8

MEDIA EDUCATIONAND NEGOTIATING

BODY IMAGE

Michelle A. Wolf

Kelly Briley

INTRODUCTION AND GENERAL FOCUS

For the past seven years, the first author of this chapter has been posing aseries of discussion questions about mass media and body image to hetero-sexual, gay, lesbian, and transsexual men and women between the ages of17 and 75. The questions stimulate in-depth exploration of how womenand men of different sexual orientations perceive their own bodies,whether they see bodies like theirs and bodies they appreciate in main-stream mass media, and, ultimately, how media contribute to their devel-oping sense of self-conception. The results of this research have beenreported elsewhere [see, for example. Wolf, Decelle, & Nichols, 2003).

In this chapter, we explore the pedagogical strategies and outcomes ofposing these questions to heterosexual women, ages 18 to 35, who weregathered in various settings in groups ranging in size from seven to rough-

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ly 100 (the larger groups included men). They were convened in collegeclassrooms, focus groups, and on a three-day retreat that was videotapedand produced by the second author as a video documentary entitled. BodyImage: The Quest for Perfection. This documentary has been part of the ped-agogy in the classroom settings since January 2001.

We begin by describing the discussion questions and groups andexplaining how the pedagogy varied across settings. This leads into a sum-mary of the conceptual framework that guided our thinking and wasexplicitly (and only) presented to students in the lecture. We then contex-tualize our instruction as a media literacy effort, summarize and analyzethe outcomes of our pedagogy, offer some general conclusions, and reviewthe main limitations of this project.

DISCUSSION OUESTIONS, GROUPS,AND PEDAGOGY

The data and arguments advanced here come from a series of discussionswith women who met in the San Francisco Bay Area over the past fiveyears. They responded to the same general questions, grouped into the fol-lowing four areas.

• Cultural and personal ideals: Based on your experiences as amedia consumer, what are the common images of women's bod-ies in mass media in general? What are the common images ofwomen's bodies in specific media forms/genres?

• Representation/exclusion: Have you seen your body representedin mass media? In what ways, if any, is your body excluded? Whatis not shown in media?

• Body image feehngs: How do you feel about your body? Haveyour feelings affected (directed) your behavior and life choices?If so, in what ways?

• Sources of body image feehngs: What do you think are some ofthe sources of your feehngs about your body? Consider messagesfrom media and other people.

Prompts for each area varied slightly in relation to group size and com-position, duration of meeting time, and the environments in which thequestions were posed. The most intensive setting was a three-day retreatthat was videotaped and produced as a documentary, i Less intensive weretwo-hour focus groups and large lecture classes with female and male stu-dents. Because the discussions were natural and free-flowing, some addi-

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tional prompts emerged in each setting. However, there were no significantdeviations from the original questions.

The instructor began all three groups by sbaring her personal experi-ence with eating disorders, which dates back to anorexia nervosa beginningin 1971, a hospital stay, and several years of bulimia.^ The goal here was touse personal experience to encourage a willingness on the part of the par-ticipants to self-disclose.

Women from the retreat responded to a notice that was posted onlineas a call for participants and tacked up as a flyer throughout the SanFrancisco Bay Area. Respondents completed written surveys with briefquestions about demographics, caretakers and siblings, body imagethoughts and feelings, and any history of counseling. The group was nar-rowed down to thirty-three women who were individually interviewed toensure group diversity regarding ethnic background and self-conceptionissues/experiences. The final seven participants wrote in journals. At theretreat, they participated in various organized and spontaneous media lit-eracy activities. For example, we brought magazines and asked them to findpictures of women who reflected their ideal body types and women theyfelt represented them. They also engaged in several noncontroUed groupactivities such as watching television, shopping for food, personal groom-ing, relaxing in a hot tub, and preparing for the day. The women were re-interviewed on videotape and via email after the group met. Several stayedin contact after the retreat.

Focus groups participants responded to the same announcements as thewomen at the retreat. They completed four-page, open-ended body imageand media usage questionnaires and wrote two narratives, one on their feel-ings about their bodies and the other on their experiences with food.

