Introduction Media can influence people’s behaviors, thoughts, and development of self-criticism towards themselves and others. Thus, media’s depiction of female heroines affects girls’ self-esteem from ages five to thirteen. The terms: Associative Self-Esteem, Mirror Stage, Aural Self-Esteem, and Body Dissatisfaction, are key elements that built a girl’s self-esteem and are found to be affected by the influence that heroines have on girls. Superheroines’ femininity has been created with false stereotypes that defines their behavior and constructs a specific body image; thus, these stereotypes drive girls to self-judge their own persona according to heroines that are portrayed in media. Elizabeth Marhsall and Özlem Sensoy, authors of "The …show more content…
First of all, majority of heroines stereotypes are common to what others think of women in general, such as: weak, venerable, victims, emotional, and powerless. This issue started when Marvel and Comincs DC created a large number of super heroines during the World War II, when women were taken a great part in helping during the war but were not actually being the heroes that were fighting against the U. S enemies. Thus, men created these comic’s characters and they wanted to create stereotypical feminine heroines that would differentiate themselves from male heroes. Having this in mind, in order to understand how girl’s self-esteem is being harm by the depictions of heroines through media, the reader must understand the power of the media as a source of influence in girls. Media has become a major outlet for information to communicate to children, in which they learn and retain that information. Marshall and Sensoy noted that a girl could identify with a character of a film, literature and television because of the Cultural Pedagogy. The articles states, “‘the media are a found and often misperceived source of cultural pedagogy: they contribute to educating us how to behave and what to think, feel, believe, fear, and desire—and what not to. The media are forms of pedagogy that teach us how to be men and women’” (Marshall, Sensoy 156). Therefore, through …show more content…
For instance, Susan Storm is a heroine that is a member of the Fantastic Four. She is known as the Invisible Woman and her superpower is invisibility and can, also, create an invisible force field. Although she is powerful, her emotions (a characteristics of being feminine) intervene with her greatness. According to Mainon and Ursini, “Invisible Woman turn[s] invisible when emotional, as if being switched off from communicating her deeper needs. Managing the balance of femininity versus masculinity, and passion versus repression, becomes the primary challenged of many female action characters” (Minon, Urini 17). Susan Storm is the only one from her team to be unable to control her emotions; hence, she literally becomes the invisible superhero compared to her other male colleagues. Consequently, the real heroes are the men. Stabile’s work on sexism and superheroes mentions that men are the “real” heroes because they are physically stronger. Stabile said, “to US culture in general, the someone in need of protection is invariably female or feminized (typically women and children, but sometimes the elderly and animals). The active roles of both protector and threat are masculinized— strength and power being the foundation of masculinity ” (Stabile 87). The inequality between heroines and heroes due to the description and meaning of “femininity,” separates the heroes and the vulnerable heroines. Because
For starters, Disney princess movies display the image of extraordinary beautiful sexy girls as princesses. They have long hair, small waist, flawless skin, nice cloths and beautiful voices (England, Descartes, Collier-Meek, 2). Unsurprisingly, young Girls want to have the qualities of these fictitious characters. They define beauty as having the perfect body image, just as Disney princess movies have taught them. Moreover, the bad people or witches in these movies always seem to be ugly, fat, or basically unattractive. This changes young girls’ view of the society, leading them to develop low self-esteem if they don’t meet the princesses’ standard (Dundes, 8). Since, Disney features the male character (prince) to be romantically linked to the female character (princess), young girls who do not think that they have the image of a princess will get the impression that they cannot be loved by handsome wealthy men (England, Descartes, Collier-Meek, 3). Also, they will consider themselves to b...
The misconception of what is beautiful can be detrimental to young girls. In a television industry attempt to sell goods, they are depicted as sexy. Creating a need for parents to intervene and present a more realistic and normal view of physical beauty. Today, TV presents sexually based images crafted to appeal to young girls. Unfortunately, they are led to believe that their value is only skin deep, causing flawed expectations, illusions, and wrong information about the truth of the physical body in the real world. In an attempt to look the part some have fallen victim to eating disorders, while others have exchanged childhood innocence for an Adult view of what is sexy.
The image of Disney’s ravishing princess marrying her perfect Prince Charming has infatuated young girl for decades. These delightful movies present role models for young girls influencing them to dress up as their favorite princesses in the image of their Disney princess models. Many parents regard this imaginative act of child's play as charming or innocent. However, there has been much speculation about the media’s message directed towards young girls. The most prevalent source of this worry is abundant in animated films (Travail). Although animated movies are exciting for young children, recent studies have shown that these films are causing a spike in body dissatisfaction in girls. Throughout the past century negative body image among young girls has been driven by Disney’s animated movies, Barbie dolls, and Barbie’s new animated films.
