Media Mindfulness

I was told to create a professional online presence and so while I am still using my personal Tumblr blog for recreational use, this blog will be for posts that have real-world meaning or just showcase the work I have been doing and the skills I have learned while on this course.

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Halloween: A Decline in the Spirits

Halloween: A Decline in the Spirits

Halloween has become a staple in most countries and cultures since its creation for centuries.

Also known as All Hallows Eve and more traditionally All Saints Eve, Halloween is believed to be adapted from the ancient Celtic/Pagan harvest festival of Samhein and was Christianized as Hallowe’en, while others believe the holiday to have originated solely with Christianity separate from any ancient…

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A Century of Herstory: Jennifer Hudson

Jennifer Hudson is an American singer and actress who first appeared on American Idol before shooting to fame in the 2006 movie musical Dreamgirls.

Jennifer Kate Hudson was born in September 1981. J-Hud developed a taste for singing from an early age. Signing up to the independent recording company Righteous Records, which earned her a place on Disney Cruise Ships until she decided she wanted to audition for American Idol after seeing Kelly Clarkson win in 2002. However, she still had to honour her contracts both to Disney and to Righteous Records so could not audition until the third season.

After storming to fame on American Idol, fans were enraged when she came 7th and felt Simon Cowell had fixed the votes after criticizing Jennifer’s performance of “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going” by saying he felt she had screamed her way through it.

However, someone was waiting to prove Cowell wrong as movie director Bill Condon took a liking to what he saw Jennifer do on American Idol and cast her as Effy White in his 2006 film Dreamgirls, where half-way through the movie she sang the song she had been eliminated from American Idol for and won numerous awards for it including an Academy Award.

Despite not being a model by trade, Jennifer was the first African-American singer to appear on the cover of Vogue in 2007.

Jennifer also won a Grammy Award for her first solo self-titled album in 2009 which sold more than one million copies worldwide.

In recent years, Jennifer has become a coach on the British and U.S. versions of The Voice, where she was the winning coach in her first season of the British version, where she gives honest and relevant critique to all contestants drawing from her own history in singing competitions.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Emma Watson

Emma Watson is a British actress most commonly known for her roles as Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter film series and more recently Belle in Disney’s live-action remake of Beauty and the Beast.

Born Emma Charlotte Duerre Watson in April 1990, Emma was born and raised in Paris, France until the age of 5 when her parents divorced, and she moved back to England to live in Oxfordshire with her mother.

Emma developed a taste for showbusiness from an early age when she attended the Stagecoach Theatre Arts school in Oxford studying singing, acting and dancing.

At the age of 10, she was suggested to agents by her theatre teachers who were looking for children to audition for Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (2001). Emma had to audition 8 times before landing the part of Hermione Granger, a role that 17 years later she is still globally known as.

Despite having to audition so many times, Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling knew she wanted Emma from her first screen test.

In interviews, Emma has stated that she wanted the character of Hermione to be seen as a role model for young girls both in terms of academic study and as an action hero who “rocks”.

In 2007, her estimated earnings for the year were at $4million while also being named “The Highest Grossing Actress of the Past Decade” by the Guinness Book of World Records with her box office gross over that past decade well above $5.4billion.

Due to her hectic filming schedule, Emma had to be tutored on set rather than attend school. Despite this she still graduated with high grades.

As well as acting, Emma’s career has seen her become a model appearing as the face of Burberry’s Autumn/Winter 2009 collection as well as their 2010 spring/summer collection. She also has appeared on the cover of Vogue in 2011.

Emma also identifies herself as a feminist, appearing at numerous events which support women’s rights and even redefining Disney Princess Belle as “the feminist princess” stating she simply took what Disney did and made it more modern.

All this plus numerous movie appearances equate to a current net worth of $60million.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Beyoncé

Beyoncé Knowles is a singer, songwriter and actress who rose to fame as the lead singer of 90s R&B girl group Destiny’s Child before breaking out as a solo star.

Beyoncé Giselle Knowles was born on September 4, 1981. Her name is a tribute to her mother’s maiden name which is also Beyoncé. At the age of 7 she started showing her raw singing potential by winning a school talent show singing John Lennon’s “Imagine” beating out 15/16-year olds. She also joined the choir at every school she was enrolled at throughout her education.

Before there was Destiny’s Child, there was Girl Tyme. At the age of 8, Beyoncé met her future backing singers Kelly Rowland and LaTavia Robertson when they auditioned to be part of a girl-group along with three other girls. This later became known as Destiny’s Child.

