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Gill, Rosalind (2012) ‘The Sexualisation of Culture?’ Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 6/7: 483-498
Richardson, Niall & Locks, Adams. (2014) Body Studies: The Basics. New York, Routledge.

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Just Babes Club is a Melbourne based company which designs and sells lingerie.
http://jbc-lingerie.com/just-babes-club/
"You are beautiful just as you are. You don’t need to prove that to anyone but yourself. No matter your shape, race, age, gender, sexuality; you deserve to feel sexy and like a total goddamn babe. Our lingerie aims to aid you in loving yourself – to feel confident, happy and empowered in your body, sexuality, and who you are.
SIZE DOES NOT DICTATE SEX-APPEAL
We are a body positive lingerie label offering unique, sexy and comfortable handmade garments in styles that flatter different body types with the option of free custom fitting."

Whereas Dove reaffirms women's identity, they way they are viewed and see themselves, as being inherently tied to the concept of beauty, JBC promotes a feeling of sexiness from an embodied perspective that is uniquely felt and expressed by each person who wears their products. This feeling can be felt by anyone, is their message, no matter your gender, age, race. It can't be defined by anyone but the individual and the feeling of sexiness is not presented for the appreciation and gratification of another, but as a tool of empowerment and expression for the individual.
All the images are shot in natural light, are not retouched or staged. These moments are captured by the photographer who operates like 'a fly on the wall', opportunistically waiting to capture an essence of the situation unfolding before her (communicated in conversation with the photographer, Anna Cunningham, 2016).

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Foucault's statement "the body is directly involved in a political field" (Richardson and Locks, 2014, 16) has inspired me in this collection to look at sources from the media showing body practices which suggest conformity or resistance to normative discourses of appropriate bodies. "...There is always the potential for resistance ...and it nearly always commences with the body" Richardson and Locks (2014, 16) suggest, and go on to say that "power relations work through and on the body by demanding 'appropriate' performance and iconography". Yet there are examples all around of us of people engaging in bodily practices which attempt to transgress the normative social discourses. I focus mainly on examples of woman who engage in  practices of embodiment  and body modification which critically examine dominant cultural discourses. Although as Rosalind Gill (2012, 492) points out in her discussion, sexualisation is a multifaceted complex set of phenomena, dominant narratives focuses on the negative and exploitative aspects. I am choosing to highlight examples in which "sexualisation is no longer presented as something 'done' to women but is something in which active, playful sexual subjects apparently freely choose to take part in..." (ibid). Another example in this collection appears to operate under the guise of resistance yet actually endorses a normative scripting of appropriate bodies. This is alluded to by Rosalind Gill (2012493) in her comment, "contemporary sexualised culture risks becoming a new mode of governmentally in which a confident sexual agent is not outside power but is central to a disciplinary 'technology of sexiness' ". 

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Foucault's statement "the body is directly involved in a political field" (Richardson and Locks, 2014, 16) has inspired me in this collection to look at sources from the media showing body practices which suggest conformity or resistance to normative discourses of appropriate bodies. "...There is always the potential for resistance ...and it nearly always commences with the body" Richardson and Locks (2014, 16) suggest, and go on to say that "power relations work through and on the body by demanding 'appropriate' performance and iconography". Yet there are examples all around of us of people engaging in bodily practices which attempt to transgress the normative social discourses. I focus mainly on examples of woman who engage in  practices of embodiment  and body modification which critically examine dominant cultural discourses. Although as Rosalind Gill (2012, 492) points out in her discussion, sexualisation is a multifaceted complex set of phenomena, dominant narratives focuses on the negative and exploitative aspects. I am choosing to highlight examples in which "sexualisation is no longer presented as something 'done' to women but is something in which active, playful sexual subjects apparently freely choose to take part in..." (ibid). Another example in this collection appears to operate under the guise of resistance yet actually endorses a normative scripting of appropriate bodies. This is alluded to by Rosalind Gill (2012493) in her comment, "contemporary sexualised culture risks becoming a new mode of governmentally in which a confident sexual agent is not outside power but is central to a disciplinary 'technology of sexiness' ". 

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https://www.instagram.com/saramaijewels/
This is Sarah Jane Adams, or "saramaijewels" on Instagram.
"What started as an interesting way to talk about my jewellery influences, soon became a social experiment, then a form of therapy, a daily diary, a creative outlet, and a series of visuals with my thoughts and opinions."
"I don't know how to act my age, I've never been this age before"
In the images presented in Saramaijewels's instagram account, she uses fashion and body posture to create an image of herself which does not conform to social expectations of the aging grey haired woman. What strongly comes through images is her attitude and this is often portrayed with the way she uses her gaze and body posture. Looking directly at the camera, holding herself strongly and defiantly, appropriating a sexual confidence usually seen in a much younger model, yet not succumbing to a sexualised gaze; she looks out and doesn't care who is looking back. She has created a look that, as reflected in many of the comments, people of all ages are inspired by and find really interesting. Below is one example of a comment on her Instagram account:
."that1middlechild Coming across your account has been the highlight of my day. I needed your positive energy and inspiration. I hope someday I will be as beautiful and wise as you. I think you make everyone a lot less anxious to age. You really go to show youth doesn't rely on a certain time in life, it can live on forever 💞"

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Use of fashion in Freetown, Sierra Leone:

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Use of fashion in Freetown, Sierra Leone:

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http://iview.abc.net.au/programs/fashpack-freetown/AC1420H001S00
The media is dominated by narratives of poverty, illness, war and genocide in Africa. We see depleted and starved bodies, skin hanging off bone, eyes filled with despair. This of course exists and the content in this TV show should not in anyway take away from the seriousness of the severe conditions many people living in African countries face in their daily reality. However what the TV show "Freetown Fashpack" does offer is an alternative narrative for us in the West to engage with. In this show we do see people living in poverty, the poorest part of Sierra Leone in fact, but we see bodies with agency, actively participating in creating their self image. The show, set in the 'junks' which are a second hand clothes market, consisting of rejected items donated from Western countries, follows regular customers who create their own unique and eye catching fashion styles by regularly attending the junks, taking items to local tailors and instructing how they should be reinvigorated. The body images we see here in this show speak of hope for the future, bodily pleasure, bodies which hold power through their self presentation. The very elements which in our Western culture would be viewed as succumbing to normative modes. However because of the context of extreme poverty and war in Sierra Leone, they become tools for empowerment - possibilities for self improvement and a way out of their existing life conditions. A couple of examples in this episode provide concrete insight: a woman speaks about spending half her weekly income on clothes. This woman is the head of her household, supporting her family and her brothers family and so has the freedom to spend as she wants without being questioned. She is also a Muslim, but a 'bad Muslim' in her words. She dresses how she wants, often revealing flesh and curves and deliberately creates a self image that will appeal to the customers and get her more tips. A man speaks about the power of his image in making him 'someone' that others talk about, lust after, aspire to be like. He has big hopes and dreams for his future, which includes becoming educated and being a leader of his people. His bedroom, the size of a closest, in the slum of Freetown houses all of his clothes which go into making his image. In my own life I actively choose not to engage in using clothes and fashion to craft my self image. I prefer to receive hand me-downs from friends, family, dress down rather than up. I feel like to disengage rather than engage with fashion is my way of avoiding normative scripting of my appearance. However I can see that in the lives of people in Freetown, Sierra Leone fashion enables them to step outside of the dominant narratives of poverty which creates a subject who is a victim of their circumstances with no possibility to create change, but must rely on external aide from wealthy countries.

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Jessamyn Stanley: yoga enthusiast and fat femme                         http://jessamynstanley.com

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Jessamyn Stanley: yoga enthusiast and fat femme                         http://jessamynstanley.com

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"Yoga teacher, body positive advocate, and writer based in Durham, North Carolina. Her classes provide a body positive approach to yoga which celebrates students’ bodies and encourages them to ask “How do I feel?” rather than “How do I look?” when practicing yoga." (taken from her website).
Initially I didn't pay too much attention to these images as I thought Jessamyn (or someone else) was presenting the images in a voyeuristic way as a 'freakish body' to be ogled at simply because she was different to the typical yoga body in the media - a large black body in contorted body postures. Not necessarily a body you would expect to see advertising for Lululemon, expensive yoga wear, or on the cover page of Yoga Journal. However these images were popping up in my Facebook more frequently and it got me thinking. I was aware that these images did not conform to typical representations of yoga bodies. What, hang on, does this mean I had assumptions of what kind of bodies would do yoga?? This was news to me. I thought as a yoga teacher I embraced an all inclusive approach to yoga, welcoming bodies of all varying levels of capacity, social class, ethnicity - doesn't yoga by its very nature transcend labelling, judgement and categorising of our human experience? Hmm so I do have preconceptions. Thank you Jessamyn for revealing to me these normative beliefs I obviously hold. I guess I have a lot more work to do on myself to expose subconscious beliefs and values to attempt to avoid continuing to contribute to normative discourse.

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Dove: "Isn't it time we redefined beauty together?"

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Dove: "Isn't it time we redefined beauty together?"

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XOa7zVqxA4

"Welcome to the home of real beauty. For over a decade, we’ve been working to make beauty a source of confidence, not anxiety, and here’s where the journey continues. We’ll bring you content made for real women, starring real women - from our most groundbreaking campaigns to beauty advice from our experts. Together, we have the power to make beauty confidence contagious."

In this advertisement for Dove's skin, hair care and deodorant products, a range of diverse body sizes, ages, skin colours, appearances, are portrayed; women who don't necessarily conform to normative feminine gender roles and stereotypical beauty norms. They are speaking about their personal struggles with judgements from others about their bodies and how they have had to rise above these challenges and criticisms to do what they want to do in life and feel comfortable with their bodies. The scenes of the women talking are underscored by emotive and uplifting music which helps to tell the story of women overcoming the odds to recognise and value their intrinsic beauty when social norms are telling them they should change/hate/hide themselves because of the body they have. The messages that I read are that all women, no matter their body size, age, skin colour, cultural background, ability are inherently beautiful and this beauty holds power, enabling women to be who they want to be and do all the things they want to in life. Further, a women, by her nature is beautiful and when this beauty is fully embodied and expressed, this woman through the energising power of her beauty will realise her potential of her being. If a woman does not identify with her beauty, or indeed beauty as a concept, she is somehow missing something, and is not fully 'woman'. In essence, being a woman is tethered to the concept of beauty and this means that a woman is conceived of a subject to be looked at and appreciated visually by another; not in terms of what she can do or experience. The emotional response to the ads from so many people shows how effective this campaign is. Emotional reaction is essential for a consumer to bond with a brand. And thus Dove, although promoting the idea that each woman is inherently beautiful and does not need to conform to ideal notions of beauty, endorses a range of products which are technologies used in the 'construction' of beauty, which if used by consumers, will support them in their personal journey of accepting themselves.

There are a lot of varied comments, below a few examples: