To begin I would like to state that, as a queer woman who loves to watch TV, and movies, this topic is particularly important to me. Growing up, I always found myself searching for characters I felt connected to and in many cases had to settle for characters that only marginally represented who I am. As Justin Dennis, one Everyday Feminism's contributing writers, says "you don’t have to be queer to identify with a queer character, just as you don’t have to be straight or cisgender to identify with a straight, cisgender character"(Justin Davis 2016), seeing yourself on screen creates a certain kind of acceptance. I think I would have accepted myself sooner if I grew up with watching characters like me. I still struggle to find shows and movies with positive representation and come up with very few options. …show more content…
This means that I am continually subjected to media that portrays my life either as a joke, a sin, or kills off the character like me.
Despite, how prevalent this trend appears to be there is very little literature about queer media representation, and therefore I decided to write the paper I needed to read. For that reason, I am both the analyst and the analyzed in this paper and use my own reactions and understanding of this phenomenon as one of my theoretical basses. When my social media platforms exploded after the character Lexa was killed on The 100, I saw how many LGBTQ+ people experienced severe physical and emotional consequences and I could not stay quite due to a lack of academic research. This paper is hopefully the just one of the first to highlight how killing queer women on screen does not only affect characters in those stories, but also the
audience. If you only ever see yourself in tragic stories, do you learn to expect sadness? If you only ever see people concealing pieces of themselves, do you learn to hide elements of yourself? Despite the changes that are occurring in American society concerning the acceptance of LGBTQ+ people, our representation in the media is deeply problematic. One of the fundamental problems is that TV, like society, asks its LGBTQ people to cover. According to Kenji Yoshino, the author of Covering: The Hidden Assault on Our Civil Rights, to covering is "to tone down a disfavored identity to fit into the mainstream" (Yoshino 2006: ix). In Covering, Yoshino examines the consequences of covering in the queer community, specifically how it affects our rights as citizens in the United States of America. Queer people constantly employ the act of covering as a way to survive in a world that is dangerous for those who are different. Moreover, the need to and compliance with covering creates unique consequences for those who do not cover due to how others perceive them to be "flaunting". This dynamic colors our understanding of what it means to be queer, and allows for the general perception to derive from a mixture of hidden characteristics and tragic realities. Through an examination of Yoshino's book Covering and his theories behind the act of covering, the idea of flaunting, and the assassination of selves we chose not to live, this paper will argue that the requirement for LGBTQ people to cover creates false and dangerous representations of queer people on TV. To illustrate the connections between Yoshino's theories of covering and its consequences we will look at four TV shows, Orphan Black, Jessica Jones, The 100 and Lost Girl. Within each of these shows this paper will analyze how the demand to cover creates dangerous storylines for lesbian and bisexual women, and how they reinforce damaging tropes on screen. The two tropes discussed below are the (1) But Not Too Gay and (2) Bury your Gay. While both of these tropes encourage covering they also illustrate what happens to characters that flaunt or that attempt to "assassinate the selves they choose not to live".
Sex and Gender was the subject of the two movies Dreamworlds 3 and Further Off The Straight & Narrow. In Dreamworlds 3 Sex is portrayed as a status of life and happiness in the media. This media displays people as objects that can be manipulated for sexual pleasure. As the media is populated with sex it tiptoes around gender, specifically that of gays or lesbians. The film Further Off The Straight & Narrow emphasized the movement through media gay and lesbian topics. This text analyzes iconic television programs and how they reflect the societal stance during that time. As a member of a generation that has had the topic of these issues prominent I believe they are important but are banal. In this reflection I will be responding to two questions, what would woman driven Dreamworlds look like? And Do you agree with the statement that if you are not on television you don’t exist?
Kidd, Dustin. 2014. “Not that There’s Anything Wrong with That: Sexuality Perspectives.” Pp. 129-163 in Pop Culture Freaks: Identity, Mass Media, and Society. Boulder: Westview Press.
I reached many other people since last week, some of them did not show much interest in doing the interview when they heard it was about homosexual representation analysis; the other people were unable to do the interview because the lack of time or other reasons. Anyway, diverse interviewees were picked to convey a considerably fair research for the attitudes toward the homosexual representation in the show Glee. These three chosen interview subjects not only vary in race (Both my boss and my roommate are Asian-American and my friend’s sister Lily is Caucasian) but also in gender (My boss is male and the other two are female). Because the main focus of the show Glee is about daily life of a group of high school students who attend their school glee club, the audience’s age range is unavoidably narrow. Despite the fact
Mainstream movies are about men’s lives, and the few movies about women’s lives, at their core, still also revolve around men (Newsom, 2011). These female leads often have male love interests, looking to get married or get pregnant. Strong independent female leads are still exist for the male view, as they are hypersexualized, or the “fighting fuck toy,” (Newsom, 2011). This depiction has created a culture where women are insecure and waiting for a knight on a horse to come rescue and provide for her as well as the acceptance of women
Smith, Jeff, and Chloe Beighley. "Normalizing Male Dominance: Gender Representation in 2012 Films." Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy. N.p., 12 Feb. 2013. Web. 1 Apr. 2014.
