Native American - Tlingit

http://www.snowwowl.com/peopletlingit1.html

The website I chose focuses on the Tlingit and Haida people of Alaska. From this page you can tell that they are very proud of their heritage and cultural roots as they give you a short overview of their folklore such as:

"The Haida legend of "The Raven and the First People" expresses how Raven discovered mankind and is responsible for the present order of our universe. Likewise, the Tlingit legend of "Raven and the Creation Story" tells us how the Raven created the world" 

 It goes on to state that, "Our people take great pride in our ability to cultivate and harvest the resources of the land and sea in a responsible manner. We recognize the value of and retain reverence and respect for all life of the land and sea that we harvest to give us strength and sustenance". As is the case with many other indigenous peoples because they have to live off the land instead of oversaturating it with farming and hunting they respect it and do these activities in a sustainable way.

Actually the first thing they state on this website is that they are a soverign state, "CCTHITA (Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska) is the Tribal Government representing over 24,000 Tlingit and Haida Indians worldwide. We are a sovereign entity and have a government to government relationship with the United States." This makes it sound asthough they are a completely independent entity which maybe due to their geographical positioning in Alaska could be seen as easier and more feaseable than paerhaps some other tribes which are on mainland America.

"Our people have made a transition to a written, formal process to engage in foreign government relationships in order to address issues impacting us. Foreigners continue to attack our rights to self-government as sovereign nations, while continuing the decimation of the Tlingit and Haida population, our traditional homeland, and our access to natural resources." This shows that in order to be able to communicate and "fight for their rights" they have made the transition to western ways of communication and its quite clear that they feel they're still under attack from foreigners.

I still find it strange that even in this day and age that people have a complete disregard for indigenous peoples and destroy their homelands just so that they can reep the benefits of whatever kind of goldmine these people be living on such as Oil, Trees etc. You don't just see this in America but also in Brazil, Northern Russia etc maybe if they took a leaf out of the Native Americans book and were more sustainable then they wouldn't have to go and destroy these peoples homeland.

Native Americans

http://www.native-languages.org/oklahoma.htm

Many other tribes live in Oklahoma today, because Oklahoma was designated by the US government as "Indian territory." This was part of the American policy of Indian Removal. Some eastern and midwestern tribes signed treaties agreeing to move onto reservations in Oklahoma and Kansas in exchange for undisputed ownership of the new lands. Other tribes refused or resisted and were forcibly moved into Oklahoma by the US Army.

This website starts with a map of the original inhabitants of the area and hyper links to different tribes that lived there.
You then go on to links about the Indian tribes that relocated into Oklahoma by the US government.

Further down the page is a list of federally recognised Indian tribes in Oklahoma today. There are about 25 listed tribes showing their addresses and how to contact them. One of the tribes is the Miami tribe of Oklahoma. On their website http://www.miamination.com/ they have drop down menus about their culture and history, government and Economic development.
Today their nation has over 3.300 citizens. Their existence is in honor of those who walked before them.
Each year their office produces a number of educational tools and materials to benefit their community.
Their History section has pictures dating back to the 1800's of the Miami leaders and explains about how people for many years have been writing books about the history of their people.

Did you know the name "Oklahoma" is a Muskogean Indian word? It comes from the Choctaw words oklah homma, which means "red people."

http://www.navajo.org/

I found a website about the Navajo Tribe in America. This website is primarily set up to provide information on current press releases, employment availability, special projects and Council news.

Navajo is a nation that stretches into the states of Utah, New Mexico and Arizona. It is known to be larger than 10 of the 50 states in America and, therefore one of the biggest Native American tribes in the States. The nation is known to be wealthy and grows by the years. They have therefore had to work on getting a sustainable economy. Within the nation oil was found in the 1920’s which meant a large step forward in the development, power and wealth of this nation.

In 1991 the Navajo Nation had to go through a reform to form a three-branch system (juridical, legislative and executive) 'the Navajos conduct what is considered to be the most sophisticated form of Indian government.' This website enables the Navajo Nation to feel like a community and to have a vision of their future as a nation, as the website displays accurate and current events within the nation. The website gives quite a homely feel and displays its strong and prideful past with images and layout (their flag, images of traditional clothed people and layout of patterns which their nation is known for).

Another reason for this website to give a community feel is the fact that on the homepage there are several links to upcoming events, jobs and public services. This is mainly done because Native American tribes tend to be disadvantaged in their living environment and there tends to be a hostile tension between people for specific tribes and the so-called 'invaders from Europe' in the early settlement era of America.

In 2009 Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), which had many positive outcomes for the Nation. They got given 787 billion dollars to address to the building of infrastructure and for creating jobs. This is another reason for the Navajo Nation to be one of the biggest and more 'popular' Native American Tribes.

The American tribe website i looked at was for the Abenaki nation.

http://www.abenakination.org/

From the outset this website seems to be primarily there to attract donations to the their tribal council, flashing on the first page before we see anything about the people themselves or their culture is 'We would greatly appreciate any support that you can provide!' With details of where to provide it to. This instigation of monetary agenda makes you think initially that their main aim is not celebration and understanding of their history and culture but rather exploitation of it. Working through the site shows more indications of this as the reader is frequently reminded that financial help is needed and donations welcome. The 'marketplace' selling traditional goods has a more prominent position than the information about their history or contemporary life which again shows a greater concern for the commercial aspect of their heritage than awareness of it.

In descriptions of their history they don't particularly focus on the persecution of their people by settlers but more their re-emergence in the last century and what they are doing to further advance that. It champions various programmes they have instigated and initiatives that all focus on the nations community but also the community around them which presents the attitude of the modern day Abenaki to be very socially conscious. They seem to want to work with the communities around them to reduce prejudice on both sides.

Having said that the underlying current through the whole website is money and business, even down to how the website was funded which is stated on every page 'This website was funded through a Rural Business Enterprise Grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.' These grants are given to small rural businesses to help them to expand, this ultimately shows that the website was set up primarily as a business and therefore the agenda will always be exploitation of the Abenaki's 'heritage' for fiscal gain.

Working Women

I found an image on a website that talks about women working in the 1950’s and different issues concerning feminism in the 1950’s. World War Two was a pe

riod in time where women in America had to take over their husband’s jobs, while they were fighting in the war, to be able to provide the family with money. For the first time wom

en were able to show their ‘masculine’ capabilities by working the men’s jobs. ‘Work that entices women out of their homes and provides them with prestige only at the price of feminine relinquishment, involves a response to masculine strivings’

(http://universityhonors.umd.edu/HONR269J/projects/hchunt/quotes.htm)

Rosie de Riveter who is now seen as an A

merican icon from the 1950’s, was a feminist who encouraged women to work the men’s jobs during this time. In the image Rosie de Riveter is wearing a blue collared overall fit to her size, which shows that it was made for her and that the days of only men sized overalls were over. She has her hair back in a handkerchief, showing that women didn’t always have to wear their hair down and also showing that she is ready for the job. This was an early sign of feminism as it was seen to be normal that women always had to look on their best. A page on the website comments on a quotation found in a 1950’s American High School home economics textbook titled ‘How to be a good wife’: ‘Have dinner ready. Prepare yourself. Touch up your makeup, put a ribbon in your hair and be fresh looking.’ This is proof that by this statement girls were brought up to be ‘fresh’ and good looking wives. The powerful statement ‘We can do it’ refers to all the women who had never worked before and felt like they weren't capable of doing whatever their husbands did at work.

This is an image of Sandra Bullock during the shooting of The Proposal. In the film she is the typical image of a contemporary business women in America. The picture is a typical image for the fact that she is wearing a tailored suit. Women wear these suits to blend in with the men's suits. Therefore, nowadays it seems like women are trying to be like men in the business world. As supposed to in the past when women were expected to wear colors and make up. Business women generally wear their hear tied into a tight pony tale or done up in some kind of way and their make up looks quite natural but powerful, creating a serious look, as portrayed in the picture. Heals still seem to be a must when wearing a tailored suit. This could be for the fact that women don't want to be too short compared to men or because they want to give off an attitude of 'women can be beautiful and work at the same time'.

