The birth of the Boscombehub

One of my interviews was undertaken with Sorted Surf Festival manager Brad Predley, at the Sorted Surf Shop on Boscombe beach. The regeneration to the area is pretty spectacular, with restaurants right on the foot of the beach and surfers galore on the Artificial Surf Reef. It seemed a whole different word away from the previous research I had conducted in town. I found myself researching into the divides between regenerated communities and the pre-regeneration residents, and nothing seemed so apparent to me as this obvious community divide. With the wealthy coming down to enjoy their beach pods on Boscombe beach as the community feels the recession pinch, there’s no wonder that the Boscombe Regeneration Project hadn’t had a positive impact on ‘their’ Boscombe.

It highlighted to me that can and should be events the integration of these two communities. The Sorted Surf Festival clearly does this well by hosting a free event day that appeals to all markets from families, to surfers, to teenagers, and adults coming to see activities going on.

And not just summer events, events held throughout the seasons. I was shocked to learn that Boscombe doesn’t have its own Christmas lights parade or an event to that effect. These sort of events are what my childhood was made up of, wrapping up warm and watching Santa in the parade. Or even going with your school and displaying your Christmas arts and crafts in the town.  If I was to implement events in Boscombe, it’s would be events to this effect as I believe these types of events that encourage community spirit in a town.

Even despite the lack of events, there was no solid marketing base for events to market themselves on. This issue seemed more apparent to me than the lack of events. Even if event were implemented in Boscombe, there would be nowhere to specifically market them to both the local community and potential tourists. To me the case study had to fix the root of the problem first so create a base line for a successful events industry. Here arose the ‘Boscombehub’.

Boscombe Regeneration Project Research- Community voice

One of the most obvious problems I faced when data gathering for my questionnaires, is that it was apparent that the residents of Boscombe didn’t want to be involved in my research. I was very careful of how I worded my questions to ensure I wasn’t going to offend any Boscombe residents, with questions such as ‘why wouldn’t you attend any events in Boscombe,’ but if I’m honest, I was looking to see if the negative stigma of Boscombe still hung despite the efforts of the regeneration. It ended up that the majority of respondents were obvious to my sly question any because the most replied that it was because they hadn’t heard of any anyway!

Something I really enjoyed from analysing my questionnaire findings was the unpredicted responses I would read. Despite researching the Boscombe Regeneration Project inside and out, and preparing myself for a whole array of opinions from the public, I still found some responses surprising. If I was to predict the data I was going to analyse, I would have guessed that Boscombe residents would have said that the Boscombe Regeneration Project has had a positive impact on their area, and the outer communities would say it had no effect and refuse to change their stereotypes of Boscombe.

In fact it was Boscombe residents who felt the scheme had had no positive impact on their community. I guess you never know what goes on behind closed doors.

The most shocking aspect of my research was asking people in Boscombe high street of their opinions of events and activities taking place in Boscombe. One guy was answering my question when a boy came over and asked me what I was doing. I told him and out of my own curiosity, asked the boy as a teenager living in the area. Despite the boy not being over 18, so I technically shouldn’t have included him in my research, I found his response so raw and shocking that I wanted to show in my case study what it’s really like living there,

‘Its the dregs.. f*** all goes on here. You go out with your mates and get out of it then feel like sh** the next day at school’ [Anonymous 13 year old].

It emphasised to me what a shame it was that the Boscombe Regeneration Project has missed its events and activities project aims. Events and activities would help get boys like him off the street and positively engaging within the community.

This is when my first report interview went straight to the Boscombe Regeneration Partnership. I asked them whether they feel the events and activities project aims were being met. The reply from Cat McMillian was, in my opinion, fairly blunt and quite defensive. She seemed to back up her argument that events were going on in the area (pub nights- not so great for teenagers), and markets (great for the over 40’s), but nothing major happening for the community or tourist interest. All this made me want to do it push on with the case study and prove that an events industry is needed to regain a sense of community pride to the area.

What inspired me to choose my case study route

At first when I began my case study module research on the Boscombe Regeneration Project, I felt I had bitten more than I could chew. I wanted to research into the events industry (or lack of!) in Boscombe since the Boscombe Regeneration Project. As one of the Boscombe Regeneration Projects key aims was for ‘nurturing creative industries’ and implementing and ‘events and activities’ hub for Bournemouth, I couldn’t quite get my head round why there were no events.

