Welcome to the Podcast Page
Here is an analysis of my process for creating the podcast/microsite and a reflection of my progress toward course objectives. The podcast's topic is Disney Film & Social Gender Norms, which talks about the Disney films’ characters’ gender roles. Besides, this podcast is also an analysis of the movies and articles read during Week 1 through Week 7, which is an excellent way to deeply understand the article and films.
Pre-Production
Anotation fromWith Rogue One, the Star Wars Franchise Gets Even More Feminist.
This annotation is from assignment week four close reading: Garber, With Rogue One Star Wars, Goes Full Feminist. It mainly focuses on analyzing the action of the female hero, Jyn. Since Jyn’s action contributes a different female gender role with Disney princesses, which is independent and strong, we could see the evolution of female values. In the process of making annotations, my ability of writing literacy has been improved. In the close reading assignment, the annotations are divided into several small pieces, such as the analysis of introduction, the analysis of character actions, and the comparison of values of different characters, that is, the summary of the main idea of the article. Following the guidance of annotation can help me deeply understand the article. Meanwhile, since the article has a particular connection with exploratory writing, I could cite some article points to support my perspective.
Anotation fromWith Rogue One, the Star Wars Franchise Gets Even More Feminist.
It's an annotation from week five close reading: Cates, Masculinity, Marvel-Style. The article mainly demonstrates several Marvel heroes' masculinity and summary the typical masculinity those female heroes and male heroes share. This annotation points out the positive masculinity of superheroes. It's an excellent example for the podcast to illustrate male characters' masculinity, like Spider-Man. In the process of making annotation, it not only improves my written literacy but also develops habits for engaged reading. Each annotation assignment has several steps to complete, like knowing whom the author is, predicting reading with a purpose, reading to find the main idea, etc. Therefore, when reading an article myself, I also tend to look up the author first and then predict the article's main idea based on its title. Thus, I successfully apply these reading skills to various kinds of text, like analyzing an article and a Podcast. perfect for long blocks of text.
This is a screenshot from the Week 1 assignment On Social Construction, which illustrates that color is an example of social construction; for example, blue is for boys and pink is for girls. In the annotation of each movie, we need to analyze the character's look, such as the appearance or outwear of the characters. As an example of social construction, the color gives me a good understanding of the look of characters. The following are two excerpts from my exploratory writing.
Annotation from Star Wars
Annotation from Star Wars
The first look is Kylo, the villain in Star War: The Force Awakens, who is dressed all in black. The second look is Spider-Man, the hero in Spider-Man: Home Coming, who wears a red and blue uniform. According to the example of social construction, the color of each characters' uniform represents their value. Therefore, I could conclude that black symbolizes evil, cruelty, and lack of compassion, while red symbolizes justice, courage, and fairness. Relating what I've learned to my thoughts has improved my mind, openness, and metacognition habits. Openness is for coming up with a different idea from what I've learned and apply it in my essay. When doing an assignment, I need to consider whether the views I have presented can be combined with the articles I have read.
Production
one connection sentence in my script
It’s an excerpt from my script. I choose this one because I have a different view from my other group members. This part is mainly about how Disney films represent masculinity. My other three team members are all discussing toxic masculinity, such as Gaston in Beauty and Beast, but what I tell is different from them, which is about Marvel's masculinity, a Positive Masculinity. I consider this part is essential because it causes a different view for the Podcast. When discussing with my group members whether to delete this part, we agreed that different opinions would enrich the Podcast's content. In writing my script, I could practice collaboration and communication skills since group discussion is part of the collaboration. Besides, when there are different opinions, group communication can give useful suggestions.
images of Rey and Leia's look
These two pictures are what I contribute to our group Podcast, which is an excellent example to show the change of female outwear and their gender values. When our group discusses how Disney films represent feminine values, I share my perspective about a Star War female character. By analyzing their outwear, we could see the value of female character in Star War changed to independence. Since the description of words cannot bring a substantial impact to the audience, the comparison of two people can help the audience understand and feel the change of female gender roles. This kind of work is another way to practice communication skills since the description must be obvious to let the audience understand my perspective, which strengthens the ability to speak.
GarageBand Podcast Editing
Since I’m the Podcast editor and our group recorded together in Zoom, I needed to cut off all the nonsense and mistakes of audio and add intro music, ending music, and interspersed music to audio to make the whole audio a complete Podcast. I select four music pieces from Disney films as the music part in the Podcast, which is related to some of the movies in the Podcast, like Beauty and Beast. I have been discussing what unnecessary details need to be cut with my team members, so this kind of work improves both my ability to edit music and group communication. Therefore, it practices my communication skills by composing in different types of media.
Our Group Podcast Link
Looking Ahead in Three Paragraphs
One of the biggest mistakes we made while recording the Podcast was that the previous person's answer didn't match the one followed. Since we have determined each segment's theme and topic, our team members write their script alone, and then we planned to string together everyone's script during the zoom meeting. However, when we string the script, we realized that our script could not be stringed since some people talk about Beauty and Beast while other talk about Marvel heroes, which is very confusing. Therefore, instead of recording the Podcast in one hour, it took three hours because everyone had to revise their scripts, wasting much time. According to this mistake, after identifying themes and subtitles, we still need to further identify the films and characters involved in the Podcast, otherwise different points of view will be challenging to mix.
According to the project's collaboration, I learned it's essential to set up a contact group, discuss and assign individual tasks, establish a deadline for each person, and set a time for group discussion. Those steps are what our group used to complete this project. Setting up a group is an excellent way for everyone to ask questions and answer others' questions, promoting the team's effective work. Besides, discussing and assigning individual tasks could effectively complete the project since an enormous task is detailed and each person does his or her little part. When combined, the task is unexceptionable. Also, the deadline is significant, which effectively plays a role in supervising each member. Thus, those skills are applicable when collaborating with peers.
Our group Podcast analyzes both female and male characters' values, so I involve many films and characters in the Podcast to illustrate what those characters have and how they contribute to the gender roles. However, in my essay, I want to delete some extra things to make my point clearer. Analyzing focus on analyze how male represent Masculinity in Disney superheroes' films. This narrowing down the film and taking a specific angle can make the point clearer. Therefore, I will keep my Podcast part talking about Masculinity and removing details about female gender values. Besides, when discussing Masculinity, my team members and I share different views. They discuss toxic Masculinity, while I discuss positive Masculinity. Hence, such a comparison gave me new ideas in my essay that I could compare toxic Masculinity with positive Masculinity by analyzing heroes and villains.