Sarah Jenny

Update: I will be focus on a Leg Avenue brand of hosiery.

I decided to focus on the clothing/textiles/garment industry as the research subject for the rest of the semester. It holds a certain power for me as my maternal lineage consists of tailors, seamstresses, and shoemakers. A common history for Ashkenazim who fled Eastern Europe, my great grandparents settled in the Lower East Side where my great grandmother was a garment industry worker at the notorious Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. As someone who rarely buys “new” clothing (my wardrobe has changed fairly in the past decade with the exception of my penchant for vintage dresses which are now about 50-60 year old garments), I am fascinating about the life cycle of various textiles throughout the world being manufactured at different periods of time.

The textile industry has been wrought with problems at every stage of the life cycle from the poor treatment of workers and working conditions (sweatshops, et. al.) to formaldehyde treated fabric to large companies such as H&M being publicly shamed (and rightfully so) for shredding unsold garments instead of donating them to those in need. I am interested in learning about every stage of the life cycle of this material and product.

Start doing deep dive research into your chosen product to review, focused on product origin, and share your findings on your blog. Where is this product made? What were you not able to discover?

Textiles are made from both organic (as in naturally occuring or plant based materials) and inorganic (as in synthetic) materials. Fibers that make up textiles come from materials more explicitly such as plants (hemp, cotton, linen, bamboo), animal (wool, alpaca, insects (silk), and crude oil(!). Synethic materials are made of all sorts of confusing things.

Textiles used for clothing are frequently made in Bangladesh, China, India and Sri Lanka as wages are significantly lower than for workers in the global north. Not surprisingly, globalization is the most contributing factor to the poor working conditions of garment workers.

From Wikipedia:

“Used, unwearable clothing was once used for quilts, rag, rugs, bandages, and many other household uses. It could also be recycled into paper. Now it is usually thrown away. Used but still wearable clothing can be sold at consignment shops, dress agencies, flea markets, online auction, or donated to charity.

There are many concerns about the life cycle of synthetics which come primarily from petrochemicals. Unlike natural fibers, their source is not renewable (in less than millions of years) and they are not biodegradable.”

However, specific brands work towards running sustainable and ethical business practices ranging from vertical integration to worker owned-cooperative to organic fibers and materials used in their products. Well known American Apparel is one of them (despite the highly sexualized nature of their advertisements…) and assorted manufacturers such as Justice Clothing and No Sweat Apparel.

Below are some of the studies I’ve found:

• Life cycle analysis for cotton and polyester
• Life cycle of clothing
• Playback Clothing Shows Benefits of Recycled Cotton, Bottles With Lifecycle Analysis
• EU COST Action 628: life cycle assessment (LCA) of textile products, eco-efficiency and definition of best available technology (BAT) of textile processing
• Life cycle assessment in woven textiles
• COTTON TEXTILES AND THE ENVIRONMENT: LIFE CYCLE ASSESSMENT OF A BATHROBE
• Sustainable textiles: Life cycle and environmental impact

Midpoint assignment: Present your idea(s) for a final project in 5 minutes. You should have a draft problem statement, goal statement and should describe the type of project you want to pursue. As your problem statement should be a social or political problem, you will take this issue on as your case study for the rest of the semester, tracking developments, news and related projects. You will hereafter be required to update the class twice before the end of the semester on your issue and your project.

Problem Statement Sex workers face a number of barriers when accessing services such as mental health care, social services, STI and HIV screenings. The barriers to access of services are exacerbated by pervasive cultural stigma, legal obstacles, poverty, education, and other factors. In Recent years, mobile technology adoption rates have soared in much of the global south. Unfortunately, HIV/AIDS prevalence is highest in these countries. As such, it seems quite a natural progression for those combating the stigma and the virus (through prevention and care) to utilize mobile technology to increase information access and education.

