Day 2, 6 October, 2009

Ok, so its day two of my experiment and I have to say it has been a very awkward day for me. First of all, when I walked out of my door, the bald security guard winked and laughed at me as if we have some new kind of mutual understanding about the world and it felt as if I needed to greet him with our secret handshake, is if I belonged to the Stonemasons or The Skulls or some kind of weir underground goverment agency. When I arrived at colledge, one of my bald Afrikaans lecturers looked at me, gave a big mieliepit-smile and said "Welkom mineer" (welcome sir) and then proceeded, without any sign of hesitation, on some tips and pointers about managing my new 'hairstyle' and the do's-and-dont's with regards to tanning and appropriate headwear for each occasion. There were mixed feelings among the other students, ranging from cute to Voldemort, some people didn't even recognise me at all and I had to say hi first to get a reaction.

With regards to my own feelings, I felt really, really indifferent towards myself while walking, everywhere I would catch glimpses of my egg-siliohett on reflective surfaces, although when I wasn't staring at my own reflection, I felt normal and as if nothing had changed. I think media and the consumer culture conditions one into conformism, I think that I felt uncomfortable with myself because every time I saw myself it reminded me of what I am not. I decided to explore this further and this is what I found:

"Frank Mort argues that the male body has also been sexualized in ways that explicitly frame men as the objects of another's gaze. In the imaging of personal grooming products (after-shave's, fragrances, deodarants) the male body is exposed to the camera as the object of a male gaze in ways that foster a more open erotisism and male narcissism within the male lexicon. Where this exposure was initially carefully managed to draw clear distinctions between heterosexual and homosexual masculinity, more recent advertising images in relation to men's fashion and fragrances allude to both homoerotisism and androgany. An example of the latter might be Calvin Klein's advertising campaign for One, which has youthful-appearing men and women lined up standing in casual, unintrested poses and invites the spectator to collapse meaningful boundries between masculinity/ femininity."-The Body in Consumer Culture.

Ok, drawing from these findings it's easy to see why i felt indifferent, advertising during the 1980's made clear distinctions between masculine and feminine ads, the newer ads tends to collapse this boundry, thus ther is no place for bald, bearded men. lol.

Here is a really funny/cool website I stumbled upon during my research, this is their mission statement and I also added more fun stuff that I got from the site, it's awsome,lol.

baldwall.wordpress.com/category/the-bald-wall/

Mission Statement:
When there is no more shame in being Bald,
The world will no longer need The Bald Wall.
Until that day, the Wall stands
As a celebration of our culture and all it has brought to the world

Every Bald head is another brick in the Wall
So add your brick and join us

Day 3, 8 October 2009

Today had a awkward moment, the streetvender where I buy gum before I leave for college complimented me on my new hair’style’. This motivated me to look at other cultures and what they perceive as masculine.

The Woodabe tribe:

The Wodaabe (or Bororo) are a small subgroup of the Fulani ethnic group. They are traditionally nomadic cattle-herders and traders in the Sachel, with migrations stretching from southern Niger, through northern Nigeria, northeastern Cameroon, and the western region of the Central African Republic.

Beauty ideal and Gerewol festival: At the end of the rainy season in September, Wodaabe clans gather in several traditional locations before the beginning of their dry season transhumance migration. The best known of these is In-Gall's Cure Salée salt market and Tuareg seasonal festival. Here the young Wodaabe men, with elaborate make-up, feathers and other adornments, perform the Yaake: dances and songs to impress marriageable women. The male beauty ideal of the Wodaabe stresses tallness, white eyes and teeth; the men will often roll their eyes and show their teeth to emphasize these characteristics. Wodaabe clans then join for the remainder of the week-long Gerewol: a series of barters over marriage and contests where the young men's beauty and skills are judged by young women.

Day 4, 9 October 2009

Well its day 4 and people are starting to get use to my new look, I am too, although I’m still not comfortable with it. I have also acquired some interesting nicknames by now and I feel these I need to share these with the world, at least it will bring some comic relief to my situation. Here they are: ‘bullet’, ‘kaalkop’(naked head-direct Afrikaans translation), and solarpanel to name a few. One of my friends who is doing the same project as I am (he is wearing a ski-mask for two weeks!) said that if we are to walk around in the streets together, we would definitely be the most suspicious and dodgy people in Cape Town. My beard is also getting very long and I decided to concentrate this blog entry on beards in male fashion.

