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Prolific sender-inner Dmitriy T.M. sent in some maps found at F.A.D. that illustrate where various agricultural items are produced. This one shows the population density of cows (pink), pigs (yellow), sheep/goats (turquoise), chickens (blue), and turkeys (green); the darker the shade of each color, the higher the density. Note that the data is broken down at the county level:

You can see a larger image here, where it’s easier to read the info at the bottom about the highest population density for each animal, per square mile: Cows = 700, pigs = 2,800, sheep/goats = 85, chickens = 75,000, turkeys = 5,500. I suspect the highest density for cattle is based on a county with a lot of feedlots, which put many more cattle in a small space than you’d see on grazing lands.

Notice the high levels of production of chickens throughout the southeast. This is a relatively new occurrence; poultry producers moved into the region due to lower wages and fewer environmental regulations compared to other areas, making it less likely their huge containment facilities would lead to a lot of opposition.

The low densities of sheep/goats are due to a few things. Most obviously, there isn’t nearly as much of a market for sheep or goat meat in the U.S. as for other meats, so they aren’t produced in large numbers. Beyond that, they’re more likely to be raised by people with a small amount of land, or even in a back yard, because they don’t need a lot of space, so you don’t have to have a lot of grazing land devoted just to them the way you do with cattle (though in the western states there certainly are very large herds).

Random bit of info: in the U.S., wool production is just a by-product of sheep meat production in most cases. I worked on a sheep ranch for a few months; they sheared their sheep just to reduce the weight the sheep had to carry around and the chance of overheating. The amount they got for the fleeces just barely covered the cost of hiring a shearing crew. The real profit was in selling the lambs for meat.

Also: you think lambs are super cute, with the jumping and baa-ing and all, but when you have to bottle-feed 40 of them twice a day, they quickly lose their allure. [Note: since commenters are already getting worked up about this being my way of justifying my brutality toward animals, I'll just state that I'm a vegetarian, so that line of reasoning isn't going to get you far. That is entirely irrelevant to how exhausting it got to feed lambs.]

Here we have % of land in each county devoted to corn (gold), wheat (green), soybeans (pink), cotton (blue), hay (yellow), and fruits/nuts/veggies (red):

Larger version here.

Dmitriy also sent in an image from GOOD that shows where the various elements that go into a taco in the U.S. come from, and how far they travel on average. I can’t get it large enough here to read the info on the various ingredients, but there’s a larger version here.

From the article on GOOD:

The various spices in the Adobo seasoning, for instance, had traveled a combined 15,000 miles. The avocados had traveled from Chile, home of the world’s largest avocado grower (a company that was said to produce 300 million fruit per year). The rice was imported from Thailand, despite an abundance of California-grown rice, and was packaged under an array of brand names.

Read more: http://www.good.is/post/your-taco-deconstructed/#ixzz0hnQh4I94

(View original at http://contexts.org/socimages)

If you’re interested, I wrote a piece for The Daily Mirror about my recent trip to the LAPD’s “Behind the Scenes” exhibit here in Vegas (which got a lot of media attention when the Kennedy family protested the inclusion of bloody clothing from Robert Kennedy’s shooting). My friend Larry was interested in the politics involved–whose personal tragedy gets put on public display? Were the displays as sensationalistic as he suspected they would be? He was particularly interested in how the case of the Black Dahlia (aka Elizabeth Short) would be presented, and what the LAPD would think was appropriate to display for public consumption.

So I agreed to go take a look. And I was horrified in so many ways. Absolutely stunned. You can find the piece here.

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Allie B. sent in this image found at Washington City Paper that shows how many men and women (aged 18-29) would be pleased by an unexpected pregnancy, despite reporting they wish to avoid pregnancy (additional images taken from the report found here):

Notice that in every category, men are quite a bit more likely to report they would be happy by an unplanned pregnancy. As the WCP article suggests, this would seem to undermine the common perception that women are baby-crazy and secretly hoping they’ll get pregnant.

Perhaps not surprisingly, both men and women are more likely to report they’d be happy about a pregnancy as they get older.  Hispanics also stand out as significantly more likely to report they would be happy about an unplanned pregnancy than non-Hispanics.