As I have always lived at maximum twenty minutes from Boscombe, I have always been aware of its reputation. Despite statistics showing that Boscombe is, to be honest, a pretty god awful area, I have however always had a couple of friends who live there and its reputation appears to be worse than its reality.  Therefore when I decided to embark on this case study, I felt that I would obviously be completely factual with all my data, but also give Boscombe a chance.

Mark Cribb is one of my references within the essay. Mark and his wife renovated a beaten down hotel in Boscombe, in a bid to try and bring up the area in the shadow of the Boscombe Regeneration Project. They later, on the success of the Urban Reef Hotel, opened up Urban Beach Restaurant on Boscombe beach. Through my research I learnt that they had a little literature in each room, ‘We know that the Urban Beach is not perfect yet, but we have been frantically renovating since January 2006. We are … just a couple in our early thirties who have borrowed more money than we can afford and will invest every penny back into the business until it is finished.’

Not only does this inspire me in itself, but upon further research I realised that they weren’t just renovating a hotel and building a restaurant. Mark Cribb is heavily involved in the regeneration of Boscombe. He has a vision for Boscombe, he wants to inspire change for the people that live there, so not only was the investment for himself and his wife, but he wanted to help make a difference. It was this research that inspired me to not give up on my case study on the ‘events industry in Boscombe’, because there wasn’t one. But re direct the research on what effect an events industry would have for the community of Boscombe, and whether I myself could do my part in researching if events could help change the lives of people who live there.

Shaolin Monks

When holidaying in South Africa last year, I bought tickets to see the world renowned Shaolin Monk show. The three hour show showed men with amazing feats of strength, flexibility, and pain-endurance, the Shaolin Monks creating themselves a world-wide reputation as the ultimate Buddhist warriors. Buddhism is considered to be the epitome of a peaceful religion, with emphasis on principles such as non-violence, vegetarianism and even self-sacrifice to avoid harming others.

The show illustrated to the audience the progression from a novice to a master Shaolin Warrior Monk and detailed the years of hard work and complex study that are to be endured. The young are required to attend a series of two hour training sessions each and every day and after that they will carry out their assigned chores in the temple. Junior Monks would attend three sessions and senior students, a fourth class at midnight. Therefore it requires vast amounts of hard work and discipline to become a Shaolin Monk. If a monk wished to leave the temple as a Shaolin master he was required to pass a test. Only after he was successful would he truly become a Shaolin Monk.

In Tibet it is considered an honor to be trained as a Shaolin Monk. Tibet’s superiority and uniqueness as a nation was not individual Monks intellectual, spiritual virtuosity, or one Monk meditating in mountains, but rather the quantity whereby tens of thousands of young boys were constantly being taken from ‘the mundane world of inevitable suffering and thrust into a purer alternative culture- the organized community of celibate Monks’ (1). Mothers willingly donate their children to Monk tribes for their cultural ethics, in full knowledge that their children will there forth be vigorously training as a Shaolin warrior and travel the world in order to perform to others. Monks are placed in monasteries by their parents when they are just children, usually between the ages of seven and eleven without regard for their personality or wishes.

Young Monks undergo spiritual teachings of the earth, self and the soul allows the Monks to tune their bodies to the energies around them, performing through the energies within their senses, resulting in natural expertise that are next to none. ‘They can observe themselves from a distance; they can look at their energies as though they are separate from themselves, and then either suppress them or transform them.’ (2) Spectators of the show will agree that the spiritual awareness within the acts is clearly evident throughout, Monks being able to confidently swipe swords against one another blind folded and accurately miss each other with millimeters to spare. The social interactions of respect and trust between the Monks and the masters is clearly apparent throughout the performances and shows the sheer reliance on inner strengths to safely perform with one another.

One of the performers within the show was a young boy of four years old who posed incredible strength, agility and confidence with the aid of the Shaolin masters. When contrasting this young Monk to western children of a similar age, it is evident why Monks are critical of the lack of spirituality in the west. Our worlds are apart and we have ethics that sit at opposite spectrums, as we sit there to watch a show of entertainment, they flood knowledge of their culture to us as we analyze whether the younger members of the show are used as a circus show tool. It is these differences that make us leave feeling confused between feelings of awe, inspiration and critically analyzing their ethics against our own cultural beleifs.