The U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief has created an extremely difficult climate for NGOs and NPOs who work with sex worker populations to maintain adequate access to funding in their programs due to the require of the Anti-Prostitution Pledge, essentially silencing them by putting restraints on organizations by requiring them to sign an anti-prostitution pledge regardless of whether prostitution is legal, decriminalized, or illegal by their own local laws. These grassroots agencies and organizations are most equipped to identify victims of trafficking as well as to penetrate this difficult to reach population and provide services. PEPFAR’s policy further discriminates against sex workers. For example, Andrew Hunter of the Asia Pacific Network of Sex Workers noted that doctors are not allowed to answer questions regarding what sex health concerns are medically valid around MSM (men having sex with men) sex work. Denial of services and education are not effective HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment policy, plain and simple.

Goal Statement
I intend to continue learning about efforts to use SMS and mobile technology as a means for disseminating information around HIV/AIDS in the global south. I will continue to look at existing programs and policies that are working to make change, it seems, outside of PEPFAR funding. I would like to continue this work, examing what has been effective and through my research and prototyping, make recommendations and continue developing technology on this subject to increase HIV/AIDS prevention and services access to marginalized populations, including by not limited to sex workers, primarily in the global south. I would like to test a pilot program in New York City in conjunction with the Bureau of AIDS and the PROS Network (a coalition of service providers and others providing harm reduction services here in New York City.)

Related Projects

• Text to Change: Text to Change (TTC), a non-profit organization in Africa, has been using mobile technology for health education since 2008. TTC has been running a fun, innovative and practical HIV/AIDS education program in three countries — Uganda, Kenya and Namibia. This program not only educates participants about AIDS but also encourages infected patients to seek medical help and adhere to medication.
• How SMS Could Save Your Life (Wired Magazine): GUGULETHU, South Africa — How do you make the expertise of two doctors and two nurses spread far and wide enough to take care of more than 500 HIV/AIDS patients? In this gritty township, the answer is text messaging.
• Tactical Technology Collective (TTC) – I put out a call for information to harm reduction and sex worker contacts. I received a report back from the Open Society Institute’s Sexual Health and Rights Project (SHARP) which was commissioned in preparation for a 2007 meeting of sex worker activists. It was written by Melissa Gira and Tactical Technology Collective (TTC) and looks at how sex workers groups are using technology in their work.
  Synopsis: I intend to study how SMS and mobile technology is working in the field of HIV prevention in sex worker populations.
• The Aphrodite Project – Sexy GPS Shoes – a project that involved ITP students a few years ago.
• Successful Launch TTC/AIC HIV SMS Quiz Program In Mbarara, Uganda –
• UGANDA: Using mobile phones to fight HIV –
  Text to Change (TTC) , an NGO that uses a bulk short message service (SMS) platform for HIV/AIDS education, recently partnered with the AIDS Information Centre in Uganda (AIC) and Celtel, a local mobile phone network, to pilot a project in western Uganda aimed at communicating knowledge about the disease and encouraging subscribers to volunteer for HIV testing.
• WHO’s HIV/AIDS sex work toolkit –
  In many parts of the world, sex workers have been among the groups most vulnerable to and most affected by HIV since the beginning of the AIDS pandemic.
• Sex Workers and HIV Prevention – Prevention campaigns aimed at sex workers not only reduce the number of HIV infections that result from paid sex; they can also play a vital role in restricting the overall spread of HIV in a country. Proof of this can be seen in countries such as Bangladesh, Benin, Cambodia, the Dominican Republic and Thailand, where general reductions in the national HIV prevalence have been largely attributed to HIV prevention initiatives aimed at sex workers and their clients.
• 
  Ecuador Sex Workers Target HIV-AIDS Prevention – Sex workers in Ecuador are building a national labor network and trying to curb HIV-AIDS, while dealing with the growing presence of minors and undocumented workers in brothels. The first of six stories on Ecuador’s sex industry.

