Womanhood

For the past week or so I've been thinking a lot about what womanhood is, and what it means. It was all kind of triggered a while ago when I was reading Mary Wollstonecraft's Vindication of Women. And when I was reading I was struck with this push for women to be strong. And independent and all that good stuff. But I don't know how I feel about that. I actually wrote something in my reader journal like, 'It's like taking women out of one room and locking them into another room, which may be bigger and a little more comfortable, but a room all the same.' I have a problem with this sort of feminism, that expects every single woman to be strong and independent and the ideal. I mean, do we expect all men to be like that? No. I think that people need to get past the idea that people should be anything. Why can't they just be? I'm actually basing an art project off of this. We are doing collages, and I am kind of taking up gender issues. Like one of them has this pinkish, traditional girly background, and then there is this 1950's style woman wagging her finger, and then I'm going to have Lady Gaga, in one of her barely-there outfits. Because I think that Lady Gaga is great. In my opinion she's combatting sexism by being open with her sexuality and her sexual needs. And sure, she sexes herself up, but she doesn't do it for men, she does it for fashion. I think she's wonderful, and she's going to teach girls to not be afraid of sex, thus on more equal footing as men. I'm really excited. Then I'm doing another one with the same type of background and there is a 1950's style couple on one side, and then on the other side there is one of those body-builder women and a man kneeling down to her. And I'm going to do another one with a manly background with cars and liquor and a man being the center of attention of his family, and then on top of that a picture of drag queen. The whole message is gender rules suck. I'm really interested in this stuff. I think I'm going to do my senior honors seminar on Gender Roles in the Media, and talk about how they are progressing and shifting. I think it will be great. I really like this stuff, and I hope I really get into it over the summer so I can get my seminar thing all done.

Besides that....I'm taking tomorrow off. I am pooped. And I do feel a sin coming on haha.