Objectives:
- Evaluate personal values and paradigms around body decoration and physical beauty.
- Investigate how physical appearance affects definitions of identity and belonging.
- Analyze values and belief systems of physical appearance across cultures, sub-cultures, and generations
Original Post:
Personal Reflection Essay — Looking Myself in the Mirror
“Mirror, mirror! Is this the girl I really want to be? Am I in the right place? ” The mirror in my bathroom is not the magic mirror of the Queen in Snow White. It cannot give me a right answer, so I have to reply the questions by myself.
“Siyang, I think you are at least not ugly.” The “self” in the mirror says. I am satisfied with my appearance that my parents give me and make up by my BB cream, eyes shadow, dress and shoes. Thanks to people’s criterion about beauty, I pay more attention to my eating habit and health, so I have a normal body type. I’m a girl, a Chinese girl, a Chinese girl with big eyes and black straight hair. When I was a little girl, my mom told me, “Beauty is natural.” She doesn’t like making up too much, so I didn’t have any makeups until I was 19. My parents like clean and simple dressing style. In my mind, my father always wears business causal when he goes to company, and he has never messed up. Their standards of beauty influenced me a lot before I went to school.
In China, students have to wear uniforms from Monday to Friday when they go to school. What really surprised me is that I wore uniforms for 12 years. The time period covers elementary school, middle school and high school. I think people in other countries might not believe all of the students in a high school wear the same uniforms. Before I was 19, which is the year that I came to America, I think I didn’t know how to dress up myself and what kind of body adornment fit my style. We were not allowed to wear personal decorations such as necklace, earrings and bracelet in school. I only wore them when I went out with friends on the weekends or holidays. If I looked through the photos that I took in my high school, I must say, “Oh my god! I looked so stupid. Why did I choose that skirts?” I think the school rules in China prevented our creativity and freedom of perusing beauty. I even did not know my personal style until I went to America.
When I went to America, I started to lean how to dress up and make up. I realized a personal should have his or her style. The way of dressing will represent one’s personality, not every parts of personality, but the first impression is very important. In Eugene, I think most of us like to wear comfortable. I always wear T-shirts and jeans to school. If the weather is nice outside, I will wear skirts or dress. However, it really depends on where I will go and what people I will meet. If I have a presentation or meeting, I must wear business causal. It shows my serious and polite attitude to other people.
Do I have my own criterion of beauty? Yes. But I have to change it according to others’ values because most of the time, my appearance is showing to other people not to myself. For example, if I want to wear high-heel tomorrow, maybe I will give up because it would be weird in university class. “Siyang, you look tired but happy.” It is true. I choose my current life style and role by myself, so I am happy. Although sometime things could be hard for me, I have enough confidence to deal with them. “Siyang, you are not the little girl; you changed a lot. Do you like that?” Half and half. I feel busy and happy at most of the time because I am learning what I am interested in and doing what I want to do. However, when I live alone or have to face some challenges, I will miss my family and miss the past “simple and innocent” little girl. Choosing to study abroad in America and being a new comer, I have to learn how to suffer the problems and get used to others’ judgments. This society forced me to change and adapt. “Siyang, will you still persist in your current choices and style?” Definitely. This is the way I want to live; this is the person I want to be; this is also the way I want to exist in our society.
Reflection:
After writing this essay for my personal adornment, I realized that how much I have changed my dressing style when I went to America. In China, I rarely got chance to show my personal style through dressing myself. I was afraid to dress up differently. As Chinese students, we got used to wear the same clothes. It was hard to recognize our personalities. On the weekend, we could wear what we really liked. The interesting thing was that we couldn’t recognize each other when we wore own clothes. I think that is because we didn’t know each persona’s style. If we had seen someone wearing red dress before, we should know, “Oh, she is the girl who likes red”.
In America, I had a totally different experience as I mentioned in the essay. People here in Eugene like to wear simple and comfortable clothes. In the first week, my roommate, a Chinese girl who is really skinny, wore a yellow dress and a high heel when we had lunch in Carson. The receipt asked her, “Are you going to a party?” My roommate was surprised because she though it was normal in China to wear such kind of clothes to college. The different backgrounds and values make us have the very different standards of beauty. My own standards of beauty has changed since I went to a new country, met new friends and saw the fashion shows and magazines.
Future:
In the future, I want to make a collection of my personal portrait pictures. I will redesgin the whole pictures and make it in a interesting way. Why do I want to do this? Because it is important to see the change and progress of my personal adornment. Sometimes, when you put things together, you will find some interesting even magical effects.
Table of Contents:
Artifact 4: The Art of Personal Adornment
Artifact 5: The Anesthetic of Horror
Artifact 6: Creative Spirituality