Continuing visual responses

I'm continuing to look at my legs theory, by studying male and female legs primarily. I was walking round my hometown to observe people and found the same kinda thing here.

Most women's bottom half will display the shape of her legs. Women are always therefore being studied for their sexual appeal, whether they realise or not. And most probably don't think about it too much - skinny jeans and leggings are just fashionable, and they don't think of the ulterior motives to show their bum and legs.

Again I also started to expand on the idea that women are always kinda protecting themselves subconsciously, physically. Folding their arms across their bodies as they walk - protective. As if they know they are being observed, constantly sized up for their sexual appeal.

Men walk more freely and confidently, and their trousers more often than not are unrevealing of the shape underneath.

I'm not quite sure where I'm going with this set of drawings. I don't know how to more explicitly say what I'm trying to say? Maybe a larger comparison piece - physically changing the sizes of people so that the men are larger and more imposing?

I've been using pens and ink because they're easier to take out and use whilst I'm out, but maybe I need to start considering other media and different applications of line, shape and texture.

I have considered colours - kinda traditional feminine pastel pinks and purples for the female drawings and blues for men, but maybe I need to think outside the box a bit more? However, these colours are instantly recognisable visual signs.

Study Task 4 - Triangulating and Harvard Referencing

I missed the CoP session when we were given this task and completely forgot to catch up on it, with pressure to finish my essay. Since we've now had some initial feedback on our essays, and I was told mine exhibits good triangulation and evaluation etc., I feel it's pointless for me to now go back and do this task?

Starting visual responses!

I started work on my visual research today. I started my research by looking at how men and women act in public, and how they display masculinity and femininity in the way they sit, stand and interact with eachother.

I went to Leeds station and coffee shops from 10AM for a few hours until I got really cold sitting down for ages! I sat and watched people walk and sit - the station was good because it has a high turnover of people, so loads of people to observe and draw, and also a lot of people staying still waiting for trains!

I noticed a lot of men in suits, a classic signal of masculinity. These men were often portraying classic positions of power in their stance.

I also noticed a lot of 'man-spreading' - men taking up more space than they need. Showing off?

On the other hand, women tended to sit closed in on themselves, which was my starting hypothesis.

Obviously, there were anomalies - everyone's different and this is only one kind of theory about gender displayed in posture etc., but there are stereotypes for a reason.

However, as the day went on, I noticed another thing about men and women. Women tend to wear clothing that shows off the shapes of their legs - dresses and skirts (with or without tights), leggings and skinny genes. Again, obviously there are exceptions, like 'mom-jeans' are quite in fashion at the moment, and I noticed older women tended to have less shape revealing clothing on. Perhaps because their legs are no longer 'desirable' and sexual?

Legs have become an extended symbol of femininity, another factor women must embody in order to fit the standard classification of beauty.

An extension of this is wearing heels. Men don't, and the first stilettos were invented for women to supposedly make their legs look longer. To make them more appealing to men.

All of this trickles down from advertising - what's in fashion and what looks good and makes you attractive.

I did notice that some younger men also wear skinny jeans, but this is perhaps an exhibition of androgyny in fashion - that is, high fashion starting to become gender-free in a way, like one of the sources I looked at for my essay suggested. Although that was more for product advertising, it does apply to fashion too. Even so, most of the men I saw still wore trousers which concealed their leg shape. Men's legs are not deemed a part of their sexual attraction (more often than not), and so the fashion industry that then trickles down, does not deem leg-revealing trousers for men to be necessary.

The final thing I noticed today was another thing I kinda hypothesized - when men and women are talking, men take up more physical space. Obviously as a general rule, men are taller and bigger than women, but this is more about body language.

The women are closed in on themselves, kinda protective, nervous, submissive almost.

Men embody the classic masculine quality of the dominant one in the conversation and interaction through body language, whether they realise it or not.

Accidental essay research

I recently started re-reading 'How To Be A Woman' by Caitlin Moran, as an attempt to start reading more again instead of watching TV before I go to sleep. As well as really loving the book, I realised that Moran actually makes a few points that I could incorporate into my essay:

The point she makes in this chapter elaborates on a point already in my essay made by Wolf - how hardcore porn is now competition for the ad market, and therefore adverts need to be more shocking than porn in order to entice viewers (??? - madness) and keep the customers interested.

She also makes some good points about strip clubs and how they let both genders down, which I think might be going off in too much of a tangent to the focus of my essay, but interesting nonetheless. 

Definitely a great read.

Although Moran is not an academic scholar, she is still a woman who is able identify sexism and misogyny in the Western world, and a journalist who basically gets pain to notice and analyse and question things. - may put a similar analysis in my essay (but worded better!).

Essay Feedback

Main points:

• Overall essay is very good - use of triangulation and analysis of sources sufficient.
• Include more quotes rather than just paraphrasing, and unpick these quotes.
• Included main sources of research in the conclusion (Berger and Wolf)
• Make sure conclusion emphasizes my key points.
• Add more sources to bibliography (I didn't realise we could include sources not quoted in the essay)
• Look at Rosalind Coward and Laura Mulvey - both have links to Berger
• Search for criticisms and comments on sources I've quoted.
• VISUAL - look at how advertising affects manifestations of femininity and masculinity in the real world - how people act and interact with each other.