bodies: hair

Dmitriy T.M., Christina W., Kelly V., and George asked us to comment on Vajazzling. Dmitriy, who sent in the video link, said he was too frightened to press play, but I am very brave and now I know what vajazzling really is! It’s hard to know because the term “vajayjay” is, um, who knows what that word means… and the term “vagina” (which actually refers to what is otherwise known as the birth canal) is now used to mean the vulva and, apparently, anything within 12 inches of it.

In any case, the video below, in which a woman documents the vajazzling of her “vagina,” reveals that the term refers to the placing of a field of tiny crystals where your public hair would be. So, you essentially replace your pubic hair with shiny objects.

So, brave souls who pressed play, sociologically analyze away.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Sometimes when we put up hyperfeminine clothes and toys for girls, people argue that no one has to buy those clothes, so there is no point in critiquing their existence.  The implication is that all conformity to gendered expectations is voluntary (on the part of both mothers and their daughters).

However, the recent furor over Shiloh Jolie-Pitts haircut and boyish outfit, sent in by Tara C., Cailin H., and Lindsay F., shows us that having a gender-consistent appearance isn’t simply voluntary; when you don’t perform gender, other people will police your choices.  In this case, people are questioning whether she is harming her child by turning her “into A BOY?”

In this case, of course, it’s mass media doing the policing (or inviting readers to do the policing).  In the lives of non-celebrities, this same sort of policing is often done by family members, friends, and even strangers.  For the non-conformist (parent), then, gender non-conformity can be a real drag.

Image borrowed from DListed.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Jersey Shore has come to end, we’re (genuinely) sad to say. We know we had fun. But is it possible we also saw something, dare I say it, subversive about beauty, gender and sexuality? I think so.

A panel discussion on the show and “Guido culture” at Queens College yesterday (you read that right), included New York State Senator and Jezebel heroine Diane Savino, who knows from stinging cultural analysis.

[Savino] explained, “‘guido’ was never a pejorative.” It grew out of the greaser look and became a way for Italian-Americans who did not fit the standard of beauty to take pride in their own heritage and define cool for themselves.

When she was growing up, everybody listened to rock; girls were supposed to be skinny with straight blonde hair (like Marcia Brady on “The Brady Bunch”); guys wore ripped jeans, sneakers and straggly hair.

The 1977 film “Saturday Night Fever” marked a turning point. “It changed the image for all of us,” Ms. Savino said. As Tony Manero, John Travolta wore a white suit, had slicked short hair, liked disco music and was hot. “It was a way we could develop our own standard of beauty,” she added.

In the same way, Virginia Heffernan writes in this weekend’s New York Times Magazine, Italian-Americans in the Northeast originally disdained their own accents until movies like “Mean Streets, Saturday Night Fever, Working Girl and, of course, Taxi Driver.” Those representations, she says, led to a “hammy” reclamation of an identity that had been mirrored back to them through Hollywood. These were second and third generation immigrants, who had mostly reached the middle class but maybe didn’t feel wholly a part of the mainstream, who telegraphed their identity through stylized symbols like Italian flags and red sauce that felt potent but no longer limited their social mobility.

That goes for the ladies too. Female beauty that took on a showily “ethnic cast” was distinct from what was already being sold. As Regina Nigro recently put it on The Awl:

We (I) laugh at bon mots like “You don’t even look Italian!” (the insult that Sammi “Sweetheart” flings at the blonde blue-eyed “grenade” …) but, ridiculous as it is, that assessment betrays a value system: Skinny blonde pale WASP princesses are deemed not attractive when measured by the JS aesthetic. And this seems curious and laughable to us.

“You don’t even look Italian!” is crazy funny but is the underlying judgment (dark hair/olive skin/Italian-looking = pretty; the inverse = not pretty) any worse than any other standard of beauty? It’s an alternative perspective, one that I suspect is so funny partly because it is so unfamiliar.

Of course, there is plenty about the Jersey Shore sexual aesthetic that is broadly familiar. The worst insult is to call a woman fat (or a “hippo”); big, exposed boobs are a baseline requirement, and the men are judged by the attractiveness of the women they acquire. (The other guys repeatedly mock The Situation about the looks of the women he brings home; Ronnie taunts him that he hasn’t brought home a girl anywhere near as pretty as Sammi).

