Banana Pineapple Sorbet – 5 minutes
Ingredients:
2 ripe bananas, sliced and frozen
3 oz pineapple juice
3 oz frozen pineapple juice
2 Tablespoon shredded coconut
Place all ingredients in a food processor and blend until smooth. Serve immediately.
After cooling off with this sweet aphrodisiac, heat it up with your position of the month from Kama Sutra, the fusion.
For this position, the man leans backwards slightly while sitting with his legs stretched out, supporting himself with his hands. His head can be relaxed.
[fusion2]The woman, assuming the active roll, passes her legs over her companion and leans back supporting herself with her hands. The foreplay must have been intense because this postion cannot use the hands and mouth . Either the woman moves back and forth or both move toward each other during penetration. Either way, the clitoris must take advantage of contact with the man. A little dirty talk and some eye contact can give this position just the spice it needs.
(Recipe from www.theveggietable.com)
(Kama Sutra image and explanation from www.jijasali.com)

My hair’s a mess. Over spring break, I tried to snag an appointment with Allyson, the girl who had been cutting my hair for almost 15 years, but she was booked and I moved back to school before she could fit me in. Two weeks later, it’s getting ridiculous. My hair’s too heavy for my gel to make it stick the way I want it. I consider growing my hair out again until I remember the mishaps of ’03 and ’06. So, that’s not an option. Finally, as my deadline is rapidly approaching and my hair is rapidly approaching disgusting, I realize I’m writing a story on Douglas J this month. Duh, Jordan, schedule a haircut (and your interviews) with MSU’s closest neighbor.

The Douglas J Aveda Institute sits in the heart of downtown East Lansing on Grand River Avenue facing the Human Ecology Building and the new parking ramp. The institute is as much a part of MSU life as it is a part of East Lansing. “In the East Lansing institute, because it’s across from campus, we try to target the student community,” said Pablo Tourn, Douglas J’s guest service’s floor manager and a music composition and conducting junior. “A lot of our clientele is Michigan State students and a lot of the people that work there are students at Michigan State like I am.”

The guest services at Douglas J range from opening the door to taking your coat to offering clients water or coffee while they wait for their appointments. “It’s a lot of little things,” Tourn said. “But it all adds up.” Tourn said these courtesy services offered at the institute’s salon aren’t offered in cities similar to East Lansing.

The institute is different from other Aveda salons because the prices are cheaper, but the work is being done by students who have yet to obtain their beauty licenses. However, because each service is critiqued by a licensed instructor, the quality isn’t lost. “Some of our educators work at the exchange as well and take their own guests when they aren’t working at the institute,” said Heather McCorry, Douglas J’s admissions coordinator and institute coach.

MSU students are certainly a large demographic of the clientele at the school’s salon, where those obtaining their beauty licenses practice everything from massages to pedicures to coloring and styling hair. “It’s the only place that’s legit and close,” advertising junior Crystal Rosinki said. “I’ve gone there since freshman year. People there are pretty modern and stylish and know what the trends are and what aren’t.”

While employees’ expertise does fall in the realm of styling, their knowledge is far from complete, so most students don’t fret over minor mistakes. Many of Douglas J’s customers are the same age as their Douglas J student stylists. “It works out fantastic. We have a lot of traffic volume from Michigan State,” McCorry said. “Yes, they are the same age group, but they’re different trends to accommodate. In this city there are so many varieties of changes and people. We have everyone from students to older people to young children. It gives our students a good sense of the real world.”

The beauty students get a lot out of the program – a first-rate education in beauty services. “You learn about the body from head to toe,” Douglas J graduate Alexandria Carlin said. “You take tests, and it’s not easy. It was nothing like I expected. But it was a great learning experience.” The schedule is a bit more stringent than MSU. Douglas J students have a little more than a week off for winter break and their schedule is year round. For a cosmetology license students generally take from 10 and a half to 14 months, while an esthiology license (which is a license for spa treatments, waxing, makeup artistry, and other wellness things) can take from four and a half to six months. After graduating from the program in the winter of 2006, Carlin attended the advanced academy for a semester and now works in a local salon in her hometown, Novi.

Many of the students who attend the Aveda Institute live in the Landings at Chandler Crossings, according to Carlin. She lived with MSU students she knew from high school in that complex. “One of the big draws was that it was in East Lansing and all my friends went to State,” Carlin said. “I checked out every beauty school within an hour of [my hometown]. I knew the second I walked in. That was it.” She finished all her beauty schooling in what would be the equivalent of four semesters.

Douglas J’s appearance is modern and fresh, much like an upscale salon. “Other beauty schools are a drag. They’re not updated and they’re not as welcoming. Douglas J is not like that,” Carlin said. “It’s unexplainable; you just feel really good about yourself. People always ask me why I chose it. I’m not sure. I just knew, I really can’t describe why.” Many clients enjoy the teaching salon for the same reasons.

But Douglas J is more than cool haircuts and a slick atmosphere. The Aveda brand has a holistic side to beauty. “I’m really into natural medicine and looking for ways to naturally heal your body. At Douglas J, we don’t just offer you haircuts. We have a spa too,” Tourn said. “I think that a facial or spa has a lot of healing qualities. They try to use products that are organically grown and environmentally friendly.” This is another reason for Aveda’s popularity with the college student population, which generally cares about the state of the environment.

At their East Lansing and Ann Arbor locations, the institute immerses their students with the college town population. “What’s cool about having the school in a campus like that is that most cosmetology schools are looked down upon, because you go right out of high school and then you’re done and you go right into your career,” Carlin said. “But all your friends are in a four-year program. I got to experience college life. I went out to parties. I met new people. I was able to go to class with my girl friends when I could. I even met my boyfriend.” The students who attend class in the institute and who are clients of the institute live, work and even play together.

The environment creates a community of various types of students who all share a large part of their lives. While being a part of the “typical” college experience isn’t necessarily encouraged by Douglas J, it definitely isn’t discouraged either, according to McCorry. “Our location gives them the opportunity to experience everything out there,” she said. “It’s a little bit of a tighter schedule than Michigan State, but if they want, they can really be a part of the college experience. But we also have a variety of students – they tend to be a little younger, but there are also young moms, for example.” Douglas J students, if they wish, can really be a part of MSU without actually attending the university.

One young mom has made the transition from elementary school teacher to beauty school student. Becky Newcombe and her family left their life in California and moved back to Lansing to be close to family. “I had been here for a year and I started to feel like I was losing it. I just needed to be somewhere with some edge and being my age, I can’t just go to the local bar,” the 32-year-old said. “Young professionals need a place, and I know that they are changing Lansing to make it a place for young professionals. I think it’s hard at my age to feel cool.” Newcombe enrolled at Douglas J and came back to school in East Lansing nearly ten years after graduating from MSU. Although she didn’t go to Douglas J in college, her husband and many of her friends did, at its old location in the Marriott. Now Newcombe has rekindled a different bond with MSU. “I think the relationship is really good,” she said. “I feel like a lot of traffic, a lot of clients, are based on the university. You can really tell, especially when it’s time for back-to-school.” After graduating, Newcombe plans to use her teaching experience and join the instructor program at Douglas J.

As for me, I scheduled the appointment. I loved the scalp massage and hot wash they gave my greasy hair. And as for the end result? Well, my stylist Carly may have just found herself a new regular client after giving me a perfect cut. “Overall, I’ve been pretty happy with the service and the outcome,” Rosinksi said. Yeah. So was I.

Gorgeous locks of hair, falsies, short skirts and red lipstick mean a lot more than a great Saturday night at the Landshark when they’re being worn by men. And five-o’clock shadows, three-piece suits and faux hawks make a totally different statement when worn by women. That is what drag is about. The men and women who choose to perform in drag are playing a game with gender — enhancing, recreating and destroying the stereotypes that come along with it.

Why drag this out?

Drag is about dressing up in the opposite sex’s clothes, yelling “hey girlfriend” and shaking your hump. But it’s also about breaking rules, breaking down and breaking the standards, even within the drag world. “This is an evolving community. You’ve always got someone who’s wanting your job, who’s wanting to take over for you,” Tyler Cooper, aka Sabin, said. “And if you don’t continue step up that game, you’ll lose it in a heartbeat.” Sabin’s five current titles have shown she can step up her game successfully, as Cooper makes a living off performing as his alter ego.

A performer since kindergarten, Cooper spent years dancing professionally all over the world before an injury took him out. Four knee surgeries later, he was ready to get back into the game. “My first drag mom, Nazhoni, asked me if I’d ever considered doing drag and I laughed in her face because I’d never even considered it at that point,” Cooper said. “And then a couple weeks later, she had me on stage in a pair of platform boots and a black fishnet shirt with makeup all over my face and the rest is history.” Sabin performs all over Michigan and currently holds the pageant title of “Michigan Drag Queen of the Year.” She’s also a staple at Spiral Video Dance Bar in Lansing.

While queens get the lion’s share of the spotlight, there is an emerging talent of female to male kings that is being recognized. “The drag king concept is getting to be a lot bigger in the past few years. It’s growing, but it’s just a few years behind the queen,” said Bradley Briegal, owner of Power Diva Productions out of Grand Rapids. “Back in the day, the queens weren’t as exposed as they are now as an art form. They’re now getting out there and mainstream exposure.” Briegal owns several titles for drag queen pageants, and he owns a few for kings as well.

Mara Deutch has never participated in any pageants, but received some help and coaching from Briegal as her drag alter ego Chad Waterfalls was being formed five years ago. “I get along really well with drag queens and gay men for that matter,” Deutch said. “They give me little tips because they are men in their lives and they know how a man should look.” Deutch’s best tips came from her drag family, which includes her drag grandmother, Sabin. The families are about friendship and support, creating an actual family within the community. The queens helped Chad become the man he is on stage.

