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Creative Project
Creative Project: Writing the Body
For my creative project I wanted to explore the various ways transsexuals navigate an expression of their bodies. I already had an interest in the experiences of female-to-male (FTM) transsexuals, and the Milliken "Unhemilich Maneuvers..." article cemented my desire to highlight this particular segment of transexuality.
Despite the documented historical marginalization in deference to male-to-female transsexuals, an extensive online community for FTMs has emerged in the past several years. The various forms of user-created content online allows for an immense amount of variety in the expression of the body.
Following this theme, my creative project is a webpage that includes examples of specific content found online. There is a focus on the 'transition' videos, commonly found on sites such as Youtube. In these videos the creator documents the physical changes associated with hormone therapy and/or associated surgeries (including "top" and "bottom" surgeries). However I also try to exhibit some of the less physical, or emotional issues associated with body expression for transsexuals. This content serves as a form of advice to others going through similar circumstances, or sometimes serves as a method of personal venting. I will provide an analysis of how these videos connect back to theories presented in the readings.
Link to creative project:
http:/
In case the comics still won't show:
http:/
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Last updated 831 days ago by Brianna
OliverC
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Your documentation of the online FTM community touches on some of the most important issues about being FTM transgender, and makes the immeasurable value of Internet visibility very clear. Images of successful FTMs, like the first collection of videos give hope to those who might think their body and self-image are irreconcilable. All the videos carry the weight of the dysphoria and practical challenges inherent in trying to alter your sexual identity, and that honesty among the diversity of voices and perspectives can be the saving grace for many FTMs who cannot find depictions of themselves in common media. We talked in class about the impossibility of characters in film and television to be completely satisfying portrayals of an entire demographic because of the burden of representation, the creation of essential subjects and stereotypes etc. In this regard, the 'new media' of the internet and youtube allow for all the multiplicities of voices to be heard, even more effectively then say, Tongues Untied, which had that specific goal. In this way, the internet, via the construction of “virtual” communities, is a final solution to this problem of mainstream (mis)representation.
I also liked how careful many of these video bloggers were to not try and represent an entire population, such as the guy giving advice on padding bras and wearing clothes to fit a diversity of body types and desired looks, or the girlfriend who talked about building a community of both men and women who date FTMs, and didn't want to generalize too much about her boyfriend while still making an important point about the difficulties of dealing with a person with gender dysphoria. The awareness and respect for diversity is crucial.
Your analysis for each section was concise and informative, but also a little on the critical/factual side. It would have been nice to hear your own voice in a creative light, perhaps by adding some of your own content or voice into the mix and joining in the conversations. I don't come away from this feeling like i've really seen you express yourself. Also the images in the last section wouldn't load on my computer, I clicked the link and read a few of the comics but i'm not sure they were the right ones.
OliverC 834 days ago