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Sociology social construction of gender roles
Sociology social construction of gender roles
Gender Roles In Society
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“Women aren't my competition because male attention and sexual objectification are not prizes for me.” ― Miya Yamanouchi
There is a buzz in society that women feel self-satisfied when men glare at them, which is absolutely a very fallacious believe. Women are at no pleasure, when men ridicule these gestures.
In this essay we will be discussing about the Male gaze and its concept by Laura Mulvey.
Before discussing about her theory, we need to know what feminism is, it has a basic concept of being having the equal right in all aspect from social to political to economical. The movement has been started a long time back for women's right and interest (Brunell and Burkett, 2018).
The main aim of feminists is not to have protest and rallies but to bring a change in people's
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The book used psychoanalysis theory as a political dart to portray the reality. It argued about its relevance to the pleasing and unpleasing offered by the historic narrative film. It further discussed scopophilia urge that is pleasure in looking at another person as an erotic object (Laura Mulvey, 1975).
The “gaze” is a concept that depicts how observers get involved with visual media. Arising, in film ideologies and criticism in the 1970s, the gaze denotes to how we look at the representations. These include publications, television series and films (Simmons, 2016).
The ideology of the male gaze is based on the concept of deprecating portrayal of women in the society (Essay UK, no date). it portrays a sexual behaviour of the men that entitles men and materializes women (Simmons, 2016). It means that men have the right on women, they believe in the myth that they own women and they hold them as its their possession and have brought it in value. Thus, it gives them superiority complex, leading to dominate and control her, to treat her according to their
In Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, Mulvey states that, “Traditionally, the woman displayed has functioned on two levels: as erotic object for the characters within the screen story, and as erotic object for the spectator within the auditorium, with a shifting tension between the looks on either side of the screen.” (Mulvey 40). A woman’s role in the narrative is bound to her sexuality or the way she
Led by Laura Mulvey, feminist film critics have discussed the difficulty presented to female spectators by the controlling male gaze and narrative generally found in mainstream film, creating for female spectators a position that forces them into limited choices: "bisexual" identification with active male characters; identification with the passive, often victimized, female characters; or on occasion, identification with a "masculinized" active female character, who is generally punished for her unhealthy behavior. Before discussing recent improvements, it is important to note that a group of Classic Hollywood films regularly offered female spectators positive, female characters who were active in controlling narrative, gazing and desiring: the screwball comedy.
Scopophilia is taking other people as objects, subjecting them to a controlling and curious gaze by allowing the spectator to look into a secret diegetic world, a projection of desire onto the former. For example, Peeping Tom (1960) stimulates a direct connection with the audience between eye and phallus, through the form of a camera wielded by protagonist and serial killer Mark Lewis (Carl Boehm). He is equip...
The male gaze has been a prominent theme in movies, music and other areas of culture for a considerable amount of time. This is something that is primarily categorized by someone who is doing the looking. More specifically it is how the audience is viewing the people or person that is being represented. The male gaze is essentially something that in advertizing, and in movies enables women to become a commodity which enables products to sell, because we all know in society that sex sells, and especially in modern marketing. Something to take into consideration is the fact that woman have not had a considerable amount of involvement in film making over the past 100 years, and even today, this is still a fact. Although women tend to be involved
To begin with, feminism started off as a social movement in England, which sought to achieve equality between the sexes by extending the rights of women. Feminist theory is an outgrowth of the general movement to empower women worldwide which is the belief that women should have equal rights to men. It can be defined as a recognition and critique of male supremacy combined with efforts to change it. Feminism is both an intellectual commitment and a political movement that seeks justice for women and the end of sexism in all forms. The goals of feminism are to demonstrate the importance of women, to reveal that historically women have been subordinate to men and to bring about gender equity.
Film scholar and gender theorist Linda Williams begins her article “Film Bodies: Genre, Gender and Excess,” with an anecdote about a dispute between herself and her son, regarding what is considered “gross,” (727) in films. It is this anecdote that invites her readers to understand the motivations and implications of films that fall under the category of “body” genre, namely, horror films, melodramas, (henceforth referred to as “weepies”) and pornography. Williams explains that, in regards to excess, the constant attempts at “determining where to draw the line,” (727) has inspired her and other theorists alike to question the inspirations, motivations, and implications of these “body genre” films. After her own research and consideration, Williams explains that she believes there is “value in thinking about the form, function, and system of seemingly gratuitous excesses in these three genres,” (728) and she will attempt to prove that these films are excessive on purpose, in order to inspire a collective physical effect on the audience that cannot be experienced when watching other genres.
Feminism has tackled gender inequality in the workforce, within politics, education and various institutes. Within the 20th century some of these issues faced in western culture have been completely reformed due to certain feminist movements that have encouraged women to fight for equal rights. (Crofton: 2011: 272-273) The first and second waves of feminism have proven to be successful by increasing equal rights between men and women. (Kaplan: 1992: 7) Despite these successes which include allowing there is still the fact of the matter remains that women are still objectified by their gender. ()The generalization of gender roles, have proven to be challenging within the feminist movement, this is often due to the objectification of women in the media. Also as feminism, is an ideology it has various schools of which have conflicting ideas of the ‘empowerment of women’ making it difficult to clarify on what is not acceptable in establishing women’s rights. (Fraser: 2014)
The idea of male gaze in cinema is best addressed by Laura Mulvey in her article “Visual Pleasures and the Narrative Cinema”. One idea she looks at is the notion that women are related to the image, and men assume the role as bearer of the look. She quotes “In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness.” The traditional exhibition role is what Sarah Polley must overcome in order to express female and national identity in a position of strength. In order to do this she must alter some the traditional constructions associated with the gaze in cinema to bring in order to critique the gaze that is male.