Although this is considered a cultural honor for the people of Tibet, the west could criticize that there is little consideration for the children born into a life of Shaolin Monks, the lifestyle is imposed on them with little consideration of how the child wants to mature through its developmental years. As a consequence of intense training as a Shaolin Monk, the children are not schooled mainstream, but instead taught by their masters. Although western cultures would consider this to be depriving  the child of the western ideology of the basic human right to education, Shaolin Monks highlight their cultural importance of educating the young masters through the temple of the earth and spirituality leading them stray from a corrupt world.

My western cultural upbringing has given me the inherited morals that every child should have the freedom of choice about how they wish to lead their lives. However after researching the Shaolin Monks, I can’t help but think that western societies could learn from the Monk’s morals, focusing less on materialistic and technological values of the western world, and encourage teachings of the self, the earth and the energies that as humans we should value and recognize as the components that made us who we are.

Although the Monks way of life could be considered desirable to some western cultures, the western world could never function through the Shaolin Monk’s beliefs. The western world has developed through external factors with the need to use equipment and tools to better ourselves and progress through work, leisure and relationships. In contrast the introvert life of Shaolin Monk’s allows them to ovoid globalisation and instead continue to develop through their religious practices, always maintaining a degree of physical separation from those not sharing the same purpose.

1.       A history of modern Tibet, the calm before the storm, Volume 2, Melvyn C. Golstein, 2009, Calafornia

2.       www.osho.com/online-library-energies-allowing-monk -e984.aspx, My way: The Way of the White Clouds, Chapter 6: Repression or Transformation

Westernisation and De-Racialisation Surgery

‘De-raicalisation’, or ‘westernisation’, is ever increasing within ethnic minority communities across the globe. Plastic surgeons are experiencing an influx of ethnic minority patients who are asking for specific surgeries to westernise their looks and steer away from their own racial backgrounds.

Back in 2009 channel four released a documentary that followed the emotional journeys of ethnic minorities desperate to westernise their bodies and faces, ‘Bleach, Nip, Tuck: The White Beauty Myth’.

The problem with contemporary society is that technologies have allowed us to look however we wish with advancements in cosmetic procedures giving us the power to adapt our appearance and change our lives. In the hidden world of de-racialisation science is making anything possible. It’s considered a part of the globalisation process whereby ethnic differences are going to be narrower and narrower. Many cultures are surgically westernising their features, believing that Caucasian attributes equals power, money, and success. Some even believe that there is a negative racial prejudice attached to their own cultures that they wish to remove from themselves, therefore the surgery is pinnacle to them integrating with western societies.

The notion of “the ideal” is something that caused a stir among viewers; some writing on 4OD’s blogging site. One posted, “The ideal? If the white body is so ideal then please tell me why so many white girls are obsessed with altering their own bodies?” Another posted that if “people felt victimised by their own race, and consequently wished to alter their appearance, technically are they not too being racist towards themselves?” Two very strong and  interesting points, both truthful in their own way, because there is an equal, if not higher demand for plastic surgery in the white population. The idea of the Caucasian body being ‘the ideal’ stems from Roman and Ancient Greek eras, even today, those are the stereotypical, perfect bodies. (1)

“Jackson’s carefully nurtured image spun out of his control. He became a victim of the weird mythology he had set out to create…. But it wasn’t just his inability to cope with fame that made him weird……He thought he was ugly – his skin was too dark, he decided, and his nose too wide. It was no help that his insensitive father and brothers called him ‘Big Nose’. He told an associate that the ‘greatest joy I ever had was in knowing I had a choice about my face’. He described himself as a ‘work in progress’.” (Taraborrelli, 1/7/09)

Ultimately, Jackson had achieved his goal of transforming himself, but at a price. Not only was he known for his talent as a performer, he was also known as a freak. He did it for him, at least he claims to, unlike today where people do it because they feel suppressed by the white society. And what Channel Four successfully, in my opinion, highlighted is that this obsession with changing race and the availability of resources to do so is not confined to Jackson. It is a growing trend that does not seem to have any signs of slowing down; nor does it have any ethical grounds as people literally are changing their outer exterior of their race.

In 2008 India released an eye-catching television ‘mini-series’ advert featuring three of Bollywood’s hottest talents in a moody love triangle. Promoting a skin whitening add. (2)

The skin whitening market in India is worth millions of pounds, popular with both men and woman alike with lotions promising to ‘improve’ their complexion. The mini-series caused outrage amongst the Indian communities, re-opening the date about India’s obsession with pale skin, some arguing the advert is discriminatory and outdated. The advertising of the ‘White Beauty’ skin lightening product no doubt infected the nation’s minds that white skin is beautiful sparking the beginning of westernisation amongst the Indian community.

