When I started this project, I knew right away that I wanted to focus on Hudson Westbrook’s Painted You Pretty. I listen to the song all the time, and I'm absolutely amazed by the metaphors in the lyrics. At first, I thought my essay would be about these metaphors themselves, but as I started digging into sources, my focus shifted to the effect of those metaphors–specifically how comparing a woman to a painting interacts with concepts like idealization and objectification. Moreover, finding sources was a mixed experience. The article on metaphors was easy to locate, but the verywellmind article on the male gaze and the Fiveable study guide on the idealization of women took more effort. Neither one directly analyzed Westbrook’s song, but reading them helped me make connections between the concepts and the lyrics. I had to think creatively about how to link the song to the ideas I was reading about and then tie this into my personal experiences, which was exciting but also challenging.
Evaluating sources and figuring out which ones fit my essay wasn’t always straightforward. I realized I didn’t have to agree with everything a source said for it to be useful. For example, some of the ideas I read suggested that Painted You Pretty idealizes the woman in a way that fulfills the male gaze. I ended up disagreeing with that and used the sources to show how Westbrook’s admiration actually empowers and celebrates individuality. Engaging with these sources also changed the way I think about other media I consume. I started noticing the male gaze in Disney movies, music videos, and other media, which gave me a new lens for analyzing the song. Understanding these frameworks helped me see why I connect with it so strongly–it feels personal and empowering, rather than objectifying. Interestingly, when I started writing my paper I had no idea that this is why I felt so connected to the song.
The hardest part of this research was putting all my thoughts into words. I had a lot of ideas in my head, and the connections I was making between the song, the metaphors, and the male gaze felt clear there. However, translating them onto paper was more difficult than I anticipated. Initially, my writing felt scattered, and I had to revise a lot to make my argument coherent. Working with the sources helped me push through that. Writing rhetorical summaries showed me how authors make intentional choices for specific audiences, which gave me strategies for structuring my own analysis. By reflecting on these sources and my research process, I feel like I’m already learning so much about thinking critically and conducting meaningful research in the writing process.