Despite this, the vast majority of all groups said that pregnancy should be planned, with men actually a little bit more likely in all categories:

The responses to these two questions seem contradictory: you believe pregnancy should be planned, yet a significant proportion say they would be happy about an unintended pregnancy. Thoughts about what’s going on there? Perhaps individuals are saying that though they don’t want a pregnancy, they would not be devastated by one, or their distress would be outweighed by the excitement of having a baby, even if they hadn’t actually planned on doing so? Maybe a sense of fatalism–pregnancy should be planned, but sometimes things just happen and you have to make the best of them? I’m somewhat stumped on this one, so I’d love to hear your thoughts.

We also see that, while in many cases the difference is negligible, in general women are somewhat more likely to say it’s acceptable for a woman to have a child outside of marriage:

It’s interesting that despite the common stereotype that African Americans are more accepting (or even encouraging) of single motherhood, in this study they were actually less likely to support doing so than were Whites and Hispanics.

(View original at http://contexts.org/socimages)

In honor of the Oscars and Katherine Bigelow’s Best Director win last night, Katrin sent in this graphic from the LA Times illustrating the underrepresentation of women in various jobs related to movie-making:

After winning her award Bigelow was interviewed backstage about being the first woman to ever win for Best Director. While expressing gratitude for the award, she said she dreams of the day that “female” is an unnecessary modifier for “director.”

I think we’ve got a while to wait.

(View original at http://contexts.org/socimages)

Shayna over at Food, Farms, and Famine posted about what the label “organic” means. The specific wording, and where on the package the statement is placed, is an indication of just how “organic” the product might be:

This video also discusses the meaning of various organic labels (put after the jump because it starts playing automatically):

If you’re interested in food issues, check out the Food, Farms, and Famine site–you can find everything from a discussion of the newest wonder-food, the acai berry, to a link to a history of food labeling. [Full disclosure: I know the students' professor, the ever-fabulous Abby K.]

Also: an eco-labeling website, ownership of organic brands, and what does “organic” look like?

(View original at http://contexts.org/socimages)

In the March 5, 2010 issue of Entertainment Weekly, Kate Ward has a feature about the women displayed on the covers of a number of novels featuring female protagonists who are clearly depicted as anything from “curvy” to “plus-size” to obese. Ward draws attention to the fact that despite how the female characters are portrayed in these novels, the cover models are often quite thin.

Now, let me admit up front that I have not read a single one of these books, so I am relying on Ward’s descriptions of their protagonists and how they compare to the cover models. I thus can’t take credit for the content of this post, but thought it was a great topic worth re-posting.

According to Ward, The Wife’s Tale includes a “302-pound protagonist” who does lose weight, but not enough that you’d expect her to look like this:

The woman in this novel is supposed to be “plus-size,” but you wouldn’t know it from the cover:

Also, a book called Take Me with the description “some invitations are too tempting to resist” creeps me out, but maybe that’s just me.

If you can find a size-12 woman who looks like this, let me know [note: be sure and check out the comments, which include a discussion of this and the range of body types that might fit any particular size]:

Or size 14:

Here we have the cover of a novel with a female protagonist nicknamed “Scottish Sausage”:

Uh-huh. How could you see that cover and not know that it was about a larger-sized woman?

Little Earthquakes is about “an overweight chef”:

About the cover of Lilian’s Story Ward says, “These sunken cheeks hardly look like they could be those of Grenville’s obese loner”:

While the woman’s legs on the cover of Jemima J are definitely larger than what we’ve seen on the other novels, “these aren’t the legs of Green’s food addict”:

The cover of a novel with a female protagonist described as “chubby”:

This novel is about a plus-size model:

Though I guess since, in the modeling world, you’re “plus-size” when you’re a 10, perhaps that one isn’t as inaccurate as we might initially think.

And finally, does this look like a “big-boned” woman to you?

[Comments from the feature, "Got a Plus-Size Heroine? Use a Skinny Cover Model!" on p. 92 of the March 5 issue.]

UPDATE: Reader Leslie says,

This reminds me of a book I read as a kid, called Jennifer Murdley’s Toad. It was a pretty good book, and the protagonist was an overweight, ugly kid (with a magical toad). It was about inner beauty, self-acceptance, blah blah blah. But the scene on the cover of the book was the one where the toad briefly changes Jennifer into a cute blonde.

The cover:

Also, commenters Per and Sarah point out how many of the novel covers show women as disembodied parts or with their faces covered. Even those with faces showing are turned away or shadowed.

Other posts about books: how to make an Asian book cover, evolution of the Dungeons and Dragons playbook, and do bookstores segregate books with African Americans on the cover?