The university lecture classes were offered every fall and spring andtypically enrolled seventy to one hundred students. Classes met once aweek for two hours and fifty minutes. The four-hour unit began during thesecond half of one class meeting and continued through the next full class.Again, the instructor began with her personal story, followed by a "partici-pation" exercise in wbich the students wrote answers to the same set ofgeneral questions posed in the focus groups and at the retreat. Data fromthe three semesters were analyzed for this writing.

After the instructor shared her personal story and students completedthe written participation exercise, the instructor introduced and initiateddiscussion of the theoretical framework and then showed the documentaryproduced at the retreat. The unit ended with a substantial in-class discus-sion about tbe documentary and the student's experiences with andresponses to the issues covered. The prompt questions posed during thefocus groups and at the retreat were woven into this discussion. Studentswere given an assignment to record and submit their personal responses to

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the unit after it ended and they were resurveyed in an optional e-mailassignment about six months after the semester ended. Students were alsotested on the unit; despite the large group size, they wrote essay exams onthe material. An important part ofthe pedagogy here was to steer studentsaway from rote memorization and régurgitation of course material andtowards a deeper level of thinking and analysis.

Prior to this unit and throughout the semester, students had weeklyopportunities to complete other participation activities by writing person-al responses to in-class and take-home assignments.^ These grew out of alocator paper assigned at the first meeting that required students to exploreand articulate the values, beliefs, and principles by which they live.Students wrote about social issues that concerned them and articulatedtheir worldview and ideology as members of a series of increasingly largersociocultural groups. These are important precursors to the body imageunit because they reveal a level of personal engagement that is often over-looked in large classes. By the time the students were asked to write andtalk about body image, they already had extensive practice using theoriesto probe and explain their thoughts about the electronically mediatedworld culture. The body image unit marked a transition in the semester inwhich students moved from considering broader cultural and politicalmedia issues to personally exploring their own self-conception in a worldpermeated by corporate-produced electronic media and popular culture.

CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

Several theories form the conceptual basis of our pedagogy and serve aslenses through which individuals can analyze and begin to understand howmass-mediated pictures and ideas become internalized as forces that con-tribute to self-conception. Although these frameworks were used to devel-op the questions posed to all participants, they were only explicitly incor-porated in the classroom instruction.

This research proceeds from the assumption that reality and self-con-ception are subjective, constructive social processes shaped by human andelectronically mediated communication. Self-conception is influenced notonly by other people, but also by what Walter Lippmann [1922) refers toas "pictures in our heads," the "medium of fictions" that frame how weadjust to our environment [Kielwasser & Wolf, 1992, p. 352). As memories,these pictures are implicated in our self-conception [Kielwasser & Wolf̂1992; Wolf, Decelle, & Nichols, 2003) and in how we construct our per-sonal and social realities. George Gerbner and his colleagues [2002) arguethat mainstream media play an especially significant role in shaping the

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social realities of heavy media users, characterizing the process as one ofcultivation. Media tell us the same stories over and over and over again, cul-tivating common images and bringing diverse individuals into shared waysof thinking.

Our media literacy efforts were designed to encourage women to crit-ically evaluate cultivated media representations by examining images ofideal and real bodies, how these images are presented in mass media, andthe extent to which messages in media and communication with otherpeople [who have been exposed to the same mediated images) contributeto the constructive, ongoing processes of self-conception. In the context ofthis cultivated imagery, we had another theoretical goal; to encourage crit-ical thinking about the role of social comparison in the formation of the self-image [Festinger, 1954; Kalodner, 1997). This theory posits that we have aneed to evaluate ourselves and that one way we do this is by comparingourselves to others. Botta [2000) applies this framework to body image dis-turbance by asserting that "people will compare themselves and significantothers to people and images whom they perceive to represent realistic,attainable goals" [p. 146) and "television viewers will compare their looksto television characters" [p. 147). Related to this were several questionsdesigned to encourage the women to think about the impact of other peo-ple on their self-conception. We refer to this hereafter as self conceptionthrough other.

