Week 4: Michelle Prinzo

Self Reflection: How does culture socialize people?

Is the woman in this portrait beautiful? If you were to meet her on the street or in a bar would you think she was beautiful? Pretty? In our society, many people would answer "no". Some people might say something like "she has a pretty face" or "if she lost a few pounds then maybe she would be beautiful." I can even imagine a comment like, "Has she ever even seen the sun?"

In all likelihood this woman would not be featured in today's fashion magazines. In chapter 4 of Vaughn's text, she says that, "perceptions are relative and become distorted easily based on sociocultural factors....We now know that based on different cultural practices of socialization and acculturation, people learn to sense certain stimuli and not others and have preferences for familiarity with particular cultural-related images,  smells, tastes, and sounds" (81). What people perceived as beautiful during DaVinci's time  and what we perceive as beautiful now is very different. Girls and women in our society feel pressure to be thin, to be tan, even if it is not a healthy thin or a healthy tan whereas  in the past women who were heavy and fair-skinned were perceived as having the ideal bodies.

Perceptions of beauty are not only between the past and present, but they vary between cultures. Cultures world-wide have differing perceptions of beauty. We hear stories of women who put rings around their neck to elongate them or women who bandage their feet to prevent them from getting bigger. Vaugh affirms this idea as she states, "Peception of what is beautiful offer differs greatly across the globe. Some fads and fashions start at a national level and quickly spread internationally. Other cultures limit the media and thus beauty is often defined for the people without the freedom to choose" (85).

Perception, of course, is not limited to only beauty. If affects every aspect of life. People who are immigrants often face internal (and at times external) conflicts based upon differences in perception. I have chosen to focus this posting on beauty because my mentee is fascinated by fashion and clothing for women. She loves to hear about my purse and my make up and asked me if I would bring magazines for us to look through and use as inspirations for our drawings.

This leads me to the second part of my post: How does a culture socialize people?

My mentee is the child of an immigrant. We have only met twice, but from what we has talked about it seems that she (and likely her parents) have assimilated into Western culture. English is her first language, and the experiences she tells me about---birthdays, bunk beds, make-up-- and the things she draws--peace signs,  flowers, dresses, and fashion accessories-- seem to indicate that her upbringing has been very influenced by American society (and a teenage sister in high school). As she is a very shy child, I am interested to learn more about her home life and family background. Perhaps she focuses on these things to relate to me, or is unaware of differences between the culture her parents are from and the culture she has grown up in. My hope is to explore these areas further as we get to know one another better.