As the television and film industries mirror reality we see more human issues arise in popular entertainment. The booming world of reality shows and sitcoms showcase many of these issues and the subject of race and gender are among the most prominent. We have always followed the female plight through these types of shows, but never before has television been geared toward feminine viewership as it is today. With a growing female audience, writers and producers have the ability to make the female characters the lead actors. The Mindy Project is a perfect example of a current television show with a female main character and through its episodes we can look to see just how prominent a role gender plays. By scrutinizing a female character on The Mindy Project, we can apply the ideas set forth in an article written by Julie Rivkin and Michael Ryan called, “Introduction; Feminist Paradigms.” This article addresses the two formal perspectives of feminism; constructionist and essentialist viewpoints.
The Mindy Project is a television show which takes place in present day Manhattan where the subjects of the show run a gynecological practice. This practice employs four doctors, three of which are male while Mindy is the sole female doctor. Mindy’s character often exhibits traditional stereotypical aspects, but embodies a strong intelligent woman at the same time. Looking at the episode titled “Girl Crush” we see the many levels of the female perspective entwined in this female role. Mindy, who is known for her pop culture references, love of boy bands and works out her emotional dramas while lying on the floor of her office, is offered a job in a high end celebrity practice. While visiting this new office her male counterparts ...
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...ture influence who she is and what she strives for; she voices her opinions, is smart and successful in spite of everything.
The women in today’s society and on television are constantly battling the oppressive masculine traditions and the male characters themselves. We see this struggle with women in our culture and it is often leads to an economic battle with our male counterparts. By looking through the eyes of the feminist perspective, we can see the efforts put forth by our female population to overcome this. With a critical eye, we can learn and understand how this struggle between men and women plays out within our society; on screen and in reality. Mindy’s willingness to be her own person and make choices that are ethically sound show us what a strong female character she is while pushing the parameters of the traditional female role.
The documentary Miss Representation describes the struggle of female leadership. It is based on the way the women look, the way they carry themselves, and the way they brutalize themselves to fit in with others. This documentation allow different women to tell their ways that the media have slashed them, and allow others to stand up for women. Women portray themselves to fit as the image that has been altered with to get it to look that way. Margaret Cho explains that her show All American Girl was cancelled because she had problems with the network who aired the show because they constantly said was not thin enough. That is a prime example of today's problems with pursuing your dreams as an actor or pursuing your dreams as a model. You have to change your physical features to fit in, and if you do not you won’t get in.
The documentary, “Miss Representation,” is a film about how women are perceived in the media. It is written, directed, and produced by Jennifer Siebel Newsom. She is an actress and a film maker who advocates for women. In the beginning of the documentary, Newsom discusses her struggles as a young woman surrounded by the pressures of looking a certain way. This film is targeting mainly women of all age that has experienced her struggles. Jennifer Siebel Newsom effectively convinces the audience of “Miss Representation” that the media has molded women in a negative way through statistics, celebrities’ and younger generation’s testimonies, and clips from the media.
In the world, today women are not fairly represented in the media. There are many problems that the media never tries to fix, such as the underrepresentation of the people of colour and women. There are shows that do break through these norms in today’s media. One television show that is breaking these norms is Grey’s Anatomy. Grey’s Anatomy is a show about a group of interns at Seattle Grace Hospital and it shows each individual interns journey and we watch each character grow over the 13 seasons that have been on the air. Grey’s Anatomy breaks many stereotypes and barriers that women in real life struggle with.
Making Them Feel Like a Natural Woman: Constructing Gender Performances on The Maury Povich Show
Men do not have the benefits of equality either, they are also limited by societal expectations and having to fulfill the requirements of what it means to “be a man”. Gender roles shape the fabric of our society. In the documentary Tough Guise, Katz chronicles the socialization of boys from the moment they are born and as they grow up. Tough guise explains how the entertainment industry feeds messages about masculinity which exclude basic human qualities such as compassion, and vulnerability. These are portrayed as feminine with a negative connotation implied (Earp, Katz, Young and Rabinovitz 2013). In American modern culture children of both sexes are consuming large amounts of media on a daily basis. The documentary MissRepresentation explores the media’s role in the shaping of our society; specifically the media’s treatment of women. When it comes to girls and women, marketers have made substantial profits from objectifying women and setting an unattainable standard of what it means to be beautiful. Hyper-feminized women are all over the covers of magazines, hypersexualized in advertisements, and in movies. Women have to walk a very thin tightrope and the expectations for a good woman are contradicting (Newsom, Scully, Dreyfous, Redlich, Congdon, and Holland
In American culture today, women continue the struggle of identifying what their roles in society are supposed to be. Our culture has been sending mixed messages to the modern day female, creating a sense of uneasiness to an already confusing and stressful world. Although women today are encouraged more than ever to be independent, educated, and successful, they are often times shamed for having done just that. Career driven females are frequently at risk of being labeled as bossy, unfeminine, or selfish for competing in many career paths that were once dominated by men. A popular medium in our culture such as television continues to have significant influences as to how people should aspire to live their lives. Viewers develop connections with relatable characters and to relationship dynamics displayed within their favorite shows. Fictional characters and relationships can ultimately influence a viewer’s fashion sense, social and political opinion, and attitude towards gender norms. Since the days of Bewitched and I Dream of Jeanie, where women were commonly portrayed as being the endearing mischievous housewife, television shows have evolved in order to reflect real life women who were becoming increasingly more independent, educated, and career oriented throughout the subsequent decades. New genres of television are introduced, such as the workplace comedy, where women are not only career oriented, but eventually transition into positions of power.