Here is an interesting bit of info on beards:

“One analyst have even argued that the barometer of men’s fashions can be found in the shaving and trimming of beards! Between 1840 and 1970, beards (a composite measure of sideburns, moustaches and beards) appeared in regular cycles of fashionableness that corresponded to the fluctuations in the widths of skirts. The heyday of the beard was between 1875 and 1895 when the fashion for wide skirts was also at its fullest. Robinson argues that these cycles in ‘style preferences’ resisted manipulation:

“The remarkable regularity of our wavelike fluctuations suggests a large measure of independence from outside historical events. The innovation of the safety razor and the wars which occurred during that period studied appear to have had neglible effects on the time series. King C. Gillette’s patented safety razor began its meteoric sales rise in 1905. But by that year beardlessness had already been on the rise for more than 30 years, and its rate of expansion seems not to have augmented appreciably afterward. Far from initiating a great style, Mr Gillette rode on one to fame and fortune.”- Fashioning Masculinity, Dressed for comfort or style.

So, before the 1900’s beards were still in fashion, so why are beards considered to be a symbol of uncleanliness or even bad grooming habits in today’s (or at least western) society? Well, with the emergence of the pre-and industrial era’s and the subsequent World Wars that followed (as well as Mr Gillette’s invention), uniforms was introduced in factories, schools and the military, in order to conform to these standards of male masculinity and the standards that the western patriotic role models embodied in advertising, clean shaven men were idolised and associated with wealth and prosperity. The clean shaven look also evolved alongside the power suit and today this is the look that holds a shared meaning of power in post-modern, western cultures today.

Day 5, 10 October 2009

Ok, it’s Friday and usually its party time for a student, although today I don’t think that I will be able to show my ‘bullet’ in any club or public space where the luminous lighting can highlight the dents on my scalp. So for this entry I decided to look into one discourse surrounding masculinity, seeing that I don’t feel “man enough” to go out tonight.

I asked myself how I felt- and why I felt like I did, this led me to investigate the discourse around men and their feelings, this is what I found:

“It has been suggested that men hide their feelings (or that they don’t have many feelings) and that they learn to value rationality over emotion. The most obvious example is the way that men are taught not to cry. However, this does not mean that they do not feel. It just makes the realization and expression of feeling more difficult. While women are encouraged to to show their tears but not their anger, men are encouraged to hide their tears but show their anger. The socialization of boys teaches them that anger and aggression are legitimate feelings for men: it is OK to be angry; indeed it can conform to masculinity. This is shown repeatedly in media representations. Men are not encouraged to discuss their feelings and are not represented as doing so. Instead their feelings are expressed through violent action.”- Ideologies and discourses of masculinity, Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2090

Day 6, 11 October 2009

Hi everyone who is reading this, happy Saturday to you all! So, I didn’t go out last, and I felt a bit angry with myself (and with my college for giving me so much work!), well the rugby is on later and it’s the Western Province against the Lions (I support WP when the Bulls aren’t playing- they are our greatest opponents and I want to see them playing the Bulls in the final!). Anyway, being the bald headed, beer drinking, rugby watching Afrikaans stereotype that I am, gave me an idea on my next entry- MALE VIOLENCE.

I have found that male violence has two aspects to it: destruction of others and destruction of self.

Destruction of others:

“Anger may sometimes be a useful response for men and women, but how that anger can be appropriately be expressed is a vexed question. The male solution (fighting) permeates the media, and this may endorse this behaviour for individual men and may promote it as the best way of solving social problems. The ubiquity of violence as a problem solving strategy endorses warfare as a legitimate problem- solving strategy. We are not arguing a direct response mechanism here: that is, we are not arguing that men see violence on television and imitate it. Nor are we arguing for repressive censorship of media violence. Both these are views are too simplistic. Rather; we want to draw your attention to the issue of male violence and to media representations of male fighting and anger towards others. Hopefully this will make you think about what model of masculinity the media offer us and how this might relate to the way men act in the real world.”

