Blog Photo Assignment                                                                                        Carlos Dominguez GSW 230

I decided to focus this photo assignment on the old school and ridiculous belief that women belong in the kitchen. There are many stereotypes out there about gender such as wage gaps between males and females, how women are represented through modeling, and how females talk to other females or vice versa the way males talk to females. I however find the issue that females “belong” in the kitchen making specific foods to be outlandish especially because I experience it firsthand 5 days out of the 7 days a week. Now don’t get me wrong, women are amazing cooks and my mother is proof of that. My dad is also a great cook, however my point isn’t that men can’t cook because it isn’t socially acceptable but the fact that it is frowned upon for women to make specific foods during gatherings such as grilling meat or anything that is a “man’s job”. I experience this every day when I am at work which is Chipotle. I am what’s considered a back of the house crew member meaning I prep food and run the grill during my shift. I have been working there for one year now and I noticed something nuts… that not one single girl has ever worked a full shift in the grill with me. Sure they might come in and flip fajitas, the chicken and mix me a rice. The point isn't that they aren’t allowed to work grill because they are, I am sure various Chipotles have girls working the grill on their own, my point is that I believe popular culture has deemed it not appropriate for women to make food that is considered the man’s work. The job I work at represents in a way the oppression of women solely because of the position they work on average when they come into work. I know for a fact some of them want to work the grill, they enjoy cooking just like everyone else because the grill is fun. The sad thing is that their requests are ignored completely and they are then put on the line… yes. They are put on the line serving food to customers walking in, not being a part of the real culture Chipotle is about which is MAKING great food, not SERVING great food and that just isn’t fair. The way I see it, why can’t women work the grill at my work, along with at picnics or at family gatherings? Why is it that it’s there responsibility or entitlement to work the “easy” jobs like making salads or deserts as contribution along with serving food to their children, their “man”, and any other guest that arrives to their home? I definitely believe this all stems back to the fact that popular culture is so woven into our culture that we don’t realize it, and I will be the first to admit that I didn’t think about issues like that in that context. It’s a ridiculous social injustice, and although it might not seem harmful in the work field, and in homes but it really is. Feminism means a whole different thing to me after taking this class, to me it means that men and women are equal in every way and without hesitation deserve the same respect, opportunities and social rights as everyone else. The picture I chose is pretty general although it did have an impact on me because I instantly made a correlation with the females at work and their tasks in contrast to the males at work. The women is standing behind the man, assuming her husband, and letting him grill the food, although I felt a bit of oppression towards the female because why stand behind the man and let him only cook when she could probably cook better than him? It’s the 21^st century, women can cook delicious grill food and I’d be more than happy serving my kids and guests at my home. It’s all about perspective. 

Magazine Beauty

        As summer quickly approaches many thoughts and ideas come to everyone’s mind: no school, warm weather, new outfits, bikinis, and bikini bodies. Women all over scramble and work out like crazy to fit into itsy swimsuits. Swimsuits that they see being worn by some of the worlds smallest women, women that are incomparable to most of the population. They will page through magazines that are advertising, not only these suits, but societies image of a woman’s perfect body. Women then believe that in order to buy this swimsuit they also need to have the same body as the tiny model. Even though all that is actually needed to own a swimsuit is money to buy it. There are no actual laws or regulations saying that skinny girls are the only girls allowed to wear bikinis, but yet for some reason millions of women are fooled by this social idea.

        The idea for this picture came to me as I was cleaning my apartment and came along a pile of catalogs and magazines my roommates and I have collected and stored up over the year. Every single one had a small woman on the cover, most of them in swimsuits or revealing outfits. I thought to myself how often I see these magazines each day, even if I don’t consciously think about the skinny women that’s the image being engraved into my mind what I should look like in a bikini. I started to think about how every where it was unavoidable for women to be “brainwashed” with the idea that they should be skinny in order to wear a swimsuit.

What is True Beauty?

We are constantly seeing ads that point out our “flaws” and give us products to correct them. Lots of ads use terms such as crow’s feet, dark circles, and wrinkles. These make women question themselves and feel that in order to come close to achieving perfection they need help from these products.

            Older women are trying to appear younger using anti-aging creams and erasers. We discussed the Botox baby in class, where women, especially celebrities, are using products at younger ages to prevent the aging process before it even begins. While younger girls are using makeup to make themselves look older.

            In this picture I show a typical teenager’s desktop. I feel younger girls are especially influenced by what is shown on magazine and T.V. ads. Women are trying to look between the ages of 18 and 35. So girls in their early teens are wearing makeup partly to feel better about themselves and also to appear older. The desk in this picture is filled with mascaras, eyeliners, foundations, perfumes, and lotions. All products that were bought to take away any flaws.

