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The homicide of 24 year-old Yale University  doctoral student, Annie Le, by Yale lab technician, Raymond Clark, have generated intense media coverage over the past 2 weeks. In brief, the unpleasant event took place on September 8, 2009 in Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, which was ironically, the day of her wedding. And on September 17, the Police for the alleged murder of Annie Le arrested Raymond Clark, after 9 days of investigations.

However, it was not the whole hyped up media coverage on the investigation of the homicide that caught my attention, but the funeral that was held on Saturday, 26^th September, that set me thinking.

Watching through the video of the memorial service and viewing the pictures taken, it gave me further insight on how different forms of non-verbal communications can be played out in one single event. So much so that even when one mute the memorial video, he or she can still unmistakably tell that a funeral ceremony is taking place, through the various indicators of non verbal communication.

1. Kinesics : Study of Body movement

The bowing of his head, with his hands placed together in front of him, is an outward expression of  the love and respect he have for his sister, Annie.

2. Paralinguistic – Study of non-verbal cues

- The tense and silent atmosphere of the ceremony, the solemn tone used by her brother and long pauses in between each sentence, clearly depicts the emotional attachment the brother has for Annie.

3. Objectics or Artifacts- Study of how meaning are conveyed through physical objects.

- The Coffin, an funeral artifact, is a clear indicator that a funeral is taking place.

4. Oculesics- Study of non-verbal meaning associated with the eye.

- From her tear soaked eyes and dipping brows, we able to tell that the lady above is deeply affected by the lost of Annie.

5. Haptics: Study of touch in communications.

-The comforting gesture and touch offered by Annie Le’s fiance, Jonathan Widawsky to Annie’s Mum clearly tells us the emotional state Vivian Le is in.

6. Proxemics: Study of space and distance in communications

- The above pictures also depicts the close relationship shared between the fiance and her mum, as he have clearly entered her personal space, with a light hug.

7.Physical appearance: Judge a person by their appearance

-From their yellow skin tone, small eyes and jet black hair we can tell that they are not native Americans but of Asian origin. ( they are Vietnamese by the way )

- And from the way they are dressed, mostly in black suits and dress, it tells us that it is non-joyous event that they are attending. As the colour black symbolizes death and respect.

Lastly, to the family members and friends of Annie Le, I would like to express my greatest condolences and may she rest in peace

On 19^th August 2009, South African runner, Caster Semenya came to the world’s attention, when she won the 800 metres World Athletics Championship in Berlin. For any 18 years old athletics, it will be a day of pride and glory, both for your country and for yourself. A day when you are expected to be drowned in unending praise and be blinded by the media limelight. And yes, 18 years old, Caster Semenya, did receive the latter, but for all the wrong reasons. She was heavily scrutinized due to suspicions about her gender, which was a result of her superior race timing, and masculine physique. And was suspected by many as being a hermaphrodite.

Hermaphrodites basically has elements of both sexes and in some cases, they may have both ovaries and testicles. For most hermaphrodites, they are assigned their gender at birth, based on the appearance of their genitals, which are often not very accurate. And such conditions are extremely rare, nearly close to one in a million.

Whatever the definition of hermaphrodite is, I am deeply upset by how the world has reacted to such unpleasant news. Just because someone does not fit into our traditional/ stereotyped mold of what a person is supposed to look like, does not give us the right to cast her straight into exile. Where in this case, a science laboratory, where multiple test are done, just to determine her gender. Yes. HER gender

I am honestly quite skeptical on human interpretation on many situations today. Subjective interpretations are basically norms and association of meaning, shaped by the culture, social world and a minimal amount of our past experience. And often, we would come to a mutual understanding or consensus about a word, action, subject, which are generally accepted by the masses within our culture. Well, I have to agree that in a way, it helps by making things or situations more comprehensible when they are mutually categorized and agreed on. However, there is a fine line between being overly judgmental and rigid, and simply following a set of interpretation, while exercising flexibility.

