Juelle Jackson
9/12/2018

Intro

Who do you think you are?

What is your role in media consumption, critique and/or media making. How much of who you are is measured against media examples and images? How much of our common experience involves shared mass media images, events and stories? Use several media examples to illustrate your description of your relationship to media. Can you think of ways that the media covers activists, acts of resistance and protest? How do you feel about this relationship? Use examples to illustrate your answers. Your blog post must be at least 4 paragraphs and you must include at least one link and ONE IMAGE.

           Most times, I try to limit my social media use. However, I have come to the realization that social media is necessary in this life. The way that I have gone about my social media usage is by only putting my time into things that are making a difference, things that represent me and where I come from, and something that is really important like protests. The main social media sites that I use are Pinterest where I am onto the latest hairstyles for black women, hair products for black women, and mainly all the things that represent black culture. I believe these things relative to me are vital to see on platforms such as Pinterest. I think these are the reason why I can browse Pinterest for hours at a time, getting new ideas on how to take care of myself as a black young woman. 

          Another platform that I use is Instagram where I purposely follow pages that represent my background and those that look like me. I believe that in media, there aren't many positive images of black women portrayed or there may not be any images of black women presented in media. For some time, black women have been viewed as inferior to other women, not as beautiful, always angry, ghetto, always wanting to fight, or just unhappy or unsatisfied with their life situations. Personally, I go out of my way to follow pages that show the opposite of those negative connotations of what would be an assumption of what all black women are. Black women are just as beautiful as any other woman. All women are beautiful. 

         One of the controversies surrounding black women is their hair. Back in the day, women had to abandon their roots in order to fit into or match societal norms. Black women could not flaunt and show off their natural fros or kinks and curls. If they did, it was deemed unacceptable and inappropriate,especially in a professional work setting. Today now, black women are embracing who they truly are and are exposing their roots. I like to follow pages that promote fros, kinks, curls, and everything. I think it is such a beautiful thing to witness when a black women connects back to her roots. I believe that these ideas of what hair should be like dates back to the times when black women or the black race as a whole were oppressed because of how they look. If you did not fit the Eurocentric look, then you were not beautiful. That belief is false and misleading. 

            Recently, on Instagram, I heard of an incident where this black young lady was told that she had to leave school because her hairstyle was inappropriate. She attended a catholic school and they told her that her hairstyle was not accepted in that school. The young lady had a style that consisted of braids, which is the traditional style for black women. The sad part is that they were taking from her education because of her hairstyle. What does a hairstyle have to do with learning? I begin to think that something like this would make me want to protest. I have actually found a couple of articles where there were young black girls and women protesting to be able to wear their natural hair and hairstyles without the harsh critique from the world. 

http://time.com/4909898/black-hair-discrimination-ignorance/