Halloween

A Very Viz-y Halloween: The Horror of the Female Body

Samara from The Ring sitting in a psychiatric ward, hooked up to wires

Image Credit: Picgifs.com 

At least once a year, my fevered, candy-addle, jumped-up-on-Halloween brain grapples with the compelling notion that the horror genre somehow contains the key to unlock some delightful secrets about our cultural, if not our human, condition. The genre fascinates because its appeal rests on its ability to draw forth all of the emotional and physiological reaction we, as a species, have been conditioned to be very, very wary of. I can understand why romantic comedies command so much cultural popularity, but horror movies? Revulsion, repulsion, terror, horror, disgust...the viewer is bombarded with stimuli that are designed to make you feel as though you should flee as quickly as you possibly can, and yet, riveted we sit, consuming horror with more fervor and delight than we consume popcorn. So how does this genre relate to gender?

Halloween, People Watching, and Fashion

A photograph of a person in clownish garb holding a stuffed toy that is vaguely shaped like a human chromosome. He/she is wearing a giant bulbous wig made of colored pieces of fabric. The caption provided says "I'm not a homeless person. I'm Tim Burton's reimagining of a homeless person."

Image Credit: Halloweenorwilliamsburg.com

Halloween season put me in mind of the hipster-bashing tumblr Halloween or Williamsburg that emerged around this time last year.  The microblog features crowd-sourced photos of people in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, whose over-the-top fashion choices cause daily confusion about whether or not it is Halloween.  The website’s wittily-captioned parade of fools is relentlessly funny, though it inevitably delivers a slightly skewed version of reality. (I've never been to Williamsburg, but I imagine not every resident reaches for the costume box when they get dressed every morning.) But that’s partly why the site offers such a satisfying experience. Scrolling through its photo logs is like going people watching and seeing only the “gems.” It’s like a walk down Telegraph Avenue sans the drab-looking Cal students. 

Mashups and Misreadings: “We’re a Culture, Not a Costume” Revisited

STARS: Arab-American student holding a picture of a person dressed as a Muslim terrorist

Image credit: STARS

I know that we just survived another Halloween, so you’re probably already on to thinking about your Thanksgiving plans. Humor me as I ask us to think about Halloween again. While perusing Colorlines, a daily news site about contemporary racial justice issues, I stumbled upon a fantastic visual campaign by Ohio University’s Students Teaching about Racism in Society (STARS) organization. The campaign, “We’re a Culture, Not a Costume,” is smart, scathing, and to the point. It’s everything I ever wanted in a campaign to raise awareness about the everyday racism that is often shrugged off in moments of embarrassment and frustration. As expected, the campaign has garnered national attention, but its message has been mocked by mashups posted all over the Internet. We need to think critically about the messages about racism in both STARS’ campaign and in its Photoshopped reiterations. Something’s askew in the mashup world, if you ask me.

"Trick or Treat, Smell my Feet..."

kid in skeleton costume

H/T: The New York Times

I found that I just couldn't resist finding some possible posting that connects to Halloween and it didn't take me long to stumble across an article in the New York Times that focuses on grade school guidelines for appropriate costumes.  Apparently several elementary and secondary schools across the county are urging (or requiring) students to limit their choice of costume to selections that are not scary, not offensive, not violent.  While it seems completely understandable to restrict students from wearing costumes that rely on offensive stereotypes, I wonder where these schools draw the line on what exactly is appropriate.  Restricting children's costumes raises several provocative questions: is Halloween a tradition that does/should celebrate horror?  Are children already exposed to too many violent images (in other words, is a zombie scarier than Grand Theft Auto)?  What should be the role of the parent in policing appropriate costumes?  the role of the school in policing appropriate dress?

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