I really enjoyed Lauren Greenfield's work. I was very intrigued by her pictures that detail the sexualization of young girls and young women. I work at a pregnancy center and we see so many young girls who are oversexualized. My heart was touched by the many pictures. I decided to do an opposite approach. I wanted to focus on African American girls because Lauren seems to focus on Caucasian girls. I went to a local youth center and took pictures of the local youth girls. I wanted to show how women are trying to teach young girls about chastity and innocence. Lauren Greenfield usually uses harsh light, so the center was dim and I decided to take most of the pictures under fluorescent light.
The first picture is of 2 girls learning a praise dance by their teacher.
The second picture is of a girl who is on the drumline at the local youth center, she was the only girl on the drumline.
The third picture is of the drum major on the drumline she is yelling out a call for the drumline to halt the line.
The last picture is of one of the mentors at the youth center who works with the young girls. Lauren Greenfield's photography consists of portraits as well. This is a portrait of her in a shirt that says "I'm worth the wait!" Most young women and young girls usually have sexually suggestive shirts, so this is out of the ordinary!!!
Faith
2 comments:
Faith, great job working to understand and duplicate Greenfield's work. You hit the nail on the head. Your access into this world through your work and other affiliations may well be your ticket to a great photo story.
The photos are a bit dark, but are still very usable.
great post--I'm always gratified to see bloggers, parents, and teachers taking up this cause.
I'm an editor at The Overlook Press in New York and one of the books we're publishing in May is about the social pressures girls endure and how the media makes them think they need to sexualize themselves in order to be noticed. The book is called THE LOLITA EFFECT: THE MEDIA SEXUALIZATION OF YOUNG GIRLS AND WHAT WE CAN DO ABOUT IT. If you're interested, I hope you'll check it out in your local library or bookstore.
The author, a professor of communications and gender studies and a mother of two girls, suggests generating positive media--like your photos here--as an antidote to all the negative imagery around us.
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