“you are such a flake” she said with a devilish grin. “i’m only five minutes late, if i was flaking i wouldn’t even be here” i countered. we’d been playing this constant cat and mouse game for weeks, with constant last minute cancellations, project meetings and client calls, now, at last we were finally seated at a table about to break bread.
with weeks of careful planning on our part at stake we thought it would be best to hand over all of our communication devices to the maitre’d with strict instructions not to return them to us unless they spontaneously combusted, turned into snakes and started attacking the staff or some other equally implausible eventuality. we had been introduced by mutual friends almost a year ago to the day. according to them we were both smart, funny driven people who would either hit it off beautifully, fall in love and make beautiful children and make everyone else envious of our seemingly perfect lives or we would hate the other’s guts and our friends would have nothing to more to be envious because our ‘perfect’ lives would be devoid of love and they could hold it over our heads.
funnily our friends both used the same word to describe us – rake. as in (s)he is quite the rake, but i love her/him so. we had both broken our share of hearts along the way, but not in a vicious take no prisoners way that precludes the possibility of friendship, in fact the aforementioned friends were multiple exes who based on the same social and professional circles managed to find new interpersonal connections. and now hopefully it was going to be our turn.
way back in April ’08, a friend asked me to post some pictures as part of a project. i never did post what the project was about or what the results until now.
Dear All,
Thank you for your interest and participation in the Photo story project. First, let me apologize for the delay in providing this explanation. I am a procrastinator. There is no other excuse.
The project was developed in a Language & Gender class held in the Spr ’08 semester at the University of Mississippi. Language is the tool we use to define the world around us. And in particular, language is the repository for history and attitudes toward class, race, and gender. In class we discussed several studies involving use of language and how it applies to gender. Gender being those presumed societal roles based on sex.
As a writer, and having lead writing workshops, I know that fiction is an ideal way to access spontaneous language that can be examined for attitudes toward gender. A study we read used a Thematic Apperception Test to prompt language. In setting up my study, I used a similar approach. I selected photos that were gender specific, but would not impose any bias. And leaving out the premise of gender in the request, I could be assured that I would be receiving unconscious representations of gender, not “politically correct” accommodations.
Despite having the results of previous studies, I determined to keep an open mind as to what I would find. And, I had a significantly smaller response group than I would have needed to publish a full-fledged study. Still, I noticed some trends.
picture use by demographic
The chart above points out that in large part, participants chose to write about the male (lying in the grass). Could that have been because his picture was first or because males are easier to write about? I could make no definite conclusions.
One result from the prior study indicated that people project violence on to women in their stories. More than half of the stories generated did so, and the other half had elements of oppressive power dynamics against women.
Most telling for me was the use of narrative voice. The voice of an omniscient narrator was most frequent, but only one female chose to use the male narrative voice, where two males chose the female narrative voice. I can say I hadn’t expected that.
gender of the narrative voice
Another element to look for was the gender roles created for the characters . By and large, the person added was a romantic partner; we also have mothers and fathers, a sister, a brother, a daughter, several non-gender specific friends, and an art patron (♂).
Of the eight stories about Photo A, half of the stories added girlfriends. All of these relationships end badly. I was able to infer, women are selfish, capricious, controlling, subject to the will of others, dismissive or easily dismissed, and brought to tears. Only one story makes direct reference to say, “Women. They are so vain.” While depictions of the woman in Photo B, as the girlfriend, is aggressive, challenging, highly sexual, anxious, dependent, patient, indecisive, and pathetic.
In some ways, the male character fares better as protagonist, by being a full and present character in the majority of stories. As the primary focus of the tale, he is presented sympathetically, i.e. we feel what he feels. He’s dumped four times which is an atypical inclusion of self-deprecation. Overall, men are presented as assholes, arrogant pricks, unable to hear sarcasm, irresponsible, and uncaring. Unlike the references to women, one man does “earn” a positive attribute; he is “a good role model.”
I was able to show the TAT is a useful means of collecting data on gender performance and interaction. Participants, for the most part, assigned roles and behaviors along rather typical lines because there is still a great reliance on the delineation of men and women. And while I would not suppose these are the personal ideological opinions of the participants themselves, I had to base my evaluations on what was present or absent from the stories.
Oh, and I got an A on the paper and in the class. Thank you.
a friend needs some help with a project. there is a due date on this project of Monday, I know you want to help and I have great faith in your abilities, so step lively.
the details are below:
Hi,
I’m doing a project on storytelling. The 3 accompanying photos are to spur your imagination. I need 30 total participants to write short stories between 200-250 words. The stories must contain the following elements.
What happened before the picture was taken?
What is happening in the picture?
What will happen next?
I ask that people write only one story, 5 women/men per. In the comments please let your fellow participants know which picture you chose using the following format: Picture A, B, or C, male or female, participant 1-5. Ex: AM1 or CF5.
To submit your story:
Please e-mail anonymuncule08_at_ gmail_dot_com with your story in the body (no attachments), your participant number (e.g. BF3), age.
If you are interested in writing a second story, I also need 10 people (5 m/f) to write about photo D. Please use the same participant number and submit both stories at the same time.
Thank you for your assistance.
PHOTO A:
PHOTO C:
PHOTO D:
