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Portrayals of women in media
Outline feminism theory
Portrayals of women in media
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Media Analysis Essay
Introduction
In this essay, I will look at GMFF5/ MELE MEL & SCORPIO / SALT N PEPA /KIA COMMERCIAL and KIA Forte 2013 Super Bowl Ad - "Hotbot" Female Robot. I will also look at a clip from Mona Lisa smile and the short film breakfast wine.
Aim of Assignment
The aims of this essay are to define five types of analyses in Media Analysis and to apply these analyses the two commercials by comparing them using (the analyses are Semiotic, Feminist, Marxist, Social and Psychoanalytical analyses). To view a clip from Mona Lisa smile and the short film breakfast wine and to apply Stuart Hall’s Audience Reception Theory to them by comparing them also to identify the genre that the films fall into.
Objectives and Methodology
I will
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Theorist definition of Feminism – Gendered Media Consumption
A primary way in which media distort reality is in underrepresenting women. Whether it is prime-time television, in which there are three times as many white men as women (Basow, 1992)
A critical Feminist analysis of both advertisements
What is Social Analysis
The Understanding of how media producers apply market segmentation techniques, for example demography and behavioural analysis e.g. targeted TV advertisements. Audience as market.
Theorist definition of Social Analysis
In fundamentalist Marxism, ideology is 'false consciousness ', which results from the emulation of the dominant ideology by those whose interests it does not reflect. From this perspective, the mass media disseminate the dominant ideology: the values of the class which owns and controls the media. Per adherents of Marxist political economy, the mass media conceal the economic basis of class struggle; 'ideology becomes the route through which struggle is obliterated rather than the site of struggle ' (Curran et al.
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The oppositional code rejects the encodings of media producers.
Which of Hall’s positions / readings I am adopting (dominant, Oppositional or Negotiated)
In breakfast wine I take hall’s position of dominant. For the short film I take dominant position as the small local pub with just the two men is a norm across rural Ireland. The pub owner problems are also quite a norm being up to his head in bill is a norm for a small rural pub in Ireland with only an handful of people going there. Also the lady’s problem of being abusied is not that common but still happends not just in rural Ireland but around the world.
In Mona Lisa Smile I take hall’s position of dominant. I take a dominat postion for this scene as I do believe that woman in the timeframe that mona lisa smile is set in do only see woman has the housewife that there life revoles around the man and the housework. I also believe that woman at the time were learning that this frame of mind was wrong and learning to be more independent.
Conclusion
In conclusion I agree with the short film and the clip from Mona Lisa Smile that they are true represation of true events even if more stylised for the big screen for more dramtic effect.
The question often is what makes a good advertisement? The answer is simple, it should be able to grab the attention of the targeted audience, and even better it should be able to make the targeted audience fall in love with the advertisement so that they can be persuaded to achieve the desired results. Of all the forms of advertisement, TV commercials always are the best considered effective way to pass the message to the targets. I believe that the combination of audio-visual effects can engrave the commercial into the hearts and minds of the viewers and that is why I have chosen to analyse a TV commercial by Weetabix: Weetabix Chocolate Dubstep Cereal Commercial.
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 society, there has always been a gap between men and women. Women are generally expected to be homebodies, and seen as inferior to their husbands. The man is always correct, as he is more educated, and a woman must respect the man as they provide for the woman’s life. During the Victorian Era, women were very accommodating to fit the “house wife” stereotype. Women were to be a representation of love, purity and family; abandoning this stereotype would be seen as churlish living and a depredation of family status. Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story "The Yellow Wallpaper" and Henry Isben’s play A Doll's House depict women in the Victorian Era who were very much menial to their husbands. Nora Helmer, the protagonist in A Doll’s House and the narrator in “The Yellow Wallpaper” both prove that living in complete inferiority to others is unhealthy as one must live for them self. However, attempts to obtain such desired freedom during the Victorian Era only end in complications.
In Bordo’s essay “Hunger As Ideology”, she has her students bring in different examples (advertisements) that are shown to violate traditional gender-dualities and the ideological messages carried in them. By doing this task with her students she she hopes to boost her points about the negative portrayal and subliminal messages about gender identification and see if any progress has been made.
According to Poverty & Prejudice: Media and Race, co-authored by Yurii Horton, Raagen Price, and Eric Brown, the media sets the tone for the morals, values and images of our culture. Many whites in American society, some of whom have never encoun...
