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For this assignment I have chosen to review the film, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, a romantic comedy about the life of a thirty year old Greek woman named Toula, who is unmarried and in a rut until one day while serving at her family’s restaurant she meets a school teacher named Ian. In the end they fall in love, get married and start a family of their own, but the film documents their struggle to break through many barriers including her family’s strong traditions, values, and beliefs. My Big Fat Greek Wedding illustrates how socialization can impact someone’s everyday life through their gender, religion, and culture. However, it also shows that when individuals violate these concepts in their traditional sense, it is commonly as social deviance and defiance.

One’s gender and their role associated with that characteristic are critical to how one fits within society. According to Conley, gender is defined as “a social position, the set of social arrangements that are built around normative sex categories.” (Conley pg. 283) In other words, through socialization someone is raised as a certain gender by treated them one way or another. This is exhibited in the film as the main character, Toula, was taught from a young age that because she was a girl she was supposed to wear long shirts and have long hair. She continued to conform to these societal norms until meeting the man of her dreams and making the conscious decision to defy those customs.

When a person is raised through socialization as a certain gender there are roles that they are expected to conform to. Gender roles are defined as “a set of behavioral norms assumed to accompany one’s status as male or female.” (Conley pg. 134) In other words, someone is typically raised as a m...

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...eliefs and values.

My Big Fat Greek Wedding illustrates the role that an individual’s gender, religion, and culture play in shaping their life choices. These characteristics of socialization that are instilled in them throughout their youth and formative years, affect how they will make decisions and develop relationships with others down the road. Socialization through these concepts can stress the idea of conformity and discredit the concept of defiance in all areas of life such as family relationships, faith practices, and expected characteristics for a particular gender. The film displays varying levels of conformity and defiance through evolution of the relationship between the main characters, especially as Toula breaks free from her family’s strong hold on their beliefs, values, and traditions to become a modern educated woman with the man of her dreams.