double consciousness

I've always found theories of the other and marked bodies to be interesting, particularly Edward Said's theories, which I did not mention in Wednesday's class. The very basics of his argument focus on Orientalism as a European construction - a process, rather than a definition. It is an invention that serves the function of marking and contrasting an opposite. Furthermore, it lives through academic and institutional traditions as artists, scholars, poets, authors, etc. all write of 'the Orient' as if it were a subject for study.

All of this can be said of other 'minorities' as well... and I think my own process in creating Wednesday's presentation says a lot about just how much a part of academic tradition this process of marking an 'other' is. I took care to try and limit the examples I had - in the sense that I was very aware that my own purview on this subject was in the Asian other. As a Korean-American female myself, I am of course aware of the double consciousness in this respect - and it made me pretty uncomfortable to focus just on the Oriental other.

I'm not sure that I did a very good job of this, but the point is that I felt more weary of pointing out racist ads and visuals than I did for pointing out sexist ads. As an American, born and raised in New York and a student at a pretty prestigious university, it was as if my brain was warning me to be politically correct and equitable at the same time it was screaming at me to stop being a wuss and make my point regardless. I could feel the pressure and weight of that consciousness that I thought was pretty ironic.