However non- causations are not the only nationalities to cosmetically change their looks. Despite de-racialisation being linked to westernisation, there seems to be little links made between western societies gets lip injections or bum implants and its similarities to the black community. It raises questions of whether de-racialisation is really a westernisation process, or a process in which individuals undertake for beauty ‘ideals’ within their cultures.

I don’t solely believe that the individuals undergo surgery to leave behind their heritage or completely steer away from their cultural communities. I believe they are simply trying to appeal to more nationalities through white features and people’s perceptions of them if they fit into the western world. The majority of people who undergo the surgery still celebrate their own religious festivals, for example even though 60% of the Chinese population undergo the eyelid surgery for a western appearance; they still celebrate Chinese New Year amongst other Chinese traditions.

There seems to be a lack of awareness of the importance of physical and cultural diversity. If de-racialization continues in relation to westernisation then there is a danger that the western world is increasing its dominance over cultural groups and making cultural diversity far more narrow.

It’s a tragedy that across the globe people are rejecting the very essence of who they are, both racially and culturally in order to obtain the unobtainable. And even if it were possible for us all to be western in appearance; what a tragedy for humanity that would be.

(1)    http://www.channel4.com/programmes/bleach-nip-tuck-the-white-beauty-myth

(2)    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJhSogkI284&feature=player_embedded

Tarraborelli. R,  How Jacksons Surgery…, The Daily Mail, 1/7/2009 accessed 18/09/09  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196633/How-Jacksons-surgery-desperate-bid-look-like-father-hated.html

Wooleston.S, The Guardian, 27/10/2009.

McCurdy, John. Cosmetic surgery of the Asian face. Thieme New York, 2005

Disney and Subliminal Messages

In this blog I will be assessing the various subliminal messages that were projected, and still are being projected to the influential minds of young children’s sub consciousness, with particular relation to Disney Pixar.

Disney is notorious for using subliminal messages across its short animations, TV series and movies. It’s a tradition of studio for them to use both subliminal and consciously visible subtle suggestions. The issue is so apparent that those viewing Disney’s creations are actively seeking for the hidden meanings and agenda’s and later blogging on the subliminal corruption that are being projected to us.

Even I was unfamiliar with the real stories behind Disney’s fairytales.  Some of the classics are rewrites based on the Grimm Brothers’ stories which are collectively dark and often cruel. Before researching on this blog I personally only recognized the subliminal messages within Disney’s ideologies of the family ‘ideal’, portraying broken marriages as unacceptable, and step – parents as wicked, [Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs]. However upon further research, delving into the structure of the Disney Company, what I find is shocking, however can be critically analyzed to suit for and against the argument.

The following are evidence of Disney’s corruption

Aladdin –

In Aladdin, at the end of one of the major songs if you turn the volume very high, you hear a voice say "All good girls take their clothes off!"

The Rescuers –

The pornographic image of a naked woman can be spotted in the background of The Rescuers. Approximately 38 minutes into the film, as Bianca and Bernard fly through the city in a sardine box strapped to the back of Orville, the Albatross Air Charter Service, the photographic picture can be seen in the window of a building in the background in two different (non-consecutive) frames.

Beauty & the Beast -

In beauty and the beast, apparently there is a dildo in the large dance number with the candlestick and the teapots.

The Lion King -

In the lion king u can see the word "sex" appear in the dust when Simba lays down.

Defenders of the company point out that Disney’s motion picture groups, such as Miramax, have huge inputs on movie editing yet any foul play is reflected back on the film producers, Disney. Miramax constantly comes under criticism for its editing, dubbing, and replacing the soundtracks of various films it releases, however Miramax defended itself by explaining that most of the films purchased by the company would have had little to no chance of achieving U.S. distribution otherwise. They also state that the purpose of the company's aggressive re-editing technique was always to try help the films find a broader American audience than they might otherwise find. As sick as it sounds, it is more than likely true that many of these messages in Disney movies are most likely come from workers who have spent hours upon days upon months animating. Many of these animators in this long time become bored or obsessed with the character. A few of these animators have changed the movie for laughs or to fulfil their own sick desires.