Finally, we wanted the women to more fully understand how theirown specific and often very personal ideas about their bodies directedthem to perceive mediated representations in distinctive ways. Here weworked from the distinctiveness postulate, which suggests that we paystronger attention to stimuli that we see as different [distinctive) from ourenvironment. Kielwasser and Wolf [1991, 1993/94) apply this to self-con-ception, arguing that when we see aspects of ourselves as different fromother people, we pay special attention to those characteristics we believemake us unique. Several of our questions were designed to stimulate thewomen to think about how they scan their environment for pieces ofrecognition [and contradiction) and actively participate in framing theirown body image against other women and the idealized bodies represent-ed in mass media.

In the lectures, the instructor explained how to combine these per-spectives:

You enter a room and imagine how the people are seeing you (self-conception through other, social comparison). That shapes how youevaluate yourself You also imagine that the people are seeing you notjust through their eyes, but also through the colored lens of media(cultivation). Because you have a heightened sensitivity to certain

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aspects of yourself (distinctiveness postulate), you suspect that otherpeople do as well, so you think they are also focusing on what youbelieve makes you different (e.g., your flabby stomach). And sinceyour self-conception is based on how you imagine they see you, nowthe media are implicated in your own self-conception.

This theoretical instruction is of special significance here. As we argue inthe rest of this chapter, we believe that this component of our media liter-acy eflort is the key factor that explains the more powerful and lastingimpact of the classroom pedagogy in comparison to the others.

In all three settings, our pedagogy functions as a media literacy effortin which analysis and application are of special concern. Our definition ofmedia literacy comes from the 1992 Aspen Institute's National LeadershipCouncil on Media Literacy Education, where a group of scholars definedmedia literacy as "the ability of a citizen to access, analyze, evaluate andproduce communication for specific outcomes" [Tyner, 1998, p. 120). Anumber of widely accepted media literacy principles are explicitly listed inthe syllabus used in the lecture class described in this chapter. The bodyimage pedagogy addresses four of these principles: [a) all media are con-structions; (b) people construct unique meanings from media messages; (c)media messages are representations of social reality; and (d) media mes-sages have economic, social, and aesthetic purposes. Specifically, women inall groups discussed a range of social, cultural, political, and economicforces that shape electronic media content. They contemplated some ofthe processes through which they individually and uniquely integrate elec-tronic media into their daily lives and applied a critical sociological imagi-nation to assessing the role of electronic media in the United States.

LEARNING OUTCOMES

Positive learning outcomes were evident across all groups, regardless of sizeand composition. Although women in the smaller groups had more time todiscuss their ideas in more intimate settings, the classroom pedagogyoffered students ample and more deeply analytical opportunities toexplore their self-conception processes. We believe this is largely due to theexplicit integration of theoretical material and the variety of discussion andfeedback opportunities offered, including class discussions (in general andin response to the documentary), guided in-class and take-home writingassignments, and private e-mail communication with the instructor afterthe class and the following semester. With multiple outlets for expression,distinctive stimuli for discussion, and the introduction and application of

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theoretical lenses through which students came to understand theirthoughts and feelings, the classroom pedagogy was a stronger stimulus forencouraging critical thinking, bolstering individuals' resilience, and enhanc-ing positive identity formation and self-esteem.

Encouraging Critical Thinking

A central goal for each group was to encourage critical thinking about bodyimage and self-conception. Although critical discussion was abundant in allthree settings, students were more deeply analytical than the other partic-ipants, moving beyond discussion to more penetrating analysis and under-standing. Our best explanation for this centers on the theoretical compo-nent of the classroom pedagogy. Although some theories were informallyaddressed in the other settings—for example in one of the focus groups themoderator mentioned the distinctiveness postulate when a commentabout distinctiveness was made—it was only in the lectures that theorieswere specifically introduced. Theory was presented at the beginning of thehody image unit in a lecture/discussion format and supplemented with ahandout listing all relevant theories and explanations of each. The instruc-tor made frequent and explicit references to these theories as studentsshared their thoughts and feelings about the documentary and their ownprocesses of self-conception. Students embraced these frameworks as toolsto move beyond discussion to explanation and understanding, and repeat-edly noted a direct correlation between the theories they learned in classand their enhanced understanding of media's impact on themselves andtheir peers. As one woman wrote: "The theories we have gone over contin-ually come up again and again in my life whenever I watch something ontelevision."

