Action meetings. Even though movies are meant to have a certain realism to them, it’s still off-putting to know that a lot of the Ana’s story mirrors something we see in movies, which typically have narratives that we feel distanced from. Hearing Ana’s story in person made it feel a lot more realistic and heightened my awareness of this type of environment.

South Korea’s largest issue is that it doesn’t recognize its social issues as big issues. In terms of the women’s movement, I feel like Korea has recently taken a huge step back. We had a female president of the first time, Park Geun Hye, who was already a controversial figure because her father had previously been president, but had been seen as a dictator. She was recently caught in a national scandal for consulting a cultist on national secret matters and allowing for this cultist to be involved in lots of corruption in the country. There was also a connection between her to the Sewol tragedy as under her presidency, the ferry that sank almost three years ago, had never been brought up from the ocean, causing a lot of the families of missing bodies to rally in protest. For 3 years, Koreans gathered in front of the city hall to protest. After the political scandal blew up, millions of Koreans all gathered weekly, almost daily to protest, and she was ultimately successfully impeached. The new president is, of course, a man, and I am quite sure that if a female decides to run for the presidency in the future, Park Geun Hye’s name will be brought up. I also do believe women are encouraged to be fragile and delicate in Korean society, such as in active, sports-based reality shows like Running Man, the female guests are often complimented for their look only or the men will always take their spot on the team, and there’s also the fact that women are not mandated to undergo military service like Korean men are. So, I would say the feminist movement is not exactly strong in Korea as both men and women don’t seem to find too much problem with it.

The social construction of gender and transgender identities

One thing I noted from the reading by Stryker is how it is not stringent with its definition of gender and transgenders. Rather, it states that while “some people are just ‘that way,’ most aren’t.” It specifies a ratio in the population by clarifying that the majority of people identifying as queer discovered this aspect of their identity in the middle, not beginning of their lives, although there is also another population that inherently felt their identity. Lorber also delves in her seminal essay about the social construction of gender, detailing several occurrences in which we inscribe “gender” onto people, both through secondary biological characteristics, fashion, appearance, and our treatment of them.

The examples of females pretending to be male calls to mind the Disney movie Mulan which follows female Chinese woman Mulan who poses as a man to take her aging father’s place in the army. Although she is at a disadvantage at first, she quickly rises to the top of the pack and amasses the respect of her peers. Despite the perception that a woman would never be able to keep up or rather should be able to keep up with the training and experiences of a traditional soldier, Mulan was able to do so consistently. The movie brings to question the social construct of the physical and mental capabilities of a woman to succeed on the battlefield.

Berliner’s Ma Vie en Rose similarly explores the social construction of gender through its protagonist Ludo, a biologically male child who strongly believes that some mistake has been made, that he was always meant to be a girl. He expresses his identity through his fashion and outward appearance like when he entered a social gathering wearing his sister’s dress and chooses to wear his hair relatively long. The act of his mother stripping him of his dress and eventually cutting off his hair was, to her, her way of saving him by forcing him to follow the social norms, but to him, it was literally stripping him of his identity. This brings to question the social aspect of gender as to how we label these materialistic objects such as clothing, which is in no way attached to our biological being, as solely available for certain sexes.

Treut’s Gendernauts also serves its purpose dutifully: to increase society’s understanding of the transgender population. The cast is a diverse collection of people, from people identifying as gender fluid, transgender, and intersex. The relationship between Tornado as surrogate mother for Texas exemplifies the humanity of these people – as people who lacked a family but found family through each other and through their struggles. The fact that they all congregated in San Francisco and labeling it as their ‘Mecca’ shows their desire for the comfort of home. And finally, a notion that specifically piqued my interest was the idea that they are cyborgs, mechanically constructed to have their sexes match their gender. This term “cyborg,” I believe, is a key vocabulary to understand the social construction of gender because a cyborg is created through change from an original body. They lose a certain anatomical part to gain something else but are still whole bodies despite the change.

