#with this in mind her race does affect those standards and it certainly impacts her social status & rights; Jack's opinion that she could be

[emcads]

okay i know i joke about esmeralda being this icon of femininity that teaches the other characters how to do their makeup or how to achieve the current fashions but something that just. hits different. about esmeralda and her connection with beauty/femininity is that it’s completely manufactured and generated: makeup is painted and removed, clothes are woven and sewn into garments,  it isn’t a natural beauty or a beauty of purity but one that is created out of her own action  (although she shares a lot of these generative, traditionally feminine symbols with Amenirdis like clothing, contrast this with Amenirdis’ natural state being the one of beauty and her illusory state being one of ugliness) in fact Esmeralda is specifically referenced as unnatural and unholy during her fight with Bainbridge: 

“Impossible! No woman could captain a vessel. That would be unnatural, a violation of the laws of God and man. The…the Almighty would never permit it.”

granted he’s fairly drunk but there’s a line he crosses when he learns the captain is a female: it’s no longer an earthly issue of legal property rights or the physical altercation or even sailor superstition, instead his attacks are moral/spiritual and invoking God.  he’s right in that Esmeralda is not a natural woman, existing in a “pure” state of womanhood or trying to portray that state falsely: she crossdresses, she wears makeup, she is indulgent and violent and lascivious. she is beautiful but she is the furthest thing from the eighteenth century ideal of the white, docile, English beauty;  Jack thinks of her only as a lady but we know whatever class Esmeralda has is not due to her by birthright from Spain, with an indigenous mother she does not have the “pure” bloodlines of European class and the benefits that go with that. ( if she had them, it was at Don Rafael’s efforts, and her parents’ murders/the burning of his estate demonstrate colonial society’s resistance to that deviation )  her nobility as perceived by Jack is thus something contrived and manufactured outside of right of blood, law, or society.  ( but more than an equal to theirs, thus exposing their own standards as contrived, but I digress ). she’s placed into a convent but instead of devoting life to god / abstinence / purity, she chooses masculinity: crossdressing, having sex with men, wielding a sword (read: the phallic symbol) and taking life rather than creating it. and yet she maintains sex appeal for men and unquestionable femininity: 

“Jack began kissing her hands, short-nailed and strong from work, but they were well-tended and feminine. He could never have mistaken them for a man’s hands.”

in her hands –– which are the agents of creation and generation –– there’s masculine behavior (wielding a sword, tending ropes at sea) matched with feminine shape and behavior (managing her appearance, softness in care to self ). without going too much into it I think what I’m starting to get at is the Eve/Lilith dichotomy, and while Esmeralda absolutely does top Jack and see herself as more than equal to men I’m more interested in Lilith’s pursuit: 

“The angels left God and pursued Lilith, whom they overtook in the midst of the sea, in the mighty waters wherein the Egyptians were destined to drown. They told her God's word, but she did not wish to return. The angels said, 'We shall drown you in the sea.’“

the sea is something feminine that gives life, to sailors it gives death. to Jack the sea means freedom and rebirth;  to Esmeralda the sea has only ever meant blood, conquest, revenge, and death. 

#// long post #i need to read up more on lilith before i start spouting more bullshit but thoughts are Forming in my brain about shipwreck cove as eden #( literally a city of plenty and based in life-giving water; safe and unseen to the outside world ) #and esmeralda as she's shown in shipwreck as eve whereas esmeralda post shipwreck after she's gained her captaincy as lilith #jack drinks his respect women juice so he always sees her as beautiful and amazing no matter what / he's impressed with her captaincy & more #masculine traits ( but taken in the context that jack is antithetical to the values of mainstream society & struggles against them too ) #also in terms of lilith topping see bainbridge not letting himself be ''plundered'' by a woman or metaphorically ''topped'' by one #so much there. no much juicy content in a potc prequel novel. in the r rated crispin cut esme probably tops jack. #but we are forced to wonder #✘; IN A WORLD WITHOUT GOLD，WE MIGHT HAVE BEEN HEROES ( headcanon ) #how the fuck did i start at ''esme is a beauty influencer lol'' and end up at ''esme is lilith'' #goddamn academia brain fuck off #also i want to be clear that i only briefly mentioned race here because especially in context with amenirdis esmeralda's #race plays a far less significant part in the events of the book than it does to the princess so i feel i should distinguish between #esmeralda being judged as less eurocentrically feminine vs. amenirdis literally being enslaved #with this in mind her race does affect those standards and it certainly impacts her social status & rights; Jack's opinion that she could be #a lady of court is simply not true and if she were she would be rejected #crispin is careful about this but the implication that it was the 'marriage' of her father and mother that caused the uprising of local #white europeans ( NOT the sex or lust but the legal and societal validation ) #it changes her sense of self from what it would have been as illegitimate but she has seen the evidence of the violence the world (europe) #will do. she has the deaths of her parents to reckon with as people who transgressed past those boundaries and she is the manifestation of #the ''crimes'' against spain which would see them murdered for it #anyway i wrote a whole other essay in the tags whoops

