Gendered Constructions of the Forest in The Village

Rachel Miles
Jeannina Perez
WST 3015 (Introduction to Women's Studies)
14 April 2010

Gendered Constructions of the Forest in The Village

M. Night Shyamalan’s The Village is the story of a small farming village isolated from the main world by the forest surrounding it. While the film examines gender roles in relation to nature in several ways, the characterization of the forest presents the most interesting and complex case. At once masculine and feminine, the forest serves initially as an oppressive force locking the villagers inside it and severely punishing those, like the film’s protagonist Ivy, who dare to venture into it; as the film reveals the village’s secret, however, the forest takes on a more gender-ambiguous role, becoming both the feminine creator and masculine protector of the constructed space the villagers inhabit and understand as safe.

The forest is most easily understood as a masculine, aggressive presence, largely because of The Village’s similarities to “Red Riding Hood” and similar fairytales. In both, a young, female protagonist dons a specifically-colored cloak; leaves her sheltered home to travel through a dark, treacherous wood to help a sick person she knows; is attacked by a forewarned monster; and (for purposes of this film) survives, but not without losing her innocence to the new revelation about what’s actually out there in the world. For Red in the fairytale, her innocence leaves with the realization that the world is not as safe or harmonious as she had once thought. For Ivy in The Village, this realization is twofold, leaving her aware by the film’s conclusion that a) her village is set in a consciously-constructed and -maintained reality grounded in the values, social systems, and technologies of 18th-century America, rather than the 21st-century America that exists outside the forest, and b) the chief instrument of maintaining this constructed reality, the red-cloaked monsters that stalk and guard the forest’s borders, are actually the village elders. In both cases, this innocence is stolen by a journey into the forest itself, lending the forest a distinctly masculine quality in its construction as an active force. Rather than being “feminized and sexualized through imagery such as ‘virgin forest’ . . . and ‘penetrating’ the wilderness” (Kirk and Okazawa-Rey 539), as traditional Western thought tends to understand it, nature here is obviously, definitively aggressive. It is not the innocence that needs to be protected; as in “Red Riding Hood,” it is the innocence-stealing force that needs to be protected against.

Ivy’s loss of innocence to the forest is what allows us to see it as, in some ways, a potentially gender-ambiguous force. The realization that the village’s setting and environment are consciously constructed casts the forest in a new light by making it no longer exclusively oppressive. As the new information about the elders’ involvement shows, it is also a creative force—a trait more commonly associated in Western tradition with femininity, especially in understandings of the environment. The myth that the elders have chosen to construct around the forest is undoubtedly oppressive in that it restricts the villagers’ access and power to move outside a certain space. It is a system both like and unlike patriarchy—like in that it creates “an arrangement of shared understandings and relationships that connect people to one another and something larger than themselves” (Johnson 71), and unlike in that the system and the space it creates are consciously maintained by a select few people within the village society. But the fact that the forest itself allows for the creation of that space and system in the first place is significant. It becomes both a protective barrier (associated with masculinity) and an almost nurturing presence, in that it provides for the villagers’ careful maintenance of the space they have constructed as normal and safe. Ivy’s breaking through the barrier to reach the outside world lends the forest and the space it provides for an additional “feminine” trait: the need to be protected and defended. Ivy’s new knowledge threatens the existence of the constructed reality of the village. Should she choose to share what she has learned, the space created by the elders and the forest-myth they rule by will be destroyed; should she choose to remain silent, the space will be preserved, with Ivy joining the ranks of the constant protectors of the secret that threatens it. Ultimately, Ivy keeps her silence and allows the system maintaining the village to continue unchallenged, questionably taking the path of least resistance but leaving us with a new understanding of the relative fragility of even the most seemingly-deep-set social systems.



Works Cited

Johnson, Allan G. “Patriarchy, the System.” Women’s Lives: Multicultural Perspectives. Ed. Gwyn Kirk and Margo Okazawa-Rey. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. 68-76. Print

Kirk, Gwyn, and Margo Okazawa-Rey. “Women and the Environment.” Women’s Lives: Multicultural Perspectives. Ed. Gwyn Kirk and Margo Okazawa-Rey. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. 534-549. Print

Shyamalan, M. Night, dir. The Village. 2004. Touchstone Home Entertainment, 2005. DVD-ROM

Critiques of Western Media in Baghdad Burning

Rachel Miles
Jeannina Perez
WST 3015 (Introduction to Women's Studies)
17 March 2010

Critiques of Western Media in Baghdad Burning

In the entry “Teapots and Kettles . . .,” dated 7 April 2004, Riverbend recounts the early days of the American occupation of Baghdad and eventually concludes that, despite what the Western media would have their audiences believe, not much about life in the city has changed or improved. Like the rest of Baghdad Burning, this entry uses Riverbend’s personal experience to critique the American occupation, with particular focus on exposing the false reality about Iraqi life presented by Western news outlets. In this sense, her blog follows two “paths” of “media advocacy . . . critiquing mainstream media, and making media tools available to people from subordinated groups to express themselves” (“Globalizing World” 387). Both a personal account and an educational tool, Baghdad Burning is the method by which Riverbend successfully calls into question the cultural perceptions Americans hold of Iraqis and the cultural perceptions Americans hold of our own military.

