The Valley Girl in Buffy the Vampire Slayer

2874 Words6 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Buffy the vampire analysis

The stereotypical valley girl would have to be one of my longstanding favourite characters in both television and film. With the valley girl known for often being the quintessential popularity queen, it may not seem so obvious to include the Buffy we know today as part of the valley girl hall of fame. But one only has to go back to the 1992 film, Buffy the Vampire Slayer to observe the full extent of Buffy’s bleach blonde valley girl roots. To place Buffy within the larger category of the valley girl, first one must have an understanding of what exactly this means. Undoubtedly, the valley girl is a product of the eighties, or at least a character that was crystallised and labelled during this period, and she has been a significant presence in teen films and television ever since. It has come to my attention that there has been a definite change, or evolution over the last two decades, of the living, breathing barbie doll otherwise known as the valley girl. And, it seems, this evolution of the valley girl within teen film and television can be traced through the character of Buffy Summers, starting from her first appearance on the big screen in 1992.

For my purposes, the term “valley girl” is useful in reference to a limited spectrum of popular teen girls in film and television, who, despite originating in name from the location of the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles, [1] are not strictly limited or restricted to being natives of this particular site. Often alarmingly oblivious to many basic concepts of social etiquette, the valley girl is the ultra-feminine, two-dimensional character identified by an abundance of material possessions and surface features that are highly prized by herself and her peers. Some of the basic, essential signifiers of the valley girl can be extracted from examination of valley girls over time who have manipulated the following:

1) POPULARITY: which is often directly linked to the valley girl also being a cheerleader (often team captain, of course) and/or prom queen. Although, sometimes basic popularity is pure and simple enough.

2) CASH SUPPLY: generous funds, namely daddy’s credit card, often help with gaining or retaining popular status, and is especially important for it’s contribution to the following,

3) THE WARDROBE: often filled with the latest fashion trends and designer labels. The valley girl must be well-versed in knowing what is now, retro, and the dreaded zone of “five minutes ago.

Show More
Related

  • The Night of Brocken Glass and The Krystal Naught

    677 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Holocaust is one of the most learned about events in history. The question is, why do we learn about it? We choose to keep the horrors of the Holocaust fresh in our minds and the minds of our children to keep it from ever happening again. The United Nations was formed to keep another World War from happening. We study the Holocaust so that we can identify the early stages of genocide and stop it before it starts. We put so much effort studying history to keep it from repeating itself.

    Read More

  • The Pure Evil of the Final Solution

    948 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...to prevent it from ever happening again. Because there is no doubt that there is someone as nuts as Hitler to try and kill a whole race. People should study the Holocaust as a whole to witness the distinguished disaster that was Earth at this point of time and make sure it will never happen to anyone ever again.

    Read More

  • The Gibson Girl and the Farm Girl

    697 Words  | 2 Pages

    The dawn of the 20th century changed the perspective of the nation and introduced many different ideas and concepts. At the turn of the century, a new and influential ideal known as the “Gibson Girl” arose. The “Gibson Girl” image, created by the American illustrator Charles Gibson, represented the perfect female archetype of the era. In the first decade of the 1900s, the Gibson Girl, exuding confidence and poise, proved increasingly popular, and acted as an icon that women everywhere attempted to imitate. She eventually developed from an illustration into a reality as many girls applied the ideal to themselves. The Gibson Girl contrasted greatly with the common farm girl who, unlike the Gibson Girl, worked for a living. At first glance, one might perceive that the farm girl led a much more difficult life than the Gibson Girl. However, upon consideration, the Gibson Girl’s life proved just as demanding, if not more, than that of the farm girl, and illustrated upper-class society’s unrelenting superficiality and focus on perfection.

    Read More

  • Sexualization Of Sexualization

    1311 Words  | 3 Pages

    A Study Conducted by the American Psychological Association Task Force concluded that sexualization occurs when a person’s value comes only from his or her sexual appeal or behavior, to the exclusion of other characteristics; a person is held to a standard that equates physical attractiveness (narrowly defined) with being sexy; a person is sexually objectified- that is, made into a thing for others’ sexual use, rather than seen as a person with the capacity for independent action and decision making; and/or sexuality is inappropriately imposed upon a person. The APA Task Force reported many example of the sexualization of girls, such as toy manufactures duce dolls wearing black leather miniskirts, feather boas, and thigh-high boots and market them to 8- to 12-year-old girls. Clothing stores sell thongs sized for 7– to 10-year-old girls, some printed with slogans such as “eye candy” or “wink wink”; other thongs sized for women and late adolescent girls are imprinted with characters from Dr. Seuss and the Muppets. In the world of child beauty pageants, 5-year-old girls wear fake teeth, hair extensions, and makeup and are encouraged to “flirt” onstage by batting their long, false eyelashes. Journalists, child advocacy organizations, parents, and psychologists have become alarmed according to the APA Task Force, arguing that the sexualization of girls is a broad and increasing problem and is harmful to girls, and I for one agree with their proposition.

    Read More

  • Should We Remember The Holocaust

    550 Words  | 2 Pages

    We need to remember the Holocaust because of all the Jewish people who died and the people who tried to save them. In the book “Book Thief”, the family risked their lives to help one of their friends who was Jewish. If the Nazis found out about the Jewish person in their basement they would take the whole family to the death camp with the Jewish friend. Also in the “Boys who challenged Hitler”, a group of boys who lived in Denmark, risked their Life’s to save Jewish people by putting them on rafts to float over to Sweden. They did that because Sweden was a free country and the Nazi’s did not have control over them.

