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relationships between media and society
stereotypes of gender in today's society
relationships between media and society
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The Representation Project As meaning making creatures, humans attempt to categorize and definitively understand anything they observe. Although this crusade for understanding is not inherently bad, it often produces unintended negative consequences. As humans sort, classify, and define everything, they simultaneously place everything into a box that constricts creativity and fluidity. Concerning gender, these boxes create harmful conceptions of each person on the planet. Although these conceptions of gender are constructed and not “real” by any means, they have real implications in the process of socialization that influence how each person lives his/her life. In the United States, the commonly socialized “boxes” of gender have done a great …show more content…
The Representation Project focuses primarily on the production of film and media in order to challenge these limiting stereotypes – ultimately leading the way for all persons to fulfill their human potential …show more content…
Social forces tell the American male hat he live in a way that rejects everything seen as feminine. As outlined in In Social Inequality: Forms, Causes, and Consequences, Hurst asserts that media often portrays American women as emotional and affectionate (Hurst, p. 126-127). Thus, men who show emotion and affection often receive both physical and verbal attacks from other men due to not rejecting these feminine actions. These conceptions of masculinity damage American males because they repress emotion and simultaneously bolster aggression. The Representation Project is combating this damaging narrative by calling on society to change the overarching stereotypes. In their documentary The Mask You Live In, the Representation Project shows American males engaging in conversations about emotions and harmful masculinity in order to peel away the dangerous mask that harms all persons. Overall, The Representation Project strives to “re-humanize” men by drawing society away from the current
Enter into any café on the UCSC campus for a prolonged period of time and you are likely to hear the words “gender is a social construct”. Initially you’ll think to yourself, “what a load of granola” this is an expected reaction because for most people the concept of “gender” is natural. Its not until you are able to see how the idea of gender is constructed from physiological differences between males and females as discussed by researcher Miller AE and his team of scientists. Or how men possess great privilege because of gender roles, and women are seen as objects, that you will truly be able to understand that gender is nothing but a social contract. Authors Gloria Anzaldúa, Marjane Satrapi, and Virginia Woolf discuss in their novels Borderlands,
The movie, Tough Guise: Violence, Media and the Crisis in Masculinity produced by Jackson Katz and Jeremy Earp, deconstructs the concepts that create the social constructs of masculinity. Masculinity, a set of behaviors, roles, and attributes correlating to men, is earned, not given (Conley 190). Starting from television shows to children’s toys, the idea of masculinity has infiltrated their minds starting at a young age. Moreover, the concept of masculinity has physical attributes, such as muscles, a deep voice, and be able to protect themselves. Masculinity, for boys of any races, socioeconomic classes, or ethnicity, has grown up with the same stereotypical image of what a man should entail. Since many media outlets show that a form of masculinity
For centuries, the ideal masculinity has been seen as the provider, the macho man, the cowboy and the emotional rock, but new representations of manliness in the media have been challenging this idea (Watson 2015, p. 270). Within these new depictions, there lies a hierarchy where one form of masculinity is more accepted than the rest (Kluch 2015). Macho masculinity has been seen as being dominant in the hierarchy for generations, however, in recent years, there have been an influx of new representations of masculinity that disrupt traditional hierarchal ideas. The masculinity of the twenty first century includes emotions, sensitivity, discipline, and intelligence. These new aspects of the hierarchy have been introduced by movies such as Brokeback Mountain, 22 Jump Street, The
In the United States, women are universally experiencing misogyny and pressure to conform to the ideals of hegemonic femininity. This experience for women is in part due to the acceptance of controlling images such as stereotypical gender roles and sexual objectification in the media and other broadcasting outlets. On the opposite side, men are also experiencing the stress and pressure of conforming to the ideals of hegemonic masculinity. The media is thus creating a vicious cycle of rhetoric and images persuading men and women that they have to act, look, and live life a certain way. Within this vicious cycle, the commodification of difference is created to benefit mass media, marketing representatives, and the generally white, upper-class
In this article, Shaw and Lee describe how the action of labels on being “feminine” or “masculine” affect society. Shaw and Lee describe how gender is, “the social organization of sexual difference” (124). In biology gender is what sex a person is and in culture gender is how a person should act and portray themselves. They mention how gender is what we were taught to do in our daily lives from a young age so that it can become natural(Shaw, Lee 126). They speak on the process of gender socialization that teaches us how to act and think in accordance to what sex a person is. Shaw and Lee state that many people identify themselves as being transgendered, which involves a person, “resisting the social construction of gender into two distinct, categories, masculinity and femininity and working to break down these constraining and polarized categories” ( 129). They write about how in mainstream America masculinity and femininity are described with the masculine trait being the more dominant of the two. They define how this contributes to putting a higher value of one gender over the other gender called gender ranking (Shaw, Lee 137). They also speak about how in order for femininity to be viewed that other systems of inequality also need to be looked at first(Shaw,Lee 139).
On a daily basis people are exposed to some sort of misrepresentation of gender; in the things individuals watch, and often the things that are purchased. Women are often the main target of this misrepresentation. “Women still experience actual prejudice and discrimination in terms of unequal treatment, unequal pay, and unequal value in real life, then so too do these themes continue to occur in media portraits.”(Byerly, Carolyn, Ross 35) The media has become so perverted, in especially the way it represents women, that a females can be handled and controlled by men, the individual man may not personally feel this way, but that is how men are characterized in American media. Some may say it doesn’t matter because media isn’t real life, but people are influenced by everything around them, surroundings that are part of daily routine start to change an individual’s perspective.