Media Representation

The questions about cultivated media imagery encouraged all participantsto critically evaluate self-conception and media representation. Women ineach group described specific mass-mediated body parts that had becomepoints of focus and held special interest for them. Together they lamentedthis situation. The value of theory became clear when we analyzed this firstarea of discussion and began to notice that students articulated and extend-ed their thinking in ways that differed from women in the other twogroups. The students moved beyond description to a deeper level of analy-sis and explanation. Whereas most participants described their fascinationwith the bodies, for example, in music videos, students also clarifled thingsthat they said they had not previously deconstructed on their own. Many

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reported knowing, for example, that they felt "jealous" of real and mediat-ed women. The fact that they scanned both their real and mediated envi-ronments for the very same female body parts was not news to most ofthese women. Yet finding a way to explain this theoretically and having theopportunity to articulate explicitly how and why they used the unrealwomen of media as points of comparison were sobering for many. As mediastudents, tbese women knew that media images are constructed, but theyhad not really thought through how media images get "inside" them. Wedid not see this happening in the other settings.

Women in all groups also critically evaluated recurring images of bod-ies and body parts and common underlying messages and values aboutideal bodies in U.S. popular culture. They had implicitly learned what cul-tivation theory suggests and were acutely aware that narrowly definedimages had been cultivated across media genres and forms. Tbey describedthis variously, as when someone from the retreat spoke of "fat phobia," theubiquitous media preference for thin women, and the general exclusion ofpositive images of large women and a full range of body types. Studentsdug deeper, as in tbis comment on how narrow media representations ofwomen's bodies reflect a larger and more complex issue regarding cultivat-ed media imagery: "It is obvious that the media focus primarily on theyoung, thin and Caucasian women. However, women are also portrayed aspetty, ridiculous, cruel and somewhat stupid. If this is how we think of our-selves, it is difficult to not be self-critical. This criticism goes beyond ourphysical bodies."

Critical discussion of media aesthetics also pervaded the groups as par-ticipants noted, for example, how camera "tricks," filters, and editingdevices are employed to challenge their insecurities. A student wrote: "Iknow not to compare myself to women in media because women in mag-azines get corrected and edited before the magazine gets published.Television uses camera tricks to make women look like the goddesses thatthey are." They recognized that understanding aesthetic devices did notnecessarily deflate media impact. Many students spoke and wrote of theincongruity between cognition and affect, between what they thought ver-sus what they felt about tbeir bodies. For some the gap was painful.Students underscored the tensions here, as one woman wrote: "Even thepeople in the media who are held to be beautiful have been physicallychanged by editing and special effects. If this is true, then perhaps nowoman in the world is beautiful by media standards."

Media Exclusion

Critical analysis of media imagery pervaded the discussions of media exclu-sion. Representation and exclusion of race raised significant concerns in all

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three settings, as the women criticized mainstream media for favoringCaucasian women over all other cultural groups. Agreeing that even ethni-cally diverse women are "watered down" and "whitewashed," participantscriticized media makers for featuring Caucasian women who appropriatespecific aspects of other cultures, for example braids, as far back as BoDerek in the film 10, and the more recent infatuation with collagen lips.An Asian-American focus group participant recalled an article in TeenMagazine "about what kind of eyeliner will make my eyes look rounder."When she read this as a teen, she saw it as a solution. Revisiting the mem-ory in the group, she re-evaluated the article as racist and very offensive.Although the distinctiveness postulate was clearly operating here, it wasnot a point of instruction in this setting. In the lecture, however, where stu-dents did learn about this concept, an African-American student evaluatedthe mixed signals she receives from a community that appreciates hervoluptuous curves and media that cultivate an unrealistic, thin ideal. Forher, the negative effects of this exclusion undermined the positive rein-forcement she received from some members of her community, leaving herfeeling only "half acceptable."

