Unit 5 – Personal Reflection Essay

Just like the girl in all over the world, I like shopping and buy many kinds of clothes. I have a big closet in my room, but without any effort, I make the closet full with my clothes in no time, so that I need to give the closet a regular clean and throw some of them away or donate them to others who need them. I have all kinds of clothes, but I like colorful dress most. Most of the clothes are bright and I do not like wear dark clothes. Moreover, instead of wearing trousers, I like wear skirt and dress. Therefore, the bright skirt and dress take up most of my closet’s space. The space left is taken up by the bright casual clothes. Meanwhile, I like wear all kinds of high-heeled shoes and plimsolls. You can find me wearing bright dress and high-heeled shoes all the time. But sometimes, you can still find me wearing casual clothes and plimsolls. I do not like wear adornment. Even though I like collecting various adornments, I do not enjoy wearing them.

The style of my dress is close related to my traditional values and brief. As I am a girl, my mother keep telling me that girl should be wear bright color clothes while boys should wear dark clothes since I was a child. And my mother also tells me that girl should wear skirts and dresses instead of trousers, trousers are made for the male. Because of my mother’s values and briefs, my mother kept buying me bright clothes and dresses and skirts and dressed me like a princess when I was a little child. Influenced by mother, I get used to the bright color clothes, dress, and skirt and I cannot help buying these kinds of clothes when I grow up. Maybe deep in my mind, just like my mother, I believe that girl should wear bright clothes, dresses, skirts and high-heeled shoes instead of trousers. However, at the mean time, the idea that male and female is equal is widely spread. And I am in the society which is become freer and freer so that I wear causal clothes and plimsolls sometimes as well. Therefore, my clothes reflect my paradoxical values and briefs. On one hand, I am traditional and like wearing like a princess. On the other hand, I accept the value of the society nowadays and dress neutral clothes.

When shopping, I choose the clothes without thinking twice. Instead, I buy clothes according to my mood at that time. I think the choice I made can reflect my subconscious. Sometimes, I feel like wearing bright clothes, but sometimes, I just want to relax and wear casual clothes. But the style of my clothes changes as days go by. When I was a child, I liked wearing bright dress and skirts. When wearing bright clothes, I wore many different kinds of adornment such as necklace, hairpin and so on. But when I grow up, I do not wear adornment at all.

My family is a traditional Chinese family, which believes that girls should wear bright dresses, skirts and clothes, while boys should wear dark clothes and trousers. And they think that girl should be conservative, while the boys should be brave and open-minded. Therefore, my mother keeps wearing bright dresses and my father keeps wearing dark clothes. And as days go by, nothing of their style in dress has changed.

The situation is completely different when it comes to my peer community. Most of my girl friends like wearing neutral clothes, while most of my boy friends enjoy wearing clothes of different colors. And most of the time, the girls around me do not enjoy wearing adornment. But some boys around me begin to like wearing rings, necklaces, bracelet and so on. I thinks it is because the idea of everybody is equal is widely spread and accepted. And as days go by, the difference between males and females become blurry. And as the pressure about the dress of female and male from public opinion become less and less with the development of the society, girls begin to enjoy wearing neutral clothes and behave like boys and boys also want to break the limitation and wear bright clothes and adornment. The great change of my peer community’s body adornment and dress reflect the values and briefs of the society is changing in high speed and the idea of equality between male and female is widely spread in the world.

Unit 5 —Observation and Value

I spent an hour to watch my neighbors- the parents and the girl. The mother wears a simple dress and an apron. Her dress is so simple and clean that I cannot find any spot on it. However, her apron is very old and there are some spot on the apron. She walks in the house again and again to clean the house, the water the plant and prepare for our dinner. She is busy doing household duties. The father just goes back home from work. He is wearing black business suit and a tie. And he also catches a briefcase. The first thing he does is putting down the briefcase and loosing his ties and then sits on the sofa reading the newspaper. The mother gets him some tea. He is totally absorbed into the newspaper. And then he goes to surf in the Internet and do watch some movies. As for the girl, the girl is doing some reading on her room, wearing a beautiful dress. Her fingernails are painted with many colors. When doing reading, she keeps texting with her telephone. Reading the texts, sometimes she smiles and laughs happily.

I believe that the mother is a kind-hearted woman who takes family as the centre of her life. I think that she believes that she should make some contributions to the family by cleaning the house and bring the things which are needed to her husband and children. I feel the father is a man who believes in male chauvinism. Maybe he thinks that his duty is to make money for the daily expense of the family. After working, I feel that what he needs to do is relax. As for the girl, I think that she is an outgoing girl who cares about others’ opinions to her. Meanwhile, I believe she want to perfect herself as well.

As all of the parents and girl are the yellow race, I believe that they are traditional family. I assume that the mother is middle age housewife who is not well educated but virtuous because her dress is so clean but her apron is old. I think that the father is a middle-aged highly-educated man because he wears a black business suit and tie. I believe that the relationship between the parents is good. And the girl is well-educated because she likes reading. Meanwhile, as she wears beautiful colorful dress and plaint colorful fingernails and laugh a lot while texting, I believe she is a happy out-going girl.

According to my assumptions, I find myself think people of yellow race tend to be traditional. And I also think that the well-educated people should go out to work while the people who stay at home tend to be poor-educated.