Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id RAA21398 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-bounces@mmu.ac.uk); Mon, 20 Aug 2001 17:12:55 +0100 From: Philip Jonkers <P.A.E.Jonkers@phys.rug.nl> X-Authentication-Warning: rugth1.phys.rug.nl: www-data set sender to jonkers@localhost using -f To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Fwd: Professors seek meaning behind flourishing market Message-ID: <998323776.3b8136409d9b3@rugth1.phys.rug.nl> Date: Mon, 20 Aug 2001 18:09:36 +0200 (CEST) References: <20010820152846.AAA20692@camailp.harvard.edu@[205.240.180.125]> In-Reply-To: <20010820152846.AAA20692@camailp.harvard.edu@[205.240.180.125]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit User-Agent: IMP/PHP IMAP webmail program 2.2.5 X-Originating-IP: 129.125.13.3 Sender: fmb-bounces@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Quoting "Wade T.Smith" <wade_smith@harvard.edu>:
> I suppose the bonobos just do it, we read about it....
>
> Then again, being an academic sometimes does mean you get to use that
> stuff you once hid inside the chemistry book.
>
> - Wade
>
> **********
>
> Porn is hot course on campus
>
> Professors seek meaning behind flourishing market
>
> By David Abel, Globe Staff, 8/20/2001
>
> http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/232/nation/Porn_is_hot_course_on_campusP.
> shtml
>
> Richard Burt, an English professor at the University of Massachusetts at
>
> Amherst and host of a provocative Web site, teaches his students about
>
> the modern adaptations of Shakespeare, often focusing on a growing
> number
> of porn flicks invoking the Bard.
>
> For the past five years, Henry Jenkins, a Massachusetts Institute of
> Technology professor, has asked his class to analyze photos from Hustler
>
> magazine and clips from blue movies such as ''Deep Throat.''
>
> And Hope Weissman, a women's studies professor at Wesleyan University,
>
> has required students in her class, ''Pornography: Writing of
> Prostitutes,'' to produce a work of pornography for their final
> project.
>
> The three professors are part of a growing movement on college campuses
>
> that is testing the bounds of academic freedom by introducing
> pornography
> into the classroom. The small but thriving community of professors
> treats
> pornography - an industry on which Americans each year spend billions of
>
> dollars - as a serious subject for academic inquiry.
>
> Many of the professors shun attention. But others who have written
> extensively about pornography and teach it in their classes eagerly
> explain why they are attracted to porn studies.
>
> ''To not study pornography is to ignore an absolutely pervasive
> phenomenon in our culture,'' said Linda Williams, a film studies
> professor at the University of California in Berkeley who helped pioneer
>
> porn studies with her book, ''Hard Core: Power, Pleasure, and the Frenzy
>
> of the Visible.''
>
> ''Hollywood makes about 400 films a year; the porn industry makes 9,000
>
> to 11,000 titles. That means an enormous number of people across the
> board are watching pornography. It's not just dirty old men.''
>
> Courses on pornography are now offered at schools such as Emerson
> College, New York University, Northwestern University, Arizona State
> University, and several campuses in the University of California system.
>
> Professors invite porn stars to lecture about subjects such as improving
>
> the working conditions of sex workers.
>
> The scholarship is growing, too, professors say. Respected journals such
>
> as The Quarterly Review of Film Studies and Human Sexuality are
> publishing more and more papers on pornography. And academics are
> increasingly writing books with titles such as ''Erotic Faculties'' by
> an
> art historian at the University of Nevada at Reno and ''Porn 101'' by a
>
> sociology professor at the University of California at Northridge.
>
> There was even an academic forum organized in Los Angeles called the
> World Pornography Conference, which in 1998 drew professors in fields
> including sociology, philosophy, English, and film studies.
>
> Many such as Constance Penley, a film studies professor who runs UC
> Santa
> Barbara's Pornography Research Focus Group, attended to spread
> understanding of their work. But some also went to rebut critics such as
>
> Catherine MacKinnon, a University of Michigan Law School professor who
>
> argues that pornography exploits women and desensitizes men to sexual
> violence, and Pat Robertson, who once called Penley's class on
> pornography ''a new low in humanist excess.''
>
> ''There have been many protests, but pornography has been taught for
> years, in medical schools, psychology and sociology departments,'' said
>
> Penley.
>
> ''What upset people, in my case, is that I study pornography to see what
>
> it consists of, not debating whether it is art or deviant. I also teach
>
> it as another genre of film, like Westerns or science fiction.''
>
> Today, porn-studies professors say, there is less resistance to and
> outrage about their work, due in part to the flourishing of pornography
>
> on home videos, cable, and the Internet.
>
> The study of pornography on campuses emerged about a decade ago,
> professors say, partly in reaction to the growth of a porn industry that
>
> some say nets as much as $14 billion a year, but also as part of a
> growing movement in academia to study popular culture, gender, and
> women's issues.
>
> In fact, most who teach in the field are women. Many of them echo the
> arguments of Laura Kipnis, a professor of media studies at Northwestern
>
> University, who argues that pornography, in the right context, is
> liberating.
>
> ''It's about removing the stigma and understanding the taboo,'' said
> Kipnis, author of ''(Male) Desire and (Female) Disgust: Reading
> Hustler.''
>
> Men, however, still face some stigma in teaching pornography. While
> Jenkins of MIT says he never had any student complain, Peter Lehman, a
>
> humanities professor at Arizona State University, once had a printing
> shop refuse to copy his course packet. Now, Lehman requires all students
>
> who take his class on ''Sexuality in the Media'' to sign a consent
> form.
>
> ''It's to prevent possible harassment charges,'' said Lehman, who has
> co-chaired workshops on porn-pedagogy and is editing an anthology of
> pornography for college classes. ''I don't want any students to be
> surprised.''
>
> Resistance to pornography in the classroom also affects female
> professors. In 1999, Wesleyan's president launched a review of
> Weissman's
> class, and for years antiporn activists have targeted attention-getting
>
> professors such as Penley for protest.
>
> At UMass-Amherst, administrators last year pressured Burt to take down
>
> his campus Web site, which featured pictures of bare-chested strippers
>
> straddling his lap and of his wife dressed as a porn star.
> Administrators
> argued the site violated UMass's acceptable use policy for information
>
> technology.
>
> A year later, however, the author of books such as ''Unspeakable
> ShaXXXspeares'' has moved the Web site to a commercial server and added
>
> content, mixing links to porn sites and interviews with adult-film
> directors with descriptions of his classes and their syllabuses.
>
> For Burt and most others in the field, porn studies is merely a natural
>
> extension of their work.
>
> ''If you're going to think about Shakespeare adaptations, which is
> something that I think about,'' he says in an article posted on his Web
>
> site, ''then why not Shakespeare porn? It's one kind of adaptation. It's
>
> a phenomenon, it's out there, it's part of the culture, so why not study
>
> it?''
>
> David Abel can be reached by e-mail at dabel@globe.com
>
> This story ran on page A1 of the Boston Globe on 8/20/2001. © Copyright
>
> 2001 Globe Newspaper Company.
>
> This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
> Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
> For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
> see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
>
The culture of pornography gaining grounds among academics huh?
Well, let's just hope they practise what they preach too...
Philip.
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
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