I have been thinking about my midterm project for Mobile Media and have

• Continue working on the Bad Date List project. Incorporate GPS capabilities so users can text in to find resources such as health and social services, and harm reduction facilities for condoms and needle exchange. Collaborate with Matt Swenson to centralize resources for victims of labor trafficking based on geo-location.
• Develop a tool for real time citizen journalism and propose a collaboration with NYC IndyMedia. News would be sent in via mobile devices and could include audio, video, or photos. The data would be displayed in short form feed, similar to Twitter. Users would peer moderate the content by voting it up or down. The feed would be visible on a website.
• Develop an event reminder tool where you can sign up for a reminder text and/or RSVP.
• Develop a “live photo stream” for events where attendees can upload photos from the events in real time to be displayed in microblog/photoblog format.

The last idea I planned out a bit and you can view below. Click the image to enlarge.

Sex Work Issues and the State Legislative Process

Tuesday , February 23rd, 6:00pm-8:30pm
Large Conference Room, Urban Justice Center

123 William St., 16th Fl

New York, NY 10038

Ask most people about government and they tend to talk about their federal representatives, the White House, or maybe the Mayor. But the state government may have the most significant impacts on our daily lives, particularly in the realm of criminal justice. This two hour seminar is presented via a partnership of Sex Work Awareness and the Urban Justice Center’s Sex Workers Project. In it, sex workers, former sex workers, and allies will learn from a veteran staffer of the state legislature how the legislative process works, how to talk to elected officials about sex work issues, and what opportunities exist to engage with elected officials and affect change in Albany.

This is a FREE event, but you must RSVP to info@sexworkawareness.org.

For more information, please contact info@sexworkawareness.org.

Snacks and coffee will be provided.

For this assignment, I interviewed my friend Carmichael who is a 4th street co-op member & has sold local food.  She works at Angelica’s Kitchen, a vegan restaurant that buys local food whenever possible. She would not use the word locavore to describe herself even though this is the term used in our assignment. Carmichael noted that it is nearly, if not simply, impossible to be a “locavore” in New York City. One would only be able to eat locally while food is available in the region. My interview is below:

Q.) Why would you choose to eat local?

• Food tastes better & is fresher.
• it didn’t travel as far, has lower carbon footprint.
• clearer sense of where it comes from as she talks to farms and those in food production
• local food in nyc = smaller scale farms
• organic or done with consideration of the land unlike large scale farms

Q.) When did you first develop consciousness around local food?

• wanted to be a vegan cook as she was a vegan and went to the natural gourmet culinary school in nyc
• she learned about where to get whole foods, not packaged foods and then to co-ops and farmers markets
• when she started working at angelica’s, they got great produce

Q.) Tell me something something you’ve noticed about local foods?

• If you buy local beans, they cook way faster because they haven’t been sitting in a warehouse for a year
• local food tastes better. so many more local options available – local popcorn, grains, and flour. Wildhide Farm at union square and 4th street co-op.

Q.) What foods can you get locally here?

• winter: apples, root veggies, artichokes, turnips, potatoes, grains
• spring: nettles (spinach-like), fiddle-head ferns, baby greens, ramps, garlic scapes,
• summer: tomatoes, summer squash, leafy greens (broccoli, etc.)
• fall: squashes with thicker skins ex. pumpkins and butternut squash, root veggies, onions and garlic.

Q.) Can you tell me about your garden?

• moved to neighborhood to have garden
• put tons of work into a pile of trash yard into a garden. but there was no sunlight.
• also had to deal with aphids. in larva stage, they can already become pregnant. reproduce very fast and then eat the plants. very difficult to get rid of. they also got fungus on pumpkins and then cucumbers and killed them.
• kale, garlic, tomatoes, and herbs were very successful.

Q.) Is eating local affordable?

• yes when it is season.
• co-ops are good because you can get 20%  off.
• CSAs are cheaper.
• winter CSAs also exist with potatoes, spelt, and eggs.

Bad Date Lists have been around for a long time. These lists, which typically manifest as handwritten or printouts of information about bad dates (explained in a moment) gathered by outreach workers as well as sex workers, have been the primary form of distributing the data. In recent years, password-protected website forums and email listservs have also served to disseminate information. In terms of sex work, a bad date refers to a client or law officer (who may also be a client) who has wronged the sex worker in some way. The most common reasons for ending up on a bad date list include refusal to pay, haggling, aggression, stalking, physical or verbal assault, threats, and/or sexual assault or rape.

