From:Carleigh
The image captured features Caroline, a
15-year-old adolescent girl who is trying to conform into womanhood. But why? “[W]hy are feminine standards of
beauty so unnatural that, to meet them, woman have to undergo pain and
suffering” (Glick and Rudman 241). To answer the why, we must justify it with
how. From unit three I concluded that the conformity of adolescent girls comes
from society’s set gender norms and gender socialization. Woman are taught from
a young age to care for themselves and be polished to keep up with what is most
important, their image. While, little boys are taught to study books, S.T.E.M
and other ambitions that provoke creativity. The “line” for boys is always meant
to be pushed but, for girls it is a strict one to be followed. Depicted in my
photo is a scene that looks like medical school, but from a magazine clipping
it is appropriately named “Beauty School”. Medical school, is supposed to be an
institution of professionalism and higher education, in the ultimate goal to
obtain a M.D. Caroline’s “Beauty School”
is influenced by many other sources and very little herself. In the photo her
eyes are covered by a phone, showing a media outlet distorting her vison of
beauty. By having the cell phone covering her real eyes and magazine eyes glued
onto it, I captured the media’s large influence on the socialization of girls.
Secondly, the position of a superior hand shows that beauty does not lie with
the beholder. Caroline is inferior to the overpowering beauty standards, and
has no where to turn in the confined space of her bathroom. In the center of
the picture, she has an arsenal of tools that look like they belong to a
surgeon not that of a 15-year-old girl. With this she is pressured to trim, cut
and carve every imperfection off of her body. Lastly, the lighting I chose, was
a bright florescent light to resemble an operating room. Operating rooms are
clean, sterile, and taken great care of. Just like beauty standards, there is a
clean cut line of what is acceptable and what is not. The procedures girls
undergo in their “bathroom beauty school” are not nearly as painful as the
repercussion they will suffer if they fail to conform to ideal standards of
femininity.
3 comments:
From: Heather
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From: Danielle
I really think this photo is clever. The feeling of prepping for surgery and prepping for womanhood alongside one another is a great comparison. The man’s hand is in a glove representing the surgeon. This could have been a woman’s hand in the glove, but it is a man’s hand to show the dominance that man have over women. The angle of the camera shows the surgeon is looking down on the woman. The hand is handing the young girl an eye lash curler as if pressuring her to use it to make herself more beautiful. The fact that her eyes are already covered by big beautiful eyes that the media says are perfect, just emphasizes that women can never accomplish perfection. She already has the eyes that are expected of a woman, but yet the surgeon is pressuring her to fix her perfect eyes and make them even better then what media says is perfect. My eyes were drawn to the hand by the lines used. All the “equipment” laid out on the towel are pointing toward his arm. The tools laid out can truly cause harm to someone; they can cut and poke which is detrimental. These tools almost look like torture devices rather than a way to make oneself beautiful. They are laid out on a white towel to represent the purity and perfection women are supposed to have. There is a beauty standard in our culture that is nearly impossible to accomplish which is partially shown with the measuring tape around the girl’s waist. Her shirt is nude which could be interpreted as making herself blend in to the beauty standard. She does not stand out from all the other beautiful girls by making herself “beautiful”, but only makes herself blend in and become insignificant, the same as every other girl. Lastly, the girl has poor posture and is slouching over which shows her own dissatisfaction with her beauty.
From: Danielle
I really think this photo is clever. The feeling of prepping for surgery and prepping for womanhood alongside one another is a great comparison. The man’s hand is in a glove representing the surgeon. This could have been a woman’s hand in the glove, but it is a man’s hand to show the dominance that man have over women. The angle of the camera shows the surgeon is looking down on the woman. The hand is handing the young girl an eye lash curler as if pressuring her to use it to make herself more beautiful. The fact that her eyes are already covered by big beautiful eyes that the media says are perfect, just emphasizes that women can never accomplish perfection. She already has the eyes that are expected of a woman, but yet the surgeon is pressuring her to fix her perfect eyes and make them even better then what media says is perfect. My eyes were drawn to the hand by the lines used. All the “equipment” laid out on the towel are pointing toward his arm. The tools laid out can truly cause harm to someone; they can cut and poke which is detrimental. These tools almost look like torture devices rather than a way to make oneself beautiful. They are laid out on a white towel to represent the purity and perfection women are supposed to have. There is a beauty standard in our culture that is nearly impossible to accomplish which is partially shown with the measuring tape around the girl’s waist. Her shirt is nude which could be interpreted as making herself blend in to the beauty standard. She does not stand out from all the other beautiful girls by making herself “beautiful”, but only makes herself blend in and become insignificant, the same as every other girl. Lastly, the girl has poor posture and is slouching over which shows her own dissatisfaction with her beauty.
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