Nichole Althusser

"To present its interest as the common interest of all the members of society, that is, expressed in ideal form: it has to give its ideas the form of universality, and present them as the only rational, universally valid ones." (40)

My thesis paper last semester in CMC100 focused on this notion of ideology in relation to women's bodies. Why do men like long silky hair, slim child like bodies, submissive women, and tall bodies? I would argue because hegemony, or this ideal form, is engraved into the minds of young men beginning when they are still in the crib. The media doesn't help this though, instead they feed right into the ideals by putting women into advertisements that are similar to what men think all women should look and behave like. What comes to mind immediately is the D&G ads that usually have a naked woman on the ground that is gaunt, tan, long hair, and in a highly sexualized pose (one ad places a man on top of a woman as she arches her back and looks like what getting raped would look like).

There are numerous fashion advertisements with exotic looking women that are hugely similar to the women that look American. As the quote shown above states, women are UNIVERSALLY valid if they are thin, young, tall and have long hair. I would argue that most men would agree that a woman is acceptable if she possesses all these qualities even if she was not stunning or smart or funny.

Remember in class when Doc Rog told us that he heard someone say that she looked like a model? What did we all think of? The same woman, essentially (tall, thin, blonde or brown sleek and shiny hair), and that’s because of the ideologies impressed into our mind. Postmodernism is anything that has caused a reaction to the principles of what is established as modern. So, the modern ideal woman has told us what she looks like and caused a serious increase of eating disorders among young women. Some reactions to what is modern is good, some are bad but we hardly have control over POSTmodernism.