Blog Post 4

I have watched all the Orange in the New Black episodes so I wanted to expand from just looking at the first episode for Marxism characteristics. Season 2, episode 9,  shows different time frames, having flashbacks from the past to the present. I tried to focus on the class conflicts that were separated by race in the current time frame. The classes conflict between the African American community led by Vee, the Caucasians led by Red, and the Hispanics. Looking into false consciousness, there are two forces that lead the classes very differently. The dominant material force is considered to be Red because she sneaks in contraband through different ways, such as the produce trucks or green house tunnel, which makes her valuable to a lot of the people in the prison. In fact, even Vee uses her resources to get ahead. In contrast, Vee represents the dominant intellectual force because she does not go through the same tactics as Red to gain contraband. She uses the people around her and manipulates them to work under her. She even threatens Red and uses her to intellect to scare her into doing business with her. Red initially feels alienation when she first enters jail, not even having her commissary in as the new person and therefore befriends Vee. This is even explained in an article called Challenges of Prison Ethnography that those alienated is considered an outsider. It discusses how the culture is to be new and how to work your way up in the prison culture. Vee is very unique in how she controls and dominates people. In this specific episode, I feel like hegemony is involved because in the beginning of the flashback, Vee recommends to Red how to become popular within the jail. She suggests the idea of knowing the produce guys to help her gain some power. This kind of power Vee has over Red is considered hegemony because she analyzes her personality to the point that she knows how to secretly dominate over. It makes Red believe she is her friend and therefore doesn't protect herself from Vee. In the end of the episode, Vee comes and uses the people she has manipulated to work for her and control Red's business of bringing in contraband.

http://www.aaanet.org/pdf/upload/50-1-James-Waldram-In-Focus.pdf