Even large respected companies are hit by subliminal messages critics. In the mid 80’s Coca Cola prompted a total re-call of all posters distributed for the new ‘Feel The Curves’. The artist who designed the poster added in a drawing of a woman performing a sexual act in one of the ice cubes that went unnoticed within production. It wasn’t until it was projected large on a Coca Cola truck that the driver then noticed the image and reported it.

  http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?q=80 27s+coca+cola+poster+subliminal+message&um=1&hl=en&sa=N&rlz=1T4ADFA_enGB415GB415&biw=1366&bih=568&tbm=isch&tbnid=_GC3fa6uNznTiM:&imgrefurl=http://www.rock1053.com/pages/missi2k7.html%3Farticle%3D7410592&docid=H_hgkD3frXnuzM&imgurl=http://media1.break.com/dnet/media/content/images/bbpics/curves2.jpg&w=400&h=300&ei=Rk4xT9GMOcfB8QOMrbjgBg&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=140&sig=115407911414088712764&page=1&tbnh=117&tbnw=156&start=0&ndsp=27&ved=1t:429,r:2,s:0&tx=58&ty=48  

Whether Disney, Coca Cola and other large companies were actively involved in the corruption of what they projected or not, it still caused a media storm and moreover gained huge publicity, although bad, that kept the company at the tip of peoples tongues. The subtlety of the subliminal messages could have been an accident; however the ambiguity of whether the corruption was intent has kept some people supporting the companies. Considering that Disney has been under scrutiny for over fifty years, it didn’t prevented  15,405,000 combined visitors visiting Disneyland Park and Walt Disney Studios Park in the fiscal year of 2009, and being France's and Europe's most visited tourist site. (1)

My initial research made me disgusted at the company for what it projected to children; however one view that I failed to consider is that could Disney be really initiating corruption of adults for recognizing the faults in the media displays. Children have always been perceived as innocent and naive to adult behaviors and don’t respond until they are old enough to recognize and understand sexual innuendo’s; therefore the subtly of the corruption faults in the Disney films could reflect that adults are actively seeking subliminal messages that their children could otherwise be oblivious to? Is it showing the corruption of adult’s minds that they refer every shape or slip of audio to a sexual innuendo?

Although there is constant outrage at the concept of Disney’s subliminal messages, there’s always going to be critics of anything shown to innocent minds of children and panic of the mind control the media has. Although evidence suggests that the Disney houses some hidden subliminal agenda’s, extremists can clutch at straws to prove Disney’s corruption, and can sometimes forget that innocent errors can be made within production that can make shapes resemble ‘sexual objects’ and other  immoral features. Whether Disney actresses are in the middle of some nudity scandal, seen scantily clothed or dancing suggestively, the company will always recover.  Poor public relations, ill-humoured subliminal messaging and racial stereotypes are no match for this animation god.  Children will continue to enjoy Disney productions and theme parks as long as we are all alive and most likely for hundreds of years to come

.

 http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?q=disney+subliminal+messages+duck+ride&um=1&hl=en&rlz=1T4ADFA_enGB415GB415&biw=1366&bih=568&tbm=isch&tbnid=h0fhfIDlT1GojM:&imgrefurl=http://www.subliminal-messaging.com/disney-subliminal-messages/&docid=Pv3TUGK7tJ86iM&imgurl=http://www.subliminal-messaging.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/donald_duck_subliminal_ride-209x300.jpg&w=209&h=300&ei=TFAxT83ECcWp8QOtr7WIBw&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=156&sig=115407911414088712764&page=1&tbnh=118&tbnw=80&start=0&ndsp=10&ved=1t:429,r:4,s:0&tx=49&ty=59

(1)    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disneyland_Paris

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_The_Walt_Disney_Company

http://www.subliminal-messaging.com/disney-subliminal-messages/

http://www.msonmarketing.com/



Technology, The Media and Human Engagment

What is the western cultures relationship to images, vision and human understanding? Western cultures rely on modern media technologies daily but what are its effects and is it diminishing our abilities to see, smell, touch and hear? We have devolved ourselves into the eye and our visions have shifted from exploration to consumption, from watching to a fixed gaze. We have developed an insecurity of absorbing the world by experience, to accepting the media’s reflection from the comfort of our own homes. It’s not that our senses disappear when we view the media, however the parallels of spectator and spectacle emphasises that once in a while we should validate the truth of the images that we come in to contact with, ‘ As much as we try to design the future with our own perceptions and to instrumentalize the effects of the tools we use, with whom lies the control of what we see’(1).

