Chicana/o-Latina/o Gender & Sexuality

A few weeks ago we read articles in class about the women who were abused and taken advantage of by the police and basically the government. It struck me how things like this were happening and nobody knew about them and they weren't brought up in the media or in any communites. Also that these women were in fear of going to the police because they were afraid of getting seperated from their familes or being deported. Why I'm bringing up this article now is because it came to mind when I was watching a movie that is now out in theatres called Changeling. This is the new Angelina Jolie movie about a mother who's son is kidnapped and when the police bring her son back it's the wrong child. This movie brings to the screen how the police force has so much power over people, especially women. They do whatever they can to make sure that Angelina does not fight back against them and when she does she finds out all the horrible things they, the police, have done to protect and save their own asses.During the movie people in the movie theatre were shocked and could not beleive what was happening and how things like this happened. I just thought that it was really interesting how stories like this are on theatre screens and that people were in awe about these stories and yet they don't even know that things like this are still happening to women and we just don't hear about them. This movie was a very frustrating movie to watch but it was good in the sense that it brought these issues to light.

Posted by Purple 30 at 3:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

November 20th at 7pm

The Red Queen by Lorena Duarte, Directed by Brian Columbus
An episodic play made up of a collection of stories centered on the experiences of women, expressing the tenderness, the ardor, the life-and-death dance that women - and particularly immigrant women - must do.
Performed by Katrina Hawley, Marie Williams and Katherine Kupiecki

WHERE: The Lowry Lab, 350 St Peter St, St Paul, 55102

TICKETS: ONLY $6 EACH!!! Reservations are the only way to guarantee availability and can be made at: 651-225-8106 or tickets@teatrodelpueblo.org

INFO: www.teatrodelpueblo.org, 651-224-8806 or info@teatrodelpueblo.org

Posted by Kandace Creel Falcon at 11:21 AM | Permalink

i'll kick off the "shoes are a feminist issue" discussion via this comment in hopes someone 1. reads it and 2. feels empowered to rant in response
are
how shoes, particularly high heels, a feminist issue? how is wearing heals subversive/oppressive? the shoes pictured below are from a popular online stripper store called trashy.com and cost $51 plus shipping. no one i know owns these particular shoes, but after looking in the closets of the stripper friends who have purchased items from trashy.com, it is safe to say all of their clothing is produced in taiwan. from what i know about the production of clothing, i would guess these shoes are produced by women of color who work under really horrendous conditions and and ultimately their bodies are exploited (or even exterminated) so that women in the first world can decorate their bodies in a certain way. what power do women in the united states have when negociating how to gender their bodies? how are potentially liberating practices also harmful to other women because of the ways in which global capitalism operates? what do shoes say about the intersections of race, class, gender, and sexuality as it relates to women's agency, privilege, and ability?

p.s. they're not vegan so if someone wants to explore how that's really cruel to animals and how that relates to the way women are exploited go for it otherwise i might do that later.

Posted by barte102 at 7:42 AM | Permalink

I know this is super late notice, but there will be a speaker on campus today discussing Selena (who we will also be discussing toward the end of the semester). Below are the details, I hope to see some of you there.

Please join us for the last event in our speakers series on Global Media & Diasporic Cultures. Tomorrow (September 23) at 12 noon, Dr. Deborah Paredez of U. Texas at Austin will give the talk titled "Que Viva Selena, Queer Diva Selena" in Murphy Hall 100. Below is a brief bio of Dr. Paredez:

Deborah Paredez, is Assistant Professor at the University of Texas, Austin. She holds a Ph.D. from the Interdisciplinary Theatre and Drama Program at Northwestern University. She teaches courses about race and performance in the Department of Theatre, the Center for Mexican American Studies, and the Center for African & African American Studies. Her recent scholarship has focused on U.S. Latina/o performance and popular culture. Her articles, "Remembering Selena, Re-membering Latinidad," (Theatre Journal, 2002) and "Becoming Selena, Becoming Latina" (Women and Migration in the US-Mexico Borderlands, Duke University Press, 2007) comprise part of her forthcoming book, Selenidad: Selena, Latinos, and the Performance of Memory, that explores the afterlife of the Tejana performer, Selena Quintanilla Perez. Her next project will focus on arts activism among communities of color in the Bronx.

