My capstone is about the misrepresentation of Black Women/girls in media. Throughout my capstone, I kept asking myself “How to take back my narrative?”. In a mini case study, I asked multiple Black girls from different backgrounds how they wanted to be represented and this is their response. I wanted to do something that I knew that I was going to be proud of and in the making of my capstone, I succeeded.

I have never liked being in highly controlled environments. When I was younger I went to this Christian school and I was constantly getting into trouble, I hated the uniforms, restrictive rules, and the physical abuse. While reading about the ward I was always thinking about the connection with that school. Although I was there for a short two years it was something that I remember vividly. The principal reminds me a lot of Nurse Ratched, she would have favorites and she would use physical forms of discipline when someone did something she didn’t like.

I have always been able to push back against systems I think are restrictive towards me. Not only at school but in the real world as well and as McMurphy helped me realize that the ward is an oppressive system I have made the similarities with what I’ve recently done. It has been a long time since I’ve spoken about systemically oppressive systems but I have found a voice speaking for the people of Palestine. In 2020 when the Black Lives Matter movement was in full effect my mother told me I wasn’t allowed to speak up because it was too dangerous. Recently, I went to a sit-in at UPenn to advocate for the people of Palestine although my activism may have been interpreted differently in the same way as how Bromden first saw McMurphy. As we, as a class looked deeper into McMurphy as a character I realized that I also have the same views and reactions when it comes to being dictated to. Like McMurphy, I also have a tendency to try and get people on board to do what’s right. The system that is happening in the book is oppressive and I think that’s why McMurphy is determined to make the other patients see that because as we discussed in class, people can be comfortable and complicit in their own oppression.

At first, I found McMurphy’s fallback suspicious because he was adamant about taking down Nure Ratched but I realize he’s trying to play the game of the ward. In class, we talked about the difference between influence and manipulation and now I think that McMurphy is trying to influence the other patients to break free from the oppressive systems Nurse Ratched has implemented on the ward. When McMurphy and Harding talk about Nurse Ratched, we can clearly see that in the beginning there’s a disagreement about her character McMurphy calls her a bitch and Harding refers to her as an angel. The way that Bromden describes the ward and Nure Ratched he talks about how the fate of the patients is solely up to her and the other doctors no matter how good or bad the outcome might be for the patients. When McMurphy stops trying to get a rise out of Ratched he establishes that he has to manipulate the system to his advantage in order to escape. McMurphy is strong about his feelings toward Nurse Ratched he doesn’t feel like he’s insane like the ward claims he is.

Songs of Choice

Nightmare - Halsey

The song “Nightmare” by Halsey was made in 2019 in response to the start of abortion bans. The song fits a lot of topics into 3 minutes. I thought about the concept of “Mayday” and how these topics relate to why they’re a thing. In the beginning, Halsey starts off with a bedtime prayer to pray for the sins she’s about to commit in the song. “I’ve been polite but won’t be caught dead.” a line from the song reminds me of how Offred has to keep up this version of herself and basically transform into another person while being a handmaid. While the lyrics may not relate to “Mayday” I think the angry-frustrusrated tone of the song does. I think one of the reasons why Mayday was created was the pent-up anger of following the rules and being in Gilead.

Mother’s Daughter - Miley Cyrus

“Mother’s Daughter” by Miley Cyrus is about Cyrus’ experience growing up with a mother who is a feminist and making her mother proud by continuing that legacy. In the book we get introduced to Offred’s mother through memories of Offred’s childhood and how her mother was a feminist who went to marches and fought on the front lines for women empowerment. While the song and book relate, they talk about different feelings. Offred didn’t like her mom’s work as they would argue a lot but in the song, Cyrus talks about feeling proud to take on that feminist role after her mother.

All Night - Beyonce

Throughout the book we see the relationship between Serena and the Commander, and how love doesn’t seem to be a priority. As it was referenced in the book it seems more of a job, something they have to do to keep the roles of Gilead in order. Although we don’t know much about Serena and Fred’s relationship before Gilead it’s safe to assume that they have been together for a long time. During the ceremony, Serena is almost always visibly uncomfortable and even though it may not be cheating according to Gilead Offred refers to herself as the Commander’s mistress. In the song, Beyonce expresses the hurt and forgiveness she feels when her husband cheated on her singing, “So many people that I know, they just tryna touch ya. — Give you some time to prove that I can trust you again.”. When trust in a relationship is broken it could be hard to regain and it seems as if Serena is having a hard time controlling her emotions because technically she can’t be upset if these are the rules and Offred is doing her job.