We should learn to embrace other forms of communications and integrate with our own experiences of the world to enhance or negate what has been presented to us. We all too easily presume we know societies and cultures around us without validation from our own experiences and knowledge of truth. However even in this instance, it is still a matter of interpretation of how we as individuals link between our memories, thought processes, creative minds and visions to interpret. Yet instead of allowing ourselves to personally process we danger ourselves by infecting our minds with a minority of individuals views who control the media, willingly subjecting ourselves to the hypodermic needle of media control.

We rely on the delivery of facts from our western media’s and base our opinions on the world from media displays. I believe that western societies and the rise of technological advancements with media and communications is forming a western culture that is forgetting the basic human structure of needs, to experience both ourselves and our neighbours, to understand our cultural and personal categories and in essence define who we are.

As our culture develops into this new medium we will see a development from the traditional notion of friendship that involves trust, support and similar values, to friendships based on a media platform, such as social networks sites. It is a worrying prospect for the younger communities who are growing up in age where the meaning of ‘friend’ is becoming devalued and computerised.

The inevitability is that technological advancements are rapidly expanding and becoming increasingly complex. Just within the short span of my lifetime, technology has revolutionized the convenience of communication, greatly expanded the capabilities of science and produced both visual and physical entertainment to degrees of engaging that could never before have been imagined. However it must be remembered that technology and physical beings are, although parallel, not integrated and this understanding will help us keep a grip on the fresh air we smell to the photographs we see, and the neighbors’ we have and the soap operas in which we fantasize. We have to explore the boundaries to truly understand the meaning of life.

(1)    Ron Burnett, Cultures of Vision, Images, Media & The Imaginary, 1995, America

http://www.utwente.nl/cw/theorieenoverzicht/Theory%20clusters/Mass%20Media/Hypodermic_Needle_Theory.doc/

The "hypodermic needle theory" implied mass media had a direct, immediate and powerful effect on its audiences

The New Face of Ballet

‘Romeo and Juliet’ by the Royal Ballet late last year made production history by casting the company's principal dancer, Carlos Acosta, in the role of Romeo, a first for a black dancer. But black male ballet talents such as Acosta are rare to stumble across - and black ballerinas almost non-existent.

In today’s contemporary society fighting for racial equality, its peculiar as to why there is still a racial prejudice about black ballerinas being accepted into ballets performing arts. I believe that the employer discrimination is not activated by racist views, but a subconscious act of not casting ethnic minorities through other thought processes driven by cultural perceptions of the norm. Brodie Wentworth from Stage Coach School, New Milton believes that racial divides don’t seem to exist in contemporary dance as much as they do in ballet. She stresses that ethnic minorities need to be given a platform within ballet that welcomes and encourages them to participate as a non-white ballerina. ‘Although there are exceptions, the majority of ballerina’s are of white ethnicity. To be a ballerina with dark skin means you’re an exception to the norm. Of the cast you will be the one to stand out amongst the white girls, directors will see you as a distraction within the show.’

[Brodie Wentworth, Phone conversation, November 8^th, 8.00pm]

To heighten the problem, both The Royal Ballet and the English National Ballet are both greatly respected ballet companies within the industry, yet neither employs a single black ballerina. Surely this would diminish a black woman’s chances of becoming a professional ballerina? Smaller competing ballet companies will be influenced by the larger company’s practices, such as The Royal Ballet, and will follow in suit of the visual element of an all white cast. It baffles me that cultural extremists were debating cutting out nativity plays within schools in fear of offending school pupils of other cultures, yet everyone has failed to recognise that in professional ballet the dancers are an all white cast. Surely that’s not representing our multi cultural England today.

However, The Royal Opera House has finally recognised this problem and is attempting to address this issue through one of its educational outreach programmes, ‘Chance to Dance’. It sends ballet dancers into underprivileged schools within London boroughs to try and inspire an interest in ballet for all social classes. Part of the problem lies in the way ballet is perceived within the division of classes within society. The art form has evolved to be stereotypically enjoyed by the wealthy class societies from its first shows in the 1770’s to the royal family. Therefore is it perceived that it is only available to elitist groups with readily available funds to spend on leisure time, ticketing prices for ballet being priced up to £90 per seat. It psychologically caps lower classes into believing that they are not of privileged wealth to enjoy ballets performing arts.

