What is beauty? Does beauty lie in the eye of the beholder or is the perspective of beauty already influenced by the media? Beauty defined as; a combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially the sight. But what makes these things aesthetically pleasing and who decides what is pleasing vs what is not?
Pictured is a photograph of my younger sister; Maddy. Maddy is a fun loving and outgoing 5 year old who is very beautiful but being a huge sports fanatic at such a young age she is called and associated with being a “tomboy”. Tomboy defined as; a girl who enjoys rough, noisy activities traditionally associated with boys. Maddy is on the top club soccer team for her age group in Maryland, Maryland United. Soccer takes up a large portion of her life but she wouldn’t want it any other way.
On a continual basis she comes home from school(kindergarten) and explains how she is criticized for wearing her soccer uniform and athletic gear everyday. Girls actually ask her “Why would you wear that to school?” I am so confounded by this, when I was in elementary school my peers never judged me on appearance or vice versa. We were more worried about what we were having for snack or whether we got to go to the playground for recess or not.
This photo portrays the typical idea of being beautiful in todays day and age and having to wear makeup in order to fit the beauty standard. When did wearing makeup make you beautiful? Maddy would NEVER think twice about wearing makeup.The melancholic facial expression on Maddy’s face is used to represent her being forced to wear makeup. How wearing makeup is considered such a social norm and how fitting into this norm is not what she wants to do- but what she has to do to be considered pretty.The fact that Maddy is not making eye contact with the photographer shows her insecurities and lack of confidence. She does not want to face the photographer or maybe it represents her not wanting to face the girls in her class that are judging her. Lastly the picture is divided into 2 sections-black and white, and color. The black and white portion of the photo represents societies negative view of her non-girly, tomboy nature. This side claiming that she is not pretty because she is a "tomboy." The colorful side of the photo represents the view of her own natural beauty- she is happy with who she is.
1 comment:
Your sister, Maddy is very brave for stepping out of her comfort zone and embracing a sport. This also resembles the fact that societies endorse both the benevolent sexism and hostile sexism. It holds a correlation between both sexisms and declared as "an iron fist in a velvet glove." Benevolent sexism represents the traditional roles that women are supposed to follow. Women are supposed to be nurturing, caring, loving and showing compassion towards others. When women follow traditional roles they are given incentives to keep them going. For example, Maddy's natural beauty strikes a subtle symbol that shows she is following traditional roles: looking friendly, beautiful, and having a very feminine look. However, straying from traditional roles portrays hostile sexism and results as giving (voluntary and involuntary) punishments. For example, the black and white side of Maddy's face shows that she has nontraditional roles: playing soccer. Wearing a soccer uniform and playing soccer are unacceptable for young girls and she faces these types of punishments: being ridiculed, being described as a tomboy, and being looked down upon. Another form of punishment is Maddy's insecurities since she is not looking at the camera. She shows low self-esteem because people do not accept the fact that she can play sports and still have a feminine outlook. She is not accepted for who she is. She needs to conform to the ways of the world and act more girly. To shine light on the situation, Maddy is a brave, unique young girl who is ready to conquer such obstacles that will tell her to "follow traditional roles and to not be herself."
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