    Read More

  • How the Media Affects the Self Esteem and Body Image of Young Girls

    1041 Words  | 3 Pages

    When girls are disheartened over their inability to look like some media idol or doll, then it is time to pay attention and ask why. Psychologist Levine and Kilbourne, emphasize a need to stay more connected, and finding out why children feel they have to compete with the images of people they see in the media (So Sexy So Soon 27). The idea of looking sexy may be fine for adults, but the notion of sexy little girls is somehow disturbing. TV is setting the agenda and succeeding as it paints the perfect girl, as tall, skinny, tan, pretty, and rich. TV commercials sell sexy because sexy sells, and is now targeting younger audiences. A preteen viewing a Bratz Dolls commercial will be prompted to visit their web site, where she will be greeted with attractive dolls dressed in sexy outfits. The dolls portray an image of teenage girls with large attractive eyes, lush glossy lips, and dressed in the latest fashion.

    Read More

  • Disney Princess Effect Summary

    275 Words  | 1 Pages

    This article touches on several cultural trends. Such as girls dropping out of sports, parents losing control of their daughters at an early age, influences of barbie dolls and young girls

    Read More

  • Gender and Sexuality in Hollywood Films

    1553 Words  | 4 Pages

    Noted in Yvonne Tasker’s Working Girls: Gender and Sexuality in Popular Cinema, Goldie Hawn says this about women's role in the film business “There are only thee ages for women in Hollywood: Babe, District Attorney and Driving Miss Daisy” (1998, p. 3). While Haw...

    Read More

  • Cinderella, Pretty Woman and Feminism

    1396 Words  | 3 Pages

    middle of paper ... ... Greenberg, H. R. & Greenberg, H. R. "Rescrewed: Pretty Woman's Co-opted Feminism. " Journal of Popular Film and Television 195605th ser. 19.1 (1991): 1-8.

    Read More

  • Clueless Movie Analysis

    216 Words  | 1 Pages

    The American society has been under the influence of the media since the early 1900's. The invisible pressure is hidden behind subconscious and subtle images and messages. One of the main examples, in this case of the cinematographic media, about spreading and validating stereotypes, is the movie "Clueless" from the year 1995. We can find many examples in this project about this aspects. The protagonist "Cher" is a clear example of how many times the media characterize teenagers as superficials, fashion and trend addicts and careless spoiled young women. One of the scenes that expose clearly this stereotypes, Is the scene when Cher has to go to her driving test and she wants to wear super exclusive clothes to impact her DMV officer.

    Read More

  • Why The Holocaust Will Never Happen Again

    431 Words  | 1 Pages

    Everyone has a different lifestyle; however what if one day they were all taken to a place where they worked for their life. If they were weak they died, if they were women most died, child most likely died, and what if they died for no apparent reason at all except killed due to their opinion or belief. For example, “Babies were thrown into the air and the machine gunners used them as targets (4).” The Holocaust is one of the top horrific things that has happened in our past that we never want to repeat. “Those who do not learn from the past are condemned to repeat it.” By learning from our past, learning from our mistakes, and working our hardest never to repeat the Holocaust it is evident that we would insure the Holocaust would never happen in the future.

    Read More

  • American Girl And The Brand Gestalt : Closing The Loop On Sociocultural Branding Research

    1570 Words  | 4 Pages

    The underlying philosophical paradigm used by Diamond et al. (2009) in the American Girl article is interpretivist research. The authors don’t predefine variables (Myers, 2013) to explain the American Girl brand, but use social activities, costs, facts, images, meanings and differences (Kozinets, 2001) to make sense of the American Girl phenomenon. To gain an in-depth understanding and broader context (Myers, 2013) of the multi-ethic, multi-generational and multi-national (Diamond et al., 2009) nature of the American Girl environment, the research method used was an ethnographic exploration. For three...

    Read More

  • Jennifer Lawrence And The History Of Cool Girls

    718 Words  | 2 Pages

    Most people describe cool as someone who is confident, does not care what other people think about them, and has a bit of mystery that people can’t really define. Besides that, people see ‘cool’ people as if their appearance is naturally done without putting effort, it’s like they are quoting Beyonce’s song “I woke up like this”, looking good already even if they haven't done anything. Though most say the phrase ‘cool’, is there such thing as ‘cool people’ or at least ‘cool girl’? Do they really exist or the media only manipulated our minds on creating cool girl? In my opinion, cool girl exist, but it is only a phase that every girl has to deal.

    Read More

  • The Representation of Women in Action Films

    1897 Words  | 4 Pages

    Journal of Popular Culture, 32(2), pp. 79-89. Retrieved from: http://web.b.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail?vid=6&sid=64cd7df8-8ea3-4d9a-ad60-1deef7e616e6%40sessionmgr114&hid=103&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl#db=aph&AN=1585569 Starlet C. (2007). Women in action movie empowered role models or chicks with guns.

    Read More

  • Textual Analysis Of The Story Of Menstruation

    805 Words  | 2 Pages

    The collaboration between Walt Disney Productions and International Cellucotton Products Company Inc.(Kotex) may have been a result of financial trouble, but nonetheless purports rather unrealistic expectations for adolescent girls. I came to discover The Story of Menstruation as part of a desire to understand the various complexities of girl culture in American society. In doing so, I noticed that the dichotomous media texts marketed toward girls during the mid-century were as difficult a terrain to navigate as much of the media presentations are today. Such materials perpetuate Judith Butler’s theory of gendered performance which underline society’s construction of femininity in order to define what it means to be a “girl.” The primary sources throughout this study often created conflicting messages for adolescent female viewers. For example, Kotex attempted to market a modern woman and was influential in the beginning of a menstrual hygiene education curricula, yet the company simultaneously was also perpetuating quintessential American ideals. Similarly, sex education curricula of the 1940s point to the importance of educating female students about their bodies, yet sexual desire, masturbation, and infidelity were only typically discussed regarding the male

    Read More

More about The Valley Girl in Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Open Document