ĭesmond Morris in Gestures: Their Origins and Distribution traces the practice back to a medieval custom used to seal business transactions. The term fistmele is a Saxon word that refers to that measurement. This fistmele should be about 7 inches (18 cm), which is about the same as a fist with a thumb extended. Before use, the fistmele (or the "brace height") was checked, that being the distance between the string and the bow on an English longbow. It has been suggested that 'thumbs up' was a signal from English archers preparing for battle that all is well with their bow and they are ready to fight.
In modern popular culture, necessarily without a historical basis from Ancient Rome, it is wrongly presumed that "thumbs down" was the signal that a defeated gladiator should be condemned to death "thumbs up", that he should be spared.
According to Anthony Corbeill, a classical studies professor who has extensively researched the practice, thumbs up signalled killing the gladiator while "a closed fist with a wraparound thumb" meant sparing him. While it is clear that the thumb was involved, the precise type of gesture described by the phrase pollice verso and its meaning are unclear in the historical and literary record. I suggest that the Roman period provides a suitable setting for an allegorical critic of present day neoliberal enslavement, highlighting its cruelty by the extreme violence that a historical narrative of Rome can afford.- Juvenal, Against the City of Rome (c.
#Gladiator thumbs down gif series
In this paper I propose a critical reading of the Spartacus series in light of neoliberal capitalism and its supportive technology, by comparing its features with the principles of the system and by analyzing its correspondence to the reality TV format.
The epic history of Spartacus received numerous adaptations in the last couple of centuries, and in 2010 the Starz Network released their version of the story in the form of a historical television drama series. The reality TV genre became ubiquitous in this modern era of Internet and neoliberalism, and previous publications have identified its roots in neoliberal philosophy. The rise of Internet and smartphone technologies, which saturate the modern individual with a choice among multiple screens for communication, media consumption and information, provided means to further substantialize neoliberal hegemony. Over the past three decades, neoliberal ideology has become, in practice, the principal sociological philosophy of economics and labor. The art of storytelling has always corresponded to its period's philosophy, politics, and technology. Reflecting the endpoint of contemporary post-feminist ideologies, Spartacus and Bromans ultimately leave power in the hands of the men. However, this agency is constrained by each series’ narrative trajectory and moral coding and their privileging of monogamous heterosexual relationships. The female gaze can thus be seen as empowering for women by giving female characters and participants agency in their personal relations. By examining moments of viewing across shows operating within different genre conventions (historical drama and competitive reality) we find that this gaze can be desiring, loving or hostile. Through two twenty-first-century television series showcasing the gladiator body and its female admirers, Spartacus: Blood and Sand (2010) and Bromans (2017), we interrogate the female gaze anew. Across this tradition, female characters view the gladiator body, and have the opportunity to own the gaze, which, since Laura Mulvey’s ‘Visual pleasure and narrative cinema’ has typically been seen as male. Women’s admiration for gladiators was documented by ancient writers, captured by nineteenth-century artists and brought to life by twentieth-century film makers.
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