 

The 1980's was a huge decade for Women in America. Starting off in 1980 being the first year that a higher percentage of women than men had voted in the Presidential election (a higher percentage of women than men have voted in every Presidential election since). This decade also saw the first woman to be nominated for Vice President (Geraldine Ferraro) and also the first American women to walk in space (Katherine Sullivan).

There is no better example of how American Women have progressed and flourished than Oprah Winfrey. She has been ranked the richest African American of the 20th century, the greatest black philanthropist in American history, and was once the world's only black billionaire. She is also, according to some assessments, the most influential woman in the world. Oprah is a testament that you can make something out of yourself even coming from the harshest backgrounds, being a women and at that an African American women. This should be proof enough to the women of America that you can accomplish whatever you want in American society.

Women are now capable of competing with men in every area of the work place, the only area in which men and women do not compete directly is in sport which may one day change but I dont see that as an area of much issue compared to that of working.

There have always been jobs in which women can use there sexuality to earn money from men as prostitution is one of the worlds oldest professions, not to say that I agree with it. The point Im trying to make is that from the 80's to the present day, women have been able to do jobs which may be deemed as degrading to women such as stripping, working at hooters (left) etc but in a sense they are using what they have been given to earn money. A few women take these kinds of jobs to help aid there education or because if they don't have any qualifications and are pretty then they can use those looks in this area, the same can't be said I believe for men.

Although many women feel that this is a degrading thing for women to do and that they shouldn't have to do a job to please men...it's hard to put across because I am a man but I feel more power to women who can take advantage of these guys and make money the ones who end up looking silly aren't the women but the men.

Housekeeping and raising a family were considered ideal female roles during the 1950s, although that standard was less rigid than in previous decades. With marriage and birthrates booming, women were becoming wives and mothers at unprecedented levels. But more women were entering the work-place as well.
During World War II women by the millions took factory jobs to make up for the domestic manpower shortage. After the war the number of working women dropped and the returned back to the job of a housewife.

Women dressed smartly in the Fifties. Good grooming and a tailored look were prized.
Acting and looking "every inch the lady" was taught from birth and wearing a dress was a given.
As you can see in the above picture although it is a picture of a housewife you can see that she has a dress on and her hair and make up is done, the only way the viewer can tell she is a housewife is because of the apron.

The picture I have posted is from the 50's TV show I Love Lucy. The character of Lucy is married to a Cuban band leader Ricky Ricardo and to Lucy, Ricky's career and days seemed so much more exciting than her days of cooking and cleaning. She desperately wanted to be a star and constantly tried to get into Ricky's act. Ricky wanted his wife to stay home and complete her homemaking duties.
In one of the episodes they switch roles, Ricky and Fred think doing housework is much easier than earning money. Lucy and Ethel feel the opposite. So the boys try doing the housework while the girls attempt to hold down a job at a candy factory. Problems soon arise on both fronts. Ricky and Fred cause a huge mess in the apartment by burning the clothes with irons and wrecking the kitchen. Lucy and Ethel find themselves fighting against a speedy belt of chocolate.



Throughout this century, the role of women within society has changed, and the majority of people feel that this change is for the better. More women work than ever before, and it is accepted in Western culture that many women now have careers.

Today we are being allowed to acquire education and also permitted to venture out of doors in search of work, she is also expected to fulfill the roles of a subservient wife and the self-abnegating mother.

The dress code for women today is different from the previous picture. Women can wear skirts or trousers with the "suit" style.

