You Must Be This Tall

When I think of image culture I think of the images that are put into my mind through high fashion magazines.  I rarely see a beautiful Asian women in front of big time fashion magazines that represent beautiful women (its funny that I said 'beautiful' in front Asian).  I have witnessed through time the changes in ethnicity in front of the covers of high fashion magazines have changed a bit.  Magazine readers could see more women of color in front of Low Rider Magazines and specialty magazines.  What does exactly is this pattern supposed to mean?  What is it saying to women who read and buy these magazines?  Maybe I haven't been paying attention to magazines that much anymore or maybe its true but I really feel that beautiful is defined by the different shades of blond most of time when I refer to these sources.  Isn't America known for diversity and embracing it?  I guess affirmative action for magazines would be absurd.  It would be like 'Disney-fying' fashion.  Disney seems to have the token person for most of the people of the Earth.  Or maybe I'm just looking for an excuse to back up my theory that mainly Caucasian women are seen to represent beauty in American fashion magazines.  But something to think about is even when I did my google image search for fashion magazines it popped up images similar to the women in my image that has been embedded in my thought.  I would like to further investigate the races that have been seen on the cover of these fashion magazines. 

I do stare at the magazines I see at the check out line from time to time but actually doing the research of the history of the models would be an awesome thing to read about as far as body type and skin color.  I do recall as a child seeing women who weren't as thin as the models that we see presently and I have also seen a huge difference in the appearance of eyebrows as well.  I find it really strange that I know that and could point out the past two decades of trends in fashion magazines.  But with fashion trends, favored characteristics of the body change all the time so I guess it will take time to broaden the amount of the women that may be featured in the future to be classified to society as beautiful.

I don't mean to put anyone off when I say that the beautiful women featured on the magazines are only Caucasian but it is simply images that I have witnessed growing up and should be thought about.  Race and religion are always heavy subjects to be talking about but I figured I should state my judgments on the history of these magazines as a viewer and reading growing up.  I once had a status on my facebook page about my friends doppleganger's and it made me think about who would mine be?  There is only a few famous or noted Asian women in fashion so it made me think a bit deeper about the images that I see in front of these magazines and even movies and commercials.  Maybe its because I am an Asian girl that this stands out to me or maybe there's another reason behind all these stylish magazines and their portrayal of beauty.  So am I to assume that Asian women aren't beautiful, if I don't have perfect skin or completely height weight proportionate that I'm ugly?  The thought of fitting the mold of what is beautiful can be debated by so many angles.

I looked into Vogue magazines history into this imagery of beauty and found that there are different magazines tailored to where it has been published as far as nations.  Japan's Vogue features famous Japanese women, Vogue China has famous Chinese women, Vogue India has the same and so on and so forth for 19 other countries.  Whatever sells seems is what the thought that I am getting from seeing all of these magazines.  I guess I can't really blame the magazines for doing what works to make money.

Rosen's theory on brain drain from an over abundance of images in beauty magazines seem to prevail as far as fashion.  Rarely do you see beefy or intellectually thought out articles in these magazines.  It makes you think that some sort of divide and conquer theme is going on here.  Women who buy these magazines might begin to build themselves on the images they see and the articles they read in the fashion magazines.  And women who read books with less images care less about their appearance and rather seek out a different texts to help them define beauty.  Trying to have more women favor magazine articles might be brain draining if the only information they are receiving are from fashion magazines.  That would be terribly tragic if commercialism had that kind of power in images.  Sometimes I would say that for the most part it kind of works.  Especially now-a-days with most of the information in the world is in a sign.  There are signs for bathrooms, traffic, check lines and most of the places we go or facilities we use on a day to day basis.