(View original at http://contexts.org/socimages)

In “The Yellow Fever Pages” (full citation below), Karen Eng discusses a recurring problem she, as a Chinese-American woman, faces when dating: that many men, particularly White men, who express interest in her are not interested in her as an individual, but rather in a generalized Asian woman and the fantasies that are associated with them. Eng sums up the fantasies many men hold about Asian (particularly Japanese) women:

The fantasy Asian is intelligent yet pliable, mysterious yet ornamental…perpetually pre-pubescent–ageless and petite…high-pitched, girly–while simultaneously being exotic and wise…She comes from a culture where women traditionally serve men… (p. 68).

Thus, when men ask her out, Eng has to figure out whether they are asking her out because they think she specifically is interesting, or whether they’re asking her out because what they see is an Asian woman to whom they attach all kinds of expectations about exoticism, subservience, and so on. As she puts it, regardless of how she presents herself, the interests she expresses, the type of music and clothing she’s interested in, “…they still see a little Oriental flower.”

I could not help but think of Eng’s article when one of my students, Casandra L., let me know about the dating website ClassyAsianLadies:

The website specifically markets Asian American women to men in the U.S., drawing on all of the stereotypes Eng describes. Here are some images from the site; I highlighted some of the most blatant examples of the “Asian women as hot but also passive” stereotypes in red:

So they aren’t trying to use you to get to the U.S. (though, after stating these are women living in the U.S., they are always described as Asian, not Asian American). And the men who want to date them just love and respect “the Asian culture” (and, you know, there’s just one culture in all of Asia). And how do you show your appreciation for a culture? By marrying someone who personifies the elements of that culture you have romanticized.

Notice the guys using the site appear to expect quite a lot in a woman: she has to remain “a lady,” be “sweet, gentle, beautiful, loving, fun,” but also be “intelligent and independent.”

I don’t know to what degree the website specifically targets White men. There were three photos of Asian women with men on the site; two showed Asian women with White men, one showed an Asian woman with an Asian man.

In case you aren’t convinced yet, here’s some more information on why you should marry an Asian woman:

Unlike “the average woman” (which presumably means White women in the U.S., since we’re the majority of women and all), Asian women haven’t become too competitive (just intelligent and independent! But that’s different!) and certainly aren’t “masculine.” Again we see the romanticizing of a certain stereotype of “Asian culture,” with Asian women having a “well-known cultural attitude of gentle and caring support” and “Eastern values,” which apparently involves being sweet and supportive. Though they’ve also “learned Western values,” which here is associated with being “outgoing…independent and fun…”. Thus, the West = independent, fun women, while the East = supportive, submissive ones.

Notice the last line in that image:  “…that perfect Asian girlfriend or wife.” This is what Eng was getting at: this isn’t about finding the perfect girlfriend or wife; this is about a fantasy of the perfect Asian girlfriend/wife. “Yellow fever” refers to the fetishization of Asian women by men who have a specific idea of what Asian women are like and view them as particularly desirable mates based not on their unique personalities but because of the “Eastern values” they supposedly adhere to. The women thus become somewhat interchangeable. Eng’s frustration grew largely out of the difficulty of getting men to notice her, as opposed to her status as an Asian American woman.

Some other gems:

Asian women are exotic but also make a lot of money (no gold-diggers here!). Men find them “intoxicating.” They’re loyal, and “dedicated to their men.” An Asian woman “always thinks of her man first!” They’ll help with financial planning without being “intrusive”–that is, they’ll make suggestions, but it’s ultimately up to him to decide and she’ll accept whatever he decides on.

They’re “easy to be with…rarely complain…and constructive with their criticism.”  One of my students said the whole “Wonderfully easy to be with” section made her think of the way people describe breeds of dogs: “Get a Labrador! They’re smart, fun, and easy-going! They’ll make a nice addition to any family!”

The translation to all of this: Asian women will offer their wisdom and support, but will then step back and let their men decide. They aren’t bitches who will nag at you or criticize you in a nasty way, or complain that you aren’t doing half the housework, or expect to have an equal role in financial decisions. And she won’t let herself go and become a fatty, so be assured–what you see now is what you can expect she’ll stay like forever.

Aside from the objectification of Asian women (and “the Asian culture”) as having a predetermined set of characteristics you can count on, this says a lot about concerns surrounding changes in gender roles in the U.S. These women are being marketed as the antithesis of the “average” woman in the U.S., who is demanding, hard to get along with, too competitive, and doesn’t stay sufficiently attractive. Female assertiveness or insistence on gender equality is de-feminizing and unattractive; it turns us into masculinized women who won’t submit to men’s authority to take our ideas into consideration but make final decisions based on what they think is best.