My second picture is of the character Lynette Scavo for the show Desperate Housewives.
When the series began Lynette is near to breaking point - stuck at home alone with four kids at the end of the series her husband Tom quits his job to become a stay at home dad and Lynette goes back to work at an advertising agency.
Throughout the show Lynette comes up against many obstacles that many women face today. She has trouble with her job due to her age, then she discovers she has Cancer and then after all that becomes pregnant with twins, which she has to hide from her boss for as long as possible. The whole family start to struggle with money problems with the childrens college fees and just surviving in general.

Female Images

This was supposed to be my second image but the computer wouldn't let me put it in below, so here it is. It comes originally from a Marie Claire magazine photo shoot for women's work clothing but i found it in a blog from someone who was drawing comparisons between it and depictions of female workers during the second world war. The main vast difference between the two lots of women shown is that (and this is a quote from comments on the blog) 'I would have cast models whose arms don’t look as though they’d snap in the machinery' for the modern pictures. This is interesting because even in attempting to emulate these idolised pioneers of women at the forefront of 'masculine' work the magazine is still needing to use super model's to enable it to be appealing. This being because these clothes though highlighted as 'work clothes' are really purely fashion items that along with their price tag and practicality would ensure their very seldom use in industrious jobs whose image they have hijacked. Now in the post industrial era this image is no longer used as a motivation or display of women in the workplace but aims at attracting them to spend their corporate dollars on the clothing items to furnish their walk-in wardrobes with.

This image is from an advert published in New York Magazine's April, 1980 issue. As you can see the main focus of the advert is emphasising how good these blazers are because they are made how they are for men. This quality is what, the company implies, should make them desirable for women, like this kind of emulation is what's needed for women to enter the workplace. Though no mention of this being clothing for work is made in the advert, the company themselves at the time must have identified a greater demand for women's smart business wear to be promoting it so. The aspect i find most interesting being the shadow of a man behind the woman as it could be interpreted two ways. One, that women are literally in the shadow of men in these areas of society, dwarfed by the great achievements of men in various fields. Two, that from the predominantly male driven world of business emerges the corporate woman, shiny, new and the future.

The images are comparable with each other as well in that both depict how women initially were unable to carve out their own identity within the workplace. First and foremost what was necessary to prove was that they were able to do jobs the same way as men did them, in the same manner, with the same clothes.

American Masculinity's Split Personality

http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2010-07-15/news/bs-ed-masculinity-yarrow-20100715_1_masculinity-gender-roles-inequality

I chose an article from the online edition of The Baltimore Sun in which it examines how the recent global recession has affected American masculinty and the widening divide between groups of men.

It talks about how corporate masculinity is different to that of working/middle class masculinity.

"Corporate or "metrosexual" men have only their investments, hair color and attractive partners to lose, whereas all too many other American men have been losing their jobs, their homes, their families, their status and their identities."

This shows that just because you go out and work and provide for your family in a "masculine" job does not neccesarily still equate to the same feeling of Masculinity as "In 2007, 22 percent of husbands had wives who earned more than they did, compared with just 4 percent in 1970." The men who are seen as less masculine in some senses because they are well groomed and less rugged are the ones with the higher paid jobs.

" "alpha moms" are celebrated as women who can do it all. They have high-powered careers, raise children, and, God forbid, don't really need men. Self-reliant and turned off by today's "losermen," record numbers choose not to marry."

Can the fact that "men in their 30s earn less than their fathers did at a comparable stage in life, while women's earnings have increased by about 25 percent" be to do with the rise of feminism and equal rights for women in the workplace and that because women have had to in most cases work alot harded to get where they are compared to some men who feel like they are entitled because they are men.

This is only going to increase with the educational performance of men falling, "One provocative Princeton study explored whether it's a coincidence that the sharp increase in the male prison population since the late 1970s has tracked the increasing failures of men at school and work since that same time."

masculinity identity

http://emptyselves-hamline.blogspot.com/2010/10/decline-of-masculinity.html

This is a blog posted by a women named Hallie.
Her topic this week was about masculinity and how it has changed. She interviewed a 28 year old man (name unknown) and asked him questions about how easy he finds it to be a man and opening up to other male friends.