Aaron H. Devor argues in his essay “Becoming Members of Society: Learning the Social Meanings of Gender” the gender roles casted by society help shape the definition of gender and that society’s norms aren’t necessarily correct. In America, the two traditional categories for gender are male and female (109). He claims that gender is taught through their culture’s social definitions of gender; children see themselves in terms they have learned from the people around them (110). To support this claim, he introduces the “I”, “me” and “self”; the “I” forms a self-image to oneself as distinctive while the “me” allows one to fit into social norms (111). Together, they form the “self” that allows one to oversee and remove any behavior that is unacceptable
In our present world, people understand and view gender in different perspectives, or “lenses.” The idea of gender that we see specifically in our present society today is very extensive compared to what it was years ago. We see a variety of different kinds of gender, whereas only years ago it was two: male and female. Personally, I have seen this in our society because I have met people that identify as many different genders that aren’t specifically just male or female. The word “gender” holds an important place in our language, specifically in today’s society, because it has determined who we are, how we identify ourselves, and ultimately our roles in society.
Society created the role of gender and created an emphasis on the differences between the two genders. Alma Gottlieb states: “biological inevitability of the sex organs comes to stand for a perceived inevitability of social roles, expectations, and meanings” (Gottlieb, 167). Sex is the scientific acknowledgment that men and women are biologically different; gender stems from society’s formation of roles assigned to each sex and the emphasis of the differences between the two sexes. The creation of meanings centers on the expectations of the roles each sex should fill; society creates cultural norms that perpetuate these creations. Gender blurs the lines between the differences created by nature and those created by society (Gottlieb, 168); gender is the cultural expectations of sexes, with meaning assigned to the diff...
Throughout today’s society, almost every aspect of someone’s day is based whether or not he or she fits into the “norm” that has been created. Specifically, masculine and feminine norms have a great impact that force people to question “am I a true man or woman?” After doing substantial research on the basis of masculine or feminine norms, it is clear that society focuses on the males being the dominant figures. If males are not fulfilling the masculine role, and females aren’t playing their role, then their gender identity becomes foggy, according to their personal judgment, as well as society’s.
The sex and gender binary is a socially-constructed classification of sex and gender into two distinct and biological forms of masculine and feminine. The binary is a restricting concept that enforces the ideology that solely two genders exist—it is a social boundary that limits people from exploring gender identity or mixing it up (Larkin, 2016). As Mann depicts it, the binary constrains us to take on one gender identity, and to follow through with the expected roles assigned to that gender. The implications are that it compels people to fit into the binary and follow the patriarchal, heteronormative traditions of society (Mann, 2012). However, the binary was not always so clear-cut, but certain concepts from scientific research such as the
On the other hand, some disagree with the claim that gender is a constructed social identity that is dangerous today. First, the counter argument begins by calling gender a necessary way to give humans characteristics that are recognizable. Since, no one can deny the biology of determining the sex, gender is one of the first things that identifies humans. Secondly, people see the duality between men and women to be a natural consequence, because “anyone can clearly see that humanity is split into two categories of individuals with manifestly different clothes, faces, bodies, smiles, movements, interests, and occupations” (Beauvoir 24); these differences should not be ignored. Nature made men and women dimorphic, hence dualistic mindsets are
Gender is such a ubiquitous notion that humans assume gender is biological. However, gender is a notion that is made up in order to organize human life. It is created and recreated giving power to the dominant gender, creating an inferior gender and producing gender roles. There are many questionable perspectives such as how two genders are learned, how humans learn their own gender and others genders, how they learn to appropriately perform their gender and how gender roles are produced. In order to understand these perspectives, we must view gender as a social institution. Society bases gender on sex and applies a sex category to people in daily life by recognizing gender markers. Sex is the foundation to which gender is created. We must understand the difference between anatomical sex and gender in order to grasp the development of gender. First, I will be assessing existing perspectives on the social construction of gender. Next, I will analyze three case studies and explain how gender construction is applied in order to provide a clearer understanding of gender construction. Lastly, I will develop my own case study by analyzing the movie Mrs. Doubtfire and apply gender construction.
Gender, race, and sexuality are socially constructed systems that act as guidelines, or rules, for how people interact with each other. A social construct often appears to be reality. However, when you step back and look at these systems critically, it is easy to see that gender, race, and sexuality do not represent a true reality. An easy example of a social construct is the game of basketball. Our society has created the game of basketball; we have rules for how to play, what to play with, and what to wear. However, if you stop and think about it, you could actually play basketball any way you’d like, but the game is only called basketball when you play by the rules. The rules define the game and give it meaning. The same is true for social
Identities are an important part of the human experience. One of the many identities that creates a person is gender. Society, being the entity establishing social norms and social roles, plays a part in effecting the individual’s gender, and how they choose to express themself. The underlying or overlying identities also have the same effect. Gender is not only an identity, it is a lifestyle inside and out. Gender, like race, class, and sexuality; is not limited to the binary scale, and that is normal, natural, and human. The concept of gender is man-made, but it forces one’s hand to analyze the thought processes behind an individual's perception on gender through self, through society, or through the dichotomy and/or correspondence of the