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Author Archives: Alexia Raynal

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The Shock of Recognition

March 17, 2014 by Alexia Raynal

One Gap in Children’s Literature Today People in the publishing industry choose which stories get told. When it comes to children’s literature, this means people choose which stories are used to inspire and inform children. Yesterday’s Opinion Pages in the New York Times featured the articles of a father and son as they discussed the limitations of today’s books for kids. In “Where are the People of Color in Children’s Books?” Walter D. Myers (father) draws from his experience as […]

Categories: Alexia Raynal, ZiR • Tags: art, children, children's literature, education, literature, New York Times

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Idealized Childhoods

March 10, 2014 by Alexia Raynal

If Charles Dickens was alive today, I think he would agree: childhood doesn’t have to be the best time of life People like to think that childhood is the best time of life. They see children as being carefree and happy. This has always made me uncomfortable. As I read the first chapters of Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations, I couldn’t help but thinking that many people have forgotten how painful, frustrating and disempowering the life of a child can be. In the opening […]

Categories: Alexia Raynal, ZiR • Tags: Charles Dickens, childhood, children, education, Great Expectations, literature

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The “P” Word: Final Reflections (V)

February 24, 2014 by Alexia Raynal

Mediated Pornography: Final Reflections (V) You don’t get to read much about Margaret Grebowicz’s personal stand on pornography in her book Why Internet Porn Matters. A committed philosopher herself, Grebowicz prefers to sit at the margins of the discussion and bring different perspectives into conflict. Her last chapter, “Pornography, Norms, and Sex Education,” is perhaps the only one to feature a strong personal and political view. In it, Grebowicz asks whether Internet pornography might, in fact, have a didactic impact: One significant […]

Categories: Alexia Raynal, ZiR • Tags: education, gender, law, philosophy, pornography, sexuality, technology

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The “P” Word: mediated pornography (IV)

February 17, 2014 by Alexia Raynal

When Margaret Grebowicz writes about the body, she usually means the female body. The body is the main site where pornography and life happen. It is the private place where we make decisions and plan on asserting who we are. But it is also the public space that limits how others see us. In one of the last chapters of Why Internet Porn Matters, Grebowicz offers a beautiful account of the value of the body as a private and public site. Her analysis […]

Categories: Alexia Raynal, ZiR • Tags: ethics, identity, philosophy, politics, pornography, sexuality

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The “P” word: Mediated Pornography (III)

February 10, 2014 by Alexia Raynal

Words matter. My recent readings, including Dylan Farrow’s letter to the New York Times, an article published by The Atlantic, and Margaret Grebowiczs’ book Why Internet Porn Matters, have made me more aware of the ways in which the names we give things redefine our experiences. Dylan Farrow’s letter to the New York Times two weeks ago rekindled public conversations about sex abuse, human rights, and privacy. But people seem as skeptical about the “truth” as they were before. The idea that […]

Categories: Alexia Raynal, ZiR • Tags: language, New York Times, philosophy, pornography, sex abuse, sexuality, words

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The “P” word: mediated pornography II

February 3, 2014 by Alexia Raynal

Two weeks ago, when I began reading Margaret Grebowicz’s Why Internet Porn Matters I learned that changes in pornography (i.e., an increasing virtual market) reflect and effect the way people think about sexuality, speech and power. Last week, as I dove into chapter 3, I discovered specific ways scholars speak about this topic. For some, pornography is a strictly masculine interest. It gets recognized—along truth and sex—as belonging to the order of the masculine (On the other hand, artifice, veiling, and seduction, […]

Categories: ZiR • Tags: fantasy, men, pornography, sexuality, technology, women

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The “P” word: mediated pornography

January 27, 2014 by Alexia Raynal

My friend was a little upset that Margret Grebowicz did not include graphic evidence of her research in her book Why Internet Porn Matters. I, on the other hand, was a little relieved. Reading a book about pornography without the images seemed less daunting than reading an illustrated version of it. Granted, there is descriptive narrative in the book, but Grebowicz seems to focus more on language and power than the visuals. This is what I found most interesting in the first two […]

Categories: ZiR • Tags: capitalism, Marx, philosophy, pornography, reading, sexuality

1

Childhood: the value of secrecy

January 20, 2014 by Alexia Raynal

(Or “Everybody is entitled to dream, even those who came before MLK”) Eugene Field was an American writer best known for his children’s poetry, reports Wikipedia. I, on the other hand, report that translating a poem of his can be quite a challenge. Mr. Field—no doubt—had his own understanding of what childhood meant. And in this particular case, I am sure he sensed that children value secrecy—perhaps just as much as we do. These are the last three verses of […]

Categories: Alexia Raynal, ZiR • Tags: childhood, children, dreams, literature, Martin Luther King, poetry, secrecy

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Our hidden search for homogeneity

January 13, 2014 by Alexia Raynal

I often avoid talking about race, class, and migration in public. People seem to take these topics as an opportunity to strengthen their beliefs, rather than to enter a discussion. (see “Breaking up the Echo” quoted in my first week of reading). A recent article in the New York Times opinion pages has taken my conviction a step further. In Does Immigration mean ‘France is Over’? Justin E. H. Smith suggests that people not only seek homogeneity in their own lives; they […]

Categories: ZiR • Tags: beliefs, culture, diversity, immigration, migration, New York Times, racism, reading

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