The Black Hair Tax: No Breaks for Black Women Who Want to Avoid Breakage
Culture, Growth, Rebellion: The Symbolism of Hair Change
Each new colour and cut marked a new season of my life, a new personality I wanted to try on. For me, hair change was a way to demarcate and bookmark a transition. I desperately wanted something to indicate to myself that time was passing and that I was growing. Or maybe, I facetiously sought maturation and healing in the hair salon chair…
The Gen-Z Bimbo: Taking Control of Patriarchal Standards or Pandering to Them?
Everything women do is politicised. We cannot win when it comes to fashion: women who dress modestly are called prudes, whilst women who dress in a revealing manner are slut-shamed and seen as vacuous and shallow, even being accused of putting themselves at risk of violence. In a world where we cannot please anyone, why not just do precisely what pleases ourselves?
Food I Associate with My Late Grandparents
Every Christmas Eve, Nana and my great aunt Bee would come over to our house for a lunch spread. Deli meats, special cheeses, and Nana’s crab salad that tastes like love. Christmas Day dinner was always classic but still special. A huge turkey, with the stuffing and mashed potatoes all present at the table. There was nothing more comforting in the world than eating a traditional dinner with Nana on a holiday she loved…
The Thrills and Fails of Living Alone as a Single Woman
For around four years now, I have lived on my own. Most of the time, I love it. I have lived with my parents, a whole bunch of strangers at university, and even an ex-boyfriend. Living alone has been my favourite, but I have to admit that it is certainly the living situation that I have found comes with the biggest highs and lowest lows…
Religion, Culture and Consumerism: Searching for a Definition of Beauty
‘I like the bit where she says beauty is a currency.’ We had been reading Naomi Wolff’s The Beauty Myth, a book so quintessentially nineties that I could almost hear the melody of an Aqua song, feel White Musk burning the inside of my nose. Both the book and the reading group prompted an inner discussion about the beauty we are defined by…
The Real Reason You Have FOMO and How You Can Use it to Get Your Dream Life
I found that I loved travelling and the adventure of being somewhere new every day. And that’s when I finally understood: every moment of FOMO, of jealousy, I had felt, was my soul telling me Yes. THAT’S what I want! Jealousy is not just an emotion that we all experience. It is a sign of something that you long for. It is a desire within you, asking to be recognised…
Social Media in the Time of Corona: New Ways of Connecting
We faced our fears of being seen and of being judged because everyone else was in the same boat. Unsure of what was happening with the virus, one of the only ways of experiencing comfort, joy and togetherness was to have an online presence. Today, this carefree and vibrant attitude to life is a clear result of our experiences over the last two years…
Thrive, Not Just Survive: Why You Should Allow Yourself to Live in the Moment
Does it ever feel like you’re running out of time? Do you hear that tick, tick, tick echoing in your ears, orbiting your mind? Has it gotten so loud that you can’t hear anything else? None of your other thoughts are allowed to exist – there isn’t space. Everything is scattered. Where did all the time go?
Remember When the World was Your Gym? How Competitiveness in Sport is Making Us Idle Athletes
If you love exercise and pushing yourself to your physical limits, then I’m happy for you. I’m not saying that I think you’re a bad person (although we probably won’t become close friends). But there needs to be something for the rest of us, you know? Isn’t it okay to take part in something just because you enjoy it? Could someone please invent a sport where the only (and I mean only) goal is to have fun?
The Practicality of Manifestation: How Behavioural Science Supports the Magic
Manifestation is the concept that we can turn our thoughts into their physical equivalent through visualisation and affirmation techniques. It says that if you believe the said desire already exists and belongs to your future, this energy is enough to create its presence in your life…
How Visiting Nudist Beaches is Helping Me Overcome Negative Body Image
I refrain from covering my lumpy, bumpy bits that hurt every time I think of them; I try to abandon those thoughts. I crave freedom within my body. Sometimes, pushing yourself into a zone of vulnerability is how you reach that sense of liberation. I am surrounded by other people who are letting themselves go. I am safe. I am beautiful, just like them…
Your Worth is Not Measured by a Set of Scales: Overcoming Diet Culture
Even though I know I have come a long way from that little girl who prayed her puppy fat would disappear, I still have a long way to go. I have many days when I look in a mirror and wish the reflection staring back at me had smaller hips or bigger lips. But I am also someone who, on more days than not, can remind herself of what her body does for her. I am a woman who can now see that I deserve to take up as much space as I please…
What Style Means to Me as a 21st Century Goth
Throughout the years, people have taken the gothic style and made it their own. New looks include coloured contacts, platform boots, tattoos, piercings, shaved eyebrows, big jewellery, and ripped fishnets or other articles of clothing. Nowadays people have a looser idea of what goth truly means. I think this is something very positive: it allows for more personal interpretation and expression…
‘A Muscle Manifesto for Women’: Why You Should Gym Like a Girl
Changing our perceptions about women’s bodies will change our perceptions about how women should work out and engage with fitness. There is a persisting myth that lifting weights will make a bulky body, which dissuades women from seating themselves on a bench by the dumbbells…
‘We Are Not Fur Coats’: A Look at Changing Body Trends
All through my adolescence, female bodies have been going in and out of style. One day it’s cool to have thick thighs; another day it’s embarrassing. One day being ‘thick’ is all the rage, and women obsess over gaining weight. Another day, women and girls kill themselves to be slim…
‘Every Day the Strokes Become Steadier’: My Eyeliner Will Not Make Me a Bad Surgeon
That eyeliner, a line drawn from the outer corner of my eye that is aligned with the curve of my waterline, required steady fingers – like a surgeon. Placing the tip of my brush at the end of the line and gently swiping it over my eyelid demonstrated a muscle memory that takes years of practice – like a surgeon. My eyeliner had required me to use as many fine motor control muscles as it takes to deftly hold a scalpel…
Navigating Fatness: Generational Trauma and Decolonising My Body as an Indian Woman
Fatness as something of aesthetic value is something about which there are varying opinions in India. Oddly enough, India used to be (relatively) accepting of fat bodies. In movies, you would see women with bulging stomachs dancing with male leads, having their stubby fingers linger on their stomachs for a while longer before they spin and spin, displaying their beauty to you, the viewer…
Food Politics and Me: The Damaging Fetishisation of Weight Loss
To be a woman is to be predisposed to worry about weight and weight loss, to worry about the size and the curvature of your body and to question hunger and suppress its cues. Whether you’ve been influenced by the idolised actresses of your childhood or have subliminally acquired the habits of other women in your life, it’s not unusual for women to face both confrontational and innate pressure to look a certain way…
Ferienliebe: My Tale of Naïvety, Solo-Travel, and Summer Love
When I arrived in Budapest on a gentle summer morning, it was still dark. I was on my own; I didn’t speak the language and feared the loud streets of a bustling city. […] With no idea of where I was going, I ended up going backwards and forwards and getting lost.
Toxic Masculinity, Slurs, and Stares: What it’s Like to be a Woman in Skate Culture
I grew up in a male-dominated neighbourhood, and the fact that I could just about wobble on the board without falling off earned me an addictive amount of respect. Despite being younger, smaller, and the only girl in my group, having even a shred of talent made me acceptable, even if being a girl did not…