Artist Statement

​

Jaden Slavens

Maddie Kahl

ENC 2135-0142

22 April 2018

 

Artist Statement

 

Flyer

            I composed an informational flyer to show that eating disorders in the dance world are more common than one might think because of the stigma around not talking about your disorder in the dance industry. I included symptoms to look for in people with an eating disorder so that people can look out for those symptoms in either themselves or others and get help.

            I have composed in this genre for high school projects.

            I originally thought about doing a poster, but then realized that with a flyer I could theoretically print many out and would be much more efficient and more people would see it.

            For this genre, I google searched a flyer template and downloaded one that was originally designed to be a template for a mental health and depression informational flyer, so I thought it would be the most relevant. I then filled the flyer with information and facts about eating disorders, symptoms of eating disorders, and designed it in a way that I believed looked the best. I also included a hotline to call for help.

            This genre would be posted in the halls the school of dance at Florida State University.

            The audience for this genre is dancers at the dance school at Florida State University so that they can understand that the symptoms they or their friends are having are serious issues that need to be dealt with.

           

 

Twitter

 

I composed in this genre because I felt like this was a good way to reach out to a larger audience, and there are many twitter accounts promoting beating eating disorders, so it is easy and convenient to interact with others either struggling with eating disorders, or programs to help those people struggling. I noticed that there is a community of teens on twitter with eating disorders that connect through posting about recovery and using hashtags like #EDRecovery.

I have composed in this genre before, as I have a personal twitter account.

I knew from the beginning that I wanted to do a twitter because I knew that would be a good way to get information out to the masses.

 To create this twitter account, I went to twitter.com and created an account with the username @dancendisorders. I then started searching under “eating disorder”, “anorexia”, “dance”, “ballet”, etc., and followed about 30 accounts that related to my research question. I then began tweeting basic facts about eating disorders and the link between eating disorders and dance. I went to my feed and started retweeting tweets from other accounts that seemed relevant. I also used relevant hashtags and tagged other accounts in some of my posted to stay connected. Every day or so I would tweet and retweet others tweets by looking up hashtags or looking at my feed.

In the real world, this genre is posted on twitter.com, where anyone can search accounts, key words, or hashtags and find my account to learn more about eating disorders and dance.

This genre reaches a new audience than my other genres because through twitter, I can reach those who are a part of the twitter community who either are interested in learning more about eating disorders or has an eating disorder and are a part of the eating disorder twitter community.

 

Newspaper Article

 

            I composed in this genre because I wanted a genre that could be considered a pathos piece, appealing to the emotions rather than just facts. By using this interview, people can see an inside look on why so many dancers have eating disorders, and how the dance industry makes people feel so insecure.

            I have never composed a piece in this genre.

            I started with a PowerPoint instead, but then I realized in reality that is not a very effective way of communicating this information to who I want to.

            First, I downloaded a newspaper article template from an online teaching website. I then reread my interview with Emily Marshall so it was fresh in my mind. Next, I formatted the newspaper how I wanted and began writing a fake article based on an interview including all the reasons Emily thought are why so many dancers have eating disorders. I added a picture and a heading, then downloaded the final product.

            This article would be “posted” in a newspaper or magazine revolving dance, bringing light to the fact that many dancers have serious security issues, and explaining why so many dancers are so insecure.

            The audience for this article are people who are in the industry and would read a newspaper focused on dance but may not know the inside scoop on the magnitude of the issue of eating disorders, and how dancers really feel about diets and their bodies.