Between 2001-2002, Beyoncé was battling with depression, however she kept it quiet as it was around the time Destiny’s Child won their Grammys.

Benevolent as the Queen B is, Beyoncé is active in charitable work. Not only did she join former bandmate Kelly Rowland to create the Survivor Foundation which provides relief for victims of natural disasters, but she also built the Knowles Temenos Place Apartments in her homeland of the greater Houston area. As well as collaborating with many other charities over the years.

Before Miley Cyrus made the MTV Video Music Awards a hotbed of controversial discussion in 2013, Beyoncé set social media ablaze in 2011 after giving a literal mic-drop moment revealing she was pregnant with her first child Blue Ivy Carter.

Because the Queen B is a woman not to be messed with, after the reveal of her husband Jay-Z’s infidelity, Beyoncé took out her betrayal in her music and her single “Hold Up” was the public catharsis of her husband’s cheating as in the accompanying video she takes a baseball bat to a supposedly random car.

But despite that dark time, Beyoncé is still Beyoncé Knowles-Carter and the couple have gone on to have twin boys adding to their expanding family and empire.

Besides her music and philanthropy, Beyoncé is also an actress. Earning critical acclaim for her leading role in 2005’s Dreamgirls, albeit being somewhat outshined by newcomer Jennifer Hudson, but also has been announced as the voice of Nala in Disney’s upcoming live-action retelling of The Lion King.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Princess Diana

Diana, Princess of Wales was the first wife of Prince Charles, the mother of Princes William and Harry and the heir apparent to the British Throne.

Born into nobility, Diana’s family was closely allied to the British Royal Family for several generations, so naturally Diana grew up surrounded by nobility and royals from birth. However, this did not stop her from living a normal life as she had a day to day job as a kindergarten assistant.

1977 is when Diana met her future husband and Prince of Wales Charles, however at the time he was dating her older sister. Fortunately for her, Charles developed feelings for her and Lady Sarah (her sister) said some incredibly stupid things to the press which naturally became public knowledge.

Upon her engagement, Diana received a 12-carat sapphire ring consisting of 14 solitaire diamonds which she chose from the Garrard Jewellery Collection catalogue as opposed to having one custom made as is traditionally the norm for royals. This ring has life nearly 20 years after Princess Di’s death as it is worn by the late Princess’ now daughter-in-law Kate Middleton.

Diana married Charles and became Princess of Wales in 1991, one of the biggest talking points about her wedding day was her wedding dress which was completed with a 25-foot silk train decorated with sequins, embroidery and 10,000 pearls and is noted as being the longest train in Royal History.

Another talking point from her big day is how she outright refused to include the traditional line of promising to “obey” Charles in her wedding vows, another gift passed down to her son Prince William and daughter-in-law Kate on their wedding day.

In the years that followed she became known for breaking norms of “traditional royal behaviour” taking her sons William and Harry on trips from fun days out like Disney World and Thorpe Park to educational visits like AIDS Clinics and Homeless Shelters.

Also, under the advice of her eldest son William, she donated 79 dresses raising around $5.76million for AIDS and Breast Cancer charities.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Ellen DeGeneres

Activist whose decision to come out as lesbian stunted her career in 1997.

Ellen Lee DeGeneres was born in 1958. Prior to her becoming an actress, Ellen worked as a bartender, paralegal, saleswoman, waitress and oyster shucker. After becoming an actress, it wasn’t long before ABC gave Ellen her own self-titled series. A show which during its fourth season in an episode written by Ellen herself, the character of Ellen came out as lesbian. This coincided with Ellen herself coming out on a talk show. The episode received huge controversy causing the network to place a PG rating over future episode broadcasts, yet the show continued for another year until it was cancelled after Season 5.

Prior to her getting her own show, Ellen turned down the part of Phoebe Buffey on Friends however Lisa Kudrow eventually got it. Other notable acting roles include voicing Dory in both Finding Nemo and its sequel Finding Dory, as well as another short-lived self-titled sitcom in the early 2000s.

However, for today’s audiences she’s mostly known for her TV Presenting, both on her own talk show which has been airing since 2003 and also the 86th Academy Awards in 2014 where she got the crowd there and online audiences buzzing with her selfie stick.

Ellen is also a massive LGBT and Animal Rights Activist. Not only did former Secretary of State Hilary Clinton name her as a special envoy for Global AIDS Awareness in 2011, but also she has done a lot to campaign against animal cruelty particularly in recent years since President Donald Trump’s decision to allow the importation of elephant trophies from Africa.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe was an actress, model and singer infamous for being one of the most popular sex symbols of the 1950s.

