Week 8

I read many articles about the most recent Cosmopolitan cover that was released earlier this week, which features the Kardashian and Jenner sisters all in one spread. This is the first time in four years that they have done a family cover shoot, and since then so much has changed among all of the girls. Most prominent on the cover are the words “America’s First Family.” When I think of the America’s First family, my mind automatically goes to the family of the President of the United States, not the Kardashians. This depiction of the Kardashians reminded me of what we discussed in class, where the Kardashians have centered themselves as the post-modern Brady Brunch. Despite all of their fame and fortune, they’re using their television show as a way to say, despite their celebrity, they have struggled in many of the same ways as everyone else. Even though their lives are so far from normal, they try to represent themselves as the norm. For Cosmopolitan to label the Kardashians as “America’s First Family,” they’re making a very strong statement. Understandably, many people found this offensive and were upset that Cosmopolitan would award them such a powerful title.

It was interesting to see how people interpreted the cover, and one article that I read on the Huffington Post talks about how the cover demonstrates Black Erasure in America. The author writes, “Putting the Kardashians on the cover is a jab of many that suggests that there is some other more glamorous and whiter option to the black family seated at the top of the nation.” In other words, this Cosmopolitan cover is basically saying that the real first family is not the one in the White House. While the Kardashians have established a strong brand and influence in the entertainment realm, they’re accomplishments will never even compare to those of the Obamas. The article also points out that the Obama family has faced much racial discrimination over the years despite being the First Family of the United States. This is another example of the prevalence of racism in the media, which diminishes the value of everything that the First Family has accomplished at the cost of an interesting cover story. At the end of the day, the labels on Cosmopolitan cover have very little significance when it comes to the value and worth of the First Family, but even a small cover can make a large statement about how popular culture constructs ridiculous images.

Huffington Post Link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lakin-starling/cosmopolitans-kardashian-cover-black-erasure_b_8244886.html

Week 7

In class we talked about “affect” and how we construct emotion, specifically how we construct emotion when in comes to thinking about any associations with the Middle East. Usually when people think about the “ArabMuslimSouthAsian” classification introduced by Vani Kannan, they are drawn to images of terrorism and are thus racializing bodies that they know nothing about. Especially as someone who was a young child when September 11^th occurred, I was led to believe that Muslims were dangerous. It was silently taught to me as a kid, whether I was in school or at home, but that was only because of the adult figures in my life and also the media, which painted this picture that every single Muslim was a potential terrorist.

            In elementary school, one of my best friends was ashamed of being called a Muslim because she also equated the Islamic population with the words “terrorist” and “national threat.” She grew up as a Muslim, but all of her friends (including myself) were Christians. For years she would tell us that she is also a Christian, but her family would say that they were Muslim. As a kid, I was confused as to how should could practice both, and my grandma (a strict Christian) would always tell me that is not possible. Possible or not, I wondered why my friend felt the need to assure people that she was not a Muslim. She certainly embraced the Islamic culture and practiced the religion of Islam, but she did not want to be labeled a Muslim. One day, she started crying to me because she felt so frustrated with people using her faith to stereotype her as a bad person. When I think about this now, it’s extremely frustrating and unfortunate to me that she felt she had to hide a part of herself out of fear of being judged and racialized as a threat. As of today, she has definitely grown out of it, but as a kid, she should not have had to face such unfair and unnecessary judgment.

Even though years have passed since September 11^th, kids today still seem to make endless terrorist jokes to Middle Easterners. At my high school, students would call a boy who practiced Hinduism and wore a turban a terrorist because they thought they were hilarious. This boy would laugh along with these kids and never did speak up or defend himself. Earlier this year, my 14 year old cousin told me that one of the boys in her class asked about her ethnicity, and once she told him she is half Pakistani, he has nicknamed her terrorist. After she tells me this story, she starts laughing and I proceed to ask her why she did not correct his poor choice of words. She tells me “oh don’t worry I know that he’s kidding it’s not a big deal.” The problem is, it IS a huge deal. It makes me sad to see that my cousin is immune to such absurd racial stereotypes. She’s laughing with them, but she does not understand the complexity of the problem. Fourteen years later, it seems we have not even slightly improved in eliminating racial discrimination and stereotyping of Middle Easterners.

Week 6

      Our discussion on images and photography this week got me thinking about my internship at a fashion public relations firm that I’ve been doing since July. My internship is not only a PR firm, but also a showroom where we present about 15-20 fashion brands that stylists can pull from for red carpet events or editorial shoots. In addition, interns conduct research for bloggers and celebrities who we think will best fit the brands, so that we can gift them samples and gain more product recognition. In doing research for these brands, I work with other interns and account executives to get their advice and approval of women who would bring the best publicity for the products. 

     While we look at how strong of a following these women have, a lot of our decision-making has to do with their image and physical appearance. I understand that this is expected, especially working in entertainment, but I was shocked to witness the blatant racial discrimination of my peers in choosing potential celebrities to wear our brands. It made me realize why we don’t have enough diversity across all platforms of entertainment, because the creators behind the scenes are given the power to choose how brands are represented. These images that we see in the media routinize the way that we see race because we’re used to seeing a specific aesthetic in campaigns and editorial shoots. 

     On the second day of my internship, while researching bloggers, I came across some beautiful people of all different races and also different body types. When I presented my list to a senior intern who was training me, she was quick to point out that those who were colored and maybe those who were fuller figured were not the “right fit” for our brands. This made me really angry and I proceeded to ask her why she would not consider them and she refused to give me a straight answer at the risk of sounding too racist. I knew why should did not agree with them, but I would have liked to hear her reasoning and point of view. When I research bloggers, I like to select a variety of girls because in my mind, anyone should be able to wear these brands. I do not understand the image that our brands are trying to capture, but I know that it is not all-inclusive. In doing this internship, I have learned the harsh reality of racial discrimination in popular culture first hand, and it makes me really frustrated to know that so many people reinforce these problems rather than solve them. I believe we need to utilize images in a more efficient way by using it as a tool to express racial diversity and inclusivity, or an accurate representation of reality.