And yet it’s oddly refreshing how much artifice itself is celebrated, with everyone participating mightily, and openly, in becoming the ideal Guido. No one is just born one, or supposed to make it look effortless. There are communal visits to tanning salons and unblinking references to fake breasts, and everyone takes hours to get ready. Vinny describes a girl admiringly: “Fake boobs, nice butt, said she was a model.”

Heffernan, writing about regional accents being reinforced by the show, uses Sammi as an example: “Every part of Sweetheart’s identity – including her skin color, which on the show is not an inborn marker of ethnicity but a badge of achievement (in the tanning bed) – is the product of intense calculation.” And Heffernan didn’t even get to Sammi’s hair extensions, which are brandished for emphasis.

No character more desperately self-produces than The Situation and his third-person pronouncements. Men are not inscluded [sic] from all this ritual artifice. In the last episode, J-Woww practically goes into heat when she sees some “juicehead gorillas” on the beach, and she lists “Human Growth Hormone” among the attractions. This, by the way, leads The Situation to mumble defensively, “Big is out and lean is in.”

That’s because on The Jersey Shore, men’s bodies are just as scrutinized as women’s, and their beauty rituals are as elaborate, expensive, and time-consuming as those of the women. Maybe even more so — in addition to blowouts, tanning sessions, and agonizing over which appliqued shirt will set them apart from the gelled masses, they spend hours at the gym, something we never see the girls do.

As much as the cast performed all this around the clock during the show’s taping, the audition tapes seen here and in the video below are even more extreme, mixing ethnic calculation with the general famewhoring savviness reality producers have become accustomed to.

Looking at this through what we know now: Sammi calls herself a “hookup slut” but aside from a few flirtations, turned out to be conventionally monogamous on the show. Vinny, in straight-up costume, claims he has to take off his pants “to really show you the magic,” but turned out to be the mildest-mannered cast member, one who unashamedly adores his doting mother. Underneath playing to the producers, though, is a more personal kind of construction, and a more particular one. And ironically, although the cast members’ self-creation was one of the most entertaining parts of the show, some underlying sense of unembarrassed authenticity, even wholesomeness, made it most worth watching.

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Irin Carmon is a reporter at Jezebel.com, from where we’re super pleased to have borrowed the post below. Her work has also appeared in the New York Times, Boston Globe, The Village Voice, and others; more information is at www.irincarmon.com.

If you would like to write a post for Sociological Images, please see our Guidelines for Guest Bloggers.

Rudo M. sent us a great example of how “normal” is socially constructed. The photos below are of the box containing a Vidal Sassoon hair dryer for “normal” hair:

It’s also, “good” hair, as is said, in so many words, the blurb on the box said so:

Not too fine or coarse,  normal hair is the most manageable hair type with the largest range of possible styles.  Though it’s fun to experiment, even the easiest-to-care-for hair requires a regimen of regular maintenance.  Proper styling tools with varying heats are crucial for keeping a healthy-looking shine, maintaining balance, and adding…

Yeah, so just in case it wasn’t clear already, “normal” hair is the bestest!  It’s “not too fine or too coarse,” has the “largest range of possible styles,” is “fun,” and is totally the “easiest-to-care-for”!

Rudo is an African woman who wears her hair natural, so she knew right away that Vidal Sassoon didn’t count her hair as “normal.”  So, what were the other options?  If you’re not normal, what are you? Well, according to Vidal Sassoon, you are, of course, “fine” or “coarse.”

But a lot of good this does Rudo, since even the models on the “coarse” box are white with essentially straight hair!  So much for a range of hair types!  Well, at least we know that even white women with straight hair can be abnormal!

And, just in case you didn’t know already that being abnormal means being WRONG, coarse hair is “hard-to-style,” fine hair is limp, and both tend to “frizz.”   What a difference from Vidal Sassoon practically falling over itself praising normal hair.

Here’s another example, sent in by @adentweets.  There’s “normal” and there’s “thick” hair.

Cara McC. sent us a Covergirl commercial selling foundation for “normal,” “oily,” and “sensitive” skin. Again, they include a range of skin types (and probably include women who represent three different races) in order to point to the diversity of skin types, but nonetheless label one “normal” (the one represented by the white woman).

For more examples of whiteness as normal and people of color as deviant (or, if we measure by Vidal Sassoon, non-existent), see our posts on Michelle Obama’s “flesh-colored” gown, Johnson’s lotion for “normal to darker skin,” bandaids and other “flesh-colored” things, why Sotomayor may be “biased,” families vs. ethnic families, and people of color add “spice.”

