It is incumbent on any educated person to understand the implications of the media. In Dr. Rhonda Hammer's course "Critical Media Literacy" she is doing a great service in educating her students to become cognizant of its pervasive manipulation. Because the course it not only theoretical but also pragmatic, it is highly accessible to students, regardless of their background or experiences.

Despite almost a half century of change and growth for women spurred by the Second Wave of the Women’s Movement, older women continue to be depicted on television as caricatures informed by ageist ideologies. A feminist textual analysis of mature women on television reveals a surprisingly consistent media archetype and helps to elucidate the politics of representation of older women. It is only very recently that counter hegemonic portrayals are acting as “filtering devices” (Cohen, 2002, p. 615) for the examinations of the stereotypes of ageism in the media.

Jennifer Abod’s new award-winning film, Look Us in the Eye: The Old Women’s Project, is a groundbreaking work in women’s studies, a video that links ageism and sexism. It is a topic that is rarely studied and even less likely to be filmed. Abod expertly captures the zest of three old women (they specifically want to be called that) who started the Old Women’s Project in San Diego in 2000, an organization created for old women activists. The film focuses on interviews with the three founders, Cynthia Rich, Janice Keefaber, and Mannie Garza and shows footage of their demonstrations against war, nuclear proliferation, low-income housing, and many other issues of social justice. The Old Women’s Project claims that old women are part of every social justice issue: child care, homelessness, prison reform, violence against women, and war. Too frequently old people are assumed to care only about age-related issues like social security and Medicare. The women’s very exuberance and activism, adeptly captured by Abod’s film, belie so many of the unexamined assumptions about what older women want and can do. These “truisms” are so pervasive that deconstructing them is not enough. Abod’s visual evidence astutely targets the prevailing ageist ideology: old woman as “other,” old woman as invisible, and old woman as a metaphor for disease, isolation, worthlessness, vulnerability, dissatisfaction, and decrepitude.

Jennifer Abod’s new award-winning film, Look Us in the Eye: The Old Women’s Project, is a groundbreaking work in women’s studies, a video that links ageism and sexism. It is a topic that is rarely studied and even less likely to be filmed. Abod expertly captures the zest of three old women (they specifically want to be called that) who started the Old Women’s Project in San Diego in 2000, an organization created for old women activists. The film focuses on interviews with the three founders, Cynthia Rich, Janice Keefaber, and Mannie Garza and shows footage of their demonstrations against war, nuclear proliferation, low-income housing, and many other issues of social justice. The Old Women’s Project claims that old women are part of every social justice issue: child care, homelessness, prison reform, violence against women, and war. Too frequently old people are assumed to care only about age-related issues like social security and Medicare. The women’s very exuberance and activism, adeptly captured by Abod’s film, belie so many of the unexamined assumptions about what older women want and can do. These “truisms” are so pervasive that deconstructing them is not enough. Abod’s visual evidence astutely targets the prevailing ageist ideology: old woman as “other,” old woman as invisible, and old woman as a metaphor for disease, isolation, worthlessness, vulnerability, dissatisfaction, and decrepitude.

It is in the domain of cultural studies to critique icons that delineate models of behavior and beliefs represented in films, movies, music, print and television. The media “provides modern morality tales that demonstrate right and wrong behavior, that show what to do and what not to do, that indicate what is or is not the ‘right thing’.” (Kellner, l995, p. 162) The TV Jewish Mother is a media archetype whose depictions represent the ambiguity that 21st Century American culture promulgates about the role of mothering. By doing a diagnostic critique of the Jewish Mother, so often stereotypically characterized on TV, one discovers that, for the most part, she is a devouringly negative, albeit loving presence in her child’s life...

On May 25, 1999, a 54-year–old homeless woman, Margaret Mitchell, was wheeling a shopping cart in an affluent neighborhood in Los Angeles. When two police officers came over to find out if she had stolen the cart, the 5´1˝ woman, obviously deranged, rummaged through her belongings, pulled out a screwdriver and began threatening the officers. One of the officers fired his gun and killed Ms. Mitchell. The reaction to the death catapulted the incident into national news, some argued because what happened was a raced event whose players were African American, Asian American and Caucasian. Besides the tragedy of such misdirected violence, the questions have to be asked: How do we tolerate so many homeless people on our streets and how can we ever find creative solutions?