ABSTRACT

‘Utilitarian’ films - those not for the purposes of art or entertainment - include instructional films addressing workplace safety. Large quantities of these were made in Australia between WW2 and the advent of video and were viewed by many workers in different industries. Their content, social significance and relationship to a wider dispositif of media and labour is therefore a fertile source of information about how work was performed and how it was discursively conceptualised. We can glean information from these films about the presumed class, proclivities, and attitudes that Australian workers were assumed to have. Their address is also gendered, almost exclusively targeting men. In analysing one unusual workplace safety film targeted at women workers, Don’t Be Scalped (R.D. Hansen, 1960 Fortune films and the NSW Department of Labour and Industry), aspects of working-class male subjectivity commonly spoken to in workplace safety films are thrown into relief. This article examines how gendered address in industrial safety films constructs and perpetuates gendered inequalities in broader discourses about health, danger and industrial labour. Don’t Be Scalped illustrates how gender difference is one way this form of utilitarian text polices and normalises attitudes to safety through targeted and specific forms of subjectification.

摘要

“功利主义”电影——那些不以艺术或娱乐为目的的电影——包括涉及工作场所安全的教学电影。在第二次世界大战和视频出现之间，大量这些是在澳大利亚制作的，并被不同行业的许多工人观看。因此，它们的内容、社会意义以及与更广泛的媒体和劳动装置的关系是关于工作是如何进行的以及它是如何被话语概念化的丰富信息来源。我们可以从这些电影中收集到关于假定的澳大利亚工人所具有的阶级、倾向和态度的信息。他们的地址也是性别化的，几乎完全针对男性。在分析一部针对女工的不同寻常的工作场所安全电影时，不要被剥头皮（RD Hansen，1960 年财富电影和新南威尔士州劳工和工业部），在工作场所安全电影中经常谈到的工人阶级男性主观性的各个方面得到了缓解。本文探讨了工业安全电影中的性别地址如何在更广泛的关于健康、危险和工业劳动的话语中构建和延续性别不平等。Don't Be Scalped说明了性别差异如何成为这种形式的功利主义文本政策的一种方式，并通过有针对性和特定形式的主体化使对安全的态度正常化。