Definition Essay: The Color Pink

Words: 857
Pages: 4

My friend Mari has bold, pastel pink hair. She didn’t just dye a few strands; Mari dyed her whole head of hair the color of bubblegum. Not only this, but her social media usernames are all variations of the words “pink gal.” This, of course, naturally led to her being known as the pink-haired girl around my school. However, she recently pointed out to me that she didn’t always embrace pink in such a way. In fact, in middle school, she used to purposely distance herself from it, claiming to hate pink in all circumstances. This struck me as odd -- the fact that during her adolescence, she has both despised and welcomed the color pink. Her relationship with said color has been a defining aspect of her person throughout the years… But why does …show more content…
From even before birth, a fetus is assigned a color dependent on what doctors expect their genitals to be. Once given a color, it will be integrated in the child’s clothing, bedroom walls, decor, toys, and plenty more. For women, this designated color is pink. This concept of the color pink and femininity intertwining is pushed heavily onto developing children. Therefore, when a young girl rejects this color, she is making a deliberate statement against what she has been taught. The separation of oneself from the color pink causes the person to present in a more masculine way. In Mari’s case, this detachment ultimately rooted from her passion for primarily male academics. Mari has always been very invested in her mathematics and science courses that she has taken throughout her academic career. Being her favorite courses, she obviously tried her best to fill up her schedules with classes that reflected as such. However, according to the National Girls Collaborative Project, women “receive far fewer [bachelor’s degrees] in the computer sciences (18.2%), engineering (19.2%), physics (19.1%), and mathematics and statistics (43.1%).” Therefore, she had dedicated herself to courses with not much female influence. Without much feminine role models in