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Media representation of gender
Gender stereotype on women in media
Gender identity in society
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Media representation of what being feminine is can be persuasive and potentially harmful. Femininity and masculinity are spectrums, not categories that people simply fall into. However, this is how a lot of our media, stemming from the cultural norms of American culture, portrays them. They are cut and dry, simple definitions, and easy to recognize. Though since these ideals are only a representation of a small population of the public, this can become harmful when individuals feel as if they are outcasts. The first two advertisements I came across while skimming a Cosmopolitan were two different makeup companies, advertising to two different population groups. The first ad from Maybelline initially stood out to me for the bold text, “Subtle doesn’t cut it, vivid matters to me.” This is a very strong statement, telling girls that standing out in the crowd is ideal, that blending into the masses is less than optimal. Other text like “make it happen”, is very strong and determined, fitting along with this theme. The woman on the cover is very beautiful, but also blatantly airbrushed to perfection. The advertisement …show more content…
I was single at the time, as most of the girls in my dorm were, and a lot of the socializing talk was about boys in our classes. One instance I remember was while I was heading out to class one day and a girl I considered to be my friend commenting on my appearance. She was surprised that I wasn’t dressing up more for a class that she knew I had with a boy I had some interest in. I explained to her my logic – that if a guy didn’t like how I looked day to day, then there’s probably a reason I wouldn’t want to be with them. She agreed with me, but said at the beginning of any relationship you needed to dress up and put in a little extra effort in your appearance. She informed me that boys are like fish, you have to attract the fish before you can reel them
Men do not have the benefits of equality either, they are also limited by societal expectations and having to fulfill the requirements of what it means to “be a man”. Gender roles shape the fabric of our society. In the documentary Tough Guise, Katz chronicles the socialization of boys from the moment they are born and as they grow up. Tough guise explains how the entertainment industry feeds messages about masculinity which exclude basic human qualities such as compassion, and vulnerability. These are portrayed as feminine with a negative connotation implied (Earp, Katz, Young and Rabinovitz 2013). In American modern culture children of both sexes are consuming large amounts of media on a daily basis. The documentary MissRepresentation explores the media’s role in the shaping of our society; specifically the media’s treatment of women. When it comes to girls and women, marketers have made substantial profits from objectifying women and setting an unattainable standard of what it means to be beautiful. Hyper-feminized women are all over the covers of magazines, hypersexualized in advertisements, and in movies. Women have to walk a very thin tightrope and the expectations for a good woman are contradicting (Newsom, Scully, Dreyfous, Redlich, Congdon, and Holland
In the United States, women are universally experiencing misogyny and pressure to conform to the ideals of hegemonic femininity. This experience for women is in part due to the acceptance of controlling images such as stereotypical gender roles and sexual objectification in the media and other broadcasting outlets. On the opposite side, men are also experiencing the stress and pressure of conforming to the ideals of hegemonic masculinity. The media is thus creating a vicious cycle of rhetoric and images persuading men and women that they have to act, look, and live life a certain way. Within this vicious cycle, the commodification of difference is created to benefit mass media, marketing representatives, and the generally white, upper-class
Meanwhile, masculinity is defined by stigmatizing femininity. They give masculinity a dominant appeal by painting women as gullible and vulnerable. As Breazeale puts it, a “simultaneous exploitation and denial of the feminine” (Breazeale 232) and so “one-dimensional representations of women have resulted from attempts to court men as consumers” (Breazeale
Feminism is the belief that women should have political and social equality that is equal to the male society. Feminism is also the belief that women should receive the same opportunities as men in their personal decisions involving their careers, politics, and expression. It is thanks to these beliefs that many authors base their works on feminism. According to Anne-Marie Kappeli, feminist texts reflect the author’s views on women in society. In addition, most of the authors who write feminist texts are women. Feminist texts often relate to the oppression of power towards women and they also point out the unfairness and deficiencies of equal opportunity in society. Feminism also is used to create an interesting story. It is typical that in feminist stories, the main character is often a heroine who struggles with the oppression of the male society.