Born Norma Jeane Mortenson in 1926, Marilyn spent her childhood going from foster home to orphanage until she married James Dougherty in 1942 at the age of 16. After her first marriage dissolved in 1946, Marilyn met baseball legend Joe DiMaggio in 1952 and went on to marry him in 1954. They divorced a year later an in 1956 Marilyn married her third husband Arthur Miller only to divorce 5 years later.

Her most famous romance was her scandalous and sultry affair with President John F. Kennedy. After her sultry performance of “Happy Birthday” at his 45th Birthday Celebration, rumours of their affair started whizzing around.

As well as her acting and personal lives, Marilyn also came to be known as a sex symbol, in 1953 she became Playboy’s first Sweetheart (later known as Playmate) of the Month after being propositioned in 1949 with $50 to have the photo taken. Playboy Owner Hugh Hefner bought the photo for $500.

Marilyn’s career started hitting self-destruct when she started either showing up late or not at all to the set of her movies, in fact the filming of 20th Century Fox’s Let’s Make Love 1960 was delayed by a further 28 days with $1 Million added to the budget, this was 6 years after Fox originally suspended her for refusing to continue in a role she felt she had become typecast in.

11 years after her death, Elton John composed his hit song “Candle in the Wind” in memory of her.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Audrey Hepburn

Audrey Hepburn was a model, humanitarian and actress during Hollywood’s Golden Age of Cinema.

Born Audrey Kathleen Reston in 1929, Audrey was raised by her parents Joseph Victor Anthony Ruston and Baroness Ella van Heemstra, It later transpired that Hepburn’s parents were in fact Nazi Sympathizers as part of the British Union of Fascists, however due to Hepburn’s career this fact about her family history was kept from public knowledge until after her death. It has been stated that Hepburn disowned her parents upon learning this fact.

From the age of 18, Hepburn had been involved in the entertainment profession, whether as a dancer or later as a stage and screen actress. Her first movie role was in Dutch in Seven Lessons 1948 and over the first 6 years of her career she cemented herself as America’s Sweetheart.

In 1954 she played the lead role in Billy Wilder’s Sabrina starring alongside notorious womanizer William Holden, behind the scenes Hepburn and Holden were having an affair, which angered his wife due to seeing Hepburn as a threat. As Hepburn wanted children and he didn’t, she dumped him and moved on to Mel Ferrer with whom she publicly got engaged to and married that year in order to expel any rumours of her and Holden’s infidelity.

Before Marilyn came on the scene, Hepburn also began dating the then unmarried senator John F. Kennedy, the year after said President’s mistress Marilyn performed her sultry rendition of “Happy Birthday” she was employed to perform the same song.

During the 1950s, Hepburn started narrated children’s stories of war on the radio for UNICEF. This led to her appointment as Goodwill Ambassador of UNICEF in 1989.

During World War II, Hepburn had to survive by eating tulip buds, this led to the Netherlands Flower Information Society naming a new hybrid tulip after her in 1990.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Eartha Kitt

Eartha Kitt was a singer, dancer, actress and activist mostly known to older audiences for her role as Catwoman in 1960s Batman series and to younger audiences for her role as Yzma in Disney’s The Emperor’s New Groove.

Eartha Mae Keith was born on in January 1927 on a cotton plantation to an African-Cherokee born mother and an unconfirmed father. Throughout Kitt’s career it was widely rumoured that her father was a Caucasian man of German descent who owned the plantation and that she was conceived as a result of rape, however even 10 years after her death nothing has been confirmed.

At the age of 8, Kitt grew up with relatives in an ethnically diverse section of Harlem, New York City. Despite having what society at the time would have deemed squalor living conditions, Kitt chose to fight her way out and at the age of 16 joined a travelling dance troupe touring parts of North America, South America and Europe before deciding to settle in Paris while the troupe returned to America. There she continued her show business career by becoming a nightclub singer.

Her acting debut came in 1952 with the role of Helen of Troy in an Orson Welles interpretation of Time Runs. She continued to have a close relationship with Welles throughout her life with Welles publicly stating Kitt was “The most exciting woman in the world”.