Drag is a hobby for some like Deutch and a career for others. With Power Diva Productions, Briegal was able to create his own career doing something he loved. “I did all right in school, but it wasn’t for me. I needed a career I could have fun with and this is it. It’s never boring when you cross the street with a car full of drag queens,” Briegal said. “I get to meet people and travel and work with my friends. It’s a lot of fun. I enjoy the artistic side of it too. When you see someone you’ve heard about for years, it’s amazing sometimes when they step out of stage. Like mini celebrities.”

Sometimes though, drag life can really be a drag. MSU alumnus Josh Kilmer-Purcell of the class of ’91 accounted his days as drag queen of all queens, AquaDisiac, in I Am Not Myself These Days: A Memoir, a New York Times Bestseller. The darker, yet inspiringly funny and witty, side of drag was clear through his use and abuse of alcohol and drugs in order to make his way to the top of the drag ladder in New York City. Now a columnist for OUT Magazine and author of the forthcoming novel Candy Everybody Wants, Kilmer-Purcell has made the somewhat destructive days as Aqua into a life experience he isn’t quick to forget, but isn’t about to start again.

Kilmer-Purcell got his start in Atlanta, shortly after graduating from MSU. He used drag as a creative outlet and a way for his self-proclaimed shy self to break into the gay world. “Being a very creative person and an [advertising firm] art director, I was just amazed at the costumes and how they pulled it all together. It was mostly from an artistic point of view that I was interested at first,” Kilmer-Purcell said. “Plus, there was the fact that they were getting all the attention. They were getting paid in these clubs. I thought it would be a great chance for me to do some artistic creative things. But then also I was a very shy person. I would never go up to anybody in the club. Once I had all the paraphernalia on, they came up to me.”

His trademark water-filled breasts with live goldfish inside and thirst to entertain helped make AquaDisiac a sensation. “I was a successful drag queen. When I moved to New York, I was getting more and more successful, which means I was going out more and more nights, which means I was getting drunk more and more nights and doing more and more drugs,” Kilmer-Purcell said. “At some point, I was just like, this doesn’t really have a retirement plan attached to it. It just dwindled. I started cutting back and the thing about a drag queen is, once you cut back, you’re forgotten. A week later, if you haven’t worked somewhere, you don’t exist.” While he has since retired his fish-filled boobs for good, Kilmer-Purcell has remained active in the pursuit of gay equality on a different level and left the drag life to a new generation of queens and kings.

Drag is all about taking gender roles to a new level and never recreating something in its original form, meaning drag is always evolving and changing. “I am pieces of everyone I come into contact with because I learn every day. I never stop learning,” Cooper said, adding, “I learn something new every day that I do this. Whether it be a new brush tourniquet or a dance step on stage or a new way to wear lipstick. That’s why I like my job. You never stop learning and that’s something I know. When you think you’ve reached your pinnacle, it’s time to go away. And I think that’s in every profession.” Sabin books bar performances, shows and competes in pageants all over Michigan in order to keep her act fresh and new. Sabin’s look is a bit more androgynous when performing by her standards, often sporting a shaved head and intense face makeup with her outfits. Sabin breaks stereotype of drag queen by her performance and it has paid off. “A lot of people cater to what I call the cookie-cutter drag queen. They’re these girls that get up on stage and I’m not going to knock them because it takes a lot of balls to get up on stage. It takes a lot of balls to do what we do,” Cooper said. “And that’s what I mean by the cookie cutter girl. What are you doing to make yourself different, to give yourself that appeal. Girls think they go up there put on a wig and some tits and they’re going to be fabulous and everyone will love them,” Cooper said. “But you’re just being some regular old drag queen. And that’s not what I want.”

Next up, Miss Conception
One of the biggest problems drag performers face is the reactions of others. While many of these reactions stem from fear of something different, they can really affect the lives of the performers. “For me, a lot of people thought the reason I did drag was because I was afraid of coming out as trans[gender],” Deutch said. “I have a lot of people who came to me at first and were like, ‘If you want to dress like a guy, why don’t you just be one?’ To me, that’s kind of rude.”

Drag is a major part of the LBGT community and has not had as much exposure in mainstream culture, at least not at the levels drag is in the LBGT community. “I think that drag performance is looked on much more positively within the queer community,” psychology junior Jill Franckowiak said. “Outside of that community, sometimes it can be viewed as degrading genders or enforcing stereotypes. But at the same time, I think that having drag performances is important, in the sense that I think it allows for a space to provide a fluidity of gender performing.”

Some performers have different gender identities and some do it for pure entertainment or creative value. “A lot of straight people assume that if you’re a drag queen, you want to be a woman. Everyone confuses transgender, transvestite and drag queens. There’s this huge spectrum of gender play,” Kilmer-Purcell said. “To me, I never wanted to be another gender. But I liked the idea of being in costume. I liked the idea of almost being a clown. It is a costume. The most common thing people assume is that I wanted to get an operation to become a woman.”

Generally, the same misconceptions that come outside the LBGT community are present inside the community as well. “There are a lot of bars that I personally don’t know that won’t cater to that part of the gay community,” Briegel said. “People who go to those bars never see drag queens. Even people who have been out for several years may have never seen a drag queen.”

Spiral Video Dance Bar in Lansing hosts a drag show every Sunday and has performers during the week as well, but that hasn’t stopped some queer-on-queen prejudice from existing. “What I’ve noticed is that a lot of men will not date a drag queen. I honestly don’t understand. Drag is just a hobby,” Deutch, who used to be a regular performer at Spiral, said. “I can’t answer that, but a lot of gay men are not into drag women. I’ve had people come up to me and say, ‘So-and-so is really good looking and so cute. I just wish he didn’t do the drag shows.’ That’s really frustrating.”

The hobby or livelihood of the performers can severely affect their personal relationships and dating life. Briegal has seen this happen firsthand with many of the performers he represents, who also happen to be his friends. “If you do drag or even if you’re transgender, then people think you’re easy. You’re willing to put out for everyone,” Briegal said. “That’s really frustrating for the transgenders who just want what everyone else wants. You know, like a relationship.” The tolerance and acceptance of drag culture will immediately influence the more personal side of the person behind the facade.

While the drag culture may not be fully embraced by every part of the LBGT community, many have embraced it with open arms. Franckowiak, for example, believes androgyny is beautiful. Her circle of friends really enjoys drag performance. “From my friends, my gay friends and such, it seems to be something they embrace,” she said. “I would definitely say it’s a positive thing, at least with the people I know.”

To assume something about a performer is to make oneself ignorant to that person’s self-concept. “Whether you’re gay or straight, if you’re uneducated, the misconceptions are the same,” Briegal said.

Let’s Drag the Queer Community into This

Drag is a staple in the LBGT community, at MSU and otherwise. Pride parades are filled with drag queens and kings of all types. “I think it just shows a sense of being fearless. A lot of us grew up afraid of what the world thought of us. Dressing up as another gender is a big middle finger to the male-female heterosexual world,” Kilmer-Purcell said. “It’s like, you call me different, now I’m really fucking different. What are you going to do about it? So I think there’s certainly a sense of pride that I really enjoyed about it when I was younger.” The community of drag queens and kings in East Lansing ranges from college students to professional drag stars like Sabin, who make a living out of their alter egos.

Sabin and other local favorites will perform in the MSU Drag Show on April 18, which is hosted in part by the University Activities Board, Respecting Individuals on Neutral Grounds (RING) and the LBGT caucus for Mason/Abbot and Snyder/Phillips. “Our goal is to get us out there,” Deutch said. “We want people to accept the LBGT community and it shows that because the majority of our audience is students who are not a part of the LBGT community.” Deutch said students from all over campus enjoy the show, and some of the Christian campus groups have been known to show up.

When the non-LBGT community experiences drag on the university level, it helps to clear up misunderstandings and preconceived notions about the entertainment. “We’re not bad people,” Deutch said. “And as much as we maybe are stereotyping genders, we do it in a fun and silly kind of way.” Kings like Deutch, aka Chad Waterfalls, perform routines, dances and songs practiced and perfected over several weeks.

Drag is a way to make the LBGT community more approachable, while messing with the rules of socially-accepted gender. “Drag queens are probably leading the way: drag queens, drag kings, gender-fuckers and queers in general,” Kilmer Purcell said. “It makes it a lot harder to come up with something when you’re not just throwing on a beehive wig and some trash. You’ve got to work a lot harder.”

“Gender-fucking” is the idea of breaking mainstream gender rules, but even within the drag community, not all gender-bending is wholly accepted. Androgynous performers and trans-performers have to even pave their own way in the drag world. Performers like Sabin have enjoyed the task of redrawing the lines of what makes the typical drag queen, or cookie-cutter drag queens as Cooper calls them. “If you tell me I can’t do something, oh that’s fuel, honey. That’s fuel. I’m going to do it just to prove you wrong and now you have to deal with me my way,” Cooper said.

Sabin and other drag performers dress up during pride events to represent themselves and the LBGT community. “We have a job that a lot of people don’t even realize. We are the face of the community. When you go to the pride festival, you see the drag queens. You see all this bright random shit,” Cooper said. “You don’t remember the naked boys walking down the middle of the street. You remember the drag queens in their ten-and-a-half-foot head dresses and eight-foot tall heels.” This is all in hopes that if one accepts a more extreme side of the LBGT community, they will accept the community all together.

The rules of gender have existed in society for as long as there was society. Putting lipstick on a man or some scruff on a woman plays with the senses, tricks the minds and redefines how we all express ourselves our own individual gender. Drag is the forefront of leading the gender-fucking revolution.

Two girls. One cup.
Those four words can spark many emotions depending on who’s hearing them: disgust, hatred, sickness, and dare I say, excitement or arousal? While the video is extremely hardcore and explicit, it nonetheless fits the category of pornography. And it’s a prime example of how pornography has permeated our everyday lives.

