Clark's Doll Test & The Bluest Eye

I would also like to post another piece of writing that I believe relates to Face Forward’s message and cause quite appropriately. The message of Face Forward is to raise awareness, educate and promote a healthy self-image. By doing so we can affect people globally in a positive manner and specifically do so via the cosmetic industry and its relation to women of color. Due to our organization’s goals, the story and message of both Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye and a particular psychology study doll test raise important issues that revolve around similar issues that Face Forward wishes to address. Read the following response I wrote to understand how reading The Bluest Eye relates to certain issues concerning race that permeate our culture still today:
For this week’s response, I found a documentary called “A Girl Like Me”. It was a film made by a senior in high school interested in recreating Kenneth Clark’s well-known doll experiment from the 1950’s. Although Davis was only a high school student when she made the film and I do not know the validity of her study, it does focus on a lot of issues that are not only problems young African American children are obviously dealing with today, but also issues which draw significant parallels to Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye. In the Morrison’s novel, the protagonist Pecola deals with not only a very difficult family life, but struggles with that fact that she doesn’t embody the qualities and make-ups of what white society of the time was projecting. In one haunting scene where Pecola and her brother are dealing with the fighting going on between their parents, Pecola envisions her body “disappearing” as a means to escape the pain of her family’s broken home. Morrison writes, “’Please, God,’ she whispered into the palm of her hand. ‘Please make me disappear.’ She squeezed her eyes shut. Little parts of her body faded away…Try as she might, she could never get her eyes to disappear. So what was the point? They were everything. Everything was there, in them. All of those pictures, all of those faces,” (45). Although Pecola’s exercise of imagining her own body disappear is a reaction to her troubled family life, it more broadly documents the feelings and self-esteem issues she has due to how society and those in her town treat her. She seems to maintain the idea that if only she were prettier her life would not be this difficult, and more specifically it reveals this never-ending obsession and belief that if only she had blue eyes everyone would like her.
However, Pecola’s mindset is not one that comes from merely her own imagination. Unfortunately Pecola deals with people saying and thinking terrible things about her throughout the whole story. These messages of negativity are reinforced by many people in the both her family and the neighborhood. In one passage where her mother Pauline (whose obsession with glamorous movie stars of the time doesn’t help normalize Pecola’s positive body image) has a short narrative, her mother says, “A right smart baby [Pecola] was. I used to like to watch her. You know they makes them greedy sounds. Eyes all soft and wet. A cross between a puppy and a dying man. But I knowed she was ugly. Head full of pretty hair, but Lord she was ugly,” (Morrison, 126). Although Pauline’s comments aren’t literally telling Pecola that “if you were beautiful, life would be better for you”, it just proves the mindset of the individuals that surround Pecola’s life. That even from those in her own home where a child is supposed to receive the most positive reinforcement and support, she sees nothing but degrading and deplorable behavior.
The documentary aptly highlights the standards of beauty that young women today still face. In the beginning of the short documentary, much of the discussion revolves around young girls and their idea of what ideal beauty is and the stories they have of friends or people they know trying to achieve this. The idea that fair or lighter skin color is still what is considered beautiful only further justifies Pecola’s very low self-esteem and body issues. When recreating Kenneth Clark’s doll test, the results are overwhelming in favor of African American children still choosing the white doll. Unfortunately it seems, (although this is only an isolated case whose study and method are not completely known to the audience) that the standard ideals of white beauty are still impacting children, over 50 years after Brown vs. the Board of Education case (for which the original test was conducted around). In one child’s response he literally says that the white doll is the “nice doll” because she is “white ”.
Unfortunately this is the reality that many are still facing, the reality that young children are somehow socially or indirectly being taught to prefer white over black, even in the simplest of examples, such as choice of dolls. Between this study and Morrison’s novel, these ideals of white beauty are strongly being reinforced by even the youngest and most innocent of our society, which makes it the most disheartening. Change needs to come from within the family and from within societal institutions for the hope to overcome this sad reality.