‘Chance to Dance’ aims to create a stepping stone for equality within the performing arts; it needs to pave a way for the Arts Council England to reach its goal where by ‘Every child and young person has the opportunity to experience the richness of the arts’ [Arts Council England, Mission, Vision and Goals], but how valid and accurate are these goals a society divided by the competition of wealth and social status.

Dahl’s theory of classical pluralism argues that, despite class divisions, society is a ‘level playing field’, where by everyone has the opportunity to succeed within their work goals if they combine their passion with hard work to achieve success. When applying this to ethnic minority ballerina’s, if more multi cultural women ballerinas fought the social prejudice of ballet being an all white cast, then more would be encouraged to do so in their wake, thus creating a future of mixed ethnicities within ballet culture. Mixed raced ballerinas must recognize that the reality of cast ethnicities is changing more slowly than attitudes, more confident performers must arise to begin the face of change.

Celebrity Culture

The celebrity culture refers to the culture of popularizing certain people who have certain attributes that society perceives as desirable and exceptional. In this modern era, these attributes may or may not be genuine. Our media history of actors, actresses, singers, authors, producers, artists, sports people and dancers were all people who needed to have certain talents to be known publicly and throughout society. Now we allow people to be well-known and in the media forefront due to their unethical behaviour or reluctant self-promotion. People sometimes attempt at becoming famous by entering into reality TV or dating someone of high status. By glorifying people who seek stardom through these methods has created a new celebrity culture based on infamy not fame. However this only causes an increasing dislike for talent-less celeb’s.


Unfortunately the celebrity culture has and will continue to have an influence on society. As they are constantly in the media, they have become role models for adolescents and teenagers. Interest in celebrities makes for a multibillion dollar business in celeb sites. This has raised a number of issues, many of them controversial and causes major debates concerning the influence of celebs on the younger, more easily influenced members of society. For example, the appeal of drug and alcohol abuse has increased due to images of intoxicated celebrities spread across magazines and television. Furthermore casual celebrity sex appears to be the norm amongst youths. Unfortunately nothing can be done to monitor who does or doesn’t become famous as the power in is in the hands of the media. They are able to control what children see. Unfortunately sex, drugs, rock and roll and any form of controversy is where the money lies.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg00YEETFzg&ob=av3e




This obsession with the media and celeb culture has etched its way into our own personal mediums of communication, whether it’s Twitter, Facebook or other like minded social networking sites. Celeb culture has led us to our own digital narcissism, social networking sites giving us the platform to inflate our own sense of self importance. Site’s such as Facebook have allowed us to promote our own personal celeb magazine page between friends. We can visually promote our life’s highlights through status’s and photos, giving us the ego-boost to broadcast a perception of an exciting and desirable life to those who view the page.

In a new study published in the journal ‘Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking, University at Buffalo’ [March 2011] researcher Michael A. Stefanone, PhD, and colleagues found that females who base their self worth on their appearance tend to share more photos online and maintain larger networks on online social networking sites.

The results suggest that females identify more strongly with their image and appearance, and use Facebook as a platform to compete for attention

In the study, 311 participants with an average age of 23.3 years, 49.8 percent of which were female, completed a questionnaire measuring their ‘contingencies of self worth’. The subjects were also questioned on their typical behaviors on Facebook.

‘“Those whose self esteem is based on public-based contingencies (defined here as others’ approval, physical appearance and outdoing others in competition) were more involved in online photo sharing, and those whose self-worth is most contingent on appearance have a higher intensity of online photo sharing,” Stefanone says.’ (Reference 1)

Stefanone noted that the women in this study who based their self worth on appearances were the most prolific photo sharers

‘“Participants whose self worth is based on private-based contingencies (defined in this study as academic competence, family love and support, and being a virtuous or moral person),” says Stefanone, “spend less time online.” For these people, social media are less about attention seeking behavior.’ (Reference 1)

The study shows the obsessive behaviors on social networking sites, allowing us to understand how personal identities on these sites are developed and maintained allowing users to compete with one another for mental hierarchy through the physical advertisement of themselves, much like celeb magazines. It further emphasizes the construction of our identities and social interactions with media use in a rapidly changing communication environment.

[http://www.communicationstudies.com/study-facebook-photo-sharing-reflects-focus-on-female-appearance]

Third Culture Kids

When understanding culture, heritage, and society around us, most people assume that everyone fits into a cultural bracket of religion, birth place, or current hometown.

