Caveat

• Today we discuss a complex issue, on sensitive topics,
• but we should be able to do so
  • thoughtfully and
  • civilly.

“Asian Fishing”

Appropriation

The Cambridge Dictionary definition implies:

1. “appropriator” is not part of the culture
2. “taking or using” is done in context of an imbalance of power
3. “does not credit its origins or is disrespectful to its meaning” (Cherid 2021, p. 359)

Harms

1. infringes indigenous legal property rights
2. attacks the viability or identity of a indigenous culture
3. negates indigenous meaning in favor of appropriator (Young and Brunk (2009) in Cherid 2021, p. 360)

Are they appropriation??

Rachel Doleza’s Blackness; BMFA’s Kimono; Candice Reese’s mnemonic

What other questions arise? How might definition be improved?

Commodification

The integration of Black culture in contemporary capitalist frameworks has served to “domesticate” the stereotype of the dangerous African American, but only insofar as it can be consumed… Black culture is intentionally being made palatable to a White audience, with the goal of making a profit. (Cherid 2021, p. 360)

Commodity fetishism

Much of cultural/media studies is based on Karl Marx.

He observed that in capitalism, “the fantastic form of a relation between things” obscures the “social relation between men themselves” (Marx 1867/2005).

That is, “commodity fetishism” is how the market obscures human/social relationships in favor of the transactional value of things.

Commodification examples?

• Nicki Minaj, Anaconda
• Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion, WAP

Blackfishing

Appropriation + Commodification

white women who wish to capitalize off of impersonating racially ambiguous/Black women for monetary and social gain… white women wear Black women’s features like a costume.

the same features that, once derided by mainstream white culture, are now coveted … with Black women’s contributions being erased all the while. (Thompson 2018)

Examples?

unlike Lil’ Kim who can only ever embody blackness, Christina Aguilera is able to take on both whiteness and non-whiteness (Cherid 2021, p. 362)

[Ariana Grande chooses] to commodify and domesticate blackness by curating it through her own body and self… as a White person she has the privilege to select which parts of the Black experience … the ones that can make her money (Cherid 2021, p. 363)

Appropriation

the historical logic of appropriation: take the culture, the aesthetics, and erase the race. (Kim 2021)

as bell hooks wrote, this desire to “eat the Other” is intrinsically tied up with a desire to be transformed by an encounter with the Other. It is through this transformation that white Americans seek to validate themselves as individuals

The digital

The “I” is composed not just of a physical body, but the technology we rely on, all those instantiations that live online, all the filtered images that exist in cyberspace — an “extended” self. (Kim 2021)

Lil Miquela

Fetish

Mainstream culture now celebrates artificially rendered influencers like Miquela, or figures like Poppy who fashion their personas as robo-entertainers… The uncanny becomes normalized, fetishized. (Kim 2021)

“Real souls”

Bodies that are mediated, composite, extended, but cannot function without a pulse; that are subject to violence digitally because of violence done to them physically, and vice versa; that deserve to be treated with dignity precisely because they are bodies, inhabited by real souls, living real lives. (Kim 2021)

Coconut Kitty

Using our terms, what might we say of Deets?

Oil London’s transition

If they can be gender fluid, can they be race fluid?

If they are appropriating race? Are they also appropriating gender?

How deepfakes work

Which is worse?

Is Jennings right, influencer tuning is more dangerous than deepfakes?

Wrap up

• Write a “3-minute paper” (bullets are fine) on
  • what concerns you about this topic,
  • what you are okay with,
  • and where’s the difference?

1. What were you concerned about?
2. What were you okay with?
3. Where’s the line?