[theafroglow]

excerpts introducing each section of Woodward Academy’s award-winning “Silent Voices” student literary magazine: 

Foreword

en·dan·gered spe·cies

noun

a species of animal or plant that is seriously at risk of extinction.

16,306 species are listed by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature as endangered. Each species becomes endangered in different ways – loss of habitat, overhunting, disease, climate change – but a common thread throughout each endangerment is human interaction and influence. Still, we could not be less concerned.

We think we are above it all. That, as humans, we are so intellectually superior that we are untouchable, immortal, and immune from the the disease spread by our touch. When in reality, we too must be infected to infect others.

We have caused almost as much ruin to ourselves and the most precious and malleable of our kind, our youth, as we have to the species we have threatened or wiped out. As humans, we have constructed a society that has endangered the American Teen, killing our youth’s confidence, sense of self, passion, and will to carry on, expecting so little, yet so much. But as teens, we may not even know we are on the edge of losing ourselves, impacted by everything, noticing nothing.

In this edition, we raise awareness about the American Teen, an endangered species on the brink of obsolescence, caged and held captive by societal expectations and limitations. Disconnected from what truly makes us teenagers: the wonder of life, finding ourselves on our terms, leaving our hearts to people and places for the first time, dreaming we can make a difference in the world, and genuinely believing we can realize those dreams. At the beginning of our path towards fulfillment, society stops us in our tracks by determining our intellect with standardized tests, calculating our self worth by the number of likes we get on Instagram, stripping away creativity and abstract thinking for regurgitation of information, and creating unrealistic, heavily photoshopped perceptions of the perfect human to compare us to.

Our leaders talk about progress and pushing towards the future, but with a species so stunted in its growth, on the edge of desolation, we can never be allowed to evolve any further. Through six chapters, we discover the factors of the American Teen that are endangered by modern society and their level of endangerment in hopes that you can help us change the outcome. The survival of our youth and the future of the human race depends on it. We are worth saving.

Chapter 1: Artistry (Vulnerable)

While the craft employs technique and talent, artistry in its purest form is a practice that does not demand perfect formulas or equations, but an untamed urge to create for the sake of expression. Artists express themselves by hurling the words they cannot say, the pain they long to forget but cannot shake, and the feelings they cannot communicate onto a canvas. But the viewers of the art tap into their own deep-seated emotions to empathize with each piece, interpreting it as if it were made for them, by them.

Now, everything is calculated. Anything not related to STEM is now considered useless by many in the federal government who propose legislation to cut funding for the arts in public schools and eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Right now, teen artists are being told to take a seat at the kitchen table, drop their paintbrushes and charcoal, get serious, and look at the “big picture:” higher paying technical jobs are the only careers that will prevent them from falling into the black hole of poverty, a darkness people are easily sucked into, but almost never escape. Nothing but technology and innovation will propel the United States forward in the global market and the human race into the future.

But what future, what world, does any teenager want to live in without music or movies? Without the secret, sappy love poems written at night when you’re smiling so hard you just can’t fall asleep? Without your favorite beaten-up, dog-eared books that you take off the shelf shelf from time to time to look at teardrop stains blurring certain words and reminisce on how you felt when you first read it? We’d rather go extinct and have power-hungry corporate robots assume our place, which will eventually happen if we continue on the path we are now.

In this section, we explore what art should be – the untainted beauty and effusion of the artist – what it shouldn’t – a definite shape with a specific form molded and cropped by society – and the inevitable loss of art as the world continues to prioritize robotization and perfection over creativity and beautiful mistakes.

