I used to be obsessed with the Gossip Girl books when I was in high school. I fell in love with the characters- with Dan, the quiet, skinny, loser who was a good writer, with Vanessa, the bald, chubby girl, with Rufus, the overweight and always un-showered father, and with Jenny, the big-breasted small girl, along with all the rest of them. I started watching the actual television show (based on the books) last year. I was agitated they had drastically changed some of my favorite characters. Jenny is tall, thin and although only 15 or 16 looked more like 22. Rufus is probably the most attractive middle-aged man I have ever seen. Vanessa is the opposite of bald with black, wavy and beautiful hair, and although she comes from the lower class it looks like every outfit she wears on the show is at least $1,000. And Dan, although still portrayed as a bit of a loser, is quite attractive and fashionable.
Although these character changes annoyed me I still enjoyed the show. I was among the target audience and fell right into the trap. It wasn’t until the other day in class that I realized what all of these character changes actually meant. Of course I knew they had made the characters more attractive and it seemed to me that they did this to appeal to the shallow viewers of modern America; but it does mean more on an even deeper level. We discussed Marx and Engels and their theory about the ruling class controlling society. How the upper class sets the styles, tastes and trends in society’s culture. This hegemony, or the power one social group holds over another, is accurately portrayed in Gossip Girl. All of the characters, even the poor ones, are dressed in the most up-to-date fashion. Their hair is perfect, their teeth are perfect, and it is pretty rare to find a main character who isn’t white, or at least extremely whitewashed. All of these physical traits are what is expected in our culture. If you want to be hip and cool (which is what Gossip Girl is in our society) then you have to dress and act the way these people do. Wear their rich clothes, talk their rich talk and walk their rich walk.
Yesterday in class I was very thrown off by the two paintings of sunflower pictures. Yes, they were the same thing. But one did mean more to me than the other. I had visited the places Van Gogh used to paint and so his paintings have meant more to me in the past. Yet I’m not going to ignore the fact that yes his paintings did become famous for a reason, besides his talent he also had help from those with money. Although he died poor, his work was loved by many wealthy Parisians. Money makes things faster, easier, more known. And so it was a mix of his talent along with his fortune that his work became famous. This is yet another example of something changing contexts and meaning over time. Van Gogh has now become a label, a brand, a name which everyone wants to have on their coffee mugs. He painted what he saw, his life, his surroundings. People took these images and changed their meanings over time. I definitely see Marx and Engel’s point. Having money, having power, having influence all do in turn help shape society, culture and history.
No comments:
Post a Comment