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Well, it’s October, and that means Halloween is coming. It also means we can expect to see the unending variety of typically racist Halloween costumes that pop up every year. You too can be Oriental, just for one night. Here a few ridiculous ones, with a hair-centric theme…

The above costume item was recently spotted at a Party City. Want to be a “China Man” this Halloween? Apparently, all it takes is a crappy-looking moustache. It’s easy. Just affix this nasty piece of hair on your upper lip, and there you go, instant China Man! Adding some fu to your manchu. (Thanks, Brandon.)

But hey, why stop there? There are other fun and easy ways to be Chinese. Just try on the Chinese Man wig, “an ancient style with bald front and long pigtail in the back.” But even at the low sale price of $41.48, the Chinese Man wig might just be a little outside your budget. That’s okay, because the Bargain Chinese Man wig is also available for just $22.05. Because nobody should miss out on the racist mockery.

Speaking of bargains, how about this kickass Oriental Guy wig? The attention to detail is just tremendous. I swear, every Oriental Guy I know wears his hair just like this! That’s amazing. Wearing this crappy piece of mess on your head, you will be the coolest Oriental Guy at the office Halloween party.

Finally, my favorite one. The Old Chinese Man wig! I have no idea what exactly makes this monstrosity “Chinese.” But it apparently comes in white, gray, brown and black. And according to the website, this wig also works for “eccentric recluse” and “prospector.” Yes, I’m scratching my head too. But the fun doesn’t end there. There are just so many ways to get your Oriental Mystique on! It’s going to be another great Halloween. That’s racist!

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Angry Asian Man blogs at Angry Asian Man.  And he’s not as angry as you might think.

If you would like to write a post for Sociological Images, please see our Guidelines for Guest Bloggers.

Mary M., of Cooking with the Junior League, took a moment out of her busy Dodgers-watching schedule to send me a link to some posters for products aimed at African American women. They were displayed at the Negro Industrial Fair in NYC in 1939 and contain some fascinating ideas about femininity, beauty, and attracting a man.

Given that a woman’s best chance at economic stability was often through marriage, this one probably wasn’t all that off-base:

Of course, it takes an enormous amount of time, energy, and money to be sure your beauty is “constant.” But it’s necessary, because beauty is the true way to get a husband:

Notice the message in that one: you might be incredibly skilled in some areas of traditional femininity (say, cooking), but it’s not enough if you can’t combine it with beauty. And you can get charm and beauty through purchasing the right products:

See also our post on Chris Rock’s documentary “Good Hair“and a woman gets fired for having an Afro.

Amelie M. drew our attention to a comment by actress Olivia Wilde.

In an interview, she explained:

When people saw “The Black Donnellys” (2007), they didn’t know it was the same girl from “The O.C.” (2003). I’m a natural blonde, but I feel like a brunette. I feel like people treat me now [as a brunette] how I should be treated. People used to be shocked, when I was blond, that I wasn’t stupid. I used to get these comments that I swear people thought were compliments. Like, ‘Oh! You’re smart!’ – like they couldn’t believe it.

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Larry Harnisch, of the Daily Mirror, who spends a lot of time at his job going through the L.A. Times‘ archives, found this story from 1969:

Of course, most airlines had strict requirements for flight attendants’ physical appearance, including weight limits and guidelines for hair and makeup. But Renwick argued that her hair was much shorter than many White flight attendants’ hair. Many in the African American community felt she was being punished not for the length of her hair, but for wearing it in a natural style instead of straightening it.  United eventually paid her $5,000, “endors[ed] the Afro hairstyle,” and offered her her job back, and offer she did not accept.

Also check out our recent post on Chris Rock’s documentary Good Hair.

In a completely unrelated post, I found this advertisement for the movie Staircase on Larry’s blog:

Text:

What makes a man live with another man? What makes them claw at each other…humiliate each other…yet never leave each other?

Under the title “Staircase” it says “the story of a marriage made in hell.” Larry says, “Rex Harrison and Richard Burton play two hairdressers who live together…”

Larry’s post also includes a review from September 26, 1969, that contains the following memorable phrases (the image is too small to read if I post it here, so click over to Larry’s post to see it):

…a pair of querulous old queans [sic]

They are bitchiness itself…

…two failed half-men…

…the boys’ ghastly mothers…

…what, with the deepest of ironies, is called the gay world.

That’s something else, eh?