In the article Construction of the Female Self: Feminist Readings Of the Disney Heroine, Jill Birmie Henke, Diane Zimmerman Umble, and Nancy J. Smith are looking at the female self and how it was developed based on two theories: Standpoint by Parker Follet and the psychological development of girls by Gilligam. That by examines gender identity especially girls and how media exposure affects them through analyzing five of Disney movies: Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, The little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Pocahontas. They segmented the article into three titles: The Oxymoron of Power and the Perfect Girl where they introduced the two theories in which they built their critic on, Construction of the Female Self where they talk about the evolution in the female character from Cinderella to Pocahontas, and Construction of Self in Relation to Others where they talk about the evolution of the self in relation to others from power-over to power-with until power-to. Finally they concluded that even if the female character in Disney’s movies was changing to become more
The media has had an increasingly destructive effect on young people who are becoming worryingly obsessed with their body image. The media is saturated in sexual imagery in which young people have to face every day. The sheer volume of sexual imagery in the media today has resulted in the vast majority of young people to become hooked on looking as near to perfection everyday by using the latest products and buying the latest fashions. This used to be enough but lately the next step to achieving perfection is cosmetic surgery. Everyone wants to look attractive, especially teenagers who are not only put under massive strain to succeed but to look beautiful and climb the ranks of the social ladder, and it seems that the only way to achieve the much desired beauty is to turn to drastic measures.
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 North America alone comic book sales have reached 517.66 million dollars in the year 2013. It is estimated that comic books sales will go up 9.04% year after year. This data suggests that comic books still have a tremendous audience. This audience has managed to remain about the same throughout the years, being males between the ages of 16 and 25. With that being said the artists and writers realized this and started a trend of hyper sexualizing and portraying super women in an unrealistic light, in hopes of enhancing the growth of their fan base. This study aims to analyze “How superhero women are depicted and represented in comic books.”
In recent years, sociologists, psychologists, and medical experts have gone to great lengths about the growing problem of body image. This literature review examines the sociological impact of media-induced body image on women, specifically women under the age of 18. Although most individuals make light of the ideal body image most will agree that today’s pop-culture is inherently hurting the youth by representing false images and unhealthy habits. The paper compares the media-induced ideal body image with significant role models of today’s youth and the surrounding historical icons of pop-culture while exploring various sociological perspectives surrounding this issue.
The mass media over the years has had such a profound role in creating an image on how women should be viewed. From their appearance to what their duties are in everyday life, the media has made sure to depict unrealistic images of women. These images have caused not only the male public but women themselves to believe that they must attain a certain kind of body or occupation to fit into society. Women often feel obligated and pressured to comply to this praised image of perfection.
It has never been easy growing up being a female in this world especially for young teenagers in the United States. “Schoolgirls: Young Women, Self-Esteem, and the Confidence Gap” written by Peggy Orenstein reminded me of a film called “Miss Representation” that I watched in The Reflective Women during my first semester at St. Catherine University. In the film, the media sends messages that women’s and girl’s powers, values and worth’s lies in their youth, appearance and not how successful they are as leaders. The film was incredibly striking and powerful to me because it shows that the media can have a significant impact on our society and the kind of messages that being sent to young females can be very dangerous. As surprising, as it can be, the “Hidden Curriculum” that Schoolgirls exposed and the effect it has on young female as school help reinforce stereotypical roles struck me because I never know that the whole hidden curriculum was placed in the education system.
There is “comics which do portray strong, interesting heroines” yet they “…still pander to young male readers”(Lanvin). Women are still being illustrated in over sexualized outfits to appease the male audience. Female writers have began to change this and are catering specifically to the female audience. There has been evidence that “…female fans are becoming more visible and vocal”(Lavin). As more women began to show interest in comic books, “…it is hoped that the negative portrayal of women in comic books will diminish”(Lavin). Comic books need to revisualizes the female character and start to accurately portray the modern female rather then illustrate a over sexualized female of men’s fantasies. Students, boys and girl, read comic books furthermore authors should write comics that can relate to both genders(Kan). This will not only increase overall sales but it will also promote gender
The film Missrepresentation, by Jennifer Newsom, is about the underrepresentation of women by the media (2011). The film challenges the viewpoints of media that are constantly depicting females as to being dependent on males. Furthermore, even when females are displayed as lead characters, the plot will ensure that their life’s will surround the life of a male. Examples of these include, a lead female falling in love with her “prince charming” as he saved her from great dangers. We rarely see a female character saving a male in the media (2011). According to the film the media continues to encourage the ideology that a women’s power is associated with her youth, beauty and sexuality, instead of her knowledge and intelligence (2011). The film also provides starling statistics, for instance by the age to 18 78% of females are unhappy with how the look. Also of the 8 million people with eating disord...
Have you ever thought about what the media does to women? The film “Miss Representation” was a documentary about how the media misrepresent woman on television, magazines, and music. Every teenager spends most of their time with a consumption of Media, and it has a great influence on them. Indeed, media always shows the standard of a woman on how the media itself likes every woman would look like. Although, there are many women who are successful they still focus on what they see physically and they will never stop criticizing a woman in every way. Therefore, men and boys see a woman as inferior to them and as an object that they could just use all the time. While, woman, and girls tend to follow the social norm so they could fit it. Media is the reason on how this gender representation started, and they are also the key on how it could be changed. The director of the film “Miss Representation” effectively convinces the audiences that media plays a high role in presenting women differently; by narrating her own experience, showing woman 's role in society, and revealing the truth on gender issues.
Researchers have used various abstract foundations for examining the relationship between media and body image ( Holmstrom, 2004). Here I review the theory that has been used by researcher in the area. Bandura’s Social cognitive theory (1994) assumed that “people learn and model the behaviors of attractive others”. The supporters of this theory suggest that young women find slim models in the media attractive and try to imitate them through dieting which leads them to eating disorders.
Oppenheimer, B., Adams-Price, C., Goodman, M., Codling, J., & Coker, J. (2003). Audience Perceptions of Strong Female Characters on Television. Communication Research Reports, 20(2), 161-172.