This dissertation employs Michel Foucault’s power/knowledge paradigm to take a discursive analytic approach to understand how the “female sportscaster” subjectivity, or imagined idea, is constructed through statements, images, and practices. That is, this dissertation investigates the way society “talks about” the “female sportscaster” and how those discussions affect the experiences of women sportscasters. Using one-on-one interviews with 10 women sportscasters, focus groups with sports media consumers, netnography, and textual analysis under the umbrella of a feminist methodological approach, this dissertation finds that the American female subjectivity is constructed through postfeminist and neoliberal discourses. These discourses “empower” women sportscasters to be responsible for their own success but, in doing so, normalize the obstacles women in sportscasting endure.
As a result of this normalization, the electronic sports media industry is seemingly justified in taking little to no meaningful action toward improving conditions for women sportscasters. Specific manifestations of these discourses are traced across phenomena such as double standards, bias in hiring and development, harassment, and the expectation of affective labor. Suggestions are made for improving conditions for women sportscasters.
I will be arguing that, although Kierkegaard is masterful when it comes incorporating rhetorical strategies and poetic elements in his works in an attempt to grasp the reader’s attention, his reliance upon a theistic system contradicts what I believe to be the message of subjectivity. This is why he does not affect me in a way that Nietzsche does and I will be objectively showing why I have been influenced more by Nietzsche through the use of their texts. His ideas on the overman, the will to power, and masks and appearances are liberating for the subjective thinker and invoke a sense of nobility in human existence that is not matched by Kierkegaard’s ideas. Perhaps my reader will disagree with my opinion but I hope this provides a dialogue or “loving fight” between these two thinkers for my reader to come to his/her own conclusion about the nature of subjectivity and its role in human existence.
The goal of such an exercise is to bring the audience closer to a character, typically the main character. A film is driven by the audience’s connection to the plot and the main character, who is typically the driving force behind the narrative. Having an audience closer to the main character is advantageous to give the audience something personal to latch onto. Getting invested in a single character’s story is a tactic that most films use and while some use traditional filmmaking styles to narrate the film, some put in these subjective moments.
Most movies include a mix of objective and subjective scene; however, the vast majority of screen time is usually objective. Subjective moments are just that, moments within a film where the filmmaking is visually distinct from before in order to communicate the transition into a character’ subjective experience of reality. The process of using cinematic techniques: sound, images and actors to create emotion is the focus of the thesis. What specific techniques do director and other filmmakers use to create these moments from the perspective of a specific character? The research on this creative project included reverse engineering scenes to firgue out the technical specifications that the filmmakers use. What kind of lighting, cameras and sound design where employed? Why were those techniques chosen to represent a character’s subjective reality? And most importantly, why do those techniques evoke those emotions?