According to the Internet Filter Review, the pornography industry worldwide was nearing $100 billion in revenues in 2006, a number that has no doubt increased since this time. The line between what is considered pornography and what is considered obscene has blurred with the Internet video boom. And while more people might be watching the “Two girls. One cup” video in order to gross out their friends or roommates (or in some cases, their mothers), the fact is the advertising revenue gained for such a popular video is through the roof.

We know what’s going on behind the computer screen. What we don’t always know is what’s going on in front of the camera – or behind it, for that matter. And while the amount of time spent on pornographic Web sites has nearly doubled between 2005 and 2008, some would still argue porn is more about exploitation than exploration.

Women, gender and social justice professor Penny Gardner is one of those people. “My perspective on pornography as a feminist is that it’s misogynist, and it puts women in danger and incites violence against women,” said Gardner. “And I’m talking about the hardcore pornography that has women in chains or hurting the woman, that kind of stuff. I don’t know that much about pornography. It absolutely turns me off, and I’m not a prude at all.” Gardner’s views follow closely to those of feminist Andrea Dworkin, who wrote a series of books and articles calling pornography degrading toward and exploitive of women.

Dworkin’s main grievances were with the violent pornographic movies, comics and pictures that eroticized chains, hurt and pain. And with that, she claimed all pornography was demeaning toward women. She feared these materials caused more pain and led to women being sexual assaulted, raped and murdered.

Whether pornography has caused these attacks on women is inconclusive, but it is still a huge topic of discussion among feminists. “We’re a repressed culture, and we don’t like to see people’s sex or sexuality, putting the weird violent stuff aside,” journalism senior Pete Nichols said. “When we do, we have to find something wrong with it. When the women’s lib[eration] movement was rolling through the ’70s, that was an easy thing to point the finger at.” Nichols said porn as a whole can’t be completely anti-feminist because of the control so many women have in it.

Not all pornography puts women in compromising positions, whichever position they happen to be in. Sex can make women feel empowered or worshiped, but questions still exist about whether those feelings transfer when the sex is being viewed by someone else with other intentions.

“I mean, I think that a lot of women who are feminists aren’t opposed to porn, even people who would consider themselves die-hard feminists,” history professor Aminda Smith said. “It’s always been a really contentious issue within the feminist movement, whatever that means, because it’s not even a unified thing. And then, maybe feminist porn would be okay. But does it even exist?” The answer is yes and no. Some feminists have been committed to creating pornography they call feminist; this has been documented in “Hot and bothered: feminist pornography,” a movie about a group of women who create porn while still fighting stereotypes and sexism in the historically chauvinistic industry. Last year, the second annual Feminist Porn Awards was hosted by “good for her,” a self-proclaimed high-quality sex toy shop catering to females, in Toronto.

This trend toward porn that’s good to women is something the user may actually prefer. Nichols, who is a fan of the classic 1950s and 1960s pin-ups, thinks it’s a great idea. “For stuff like that to be effective, there has to be at least some kind of emotion in it,” Nichols said. “I really think that that’s a positive step forward. I think it’s brilliant.”

Some women argue the porn industry is quite often more than fair to women, especially when it comes to professionally produced videos. “It’s one of the very few industries – maybe the only industry – where, on average, women make more than men,” Smith said. “And some people would say, ‘Well, that’s not enough to make it worth it.’ But other people who are fighting for economic equality would say, ‘Women should have a right to engage in one of the only industries that gives them more money.’” Women as famous as star Jenna Jameson are pulling figures that no men in the business are. Her production company, Club Jenna, made more than $30 million in revenues in 2005, according to a Forbes article, and Jameson wasn’t putting out any new videos of herself. Former adult and actor and current owner of Baileey Productions, Inc., Baileey, thinks the entire porn industry is a bit misunderstood. His business has clients like Club Jenna and Playboy, and Web sites like Reality Kings. “It’s like any other business,” said Baileey, who works and lives by his stage name. “The government is coming down a little bit harder these days. But I don’t think it’s any harder than having any other business. I have to worry about my taxes, making sure [of] all my IDs and 2257s. I have to make sure that I abide by the rules of that 2257 law.” The 2257 law makes reference to records that businesses must keep, particularly in the pornography industry, to ensure children and minors are abstaining from both working in pornography and viewing content that is not legal for them to see. Other than that, Baileey addresses typical business concerns, with just a bit more nudity.

While it would originally seem the surplus of free video Web sites like the monster XTube (the porn world’s answer to YouTube) would be a detriment to professional porn, it doesn’t have quite the effect on pornography that downloading did to the recording industry. In fact, it is just the opposite. “It’s just encouraged [industry growth]. These Web sites make people want to see their favorite model or actor more, so they come to professional porn for that,” Baileey said. “It’s only increased the number of people viewing porn.” XTube claims to have more than 2 million users and as of July 2007, more than 5 million visits per day.

The explosion of porn sites is evident; some statistics state 12 percent of all Web sites are pornographic in some manner. “It’s kind of like with radio: there was AM and then FM. The Internet is kind of the FM for porn,” Nichols said. “Suddenly there’s a much broader scope. It’s expanding and at the same time becoming more particular. You now have sites that deal with very specific things.” Everything from rubber fetish to silver daddies to defecation porn are available without having to get out of a chair, not to mention the incredible amounts of user-uploaded content.

Sites like XTube have created a new and easy way for users to not only view professionally uploaded content, but real amateur content. Users are able to upload videos or pictures of themselves or others to this Web site for public display. People can explore their sexuality through idle viewing, or by actively commenting on or creating pornography themselves. However, the amateur uploads don’t supply the user with any type of financial support, even in such a lucrative business. Baileey who started as a paid amateur at 18, has since gone into production work because, as he said, you can’t stay in front of the camera forever. “To be honest with you, when I was in college, it paid for all my bills,” he said. “The money was fantastic and it allowed me to finish school with no worries and get my degree.” But that type of money isn’t being seen by the users uploading to sites like XTube. The answer to why people would use such sites may lie in an overarching trend in entertainment.

People are obsessed with reality. The number of reality television shows has sky-rocketed and there is a serious demand to see things that are perceived as real. “It just seems like amateur porn is just another facet of that,” Smith said. “And a lot of people have argued that amateur porn is partially responsible for our demand for stuff that feels really real, really authentic and really gritty – whether it be just people’s social lives or Real World and stuff like that. But I think it’s part of a larger trend, where a lot of consumers of entertainment are craving some kind of authenticity that they’re not getting from the really slick, really packaged things that were available before this. The ironic thing about all this is that sometimes the stuff is more packaged and more slick than some of the other stuff.” The demand for the realness has users feeling like they are wanted, and positive feedback on sexual prowess on- or off-camera can be a huge inflation to the ego.

Users of all ages, backgrounds, sexualities, ethnicities and even disabilities can represent themselves sexually on the Web and often find a fan or two. It’s diversifying the porn selection in a way that hasn’t been done before. “I’m not sure that the feedback a young woman would get from masturbating on camera or showing her breasts or her vulva, what kind of feedback would it feed her…would it make her stronger, would she be empowered by that?” Gardner said. “And would that empowerment be the kind of empowerment she needs to survive in a global community?” The women who break stereotypes and gender roles and still receive positive feedback may indeed feel empowered enough to survive in the global community.
Whether this is happening has yet to be determined, but if there’s any place for it, the Internet is it. “There’s always been porn in society, but it’s always been something to hide. You hide it in your sock drawer or in your brown paper bag,” Nichols said. “But now because of the Internet, it’s becoming more mainstream. Porn stars are well-known and famous. It’s more out in the open. And that’s a good thing because along with that, you’re going to get more safety and more control in the industry.”

Whether the videos you prefer are gross-out porn or someone masturbating while watching the latest from Club Jenna, porn is weaved throughout our culture. It has historically been viewed as degrading and humiliating toward women, while simultaneously being a rite of passage to exploring one’s sexual self on a personal level. The Internet has changed things forever: increasing the availability, the sheer number and the reality of pornography. Despite this rampant growth, Grandma might not be ready for “Two Girls. One Cup.” But if you choose to show it to her, make sure to videotape her reaction and upload it to YouTube.

Subtitles, exotic plots and unfamiliar faces are what many students conjure when they think of international films. These conceptions are not entirely off, but international film offers a lot more than a cool conversation starter when you are trying to impress others. Reading the translated words at the bottom of the screen can bring new cultural awareness and a unique perspective, and teach things Hollywood often shies away from. One of the most popular (and sexiest) international films is Y Tú Mama También (And Your Mother, Also), directed by Alfonso Cuarón and set in Mexico. The audience learns the meanings of “sexo colectivo” and puta. Not to mention those Mexican accents – they can turn on even the most modest of viewers.

Foreign films transcend all cultures and act as a liaison for different countries to artistically interact. Watching independent and foreign films can give viewers a look outside of the polished and canned Hollywood movie.

“I think you can really open up your mind to what film can be – get rid of some prejudice,” film studies senior Alex Reyme said. “Expand upon domestic film. Doing anything or researching anything from a different part of the world is beneficial.” Reyme is an aspiring director and has watched many international movies in his classes and during his free time. But you do not have to be in the film studies program to open up to these movies on campus.

Other departments have classes that allow students to experience international film. Maria Murdrovcic teaches Spanish Media and Conversation, enabling her students to screen and discuss films from Latin America and Spain. “I think it’s to expose those students to a different language. At least, I will speak about Latin American and Hispanic films. It’s a different way of picking topics, narrating stories, telling the stories, narrating what is going on,” Murdrovcic said. “And the difference at first is shocking and afterward, it’s kind of ‘Okay, how can we understand this way of telling us something we are accustomed to seeing a different way?’” The topics covered in her class range from sexual identities to revolutionary history to feminism. It is a unique way for students to merge their Spanish conversational skills while dealing with cultural topics.

