Peas On The Moon

. . . because peas go well with moon coffee.

My I.Q

| 9 comments
when i was four years old
they tried to test my i.q.
they showed me a picture
of 3 oranges and a pear
they said,
which one is different?
it does not belong
they taught me different is wrong
but when i was 13 years old
i woke up one morning
thighs covered in blood
like a war
like a warning
that i live in a breakable takeable body
an ever increasingly valuable body
that a woman had come in the night to replace me
deface me
see,
my body is borrowed
yeah, i got it on loan
for the time in between my mom and some maggots
i don't need anyone to hold me
i can hold my own
i got highways for stretchmarks
see where i've grown
i sing sometimes
like my life is at stake
'cause you're only as loud
as the noises you make
i'm learning to laugh as hard
as i can listen
'cause silence
is violence
in women and poor people
if more people were screaming then i could relax
but a good brain ain't diddley
if you don't have the facts
we live in a breakable takeable world
an ever available possible world
and we can make music
like we can make do
genius is in a back beat
backseat to nothing if you're dancing
especially something stupid
like i.q.
for every lie i unlearn
i learn something new
i sing sometimes for the war that i fight
'cause every tool is a weapon -
if you hold it right.
- Ani Difranco "My I.Q"

I've been thinking about this song for a few weeks. Ani Difranco has an amazing lyrical ability. There is no song of hers that doesn't have something provocative to say. This song first caught my attention because of the first few lines...."Which one is different?/it does not belong/they taught me different was wrong". But that section is a subject for another post. I left the song for a while, then a few weeks ago I was playing with some images in Photoshop and it came up again. I wanted some text to incorporate into the image, so I went back to this song. The end result was the image seen below.

I was thinking of bodies as commodities and not just with negative connotations. Specifically female bodies. I took a second glance and the quote sounded violent. Like someone was violated sexually, but I wasn't thinking that way. I was thinking more of the aspects of everyday life, and less about the violent tragedies (not to say they don't happen or shouldn't be talked about).

I can't get away from the idea that the female body is a commodity. Not in the sex trade idea, but in the every day working/living life way. There are so many things I love about my body, but so many of those things not straightforward.

  • I love the fact that I can use my body to express myself.
  • I hate the fact that my expressions are not universal to everyone. They take it how they want to and I can do nothing to stop it.
  • I love the fact that my I can feel good about my body and feel beautiful in it.
  • I hate the way that society can make me hate it.
  • I love how my body is healthy and able.
  • I hate how my body, being female, restricts me in this patriarchal society.
  • I love how my body shows who I am.
  • I hate how people see me and judge me based upon my body and it's appearance.
  • I love going out and poking around for fun or interesting things to wear.
  • I hate the fact that the choices of what I wear are not all mine but restricted to what is for sale.
  • I love the fact that so much progress has been made in terms of female bodies and sexuality.
  • I hate how I can be made into a sexual object with no agency.

My body is valuable, both to myself, and to the world. It's possibilities are almost endless but this does not remove the restrictions that society has placed on it, or the fact that even though i try not to buy into those restrictions, I often cannot escape them. My body is my own, but only to the extent that I follow the expectations that society has set out for me.

Comments

Mike

To prevent society from restricting your wardrobe choices you're going to have to start making your own clothing. You know, in that time you have between writing papers, reading books, going to work and hanging out with me.

Laura

Hmm, but even that's not safe from societal influence! I found a book at Urban Outfitters on 101 ways to remake a t-shirt- now you can buy your originality.
I have to ask, did the belt scene from The Devil Wear's Prada inspire any of this?
And finally, do you believe that at times you actually have no agency? Foucault and potential power comes to mind :) Great post, I hope it creates some provocative discussion!

Maria

This post was not about having or not having originality or agency, hence the love and hate binary. I believe i have both of those things. I think most people who know me know that i have agency and use it to my liking to show my originality. I was using this post to show the conflicts and issues that are out there for the female body, not necessarily believing they they are all always issues for me.
The clothes idea is an interesting one. And like Mike said, "in my spare time";). But even if i was to make my own clothes, t-shirts etc.... i'd still be stuck with societies trends for clothing (personally i don't have a huge problem with most of them). I may not be wearing them, but i'd still be affected by them. I believe that even though i can't escape societies restraints, i still have agency to do with them what i want and take them how i want, more or less.

liz

well.. i loved this post.. i loved the song lyrics..
right now i'm singing out loud.. as loud as i can.. (hope my neighbors like it.)

so much i could say about this post.. i wonder what you mean when you two use the word "agency"

god.. the female body. .both a beautiful and ugly thing all on it's own.. i love being me.. i love my shape. and my build and the way my body moves when i ask it to do the things i ask it to.. i hate the parts of me that i am scared to show other people -for fear they won't think they are beautiful.

the female body is most beautiful in it's complete self.. when you combine the personality with the body and look at it like that.. as one inseperable quantity. i guess the same with any being.

i think every girl should be growing towards loving the body they are in.. so much that they learn, and want to learn , how to take care of.. and how to show it off best. how to appreciate it, rather than how to change it, and how to make due with it.

Maria

Glad you asked liz.I forget that people outside the humanities and women's studies may not be familiar with agency in this use. Wikipedia had a decent definition which states: "Human agency is the capacity for human beings to make choices and to impose those choices on the world." There is more to the definition at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_agency>. Thanks for your thoughts:).

Laura

Liz, thanks for two things- one, for reminding Maria and I not to get caught up in our secret arts languages (we had a speaker in today, an anthropologist who works for the gov't and she told us about the translation she went through to explain 'culture' and 'ethnicity' to a group of psychiatrists. Yes, this is stuff we learned about in Anth 101, but I guess not everyone took it...)

And two, thanks for that last comment about girls 'growing towards loving the body they are in'. I know I'm repeating general knowledge, we do hear it so often- we know that different contexts (the size of women during the Renaissance compared to the Roaring 20's) and different cultures (when living in poverty, big is good) show us that our idea of body beauty is constructed (created) by place and time. I wish we could move away from those constructions. But what is so strong, this pressure to fit in that girls/guys/everyone feels strange wearing purple tights when the majority are in black? Why the styles and wardrobe revamps each season when some styles just look better on some people, and another style on others? Agency is a willingness to act, a form of resistance...and I know that mine often gets lost in my sock drawer.

Maria

I think mine lives in my sock drawer.

Laura

Wasn't there a Robert Munsch story about a boy who lived in a sock drawer?

Alfy the Alf

I dont get the song at ALL it is wiered and complex it talks about lots of things and has like 1000 points can some one explain me this song with clarity?
ps i would highly value it thanks

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