OUGD501:Body Image Survey

For help with my essay and final outcome for context of practice two I produced a quick questionnaire for my friends and family on Facebook and Twitter. The results I found were incredibly useful and a great insight into body image and the media. I typically used questions that would be pretty blunt so I would get honest responses.

I found the respondents answers incredibly interesting, it was a huge amount of people felt that the media's representation were an unhealthy image to follow. I agree most with the comment highlighted, the media needs to promote health and keeping fit. 

I think it's difficult to say. It's perfectly possible to as skinny as the media say a female should be whilst still being healthy, i think it varies from case to case really. It's mentally unhealthy I suppose, but physically, it varies.

1/28/2015 11:18 PM View respondent's answers

Yes, in that it is healthier to be fit, and often thinner, as opposed to being overweight. Some figures who are given media attention however, place the emphasis on being as thin as possible. This is equally not a healthy image to follow.

1/28/2015 6:04 PM View respondent's answers

I think people who have something to say about it just say it to try and feel more comfortable with being overweight! Obviously the media that drives size 0 is still a problem

1/28/2015 5:37 PM View respondent's answers

Everything apart from the fashion industry isn't so bad, Also on the other end of the scale I think the recent adaptation from the fashion industry of plus size models could potentially be dangerous from a health point of view. I feel it may cause people to ignore a genuine problem due to being afraid of this new "fat shaming" adjective thats come about.

1/28/2015 4:53 PM View respondent's answers

I think they represent and show 'fit' bodies, which are clearly healthy (healthy eating, good diet etc). Physically - yes, physiologically - no

1/28/2015 4:53 PM View respondent's answers

its progressing though

No, but there comes a point when a person becomes too fat for me to think they're attractive

1/28/2015 11:18 PM View respondent's answers

a healthy, normal body size, like i would imagine question 6 to be portraying

1/28/2015 5:37 PM View respondent's answers

Thats subjective as everyone has a different perspective of what "thin" is. But I would say that people around a healthy body weight and body fat percentage tend to be more physically attractive that those who aren't. Whether this is instinctive or due to social conditioning i'm not sure.

1/28/2015 4:53 PM View respondent's answers

I personally don't believe that it is the beauty ideal, but if you are thin you will more likely be considered physically attractive.

1/28/2015 4:53 PM View respondent's answers

Not thinness, but a healthy weight and level of fitness

1/28/2015 4:35 PM View respondent's answers

Boobs & bum

1/28/2015 4:29 PM View respondent's answers

Being healthy & toned

1/28/2015 4:24 PM View respondent's answers

It is the social idea, although I'm not sure I agree

This response shocked me actually I felt given the chance people would lose weight but its pretty much 50/50.

These answers were a great insight my favourite response was, You have to be happy with your own health/ looks I believe to practice "self-love"

I don't think your physical appearance affects your happiness, but more how comfortable you are with your appearance, so partly, i suppose.

1/28/2015 11:18 PM View respondent's answers

If you feel good your happier

1/28/2015 7:04 PM View respondent's answers

No, though you are likely to be happier if you are happy with your physical appearance.

1/28/2015 6:04 PM View respondent's answers

I think it's difficult to feel in good spirits if you don't feel good about the way you look.

1/28/2015 6:01 PM View respondent's answers

I'd say its completely down to each individual to decide this. It'l be a different answer for each person.

1/28/2015 4:53 PM View respondent's answers

Different for different people

1/28/2015 4:35 PM View respondent's answers

not completely but I think a lot of happiness comes from feeling good and healthy...which correlates with physical appearance. You know what I mean.

1/28/2015 4:34 PM View respondent's answers

You have to be happy with your own health/ looks I believe to practice "self-love"

OUGD501 Study Task 05

Write a blog entry for this task - discuss 3 things that you have learned, observed, noted about the dissertations that you looked at and how this will help when addressing your own written piece.



I didn't find any dissertations that jumped out at me. The whole experience of looking through the shelves at dissertations overwhelmed me slightly as I will be starting my research this summer into what I want to do! I was


Does the way female body is used in advertising affect the way society views women and young girls? 

Chapter 1 - Advertising Theory/Gaze Theory
Tone of Voice - used first person a lot, which is something I thought you just didn't use when writing an essay

Who are the Leading Drivers on the Road to Green consumerism? 

I chose to look at this one as I have interests in consumerism and global warming.
Chapter 1: Setting the Scene... global warming (climate change/greenhouse effect/sustainability and green consumerism have become part of everyday language).
The Green Consumer Guide

Psychology and ethics in advertising: An investigation into contemporary practice with specific regard to advertising aimed at children. This dissertation explores on how psychology and ethics play a role in the advertising industry, especially in regard to advertisements aimed at children. Chapter one is on the effects

My thoughts: 
From looking at these dissertations and just how weighty they are! I really need to start thinking about my dissertation and what I would like to write it on, choosing a subject I am interested in whether that be, editorial, advertising, women etc. Over summer, I will start researching, planning and reading books once I know what my dissertation topic will be.

A lot the dissertations had good primary research using questionnaires, interviews and visiting schools.

Across the dissertations I read the introductions gave me a very clear outline of what the rest of the dissertation is going to be about, planned well with chapters and very thorough.

Across all the dissertations I flicked through I noticed they were all incredibly well referenced something I need to improve on, as I tend to leave referencing til last I can make clumsy mistakes or miss things.

OUGD501: Study Task

Technique, Content, Communication.

Based on the above, extract the practical issues/aspects surrounding your chosen field of interest. 

