Growing Up In The E80's Analysis

From the earliest age, you are bombard with what is perceived to be the famine or masculine ideal from commercials, movies but also its learned from the type of family unit you are most in contact with. This is not new as my mother would lament of her apparent inability to keep the house as was depicted by June Clever played by Janine Turner in the Leave it to Beaver show. Growing up, I was shown the physical stereotype of the strong male, that is successful and with a promising career but also of the empowered woman that does it all. By the 70’s, Farrah Fawcett became the ideal with the bell bottoms, feathered hair and could portray and tough crime fighter working with other women. This constant evolution helped me to realize that these roles and definitions are not static and could be embraced. Growing up in the e80’s, I even had the feathered hair.

But if you’re life experience was of a stable home with more traditional family structure, it is understandable that a person would attempt to emulate it and resist changes. If it worked in the past, why break it? If all of your friends had mothers that took the last name of their husband, breaking from that mold could cast you in an unfavorable light. By emersion, a person becomes the embodiment of what is around them and stereotypes are reinforced. Growing up in a small community, attending a small school, I didn’t experience alternative life styles. My frame of reference was that all of my friends had intact families and that getting married and staying that way was the norm. Right or wrong, that structure would be something I would want to replicate. Assuming that the experience was positive, others with differing models from mine would probably feel the same way. Each generation will attempt to make life better to some degree, but it can be comforting to fall back on the