Miss Representation, a documentary film produced by Jennifer Siebel Newsom released in 2011, presents a contemporary issue which is the misrepresentation of women’s portrayal in mass media. The media is powerful in shaping audience’s belief in how to be feminine. Women are expected to be beautiful, attractive, and even sexual on the media to attract audience’s attention. Also, the film points out the existence of social system in which men are considered more powerful and dominant than women. Finally, the film tries to increase the awareness of female real value including capability, educational achievement, and leadership. Consuming the media wisely to eliminate gendered stereotypes can help young women build their confidence and be successful.
The media is a very influential aspect of our daily lives. The media is everywhere we look, everything we listen to, and everything we talk about, we cannot escape it. It only makes sense that the media would have an affect of the construction of how we view masculinity and femininity. The media has the ideals or standards of what it means to masculine or feminine which with our changing times do not represent a majority of people. These standards are set so high that no one can reach them, which makes people feel defeated since they do not meet these expectations. With many people not fitting into these generalized norms we set for a “man” or “woman” it is time we get rid of these norms, or at least update them to the times. People are changing
Women around the world struggle with life because of the effect of how they’re perceived in the media. Why is this? Well Editor Ravneet Vohra explains in an article called Body positive warrior. The reasoning women believe their appearance such as body image needs to be a certain way. Before the women 's rights movement happened. The term femininity defined women and masculinity which is used to define males.
Media representations of women remain wrong. However, the status of women has changed significantly. Representations of women across all media tend to highlight the following: beauty (within narrow conventions), size/physique, sexuality, emotional (as opposed to intellectual) dealings and relationships (as opposed to independence/freedom).
The documentary Miss Representation identifies the numerous ways women are misrepresented in the media, including in news, advertisements, movies, and television. The title Miss Representation emphasizes that the way we portray women in the media is a misrepresentation, as in it does not do women justice and oftentimes, has a negative impact on the perception of women. Frequently in the media, women lack leading roles and complexity, are held to an unrealistic standard of beauty, and are subject to objectification and beautification (Newsom, 2011). These misrepresentations lay the groundwork for gender socialization, and therefore, shape how women perceive themselves and are perceived by others.
In order to understand the effects that ideas of femininity have on literary texts, we must first acknowledge what the term means. Clearly both terms derive from the original sex of the being, whether male or female, and can be similarly tied in with notions of gender, either masculine or feminine, which are said to be constructs, or labels, created by society. However `masculinity' and `femininity' become, on some levels, dislodged from the idea of the biological makeup and gender constructs, and instead tend to be described in terms of discourse. It is not just the sex and gender of a being that determines their actions, but instead their thoughts and opinions.
On a daily basis people are exposed to some sort of misrepresentation of gender; in the things individuals watch, and often the things that are purchased. Women are often the main target of this misrepresentation. “Women still experience actual prejudice and discrimination in terms of unequal treatment, unequal pay, and unequal value in real life, then so too do these themes continue to occur in media portraits.”(Byerly, Carolyn, Ross 35) The media has become so perverted, in especially the way it represents women, that a females can be handled and controlled by men, the individual man may not personally feel this way, but that is how men are characterized in American media. Some may say it doesn’t matter because media isn’t real life, but people are influenced by everything around them, surroundings that are part of daily routine start to change an individual’s perspective.
Gender stereotypes and biasses exist in media. In most situations, women are associated with more negative stereotypes and their portrayals can “undermine their presence by being “hyper-attractive” or “hyper-sexual” and/or passive” (Smith, 2008). In The Wolf of Wall Street women are objectified. They are treated
Gender stereotype in the media promotes a more conservative, heteronormative view on what gender is. The stereotypes also promote a very binary view on gender; you’re either a stereotypical man or a stereotypical woman, nothing in between. Luckily, the media is also changing; nowadays, with more celebrities identifying as non-binary, not confirming gender, transgender, and also having non-hetero sexual preferences, we’re just beginning to see the diversity of human beings when it comes to
“Sexual Politics, “For it is precisely because certain groups have no representation in a number of recognized political structures that they 're position tends to be so stable, their oppression so continuous” (191). For this reason, theory, among various other structures, should become more inclusive, recognizing nonbinary genders and facing issues that affect the people who identify with them. Nonbinary gender has largely been left out of feminist discourse, as well as queer theory and even trans studies. Even pivotal works on gender fail to recognize and account for the existence of non or multiple genders.
women are seen in the world. There are many different facets of the media such as magazines,