Activities

“How to Make an Enemy: Transmisogyny and the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election”

Dr. K. Allison Hammer’s (Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies) guest lecture on “How to Make an Enemy: Transmisogyny and the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election” on 3 July 2024 at 4:00 PM CET.
Prof. Christine M. Klapeer (JLU, Politikwissenschaft mit dem Schwerpunkt Gender Studies) will provide a response.

This talk examines how a Trump presidency may put trans people at risk of being stripped of their right to exist in public. To understand the danger that he and his administration represent, it’s essential to recall the autocratic attempt undertaken from 2016-2020. However, while much attention has been paid to his desire to be a dictator, his deep ties to White Christian nationalism have been under-theorized in trans studies. Evangelical extremists at the center of his future administration threaten to turn trans people, transfeminine individuals in particular, into personae non gratae. Their views on the body, sexual sin, the family, as well as the restriction of “woman” to the realm of reproduction all play a role in their demonization of what they call “transgender nationalism.” The vigilante and the world crusader will be discussed as two powerful figurations that convey the radical transformation they envision for the United States and for the rest of the world. 

The lecture is part of a series of talks on “Diversity Issues and the 2024 U.S. Presidential Elections: Transnational Perspectives” at the University of Giessen and is supported by the Center for Diversity, Media, and Law. Dr. Hammer’s text will be published in an open-access book by the same name with transcript in October 2024.

Dr. Hammer will be conducting research at the Center for Diversity, Media, and Law at the JLU through 17 July. Their stay is generously supported by the Forschungscampus Mittelhessen.  Dr. Hammer will conduct a workshop on TransUtopia on 16 July at the Center from 12 until 2 PM.

 June 13-14, 2024

Input - Output: Didactic perspectives on artificial intelligence (AI)

The ZMI section "Medien und Didaktik" invites you to a two-day interdisciplinary workshop "Input - Output: Didactic perspectives on artificial intelligence (AI)". The event will take place on Thursday, June 13, 2024, from 4 to 7 pm, and on Friday, June 14, 2024, from 9 am to 12:30 pm in the Margarete Bieber Hall at Justus Liebig University Giessen.

Margarete-Bieber-Saal
Ludwigstr. 34
35390 Gießen

 August 1, 2023

Beyond the Gaze: Media Awareness for Media Inclusivity (For Educational Purposes)

Beyond the Gaze is a non-commercial short film intended for educational purposes that was made at the University of Giessen, Germany in 2023. The film engages with meanings of “the gaze” in order to open people up to thinking about how we interact with popular media. Originally, Laura Mulvey used the concept of “the male gaze” (1975) to describe film techniques that turn women into objects without subjective points of view, and to think about the profound pleasure people take in looking at films and seeing as the camera does. Since then, the term “the gaze” has come to denote White, colonialist, cis-hetero-patriarchal, and ableist ways of seeing and thinking that are transported by film, television, and other media. By revisiting different conceptualizations of “the gaze,” the film aims to promote a deeper understanding of power dynamics and media narratives that shape society.

Beyond the Gaze quotes insights by scholars such as Frantz Fanon, Toni Morrison, Stuart Hall, bell hooks, and Laura Mulvey on how to recognize and resist prejudiced ways of seeing. The film then introduces methods for addressing discrimination in media on the levels of representation, production, and reception. By taking viewers behind the camera, Beyond the Gazedemonstrates how to use reverse engineering to understand how camera work and sound combine to shape media experience. The film describes existing tests for measuring diversity and inclusion. These tests include the Bechdel-Wallace test (1985) to see if a film or television show recognizes women as actual people; the DuVernay test (2016) to see if a film portrays Black, Indigenous, and People of Color as individuals with complex experiences; the Vito Russo test (2019) to measure whether LGBTQIA persons are depicted in ways that go beyond sexual orientation and gender status; and the Riz test (2018) to see if Muslims are presented as individuals rather than as negative stereotypes.

In front of the camera, interviewees reflect on when they first noticed the gaze and how the gaze has affected them personally. They discuss their techniques for enjoying media, when possible, while remaining critically vigilant about how media can make existing social hierarchies appear natural and ‘good.’ The filmmakers and actors imagine what media could be and what we can make it be – a garden in which everyone finds a place for themself.  

The film team would like to thank the Justus Liebig University of Giessen for generous financial support of the film.