Throughout her stage career, Kitt would perform in sultry and revealing garments earning her the nickname “The Sex Kitten”. However, Kitt would always set the record straight by insisting she never sang naughty songs and rather portrayed a mischievous little girl as “Innocence is one of the most exciting things in the world”.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Amelia Earhart

Amelia Earhart was an aviation pioneer who became the first female pilot to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean.

Born Amelia Mary Earhart in 1897, Earhart was given the nickname “Meeley” or Millie as she was commonly called which was a nickname that stuck with her into her adult years. Throughout her childhood, her mother raised both Amelia and her sister in a somewhat unconventional sense to how the other young girls were brought up at the time, this encouraged a spark of freedom and independence in Amelia from a young age.

In 1908 at the Iowa State Fair, Earhart saw an aeroplane for the first time, however she was not impressed. In fact, it wasn’t until she began working as a nurse where she started hanging out at hangers with friends that she became comfortable around them leading to her finally becoming a passenger on a plane in 1920.

Despite being the first woman to earn her pilot’s license from the National Aeronautic Association and flying seemingly being in Earhart’s blood, her father suffered from Aviophobia, otherwise known as a fear of flying, therefore discouraged his daughter’s ambition. Her mother on the other hand supported and encouraged her to pursue her dreams.

One of the biggest mysteries in history, to this day, is the disappearance of Amelia Earhart on July 2, 1937, when by some still unknown factor Earhart and her navigator disappeared over the Central Pacific Ocean while attempting a circumnavigation flight of the world. That one day has turned this otherwise everyday woman into one of the biggest women of mysteries ever to have lived. 

While Earhart is presumed deceased, her legacy lives on having been president of the first all-female pilots organisation The Ninety-Nines, also she remains an inspiration to many women including former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Lili Elbe

Lili Elbe was a transgender Danish artist who was one of the first recipients of sex reassignment surgery.

Born Einar Magnus Andreas Wegener in 1882, Elbe became known as a successful painter who began dressing and presenting as a woman after asking to substitute for an absentee model. After discovering how comfortable she found the attire she began to dress regularly as a woman for events and festivities and started identifying herself as a woman. At these functions her then wife and fellow artist Gerda Gottlieb would introduce her as her own sister and it was not until she transitioned that anyone knew who she really was. In 1912, the couple moved to Paris where Lili began publicly identifying as a woman and changing her name from Einar to Lili.

In the 1920s, Elbe sought to permanently change her body from that of a man to a woman through Sex Reassignment Surgery at the German Institute of Sexual Science founded and run by Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld who coined the terms “transsexualism”. The surgeries provided curiosities as during a transplantation of human ovarian tissue, it is postulated that Elbe was in fact born intersex due to supposedly already having rudimentary ovaries in her abdomen.

After Elbe underwent four surgeries which changed her reproductive system from that of a man to that of a woman, she was permitted to change her name and sex for all manner of legal documentation and be formally known as Lili Elbe.

After her marriage to Gottlieb was annulled, Elbe started a relationship with French art dealer Claude Lejeune with whom she wanted children with. In 1931 she underwent another surgery this time for a uterus transplant, however due to her body rejecting the uterus, Elbe developed an infection and died that September.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Emmeline Pankhurst

Emmeline Pankhurst was the leader of the British Suffragette Movement who helped women gain the right to vote in 1918.

Born Emmeline Goulden in Manchester 1858 and growing up in a radical politics family, Emmeline went on to marry lawyer and women’s rights activist Richard Pankhurst at the age of 19. Through his connections, Emmeline was able to start the Women’s Franchise League in 1889 which fought for a married woman’s right to vote in local elections. They went on to have two daughters and a son; Christabel (Born 1880), Estelle (Born 1882) and Frank (Born 1884).

After her husband’s death in 1898, Pankhurst founded the WSPU (Women’s Social and Political Union) which became the first group of women to be known as suffragettes. Pankhurst’s two daughters were also active members of the union and as a group carried out various demonstrations including window smashing, hunger strikes and arson. Once the First World War had begun in 1914, Pankhurst turned her attention from public demonstrations to supporting the war effort.

In 1918, Pankhurst saw her 20year struggle rewarded as thanks to the Representation of the People Act, women over 30 were given the right to vote. Ten years later in 1928 the Act of Parliament was extended by the Representation of People (Equal Franchise) Act which saw women get the vote from the same minimal age as legal for men at the time, 21. Sadly that same year, decades of hunger strikes had caught up with her and she died at the age of 69.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Marie Curie

Marie Curie was a famous Polish physicist who pioneered research in the field of radioactivity study.

