Emily Ratajkowski Shares Swimsuit Photos Reading "Working Girl"
Emily Ratajkowski boldly challenges conventional notions of empowerment. The model and author has once again ignited conversation by sharing a swimsuit-clad photo from within her house. The image echoes her ongoing exploration of empowerment, as she delves into the complexities of image commodification and self-objectification. In her book My Body, Ratajkowski traverses the intricate landscape of her journey, addressing the multifaceted dimensions of power, sexuality, and feminism. With candor, she questions the dynamics that underpin empowerment and invites us all to contemplate the nuanced shades within. (In the new photo, she is holding the book Working Girl: On Selling Art and Selling Sex.) Read on to hear her thoughts on all this and to see the photos she has shared to continue the conversation.
A Booster for Empowerment
Ratajkowski wrote a book called My Body with a purpose in mind "I think that I was a young woman who a lot of people looked to as this example of empowerment through capitalizing off of the way I looked off of my sexuality, and I wanted to tell the whole story to that. I think that it's not just as simple as power is equals sexualizing yourself, being a model, being beautiful. There's obviously so many ways that I've been empowered. I found fame and success, but especially for young girls, I wanted them to understand the whole story," she said on The View.
Advice For Young Women
"I think in general, young women, you kind of have this feeling when you're 19 that you own the world," she said on The View. "You're beautiful, you're getting this attention, and I think that you can sort of think that you are the one in power. You're the one in charge when you're actually being taken advantage of. And I think that's why so many women when they look back on their lives, say like, wow, I was a child then. I didn't realize for young models specifically, you're taught that what I was saying about the Blurred Lines video"—in which she appeared without clothes—"that there's someone who's prettier, who's more agreeable, who's not going to waste any money your time on set. So just don't make a big fuss. I wish that I had learned that."
She Has a Signature Scent
About her book, she says, "Well, all the essays are about kind of relationships or experiences I've had with my body, whether it be through modeling as a commodity or as a young woman developing into a woman's figure when I was still very young. And I also liked the idea that when I came up with the title that it would be an all-text cover. I think that so many people are used to seeing images of me in my body. I liked the idea that just the words were kind of enough for the association and that people would bring their ideas about who I am or my image publicly to the book, and then we'd kind of shatter them," she told British Vogue.
Complicated Sides
"An idea that's really at the heart of the book is the double-edged sword of commodification of image and body and sexuality and objectification of self. I mean, I think that undeniably, there's been so many ways that I have," she told British Vogue. "I built a platform, I'm talking to you right now. If I was an unknown writer, I'm not sure that I would have the same capability to get these ideas out into the world. And that's come through fame, which has been through modeling and more specifically in my case, really sexualizing myself and letting others sexualize me. I think it's really important to kind of name that there's just obvious power that can be achieved through that. What this book is trying to do is sort of show the complicated sides to it, that for a very long time I felt like being a hustler and knowing how to work the system as a woman was feminism, and then it was my choice, and it's just more complicated than that."
Asking Questions About Feminism
"I'm more interested in asking questions around feminism than I used to be. I think that there was a defiant wanting to prove something. Before, when people would ask me about my politics around feminism and being a woman, I felt very like, [eff] off. It's my choice and I can do what I want. And that's feminism because I'm choosing and kind of had ideas about what was empowering and what wasn't. And now I'm just more curious about looking and asking questions and having conversations around power dynamics and women. I don't come with answers even though I've written this book. I feel like it's much more about the posing questions around feminism," she told British Vogue.
