Wednesday Word: Sound and Fury, Signifying Nothing
No new words today.
What's the point of talking if no one hears you?
What's the point of talking if, for saying a few words, you get trashed for hyper-extensive hyping yourself?
Seanan McGuire reminded her fans and blog-followers, once or twice, that she's eligible for several categories of the Nebula Awards.
(Most recently, she wrote Midnight Blue-Light Special, which I read in one go, when I was supposed to be doing my homework, and finished while I was supposed to be going to sleep. So I'll do my homework in the ten seconds before the teacher walks in, while running on low sleep. So? My priorities are perfectly sound.)
What's a Nebula, ask the non SF readers?
Its a fan-nominated award. Fans nominate their favorite stories/authors to the ballot, and fans vote for the winners.
Seanan, having used her amazing mind-powers to influence people, was nominated five times for the Nebula Ballots. Couldn't be that she's just that awesome, right? After all, she's a gurl, and SF is a guy-thing. Must be she cheated by... writing lots of awesome stories? IT"S NOT FAIR SHE CHEATED SHE PUSHED HER NAME AT PEOPLE TOO OFTEN SHE SHOULD JUST SHUT UP.
Male writers who pushed the Nebulas constantly in their blogs, 'vote for me vote for me vote for me', were not scolded for pushing themselves.
Seanan linked this page, and pulled her favorite quote. Not surprisingly, after I read the page, this was the quote that gave me the most head-desk HULK SMASH moment.
"Teachers are often unaware of the gender distribution of talk in their classrooms. They usually consider that they give equal amounts of attention to girls and boys, and it is only when they make a tape recording that they realize that boys are dominating the interactions. Dale Spender, an Australian feminist who has been a strong advocate of female rights in this area, noted that teachers who tried to restore the balance by deliberately ‘favouring’ the girls were astounded to find that despite their efforts they continued to devote more time to the boys in their classrooms. Another study reported that a male science teacher who managed to create an atmosphere in which girls and boys contributed more equally to discussion felt that he was devoting 90 per cent of his attention to the girls. And so did his male pupils. They complained vociferously that the girls were getting too much talking time.
In other public contexts, too, such as seminars and debates, when women and men are deliberately given an equal amount of the highly valued talking time, there is often a perception that they are getting more than their fair share. Dale Spender explains this as follows:
The talkativeness of women has been gauged in comparison not with men but with silence. Women have not been judged on the grounds of whether they talk more than men, but of whether they talk more than silent women.
In other words, if women talk at all, this may be perceived as ‘too much’ by men who expect them to provide a silent, decorative background in many social contexts. This may sound outrageous, but think about how you react when precocious children dominate the talk at an adult party. As women begin to make inroads into formerly ‘male’ domains such as business and professional contexts, we should not be surprised to find that their contributions are not always perceived positively or even accurately."
Its not only speech. Apparently, people who look like women can't play well enough to join the Philharmonic, but people behind the screen, who happen to be women, play just fine.
Yay post-feminist world. I am womyn, don't bother listening to me roar.
What's the point of talking if no one hears you?
What's the point of talking if, for saying a few words, you get trashed for hyper-extensive hyping yourself?
Seanan McGuire reminded her fans and blog-followers, once or twice, that she's eligible for several categories of the Nebula Awards.
(Most recently, she wrote Midnight Blue-Light Special, which I read in one go, when I was supposed to be doing my homework, and finished while I was supposed to be going to sleep. So I'll do my homework in the ten seconds before the teacher walks in, while running on low sleep. So? My priorities are perfectly sound.)
What's a Nebula, ask the non SF readers?
Its a fan-nominated award. Fans nominate their favorite stories/authors to the ballot, and fans vote for the winners.
Seanan, having used her amazing mind-powers to influence people, was nominated five times for the Nebula Ballots. Couldn't be that she's just that awesome, right? After all, she's a gurl, and SF is a guy-thing. Must be she cheated by... writing lots of awesome stories? IT"S NOT FAIR SHE CHEATED SHE PUSHED HER NAME AT PEOPLE TOO OFTEN SHE SHOULD JUST SHUT UP.
Male writers who pushed the Nebulas constantly in their blogs, 'vote for me vote for me vote for me', were not scolded for pushing themselves.
Seanan linked this page, and pulled her favorite quote. Not surprisingly, after I read the page, this was the quote that gave me the most head-desk HULK SMASH moment.
"Teachers are often unaware of the gender distribution of talk in their classrooms. They usually consider that they give equal amounts of attention to girls and boys, and it is only when they make a tape recording that they realize that boys are dominating the interactions. Dale Spender, an Australian feminist who has been a strong advocate of female rights in this area, noted that teachers who tried to restore the balance by deliberately ‘favouring’ the girls were astounded to find that despite their efforts they continued to devote more time to the boys in their classrooms. Another study reported that a male science teacher who managed to create an atmosphere in which girls and boys contributed more equally to discussion felt that he was devoting 90 per cent of his attention to the girls. And so did his male pupils. They complained vociferously that the girls were getting too much talking time.
In other public contexts, too, such as seminars and debates, when women and men are deliberately given an equal amount of the highly valued talking time, there is often a perception that they are getting more than their fair share. Dale Spender explains this as follows:
The talkativeness of women has been gauged in comparison not with men but with silence. Women have not been judged on the grounds of whether they talk more than men, but of whether they talk more than silent women.
In other words, if women talk at all, this may be perceived as ‘too much’ by men who expect them to provide a silent, decorative background in many social contexts. This may sound outrageous, but think about how you react when precocious children dominate the talk at an adult party. As women begin to make inroads into formerly ‘male’ domains such as business and professional contexts, we should not be surprised to find that their contributions are not always perceived positively or even accurately."
Its not only speech. Apparently, people who look like women can't play well enough to join the Philharmonic, but people behind the screen, who happen to be women, play just fine.
Yay post-feminist world. I am womyn, don't bother listening to me roar.