Born Maria Salomea Skłodowska on 7 November 1867 in Warsaw, Poland, Curie gained French citizenship in late 1891 after moving to Paris to study physics, chemistry and mathematics. It was here she met fellow physicist Pierre Curie who she went on to marry in 1895.

In December 1903, Curie won the Nobel Prize in Physics along with Pierre and their colleague Henri Becquerel for “In recognition of the extraordinary services they have rendered by their joint researches on the radiation phenomena discovered by Professor Henri Becquerel”. However originally only the two male scientists were to be honoured, it was not until one of the committee members who was an advocate for female scientists alerted Pierre to this fact that Marie was added to the honour.

Tragically in a July 1934, Madame Curie died of the very chemical substance she helped discover when she was exposed to radiation during the course of her research in World War I.

In February 1948 the Marie Curie charity was founded in the United Kingdom with aims to provide support for patients suffering with terminal illnesses and their families. Almost 80 years after her death in 2012, the ESTRO Cancer Foundation was formed to help raise awareness of the benefits of radiotherapy in cancer patients.

Thanks for reading. Check out other Century of Herstory posts here and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness coming soon.

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A Century of Herstory: Introduction

As part of my Media and Communications course at BCU, I took part in a Media Festival celebrating 100 years since women gained the vote in the U.K. as part of the Collaborative Project module.

Over the next week I will be posting the 14 posts I created about famous inspirational women over the last 100 years in a project I titled “A Century of Herstory”.

The word “Herstory” I thought of thanks to RuPaul’s Drag Race where the word has been used numerous times through its tenure. However when the title of the festival was revealed as BCU HerStory, I originally decided not to use the title as I felt people may have felt I was either copying or playing up a bit which is something I don’t like doing. Fortunately on the day of the festival I decided just to go with it and am glad I did because I got a lot of praise for the title.

When deciding on the 14 women I selected. I looked back at three generations of women; Now I could say I did this in a certain in depth way but actually I just thought of my sister, my mother and my nan and then thought of women either around their youth and adult years which gave me my list.

I could not use all of my posts on the day because I had a regular table which could only fit 9 pieces of A4, but I still have the other 5 and will still show them here.

The women I have chosen are:Marie Curie, Emmeline Pankhurst, Lili Elbe, Amelia Earhart, Eartha Kitt, Audrey Hepburn, Marilyn Monroe, Ellen DeGeneres, Princess Diana, Beyoncé, Emma Watson, Jennifer Hudson, Lady Gaga and Michelle Obama.

I chose to do this because I feel it is important to spotlight these inspirational women throughout history while also highlight some possibly unknown and interesting facts people did not know about them.

Thanks for reading, look out for these Century of Herstory posts coming in the next week and meanwhile post any queries or comments you have and stay tuned for more Media Mindfulness.

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Point of Interest: An Introduction to Myself

Alright so this is pretty different for me to do but this post is an introduction about me and this blog as it will be a more professional and personal blog to me than ShamrockVibe is.

I am James, born September 1992 (whenever you are reading this post, the date is more long-lasting than my actual age) and am a first year Media and Communications student at Birmingham City University in Birmingham, England.

I have been blogging for a fair few years now, I believe my first blog was when I was 20/21 and my main interest in blogging has always been Movie and TV reviews. However studying in this Media course has encouraged me to look at blogging a different way and to possibly create a blog that has more of a real-world impact than just my opinion on Movies, TV Shows and Comic-Books.

I chose the name “Media Mindfulness” because, while I know it is a phrase that has been used before particularly by religious groups to encourage children away from social media, I hope to offer a different outlook on the term “Mindfulness” and instead produce posts that put a spotlight important issues, historical facts and modern-day pearls of wisdom both from my own experience and research I have conducted that give the readers a feeling of insight through media.

As well as posting some of the work I have created during this course, I will also be creating posts about problems I have faced with certain mental conditions and how I overcome them which I hope will offer insight to other people, as well as other types of posts that spark my interest.

I will not be subject to a set schedule overall. This will not be a blog where I will post something new every week; If I have a series of posts about the same topic then that will be to a schedule however once I have finished that topic, it won’t always be the case that the next topic or the next standalone post happens the following week.

Anything anyone wants to see me make a post about, I am open to hearing your suggestions and will take them into consideration against the topic I am covering at the time or how I could put my own spin on it, I will not be a sellout.

That is all I have to say for now. Post your comments if you have any questions or suggestions for topics you want me to cover and stay tuned for Media Mindfulness posts coming soon.