Reflection Letter

Instead of posting my entire reflection letter, I decided to only post my reflection on this assignment. Overall, I really enjoyed writing this paper and learning about cultural myths and stereotypes. I think that it is really important to understand who we are rather than who we think we should be or how society defines us because we are the ones who dictate how we live our life and the choices that we make. While parts of our identity such as gender, race, religion, etc. can serve to define us in some ways, it is up to us to decide how we want people to view us and how we want to be perceived. The issue of identity is something that fascinates me because identity is so multifaceted and how we define ourselves is constantly changing. Writing this paper helped me delve deeper into what it means to have an identity and what it means to be aligned with a certain group. I never realized that there could be so much research and information about blondes in society and the historical roots of blonde myths, but I enjoyed learning about the roots of the contemporary blonde identity. It is incredibly rewarding to produce a paper of this magnitude and although it sounds cheesy, I enjoyed my topic so much that writing it didn't really seem like an assignment. The sources that I found were very relatable and interesting to read and as nerdy as it sounds this is a topic that I may further explore. It's crazy how much one stereotype can be exploited and how relevant stereotypes are in the American society. While we are much more open than decades ago, it is still human nature to judge people by appearances and I think the conclusion that we all made in writing these papers is that generalizations don't apply to each individual of a certain group or population. Therefore, I ended my paper by saying that when it comes to the roots of what it really means to be blonde, it is not up to society to dictate, but rather it is up to each individual woman to decide.