Hilarious article about media bias and journalism over at Junkee: The Australian’s Media Editor Goes To Uni “Undercover”; Is Outraged That Media Degrees Are Teaching Media Students About The Media
Disclaimer: No Award is a ridiculously leftist website. In case you hadn’t noticed. Also, Liz did, like, six months of a Bachelor of Journalism before she realised she hated talking to people. That was back when NewsCorp was more or less respectable, and it still provided 95% of examples of terrible media bias.
Stephanie adores Leigh Sales, and she interviews Annabel Crabb re: the Wife Drought and allows me to love her even more (and Annabel is also good). Annabel Crabb explores the Wife Drought.
Stephanie super loves art, and she especially loves south east asian art, and being mean to European art, so this article at The Toast, Literally All of Europe Can Suck It, about the new discoveries in Indonesia, fills her with glee and delight. (Here is an article in Nat Geo if you didn’t know about it yet)
Frozen, Legend of Korra, Avatar: The Last Airbender, and the Narrative Right to Trauma
Trauma in modern American media is a tricky thing. On one hand, the backstories of nearly everyone, heroes and villains alike are full of it. On the other, trauma is heavily shamed, and leaves characters open to accusations of weakness, or of being whiny. This means that while we want characters who go through traumatic experiences, we are extremely uncomfortable with expressions of trauma. Also, we are much more comfortable with some expressions of trauma than with others. Only certain kinds of traumatic expression are allowed, and like so much about culture, who and what a character is determines what kind of traumatic expression we as a society will allow them to have. Straight white men are given the most freedom to be traumatized, and stereotypically masculine trauma is the most widely viewed as legitimate within fandom in my experience.
One of Liz’s pet peeves is the way Tumblr culture encourages rumour, misinformation and outright falsehood. It’s partially a problem with the platform’s limitations in general, but it’s more complex.
Anyway, this post gives some useful, practical tips on finding sources and confirming facts, and generally applying critical thinking. (One of the advantages in growing up in a super right wing household, as Liz did, is that her parents taught her how to critique the left, and then she discovered the same skills could be applied to anything.)
In amazingness, British backpacker Daniela Liverani had leech up her nose for weeks.
This weekend unexpectedly split Australia as we saw the great potato CAKE debate of 2014. Important Australian stuff. Stephanie stopped off on her way home for a potato cake. PS TEAM POTATO CAKE.
Talking about chronic illness, as a reader and as a writer.
On Chinese Horror: Part 1 at Snow Pavilion
No Award around the place: Steph forgot to mention, but a couple of weeks ago she put up her long essay on feminist monsters of Asia! It’s 8500 words originally published by The Lifted Brow, now available for download. Sympathy for Lady Vengeance: Feminist Ghosts and Monstrous Women of Asia. The monstrous women of Asia, feminism, and colonialism.
no-award.net 