Riverbend’s blatant critique of Western media is a common, constant theme throughout her blog. As in another entry from later that same month, “Media and Falloojeh,” she contrasts accounts of what Western or Western-affiliated news stations are reporting with her own observations as a citizen of occupied Baghdad. “The foreign news channels [CNN, BBC, LBC] are hardly showing anything,” she says. Instead of reporting on the “over 150 Iraqis [who] have been killed by troops all over Iraq” during the last three days, the Western media airs “dazzling reportages on football games and family pets,” only occasionally “showing the same faces running around in a frenzy of bombing and gunfire” (Riverbend). For Riverbend, this inaccurate portrayal of circumstances is inexcusable. It presents an obviously false image of the American occupation and furthers the ludicrous beliefs Americans hold about the Iraqi population and the war itself. Rather than acknowledge the war as a serious, deadly affront with serious, deadly consequences for Iraq, the Western media’s reporting maintains the myth of American liberation: the idea that “the [American] troops were going to be ‘greeted with flowers and candy’” (Riverbend) by Iraqis grateful for liberation upon their arrival. In reality, the truth could not be more different. If Riverbend’s account is anything to go by, the Iraqis feel like “caged animal[s]—there’s so much frustration and anger . . . all the mosques, Sunni and Shi’a alike, are calling for Jihad” (Riverbend), and no one feels safe, stable, or free.

Less obviously, Riverbend’s entry forces us as Americans to reevaluate how we perceive our military. Even if we don’t fully realize it, “the military shapes our notions of patriotism, heroism, honor, duty, adventure, and citizenship . . . Politically, economically, and culturally, the military is a central U.S. institution” (“Women and the Military” 494). We are taught to evaluate and understand patriotism, devotion to one’s country, and courage in terms of military service, which further engenders an already-deep sense of pride in our troops and any initiative they become involved in. Riverbend’s accounts, however, remind us that there is more involved in war than our troops making us proud—namely severe consequences for the country being “liberated.” Why, she challenges us to ask, are we proud to learn of our military “bombing” a city “constantly,” leaving “dozens dead” and taking out “the only functional hospital . . . except a meager clinic that can hold up to 10 patients at a time” (Riverbend)? Why are we proud to hear of our troops effectively blockading a city, cutting off supplies of produce and food and leaving its inhabitants in streets littered with “bodies . . . beginning to decompose in the April heat” (Riverbend)? By unrepentantly showing us the harsh, negative consequences of war, Riverbend forces us to acknowledge that the “liberating Americans” myth is false from both perspectives: just as Iraqis (and, indeed, many people supposedly in need of democracy and U.S. aid) largely do not feel grateful and liberated under American occupation, our American troops are not nearly so often the heroic, untarnished saviors we should like to understand them as.



Works Cited

Kirk, Gwyn, and Margo Okazawa-Rey. “Living in a Globalizing World.” Women’s Lives: Multicultural Perspectives. Ed. Gwyn Kirk and Margo Okazawa-Rey. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. 371-392. Print

Kirk, Gwyn, and Margo Okazawa-Rey. “Women and the Military, War, and Peace.” Women’s Lives: Multicultural Perspectives. Ed. Gwyn Kirk and Margo Okazawa-Rey. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. 493-509. Print

Riverbend. “Teapots and Kettles . . .” Baghdad Burning. Blogger, 7 Apr. 2004. Web. 5 Apr. 2010.

Activism Log VII

Rachel Miles
Jeannina Perez
WST 3015 (Introduction to Women’s Studies)
4 April 2010

Activism
Family emergency stayed pretty severe this week, so again, no tabling for me. I’ve sent an email to Rebecca to see about alternative forms of involvement, but so far, I haven’t heard anything back yet. I was able to start a Facebook chat with a few friends about the project in hopes of gaining support for it, but that quickly turned more infuriating than productive, so not much luck there.

Reflection
The most interesting discussion and readings we had this week were on Womanism, which I personally find to be a fascinating branch of feminism. The article I particularly enjoyed was Alice Walker’s “In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens,” which discusses Walker’s attempts to rediscover and reclaim the history of black women, the generations of mothers and grandmothers who came before her and were forbidden by social convention from being understood or recognized as capable of great things. For the transgendered community, I feel this idea of rediscovering and reclaiming history is especially relevant. Because transgenderism is still largely rejected and feared by society, that community exists with little to no knowledge of its own history. There are some records of transvestitism, or of the earliest transsexuals to undergo sex-reassignment surgery, but for the most part, general society marks transgenderism and the achievements of transgendered or gender-variant people as taboo and unmentionable. Hopefully, as activist efforts force social tolerance and acceptance of the transgendered community, its ability to recover and acknowledge its own history will be restored and, much like Walker’s search, what is uncovered will help further develop a sense of strengthened identity in that community.

Reciprocity
This week was an extremely stressful one for several reasons. First, I am beyond frustrated with myself and the circumstances that have prevented me from tabling so far. I feel like I am letting down my project group and the entire initiative, and while Rebecca has told me she understands, I sincerely hope she can come up with something for me to do so I feel like more of a contributing member. I’ve still been collecting signatures on my own where I can, but it’s slow-going. And finally, the Facebook chat I tried to start turned into a complete disaster. Instead of talking to my friends about issues relating to the transgendered community and our project, I spent an hour in a heated, immensely aggravating discussion about more well-known “aspects” of feminism. I say “aspects” very loosely, because it was mostly a few friends throwing around negative stereotypes of feminists while one refused to hear anything other than his own belief that women belong in the kitchen and the bedroom, and nowhere else. Normally, I am all for discussions about feminism, especially when they’re informative discussions that help clear up common misconceptions surrounding the movement for people who are genuinely interested; the type of conversation I found myself in this week, though, was quite the opposite, and one I’ve been hearing/having all too frequently since really establishing myself as a feminist this semester. Overall, this week was just a stressful, disheartening experience, and I’m glad it’s over. The good news is that it looks like my family troubles are clearing up, at least for now, so I should definitely be on for tabling next week. I just want something that will get me back into loving this project whole-heartedly like I did during the first few weeks.



Works Referenced
Walker, Alice. "In Search of Our Mother's Gardens." In Search of Our Mother's Gardens. Ed. Alice Walker. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2003. 231-43. Print.