In The Zone

In the Zone

The "Arts of the Contact Zone" by Mary Louise Pratt is a speech that she wrote and presented as an MLA member. In it she analyzed a letter written by an unknown but literate Andean to King Philip III. She defines "social space where cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other, often in contexts of highly asymmetrical relation of power, such as colonialism, slavery, or their aftermaths as they are lived out in many parts of the world today" (519) as contact zones. The letter was written in 1613 but was never read by anyone until 1908.

Jus as Mary Louise Pratt I read and analyzed a piece of text and I would like to introduce you to it. This is an essay named "Sex, beauty and beast" by Celia Kitzinger. In her essay, she makes it clear that a male perception of women is both unacceptable and degrading. The essay itself is divided into four parts. The first part is an introduction and lets us know that throughout history women have been looked down on and not thought of as equals but rather as one of the animals not good enough to be on the same level as men. Aristotle once compared women to animals and used that argument as an excuse not to include women in politics. She lists other ways women have been abused by making fun of and put down.

Her essay is pointing these things out not only to men but also to women who might think this is all true (and let us be honest, we all know there are women like that out there). She also included a poster that says, "It takes up to forty dumb animals to make a fur coat. But only one to wear it". On the poster itself shown a woman with a bloody fur coat. Statements like that come from Animal Rights Activists, but they advocate "sexism".

The other three parts are Complicity, Pornography, and Fear and beauty. I will go through them one by one.

In the Complicity, Celia tries to explain how women that wear fur might be accused of cruelty to animals. In reality it is not the woman that does all the killing. Men find cruel ways to kill animals without damaging their skin, or bones, or even teeth. Some animals like the African elephant are on the brink of extinction as a result. She also points out that while most women might wear perfume and make up that might have been tested on animals, it is once again men that carry out those experiments. While women contribute to these kinds of experiments and treatment of animals, "women have undoubtedly been less guilty of active abuse and destruction of animals".

Long before animals were being killed for the sake of fashion men have been hunting them to provide food for their families while women did nothing more than bear children and collect barriers. Even though in the essay Celia refers to the evidence of that" human survival relied more heavily on the skills necessary in gathering vegetable food than on meat" some still think of hunting animals was vital for our survival.

This brings us to the nest part of her essay - Pornography. Killing animals was always the sign of masculinity it has been incorporated in pornography too. Since men are considered "the hunters" women must play as their prey or "fair game". She describes a photograph in Hustler magazine where this situation is portrayed, complete with sexist slogans. Pictures showing and describing these types of situations can be found in many of those kinds of magazines, and not only. Sex has been used as advertisement even in pictures of catalogs of equipment for laboratories in which animal experiments take place. Women pose next to cages and animals are photographed in poses that conform to gender stereotypes. Power for men is everything. Men get a power boost from degrading women but even then some men are still threatened by women and they resort to sexual abuse of animals. Being powerful