Overall he thinks that it more acceptable for men to talk about their feelings and being able to talk to someone has made him become more verbally expressive and confident.

Hallie starts by mentioning “The Hearts of Men" by Barbara Ehrenreich who is a an American feminist, democratic socialist and political activist.

Ehrenreich's book illustrates how gender roles have highly constricted men, not just women, and therefore have inhibited American society from developing its full potential.The most striking element of Ehrenreich 's argument, however, lies in the her assertion that men have suffered more than women from their gender role.

The Misandry Bubble

http://www.singularity2050.com/2010/01/the-misandry-bubble.html

This site contains is a detailed article on the decline in masculinity, how it came along and what are the factors that keep it going. I used the first few paragraphs as my research for this blog. It was written on the first of January 2010 by an anonymous writer and

the title is ‘The Misandry Bubble’ meaning that men and women are currently in a bubble of beliefs about men that makes them look bad and dangerous and that women supposedly have to keep them tame.

One of the issues presented on this site is that nowaday

s there are no well-known masculine characters, like in the 1980’s. In the 1980’s there were people known for their masculinity like Mister T from the A-team and Bill Cosby, they were men that little boys looked up to. Nowadays men are described as ‘thuggish degenerates, or as effete androgynes’ and remakes are made of Star Trek, the A-team and Indiana Jones, but they all seem to only be looking at the past, when masculinity was an image, when it was something to live for. Men nowadays are represented as husbands and businessmen who live under their wife’s rule.

In the article he seems to make the point that men are being accused of domestic violence and adultery and that hereby the image of the man is not what it used to be; protective over women. It is probably because of this

generalisation that men get an image of being bad and it makes the outcome of ‘women to disrespect men, wives to think poorly of their husbands, and girls to devalue the importance of their fathers’

The writer seems to believe that nowadays people believe that masculine behaviour is wrong and whatever women have to say against the right of men is right.

He makes it clear that he is of the opinion that feminism and media have a big influence of the decline or change in masc

ulinity over the years. Feminist statements and expressions seem to make women in general believe that men are above them and that that is bad and the media, for example sitcoms and soaps, seem to be the ‘proof’ for these statements.

Men have definitely gone down in ‘power’ over the years with the issue of equal rights in payment etc, and that could be one of the reasons for men to be less masculine than they were in the 1980’s, like for example the adventurous outdoors typical American husband.

Basically 'The Futurist' makes clear points about how Feminist actions have been a big influence on the behaviour and the image of men and he is of the opinion that media characterizes men as gangsters and men who harm women.

American masculinity's split personality

http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2010-07-15/news/bs-ed-masculinity-yarrow-20100715_1_masculinity-gender-roles-inequality (please scroll down and onto following page for whole article.)

The page relating to masculinity issues I've found is an article from the Baltimore Sun newspaper discussing how the challenging economic times of the last few years have contributed drastically to the vast separation of archetypal masculine personalities. It cites current films as cultural proof of massive divide between the 'atop the world, well dressed, well paid, slickly sophisticated,' metrosexual types, who are made up largely of the upper middle and rich classes, and the 'unemployed factory workers and strapped, often bedraggled middle-class men in modest, if not foreclosed, homes, whose wives and children chide them for what they don't have'.

The article talks about how changes in gender roles both in employment and on a domestic level have influenced the development of multiple masculine identities. It seems that the adaptable 'corporate' male who is able to incorporate elements of femininity into his identity is far more prosperous than the blue collar lower class male, who in an increasingly female influenced world is regarded as archaic and unrefined.

Throughout, the article seems to be coming from a very male biased perspective attributing the male decline in schools and work to the increased proliferation of females in these areas. Even inferring that the same is related to the massive increase of male prison inmates since the 1970's. However towards the end suggests that methods for righting and balancing the socioeconomic inequality that has developed over the past forty years should not come at the detriment of the gains made by females in that time. So overall the question arising after reading this article is if the improved equality of women is not to blame for decreased employment, academic/career success with males, what is?

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