tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4980720454317909022.post3348241315767346398..comments2017-06-02T01:06:43.537-07:00Comments on The Strident Geek: The Problem with HotscapingAbi Hhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14513895101815281106noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4980720454317909022.post-31830649938115120452012-10-09T12:35:51.334-07:002012-10-09T12:35:51.334-07:00Thanks!
The funny thing is, they're not the on...Thanks!<br />The funny thing is, they're not the only two. There are a fair number of women who were just as influential, but we never hear about them, or if we do only hear the scandalous bits.<br /><br />Catherine the Great, who was a powerful and capable ruler and corresponded with most of the great philosophers of her time is primarily known for her (partially imagined) sexual exploits. No one much remarks on the fact that the two rulers of Russia before her (excepting her husband who ruled only briefly) were also women. <br /><br />Maria Theresa of Austria was incredibly powerful and influential, and yet we hear very little about her compared to the amount we hear about the men of her period. <br /><br />It's not just that powerful women didn't exist; it's that they are systematically ignored. Elizabeth I is an exception because she was so incredibly powerful and able that they really can't ignore her. Even so, a lot of focus is put on whether or not she was really a virgin, and if not who her lovers were, rather than on the very real challenges she faced in her reign.<br /><br />Victoria is an exception because she was an arbiter of taste, and largely kept to the domestic sphere. Her attitudes and personal choices influenced culture in a way that was fundamentally regressive, and so the male historians and public figures of her time loved her. <br /><br />I'll also note that women who were not regressive are often shown in an unflattering light. There are photographs of Susan B. Anthony in most text books, but the texts rarely touch on more than the bare bones of what she did and why it was important. They talk about suffrage, but don't really discuss the lesss obvious reasons why she (and others) felt it was important to fight for it. Other women who participated in the social movements of the period tend to be ignored entirely.<br /><br />I've spent a fair amount of time reading histories and biographies dealing with the women who were the exceptions to the rule of male dominance. They're there, but we as a culture have a habit of not seeing them. We really need to work on that. Abi Hhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14513895101815281106noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4980720454317909022.post-23826193349718526412012-10-09T07:08:40.165-07:002012-10-09T07:08:40.165-07:00There's another problem, here, that I missed u...There's another problem, here, that I missed until I read this piece. I noticed because my first thought was, "Part of the reason this happens is that we all have a sense of what Lincoln looked like, and you can't get away with making him look differently, whereas few of us know what Tubman looked like."<br /><br />And then I realized that's part of the same problem. Picture George Washington. Easy, right? Now picture Martha Washington. Errrr... I kind of see a painting of some generic 18th-century upper-class woman. Picture Frederick Douglass. Now picture Harriet Beecher Stowe.<br /><br />I had to go look up Mrs. Stowe on Wikipedia, because I had absolutely no idea what she looked like. And we grew up in Hartford!<br /><br />Flip through a history textbook at almost any level. Who's in the pictures? Men. Oh, and Elizabeth I and Victoria.<br /><br />We're fed iconic images of the men of history from early childhood, but such images of women who have played roles just as significant are rare. There are exceptions (to some extent: most of us know Queen Victoria was rather small and round, but not that she was, in fact, a bit homely; likewise, most of us can picture Queen Elizabeth I). <br /><br />Would we still remember them if they were not, in fact, essentially the only two women in the history of the human race who fairly successfully ruled the Western world, one (Elizabeth) pretty much literally and the other (Victoria) as an arbiter of taste?<br /><br />...And even they to get "prettied up" in movies, insofar as the movie-makers think they can get away with it while retaining the iconic factor.<br /><br />Thank you for getting me thinking about this. And thank you for being blunt about it.<br /><br />Myself, I'd rather see the real Tubman, who looks, right at the camera, as enduring and immovable as a mountain, than her prettied-up stand-in who flirts playfully with the photographer.Kokorozashihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10226186864904149792noreply@blogger.com