Strong is the new pretty

"My girls know that who they are is just perfect.
Their silly, adventureous, frustrated, happy, LOUD, athletic, fierce, funny selves.
Being themselves is enough for us. And ultimately, for them, too…that’s the goal, at least.
They don’t need to have their hair done, clothes matching, or even be clean to be loved or accepted.
We love them as they are, loud, dirty, competitive…just like my parents loved me for being um, the exact same way. I wanted this series of images to show their boldness, their strength and the beauty in them, as they are.
Strong is the new pretty."
Kate T. Parker, photographer and mother



"I started to see patterns and recognize that the images where the girls were authentically captured were the strongest images. The images that showed the girls as they genuinely are were my favorites. After seeing this, I started to shoot with that in mind."
Kate T. Parker



"The project became about capturing my girls and their friends as they truly are and how that is OK. Not only OK, but worthy of celebration. There's a lot of pressure for girls (and women) to look a certain way, act in certain manner, and I wanted to let my daughters know that who they naturally are is enough."
Kate T. Parker



"I grew up playing sports and hanging out with athletic, strong, confident girls. My teammates and friends weren’t concerned as much with how they looked as how they played. They didn’t find their worth in how their body looked, rather what it could do. Regardless of whether or not my girls even wanted to play sports, I wanted them to have that same sensibility, that same confidence. We all get these messages to be thin, perfectly groomed, complacent and smiling to be considered beautiful. I simply don’t believe that. The most beautiful girls and women are the ones who are confident to be true to themselves. Girls on the Run’s mission and message perfectly aligns with this. I was so thankful to be able to work on campaign that I 100% completely believed in and felt like I 'knew'."
Kate T. Parker



"My goal with this project was to showcase my girls and their friends, to tell their story. That there is beauty in confident, strong, fierce, messy, silly young girls. I hope that other girls see this and recognize that whatever they love, whatever makes them unique and special is beautiful and worthy of celebration, too."
Kate T. Parker




photographs by Kate T. Parker via and via and via and via and via and via and via and via and via and via and  via and via and via and via and via and via and via and via and via and via

Blended

A "dark" aspect of intergroup relations is that group membership tends to yield stereotyping, prejudice and discrimination of "the other". The question is whether an individual’s beliefs and practices about diversity (i.e. diversity ideologies) play a role in the positive and negative outcomes of intergroup reactions.



Two of these ideologies are a) colourblindness and b) multiculturalism. Colourblindness refers to the approach of gaining equality by downplaying group distinctions. In US-American society, it can be traced to the movement that opposed segregation and inequality verbalised by Martin Luther King’s famous words that one day people would "not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character". Multiculturalism, on the other hand, gains equality by acknowledging and valuing differences, by focusing on positive consequences of group memberships. This approach opposes the idea of the melting pot which has one cultural ideal and hence leads to assimilation.



In general, members of majority groups tend to adopt the colourblind strategy (in order to appear unbiased) more than members of minority groups do. This "avoidance strategy" (for instance not mentioning someone’s ethnicity) is perceived as positive – in the sense of the group member being less biased – when ethnicity is irrelevant but negative – in the sense of the group member being more biased – when ethnicity is relevant.



According to research findings, comparing the effects of the two diversity strategies, colourblindness leads to less stereotyping whereas multiculturalism leads to less prejudice. And, colourblindness of majority workers can lead to less engagement of minority co-workers...



The authors compare research findings and come to the conclusion that "these diversity ideologies affect virtually every aspect of intergroup relations" and that "there is more consensus in the data showing that a multicultural ideology benefits minorities".






Kate T. Parker's photo series "Blended" shows her sister's adoption of the little boy Sam. “We are so in love with this amazing little man who has brought such joy into our lives. There are so many wonderful and interesting things I am documenting, the power of love, the agonizing wait (and then elation) of adoption, the welcoming of another life into our clan, and what it means to be a biracial family.” (information and photographs via).



- Rattan, A. & Ambady, N. (2013). Diversity ideologies and intergroup relations: An examination of colorblindness and multiculturalism. European Journal of Social Psychology, 43, 12-21

repost (originally posted as "Diversity ideologies: Colourblind or multicultural" on Google Science, 1 April 2014, link)