Consideration - Rihanna & SZA

We see the relationship between Offred and the Commander progress since Chapter 23 when he asks her to meet in his office for the first time. While listening to this song Rihanna and SZA sing the line “Let me cover your shit in glitter, I could make it gold” and I think this line does a good job of representing the obliviousness of the Commander when Offred tells him that the handmaids use butter as lotion. Using glitter to make something look better than it is, the Commander doesn’t know how bad it really is for the handmaids even though he helped put this system in place. “I needed you to please give my reflection a break. From the faces, it’s seeing now.” in this line Rihanna talks about her reflection and how she’s had to maintain an image, one that she wants to get rid of, which reminded me of how there are no mirrors in the bathrooms so the handmaids can’t see themselves and how Offred has shed the image of her old self from the “before times” into who we now know as Offred.

Love - Kendrick Lamar & Zacari

The theme of Love comes up in the book a few times as something that is non-existent and that’s not useful for the Hanmaid’s purpose. This song is all about love and what Gilead lacks according to Ofrred In chapter 33 on page 220 Aunt Lydia tells the girls “Love is not the point” in the red center. After the Commander asks Offred what Gilead lacks Offred responds with “Love” and the idea of falling in love. I also noticed that Serena and the Commander don’t seem to have a loving relationship as the Commander told Offred “Arranged marriages have always worked you just as well, if not better.” (220). The lyrics of the song “If I minimized my worth, would you still love me?” made me think of Serena and how she aligned and still aligns with the views of Gilead but now that the rules of Gilead have had an effect on her she might be changing her mind. She has to have her image minimized as a “Commander’s Wife” where her status is high but her power is limited.

In my blog post I explained my project which was, helping teens and their mental health during the pandemic. My idea for my agent of change was to make a discord server to help and communicate with other teens who were affected by the pandemic. In my discord server there are multiple different eras and bots made to make different people comfortable, for example if you like k-pop there is a k-pop section with different text and voice channels. The bots in the server are for comfort purposes with virtual hugs, kisses, and pats. Now that everything is set up my goal is to get more people on the server if they’re interested.

@realdepressionproject has an instagram full of resources and advice on how to deal with what you’re going through, and for people who aren’t familiar with mental illness they have posts to help you better understand people with mental illness. They have posts like “what does depression feel like” and “15 ways to reach out without saying ‘how are you’” so you can assist and help your friends get through this time. There are a lot of ways to make a change and I think the “real depression project” is a great way for teens who feel isolated to get help.

The real depression project was part of what I wanted to do for this project. For me it was really difficult for me to choose what I wanted to do because I felt like you couldn’t do much with my topic. Choosing my ‘Agent of change’ was chaotic, I did make an instagram page for my project but I didn’t feel like anyone considered it a safe space and I didn’t know how to make it a safe space. I wanted it to be more private, and even though discord is a public app I wanted people to feel like they wouldn’t be easily judged.

In the process of my ‘Agent of change’ I had many different topics and I was struggling to find a topic that really affected me and my peers, until I realized we were in a pandemic. I think teens’ mental health has been going under the rug for a really long time and even now, I had a hard time finding resources about it. Out of all of the topics I had I’m glad I chose this one because it really represents what a lot out of teens are going through right now.

Now that this project is coming to an end I feel like this project was perfect for the class of 2024. This project gives us time to reflect and think about what’s going on in our world, I feel like this project made us look at the world and actually do something. I enjoyed doing this project and I think the 9th graders next year will too.

Since doing this project I learned the importance of mental health and communication, there were things I learnt about myself, like coding and organizing certain things like the bots and sections. It was really hard for me to set this up so I watched tutorials on youtube and that helped. I feel like there are things that I could’ve done better because I’ve never done this before. I could’ve gotten the server more organized with the channels and I got caught up with the commands for some bots so that could’ve been improved as well, luckily that’s an easy fix.