Representation and exclusion questions also stimulated critical evalua-tion of the narrow range of "acceptable" body shapes and sizes. Manywomen expressed concern about the influence of narrowly cultivatedmedia imagery on societal perceptions of body size and shape. Women inall three groups criticized media makers for casting "fat" women in unfa-vorable roles. A retreat participant described the common images: "They'reeither oafs, stupid, dumb, mothers, plain, cackling witches, or a backgroundcharacter. Never a lead. Never the romantic partner. Always the butt ofthejoke." Participants complained that writers and producers use "fat" as a plotdevice and not a human quality, as is clear from this woman's comment: "Ifthey have a lot of excess fat, they're cast that way for a purpose. SayMuriel's Wedding, her weight was an issue. The main character [KathyBates] of Fried Green Tomatoes, her weight was an issue as well." She wenton to argue that large women are "used" in media content because they arebig; they are "non-women" because they are "fat." Many students acknowl-edged the effects of this representation on their own perceptions. As oneman noted, "cultural influence in our country has taught me to find some-thing wrong with overweight people."

We include this comment because it is worth noting that criticalengagement pervaded the classrooms. In the only mixed gender setting,women reported great appreciation for the opportunity to discuss bodyimage issues with their male peers. After viewing the documentary, nearlyall of the men expressed sadness, along with greater empathy for andincreased interest in women's struggles. One wrote: "I think I need to takea few women's studies classes. I don't know my female friends as well as I

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think I do." Men were fascinated by what they learned, commenting thatthe video and discussion helped deflate stereotypes they had about womenand body image. Many men said the documentary and discussion madethem question how they spoke to women about their bodies, for example:"I'm never going to give any female a hard time about her appearance againin my hfe. All these young girls and women are running around trying tochange their bodies to conform to the social standard and it is just destruc-tive and downright dangerous to their physical and mental well-being."

The men overwhelmingly agreed that the classroom unit offered themgreater insight into their own self-conception and how messages from massmedia and other people had impacted their lives. Several criticized the ten-dency to ascribe body image issues mainly to women, reporting that theystruggled mightily with their own body self-acceptance. One student wor-ried that because body image is more often presented as the domain ofwomen, men might hide their own insecurities due to fear of emasculation.Many women were, in fact, surprised to discover that men in the class hadreal body image concerns not unlike their own. "I was surprised to see thatthey felt the relevance of the subject and [were] sympathetic because theyalso have insecurities about their own body images," wrote one woman.

Bolstering Resilience

Women in all three settings engaged in various forms of resisting the culti-vated imagery of mass media. They despised the mediated "pictures in theirheads" of what is and is not attractive in our culture. Students explicitlyreferred to Walter Lippmann's [1922) notion of this term to explain thissituation. They agreed that media imagery affected their self-conceptionand assumed that others evaluated them at least in part through the col-ored lenses of mass media. Women in all three groups recognized what wasfor some a constant struggle to negotiate the gap between the idealizedimages they had constructed in their heads and their real bodies.Interestingly, especially in the face of their massive exposure to massmedia, most of the women said they did not discuss these images or theirbody image feelings with other women because they were embarrassed andhad to compete with other women, even their closest friends, to "get along"in the culture.

In the end, the women appreciated the opportunity to listen to andshare their feelings with other women. A retreat participant captured thissentiment: "Whether we're from the same background, rich, poor, differentraces, whatever, there's this thing we have in common." This communalthread was liberating for many. Another retreat participant said: "It reaf-firmed everything that I felt as a woman. Everything I've tried to discusswith my friends, my family, my boyfriend, questions within myself. I

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thought I was alone in what I thought. I thought 'are people really accept-ing the crap that they're dishing us?"' Interestingly, this woman initiallyassumed that cultivated media images had affected everyone but her. Shewas surprised and moved to find out that others had the same concerns,and that she, too, was profoundly impacted by media. After the retreat, shebegan to see a therapist to more deeply explore her self-conception issues.She recently completed a film entitled Big Fat Deal in which she exploreswhat it means to grow up "fat" in a society that has so completely boughtinto the thin ideal.

Most of the women said they were uncomfortable discussing theseissues on their own. It became clear to us that it was not terribly difficultfor the women to participate in what we refer to as "descriptive" conversa-tions about body image. With various measures of [dis)comfort and thecareful selection of conversation partners, they could and did describesome of the things they "did to" to their bodies. Yet these discussions werelargely superficial; they touched on such things as a new hair dye, a pre-ferred exercise regime, the purchase of a dress that hid the "bulges," or asubscription to the diet of the month. Another goal of our pedagogy—bol-stering resilience—was realized as women in all three settings reported thatthey could begin to break this pattern of discomfort by moving from con-versations about what they did to their bodies to explorations of how theyfelt about themselves and why they had these feelings. Their expressionsmade them feel vindicated and encouraged them to look deeply into theirreal lives and, as a woman from the lecture group put it, "see what shecould do with them."