            Women in ads have perfect skin with no acne or blemishes. When we see these women we feel obligated to put on foundation to cover our skin up. Then the ads say that natural skin is beautiful so they make lighter, more natural foundations to make skin have natural glow while still covering acne. Making “natural” no longer natural. We are made to feel that we can’t be beautiful without wearing makeup. The media all around us tells us we are beautiful just the way we are. BUT, at the same time they tell us to wear makeup to show our true beauty.

Growing up, I’ve always been a tom boy. In high school all my friends would dress up and wear makeup. I never felt like I had to dress up, or wanted to. Society and the media showed women as dressing girly, like wearing dresses, heels, and makeup. I preferred wearing comfy clothes and being myself. Every day I was faced with someone telling me I needed to dress up, or play my gender role. People judged me because I dressed like a “boy” even though I am a girl.

            I was inspired to show these two pictures of myself over spring break. It was mandatory to dress up for formal dinner nights. The picture on the left is how I looked going to dinner. The one on the right is how I looked after dinner. Although I felt pretty, I couldn’t wait to get back into my comfy clothes. I wish society hadn’t portrayed women as always being dressed up because I don’t like getting dressed up. The few times I actually do dress up, everyone makes a big deal about it and tells me I should always dress like that, but that’s not who I am.

 

"WHAT DO YOU DEFINE BEAUTIFUL AS?"

I decided to do my  blog post on the discrimination of women and what it means to you to be beautiful. Throughout society and our culture the media has always shown women as being beautiful if they were tall, very thin, and white. With these images being shown to us everyday it almost forces us to believe that we are not beautiful unless we look like those women that are shown in the media, when in all reality that's not true at all. I had flipped through magazines and found various images of women, men, children, etc. I took images of people of different ethnicites, elderly people, and people of disabilities because there really isn't just 1 type of beautiful no matter what the media tries to portray to us.
I chose to do stereotypes of women within our culture because so many women strive and try to achieve the look of the women that are shown in ads when really they are beautiful just the way they are. People come in different shapes, sizes, and color; but there is definitely not just one definition of beautiful for all of these. I have shown an elderly couple and a family for they have lived their lives, had children, and made memories of their own.  I think that is beautiful. I have shown images of children with disabilities, and yet they have their whole life ahead of them and still seem to not have a care in the world. I think that is beautiful. I have shown women of color for our media does not put them in advertisements unless they are shown with very light skin or they are in an exotic advertisement. Women of color are just as beautiful as any other white women we see in advertisements.
I had chose this stereotype in hopes to share with all of you that there really isn't just one type of beautiful and that our media and culture shouldn't be the deciding factor on what makes YOU beautiful.

Activist Photo Assignment

For as long as I can remember, I've been getting box braids and pressed buns in my hair throughout my “growing up” years. These protective hairstyles allowed me to wear my hair naturally, but growing up especially in school I noticed my natural hair was seen negatively. Questions from “why don’t you wear your hair like mine?” to deliberately touching my natural hair are a few of the misfortunes I and many other people have had to experience.   

The policing of women’s hairstyles is nothing new. More and more, women of different ethnic backgrounds with different hairstyles are facing scrutiny in the job employment world. Many women are forced to choose between their natural hair and their jobs. The standard of beauty or what is considered appropriate hair to wear when going to some job interviews is the straighter Western European look. Plenty of women have been asked to wear their hair differently or have been completely denied a job because they choose to wear their hair either naturally or in a protective style that suits their ethnic hair. We do not have the privilege of our hair not making radical statements as it unfortunately did for celebrities such as Zendaya and Solange Knowles. The problem is that when you’re focusing on a women’s appearance you are taking away from their accomplishments, professionalism, and experience.

These women in the picture above are fighting these societal views by choosing to wear their hair naturally or a way that fits best with their hair type and personality. 

-Sava Gidey   

Gender Wage Gap

By: Madelyn Brown & Ally Hlavka

We decided to focus on the gender wage gap.  Full-time female workers make 78 cents to every dollar a man makes.  This is especially surprising considering women don’t pay less for things than men do.  Products at the store are not priced differently based on gender, that wouldn’t be fair.  It wouldn’t be considered fair if women paid significantly less for the exact same college degree as a man.  Therefore, it shouldn’t be considered fair that women get paid significantly less to do the same exact job a man does.  This is not only a problem that exists among a few different types of jobs, almost every type of job has a gender wage gap, where women make less than men.

In these pictures both individuals are showing that their degrees were worth the same amount of money.  Theoretically, these are two individuals who attained the exact same degree, have the exact same job, dedicate the same amount of hours and have the same job responsibilities.  The man gets paid 22 percent more than the woman.  This puts into perspective the difference between 78 cents to every dollar a woman makes in comparison to a man.  The gender inequalities within the workplace have improved over the years.  Where women used to mostly hold jobs that were considered "female jobs", like being a secretary, they are now in positions that were traditionally held by men.  This being said, the gender wage gap still exists and it is an issue for all women and families they have to support.