However one culture that I failed to recognise is ‘Third Culture Kids’ a term created in the early 1950s by American sociologist and anthropologist Ruth Hill Useem. Third Culture Kids (TCK) are children who build up their own cultural identity from spending a significant amount of their developmental years outside their parents culture. By integrating elements of the cultures they have experienced and their own birth culture, there is a construction of a third culture, making it hard for Third Culture Kids to define their single nationality.

Sometimes the local cultural mirror reflects that children are clear foreigners, neither physically resembling the dominant culture nor sharing the traditions or beliefs and values held in the deeper part of that surrounding culture. Other times, however, they may be ‘hidden immigrants’- physically resembling those around them, but not sharing the cultural knowledge of the local culture. The hidden immigrants have a less empathetic response from the local community as they are unable to recognise that although the child looks the same, it doesn’t feel like an integrated part of the community.

Whilst being a Third Culture Kid could be perceived as adventurous and romantic, it’s enviable that Third Culture Kids struggle with self identification, being unable to single themselves to a particular culture or nationality, perceiving themselves as an ‘outsider’.

Shantanu Banerji 22, Cardiff University considers himself a Third Culture Kid. Although originally born in India, his father’s company meant that his immediate family were able to live in many countries all over the world. Shantanu has lived by himself in England for the past two years, a decision made through his university and career choice. He carries a very strong American accent after living there since 2005 so it would be easy for people meeting him for the first time to assume he is of American nationality. However Shan has also lived in India, Monaco, Australia, America and London. When I asked him if he could define himself to one nationality he jokes he has the nationality of a ‘bird’, he ‘flew before he walked’ and sorts his ‘friends by continents’.

‘It’s never bothered me being a third culture kid, especially now at 22 years old as I’ve seen the world and can make up my own mind about where I want to settle. For example, now my parents both live in America and yet choose to study in the UK. I can see how it affects children though, if your heart is settled in a new country and your parents decide they want to go home- that’s a tough decision for anyone to make.’

[Shantanu Banerji, mobile conversation, November 2^nd, 5.30pm]

Third culture kids may feel alone in new surroundings of environments where people are confident in their nationalities, however when TCK’s are with other TCK’s they are able to share strong emotional and psychological traits, being able to emphasise with one another’s personal and cultural identities from the various environments they have been exposed to.

Obama recognised this when coming into power in 2008, and chose to pack his staff with Third Culture Kids. He realised that the characteristics derived from an expat childhood may be well suited to the challenges facing new administration. With a team of Third Culture Kids in Obama’s administration he knows that each individual had lived with so many differences in their life time that little threatens them anymore. By negotiating between cultural worlds since birth, TCK’s don’t have to be taught such skills, its already second nature to them. Obama found that by working with the TCK’s they had a shared global perspective, socially acceptable and intellectually flexible. They are quick to think outside the box and can appreciate and reconcile different points of view.

However an issue facing TCK’s is that many haven’t held part time jobs through travelling from country to country therefore even if they succeeded in school and exams, the little practical work experience within the industry will be likely to hold them back when applying for jobs in adult hood.

In relation to Obama’s theory theres an article written by Denise A. Bonebright on ‘Adult Third Culture Kids’ that recognised the under-tapped source of high quality employees that ATCK’s produce. The advantages of ATCK’s are extremely beneficial to any employer with natural skills of adapting to new situations, willingness to relocate, fluency in more than one language, cross cultural skills, global network of social contacts amongst others. ATCK’s would be able to approach international assignments with a well- developed global skill set and desire to experience an international mobile lifestyle.

[www.tandfonlince.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13678861003746822 ,23 June 2010, Denise.A. Bonebright, Adult third culture kids: HRD challenges and opportunities, pages 351-359 abstract]

Interestingly, in 1984 Dr. Ted Ward, a sociologist at Michigan State University declared that Third Culture Kids will be the ‘prototype citizens of the future’, it seems that time is now. With extreme advancements in technology, transportation, communication, and trade, many children of many backgrounds all over the world are now growing up interacting with many cultural environments and not only will the rate of Third Culture Kids rise, it’s likely to become the norm.

[en.wiktionary.org/wiki/third_culture_kid 9 September 2011]

[www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2008/11/26/obamas-third-culture-team.html, Nov 26 2008, 10.56am, Ruth E.Van Reken]