Thus, the impact of the lecture unit on body image moved out of theclassroom. In the postlecture surveys, a great many women [and men)reported that they used the lecture content and the insights they gainedfrom the theoretical material to initiate discussions with family members,partners, and friends. Many students explicitly stated that they wanted to,and did, share what they learned in class. As one woman attested: "I alwaysrevert back to your class. I find myself having to educate these people basedon how you have educated me." Students appreciated the value of theoryas a way to explain media impact. Another woman wrote: "It's only nowthat I am fully aware of myself, and my thought patterns, and how they aredeveloping."

Although most students appreciated the opportunity to talk aboutthese issues, some men and women reacted negatively to what one persondescribed as an "obsession with body image." A few students said thatthinking about body image was a luxury in a world full of starving people.One student wondered if spending energy on such issues takes away fromnaore pressing social concerns. Although thoughts like these were wel-comed and freely expressed in the classroom, many women were enor-

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mously disappointed to hear their classmates move the discussion from thepersonal to the more broadly political. These women were so reheved tohave a forum in which to express their disappointment that they explicit-ly resisted efforts to diminish their feelings. As one woman put it: "I wasvery angered by the lack of compassion."

Noting that opportunities for such discussion were rare to nonexistent,most of the students argued that no woman could fully escape the feelingsof inadequacy, competition, exclusion, and insecurity in our culture. Onewoman hypothesized that negative reactions to discussing body imagemight stem from embarrassment in the mixed gender classroom setting.We suspect that some students who were outwardly critical about thetopic might have already possessed a healthy body image and thereforegained less personal insight from the body unit. Some students had suchlow self-esteem that they needed more guidance than a classroom unitcould provide. In any case, the vast majority of students were grateful forthe opportunity to explore the role of media in the development of self-conception.

Improving Self-Esteem

The women at the retreat agreed that the experience marked the start of adeeper exploration of self Some students reported using the body imagediscussions and the documentary to launch unofficial support groups tocontinue what one woman described as a "catalyst for change." When thesmaller group meetings came to a close, the women traded strategies fordealing with body image and self-conception. They spoke of the impor-tance of community support and mentoring young girls and also offeredsome solutions: for example, teaching children about body image andmedia literacy; being less critical of other women; becoming more aware ofhow they feel manipulated by media imagery and other people; and tryingto change media programming. These responses demonstrate the peda-gogy's effectiveness in moving students beyond analysis and into(re)action.

For some participants, greater awareness of self-conception came witha price. Several women felt enlightened yet saddened by issues that aroseand recognized that dealing with new insights can be painful: "I think it'sbeen very beneficial to see several different points of view, but at the sametime, I think it's been very hard, because there has been the opening of adeep wound." Other women acknowledged that pain had surfaced but con-cluded that the discussions made them feel stronger and more capable ofdealing with the onslaught of negative media imagery they faced on a dailybasis. Students also appreciated that deeper critical thinking and under-standing of the forces that shape self-conception do not necessarily bring

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immediate relief In an e-mail message to the instructor, a woman disclosedhow badly she felt about the impact of other people on her self-conception:

I continue to crave validation from the outside. I find it difficult, if notimpossible, not to feed off the perceptions of others. People only seemto tell you how great you look when you lose a noticeable amount ofweight. They don't often tell you how great you look when you arepacking a few extra pounds. This closely relates to the self-conceptionthrough other perspective and I am afraid this is the theory to which Ifall most victim. It seems synchronous with my overall need for valida-tion from outside sources.

CONCLUSIONS

Throughout this chapter we have explored the pedagogical strategies andoutcomes of posing a series of discussion questions about mass media andbody image to heterosexual women gathered in various settings in groupsof different sizes. Here, we summarize the major results of these strategies,offer recommendations for others who engage in similar media literacyefforts, and review the limitations of this research.