Chapter 2: Health (Near Threatened)

Our bodies are vessels, vehicles we maneuver throughout our lives to get from one place to another. Sitting in the driver’s seat, some of us are able to travel safely and quickly with ease, one hand on the steering wheel, the other searching for lipgloss in the glove compartment. Some of us don’t have to focus. Some of us don’t have to try. Some of us know they will get where they’re supposed to go.

For the rest of us, our vehicles work a bit differently, but no mechanic seems to know exactly why or how to fix them. Some days we are able to drive around just fine, our mental and physical health not affecting our daily lives. Some days we relapse and are caught in a tailspin, leaving a wreckage of cars behind us which honk and holler, but we have no control. Some days we drive through the endless pitch black tunnel that is our minds, with little to no light up ahead.

Yet, our GPS still tells us to keep driving as normal. To exhaust our engines trying to get to a light that seems miles down the road. They throw doctors, psychiatrists and piles of pills our way to keep our engines going for a little while, but we don’t even feel like we’re moving anymore. We stay in neutral, unable to feel anything good or bad, helplessly pounding on the accelerator but getting nowhere. More than anything, we wish to get out of the car and take a real step forward in our mental and physical health, realizing that the industry charged with tuning up our bodies focuses on treatments that improve their fiscal bottom line. Never on a cure that will fix our maladies permanently.

In this section, we discover how our bodies, the carriers that harbor our most precious cargo -- our hearts, minds and souls --  are not our own. They are affected both internally, by predetermined condition, and externally, by those who wish to take advantage of us.

Chapter 3: Home (Threatened)

A home is a habitat for the human. Since the origination of our species, we have found the basic needs from Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs -- food, water, warmth, rest, and shelter -- within our homes. Without these baseline needs, we we wouldn’t be able to strive for love, belongingness, esteem, or self-actualization, most of which many homes also provide or contribute to.

Our homes are meant to provide a sense of security, as we enter the front door and slam the cruelties and judgements of the world out, then proceed to kick off our shoes and follow the engrossing smell of our mother’s homemade soup to the kitchen table. A sense of identity, as we explore the history, hardships, and traits of our people, who once inhabited our homes or homelands. A sense of love, as we nestle into the couch alongside a loved one and sit there together, exchanging energy, wisdom, secret family recipes, the worst and best parts of ourselves that we wouldn’t dare share with anyone who wasn’t forced to love us by the bond of blood.

But now we have compounded and confined this gargantuan, amorphous interpretation of home into four expensive glass walls, shiny, bright, and easily shattered, broken by actions beyond our control: separation, greed, divorce, and death. Someone always moves forward while another gets left behind, perhaps at the expense of the other, yet home is supposed to be the place that binds us all.

In this section, we see just how easy our homes, the brick walls sealed with mortar that we believed would withstand any storm, can fall to pieces with one slight blow.

Chapter 4: Relationships (Endangered)

Love has never been an easy thing. There’s always been awkward hand holding in the tub of movie theatre popcorn, writing “Do you like me? Yes or No” on a sheet of paper and sliding it to your crush across the classroom, and praying to God that you won’t trip over your words when you meet his or her parents for the first time. But it certainly was easier before the internet and social media came into play. Now we are in relationships with our phones, attempting to communicate messy, fuzzy feelings through a piece of cold, hard metal and black glass. We’ve taken “playing games” to the next level, constructing an algorithm of the appropriate amount of time to respond to a text or Snapchat for optimal interest: open the message at exactly double the amount of time it took the other person to open the message, and respond in at least double the amount of time it took the other to respond. You can’t use too many bitmojis or emojis to carry on the conversation, but you also can’t nix them completely, because then you’ll seem like you don’t have a personality or sense of humor.

On our social media accounts, we brand ourselves as completely different people. With the right lighting, camera quality, punny caption, and clothes showing off a Kylie Jenner-approved amount of skin, we display the most beautiful, likeable, funny, sexy, and witty versions of ourselves. We put on that same surface level front in our relationships, calculating every joke and flirtatious jab we make at the other to match the images we’ve constructed. It’s hard to make a real connection or find “the one” when we don’t even truly know the person we are posting mushy couple photos with. When we do finally lay rest to our guises and allow ourselves to be authentic and vulnerable with people, that’s a huge deal.

It’s scary and amazing to be human with another human. To tell them your deepest fears and share your worst memories. To show them your weird quirks and stay up all night on FaceTime looking at each other and marveling at the other’s smile, saying you’re going to go to bed in five minutes every 15 minutes. To tell them the truth about who you are, what you believe, where you’ve been, and where you want to go. To hear them say they’ll join you on your journey to that place.

