Feminism In Grey's Anatomy

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Many people today would likely claim that society is much farther ahead of where it was fifty years ago, in regards to gender equality especially. While this may be true to some extent, feminism has yet to fully take force around the world. The media content individuals are exposed to tends to shape how they view the world around them. Young women are especially impressionable from the messages they receive from a multitude of sources. Feminism does not tend to be a part of the mainstream pop culture and many young women do not claim the title of feminist. Looking at the female role models young women and girls have, there seems to be a lack of a rallying point for the feminist movement to continue into the future. Grey’s Anatomy has lent itself …show more content…

Cristina Yang, a friend of Meredith’s, becomes pregnant twice during her surgical residency. The first time she experiences complications and loses her baby, and the second she elects to terminate her pregnancy (Rhimes, 2005). Cristina’s focus is almost entirely on advancing her career, and when she found herself pregnant she realized that she wanted to be only a surgeon and not a mother. Another of Meredith’s fellow surgeons, Izzie Stevens, is discovered to have given up a child she had when she was young. While she had chosen to give up her child, Izzie seeks to have a relationship with her daughter years later and is devastated when her attempts are rejected. The main concern of women tends to be how they can balance work and family in their everyday lives (Willett, 2004). Even Meredith herself faced this issue, as when she and her husband began having children she found herself slightly behind in her surgical residency. Not one of these situations shows the typical mother-child relationship, but instead depicts the different kinds of choices a woman may have. Whether it was choosing not to have children or incorporating a child into an already busy life, these women make decisions based on what they want and not on expectations of …show more content…

The media itself has the ability to reconstruct social reality through the messages and images it shows. Through depicting women mainly in their expected societal role, the stereotypes are able to be perpetuated. More recent shows, like Grey’s Anatomy, tend to challenge or break these preconceived notions about women. Women in the workplace often need to act more strictly than their male coworkers in order to be taken seriously (Mattoon D 'Amore, 2014). Dr. Miranda Bailey, Meredith Grey’s mentor, was often viewed as the toughest surgeon in the hospital earning her the title of “The Nazi”. When an unfamiliar doctor fills in at the hospital, he asked to work with “a guy they call the Nazi” (Rhimes, 2005). Due to gender stereotypes, the other doctor automatically assumes that someone with such a disciplinary sounding nickname must be a man. However the majority of the time, the female doctors do not need to work harder to be taken seriously. Their merit in their profession is judged based on how well they perform in the operating room, and nothing

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