Review: Size 6: The Western Women's Harem

SUMMARY:

Size 6: The Western Women's Harem, is a story-essay written by Fatema Mernissi. Mernissi was raised in a traditional Muslim household. One day, she travels to the Western side of the United States of America. While she is shopping for a cotton skirt in an American department store, she gets criticized by the saleslady for something that anyone would get angry if criticized for it. Mernissi was criticized for being "too big". The saleslady said Mernissi did not fit a size 4 or 6 which are the sizes for the "norm". Mernissi explains why standards of beauty created by men are not good, and why they should disappear from every country so nobody would have to be judged by not fitting any of the standards.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Fatema Mernissi was born in Fes, Morocco, in 1940. She studied at Brandeis University, where she earned her doctorate, and many other schools. She is noted mainly as an Islamic feminist. Mernissi is a sociologist who mainly is concerned with Islam and the women's roles in it. She wrote many articles and books concerning Islam and women's roles and rights so far in her life.

EXAMPLES OF FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE FROM THE STORY:

Figurative languages are description those describe something by comparing it with something else, they involve simile, metaphor, imagery, hyperbole, etc.

The first figurative language we found is “the saleswoman added a condescending judgment, which sounded to me like Imam fatwa”. This quote was from page 253, when Mernissi was buying skirts. this is one of example of simile, because this quote used word “like” which word comepares things.

The second figurative language we found is "you are too big!”. This quote was from page 253, when the saleslady was fitting the skirt to Mernissi. This is one of example of a hyperbole, because this quote includes word “too”, which word explains a amount bigger.

The third figurative language we found is “her knee-lenght, navy blue, Chanel dress had a white silk collar reminiscent of the subdued elegance of aristocratic French Catholic schoolgirls”. This quote was from page 254, when the other woman was coming into the store. This quote is one of example of an imagery, because this quote was so descriptive that I could imagine how the woman looked like.

CONNECTIONS:

TEXT TO TEXT:

This story reminds me the article that I read about plastic surgery in Korea. It is increasing in a really fast pace, which means more and more people are receiving plastic surgery. In this story, the main character was judged for her being "too big" by the saleslady who works in the shopping center, but also in the article that I read about the Korean plastic surgery, it said that more and more people are getting plastic surgery, because they were compared by the standard of beauty, and they have plastic surgery to become closer to the standard of beauty in others' eyes.

The story also reminds me of a article about the Japanese crooked teeth culture. I do not know the standard of beauty for each countries, but some of them seems not that attractive to me. In the story, Mernissi is a foreigner, so the saleslady might have not understood their culture for beauty and criticized her. This situation reminds me that there are different cultures to understand.

TEXT TO LIFE:

This story reminds me when I was young, because I also had some complexes with my appearance. In the story the main character has her own complex of appearance and she got compared and judged by someone else. I also had those experiences similar to hers when I was comparing and judging by the other people.

I found some similar difficulties that I had before, like when the main character of the story was treated unequally because she is a foreigner. When I went back to Korea, my ability to speak Korean was not that great as the people who were raised at Korea. Some of the students treated me like how Mernissi was treated like.

ESSAY:

The article on Buzzfeed (http://www.buzzfeed.com/ashleyperez/global-beauty-standards#.uoYyydvNo ) is an article written by Ashley Perez which includes many photos of the same woman, Esther Honig, but photo shopped in more than twenty-five different countries around the world. This article shows you what the basic beauty standards are in different cultures in some countries, and that there are many different beauty standards every different country prefers. For example, this article shows that Argentina’s beauty standard is having more of a fancy look, while the country of Israel has a beauty standard which prefers more of a natural, soft appearance.

Some things I saw and learned from this interesting article is that all countries have that specific beauty standard for women created by people, mostly the men, whether it is a natural appearance or an appearance where the woman has a thick layer of shiny makeup on. I created a thought that most women from all countries may receive stress from trying to be in the beauty standard range that was created overtime by the men to suit their wanting. Women should not have to go on extreme diets, plastic surgery, or any other things if they do not want to, just to fit in the beauty standard that were “forced” to them by some men. I can relate to this article and the message I thought from the article was because I have had a time, and still sometimes am having a time where I tend to feel like I need to lose weight to become skinny or a time when I look at a mirror and feel like I need to change parts to satisfy a beauty standard. Also, a text to text connection example can be from this article to Size 6: The Western Women’s Harem, where the main character in the story talks about how disapproving of it is to have such high beauty standards for women in some countries.

-Taken from MinJu Kang's Beauty Ideal Reflection #1-

OPINIONS WITH EVIDENCE:

We began to think about the issues with standards of beauty for countries. People, men and women all over the world are going through pain and stress to fit the "norm" or in other words, the "normal" which means people who fit into the specific beauty standards for their country created by people of the other gender. In the story, Mernissi made many examples that have to do with beauty standards. She gave an example when she wrote about how she was criticized by a saleslady, whom she did not know, for her physical appearance. Mernissi also made an example when she compared how the Western man gave indirect stress to women by creating the standards for them to how long-ago China men preferred small feet, which lead to the Chinese women going through pain to make their feet tiny to suit the men's wanting.