But that feeling either fades elegantly or is severed violently and unexpectedly. Both hurt. Both make you feel like you made a mistake by dropping the facade. Both make you feel worthless. Both make you attempt to become the person you think the other would want, somehow thinking that it isn’t too late to at least make them regret it. Both make you wonder what you could have done differently. Both make you cling to the future, the only place where you can rebuild your image.

But that means it wasn’t love, because if you loved that person, you wouldn’t be able to mend your broken heart by retreating back to social media for validation, posting a #PostBreakup selfie and then methodically scrolling through every like and reassuring comment. Real love is gone. Real human connection is few and far between.

In this section, we see the highs and lows of relationships and how we deal with those in comparison to past generations.

Chapter 5: Identity (Critically Endangered)

Confined to a cubicle hedged with two-way mirrors like the ones you’d find in a police station’s interrogation room, we sit and stare at ourselves, unaware of the crowd lining up on the other side to behold and take pictures with the rare beast. A creature coined as both weak and dangerous. Both ugly and exotic. Both useless and entitled.

We grow up in captivity being told we are in control of our mind, thoughts, and opinions. That we are the masters of our fates and shape our our own identities. But in reality, we are products of our environment, which requires each one of us to strive for a specific hair texture. A specific gender role. A specific balance between prude and slut. A specific skin color. A specific sexual orientation. A specific religion. A specific norm that society is familiar with and understands so they’re not afraid of it.

We do tricks and perform for an audience we cannot even see -- that does not know us, understand us, or relate to who we are or what we can become -- to be rewarded with a scratch behind the ear, a new toy, or food to keep us quiet. We shape shift and contort ourselves, ripping out wads of hair, scratching away skin cells, removing our religious garb, or covering our distracting shoulders to fit into narrow crates they can seal, label, rate, and determine if we’re worth keeping, killing, or shipping off to the next zoo.

We pay attention to their judgements. We listen. We jump for joy at their validation and sadly accept and apply their criticisms. They give us ideals to reach for, standards to aspire to, but constantly remind us we are nothing less or more than everything they say we are, and we’re okay with that. In this section, we explore how our harsh, judgmental society impacts our sense of self.

Chapter 6: Hope (Extinct)

Hope is believing in the endless possibilities and continuation of life and evolution. Hope is believing things will be different. That we can constantly die and be reborn again as people slightly better than we were yesterday. When we didn’t have anything, we had Hope, but society has abused our Hope to the point where we don’t even recognize its face anymore.

We search for it in a crowd, but we can’t seem to find it. We only see endless streaming videos of police brutality and bloodshed. We see corrupt government leaders suggesting paths that do not reflect the better nature of men. We see people who are supposed to be role models relishing in the destruction of our planet, and people in the pursuit of power above all else. We see the good guy, capable of making significant positive change in the world, silenced and pushed to the side. We see our parents crumble before us, admitting they don’t have all the answers, who cry at night when they think about the uncertainty of our futures.

Hope says, “Enough is enough,” but feels like an unwanted guest at a dinner party. Hope doesn’t make a scene, doesn’t say goodbye. Hope just exits. Goes home, takes a cold shower, gets into bed, and fades away as fast as it falls asleep.

In the morning, we feel the shift. We feel the loss. But we can’t ever put a name to it. Hope is eradicated from our vocabularies. We stop looking for it in the crowd, because we are convinced it never existed to begin with.

This is the greatest endangerment to the American teenager, who was built upon hope. In this section, we attempt to repopulate Hope by recognizing that we lack it and realizing we must become it.

Conclusion

When beings from other nations or planets look at the remains of the long extinct American Teen, we don’t want them to say we sat and watched as our fellow man wiped us out. We don’t want them to say we didn’t care. About authenticity, ambition, growing into the most awkward parts of our bodies and emotions, making mistakes and learning from them, falling in and out of love, blaring music in the car on the highway, putting ourselves down and picking ourselves back up time and time again. About what it means to be a teenager. Because we care. We care enough to write these words for you in hope that you’ll understand. That you’ll become aware that we are an endangered species, becoming increasingly rare everyday with every part of ourselves that is manipulated by society. That you’ll have the courage to make a change before it’s too late.

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