An Introduction to Inclusion

I’m a size four most of the time. I can never order dresses online because I have a short torso and long legs that follow a set of wider hips. My favorite cheetah jacket is a size large, my comfiest sweater is a small and I have two favorite pants from Lululemon—one’s a size six, the other a two. Although I don’t fit into just one size—or even just two—I still feel confident in my body. Like any other person, it did take me a while to get there. But now that I like the way I look, I feel happy.

As much as I have learned to love my body, there will always be moments that I feel insecure and question myself. I try not to, but it’s hard to feel confident all the time when the word beautiful is often associated with Victoria’s Secret models. If I eat the right amount of food and exercise as much as I can, why aren’t there any famous models with a body like mine?

In the past few years, magazines like Sports Illustrated, brands like Aerie and Forever 21 and organizations like the Council of Fashion Designers of America have made sufficient efforts to add plussize models to runways and the media. These changes have shown the 67 percent of American women who are plus-size that they are just as beautiful and just as “real” as everyone else.

While these improvements in the fashion industry have been influential, it’s not enough. There is an entire other category—the “Inbetweeners” we will call them—that aren’t represented in the spotlight. Nowadays, there aren’t just “body types” to define how a person looks.

If the fashion industry, clothing companies and other corporations really want to effectively gain the respect of all types, these Inbetweener models need to be included. For young girls and boys, there is no better way to teach them to love themselves than including all types of individuals in the “beautiful” stereotype.

The pressures of looking a certain way on the runway and in media is very prominent for males, too. From six packs to V-lines, our society has taught us that these men are perfect. This shows that, although there may not be as prominent of a body-positivemovement for male models as there is for female ones, it ought to be addressed.

For instance, when you Google “Male Runway Models”, the first thing to come up is an article by The Balance. The headline snippet reads, “... in general male runway models should: Be between 6' and 6'2'' tall, Have a 38'' to 40'' chest, Have a 30'' to 32'' waist.”

I didn’t Google “male model requirements,” yet the first thing to appear is a description of an ideal type of man, demonstrating how the fashion industry unfairly caters to more fit male models. Here, it is easy to see a problematic pressure that the modeling industry places on their male models. It suggests to young boys that if there is any difference between one body and another that fulfills these requirements, then the former is not good enough.

“Today, we have ‘plus-size models’ and then just ‘models.’ We don’t have a name for the super-skinny models. Scholarship would say there's a term for that called exnomination,” said Dr. Ron Becker, a professor of media and culture at Miami. “An example of exnomination is saying basketball and women’s basketball. When you have a name attached to specify a certain group, but the other one isn’t called out as anything, that’s evidence that the unlabeled one is the norm; the thing you're supposed to follow. A tip for social change that would come out of that class would be to come up with a name for the skinny models. Which would shift how people thought about them.”

By limiting the types of models in the media and on the runway and labeling them in a certain way, it is harder to accept changes that should be made in the fashion industry.

Caroline O’Connor, a model for Miami University Fashion and Design, recognizes the issue of body image in fashion. O'Connor has struggled with her self-image, but decided she had to make a change to strive for health, and not society's image of perfection.

“Through fitness and nutrition, I learned to love myself and accept my body just the way it is,” O’Connor said. “Our bodies give us the ability to live life to the fullest and I think there is no better way to show self-love than by taking care of it and keeping it healthy.”

O’Connor spends a lot of her time in front of the camera and on the runway. Through her own experience, she sees that there are still major changes that need to be made in the industry. “The shift needs to be in the mindset of the business, not just in the variety of bodies appearing on the runway,” O’Connor said. “When the mindset changes, then the public will begin to see those changes reflected in the media.”

written by Emma Nolan

styled by Coquise Frost

models: Rose Naylor, Gabby Brown, and Kelly Milan

photographed by Allison Jenkins