Destruction of self:

“Many male feelings of anger are turned inwards masochistically. The culture of pain and masochism is found in sport, one of the defining arenas of traditional masculinity.
Sport is often presented as an arena of endurance: ‘no pain, no gain’; ‘when the going gets tough, the tough gets going’; and so on.”

“The following comments by professional sportsmen show sport as a regime of endurance and punishment for the body:

“Your thigh muscels swell up as if you were going to burst. You zigzag along. The whole body is under pressure. (P. Trentin, cyclist)”

“The feeling of lack of air is terrible. You think you’re going to pass out- that you’re no far from dying. It’s true you say to yourself maybe that’s what it feels like. (B. Thevenet, cyclist).

What these quotations demonstrate is that the body is being disciplined and controlled, pleasure is not involved or, if it is, it is the pleasure of pain- masochism.”

Day 7, 12 October 2009

Hi everybody! So I took a good look at myself in the mirror today and I still felt like I have lost my masculinity, or I think confidence might be a better word for that, for that is, any confidence that I had with my previous hair style in relation to the opposite sex. So, we know that the female body- for as long as I can remember, has been used erotically in advertising to dictate what products and lifestyles are sexy and “in”, yet in modern day society we see more and more ads that represent male bodies in an erotic way (this is also linked to the increase and acceptance of gay communities, but these representations is not entirely the product of the latter). Today I want to explore the male naked male body and how it is used in the media.

First of all, if we look back at the earlier ads, the naked male body is predominantly represented as a source of humour (in contrast to female bodies), this is mainly to diffuse feelings of unease about the naked male body. Think about it for a sec, the naked female body has been represented in art throughout history, I am not saying that there were no male representations at all, no, I am saying that the naked male body has never been subject to so many erotic representations as the female body, the objectification of women had thus become standard and society has become desensitised to an erotic female representation.

Secondly, if you look at ads where the male body is represented as an object of erotic desire, notice that the body is always muscular, clean shaven and the model seldom looks at the viewer, all of this helps to maintain masculine identity.

Day 8, 13 Oct. 09

Hi everyone! Monday madness again! I saw an interesting ad on the net while doing some research on balding and the way people try and modify their bodies to look ‘natural’. I then asked myself what is a ‘natural’ body and is there set standard to the way our bodies should be represented.

There is a discourse with the words ‘natural body’ and the way people try to modify their bodies to fit and to be accepted within western notions of ‘natural’, the ad deals specifically with balding, but this concept can be linked to any form of beautification (including plastic surgery, piercing, scarification and tattooing) of the body in order to fit in with social standards of a ‘natural body’. The truth is that there is no such thing as a ‘natural body’, this concept has been invented by cultural powers and the media, every person is different on a biological level. The body has thus become an political object that can be consciously moulded and changed to meet the expectations of our own minds and what we perceive as being a ‘natural body’.

“As a socio-historical ‘object’, the body can no longer be confined to biological determinants, to an immanent, ‘factious’, or unchanging social status. It is a political object par excellence; its forms, capacities, behaviour, gestures, movements, potential are primary objects of contestation. As a political object, the body is not inert or fixed. It is pliable and plastic material, which is capable of being formed and organised.”- (Grosz, 1987: 3)

Ok, so there you have it, please don’t get me wrong, I am not arguing that plastic surgery is wrong, it is a wonderful breakthrough in medical science and millions of people with severe medical problems (burns, scarring of the face esc.) have benefited from these procedures, aside from that, I am also acknowledging the fact that healthy people (people who doesn’t need the surgery to function normally) have emotionally benefited from this procedure, anything that boosts self confidence is wonderful, even if it is superficial.

Day 9, 14 October 2009

Hi everyone, my hair is slowly starting to grow back; it’s a full 2mm now! My beard is also starting to get really lengthy and it irritates the shit out of me! When I look at my shaving cream I get the feeling that I have lost a good friend. That got me thinking about the products and the way that the copy reads (along with the naming) to keep their masculinity.