This information can become out of date quite fast and is limited to geographic areas for print outs and to workers with access to the internet. The reality is, clients travel and so do workers. The idea has been around for a while to create an SMS based-bad date list. There are a number of factors that go along with this new technology:

• How should subscribers be screened?
• How can the data be kept out of the wrong hands?
• How can the data be kept private and safe?
• How can users and developers avoid legal complications form using the service?
• How can the BDL (bad date list) in an SMS-format be developed on a technical level?

As a harm reductionist, community organizer, and technologist, I decided to take on this challenge. Initially I was planning on developing a system for students who receive packages at my graduate program to be pinged by SMS to notify them when a package arrives. However, I decided to give the SMS BDL a try instead for my Mobile Me(dia) class.

Thus far, I’ve been able to receive SMSes and have them written into a PHP MySQL database and furthermore, displayed on a website. The phone number of the person who texts in the information will be omitted but the information they provide will be displayed. I am still figuring out how to add a time/date stamp and how to send data back to subscribers based on keywords such as zipcodes for geographic location.

My prototyping page can be found here.

Here are my notes from Brian’s workshop!

• RAW is good for white balance, contrast, and chromatic aberration
• EV – shortening the exposure time, closing your aperture
• Darkest part set at 128 = midtone
• EXR = 32-bit TIFF. Efficient way of saving HDR image.

Masks

• Don’t use magnetic lasso, use PATHS with the pen tool!
• Hold down command key while you have path tool selected to bring in points
• Hold down option key to create an arrow to rotate lines between points
• The old looking pen thing is the pen tool…paths is located under Layers/Channels/Paths
• Auto Add/Delete  – use this to remove points or to add a point
• Activate the layer to make an adjustment. For example, a color adjustment.  To remove sharp edge,  go to SELECT > Refine Edge.
• CMD + H to hide the “marching ants” (border-y thing)
• If you screw up you can always go back to the master mask.
• Hold down Option and Command keys to select one selection and remove overlapped selection
• Path is a smaller file than a layer
• Cmd + Option + R: Mask menu
• LAB – color space developed in the 1970s.
• CMYK (SWOP) = used for developing plates for printing. it is a narrow color space. Good for press.
• SRGB = generic for screen
• Adobe RGB = Adobe’s…
• ProPhoto RGB = Recommende by Brian. 90% of colors you can get in LAB.
• L stands for Lightness. The value of 1 – 100.  A stands for Magenta/Green. The value of 128 (Magenta) to -128 (Green). B stands for Yellow/Blue. The value to 128 (Yellow) to -128 (Blue).
• Everything you touch a color in RGB you change a value. That does NOT happen in LAB. You can make color changes independent of value.
• PHOTOSHOP: EDIT > Convert to Profile > Destination Space Profile [SELECT LAB].
• You can work in lab then sample down, for example, to AdobeRGB.
• Make an INVERSE of the MASK. Now you have a histogram of, for example, someone’s face. You want to reduce magenta.
• How to lighten a dark dress in LAB: Select Dress > Dupe Background Layer ? Change Blending Mode to SCREEN > (Blends a new layer) > Under Layer Styles remove A and B…keep L (value), thus only screening the value.

How To Reduce Red-Eye

@ Sarah

Red eye reduction is pretty straight forward.
1-using the Marquee tool (m on the keyboard + shift until you get to the ellipse shape).

2- marquee around the red pupil.

3-add a adjustment layer> hue saturation.

4-desaturate the eye.

5- soften the selection using select> refine edges (command option-r).  Use the feather slider to soften the edge transition.

6. if you want to make the pupil darker you can use the brighteness option in hue/saturation. While  I don’t use this adjustment layer to alter value ever, it is such a basic move, the penalty for doing so is low.