Just random how-to's seem to be incredibly dominate in these magazines.  So I really have to dig deep when I think about the images of beauty.  Magazines and commericials show the vanity of our culture.  So I really can't bash on the women that they chose to put on these magazines.  Fashion has a plethora of sub-groups that can be broken down as far as presentation.  The fashion industry is directly the reason for make-up lines, nail shops, jewelry stores, clothing stores, and gyms can even be debated.  If images of what is beautiful begin to sway your mind or thoughts on what is beautiful you could be a victim to Rosen's theory of images plaguing the mind.  When do we stop and really think about thinking about the image of beauty further than what we witness in society of the masses.

I thought the readings from Rosen's writings about technological mediums were very thorough in some aspects of the way that the mind thinks.  I could see how there could be negative effects on the mind when you do too much of one thing can and in this case only gaining knowledge about the world through images rather than texts.

I like how she brought up the legitimacy of photographs.  I think that we give too much credit to images we see when it is presented from an accredited source or what source we value.  It could potentially be the downfall of intelligence if we constantly give into sources that we respect without any follow up.  But I guess it really depends on what kind of intelligence you are referring too.  Rosen is referring to the complete dumbing down of humanity without the use of text.  I see where she is trying to get at with this point but I think that some images cause people to investigate more about the image.  Like who took the picture, who mad the picture, and so on and so forth.  In order to do further research it is imperative that you know how to read and thus write.

For those who choose to take images at face value it can become a potential problem.  But this also could be a different kind of intelligence.  Certain images can correlate to common thought and building on these images could help you refer back to things you have already seen in the past.  If a child first sees fire and touches it and it burns them they are conditioned to not touch it again.  This idea can also be applied to any given situation if one chooses to think the situation through or has the ability to do so.  If i see an image of a beautiful woman on the cover of the magazine a lot of observations comes to mind.  The portrayal of beauty is swayed to one spectrum of what beauty is.  What about the beauty of a fifty year old woman or a woman of color?  These things say a lot to women when we look at what is portrayed as beautiful.  Most covers have light skinned models that are mostly Caucasian.  Rarely will you see a Indian woman, African, Asian, or Latin woman.  I'm not trying to get into a battle of the races, I am stating what I see on the racks throughout California.  The publishers of these fashion magazines show us that beauty is a youthful woman who has perfect complexion, who is fashionably in tune, and is rail thin.  If I choose to let this idea rule my opinion of what beautiful is then I will constantly give into the things around me that mimic that image.  If I sit back and really think about the production of the magazine, who is distributing the magazine and why I think certain things are beautiful I then begin to put myself in a box that I don't fit in.  I know that its not natural for all women to have rail thin bodies, immaculate skin, full breasts, perfect hair, perfect make-up, and fashionable attire.  These are all sellers that keep us in the loop of consumerism for beauty products.

We buy the products that models are wearing.  We wear the make up to try to mimic what we think is beauty.  It becomes a vicious cycle that Rosen has talked about.  Getting caught in the loop of images rather seeing past what the image is saying.  I have fallen guilty to this too.  But I think without getting lost you will never really try to find your way out of the misguided articles.  The complete spectrum of what beauty is lacks in this kind of system.  Older women feel they are too aged and younger women want to be something they're not as well.  This is why it is important to investigate your sources.

I don't think that all of humanity will follow the same thought though when reacting to an image.  People often develop their own theories or beliefs about images they see and not everyone takes it at face value.  I think that when I see something repeatedly through the day like on a bus or stop signs my subconscious is working to store it and use it to my advantage.  My first initial thought is 'what are they trying to get me to buy'?  Maybe because I'm skeptical or maybe because I have learned through trial and error that a lot of advertisements try to tap into you believing in what they are selling is legit.

When sitting back and thinking about how images affect me I could see how it could be bad  if you get caught in the cycle of a image based life.  But texts are just a collection of symbols that are images, so you could take that stance that texts can be harmful to one's intelligence.  Each letter is a symbol is represented by images and the collection of the symbols make a statement too when you take a stance on how you want to organize you ideas with these symbols.  Reading into things that are falsely reported can be a dangerous road to travel down as well.