The pedagogy explored here varied across several dimensions. As previ-ously stated, the settings differed in terms of size, composition, duration ofmeeting time, and the texture of the environment. Although the questionswere consistent across settings, women at the retreat had substantially moretime for discussion and reflection. They also developed intimate relation-ships as they engaged in their daily routines and personal interactions.

Women in the focus groups felt relaxed and comfortable and spokefreely about very personal thoughts and feelings that many had nevershared before. The large, mixed gender setting restricted the amount andintensity of personal interaction so that relative to the class size, a smallpercentage of the women actually spoke aloud. Although the classroomwas less personal, students learned how to use theories to deeply analyzethe links between body image, mass media, and their own processes of self-conception. The fact that they were tested on this material reinforced theirunderstanding in a more formal way.

Thus, group size and context affected the quantity and quality of indi-vidual expression. Although the smaller groups allowed for more activeand personal participation, the classroom discussions were neverthelesseffective and powerful stimuli for self-reflection and expression, thoughnot necessarily in the form of talk. Those students who did speak were sur-prisingly forthcoming in the lecture environment, and their e-mail commu-nication with the instructor was quite intimate. Although it would make

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sense to assume that a large classroom would discourage personal partici-pation, the pedagogy described here is uniquely designed to challenge thisassumption. In a published analysis of the teaching strategies employed inthis class, Glenn [2002) argues that Wolf achieves a level of critical studentengagement that is much more common in smaller and typically "safer" set-tings, attributing this in part to a pedagogy that encourages her students tofeel secure as they critically engage with the course content.

We believe the discussions reported here can be successfully conduct-ed in different environments for educational purposes. In fact, perhaps themost interesting conclusion is that the pedagogy was most potent in thelecture settings. We believe this occurred for three main reasons. First, theclassroom instruction began with an overview of conceptual frameworksthrough which the students could and did make sense of their learningexperiences. Second, classrooms were the only settings where the docu-mentary was used as an instructional tool. Seeing and hearing other womendiscuss body image and self-conception experiences helped students tofocus their thoughts and feelings and to use the experiences of other peo-ple as stimuli for their own self-expression. Comments that began asresponses to the documentary became increasingly more personalized asthe postviewing discussion and writing assignments progressed. Third, theparticipation activities encouraged critical thinking and gave students achance to think independently and to continue this thinking outside of theclassroom. The fact that they were surveyed about their thoughts and feel-ings after the class had ended suggested to several students [based on com-ments they made and notes that accompanied the second e-mail survey)that this sort of continuation of thought matters and, perhaps more impor-tant, that what they think matters.

RECOMMENDATIONS

It should be clear by now that we believe that our body image media edu-cation program has helped many women think more critically about, andin some cases resist, mainstream mediated representations of the femalebody. We have ample evidence to support the argument that our pedagogyencourages critical thinking, and we have offered a number of explanationsfor why we believe this played out differently across the three groups. Tovarying degrees women in all of the groups reported that our pedagogyhelped them to think more critically about body image, to develop strate-gies to resist media imagery, and to feel better about themselves. Giventhis, we offer the following recommendations for those who engage in sim-ilar media literacy efforts.

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Create an atmosphere of intimacy. Although this is more difficultto achieve with a large group, it is still very important when acourse is framed around problematic media representations,identity construction, and such sensitive content areas as gender,race, sexuality, age, [dis) ability, and, as elaborated in this chapter,body image. This challenges the instructor for obvious reasons.The lecture environment is by its very nature impersonal; forexample, students are typically unknown to the instructor, theirlearning is commonly assessed through quantitative measures,and they are more likely to cut classes. Establishing intimacyagainst such odds clearly requires a significant instructionaleffort.Model the kind of introspection desired and offer follow-up opportu-nities for application. There are many ways to encourage partici-pants to open up. The documentary, for example, allows studentsto respond to experiences of other women before personalizingthe material. The discussion questions from the video's studyguide help instructors to facilitate increasingly inward thinking.When facilitators share personal experiences, they also modelemotional literacy, an important component of media literacy.Integrate theory. Students used the theories described here toname, normalize, and make sense of their life experiences.Develop an array of assignments that allow participants to usetheory in different ways. When possible, use assignments that callfor writing, probing, and self-disclosure.Encourage critical engagement. In the end, a central goal of thispedagogy is to find ways to encourage participants to engage crit-ically with the material. This is of utmost importance. As Glenn[2002, closing thoughts, pp. 11-12) concludes:

