From: Krishia
In
my photo I chose to depict the idea of Romantic Socialization. The subject is
dressed in what the American society deems as beautiful, but staring longingly
at the running shoes right next to her. The camera is angled above the subject
to show that the subject looked down upon to show that women’s comfort and
happiness is not relevant when compared to looking perfect. Women are often
times viewed at the lower tier of society compared to men, and are commonly
looked down on, not only because men are generally taller, but also because men
feel the need to protect women, but that feeds into the idea that women need to
be taken care of. The background is white to represent purity, and virginity,
because in our society it is expected of women to be beautiful sex-objects, but
are also expected not to be promiscuous. In addition to the idea that women are
portrayed as sex-objects, the subject is dressed in a nude dress and nude
shoes, and from a far looks almost naked, to represent how women are shown in
the media. The subject was given what is the typical “romantic ideal” for the
average heterosexual man, but clearly is unhappy with the way that women are
socially conditioned to fit to the male ideal; through blonde hair, high heels,
and heavy makeup. But given the option the subject would clearly rather be in
sneakers. Women are often expected to sacrifice comfort for style for the sake
of finding someone to love them, and women are commonly conditioned to believe
that they will never find anyone unless they fit the social romantic ideal, and
finding a husband, or mate if their choosing is the most important thing to be
doing in life.
5 comments:
From: Téa
After reading this I had a better understanding on Romantic Socialization. I liked how you've shown two different definitions on what "beauty" is. Nakedness is connected to sex which is connected to sex-objects which tells me that men only want "purity" females when beauty isn't all about that. The beauty behind women makes men believe that women sacrifice everything for them to be accepted in the eyes of males. Hopefully after all this, men start to understand that what women do can be the same as men; running which is normal for both sexes and has beauty in that. This photo and the color are beautiful; at first I was confused on how this was related to Romantic Socialization but that was before I started to read.
From: Casey
What stood out most for me in this photo is that she appears to be taking a selfie, with the way her arm is angled. We live in a time where the pressure to take good photos has resulted in people preferring to take these more closely cropped self-portraits, seemingly mostly because of the control it gives them over the image. I have a younger cousin who gets dolled up in her favorite clothing and make-up just to take selfies to post on social media. In this selfie, with the subject’s tight dress, high heels and heavily made up hair and makeup, she is not looking at the camera, which appears to say despite these supposedly confidence boosting things she has done with herself, she is not happy. She stares at the shoes, maybe in longing, but it could also be in loathing of all the time and effort she must spend to be able to look good in that dress. I also noticed that the shoes are not facing in the same direction, which made me think of the different reasons she could be staring at the shoes instead of looking toward the camera. It could be for comfort, as intended by the author, out of loathing, as I speculated, or maybe the shoes facing opposite directions could mean both. On one hand, she longs to be comfortable or work out for herself, but on the other, she hates that she must put the level of work in that she does for others acceptance.
This was very enlightening in the concept of romantic socialization. The way that you represented the different things such as the running shoes how she is looking at them like she wants to go against the pre-set gender scrips society expects our women to follow and uphold. Also I liked what you did with the background which represents the idea purity, is what society also wants our women to perpetuate. Society makes our women feel like they have to be "sex-objects" to get what they want, but if our women want to explore their sexuality more (because that's what society portrays daily) they are looked at as "whores" and that's being a contradiction and making women feel like being "themselves" is nearly impossible. With the nude dress & shoes represents how our women are shown in our pop culture, tv, movies, music videos,& magazines.
The most obvious and disappointing element in this photo is the idea that often women become uncomfortable for the sake of a comfortable relationship with a man. The subject is clearly longing for clothes that society does not deem beautiful or feminine, yet she is wearing the clothes that are feminine simply because she must fit within the prescribed societal role of being a woman. It was interesting to me that the dress was short and low cut, ascribing that men view women as sexual beings first, before they view them as souls worthy of attention and love; whether she is wearing sweats, or a nice dress. The camera angle is particularly poignant because not only is it a metaphor for society looking down on her, it also makes her appear thinner. The modeling industry is one of the many things to blame for unrealistic standards of beauty, and clearly this girl has been impacted in that the thinner one appears, the more attractive they also appear. It is good to note that the subject is wearing a nude dress and nude heels. Because it is almost as though she blends in with her background, it signifies that perhaps she must feel as though she is conforming to the world, and is not unique. The bright pink shoes show a stark contrast to her nude ensemble, breaking out of the camouflage that is the societal norms of beauty. This photograph shows that conforming to the culture set by society is camouflaging yourself, uncomfortable, and even compromising of the unique and individual traits that make you, you. It is important for us to support uniqueness and differences, as well as unity, so maybe women do not feel heightened pressure to endure pain to be considered beautiful.
That last comment was from Hannah.
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