“beauty enhancement products aimed at men still depend on translation into “manly” language in order to sell: hair spray as “hair control”, astringents as “scrubbing lotion”, fragrances and moisturizers as “after-“ or “pre-“accompaniments to that most masculine of rituals, the shave. Cosmetic surgeons emphasize the corporate advantage that face-lift or tummy tuck will give you.” A youthful look”, says one “gives the appearance of a more dynamic, charging individual who will go out and get the business”. Such marketing strategies very consciously and deliberately portray attention to appearance as congruous with that middle class, performance orientated, no nonsense version of “masculinity” that has dominated the American ethos since the late nineteenth century. As this notion ascended, more aristocratic versions of manliness became “effete”; words like “dandy” and “sissy” came into vogue, and homosexuality became construed as a disease- of effeminacy”.

 

Day 10, 15 October 2009

Ok, so yesterday I spoke a bit about the products and the way they read in order to keep their masculinity. Today I want to do some more research into the more modern approach that marketers use to sell to men, I think we have to keep in mind that this exploration has a lot to do with gender, and we should also keep in mind that gender and sex is not the same. Sex is biological (whether are you born with a penis or vagina) and gender is your sexual orientation (straight, gay or bisexual). Marketers in the old days use to target only women or men, these days there are niche target audiences for the marketers to consider within almost every category you can think of. My beard is really scratch at the moment and we call that “Die vuil baard” in Afrikaans, wich means ‘the dirty beard’, I hate it, just thought you would like to know that .

“Calvin Klein’s was that of a cultural Geiger counter whose own bisexuality enabled him to see that it is arguably the phallic body- not any female version of beauty-that is the true, enduring sex object of Western culture. But if we had entered a new, post- Bergerian world of male bodies it is largely because of a more “material” kind of epiphany- a drawing recognition among advertisers of the buying power of gay men. For a long time prejudice has triumphed over the profit motive, blinding marketers to just how sizeable- and well heeled- consumer group gay men represent.”

 

Day 11, 15 October 2009

Morning peoples, Bearded Bullet- yes that is my evolved nickname, ok, I’ll give you a moment laugh, point and stare………………… Ok? Done? Now let’s get back to business. Seeing that I have a new alias and I can’t do anything that involves me presenting my identification document and I feel like a new (not in a good way) person, I thought about working around the central theme of “newness” and in particular the new male model.

First of all, we touched on some 19th and 20th century versions of masculinity as well as the emergence of gay and bisexual representations by the “new” media. We have to understand how earlier Western representations have contributed to the new “evolved” male.

“The idea of the New Man has an implied counterpoint- the old- fashioned man. This man seems to be derived from several masculine types: ‘the gentleman’ who is ‘styled and stereotyped as the strong and silent type’; ‘the action man’ who is ‘virile, strong, independent and anomic.’ And denoted by the cowboy, war hero, and Marlboro Man; the slob who is functional but uninterested in speed and style; and the chauvinist who is authoritative and ambitious (but equally ruthless and a misogynist). While all may be recognisable, these types of conflict and refer to different cultural attributes of masculinity. The new man is a contradictory composite: ‘one who sees through the farce of masculinity and all the entrappings that accompany it’ –Fashioning Masculinity

So, is the image of the ‘New Man’ contradictory to my current look? DEFINITELY!
 

 

Day 12, 16 October 2009

Morning everyone! Yesterday’s discussion on the ‘New Man’ was really insightful (and disturbing at the same time) to my current situation. This prompted me to do some more reading on the topic of the ‘New Man’ and everything it said justified why I feel so out and so old-fashioned (and just old for that matter). I currently fall under the category of ‘slob’, the ‘new man’ or post-modern man can also be divided into sub- stereotypes.

“The new man has prompted the fashion industry to distinguish different male markets in terms of lifestyles composed of attributes of personality, roles and prestigious imitations. Types include: the quiet family man (self- sufficient and family orientated), the traditionalist (conservative, conventional and ordered); the discontented man (dissatisfied with his lot, suspicious, wanting a change), the ethical highbrow (aesthete, sensitive, ascetic, discriminating); the pleasure orientated man (macho, hedonistic, impulsive); the achiever (forceful, ambitious, status conscious); the he-man (action man, dominant, thrill seeker); and the sophisticated man (intellectual, socially aware, cosmopolitan).”