One of Murdrovcic’s students, Spanish sophomore Amanda Moore, watched films this semester from Argentina, Cuba, Mexico and Spain, among other countries. “I really enjoyed watching them because they’re so different from films I’m used to,” Moore said. “They often point out things that I’m not used to or things I’m not comfortable watching, but it’s really good to know about what’s going on in other parts of the world and in other cultures.” Moore cited the example of María, Llena Eres de Gracia (Maria Full of Grace), where the main character swallows balloons of cocaine while pregnant to smuggle it into the United States. The film’s main focus is what people were willing to risk for their families and aspirations.

In many ways, Latin American films utilize their meager funding to add more context to the statement the movie is trying to make. “We are considered the cinema of the third world. What that means is that we don’t have the money that they have, but we don’t simulate or lie that the movie is an expensive movie,” Murdrovcic said. “What we say is that it’s the cinema of imperfection. It’s showing what we cannot do or what we cannot achieve. It’s not like we hide behind a nice house and a non-existent car. We show the reality of it.” Though it makes attempts at it, reality is something often lost in the fantasy of Hollywood movies. Between the big-budget explosions, climactic ending of worlds and superhuman abilities, Hollywood creates things that do not exist, instead of delving into the complex realities independent films explore.

“In North America, it’s quite clear: The director tells you which characters to hate and which to love,” Murdrovcic said. “And in Latin American movies, it’s much more ambiguous…it’s a way of not giving you the results. You have to make the decisions.” The films make the viewer an active participant instead of using movies as a passive activity. The more thought that goes into the movies, the more the viewer has to think to get anything out of it.

The passivity of American films is a possible reason for their popularity among college students. Hollywood films feature the stars that routinely grace the covers of US Weekly and Esquire and the industry often creates a lighthearted and shallow production. “It’s hard to compete with the familiar, with the effortless, with the predictability of a North American movie,” Murdrovcic said. “And the attraction and the beauty.”

Hollywood goes to huge efforts to please the viewers, as shown each year with blockbusters hitting the theaters. It may be something foreign directors would have attempted more if they had the Hollywood resources. “I would say that every country has its own history of film. Hollywood just has its own identity and it happens to be in America,” Reyme said. “A lot of times, foreign films aren’t as streamlined. They’re always more about character development. I think that’s a defining factor for international art cinema across the world.” This may be a reason why many international directors make significant strides when they come to America. For example, director Ang Lee enjoyed great success with Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, winning the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2000.

In the same vein, Y Tú Mama También won the Golden Globe for the foreign film category. Director Cuarón’s American influence may have been a factor in his film success, as he went on to direct one of the Harry Potter movies. “You see how much Hollywood movies follow a set pattern, and there’s so much more the world of cinema has to offer than Hollywood can give,” history professor Ethan Segal said, who shows a film at the history department’s International Film Series. “Don’t get me wrong – Hollywood films are great, but there’s so many ways to tell a story with film.” The story-telling aspect of foreign films is often why they seem confusing; unlike in literature, films generally only tell a story one way: from a certain point-of-view and usually in chronological order.

Outside of class, MSU’s campus has a veritable marathon of international film throughout the year. This fall, the History Department put on their second annual International Film Series, which concludes on Dec. 4. The last movie is a Brazilian film, hosted by assistant history professor Erica Windler. “Hopefully, it’ll be able to provide them with a visual context for thinking about some of the issues they’re dealing with in class,” Windler said. “It’ll encourage them hopefully to keep talking about things that they’ve seen and to think about also how film serves as an interpretation of society. We hope that it will open students up, even for a brief moment, to cultures and time periods that they might not otherwise have exposure to.” The film series is a way for history professors to show films without taking up class time. The attendance at these different films ranges from as little as a few people to as many as a hundred, often depending on the film being shown, but more often whether extra credit is involved.

Aside from extra credit opportunities, if students are trying to learn a language, foreign films are a great tool. “We watch movies with different dialects. I’m really interested in different dialects,” Moore said. “I didn’t understand a Cuban film at all, but it was explained why in my phonetics and pronunciation class.” Moore will further her Spanish education in Spain next semester through an MSU’s study abroad program. She said she has definitely been turned on to foreign films after taking Murdrovcic’s class and believes she will find Spain will further her interest in Spanish-speaking film.

Not everyone can go abroad to watch films, and with the absence of a Lansing-area international film house, many students turn to campus events like the International Film Series for their foreign film needs. “I think it’s a really good thing in the sense that it’s something students can get into,” Windler said. “It gets them out in realizing that there’s more to their learning experience and their university experience than what happens in the classroom. By doing that, they hopefully form a sense of community.” Students take home something they otherwise would not have, even if it is just a minuscule look into another culture. And this experience can be shared with other students in the community.

The film series also help to bridge gaps between professors and students. For these series, the professors chose films that pertain to class, and those that they enjoy. “A lot of times it’s hard to go and look, if you’re at Blockbuster or Netflix, to pick something from this huge mess of films and know that it’s going to be good,” Windler said. “[On the other hand], you have these films that have been suggested by people that really know what’s going on and they are films we want to use to attract people. We hope that not only will they have intellectual content, but will be interesting for students and fun.” In this way, the students gain a personal insight into their professors’ views and interests.

Film is a subject that transcends many cultures, individuals and viewpoints. It has created stars and burned others out. It has had a profound effect on cultures all over the world, which is why people should not limit themselves to film from just their own cultures. “I like that it’s a form of art and it’s a very collaborative form of art that involved acting, pictures, movement – all in one,” Reyme said. Foreign film uses all those same forms of art in a different way, completing the puzzle. Giving foreign films a chance is enhancing one’s cultural education.

With less than a month’s notice, I bought my plane ticket and made living arrangements to spend six weeks of my summer interning for an Ecuadorian-based travel book. I would act the part of a living, breathing, international journalist with all of the guts and glamour that goes along with interning abroad. Viva Travel Guides is the young company that was able to give me some of the best hands-on experience that is generally not available at large veteran publications.

I had applied for my internship in the spring, but my lack of Adobe InDesign experience stopped the company from originally hiring me. My interview went well though, and when another intern backed out, I accepted their offer to take the open position.

My arrival in Quito, a city with approximately 9,000-foot elevation, was both exhausting and exciting. My body’s adjustment period was about five days – where I slept a ton, ate very little and watched the Ecuadorian version of Desperate Housewives. As soon as I was acclimatized, work began.

Working at a travel guide wasn’t exactly what I had expected, but I’m not sure what I expected. I knew that I wouldn’t be traveling the continent sending in stories from afar, but I knew it had to be more than a 9-to-5 desk job (or actually 9:30 to 5:15 because nothing ever seemed to happen on time). “I think it’s a little different than people expect,” said Erin Helland, who completed her sixth-month internship with Viva in July. “A lot of people I talked to think that I’m being shipped around the world to fancy places. But mostly my job was office based.” There are, however opportunities for travel for those that want to take them. Helland was able to travel to the coast, the mountains and the Galápagos Islands, though most was on her own expense.

When traveling on business for Viva, the writers live off of about $15 a day. “It doesn’t sound like much in American money,” Helland said. “But, buses in Ecuador are about a dollar an hour and I was usually on a bus for two-three hours. Cabs are a couple bucks. My hotel was about 7 dollars a day and breakfast you could get for about a dollar. I usually ended up spending about 20 dollars a day but really it’s very reasonable.” Helland’s travel guide research took her to several small mountain communities including Ambato, Riobamba and Salinas.

One of the main misconceptions about field work for a travel book is that it’s all very glamorous and posh. The reality isn’t quite so. “You really don’t have a long time in a place. You eat alone. You’re working a lot and quite intensively and you don’t have internet connection,” editor-in-chief of Viva’s travel books Paula Newton said. “People need to be quite resilient. You can be gone for a long time. It’s pretty intense. We expect quite a lot from our writers who are out in the field.” Writers must do a lot of research before reaching a destination so that they may not waste time. Viva expects their writers to have contacts available, know where they are going and where they are staying while traveling for the company.

Once the content is collected, the writers and interns upload the new information on to Viva’s Web site, where all their content is kept. Twice a year, they update their print versions from the new content on the Web. “The company was set up with the idea of being the most up-to-date guidebook on the market recognizing that when you take guidebooks with you like Lonely Planet which is updated every couple years, things have gotten a bit outdated,” said Newton. Viva’s latest book is their Ecuador guidebook, which updated in September. Their first edition of a guidebook to Peru is almost complete and guidebooks to both Columbia and Argentina are in the works. For a company that’s only a little over a year old, they are expanding quite gracefully.

The Web site works much in the way of Wikipedia, where users can create new pages and update pages about hotels, restaurants, cities and activities that the Viva writers have not been able to cover yet. They make suggestions and give ratings based on their travel experience – all of which is taken into account when publishing the books. If their review or description fits Viva’s standards, it will often make it into the book.

Since the office is based in Ecuador’s capital, Quito, the interns do their best to keep the Quito nightlife section updated on a regular basis. “We work hard, we play hard,” Newton always said. Part of the job of writers and interns is to put their own personal experiences into the book, even if they didn’t get paid for the research. A passion for culture and travel is a requirement for this job. “I get to do for my job what I used to do during my lunch breaks, which is research different places to travel,” Newton said. “Now, I get to research places to travel and I get paid for it.” Aside from research, a ton of editing and rewriting go into publishing a book. In such a small company, about five people read the book over and over until its ready for publication and quite often the interns and the editors are doing the same job.

Besides editing and reviewing travel destinations, the staff can find themselves doing other things like writing a personal narrative, updating the Web site, or even creating a MySpace or Facebook page to get more of the word out there. “Because we’re such a small start up company I can end up doing anything really aside from cleaning really,” Newton said. Being based in Latin American gives the workplace a more homelike feel. The office atmosphere is just as relaxed as the staff’s titles are.

