TAKE BACK THE NIGHT MARCH & RALLY

LEARNING MODULE NINE Due Sat. 4/9 by noon

What would you do to end sexual violence at the University of Alabama? 

Using your articles for this week, write 1-2 paragraphs demonstrating your understanding of the social systems and social conditions that support male sexual violence against women and other men on college campuses. 

 Then in 1-2 paragraphs, build upon the “Feminist Frat Boys” article and reflect upon some possible forms of action/activism that you and your peers (as well as the larger University system) can take to end sexual violence on the UA campus.

University of Alabama Women's Resource Center

National Sexual Violence Resource Center

Understanding Sexual Assault & What to do if it Happens to You

Toronto Slutwalk

Since we're discussing violence against women this week, I thought it appropriate to bring up a Toronto police officer's comment at a York University event that women should avoid dressing "like sluts" in order to be victimized. In response, Slutwalk Toronto was organized as "a march designed to draw attention to the way in which the term 'slut' is used to stigmatize and invalidate women." There's some great pictures at the link. This, to me, is the most powerful:

group 3

This was posted at 11:30 am yesterday in the section group blog:

Group Media Project
Section 1: Group 3

Title of Project: Body Image

Date of Presentation: Monday, April 25, 2011

Project Conception:
- The main thing that we want to explore when doing this topic is to aim at those who are about the same age as we are. We are going to focus on college students around campus, both boy and girl.
- We are going to explore the problems that these college students tend to go through and get their true outlook on what they perceive the ‘perfect body’ to be.

Questions when Interviewing:
- What do you think the perfect body image is?
- Give/Offer statistics on how the average woman is categorized compared to how those on the front page of magazines.
- Show the person being interviewed a picture of an ad and ask them their first impression of that picture and then ask them how it should be portrayed.

Literature Review:
- In developing our project we are going to be referring back to the ad and discussion form class on the topic ‘Killing us Softly’.

Project Method:
- Our group is going to explore college age students and get true opinions on how people see others in this day in time.
- We are also going to explore and use magazine ads as well as how women are used in music videos.
- We are also going to be using the student media center and are planning on using a video camera and microphone and implement these interviews into our powerpoint slide show which will be shown during our presentation.

Project Contribution:
- We hope to contribute in our classmates understanding of the project by addressing the reality of how body image is clearly being seen through the eyes of college students today.
Individual Group Member Tasks:
- Everyone decided that each group member will be responsible in asking the same questions to 2 different people (male/female).
- We divided up what groups of people that we are going to be interviewing and they are: 2 different religious students, 2 African American males, 2 African American females, 2 White males, 2 White females.
- Everyone has the responsibility of being the videographer and interviewing their specific group.
- Emilie and Emily are finding pictures to use in this project to use during the interviews. Morgan is putting together the written proposal with the help of all group members.
- Also everyone is responsible to discuss their interviews to the class as well as making their slide for the powerpoint.
Agreed Upon Schedule of Completion:
- Sunday, April 3 = proposal
- April 4th – 9th = gather questions/ ads
- April 11th – 16th = video taping
- April 17th – 20th = edit video
- April 20th = final touch-ups/ finish project
- April 25th = give in-class oral presentation

Section 1, Group 2 Project Proposal

Section 1, Group 2 is doing a project titled "Healing the Wounded Hearts" and will be presenting on Wednesday, April 20th. We will be participating in promoting the Healing the Wouned Hearts Exhibit which is being displayed in the month of April beginning Monday, April 4th. This exhibit put on by the Women's Resource Center, is a display of decorated wooden hearts created by victims of sexual assault and abuse as a way of therapy. These crosses allow the victims to express themselves and promote strength and healing. It will be located in the Crossroads Community Lounge Ferguson Student Center and begins at 4:00PM throughout the month. Our project will deal with issues of sexual abuse and its victims. We plan to attend the exhibit ourselves, interview those who attend willing to share their reaction and thoughts about the exhibit (recorded on video from a borrowed video camera), and survey others at the exhibit and around campus about the issue of sexual abuse. We will ask questions about their thoughts on the topic, how they are affected or not affected, whethere they believe more awareness should be raised, and what we can do around campus to help with the issue. We will present our information gathere through a power point including factual information (researched on the internet), recorded vieos of students' thoughts, and results concluded from the surveys about the topic. We hope to inform our classmates about the problem of sexual harassment and abuse that is often not talked about. There are people in our area, even on our campus, who have been victims to this issue, and we need to become more aware and help with its prevention as much as possible. By openly discussing ther problem, we may be able to educate people on how to be safe and protected. Also, we desire to help others become more considerate and compassionate towards those who are victims and hopefully create more open environments where these can feel safe and not threatened or judged. Although sexual abuse affects both females and males, women and girls are the ones mostly affected. Therefore, the texts used focus mainly on women's perspectives on this issue. Abuse starts with whatever causes the thought to be placed in the mind of the one giving the abuse. In this example, it would be males. In Sharpley-Whiting's "I See the Same Ho: Video Vixens, Beauty Culture, and Diasporic Sex Tourism", we see how media has turned many women into objects, usually for men's pleasure. Because of images and concepts like these, mwn take these thoughts and can twist them into justifying taking advantage of women without the woman's consent-sexual abuse. Also in the piece "Fraternities and Rape on Campus" by Patricia y Martin and Robert Hummer, sexual abuse is discussed as a problem on many college campuses. This especially relates to our project by talking about it as an issue on campuses like ours nationwide. Our schedule of completion begins with attending the exhibit and discussing our thoughts on the best way to talk to people at the exhibit on Monday, April 4th. Throughout this same week and the following week (of the 11th), we will interview and survey people about the topic at the exhibit as well as around the campus/community. The week of the 11th, we will create the power point, including factual information, video interviews, and results from the surveys. By the presentation week of the 18th, we will have our presentation completed. Task assignments have been divided, even though a lot of our prohect will be done together through mutual effort. Alysia Nailor will be renting and taking care of the camera equipment for us. Robyn Jones will be writing and submitting the Project Proposal. Katherine Nowell will be helping create and administer the surveys. Monty Millard will be helping with the surveys and interviews, researching information on our topic, and creating the power point.