Pop Culture Link to Check Out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjy9q8VekmE&feature=related

Activism: The Kent State Shootings

In our Introduction to Black Studies class, we are given weekly assignments to relate readings to certain advertisements, movies, music videos or images in pop culture. These assignments not only allow us as students to think critically about the readings, but allow us to process the information and turn the concepts and theories into something we relate to in every day life. The daily occurrences and products that the media feed us influence our thoughts and actions daily. Thus, the pieces and books we have throughout our course serve as valuable tools when we want to apply critical thinking to certain messages within pop culture.

One specific response I wrote relates to Face Forward’s progressive demand for change. This particular reading revolved around the role activism plays in our lives and highlights occurrences that took place on a college campus. Since Face Forward was born and created on a college campus, the organization certainly represents activism and its message for change to the status quo. Whether or not activism to change something revolves around a war or certain cause, it certainly has an impact on the status quo and gets people involved at a local level in the hope to make big waves on a bigger one. Here is one particular piece of writing that focuses on activism and in a drastic level affected a college campus amidst wild protesting:

When I think about activism, the images that come to mind are often from the Civil Rights movement. The 1960’s through the 1970’s were filled with individuals from all backgrounds coming together to fight for multiple causes. One such cause was the anti-war movement. This in particular, gained attention and momentum on college campus across the U.S. I chose to focus on the activism that took place as part of this anti-war movement on Kent State’s campus in Ohio, in May of 1970. Part of the reason I chose this was because I often used to ride around with the windows down in my Dad’s car singing Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s “Ohio” when I was younger. Not fully understanding the true meaning of the song, I would listen to my Dad tell his stories of when he took part in sit-in protests at the University of Maryland where students were broken up with tear gas and policemen. When four Kent State students were shot and killed during protests by the Ohio National Guard, a sad moment in U.S. history unfolded.
Activists recognize that change needs to occur somewhere in the social and moral makeup of societal order. James Jenning’s argues that praxis, or the practical application of learning, needs to take place out of the classroom. Crusader Ida B. Wells-Barnett, believed that true change in the African-American community had to come about through education but also “that the moral responsibility of Black intellectuals meant not only trying, socially and economically, to uplift the community, but also challenging racist order,” (Jennings, 38). Although my pop culture link doesn’t focus on the African-American community specifically, it recognizes that challenge against any institutionalized order needs to come about in order for any change to take place. And that is exactly what these college students did; they started a movement in their own community, literally outside their classrooms, and demanded social and political change. Unfortunately their activism was met with stronger tools than they knew how to handle.
The events that took place at Kent State on May 4, 1970 shook the country and the “May 4 Massacre” is recognized as a tragic, confusing and controversial event in U.S. history. When U.S. forces begin killing their own citizens, the consequences are irreversible and astonishing. It proves to show how “the master’s tools never will never dismantle the master’s house,” (Lorde 23); that literally they will use whatever means necessary to keep the established order of things. When the “master” fought back using the most extreme tools they had at their disposal; weapons, not much could be done to defend the activists. I found that this tragedy proved to be one of the most literal translations of Lorde’s argument. Activism is a powerful tool, however, in this instance the U.S. government reverted to using even stronger tools in order to maintain its own control.







Pop Culture Link to Check Out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSCSRI4oa8M&feature=related

To Be The Queen... - Duff

In our Black Studies class, one week’s reading assignment was “The Bluest Eye”, by Toni Morrison. I have read this book twice before in classes at William and Mary, making this the third time I’ve read it in college, and I read it once in high school, having read the book a total of 4 times now. The one thing I enjoy is that each time I’ve read it, I’ve learned something new.
I like this reading assignment this week because it ties in with my Community Action Project in my Black Studies class. Our CAP project addresses beauty in society and takes a look at and a stand for alternative forms of beauty coming from women of color instead of just the standard form that excludes many women. “The Bluest Eye” addresses this issue of standardized beauty. The book revolves around the lives of several young black girls living in an ignored black community with surrounding white areas. The story documents the challenge of the girls Frieda, Claudia, and particularly Pecola, to accept that they don’t meet their society’s standard of beauty of blue-eyed, blonde haired girls and the struggle they face inwardly to prove to themselves that they, too, are beautiful and ask why they were born black.