Friday evenings at Viva come with beer and chips from the boss, and often the staff goes out together afterward. Doing anything out in public can be seen as research for the book and that’s the excuse we used for going to the bar even if we had to work the next day. The next day, we might have quite a few reviews to write about the drinks being too expensive in one place or the place with the best chicken Schwarmas near the nightlife.

I left Ecuador with a new outlook on life and journalism: my profession may be one of the most exciting yet tiring livelihoods in the world – something I always thought but had never experienced. I left professionally published both online and in a book. I left with a new understanding of a culture different than my own. I was given the means to do my three favorite things: writing, traveling and socializing. And I still get to call it work.

I knew.

Without becoming overly-sentimental, I knew long before I left for Europe the impact it would have on my life. I knew there would be culture shock, new friendships would form and I would come back a changed man. I knew I would go to great places like the London Tower, the Guinness Factory and Edinburgh Castle. I knew I would hear British, Irish and Scottish accents – perhaps what I was most excited about. And I knew I\’d make great memories. What I wasn’t prepared for was the great influence the music in Europe would have on my trip.

My study abroad program was called “Reporting in the British Isles,” with 14 students from MSU and one from Columbia College. Two MSU journalism professors were deemed responsible for us as we roamed around the British Isles and beyond, each taking lead for half of the six-week adventure. We didn\’t always agree on what to eat, what wine to drink or where to party, but we always agreed on one thing: we loved the music.

Before I left, I loaded my iPod with my favorite music, including a brand new playlist titled Down in London Town. The playlist featured my favorite British and Irish bands like the Sex Pistols, the Smiths, U2, Oasis and the Libertines. It also featured songs set in London, such as Clark Gable by Postal Service. As I flew overseas, the familiar music comforted me as I journeyed to a place I had only listened to others sing about.

London Calling
Our first stop on the trip was London, a city full of opportunities for great music. Every stop on the tube, the city\’s underground rail, had posters of the Arctic Monkey’s latest CD Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not plastered on the walls. Although they are rather popular in the States now, they weren\’t when I was in the UK. A band I had barely heard of in the United States, but one that had made it onto my playlist, had a monopoly of the best and biggest posters in the tube. London is all about the music.

One night, our entire group ordered food and drinks at a great little bar called Prince Alfred’s. It wasn’t anything too special, but we were in London and excited to get to know one another. The bar had live music from a guy who covered Oasis songs on his acoustic guitar. We soon realized finding music at a pub or restaurant wasn’t a special event in London – it was just a normal occurrence. Quite often, our large group would just happen upon a great live band inside a small bar and it would make for a memorable night. Another night, we would find ourselves dancing to the cheesiest ’80s music at an American Sports pub – yes, we were in an American sports club in England (but the Pistons were playing, so we had an excuse.)

When Irish Eyes Are Smiling
The entire group anxiously anticipated our arrival in Dublin. Since many of us claimed Irish heritage, it felt somewhat like coming home. And it became home in the five short days that we romped around that city. Dublin’s famous Temple Bar district, an area of many pubs in the center of the city, claimed most of the group’s nights. Each evening, several bars had live music covering everything from The Cure to The Cranberries. Most memorably, however, were traditional Irish folk songs and we all quickly learned the words to them. By the end of our time in Dublin, we knew when to clap during Whiskey in the Jar and Finnegan’s Wake. Our favorite band from Dublin, The Folksmen, played a lot of their own music with some traditional Irish music. Between the music and the pints of Guinness, we all realized how great Ireland was.

Linger, a song by The Cranberries, became quite the anthem for our study abroad. We listened to it at bars and on bus tours and even sharing earbuds with each other while traveling. Although we only stayed in the city for five days, the weekend life in Dublin was an explosion of music. Every pub we visited had live music. The music spilled out of the pubs and into the streets, where even more musicians played anything from bagpipes to trumpets to guitars.

After our five-day stint in Dublin, we took off on our first of two bus tours of the program. Our tour guide, a recently graduated journalism-major, like ourselves, was named Aiden. Aiden became an integral part of the trip, with everyone feeling as if he fit right in. He had great taste in American music, playing Jack Johnson to get the entire bus to mellow out and sing. Like any Irishman, he loved The Cranberries and U2, and we did, too. I think that any of my fellow travelers would agree that Aiden’s greatest attribution to the group came when he introduced us to his favorite song, Where’s Me Jumper?, by Sultans of Ping.

The song chronicles a night of partying and “dancing at the disco” only to realize the singer can’t find his jumper (that’s “sweater” in the U.S.) It’s a mix of heavy electric riffs, a thick Irish accent and a comical storyline. I doubt any of the people on my trip can think of that song or of Aiden and not crack a smile. Traveling through the Irish countryside, we would be belting the chorus to our newfound favorite Irish song:

“And my mother will be so, so angry/
and my brother will be so, so angry/
and my girlfriend will be so, so angry/
and my dog will be so, so angry.”

Scotland The Brave
Sadly, Edinburgh didn’t quite have the musical influence that the other cities did. But the music bug had stuck and we weren’t going to give it up. Cheap iPod speakers constantly blasted whatever any of us were feeling at a particular moment, my special playlist making quite the hit among the group.

From our dorms in Edinburgh, we could often hear a faint sound of bagpipes coming from somewhere in the vicinity. While seeing our first bagpiper in London was quite the novelty, it was more like an everyday occurrence in Scotland. Along with the traditional Scottish instruments, many Scots wore their traditional formal kilts and dress shirts while attending special events.

Our second bus tour of the trip took place in the Highlands of Scotland. Our tour guide this time was named “Disco Dave.” He wasn’t nearly as funny or smart as Aiden, but did manage to elbow one of our group members in the face while attempting to dance. We spent that faithful evening at a bar called Saucy Mary’s in the Isle of Sky. When the World Cup game had finished, the band – consisting of some great string musicians – started playing folk music worth dancing to. Unfortunately, Disco Dave wasn’t quite the dancer that his name implied, as my friend Rachel spent 20 minutes in the bathroom bleeding from the mouth.

I just knew. I knew coming home would be hard. I knew my life had changed forever. I knew I had 15 new best friends – and two new favorite professors. I knew that I now I had a taste for wine and a thirst for travel. And I knew that I could never again hear Linger without cracking a smile.

Purple lockers line the hallways. They are no doubt filled with home-sewn dresses and tops, fabric swatches and endless sketches of things you’ll probably be wearing in five to 10 years. In this building, suede boots are far more common than everyday Pumas.

During the first two weeks of April, the classrooms and sewing labs in the Human Ecology building will be filled with over-stressed and over-caffeinated students working to construct, deconstruct, sew and ultimately complete their collection for the annual Student Apparel Design Association (SADA) fashion show.

But there is a lot more to the apparel and textile design department than fashion shows and trendy shoes.

Apparel and textile design is a fiercely competitive industry, and some of that competition has made its way to MSU – SADA has had to split its runway designers into two different shows. “The numbers increased probably 25 percent in members this year,” saod Carol Beard, SADA advisor and an apparel and textile design professor. While only 40 people participated last year, 66 designers signed up for this year’s fashion show. Although only 49 of those met the appropriate deadlines, there were still too many collections for just one show.

Rock ‘N Vogue
The fashion show called “Rock ‘N Vogue” will take place on Friday, April 13 at 7 p.m. at the Wharton Center. Student designed and handmade garments will stomp down the runway, imitating the major fashion shows in New York, Paris or Milan. Each designer or design-team must have at least three ensembles in order to participate in the show.

Tony Gianacakos is an apparel and textile design junior who will take part in the fashion show for his second time. “I’m doing three women’s ensembles and two men’s ensembles,” he said. “I’ve never done menswear before. It’s actually a lot harder to do than women’s wear. That was a little ambitious.”

After a year of preparation, “pre-fashion show season” – as senior SADA president Jenny Lerczak calls it – is upon us. The season requires designers to have completely finished garments, including accessories. The garments will be judged before they go down the runway and awards will be given out at the end of Friday’s show.

Despite the growth, the venue changed this year from the Auditorium to the Pasant Theatre, a smaller location. “Basically, it’s going to be a more intimate show than it’s been in the past,” Lerczak said. “I’m really impressed with the caliber of the designs people submitted this year – I just really hope it’s translated well onto the runway.

Music will be emphasized during the show this year, which organizers hope will add to the mood of the show. “It’s going to be a lot of songs people recognize,” Lerczak said. “They mood is going to change a lot in the show just because we’ve got the [music] lineup set so that it mixes it up a bit.”

Once crunch time began in mid-March, the designers, who also must participate in the planning and production of the show, were left with little free time. The show takes a lot of hard work and dedication to run so smoothly. “I just go and go and go and go – I never stop,” Gianacakos said. “There’s always something you can improve. It’s not like we’re professionals.”

Any paid member of SADA can sign up to be in the fashion show. Potential designers create a design packet that gets reviewed by the department’s faculty members and a decision is made into which show the designer’s collection will go. “It’s a lot of work. It’s drawing your ensembles on bodies and they need to be fully rendered [colored],” Gianacakos said “It’s a lot of thinking because you want your collection to coordinate but you don’t want it to be too similar.”

Community Threads
While the fashion show is SADA’s largest and most time-consuming event, the organization does not exist for the sole purpose of displaying student work. “We’re still a young organization,” Gianacakos said. “We’re trying to implement more things for the community. We’re hosting a historical ball which is the day after the fashion show…It’s people who enjoy dressing up in historical costume and coming to venues. That is one of our things we do to give back to the community – we put on something not for us, but for others.”

Students in the association also take an annual trip to New York City where they meet different people in the industry, such as Vera Wang. Part of Gianancakos’ position in SADA requires him to help build relationships with people in the industry. “I think that’s the hardest part about our major is networking and trying to build relationships with people,” Gianancakos said. “If you know how to do that, you’re set.”

While the New York trip allows the student designers to gain networking skills and meet others in the industry, their classes at MSU offer real world business and creative experiences. “We’ve tried to set it up – at least in my classes – so it prepares you for what you’re really going to get, not just what the books say, but what really happens in the industry,” Faulkner said. “The designer isn’t always the be-all end-all saying ‘Here’s my vision and everyone goes, ‘OK’. A lot of times it’s, “Here’s our vision, make it happen.’ There’s give and take, so hopefully we’ve infused some industry experience and background into the program.”

Beard said there are certain advantages to gaining your four-year degree from a state school like MSU. “I think what we do is give them a broad base of education,” Beard said. “You’re getting your liberal arts degree when you come here. We want students that can really think broadly. I think that’s the advantage of getting a four-year degree because if you choose to change careers, you have that basis at Michigan State. If you chose to go to a design school, you are going to get more hands-on classes. You are going to get more art classes. You are going to get more construction classes. We teach the same things, just not as intensely as those schools do. But our students are still getting really good jobs.”

Beard has had recent graduates placed all over the country, from New York to Los Angeles. Some tackle private designing, a particularly competitive choice, while others go to work for big names, such as Target or Dillard’s. Some students begin to work in the magazine industry.

The department tries to apply those real world situations by giving students an outlet to help people within East Lansing and the surrounding areas. “We also do a lot of community things,” Beard said. “We find people with special clothing needs and the students interview them and take measurements, research whatever the disability was that the person had and then they created a garment for that person specifically. We worked with Sparrow hospital on that.”

Last year, Lerczak was one of the students who helped design for a female who used a wheelchair. This allowed Lerczak and her classmates to use their knowledge of construction and measurements to create something really meaningful. “That to me was probably my favorite project to work on just because it was so great to see that we were impacting someone’s life,” Lerczak said. “We had a positive impact on her – she got 20 new garments out of that deal and they were all things that fit her.”

Getting Technical
New technology makes it easier to design, whether it’s for the community, the SADA fashion show or class projects. The ability to design and create fabrics for any purpose is now as easy as the click of a mouse – the creations are only limited by the imagination. One program, called U4ia (pronounced “euphoria”) is an apparel design program used by large companies such as Gap and JCPenney. Though extremely expensive, the technology is available for the apparel and textile design department. “I helped create some of the design software so they donated the software,” professor Lori Faulkner said. “They donated over 10 million dollars worth of software now. It’s used more than any other apparel software in companies across the whole world.”
Advanced technology like U4ia is increasing the creative aspect of the design program. Now that the College of Human Ecology has disbanded, the apparel and textile design program is located within the College of Arts and Letters and possibly faces curriculum changes. “We’re hoping that by being affiliated with Arts and Letters, we will be able to expand some of our creative classes,” Beard said.

Part of the decision to make the program more inventive required hiring some new staff, such as Della Reams, a professor with more than 25 years of real world industry experience in designing and selling clothing. “I designed and manufactured and sold to other stores,” she said. “The industry is really competitive, but there’s also a lot of nice people who have small businesses. There are creepy people too but I suppose that’s true of an industry.”

Reams aspires to create new classes and programs within the department and hopes to teach a class where students weave their own fabric using a machine to the exact measurements they need to create a garment. “That’s what I’d like to teach here; more of the experimentation and creating something that’s never been created before, instead of learning just skills for the job,” Reams said.

The program has continued to grow and adding faculty like Reams was necessary to meet the demands of the students. “I think there’s a lot more interest in sewing and creating clothes. You wonder if it’s partially Project Runway [a popular Bravo channel reality show.] It’s really created a buzz with kids and they’re thinking, ‘If I see something, I can have it and if I dream it, I can create it.’ I think those two concepts create an interest in fashion,” Reams said.

New York, New York
Students who wish to receive a more hands-on experience can still do so while earning their degree from MSU. In a partnership with the Fashion Institute of Technology, MSU apparel and textile design students can apply to participate in a one-year intensive program at the prominent fashion school to reap benefits of a big city design school and internship placement at the same time. “They would go to New York City for one year, their junior year, and that would go from August through May,” Faulkner said. “They end up having two degrees, an associate’s from FIT and a bachelor’s from Michigan State.”

Every year, MSU has an average of 10 students apply and about five typically get in. While there is no one at FIT from MSU this academic year, seven students applied to participate for the 2007-2008 year. Faulker said most likely three will be accepted. Faulkner is not only in charge of MSU’s side of the partnership, but was once a participant herself when she attended MSU as an undergrad. “I was so thrilled to be accepted and I went and I took children’s wear [at FIT] because we had two children’s wear manufacturers at the time in Michigan and I wanted to stay in Michigan and be employed,” Faulkner said. Her experience at FIT allowed her to achieve this goal.

As more and more schools make the cooperative effort with FIT, the program becomes increasingly competitive. “There used to be just a few they did it with,” Faulkner said. “We were one of the first ones they started the program with but now, there are other schools, so it’s even harder to get it. You have to be pretty qualified and have a good portfolio and sewing experience to get in. It’s beneficial because usually it doesn’t take you longer [to graduate] and you have those two degrees and you get to spend that time in New York City.”

Closely Knit
For the students in the program, creativity comes naturally. The apparel and textile design program is one of MSU’s smaller departments, but has an abundance of passion. “Because it’s so small, everybody knows each other and it’s a tight-knit group of people – we all know each other’s strengths and weaknesses and so when we do group work, it’s not like we’re working with completely random people,” Lerczak said. “Also, I really like that the majority of the people in this major are in SADA, so a lot of the stuff we do in class can relate to SADA and a lot of the stuff we do in SADA can relate to what we do in class.”

Beard has seen placement of many of her students in jobs all over the country and said 25 percent received jobs in New York City last year. “I see a lot of students that have come through my [in-home] sewing school,” Beard said. “And there are some students who were born to construct and create. They think very three-dimensionally and you can explain their two-dimensional design into a three-dimensional product and they do a really good job because they’re able to translate what’s on paper to a pattern to a three-dimensional object.”

The program’s best designers do exactly this when creating garments for Rock ‘N Vogue. This year’s show, where all the garments are inspired by the runway music, will be sure to leave some audience members replacing their everyday Pumas with some suede boots.

Tucked away in one of the oldest areas in the city, 10 blocks of unique Victorian buildings and homes make up Old Town Lansing, the city’s hidden gem. Thanks to community members, the district has been revived over the past 20 or 30 years and within the last two years, has made great strides in bringing back its original 1840s splendor. Old Town now has countless art galleries, shops and eateries that are a perfect fit for young people looking for a cultural vibe, and yet the area has remained somewhat unfamiliar to the MSU community.

“It’s got amazing little shops that you can’t find anywhere in East Lansing,” said Shannon Rolley, an advertising senior and intern for the Old Town Commercial Association (OTCA). “I feel like students don’t really go out of the East Lansing bubble, which is unfortunate. And I was one of them until I got this internship and realized all that Lansing and Old Town have to offer.”

As a result of her internship, Rolley has fallen in love with Old Town. She works directly under the executive director for the association, Jamie Schriner-Hooper. OTCA puts on events, shows, galleries and does publicity throughout the Greater Lansing Area to promote Old Town happenings. “[The] biggest thing we do to promote Old Town as a whole is put on special events,\” Schriner-Hooper said. \”And those events draw thousands of people down to the area.”

Old Town, New Festivals
Old Town hosts events year-round to bring life to the city. This past October saw the first-ever Old Town Oktoberfest, a full day of folk music and bar specials. In February, the first Anti-Valentine’s Day event took place, in which several of the area businesses threw parties, had singles specials and even “tear-up-a-picture-of-your-ex” specials at the bar.

On April 1, the OTCA will put on an event called “Old Town on Ice,” a progressive sampler where people can pay a fee to visit all the area restaurants. Each restaurant in the area has a unique type of food they give out to taste-testers. “You actually walk around and go into the different places,” Schriner-Hooper said. “Vernadine\’s is a soul food restaurant. Pablo’s is the best Mexican food I\’ve ever had, hands down. Relish is a culinary boutique. Papa Leo\’s is a pizza place. Sir Pizza Grand Cafe [is] a pizza place as well. The Old Town Diner is a great diner and there\’s an organic restaurant that\’s opening in next door. The Rendezvous is a bar that has really good sandwiches and pub food.”

Old Town has numerous summer activities for those looking to enjoy the warm weather in a fun atmosphere. “At the end of June, we have the Festival of the Moon and the Festival of the Sun,” Schriner-Hooper said. “The Festival of the Moon is a beer tent with live music. The Festival of the Sun is a huge beer and wine tasting event. They’re just great fun. The Festival of the Sun is what initially introduced me to Old Town, and that was about eight years ago.” The end of the summer also brings the Lansing JazzFest and the Lansing Blues Festival, both held on the streets of Old Town.

Graduate physics student, Josh Veazey, mainly heads down to Old Town for the summer festivals. He has visited the jazz and blues festivals the past two summers. “The blues fest is probably my favorite. It’s probably just my taste of music. All the festivals down there are good,” Veazey said.

Although enjoying Old Town doesn’t have an age stamp, having a bar-ready I.D. does have its benefits. “You don’t have to be 21 to come down, but it does help,” Schriner-Hooper said. “It’s a little more fun if you are.”

Galleries & Grub
Old Town has more to offer students than live music festivals and beer sampling. The everyday life in Old Town can give students an ethnic eating experience, boutiques with unique-to-Lansing items, and art galleries featuring up-and-coming artists. Victorian buildings house these establishments, adding to the aesthetics in the area. The buildings are constantly being restored both on the storefronts and within the walls.

The Old Town shopping atmosphere is very relaxed, and it’s not unusual for the owner to be working behind the register. Getting offered a cup of coffee and some friendly conversation is the norm. The most important thing to the shop owners is not gaining a large profit, but retaining good relations with their clientele and hoping they come back. “It’s a family down here definitely, which is really neat,” said Summer Schriner, owner of the newly-opened clothing boutique, Grace. “It is my friends and family, and they’re all down here. It’s fun because it’s primarily a group of young people who are really just getting started in their professional lives and it’s really neat to be a part of it.”

Schriner and Schriner-Hooper are sisters who have been living in Old Town for about 10 years. In the past two years, they have become extremely involved in the community, with Schriner-Hooper serving as executive director of the OTCA and Schriner opening her boutique. Schriner has nothing but respect and admiration for her sister and what she’s done with Old Town. “I think it’s absolutely incredible,” she said. “It’s just amazing. More and more often, people will approach me and say that ‘Old Town is really making a comeback and it’s really beautiful down here these days.’ And I think it’s just Jamie. She’s worked really hard and it’s obviously really paid off.”

Grace carries hard-to-find quality professional clothing from brand names like BCBG Max Azria, Spanx, Cole Haan and Charles David. Schriner’s store is adorned with simple yet modern fixtures that hold blouses, purses, skirts and accessories. She also has a glass room filled with just one thing – shoes. “I think the shoes and accessories here cater to college [women],” Schriner said. “Especially the shoes. None of us can really resist a cute pair of shoes. We’ve got a whole room full of them here.”

Art gallery and gift boutique October Moon provides unique gifts for people looking to share something with someone else or splurge on themselves. They carry everything from soaps to bath oils to soft hand towels to purses. “There’s nothing in my store that you can find anywhere else,” owner Aura Ozburn said. “We always try to work with local artists, then statewide, then national. We’re also a local independent business, which, unfortunately, East Lansing is pulling away from. It didn’t used to be that way.”

Just across the street sits Relish, a gourmet culinary boutique that sells items that are hard or nearly impossible to find in the Lansing area. Owner John Kodeski makes sure his shelves are lined with food, wine and culinary tools from all over the world. “I have hard-to-find gourmet food products,” he said. “I carry Owen Company – olive oils and vinegars and tapenades. I’m actually the only store in Michigan that carries it. There’s that niche that I fill–just having a place that’s a little more eclectic than your average retail distributor. I have a lot of things that you won’t find anywhere else.”

Kodeski said he is currently in transition, trying to figure out what sells while still keeping the store unique. “As soon as I find something somewhere else, I pull it off the shelves,” he said. “I also carry wine and beer – I’m the only one who carries upper-end wine.”

Old Town has something for everyone, although some boutiques may be a better fit for older undergraduate students, graduate students and young professors. “I have a large population of students, not so much undergrad, but graduate students that come in here and fall all over this stuff,” Kodeski said. “A lot of times they’re from larger cities or places that will have more things than Lansing has to offer. So they’re very pleased with what I have to offer. I have a lot of professors that come in here, too. It’s neat, especially the ones that come from another country – It’s more of a European-style relaxed shopping atmosphere. They don’t have to buy anything. They just come in and see something. They can just sometimes connect with me.”

The area offers a greater selection of unique eateries than most places in the Lansing region. Whether your craving soul food or pizza, an eating experience in Old Town is distinctive. “There’s a Mexican bakery that I like. And there’s another place. It’s a Sir Pizza, but they serve coffee and beer and wine. It’s like a coffee shop setting. It’s nice if you want a quiet night,” Veazey said.

For You, MSU
Aside from the great shoes at Grace, Old Town has a lot to offer students. However, since the closing of Old Town’s biggest MSU attraction this fall, many students have turned their heads away from the area. “Unfortunately, the Temple Club isn’t here anymore which I know is a reason that a lot of students came down,” Rolley said. “But the Creole [Gallery] has amazing shows all the time. They have a lot of jazz performances and a lot of local performers that come down here and it’s just a unique area.”

Spiral Video Dance bar has an eclectic clientele and caters to an 18-and-up crowd. They’re open Wednesday – Sunday every week and have drink specials and guest DJs on Fridays and Saturdays. “We’re trying to get more nightlife down here,” Schriner-Hooper said. “We’re trying to get a great destination restaurant, but that\’s something we\’ve struggled with for a while.”

Perhaps the biggest turnoff students find is the difficulty of transportation. Riding two CATA buses, one of which only loops every 40 minutes, can definitely put a damper on students’ plans. For students with cars, Old Town has plenty of parking, but car-less students may now be in luck. “One of the things that the city of Lansing has been working on is …a trolley that runs on Fridays and Saturdays, called the Entertainment Express,” Schriner-Hooper said. “And the trolley just goes straight down Michigan Avenue right now, but within a year, it’s supposed to come down to Old Town. That will make things a lot easier.”

Students who stay in town for the summer will find that Old Town is a hotspot for activity, even between festivals. From June to October, starting at 6 p.m. every Thursday, there are amateur musicians who flock to Old Town to play music in the park. “Acoustic musicians come here and it’s essentially like a big jam session,” Schriner-Hooper said. “People bring picnics and listen. We get some really good musicians; they split off into different groups. We’ll have one group playing blues and one group playing rock.”

Old Town: Old to Now
Old Town hasn’t always been the growing community it is today. In fact, it has only been in the last 20 or 30 years things have started to pick up. The community has been coming together, and the area has become relatively safer. In the heart of Lansing, Old Town is really a diamond in the rough. “In the 1840s when things started down here, things were great,” Schriner-Hooper said. “This was the original downtown, all the buildings were erected. The area was thriving. That continued over the turn of the century. Then after [World War II], in the ’50s and ’60s, people started moving out to the suburbs. That was the trend: to get out of the cities and move to the suburbs. So as people moved, out it became a ghost town down here.”

After years of failing businesses and a poor reputation, Old Town became home to a group of artists in the 1970s and early 1980s that saw the area’s potential and began the revival. “They were like our Old Town pioneers,” Schriner-Hooper said. “They started buying up buildings and rehabbing buildings and they put in a couple of art galleries. They decided to give the impression that all kinds of things were happening even though they weren’t necessarily going on. They started putting on festivals. And those festivals gave at least the perception that all this cool stuff was going on. After having those first few festivals, then really cool stuff did start going on.”

Although the festivals seemed to bring in the occasional crowd, the community decided it wasn’t enough to continue the rehabilitation of the area on the scale necessary to make it a thriving community. They took it to the next step by forming the Old Town Business and Art Development Association (OTBADA). Making the area a National Mainstreet Program required the area to meet many new guidelines. “The people from OTBADA decided that was too much for them and they decided they just wanted to keep going with their volunteer stuff, so they created the Old Town Commercial Association,” Schriner-Hooper said.

“So that’s where we came from. We picked up from there. We do the more formal things. We work with the city. Over the course of the last 10 years, things have really stepped up. Even in the past two years things have picked up even more. We had Old Town designated as a Michigan Main Street Program and a Cool City under Governor Granholm’s Cool Cities initiative.”

It has been Schriner-Hooper who has taken the past two years to keep the community on track and thriving. The business-owners in the area praise her and her determination to save Old Town. “OTCA has gone through a lot of changes in just who’s running, as well as because it is a non-profit and it’s run by a board,” Ozburn said. “It’s very reflective of the people that are on the board as well as who they hire as a director. Since Jamie Schriner-Hooper has been there, she’s done great. No one has even come close to doing what she has done in a short amount of time. She’s spectacular. I mean, she’s like Lansing’s next mayor. She’s doing this because she loves it.”

Things are Looking Up for Lansing’s Original Downtown
Certainly Schriner-Hooper has had a major impact on the area because buildings are being redone and remodeled everyday. New businesses open all the time and the community continues to grow and change. “In September we did a ribbon-cutting for eight new businesses and we’re planning one in March,” Schriner-Hooper said. “We had about a half-dozen business that either have opened in the past two months or will be opening in the next couple of months. We now have larger organizations coming down here. The governor’s council and physical fitness is coming down here and they\’re all about creating walkable and bikable communities. We have a new photography studio going in and we just had a new women’s clothing boutique open up, and we had a furniture store open up. We have a graphic design company going in a building on the river. Things are just popping up all over.”

Not only is Old Town a thriving area for small businesses and organizations, but above almost every building, new modern loft-style apartments are available. They are the perfect space for people who don’t mind paying a little extra to have their own room. “[The lofts] are really cool. They have about a 16- or 17-foot ceiling, exposed brick walls and original advertising murals on the walls and then hard wood floors, and people love living in an urban environment,” Schriner-Hooper said.

The area no longer has the reputation it once had of a harsh high-crime area in the center of Lansing. Now the streets are alive with trees and brand-new storefronts and customers shopping in the boutiques. “It’s very safe down here,” Kodeski said. “It’s a great community. Everyone knows each other. Everyone knows my kids. So that’s why I’m down here.”

The friendships the businesses and residents build by being a part of the OTCA is very strong. “It’s hard to almost explain,” Ozburn said. “You’re in a city, but you feel like you’re in a small town. We’re sort of hokey in that respect. We have town meetings once a month. But it’s great, you break bread with your neighbors, and I love Old Town. It’s run down to a certain level, but it has heart. I guess it’s like when you look at an old house and you see what it’s going to look like eventually. It has love toward it. That to me, is what Old Town is about.”

The Big Green staff sends our deepest condolences to the family and friends of Robert Busby, a key player in the Old Town revival. He will be missed.

[jam]Music and fashion have a lot of in common- seriously. Popular styles are constantly changing and evolving. Designers and musicians are always striving to produce something unique, trying not to instinctively copy trends they’re familiar with, and at the same time, trying to create a sound or an image that will sell. And often, a sound and image go hand-in-hand.
“When you’re younger, the music you listen to tends to affect your dress,” David Bernath, owner of Flat, Black & Circular, said.
Take a glance around campus and you’ll find people doing just what Bernath claims. Students are able to express themselves openly by wearing whatever they decide to throw on each morning (and sometimes, afternoon if you just happen to snooze through your eight o’clock). Some students try to do it with makeup, others with extravagant clothing. It’s not even uncommon to see neon pink hair on a guy walking down the street, although the same can be said circa 1982. “A lot more extreme styles are accepted these days,” Jon Howard, who has worked for Flat, Black & Ciruclar for 12 years, said. “I used to have spiked hair, and I used to have stuff thrown at me out of car windows while I was walking down the street. Now, your average secretary has spiked hair.”
Out of all the music/fashion overlaps, several have been extremely prevalent and inspirational to the younger generations. Hip-hop has created a unified urban style of dress while punk created a rock n’ roll style that has influenced suburban youth as well as its sister genres. Emo style has ruled the Internet with youtube videos, illegal downloads and pictures of MySpacers staring off into the distance.
EMOtional
[emo3]Emo music listeners are arguably the most mocked – and the fastest-rising – of the bunch, dressing like their idols onstage. Common emo fashion includes guys donning tight womens’ jeans (although it seems very uncomfortable), women in lots of layers and leggings, self-cut hair and a tear on their cheek (a la Johnny Depp in Crybaby).
It’s almost as if everyone is trying to be emo, but no one wants to call themselves emo. “People call me the emo kid of the group. It’s really [that] I don’t have a style. It’s really just whatever I want to wear,” telecommunication sophomore Ronnie Smith said.
So what exactly is an emo kid? It’s hard to say these days. “Emo” has become a generic term for the original word “Emotional,” which was once reserved for emotionally-charged bands like Dashboard Confessional, and is now used to describe anything remotely indie.
Not only are fashion and music emo, but one can have an emo day or emo look just because they’re not smiling. “Everthing is emo now,” Smith said. “Even my buddies, I’ll be listening to 311 or Red Hot Chilli Peppers, who have been around, and they’ll be like ‘Dude, this is so emo.’ They’re like generally defining alternative and rock bands.”
Now that emo has become generalized and very public, a lot of emos are hanging up their girl pants, tossing their super black mascara into the trash and wiping their tears away. Finding an admitted cryer is almost impossible unless you surf for 12-year-olds on MySpace. “I’m not a crier,” Smith said. “The last time I cried was sophomore year of high school, I remember.”
If there’s someone sitting on the street corner crying, don’t automatically consider them emo. There’s a few key things you need to remember about how to categorize someone and hair-cutting, livejournaling emo boy. “My buddy bought loose pants and then sowed it up the leg. Or like excentric wrist bands and necklaces, long hair,” Smith said. “Dyed black or sometimes blonde. Random glasses, random things just to separate themselves from someone else.”
What are emo kids doing in trying to separate themselves from others, if not a little gender bending, crying and hair-dying? “They are trying to be part of something,” Howard said.

Punks These Days
While the Beatles may have influenced thousands of teenage boys to defy their parents and grow their hair past their ears (gasp!), punk music taught them to defy every rule of society since its early 1970s conception and has remained steadfast in its intention, influencing bands up to the current time. “Our music is a fusion of a couple different kinds of music,” Kevin Curtin, lead singer and guitarist of local punk band, The Boxcutters, said. “Its primary punk, but a lot of the song writing is like American folk music. Or American roots music, you could also say. Part of the reason we’d be considered a punk rock band is because of how we dress. Punk is such a distinctive kind of fashion.”
[punk]Punk music has become a lot more pop sensationalized in recent years, but bands like the Boxcutters stay true to the original image and message. Requirements for being a real punk? A rainbow-colored Mohawk, tight pants, bondage straps, Converse shoes and a tight Sex Pistols t-shirt will do the trick. “I would say the main thing is that it’s about…loud, fast and really creative music,” Curtin, who recently graduated from MSU’s journalism school, said. “As for the whole culture thing, in the definition you have to incorporate that it’s a sub culture. Punk’s very underground. It knows itself well. Punk people definitely know their identity.”
The Punk style has been an inspiration for designers and other rock musicans despite the negative connotation of the everpresent ‘f–k off’ attitude the community prides itself on. But when it comes down to it, punk is really about the music, not what you are wearing or what color your hair is. “A lot of the people who listen to punk rock are also really big fans of underground hip-hop and might dress the same,” Curtin said. “Sage Francis and those guys have strong ties to punk. I don’t think it would be out of place to see a punk at a hip-hop show or the other way around.”
Hip Hop Cleans Up
[hiphop2]Journalism sophomore Cierra Middlebrooks just completed an internship with the New York-based independent hip-hop label Sophist Productions. She marketed bands to the local radio stations and did some promoting around campus. She said she considers herself a huge fan of hip-hop. “There’s a guy named Jim Jones,” Middlebrooks said. “He dresses more like a rock star. He wears really tight jeans that you don’t see on most hip-hop artists. Hip-hop is definitely changing. You don’t see the baggy jeans very much anymore. Sometimes, they still wear them a little below their waist, but the jeans aren’t as baggy. ”
Hip-hop has come a long way from its early funk roots. Hip-hop and rap artists now sample everything from classic rock to ’80s pop to musicals. Along with this fusion of so many types of music, hip-hop fashion has changed and evolved, almost as often as Sean Combs has changed his name. The clothing is known for sampling styles from all over the map, just like in the music. “It’s changing and I think Kanye [West] had a lot to do with that,” Middlebrooks said. “But I think it’s a good thing that it’s changing. A lot of guys I went to high school with are starting to change how they dress because of what they see people wearing on TV.”
[kevin]Lately, the hip-hop artists have been doning a much cleaner look on the red carpet. They’ve gone from big sagging jeans, white tees and gold chains to fitted Armani suits with white sneakers, Ray Ban sunglasses and gold chains (some things will never change.) The most influential artists in the business take inspiration from their several places and produce multi-demensional records that have tracks that are both just for dancing and others that hit fans straight in the heart. “The band that you hold in high regard can have a big impact on your life,” Curtin said. “Music can be pretty profound. You tend to dress like the people who are touching you with their art.”
Hip-hop is not alone in drawing influence from different genres. Those who wear the gold chains no longer just listen to the artists who dress like them and the kid walking down the street crying may be a bigger fan of Eminem than you’d guess. Fans enjoy the freedom of moving freely between styles of music even if they stick to one particular style of dress, or none at all. “It’s kind of a melting pot these days,” Howard said.
A Melting Pot It Is
People listen to everything from pop to punk, hardcore rock to hip-hop, oldies and Motown. The average person doesn’t wear spurs or have a mohawk, but rather is a bit of a mix amongst the genres. Most kids’ style, like their music, is far from being influenced by one singular type of music. Students like Shantel Hamilton, a medical technology junior, are a byproduct of this melting pot. “I don’t have a specific type of music that I like the most,” Hamilton said. “It really depends on my mood, what I listen to. It’s the same with what I wear. If I’m really excited I’ll wear bright colors or if I’m feeling mellow, I’ll just put on some jeans and a t-shirt.”
So how do you tell what kind of music someone listens to if you can’t tell by how they dress? Easy. Checking out the latest playlist on their iPod is a good place to start. Those who don’t dress the part are not stopped from listening to what they like. A lack of certain style doesn’t mean a lack of taste when it comes to music. “I’m fashionably-challenged,” Hamilton said. “I’ll just buy something because I like the color and then I’ll get it home and try it on and think, ‘This is the worse shirt I’ve ever bought.’ I just buy something if I think it looks cool or I like the color. I worked at Cold Stone and someone put on a System of the Down CD and I was singing all the words and people were like, ‘You like System of a Down?’ No one would have expected that I like them,” Hamilton said. “I usually would listen to Disney music at work.”
Music magazines are where many artists not only express themselves in interviews, but express their style through photospreads and cover shoots. Photographers for magazines like Rolling Stone have taken famous photographs for covers that have immortalized artists. “That’s one area that you don’t see a lot mixing. You don’t really see people buying <Gold Mine and XXL,” Bernath said.
While you not might see a grey-haired man purchasing this months issue of a hip-hop magazine, you do find that people will buy several different types of rock magazines, everything from Rolling Stone, to Spin, to Paste. Magazines are the best place for fans and aspiring artists to get to know the style of and find inspiration from music stars they emulate. “If you want to look at it in a cultural way, people – regardless of whether it’s because of music or not – will idolize the people they admire,” Curtin said. “If you’re into Paris Hilton, you wear sunglasses and have blonde hair. But if you idolize punk bands, you wear tight jeans and vests and spiked hair and studded belts.”
Fashion has been inspired by music in every way possible. Vintage-looking t-shirts of long deceased bands like the Beatles still pop up in clothing stores. Wedding dresses now come in styles to fit a little more alternative bride. Infamous rockers like Lenny Kravitz have signed up to do ads for large clothing corporations like the Gap. And rarely will you find a clothing commercial that does not have some famous artist’s music in the background. “A lot of people just want to look like rock stars. So they dress just like their favorite rock star,” Hamilton said.
[phones]Whether their favorite rock star is Fergie Ferg or the lead singer from the Panic! At the Disco, students continue to emulate the style of artists they admire. They might grow out their hair, throw on some tight jeans, cry themselves to sleep or dye their hair all the colors of the rainbow, but music fans express themselves in a way that can be entirely unique and original or comfortable and normal. “I guess what it really boils down to, when you look good, you feel good,” Curtin said. “When you’re doing it for yourself, that’s great. When you’re doing it for other people, then it sucks.”