An Intersectional Feminist Analysis of My Extended Family

Upon entering college as a first-year student, the most frequently asked question was by far: where are you from? To some, this can easily be a one-worded answer – a state, a well-known city, another country perhaps. But, I am what is called a “third culture kid,” meaning I have been raised and spent the majority of my childhood outside my parent’s culture. I have two passports, experience weather in both Fahrenheit and Celsius, and like most third culture kids, cannot answer the aforementioned question in few words. This is intersectionality; according to Berkeley professor Trina Grillo, the idea of intersectionality argues that “we all stand at multiple intersections of our fragmented legal serves” (Grillo 18). And my intertwining identities do not conform to the homogenous identities of my Korean extended family – family who have only known life and culture in Korea. This key difference illuminates further implicit difference in our values and perspective. In this essay, I will examine how my identity relates to my extended family community in terms of race, sex, and class.

Sexism has a strong, yet incredibly subtle presence in the South Korean society. Audre Lorde defines sexism as “the belief in the inherent superiority of one sex over the other and thereby the right to dominance” (Lorde 115). This is definitely pertinent in my extended family. When my mother earned top scores during her time in school which concurrently earned her scolding from her mother – my grandmother – for “attempting to outshine” my mother’s brothers. My grandmother’s perspective on the notion that men should be academically superior to their female counterparts is an intersection of both her race and gender. To provide context behind my grandmother’s perspective, Korean society is incredibly driven and competitive. After suffering from the Korean War and the Japanese annexation, it is a matter of pride for Koreans to work hard to regain a sense of independence. Thus, academic standing is one of the most important aspects of a Korean person that can determine their class. This hierarchical structure is furthered by the introduction of gender. As Mari Mikkola explains, gender is a social construct, separate from the biological characteristics that dictate sex. With Korea being a patriarchal society, much of a woman’s role is in relation to men and how men view her. As such, female beauty is exalted in Korea to the point where employment can largely hinge on appearance, whereas a man’s masculinity is largely based on his ability to earn wages for his future family. So, my grandmother’s disapproval of my mother’s academic merit was a form of prodding my mother into the traditional path of a Korean woman. And, in a homogenous society like Korea where group identities are particularly emphasized, any move to fit a person into their given role in society is a supportive one. To tie this into the idea of intersectionality, my grandmother’s ideology regarding the feminine role in society is rooted in the culture of her ethnicity.

While sexism is a notable aspect of Korean society, the privilege that comes with ‘class’ is not as frequently addressed. University professors Andersen and Collins argue that “racial classification systems reflect prevailing views of race, thereby establishing groups that are presumed to be “natural” (Andersen and Collins 83). My extended family identifies as Protestant Christian, all individually heterosexual, and most of our family is in the middle to upper class of Korean society. These are all statuses that enable myself and my extended family to experience privilege in Korea. Although Korea has modernized to become a technological capital of the world, the rate of modernization in terms of values and belief systems pales in comparison. Like many other East Asian countries, the LGBT community is nearly nonexistent in Korea. Of course, there are undoubtedly Koreans who identify as someone other than heterosexual, but the conservative society represses these identities to silence. Being a Christian family and involved in various churches across Korea earns a form of respect and labels my cousins, myself, and my brother as “good children.” My grandfather attended an elite university in Korea, equivalent to the Ivy League in America, so we are also in the privileged position of being recognized as academically successful. Although it may not always seem like it, my extended family is in a position of privilege because they are follow the norms of society. This privilege returns simple advantages, such as being able to socialize with the vast majority of Koreans on an equal basis, being able to walk through the subway or talk in public without being stared at, and to receive a good education. I am definitely privileged as well in my own ways, but I do not follow the norms of homogenous Korea as I do not speak Korean well, I do not follow Korean makeup trends, and I do not crop my bangs in the typical Korean woman’s hairstyle. So, I have not experienced some of the everyday advantages that my extended family, such as my cousins have: I cannot speak in public in Korea as my use of English is seen as arrogant by Koreans, my mom did not send me to Korean school fearing I would get bullied, and I was not able to partake in many familial activities with my extended family such as celebrating holidays due to the linguistic barrier. Several aspects of my identity, such as my perception of women’s beauty as a female and my ethnic background, is not considered normal in Korea, so in this context, I am disadvantaged.

It is often hard to see how intersectionality comes to play in a homogenous society like Korea where each individual identity is encouraged to be conform to the group’s collective identity. However, further reflection reveals the connections between a person’s sex and sexual identification in terms of their racial profile and how this can determine their class.