Final Remarks

For my final remarks I just want to discuss my finds and what I have concluded since the beginning, with the addition of talking about how this translates into my graphic media portion of this project.

I believe this time around this project had really developed and changed into something I was not necessarily expecting at the beginning. I began with a small discussion about how I wanted to discuss Masculinity and Femininity and the traits that come with them. But as I was researching and finding sources I discovered a whole new side to my topic that I had not covered before. Toxic masculinity and specifically in India was such an interesting topic of discussion and really entered me into a whole new conversation about masculine traits. It creates a discussion about how some men have almost taken the traits of ‘what it means to be masculine’ and taken them to the extreme. What happens when, as a man, you take the idea of being masculine to the extent that it begins to negatively effect the people around you. More specifically the women around you.

I began discussing and research what young boys and men were being taught within their cultures, where it came from, how it effected the women around them etc. From research I discovered that, in countries such as India the idea of men being masculine and women being feminine is an almost no-brainer way of viewing those traits and what they mean. To the extent that we then get into the conversation about how that effects gender rights. Which in my previous Identity project I spoke about how these traits have nothing to do with gender and what they are socially assigned to. But in the case of places like India where the hierarchy of men and women becomes a bit more complicated, those women do not get the option of picking and choosing what sort of person they wish to be or how they wish to carry themselves. Toxic masculinity has taken over this opportunity and they are left to deal with the ugly truth of what overly masculine men are like in India.

However, from further research I discovered that toxic masculinity within India has been an issue for a long time but there’s attempts to tackle it. Organisations like MAVA (Men Against Violence and Abuse) are dedicated to helping teach young boys and men about gender equality and its importance. Abolishing toxic masculinity from an early age is one of the most vital ways of getting to a more equal and acceptable society, where any gender can feel comfortable within themselves and are not defined by these feminine and masculine traits.

In conclusion, I am hoping these findings and research will translate effectively in my graphic media work. As I have previously mentioned I am doing a claymation where I am representing both feminine and masculine traits in an abstract form of animation. To make it different from my previous claymation I am using coloured plasticine which is more mouldable and doesn’t try like clay. This has been successful than clay so far as I have been able to leave and come back to the models in order to make a longer and more successful looking claymation. I have been able to add a lot more emotion and meaning to the piece which really translates my research a better than before, despite it overall being quite abstract. A more abstract approach really puts an alternative look on a heavy topic such as toxic masculinity, bringing in those colours and harsh lighting the topic is made a lot more personal to the people affected. We really get an idea of what people go through when they deal with such things as toxic masculinity, which was of course the aim. I am excited where it will finish off and I know that the ending I have left to do will translate a harsher reality of what many go through in India and the rest of the world.