Posted by Kandace Creel Falcon at 10:34 AM | Permalink

1. I apologize for my lack of articulation in class. 2. We needed some controversy, right? Now I apologize for my numerical phrasing ;)

Here's the deal. I have no authority on which to speak here. My apologies are sincere in the case that I did offend. Feel free to tell me to my face or write mean things about me on the bathroom wall.

In regard to Chicana Gender and Sexuality Politics, I have nothing. My school of thought was grounded in this question. "How do we subvert the white, patriarchal, heteronormative?" I did not consider "audience" because I am always challenging these constructs. I was more channeling a gut reaction of what my ideas of the majority are. I was not arguing its place, existentially, by any means. I think of academic work, as in the Trujillo, as a means in which, simplistically, will endlessly reshape "thought" so that it trickles on down to the "US Weekly" reader.

What perhaps allowed me to bring this perspective into play, was the critique of the art we had looked at in class. We not only read it from our perspective, but we also read how it was received by the powers that be. Though the art may not have been intended for that audience, it isn't any less valid to speculate on the audience it did reach.

Therefore, my gut reaction rested in the majority's ability to use something subversive against the movement itself. i.e. the magazine cover got cut because it went too far. There is room to say that sexualizing a figure, who for some is the epitome of virtue and truth, could work against the initial reclaiming of that figure. I'm not subscribing to this thought... but here we go...

-Today's Devil's Advocate

P.S. If nothing else, we will all solidify and redefine the reasons the above is completely irrelevant.

Posted by rusco001 at 3:36 PM | Permalink

Laura Garcia and Sandra Gutierrez will discuss their book Teatro Chicana at the University of Minnesota Bookstore on Wednesday, September 24 at 4:00 p.m.

Who: Laura Garcia and Sandra Gutierrez

What: Reading and book signing

When: Wednesday, September 24 at 4:00 p.m.

Where:University of Minnesota Bookstore
300 Washington Ave. S.E. Minneapolis

Contact: Kari Erpenbach, University of Minnesota Bookstore
(612) 625-6564
kari@umn.edu

MINNEAPOLIS, MN—(September 2, 2008) Laura Garcia and Sandra Gutierrez, members of the Mexican Theatre group Teatro de las Chicanas, and editors of the book Teatro Chicana: A Collective Memoir and Selected Plays, will discuss their book on Wednesday, September 24 at 4:00 p.m. at the University of Minnesota Bookstore in Coffman Memorial Union, 300 Washington Ave. S.E. Minneapolis.

Teatro Chicana is a first hand history of a Chicana women’s political theatre group that operated in the 1970s and 1980s in San Diego. The group performed plays addressing social, gender, and political issues of the working class and the Chicano Movement. In this collective memoir, seventeen women come together to share why they joined the theatre and how it transformed their lives.

Garcia and Gutierrez, will sign copies of their book following the discussion. This event is free and open to the public. For more information, or to order a signed copy visit www.bookstore.umn.edu/genref/authors.html.

Posted by Kandace Creel Falcon at 11:07 AM | Permalink

How to Make it to the Dance Floor: A Salsa Guide for Women
(Based on Actual Experiences)
written by Cindy García

Monday, 7:00 pm, September 22, 2008
Arena Theatre in Rarig, West Bank, University of Minnesota
Free

Summary
How to Make it to the Dance Floor is a play about salsera wallflowers on a Saturday night in a fictional Los Angeles nightclub. A (red-haired) Chicana feminist ethnographer records the night's events on the bathroom wall. When the wallflowers challenge The Ethnographer's interpretations, they collectively decipher four crucial rules for salseras. Their different histories, experiences, and dance styles propel their encounters, truces, and clashes on the dance floor.

This staged reading is presented by Diverse Voices at the University of Minnesota.
This production is co-sponsored by the Office of the Vice President and Vice Provost for Equity and Diversity.

Posted by Kandace Creel Falcon at 2:53 PM | Permalink