viz.

(Photo credits:  The Athlete by Howard Schatz and Beverly Ornstein, via SocImages)

Thanks to fitness magazines and the weight loss industry, we've become acculturated to the notion that fitness looks a certain way.  This photo collection by Howard Schatz and Beverly Ornstein challenges our assumptions about athleticism by presenting Olympic athletes with an array of body types, ranging from the typical "shredded" bodybuilder look to bodies that we might view as "unhealthy" in a different context. 

(Video Credit:  QueenBeyonceStan, Youtube)

These images have been circulating just about everywhere, but the subject matter seemed particularly appropriate for viz.  In this photo shoot for the French magazine L'Officiel, Beyonce has been styled in looks that evoke "authenticity" African dress, and in some of the images, Beyonce's face is deliberately darkened.  The shoot--in keeping with one of the themes of Beyonce's newest album--was meant to play tribute to Nigerian musician Fela Kuti. 

(Video Credit:  CSPAN)

Last week, I wrote about some striking historical and cultural shifts in anti-abortion rhetoric.  Namely, I argued that the pro-life movement has been so persuasive largely because in their verbal and visual rhetoric, they have successfully turned babies into the primary object of the viewer's identification and sympathy.  I also argued that a successful pro-choice rhetoric would return women in need of abortions to the center of the frame.  I was heartened by Representative Jackie Speier's (D-CA) speech on the floor of the house, this week, where she talked about her own experience.

(Public Domain Image found at Wikimedia Commons)

I came across this Russian anti-abortion poster from 1925, and thought it was pretty striking.  The text translates to:  "Abortions performed by either trained or self-taught midwives not only maim the woman, they also often lead to death."  It shows a woman talking with a midwife, then a woman in a hospital, and then a coffin being lowered into a grave with mourners looking on.  What struck me about the image is that the argument is essentially that abortions are bad because they endanger the lives of the women who get them.  The pathetic appeal depends on the viewer's sense of identification with the woman. 

(Image Credits:  Association of Religion Data Archives)

What do people mean when they say that the United States is a religious nation, or even a Christian nation?  The Association of Religion Data Archives (ARDA) compiles data taken from census records and surveys to provide comprehensive information on expressions of faith throughout the nation.  Of particular interest to this blog is the impressive interactive map database that allows you to choose and compare data sets in order to gain specific information about rates of adherence, denominational affiliation, and demographics.  I have used these in my Literature and Religion class to help students begin to think about the relationship between faith and other socio-cultural forces, such as immigration patterns and socio-economic changes in a region.  

(Video credit:  NASA, public domain)

This past Sunday at Paris Fashion Week, New York designer Thom Browne showcased a menswear collection in a manner that evoked performance art more than a conventional fashion show.  Male models strutted down the catwalk in creations inspired by the Founding Fathers, specifically Thomas Jefferson's trip to Paris and the Thanksgiving tradition.  Wearing 18th century sillouettes, top hats, canes, and knit caps that suggested powerded wigs, the models carried turkeys down the cat walk before sitting down at an elaborate table and "eating" a traditional Thanksgiving meal. 

If you are a graduate student in the humanities, chances are someone has already forwarded this video to you to remind you what a stupid, stupid life choice you've made. In case you've been spared, the gist is that a naive undergraduate is asking her cynical professor for a recommendation for grad school and gets an earful of everything that is currently wrong with academic apprenticeship in the humanities, including exploitive labor conditions and terrible job prospects. It's one of those "funny because it's true/sad" sorts of things where you don't know whether to laugh hysterically or burst into tears. On second thought, it's probably not the kindest thing to post on a Monday morning. Oh well, too late.

Photo credit:  Pargon, Flickr Creative Commons

There are plenty of negative things to be said about the Tea Party, particularly in the wake of Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally:  that the movement's appropriation of the words and images of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Frederick Douglass, and Abraham Lincoln represents the deployment of unreconstructed white privilege at its worst, that it is controlled by corporate and media elites with a vested interest in obstructing a Democratic agenda (note the Tea Party's inexplicable support of the Citizen's United decision, which seems completely out of step with their populist ethos though perhaps somewhat consistent with the libertarian ideal of unfettered markets). 

Let's get this semester started with some happy, shall we?  This is a 2009 video of a flash mob in Antwerp performing a choreographed dance to "Do-Re-Mi" from The Sound of Music.  This stunt was apparently orchestrated to promote a Belgian television show.  Though common sense tells you that this performance was meticulously organized and rehearsed, it's hard to deny the arrestingly joyous quality of the video.  As with most well-done flash mob videos, both the filming techniques and the performance itself promote the illusion that this was a spontaneous event.  The camera pans to individuals who appear to be regular by-standers, individuals who later join in the performance just for the sheer fun of it.  It's initially unclear whether the crowd of dancers rushing down the stairs is part of the performance or simply spectators trying to get a look at what's going on.