In her essay "What is the Male Gaze?", Leonard argues that there is a clear bias towards men in media, where women are often depicted as passive objects to be looked at by men. She notes that this bias extends beyond just visual media like film and television but also influences other forms of media such as literature and advertising. Leonard's argument highlights how pervasive this issue is across various forms of media.
On the other hand, Kelly Oliver's essay "The male gaze is more relevant and more dangerous than ever" offers a more nuanced critique of the concept. She argues that while there is undoubtedly an issue with how women are portrayed in media, focusing solely on the male gaze can limit our understanding of gender dynamics in society.
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She notes that this bias extends beyond just visual media like film and television but also influences other forms of media such as literature and advertising. Leonard's argument highlights how pervasive this issue is across various forms of media.
On the other hand, Kelly Oliver's essay "The male gaze is more relevant and more dangerous than ever" offers a more nuanced critique of the concept. She argues that while there is undoubtedly an issue with how women are portrayed in media, focusing solely on the male gaze can limit our understanding of gender dynamics in society. Oliver suggests we broaden our analysis to consider how power operates more broadly across social structures.
Overall, these two essays offer important insights into an ongoing debate within feminist theory about representations of gender in popular culture. By examining both authors' perspectives on bias towards men in media and feminist critique of the male gaze, we can better understand this complex
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Women are often presented as one-dimensional characters whose sole purpose is to fulfill male fantasies. They are usually young, thin, conventionally attractive, and submissive to men's desires. This not only reinforces gender stereotypes but also perpetuates harmful ideas about femininity and beauty standards. Moreover, these representations have real-world consequences for how women are treated. The objectification of women leads to a culture where they are treated as inferior beings who exist solely for men's pleasure or entertainment. This can manifest in various forms, such as sexual harassment, assault, or violence against women.
The male gaze is more relevant today because of the proliferation of social media and digital technologies. With the rise of platforms like Instagram and TikTok, individuals have greater access to images that perpetuate unrealistic beauty standards for women. These images often reinforce traditional gender roles where women are expected to be sexually attractive to men at all times. Moreover, media algorithms prioritize content that aligns with these norms, making it difficult for alternative perspectives to gain
In Abernethy’s “Male Bashing on TV”, the way that the author revealed the trend of males depicted as bumbling, lazy, and incompetent on commercials and modern TV shows irritated me Abernethy revealed in this article that the trend of men that are depicted as a minority on TV is getting worse. He shows that men in the media nowadays are shown making a fool out of themselves, doing ridiculous stunts, and overall showing idiotic characteristics unlike many men today. He blames primarily the media for depicting men as “bumbling husbands, and inept, uninvolved fathers”, in which he describes as the “comic image of men on TV” (Abernethy 351). Additionally, he states that since this has become a common theme on modern television, young boys can
The accepted social authority of men and a structural endorsement of masculinity in all socio-cultural spheres are perpetuated and kept in place through an appropriation of male-dominated ways of seeing. Consequently, doing gender is based on 'deeply rooted gendered social norms that reinforce existing understandings of appropriate roles for women and men ' (LSE, 2015, p.
Throughout the film we are shown various prints and television advertisements that show a pattern of damaging gender stereotypes that often reinforce unhealthy and unrealistic perceptions of beauty, sexuality, and perfection. These advertisements further objectify women and continuously perpetuates masculine dominance. Jean Kilbourne emphasis that human qualities should be shared and not categorized in advertisements because labeling men as tough and women as weak promotes violence and power within certain groups. These images of the aggressive, strong, insensitive man push an aggressive, dominant agenda while women are passive. She concludes the documentary by discussing how society has to continuously be aware of these norms and values in our everyday lives to resolve these advertisement
In the book, The Rise of Enlightened Sexism by Susan Douglas, gives insight and knowledge that digs deep into pop culture explaining how the media portrays the appearances of women that are in powerful positions in our culture. The appetencies tent undermines the actual progress of women. Douglas is interested in what these pop culture ideals shows about our culture. The way we react to women in our culture with powerful influence. What do these shows do to the female imagine in our culture?
The purpose of this is to show how common it is for women to be misrepresented in today’s society, and how it affects women of all ages. The documentary Miss Representation argues that the media needs to change its perception of women. To draw attention to this issue the documentary uses rhetorical devices to effectively get the point across. Although the documentary effectively
Shannon Ross K. Miller ENG4UI - P4 20 January, 2023 Selecting The Villain: A Patriarchal Bias "You are a woman with a man inside watching a woman. You are your own voyeur. " - Margaret Atwood. This quote addresses the unconscious response of women to conform to the male gaze without their knowledge or consent. As a result, women monitor themselves constantly and treat others based on a patriarchal view they are often unaware they employ.
In Generation Me: Misogyny in Media and Culture, this documentary explained how and what is causing us to see gender in a certain way. Misogynist ideas will continue to exist because it’s motivated by the idea of masculinity and femininity. We are repeatedly being taught and raised by these ideas. The media is using it to sell on the market, while the kids eat it up like it’s normal. As long as we follow this ideal, nothing will change for generations to come.
Being a young woman in America, I have stared eye to eye with the guidelines that the media has handed to me. The documentary, Miss Representation, directed by Jennifer Siebel Newsom, discusses how the media’s objectification of women impacts the lives of girls and women across America. Miss Representation shows that as a girl watches other women
Today's society is constantly besieged by the media, through advertisements and extolling the importance of female beauty and discrediting other virtues such as
Throughout history, women have been held to certain stereotypes that place societal expectations upon them. These expectations can be viewed through various outlets of media, a major one being movies. In the movie Rear Window, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, women are portrayed as dependent on men. Through the portrayal of Lisa and Jeff’s relationship and the showcasing of Miss Lonelyheart’s isolation, Hitchcock conveys the perception of a patriarchal society by utilizing various cinematic elements and film techniques.
In contrast to the twentieth century we still see some of this in our current day and ages. Contrasting portrayals of men and women in films leave us with the fact that we haven’t changed. Men and women are sought to have different gender roles within
Although the collective interest is among those affect it can also include the eternal audience. Within the film they showed how the media is what influences men’s actions and idea about what women should look like. Since this film extends to the external audience, which are the men, they too can be recruited into the movement to share the same common interest and goals of feminist to ensure that objectification of females is prevented (Taylor et al., 2004). One communal interest or goal the group may have is helping spread awareness that the representation of women in the media is
The reading that best supports this view is the Laura Mulvey reading “visual pleasure and narrative cinema” (Mulvey 1975). Although this reading is dated it does raise some interesting issues with regards to gender representation in cinema. Mulvey discusses the male gaze in cinema and outlines how woman are portrayed on screen from a male view point. She discusses how this could influence media in such a way that it may lead to the female section of the society to be misrepresented.
The representation of gender in mass communications has been a hugely debated topic for years and will continue to be one for many more years to come. The media plays a big role in how they want to portray a gender to the public. They create certain stereotypes through the role of a gender in order to attract a large audience and interest to sell a product, brand or image. Media is so important in today’s society, people spend hours and hours each day watching TV, browsing the Internet and reading magazines. There are so many images of men and women in the media today that it certainly has an impact on the viewer’s thoughts and sense of identity.
Abstract: In most parts of the world, females have always been the victim of oppressive patriarchy and male chauvinism since ages. This problem has been represented by many people through various forms of creations be it art, literature or films. Films are the most popular visual mediums of entertainment through which a large segment of people can be approached. Like literature, a film is also a work of art which mirrors the society, it also depicts the reality of the society though it has some fictionality in it.