First of all, in The Simpsons, the scene where we get into the actual plot of the story opens with Marge and Lisa walking into a department store that sells dolls. The gender stereotype that girls are only interested in playing with dolls is reinforced here as a huge selection of Malibu Stacy dolls is on display with a throng of screeching, bloodthirsty girls tearing the store apart. Lisa says, “I’m warning you mom, I might get a little crazy.” and immediately knocks down a girl and snatches another in a choke-hold to be the first in line for the new Malibu Stacy doll. In the very next scene we have the whole family in the car with Homer driving. He is baking a cupcake with an easy-bake-oven that he bought from the mall. Marge advises him that he should not be doing that. The stereotype here is that men are more impulsive as demonstrated by Homer and his baking while driving without any concern of his or his family’s safety; and that women like to play it safe and think before acting as demonstrated by Marge. Another noteworthy observation is the fact that Homer completes his gender stereotype as the bread-winner of the family. He works at the Nuclear power plant while Marge plays the role of the proud homemaker who is rarely seen outside the home and who has little friends. Homer on the other hand, is not confined to his domestic role and his frequently shown at Moe’s Tavern with his friends, at work, or doing something that is stupid and dangerous. This enforces the stereotype that women have few friends and stay close to domestic life whereas men have lots of friends, are more independent, and bring home the bacon. Moreover, Bart and Lisa are in accordance with their gender stereotypes as well. For instance, in the backseat, Ba...
Goodman, Mark. "Chapter 8: The Media Contribution to Racism and Sexism." Mass Media and Society. Mississippi State University, n.d. Web. 24 Nov. 2013.
The use of media has always been very tactical and representative of a statement or purpose. The issue of race has always been a topic of immaculate exploration through different forms of media. Mediated topics such as race, gender, and class have always been topics represented in the media as a form of oppression. The widely use of media surrounds the globe extensively as the public is bombarded with media daily. There are many different types of media that circulates the public making it widely available to anyone. Media can hold an immense amount of power as it can distort the manner in which people understand the world. In our society the media creates the dominant ideology that is to be followed for centuries in the classifications of race, gender, and class. Media can be a powerful tool to use to display a message which, is how “…the media also resorts to sensationalism whereby it invents new forms of menace” (Welch, Price and Yankey 36). Media makers and contributors take advantage of the high power that it possesses and begin to display messages of ideologies that represent only one dominant race or gender. It became to be known as the “dominant ideology of white supremacy” for many and all (Hazell and Clarke 6).
In conclusion, we can see how everything presented in an advertisement can actually have an impact in the people. Although the company’s target was to sell their product, their way of transmitting the message to the people also fortifies the stereotype. Thus, the media today does abuse the power of stereotyping in order to gain a favorable reputation. Everything they present in the ad, from symbolism to the lifestyle of the characters, race, age and gender, has an effect on strengthening the stereotype. In this case, women are perceived as emotionally drained, weak and incapable, although now a days that characterization is trying to be broken because women are much more than that and can actually get to achieve greater things.
For my semiotic analysis I chose to talk about a commercial for ‘Be delicious’ from Donna Karan New York to demonstrate how advertising generates its meanings, construct the image and behaviors ideology in order to attract customers.
According to a report by ZenithOptimedia, people spend more than an average of 490 minutes of their day consuming some form of media or text (Karaian). In a society that’s driven primarily by the media, we as consumers have been constantly exposed, yet desensitized, to the various perspectives and theoretical frameworks that media has historically illustrated and produced. The most common concepts that are explored involve ideas of race, heteronormativity, whiteness and white privilege, female objectification, class identity, and gender. Each perception is complex and is seen differently in media depending on who you are and the way that you see the world through the lenses created by your own beliefs and culture.
...ies of the bourgeois class remain dominant, the male counterpart also continues to sustain their dominant status in our media driven hegemonic society.
A television is defined as “a widely used telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images, either monochromatic (black and white) or color, usually accompanied by sound” (Webster’s). Since the invention of this device in the 1930’s, people have been able to be entertained by various television shows in the privacy and comfort of their own home. Although each of these shows relate to different age groups, nationalities, race, and genders, they all seem to have one thing in common. They all act out and portray the stereotypes placed on people because of their age, sex, job, culture, race, look, and position in the household. Due to these different categories being presented in the media pre conceived notions are formed about how people should behave, specifically men and women. Women generally take care and men take charge. But why does the television represent this “take care” and “take charge” image of women and men? In this paper, I will focus on one of the highly popularized television shows that viewers watch today; Desperate Housewives. Using this television show, I will be able to show and analyze how women are represented in the media and why they are represented this way.
Althusser (1971) explains that, as an ideological state apparatus, media doesn’t use pressure as a way to bind society together under one dominant ideology, but instead uses the will of the people to make them accept the dominant ideology. However, media is also used as a way for people to challenge the dominant ideology. Newspapers, for example, will have articles that openly criticise and oppose the dominant ideology for what it is, whilst at the same time providing perspectives and opinions on different ideologies (such as feminism) that society can believe in. Although these alternate ideological perspectives exist, they are usually overlooked and only ever reach small audiences. Ideology can also help us understand the media because of the way in which it distributes ideology.
There is a pressing need for engaging with Marx and the critique of class and capitalism in order to interpret and change the contemporary world and contemporary media (Fuschs and Mosco, 135). Media are controlled by political-economic elites motivated by profit and power. Media institutions may be plural but their common interest in profits excludes many forms of content- i.e. erosion of the diversity of the world. Media are powerful ideological tools for the capitalist system and play a key role in the proletariat’s false consciousness. Media facilitate an illusory sense of democratic process- there is no real political choice outside capitalism.