The entire Stonewall Uprising documentary, and especially the conclusion, places the fight for gay rights firmly in the past and implies that, with the advent of gay pride in 1970, equality had been achieved and all former oppressions could be forgiven and forgotten. Within the documentary, the vast majority of people interviewed are cisgender, white, gay men, and a retired NYPD police officer who fought on the “wrong side of history” at Stonewall had a prominent role. While this may be partially due to the fact that these people are simply the most likely to be alive so many years after Stonewall, it entirely erases the role that people of color, trans women, drag queens, and gender nonconforming people played in the Stonewall riots. Additionally, there is at least one Black trans woman who participated in the Stonewall riots still alive today, and her presence is not a secret within the LGBTQ community. Miss Major, a Black trans woman currently based on San Francisco, is a very high-profile trans
The news article I studied is from March 12th 2014 and found in the Fashion and Style section of The New York Times. Its title is “In their Own Terms- the growing transgender presence in Pop culture.” This article outlines the culture surrounding transgender and transgender situations in the United States, whilst following the lives and transformations of some known citizens of pop culture.
Putnam, A. (2013). Mean ladies: Transgendered villains in Disney films. In J. Cheu (Ed.), Diversity in
The media has had a significant shift from the past in their portrayal of gay people including in gay marriage and gay rights. In the 1980’s and 90’s the subject was much more taboo and the idea of gay marriage was popularly opposed. However today, the majority of Americans support legalizing gay marriage. What could be the reason for such a change? Could it be the media portrayal?
Works Cited Kane, Matt. “Transgender characters that changed film and television”. Entertainment Media at GLAAD. 12 November 2013. Web.
When television first appeared back in the 1940's, times were very different. What we would consider completely normal today would have seemed quite taboo just a few decades ago. For example, in 1953, Lucille Ball was not allowed to say the word "pregnant" while she was expecting baby Ricky and it wasn't until the 1960's show Bewitched, that we saw a married couple actually sharing the same bed. Considering how conservative the television networks were back then, it is not hard to deduce that something as controversial as homosexuality would be far from discussed or portrayed at any level. It was only in 1973 that television premiered its first homosexual character. Over the next three decades the emergence of gay and lesbian characters in television has increased and decreased as the times have changed. Due to the resurgence of conservatism that came back in the early 1980's, homosexual topics were again reduced to a minimum. Since that time though, as many people can see, there has been a rise of gay and lesbian characters on television. One might think after a first glance at the previous sentence that there has been progress among gay and lesbian communities to have a fair representation in the media. However, if one looks hard at the circumstances surrounding their portrayal, many people may start to believe that if there has been any progress then it has been quite minimal.
For the purpose of this study, I will critically examine the representation of homosexuality in Hollywood cinema. I will specifically analyse films from the early 90’s to mid 2000’s from ‘Philadelphia’ to ‘Brokeback Mountain’. This dissertation will argue that over the space of 12 years homosexuality has become an acceptable part of cinema. I will look at early Hollywood’s representation of homosexuality depicting how aesthetically so much has changed. The current paper will predominantly focus on the two films ‘Philadelphia’ and ‘Brokeback Mountain’, by critically analysing the aesthetic differences between each film as well as their overall importance to gay culture.
The 1990s saw surge of gay characters in both television and movies. From Ellen Degeneres and her character Ellen Morgan coming out under much scrutiny on the TV show ‘Ellen,’ to Julia Roberts and Rupert Everett comedically playing off each other in the motion picture ‘My Best Friend’s Wedding.’ Sure, gays and lesbians have been around forever, especially in Hollywood. But never has there been a time to be more out. With the popularity of shows like Will and Grace, which feature leading gay characters, as well as Dawson’s Creek and it’s supporting character of teenager Jack McPhee, we are slowly seeing gay and lesbian characters creeping into the mainstream media.
The Representation of Men and Women in the Media Men and women are both represented differently in the media these days. Then the sand was sunk. Ironically it was even represented differently in the title of this essay. Men came before women! I am writing an essay to explain how men and women are represented in the media.
Media portrayal of the LGBT community is varying. It may be very positive and a “good” portrayal or negative and instead focuses on the stereotypical aspects of the LGBT community. One definition of a good LGBT television portrayal is one that depicts an LGBT character without over glaringly obviousness of their sexual orientation, or without adding many LGBT stereotypes that are all too often added.