Shadowing Practice: How did pink become a girly color? - Learn English Speaking with Video

Creating lesson...
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In 1927, Time magazine took a survey of all the major department stores across the country.
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They wanted to know which colors they associated with girls in their clothing lines.
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The answers came back pretty mixed.
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There's also a catalog in 1918 that suggests that little girls should all wear blue because it's a delicate and dainty color.
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That's Jennifer Wright.
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She's an author and often writes about history and fashion for Rakt.
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It was only after the war that pink got the symbolic association that we have today.
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In 1953, Dwight Eisenhower, the general who won World War II, becomes president.
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And this actually turns out to be a pretty important moment in the history of pink.
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It was Ike's inauguration and Mamie Eisenhower came out in this enormous rhinestone -studded pink ball gown,
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the legs of which you never would have seen during the war when women were wearing much simpler styles.
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Mamie Eisenhower loved the color pink and she was known for it.
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She thought that the pink really brought out her complexion.
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She had really pretty blue eyes.
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It was a nice contrast.
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In fact, a quick search of newspaper headlines mentioning Mamie Eisenhower also referenced the color pink pretty frequently.
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And it wasn't just called pink, it was called Mamie Pink.
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She went around giving quotes like, Ike runs the country, I turn the pork chops.
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But yeah, it was a very arbitrary decision that she just loved pink and everybody else decided, okay, this is the color that ladylike women wear.
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There's a great song in Funny Face called Think Pink.
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Here is our theme, here is our answer, PINK!
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Where the lady editor of a magazine who is very much based off of Diana Freeland
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sings about how women in America today have got to think pink.
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Pink Pink!
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Forget that!
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And there's a great line in it where she says, Banish the black, burn the blue!
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Which are two colors that women would have been seeing a lot of during the war years.
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Around this time, pink became a popular color not only in just women's clothing, but also in the home.
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Pink as a bridal blush.
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New camé.
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Loving pink camé with an exciting new fragrance.
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Sealed in pink pearl foil.
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New loving pink camé.
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This was something a lot of women liked, by the way, it wasn't seen as a terribly oppressive thing,
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but there were definitely women like Diana Freeland who didn't really want to revert to those traditional roles.
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I haven't seen a woman in two beats in anything but pink!
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What about you?
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Me?
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I wouldn't be caught dead.
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It was at this point where you start to see the color pink representing women real
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and fictional who were anything but traditional.
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The champion race car driver Donna Mae Mims is a really good example of this.
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She had a pink uniform and a pink helmet and a pink race car.
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There's the pink ladies in Greece and the plastics in Mean Girls.
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The girls who are incredibly canny and kind of terrifying rightly explain.
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On Wednesdays we wear pink.
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There's a great cover of Hillary Clinton on the cover of People magazine wearing a bright pink jacket
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and the caption next to it is how we need to break the highest, hardest glass ceiling as women.
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So she's pretty much doing the opposite of what Mamie Eisenhower wanted to do.
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This isn't just about the color pink.
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It's about how it's used to define a person's personality and what we think they're capable of.
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She still wants to show people that really I'm just just a girl just like you.

What You'll Learn

This video helps you build two key speaking skills: narrating historical timelines (using phrases like "It was only after the war that..." and "In 1953, ... becomes president") and discussing cultural symbolism (explaining how colors represent ideas, e.g., "pink became a symbol of lady-like women"). These skills are perfect for conversations about history, fashion, or pop culture—essential for real-world English. Plus, practicing with this clip improves your ability to follow and repeat complex stories, a must for shadow speak practice.

Listen For These Sounds

Notice the connected speech in phrases like "the likes of which" (linking "of" and "which" to sound like "ovwhich") and "turn the pork chops" (reducing "the" to "thuh"). The speaker also uses casual contractions, such as "it's" and "that's," which are common in natural English. Pay attention to how "Mamie pink" is stressed—"Mamie" is emphasized to highlight the color's association with her. These details are key for improving English pronunciation and sounding more native.

Say It Like a Native

To mirror the speaker's rhythm, stress important words like "enormous," "rhinestone-studded," and "arbitrary" to emphasize key points. The dialogue has a conversational flow, so pause slightly after transitions like "In fact," "But," and "So" to mimic natural pacing. For shadowing practice, repeat sentences like "This isn't just about the color pink, it's about how it's used to define a person's personality"—focus on linking "about the" and stressing "define" and "personality." This helps you master the rhythm of analytical speech, a skill that makes learn English with videos effective. Remember, shadow speak isn't just about repeating words—it's about capturing the tone and emphasis that convey meaning.

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.