For a certain group of men, then, dating an Asian woman is a way to reclaim a romanticized gender hierarchy in which women mix cultural elements associated with the “East” and the “West.” They’re independent and make money (the fun part of female empowerment, unless the independence goes to far and they get uppity), but they retain “Eastern” gender roles in which their independence is, ultimately, limited by their passivity and submissiveness to men, as well as appropriate displays of femininity (being thin, beautiful, and exotic). And, thus, this type of relationship allows men who believe they have been victimized and emasculated by the women’s movement to reclaim some of the overt patriarchal power the believe they’ve been robbed of.

(“The Yellow Fever Pages.” 2000. Bitch issue 12, p. 68-73.)

Also check out Lisa’s post on marketing Asian women to specifically anti-feminist men.

(View original at http://contexts.org/socimages)

Jay Smooth on why we should focus less on the dumb racist/sexist/asshole-y bullshit people like John Mayer say (and man, did he ever say some dumb bullshit) and more on, say, re-segregation of the public school system:

And just for fun, Jay Smooth discussing Chris Matthews’s comment that he “forgot” President Obama was black, and what that says about what we think racial equality would look like:

I get this with students a lot: they desperately want to deny ever noticing anyone’s race/ethnicity, because the discourse of color blindness states that the way to treat people equally and eradicate racism is to stop acknowledging racial categories at all. But when you simply start ignoring the role of an important socially-constructed category without actually eliminating the negative effect is has on those in certain categories, you aren’t ending racism. It’s just making it harder to talk about or address, since anyone who tries to start a conversation about racial inequality is accused of actually perpetuating inequality and/or being racist for bringing the topic up.

This ties back in with the first video–we are more comfortable with more symbolic or linguistic forms of combating racial inequality (so, say, people say they have a friend who “happens to be Black,” as though it’s something they never thought about until that very second) than the much more complicated, difficult, and long-term work of rooting out structural inequality.

(View original at http://contexts.org/socimages)

The Winter 2010 Contexts photo essay “Seeing Switzerland: A Cross-Cultural Conversation” investigates the socially construction of Switzerland as an “idealized landscape” of gorgeous mountains, pretty meadows full of happy cows (Brown Swiss, of course!), and delicious chocolates.

As photographer and sociologist Douglas Harper says,

…the Swiss landscape is actually quite small, crisscrossed with electrical lines, and etched with startling towers…even the chocolate, as good as legend has it, is made largely from milk from outside Swiss borders.

Check out photos essay and Harper’s deconstruction of the mythology surrounding Switzerland; he does a better job than I ever could.

(View original at http://contexts.org/socimages)

Dmitriy T.M., Jody B., Chad W., and Jeff H. sent in these anti-smoking posters that are part of Les Droits des Non-Fumeurs anti-smoking campaign in France. The posters clearly associate cigarettes as penises and smoking as being forced to give an older man oral sex. I think it’s probably safe for a lot of workplaces (it doesn’t show an actual penis; it’s a cigarette where a penis would be, no nudity), but just to be extra safe I’m putting it after the jump.

The slogan says “Smoking means being a slave to tobacco.” The PSAs have generated quite a bit of controversy in France. Some argue they’re pointlessly sensationalist, that they trivialize sexual abuse, or that young people are more likely to laugh at them than to pay any attention to the intended message. Not surprisingly, tobacco sellers are unhappy about being associated with pedophilia (via abcnews).

What strikes me is the representation of the penis as dangerous and harmful. It is powerful, threatening, a weapon to be used against others. And to the degree that we think of the penis as a potential weapon, what does that mean for those who are on the receiving end, who provide oral or other sexual contact? The use (in the U.S.) of the phrase “sucks,” a reference to oral sex, as a general put-down or indication that something is unpleasant or disappointing pretty clearly shows that providing oral sex to men is viewed as degrading and demeaning.

Also see our posts about PSA imagery that presents sex as threatening or sexual assault as the punishment for inappropriate behaviors; for instance, a lot of campaigns that encourage condom use compare penises to guns. So does this one. This anti-drunk driving poster threatens young people with the idea of prison rape. During World War II the U.S. government personified sexually transmitted infections as women who prey on “the young, the brave, the strong.” The Montana Meth Project warns that using meth will turn you into a $15 prostitute and/or lead to prison rape.

(View original at http://contexts.org/socimages)