Kubrick’s Gaze In Laura Mulvey’s article “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” she uses the concept of scopophilia, or pleasure obtained through looking at things, to discuss the portrayal of women in film as passive sexual objects, while inferring that it is the active male “gaze” that objectifies them. Mulvey’s ideas are extremely relevant to Stanley Kubrick’s final film Eyes Wide Shut, in which the themes of sexuality and voyeurism are abundant. Gender roles are very clearly defined in Eyes Wide Shut. Men control the “gaze” and obtain scopophilic pleasure by looking at women.
Feminism is a movement that supports women equality within society. In relation to film, feminism is what pushes the equal representation of females in mainstream films. Laura Mulvey is a feminist theorist that is famous for touching on this particular issue of how men and women are represented in movies. Through her studies, she discovered that many films were portraying men and women very differently from reality. She came up with a theory that best described why there is such as huge misrepresentation of the social status quos of male and female characters. She believed that mainstream film is used to maintain the status quo and prevent the realization of gender equality. This is why films are continuously following the old tradition that males are dominant and females are submissive. This is the ideology that is always present when we watch a movie. This is evident in the films from the past but also currently. It is as if the film industry is still catering to the male viewers of each generation in the same way. Laura Mulvey points out that women are constantly being seen as sexual objects, whether it is the outfits they wear or do not wear or the way they behave, or secondary characters with no symbolic cause. She states that, “in traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote it-be-looked-at-ness.”(Mulvey pg. 715). Thus, women are nevertheless displayed as nothing more than passive objects for the viewing pleasure of the audience. Mulvey also points out through her research that in every mainstream movie, there is ...
Feminism can simply be defined as a range of movements and ideologies in which share a common ground in terms of defining, establishing and achieving equal opportunities to that of males, in regards to economic, cultural and social rights. It is a critique of male supremacy with efforts in changing this to end the social oppression of women. (Hooks, 2000)
Feminist theory was derived from the social movement of feminism where political women fight for the right of females in general and argue in depth about the unequality we face today. In the aspect of cinema, feminists notice the fictitious representations of females and also, machismo. In 1974, a book written by Molly Haskell "From Reverence to Rape: The treatment of Women in Movies" argues about how women almost always play only passive roles while men are always awarded with active, heroic roles. Moreover, how women are portrayed in movies are very important as it plays a big role to the audience on how to look at a woman and how to treat her in real life due to the illusionism that cinema offers. These images of women created in the cinema shapes what an ideal woman is. This can be further explained through an article 'Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema' written by a feminist named Laura Mulvey in 1975. She uses psychoanalysis theories by Sigmund Freud to analyze 'Scopophilia' which is the desire to see. This explains how the audience is hooked to the screen when a sexy woman is present. In a bigger picture, where Scopophilia derives from, 'Voyeurism' is also known as feeling visual pleasure when looking at another. Narcissism on the other hand means identifying one's self with the role played. It is not hard to notice that in classical cinema, men often play the active role while the women are always the object of desire for the male leads, displayed as a sexual object and frequently the damsels in distress. Therefore, the obvious imbalance of power in classical cinema shows how men are accountable to moving the narratives along. Subconsciously, narcissism occurs in the audience as they ...
Feminism is the movement towards women’s equality. It fights for equal rights in the social, political, cultural and economical aspects for women. Feminism also fights for equal opportunity for women in employment and education. A feminist is someone who advocates their support for women’s rights but is not restricted to only women; anyone who supports women’s rights and equality are feminists, including men. Feminism is not only about the females, it fights for gender equality for all. Feminist movements, or Women’s movements, campaign for reforms in household issues with domestic violence, political issues with equal pay, employment and maternity leave, and reproduction rights. All feminism movements fight for equal rights, but it cannot be conquered or be made known all at once. First wave feminism was mostly about women’s suffrage and political equality in general. Second wave feminism went more in depth about the social and cultural inequalities.
The term “feminism” tends to have a negative connotation in today’s culture. Feminism is now focusing on female dominance and male disrespect. Women are fighting for equality, yet using personal bias to define equality, claiming identical rights for all will produce an equal culture. The mainstream feminist movement is using this corrupted view of equality to force rights of women. Contrary to popular belief, true feminism fights for true equality for women, as well as other people groups. The false view of feminism causes women to distort gender roles, dishonor themselves, and degrade men.
In order to completely understand the feminist movement, it’s important to understand the terminology used. A very common misconception is that the feminism movement is synonymous to the women’s suffrage movement. As defined by Oxford Dictionary, feminism is “The advocacy of women’s rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men.” When discussing women’s suffrage, one would be referring to the fight for women to get the right to vote. Although women did achieve this right, this was not the end of feminism. Other terms involved when discussing feminism would be sexist or discrimination on the grounds of gender and misogynistic or showing hatred,mistrust, and mistreatment of women.