Gender Matters is a collection of various essays on feminist linguistic texts analysis, by Sara Mills. Mills develops methods of analyzing literary and non-literary texts, in addition to conversational analysis based on a feminist approach. The author draws on data from her collection of essays gathered over the last two decades on feminism during the 1990s. The essays focus on gender issues, the representation of gender in reading, writing, and in public speaking. Furthermore, it highlights the importance of feminists’ analysis of sexism in literature and the relation between gender and politeness. The article is informative for my research paper, as my topic is going to cover language analysis of the text and who women reading and writing differs according to the discourse analysis within linguistic, psychology, case studies audiences and surveys. The book would be helpful, particularly the last three essays that discusses gender, public speaking, the question of politeness and impoliteness in public speaking. Mills’ analysis is not complete without including the idea of global notions of both women and men, to see whether women and men write and read in the same way globally. Therefore, an update would enrich the book’s discussion section. Although, Mills addresses the class and race theme in language and public speaking, I will only look into the role of language that plays a part in doing or reducing gender in literary, non-literary texts and in conversation.
Aymar Jean Christian composed “The End of Post-Identity Television” to critique mainstream media (in the 2000s) for its’ failure to shed light on issues concerning race and gender identity despite their presence in everyday life. Christian uses his article to argue that identity is still important and the issues surrounding it should be discussed and portrayed like they are in reality. While Aaron Devor’s article “Gender Role Behaviors and Attitude” aims to bring awareness to the strong influence culture has on gender appropriation. He emphasizes that gender roles are not a natural occurrence but a phenomenon conceived and nurtured by society itself. In 2001, during the beginning of post-identity television, the movie “Legally Blonde” written
In conclusion, this show focuses on many aspects, particularly gender roles and sexism. Although this show could have more diverse characters, it focuses on male and female stereotypes very well. I appreciate that there are several strong female characters who aren’t afraid to stand up for themselves and perform typically masculine
Jamestown, Virginia, is a crucial source of legends about the United States. Pocahontas, a daughter of an Indian werowance married an Englishman named John Rolfe and changed her name to Rebecca. In her article, “Gender Frontier”, Kathleen Brown underscores gender role and responsibility in both Native American and English settlers. Gender frontier is the meeting of two or more culturally specific system of knowledge about gender and nature. She also stresses the duties that they played in their societies prior to the arrival of the English people in the early colony in Virginia. Brown describes the difference values between Europeans and Native Americans in regards to what women and men should and should not do and the complex progression of
The world of television can either completely hit or miss the mark when it comes to providing its audience a diverse cast/actors. "Girls" is a new HBO show about young, prosperous, and white New Yorkers in their twenties struggling to find their footing in the post-collegiate world. It is a poor example of representation of race, but the show in itself cannot be held responsible for the whole problem of racial diversity of media and popular culture. There has been a lot of controversy about the show's diversity since the first episode, seeing how it is set in the melting pot of NYC and Brooklyn, yet it is prominently white. The shocking part is that despite its meting pot nature, it is very easy to live a segregated social life in New York City, especially if you are a rich white person. The fact that the show is so white should not come off as unusual, yet it does because this generation is more willing to see that change happen in pop culture. Not everyone sees it that way and pop culture still does not represent races equally or at times even accurately. For example, when show do add in minorities they often make them extremely stereotypical to their race. The recurrence in the lack of realistic representation in the show highlights the “whiteness” of stereotypical roles that overshadows real life representation.
Today, love, sex and romance are three main topics that presented in media as main themes discuss in contemporary popular culture. Social media is important in shaping audience value about feminism through the framework of contemporary media like films, magazines, plays, advertisements, TV shows, graphic novels, etc. The television show “Sex and the City” incorporates “pop feminism” that influences many lives of women. Sex and the City is originally talking about four single thirty-something women living in Manhattan. They are coming to New York in order to seek “love and labels” (Sex and the City). The main theme of Sex and the City is concentrating on contemporary American woman’s conception of sex, love, and romance. As we learned from lecture, sex, love, and romance have a history; they are different in different cultures; they are shaped by gender, class, race, ethnicity, nation, ability, and other differences (Lecture Notes). Sex and the City is focusing on modern American woman’s experiences and their thinks with sex, love, and romance. The four main women characters in Sex and the City represent diversity of gender, class, race, ethnicity, religion, age, able-bodiedness through their different experience and expectations of their life (Lecture Notes). Sex and the City represents that the feminism notions of sex, love, and romance are socially constructed, and this social construction of sex, love and romance are featured in these female characters’ personalities.
Miss Representation, a documentary film produced by Jennifer Siebel Newsom released in 2011, presents a contemporary issue which is the misrepresentation of women’s portrayal in mass media. The media is powerful in shaping audience’s belief in how to be feminine. Women are expected to be beautiful, attractive, and even sexual on the media to attract audience’s attention. Also, the film points out the existence of social system in which men are considered more powerful and dominant than women. Finally, the film tries to increase the awareness of female real value including capability, educational achievement, and leadership. Consuming the media wisely to eliminate gendered stereotypes can help young women build their confidence and be successful.
In both of these series, representations and meanings of masculinity and femininity are affected by the ideology of patriarchy. Even though it is true that these shows tried to fight back against stereotypical representations of men and women, the subtle textual evidence in these shows show that there are limits to how gender norms can be represented on television, especially in the Classic Network
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