In the context of genders, I will have to agree that there is nothing wrong for us to categorize or define females as species with breast, female genital and species who possess feminine attributes, such as gentleness, being more loving and sentimental etc. Such gender classifications are basically subjective interpretations shaped by the social world today. However, when such interpretations become too rigid, its consequences are often clear and critical. For instance, a female who possess a single masculine attribute, such as being more muscular, deviates away from our social interpretation of a female, and is then cast into a category of abnormalities. Extreme as it seems, we are shaped to interpret many situations with such extreme views today. Like how Semenya was made to suffer publicly, just because she does not fit into our social and traditional mold of what a woman is expected to look like.

As quoted in a recent interview, the chair of South Africa’s sports committee reportedly said that Semenya is “like a raped person” because of the brutal, public humiliation she has endured. What started out as a competition and a chance to represent her country has turned into a public struggle of trying to fit people into specific gender categories.

South Africa’s Minister for Women, Noluthando Mayende-Sibiya also mentioned in a letter sent to the U.N Division for the Advancement of Women that the questioning of her gender is based on a stereotypic view of the physical features and abilities attributable to women and that such stereotypes demonstrate the extent of patriarchy within the world’s sporting community.

“This is a woman who was raised a female. She will always be female, no matter what people say.” – Lesiba Rammaabi, Semenya’s uncle.

And yes, no matter how she looks like, she is still a female afterall.

The theory goes like this: female consumers are presented with an ideal and impossible standard of beauty by advertisers. By accepting such standards, they feel perpetually inadequate and insecure, which keeps them buying and buying in the hopes of achieving the unachievable, of becoming one of the women in the advertisements. These women do not exist in reality because not only are they the product of plastic surgery, personal trainers, makeup artists and hair stylists, they are also often the canvas for many Photoshop artists.  In essence, they’re mannequins.

Well basically, the media today shapes our perception of beauty. Like it or not, we are all, in one way or another, influenced and held captive by these standards ascribed to us by the media. In the event that we do live up to such unrealistic standards, we will be ridiculed or ostracized by others for not being “beautiful” enough. Yet often, we don’t realize that these perceptions are really products of insidious advertising – that is, this is what the media wants us to believe. And as a result, many people out there are willing to go any length just to make sure they meet the standards set by the media.

I personally find this quite worrying, based on the fact that our perception of beauty has been quite unassumingly shaped and created by these advertisements. Back in 1613, Sir Thomas Overbury coined the popular phrase “Beauty is only skin deep”, and I am a complete advocate to this saying. For I believe that the only way to look beautiful is to feel beautiful

Below, is a link i chanced upon recently

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/personal/09/07/o.self.esteem.repair.kit/index.html

In a nutshell, self-worth is not defined by the attention people pay you, but instead is directly related to how you view yourself. For instance, when the author was growing up, she often used her physical appearances to fish for compliments and retrieve wanted attention. As a result, she learnt to define her self-worth against how much attention and social acceptance she could attract.  While psychologists say that it is normal to want to be liked and approved of, the author allowed it to develop into a problem when she could not see any other way of defining her self-worth. Through a series of experiments with her therapist, she began to understand that she was already plagued with the mentality of unworthiness since she was young. Hence, in order for her to overcome it, she had to face up to her past, and accept the fact that she was indeed worthy of anything just by being herself.

“What’s wrong with exterior beauty?”, you may ask.

Nothing!

However, things start to go wrong when we see beauty only as skin deep. Would the supermodel I marry look the same after 30 years? If she does, it would probably involve tons of botox, facelifts, liposuctions, or whatever the plastic surgeon deems fit. Even if she does look the same, I definitely would not be interested in a young-looking woman limping around with chronic back pains.

My point here is that we should not fall prey and completely subscribe to the media’s definition of beauty, as we will never be able to catch up with it. But instead, we should learn to work on and appreciate our inner beauty, for it never fades.

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