My Essay Question: 

Do fashion publications perpetuate traditional feminine ideals? 

Practical Element of COP:

For the practical element to COP I plan to create a magazine going through the evolution of the feminine ideal, I plan to date it back at least 100 years and go through each decade showing the feminine ideals and models from that era with a small written analysis and quotes. 

Technique:

Layout/Editorial
Grids 
Advertising/Sex Sells
Photography/Photoshop
Models/Size Zero
Gender

Content: 

Typeface 
Colour
Celebrity Content 

Communication: 

Gender Representation
Class

women's ideal body types throughout history

My housemate showed me this video of women's ideal body types throughout history, which is incredibly relevant to my essay. In fact I could possible use this as a basis for my COP practical, perhaps designing and producing a magazine on 'the evolution of women's ideal body type' throughout history. Buzzfeed has used a diverse cast of models shows how the standard of beauty for women has changed dramatically over time.

Lecture: What is research? Part 1

Context is Everything

an incomplete manifesto for growth - Bruce Mau

Allow events to change you. You have to be willing to grow. Growth is different from something that happens to you. You produce it. You live it. The prerequisites for growth: the openness to experience events and the willingness to be changed by them.

Forget about good. Good is a known quantity. Good is what we all agree on. Growth is not necessarily good. Growth is an exploration of unlit recesses that may or may not yield to our research. As long as you stick to good you’ll never have real growth.

Process is more important than outcome. When the outcome drives the process we will only ever go to where we’ve already been. If process drives outcome we may not know where we’re going, but we will know we want to be there.

Love your experiments (as you would an ugly child). Joy is the engine of growth. Exploit the liberty in casting your work as beautiful experiments, iterations, attempts, trials, and errors. Take the long view and allow yourself the fun of failure every day.
Steven Johnson - where good ideas come from

approaches to the generation and investigation of ideas

stimulated approach
this is a conscious or subconscious search for inspiration from an external repertoire in the surroundings, media, in discussion, libraries etc. The main concern here is the development of analogies and associative approaches, which are then further developed into individual solutions.

systematic approach
this is based on the systematic collection and modification of components,  characteristics  and means of expression: such as by structuring and restructuring, enlarging and reducing, combining and extracting, replacing, adding, mirroring or reproducing

intuitive approach
this is the development of thought process, which is primarily based on internalised perceptions and knowledge, that is to say an internal repertoire. This type of thought process may occur spontaneously, without being evoked specially. This is actually a systematic process that takes place subconsciously.

Types of Research

primary research
research that is developed and collected 

secondary research
published or recorded data that has already been collected

quantitative research
deals with facts and figures. data that can be converted into numbers

qualitative research
explores and tries to understand people's beliefs, experiences, attitudes, behaviour and interactions (in-depth interviews/focus groups/documentary analysis etc)

What is information? 
Information is the result of processing, manipulation and organising data in a way that adds to the knowledge of the person receiving.  Data that has been processed to add or create meaning and hopefully knowledge for the person who receives it . Information should be sufficient competent, relevant, and useful.
Any communication or representation of knowledge such as facts, data, or opinions in any medium or form, including textual, numerical graphic cartographic narrative or audio visual forms 

Essay Planning

Discussion points: 

> Evolution of Vogue 

>Visual Language (type and image) 

>Colour Schemes 

>Advertisements (influential in formulating, maintaining and altering how readers understand construction of socially acceptable gender forms) 

>Body-Size (Social pressure/thin body is admired as it is considered socially attractive) 

> Glossy Mags - (Feminine Power/sell escapism/language of liberation) 

>Psychological Factors that influence consumer buying behaviour: Motivation & Need, Learning & Conditioning, Perception, Attention, Distortion and Retention. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs ∆ 

> Consumer Culture Theory

Lecture 10: Censorship and Truth

Censorship

The practice or policy of censoring films, letters, or publications. 

Ansel Adams, aspens. 

He manipulates his photographs in the dark room , to render a different interpretation (different season etc)

Stalin with, and without, Nikolai Yezhov (another example with Trotsky didn't suit his political purpose so was removed from the photographs.

9/11 ironic/anti-capitalist 

Kate Winslet on cover of GQ Magazine, with legs elongated in photoshop.

Robert Capa, Death of a Loyalist Soldier, 1936 (invented persona//vue quote)

Simulacrum
noun
an image or representation of someone or something.
"a small-scale simulacrum of a skyscraper"
an unsatisfactory imitation or substitute.
"a bland simulacrum of American soul music"

Ken Jarecke, Iraqi soldier,1991. Too graphic for the front page of a newspaper

Morals 

Principles of knowing whats right or wrong.

Ethics

moral principles that govern a person's behaviour or the conducting of an activity.
the branch of knowledge that deals with moral principles.

Opium advertisement. Opium emplies drugs, sexual ecstasy. 

agnolo bronzino, venus, cupid,folly and time c 1545, oil on wood

balthus, the golden years, c 1945

therese dreaming, 1938 

lots of sexual connotations. because its a painting does it distance itself from a photograph?

andy earl, bow wow wow cover

The singer for Bow Wow Wow was only 15 years old when this album was released. Lwin’s covered-but-naked body on the album cover, prompted her mother to accuse band manager Malcolm Mclaren of exploiting a minor. Scotland Yard even investigated the case.

the miller test, 1973

3 questions to determine a given work should be labelled obscene.

obscenity law

to protect at whilst prohibting trash 

the dividing line between speech and non speech

the dividing line between prison and freedom

sally mann, candy cigarette, immediate family, 1989