One point of the story that deals with beauty is Claudia’s hatred of Shirley Temple and Raggedy Ann dolls. Throughout the story, Shirley Temple, who was a standard of young girl beauty, is brought up multiple times in a negative way from Claudia. “I couldn’t join them in their adoration because I hated Shirley…What I felt at that time was unsullied hatred. But before that I had felt a stranger, more frightening than hatred for all the Shirley Temples in the world.” (Morrison, page 19) In this quote, Claudia speaks of “all the Shirley Temples”, or in other words, her generalization of white beauty and how she hates it because it’s the only beauty standard that exists for girls and she will never meet it. Another quote comes from Claudia speaking about white Raggedy Ann dolls. “Adults, older girls, shops, magazines, newspapers, window signs-all the world had agreed that a blue-eyed, yellow-haired, pink skinned doll is what every girl child treasured.” (Morrison, page 20) These quotes show that their world had a standard of beauty for girls that didn’t include girls of color. This idea can be damaging to girls, just as the story shows Pecola going mad at the end of the story wishing for blue eyes to be beautiful.

This idea of beauty is still a standard in our society, even among girls still. A recent movie that shows this standard is Little Miss Sunshine. In the movie, a young girl enters a pageant but her and her family realizes she could never win because she doesn’t meet the standard of beauty. What makes it more interesting is that she does meet the former blue eyes and blond hair standard for girls, but is still considered ‘ugly’ because she does not have the body or poise. This shows that a standard of beauty still exists in our society.


http://www.bigfanboy.com/pages/reviews/filmreviews/2006/littlemiss/ThePageant.jpg


Why is this beauty standard still enacting? Who is it that’s enforcing it?
Is it possible for our society not to have a standard of beauty?

What's Color Anymore? -Duff

If you turn on any TV, open any magazine, or view any gossip website, images of beauty standards lie in each example. Though I never actively ignored the African-American standards of beauty, I never paid any particular close attention growing up to what real black women are supposed to look like because I was young and a small white girl, not noticing much else besides Mac n’ cheese and how I could torment my sister. Recently, I have begun to take a closer notice at standards of beauty in the spectrum of women of color.

Sirena J. Riley also takes a stand at critiquing beauty standards placed upon African-American women. “As a black woman, I would love to believe that as a whole we are completely secure with our bodies. But that would completely miss the racism, sexism and classism that affect the specific ways in which black women’s beauty ideals and experiences of body dissatisfaction are often different from those of white women.” (Riley, page 357) She explains that white women are not the only race that has to deal with preconceived and often impossible images of what beauty perfection means, black women also face this.

The black female community has high appearance standards placed among them. The media focuses on beautiful women of color to create the standard. Riley explains this, “such beauties as Halle Berry, Jada Pinkett Smith, Nia Long, Iman and Angela Bassett. In the music scene there are the young women of Destiny’s Child, Lauryn Hill and Janet Jackson…Granted, these women don’t necessarily represent the waif look or heroin chic that plagues the pages of predominately white fashion and entertainment magazines, but come on. They are still a hard act to follow.” (Riley, page 364) One of the beauties listed, Beyonce of Destiny’s Child, has recently been critiqued in the media. She modeled for L’Oreal’s hair dye product and it seems as though the photo had been retouched to make her skin more white and hair longer and softer, making her look more like a white female rather than a black female. It had come with much criticism because this European company was turning Beyonce, a huge figure in all American culture, but especially in Black culture and giving her white features to appeal to white consumers. The company has taken away her ethnic identity and replaced it with white standards of beauty.

This image is a double edged sword for the black community. Not only does it make the ‘black’ version of Beyonce an unattainable beauty standard, but it makes the ‘white’ version of Beyonce an even more unattainable beauty standard. The addition of Perez’s racist whitewashed comment takes the advertisement to the extreme. Overall, this ad does more hurt than help and certainly represents more than just a sales pitch for a hair company.

http://perezhilton.com/2008-08-07-whitewashed

Is the term ‘whitewashed’ more offensive in the white or black community? Which of these coined the term? Besides being phonetic, do you think the ‘washed’ section is a racist comment referring to cleansing of the skin?