Dr. Wolf's intentional and risky stimulation of her students throughexplicit cultural critiques and controversial media choices, open andhonest self-disclosure, and spontaneous, provocative participationassignments all promoted critical engagement in diverse and particu-larized ways in her classroom. Likewise, her students' understanding of,and responses to, her intentions and approach seems to indicate thatthe performance of critical rhetoric, on the part of teachers, offers analternative to privileging student dialogue while maintaining the abili-ty to nurture students' critical consciousness development. Contrary tocritical pedagogy literature that assumes learner-centered dialogue isthe key to critical consciousness development, this study seems to sug-gest alternative, unique aspects of critical engagement in a large classthat does not lend itself to critical discussion.

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LIMITATIONS

This chapter would be incomplete without some discussion of the limita-tions of the arguments advanced here. We do not see all the points that fol-low as drawbacks, yet they are certainly worthy of consideration for thosewho develop media literacy programs and incorporate ideas presented here.

To begin, we have not assessed the long-term impact of the instruction.Because the classroom responses and retreat follow-up questions were vol-untary, this participation was self-selected and included only a subset of theoriginal groups. Nevertheless, the response rate was quite high, as morethan half the students wrote something, all the women in the retreat par-ticipated in videotaped interviews, and most of the women in the focusgroup responded to e-mail communication. The women from the retreatand focus groups were also self-selected and thus already interested in theproject and thinking about the issues we discussed. Also, at the retreat, thevideotaping and the women's awareness that they would be featured in adocumentary surely affected the nature and unfolding of self-disclosure.We do not assume the women held back in significant ways; nonetheless,we must allow for this possibility.

In addition to the constraints of the lecture setting itself, the presenceof men in the classroom is likely to have discouraged some women fromtalking. Because the more significant disclosure occurred out of the class-room in personal written communication with the instructor, we do not seethis as a major drawback. It is nevertheless a point to acknowledge.Notably, many women appreciated that men saw the documentary andgained some insight into the female body image experience through thevideo and class discussion.

It is worth mentioning again that because part of the students' coursegrade was based on written participation, the e-mail responses carried areward. Because students had many options for such activity, feedback onthis particular subject was not necessary to earn the maximum participa-tion points allowed in this class.

We also made some assumptions about depth of understanding basedon limited data in any given class. The arguments advanced here, however,should be considered within the broader context of Wolf having taught thisand other mass communication theory classes for almost twenty five yearsto groups of students ranging in size from five [graduate seminars) to over650.

In closing, we want to make one final point. Understanding how mediaimages get inside our heads does not free us from the corporate media cul-ture or its impact. The development of self-conception in the face of mediaimagery is a complicated and lifelong process. Media literacy is more than

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deconstructing and analyzing media images, and being media literate is nota pass to override culture and find liberation from its clutches. We are veryconcerned about the obsession in U.S. culture with how we look, andtherefore strongly support media education pedagogies that teach emo-tional literacy and provide people with the tools to deconstruct not onlytheir external, but also their internal environments.

NOTES

1. The main documentary objectives were twofold. A primary goal was to stimu-late in-depth discussions of media-cultural-personal hody image ideals, mediarepresentation (and exclusion), feelings about body image and the sources ofthese feelings. A secondary objective was to produce greater awareness of theforces that shape self-conception in general and body image in particular. Aviewing guide with classroom discussion questions and activities was developedto assist teachers who use the documentary as a media literacy tool (seehttp://www.bodyimagesite.com) and want to stimulate student thinking on self-conception in general and body image in particular. Because the same questionsposed in the classroom and smaller group settings were used to frame the doc-umentary, it has helped us in our ongoing re-assessment of the value of these dis-cussion questions for encouraging women (and men) to explore and come tounderstand how they negotiate their body images in the face of consonant anddisparate messages from mass media and other people.

2. We use the term "instructor" throughout to refer to the focus group facilitatorand the instructor of the lecture class. This is also the first author of this chapter.

3. For a lengthy analysis of the pedagogy employed in this classroom see Glenn's(2002) published case study of Dr. Wolf's class.

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