There is still more work that needs to be done, obviously me making a discord is not going to solve this problem. However I think the real work needs to be education and better understanding of what you or another person might be going through, because yes the pandemic made it worse but it’s not going to go away. I think a real solution would be to continue having these conversations with my discord and instagram accounts like @realdepressionproject

At the start of the lockdown I was relieved to have a break from school for a while because I thought the start of quarantine to be a 2 week break and then we would have to eventually go back to normal. When it went a little longer than I thought it would, I was still very optimistic about going back to school and having a normal life. It was until I heard I was entering the 9th grade through zoom, when I started to feel helpless.

I chose this topic with the sole purpose of trying not to feel alone. I thought that I was the only one having trouble with depression motivation throughout the school year. I didn’t want to be a Debby downer but I genuinely thought we weren’t ever gonna get out of this pandemic. When I was researching I shared a lot of my thoughts in the teenagers that the articles talk about. I feel we need to talk about this topic because I feel like it has not been talked about as much as it should be, obviously everyone is having a hard time but teenagers need socialization to grow and thrive. I think it’s most important for adults to know about this topic because they think this is just a time were we teens have all the time in the world and it has been really stressful and adults really don’t seem to understand that.

Many teens are experiencing eating disorders, new suicidal thoughts and new waves of anxiety, with a 40% increase of teens calling The National Eating Disorder Association since may reporting that they have been binge eating during the pandemic and with online school and always being on our devices we can lose track of how much we eat. An issue like this is significant because the spike in self-harm within the teen community since the pandemic started, is serious.

According to FAIR Health there was a 334% spike in self-harm in teens and young adults amid the pandemic, teens and children feeling trapped inside. Usually when kids are feeling depressed adults try to make them engage in outside activities such as hanging with friends or going to the park, which we all can’t do now. Not having the space to fully develop teens are not ok, the proportion of mental health emergency admission was up 31% higher than it was in 2019 according to The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 14.3% of teens will be affected by depression and bipolar disorder and with the added trauma from the pandemic, teens are now one of the most affected groups.

Researching this topic for the You & The World project made me realize that I am not alone and there are hundreds of people who are struggling with the same things I am. One part about my research I still want to know more about is the child abuse and how children and teens are living with their abusers, and if there is any way to get them help. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be trapped with an abuser for months on end not knowing when it’s going to be over. Another thing I still want to dig deeper into is to eating disorders and if binge eating is the only eating disorder people are struggling with, I know some people have bulimia and Anorexia and I want to know if the pandemic made it worse for them and if there are coping methods they have.

With the pandemic not being over soon I am feeling apprehensive about the future for teens during this pandemic knowing a lot of them aren’t in their right state of mind.

Sources

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/12/health/covid-teenagers-mental-health.html

https://www.healthline.com/health-news/impact-of-covid-19-lockdown-on-teens-mental-health

https://edsource.org/2021/eating-disorders-among-teens-surging-during-the-pandemic/650882

https://time.com/5943896/covid-19-teen-mental-health/

https://www.npr.org/2021/03/14/977215385/professionals-see-uptick-in-teen-mental-health-issues-aggravated-by-pandemic

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/teenagers-covid-pandemic-mental-health/2021/02/10/3389983a-39d6-11eb-9276-ae0ca72729be_story.html

Reading Born a Crime by Trevor Noah I noticed that we share similar experiences, the feeling of feeling “other” and being conflicted on where you belong. Noah talks about struggling with his identity not knowing which category he fit into most. Noah would mostly write his stories in a humorous manner but there would be times he would be serious and detailed, I decided to take this approach. I wanted to try out the humorous style but it didn’t seem to work out. I decided to use the serious/detailed because even though I joke about my life often I didn’t think that it would fit into my memoir.

In my memoir, I talk about my struggles with relating to African American culture and enduring bullying due to the way I carried myself. The disconnect I felt in middle with African American culture because most of the black kids seen me as “whitewashed” and me trying to fit in.

Maralese and I worked on a soundtrack for this book based on different scenarios and situations that go on throughout the book.

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1T7_jz_obyE0r3BRQ5iPHNZfX3PK-gHB8cxOnT0IW5AA/edit?usp=sharing

This year was the worst yea I’ve ever been alive. On my website, I talk about how music influenced my life this year and how it helped me escape. The transition from Middle school to high school all while doing it virtually is what I also talk about and how the year 2020 has affected my mental health. The artist I chose the mention: BTS, SZA, and Ariana grande have helped me tremendously through these times and I’m happy I get to share this project with you.

https://raegan.carrd.co/