Blog 2 – Creative Practice Reflection
I was very clear about my selection for the Better Lives project. I have a strong interest in Public Relations and wanted to collaborate with the PR teaching team. As a Fashion Journalism Student, you are told that PR holds significant importance in being the link between journalists and brands. Most of the lectures held centered around social responsibility and the way it can be in cooperated in campaigns. We started by reflecting on how PR works and focused next on target audiences. It is very important to understand the customer in order to be able to create a customer profile and think about a cause they would be interested in.
I chose to work on Grace Wales Bonner. I was drawn to the brand due to her innovative approach to masculinity and her background as a creative of color marrying her identity with her work.
Creatively collaborating with students from other courses challenged my work ethic. I am someone who has bad timekeeping skills and submits work last minute. Working in a group required me to adapt to coordination and contribute my work so it could be edited together. Diversity has played an important role in the lectures. We were taught how privilege is ingrained in every aspect of life. In our group setting people from different abilities and privileges came together. Acknowledging and accommodating to their needs was an important factor of the collaborative work that wasn’t acknowledged.
Working with other people is an effort for me as I enjoy independent tasks. I don’t think I will be actively seeking to work with others in the future. Most of the times I felt not being able to voice my opinion and being silenced by more vocal team members. The tutors encouraged collaboration but were not able to control the group dynamic outside of class. It was decided to set up an Instagram group. Early into the project, it became apparent who was invested in the project and who wasn’t. Motivated students distributed the tasks. This led to me disengaging from the entire project.
Furthermore, the pandemic discouraged me to contribute my ideas. I was initially on-board to explore a cause that thematized the Windrush Generation, something Wales Bonner would be able to get behind. However, we as a group decided to go with the easiest cause and work collaboratively on a Google Doc.
Better Lives has not introduced a new way of working to me. However, I thoroughly enjoyed the lectures and the teaching by the PR team. The only skill I have acquired is working with Google Docs remotely. Something I am keen on learning in the future is to be able to bring in my ideas within a group and not feel gaslight.