Media - Representations of different characteristics Flashcards
The different groups
- Gender
- Sexuality
- Disability
- Ethnicity
- Age
- Class
How is gender represented in the media?
1) Symbolic annihilation - Tuchman et al; women’s achievements are subject to omission, trivialisation or condemnation
2) Cult of femininity - Fergurson; women are encouraged to conform to the feminine ideal focused on appearance and relationships rather than careers
3) Male gaze - Wolf / Mulvey - women are presented as sex objects that are viewed from a male perspective to conform to the ‘beauty myth’
4) Hegemonic gender identity - Connell; the media encourages socialisation into gender norms, based around hierarchy, behaviour, appearance, language and social position
5) Retributive masculinity - Gauntlett - the backlash against metro sexuality as encouraged more media content that attempts to regain hegemonic gender identities in the face of toxic masculinity
Stereotypes of gender in the media
Characteristic: Sexuality
- Hegemonic femininity - Women are sex objects, should be submissive, heterosexual
- Hegemonic masculinity - Men are dominant, women are theirs to be used, heterosexual
Characteristic: Physicality
- Hegemonic femininity - Women should have a good waist-hip ratio, should show off curves, weak, skinny. Long hair
- Hegemonic masculinity - Men should be broad and strong, short hair, tall
Characteristic: Emotions
- Hegemonic femininity - Women are emotional, damsel in distress
- Hegemonic masculinity - Men are not emotional apart from feeling violent and aggressive
Characteristic - Role:
- Hegemonic femininity - Women in the home
- Hegemonic masculinity - Men at work
Gender - representation of women
- Symbolic annihilation, Limited roles, Male gaze, Mannequins, Cult of femininity, Beauty myth
Sociologists -
1) Tuchman - (SA) - narrow roles shown for sex appeal and looks not achievements.
- Double standard around age and gender
2) Kilbourne - mannequin presentation - women are expected to be size 0, long legs, perfect hair/skin/teeth and this image is used to sell products that benefit the male gaze
3) Tunstall - biased towards housewife representation
- Ignores that most women work - half of British women go out to work, and presents them as housewives etc, whereas Tunstall notes that men are often portrayed in positions of power and they are rarely referred to by marriage status or reduced to their body.
4) Wolf - dominant media message aimed at women is that their bodies are a project in constant need of improvement
5) Bates - music industry sexualises women
6) Salinas - journalists often pass negative comments on female bodies
7) Martinson - few media stories about the ability and expertise of women and that experts consulted by the media overwhelmingly are men
8) Cochrane - symbolic annihilation in TV’s relationship with women, with many outputs being dominated by men
9) Plant - the internet is a feminine technology that is the most empowering tool for women as it allows women to subvert and create new identities and breakdown the patriarchy through new media; equally, it makes space for misogynists and misandrists
Examples -
- ‘Just the Women’ report - concluded that 1300 news reports portrayed women in limited roles
- 2012 Olympics - 4.5% of articles related to female sport, which dropped to 2.9% after it finished, and the coverage tends to trivialise their achievements
- Nicola Sturgeon - noted in a speech she felt her appearance was attacked by journalists, which she worried would put women off politics
- 84% of reporters and guests on BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme are males
- Under many articles empowering women, there are a range of sexist comments - Caroline Criado Perez, Mary Beard, MP Stella Creasy
Gender - representation of men
- Breadwinner, Toxic masculinity, Metrosexual male, Demonised males
Sociologists and evidence;
1) McNamara - newspaper analysis shown in a range of negative roles, irresponsible and risk takers
2) Children Now Report - media reinforced cultural expectations of male violence, lack emotion, problem solvers
- A third of boys have never seen a man doing domestic chores on TV, and these images support the idea that traditional images of masculinity generally continue to dominate mass-media coverage
20% of media representations of masculinity focused on men and boys who were in touch with their feminine side
3) Metrosexual male - need to connect emotionally with children, in touch with femininity - men are demonised in the media for doing this
4) FHM and Men’s Health transmit metrosexual values because they portray men to be fundamentally caring, generous and good humoured and helps men be more considerate around the house
5) Magazines that create female images to benefit the male gaze are increasingly few and far between, and images of conventionally rugged, macho and independent men remain
6) Although media representation of masculinity is embracing new forms of fatherhood and emotional vulnerability, it is important to note that changes in representation of masculinity still supports hegemonic masculinity
Theoretical perspectives on representation of gender in the media - feminism
- Critical of representations of each gender in the media as they believe the mass media and family and education are the main players in the construction of gender roles - media makes females domestic goddesses and sex objects is seen as problematic because it is believed to have a limiting effect on young females behaviour and aspirations, especially in adolescence
- Liberal feminists - media representation has been slow in matching societal progress in response to female achievement in society - cultural lag is due to women not being prominent in media ownership
- Mills - culture of the newsroom is male; off putting for females with a deeply entrenched bloke culture
- Lauren - women account for 27% of creators in 2014-15, and only 12% of protagonists, 29% of major characters and 30% of speaking roles in the 100 most grossing films of 2015 were women and they tend to be in roles such as makeup and costume design, being underpaid in comparison to male dominated technical areas
- Marxist feminists - roots of representation are economic - by product of media conglomerates needing to make a profit in capitalist societies; in order to attract audiences, the content reflects the consensus on domestic roles - women who are not domestic are excluded to avoid isolating the traditional audiences
- Also a promotion of false needs around beauty, size and shape in order to attract advertising revenue - by ensuring an unachievable ideal, capitalists have a constant profit
- Radical feminists - Wolf - deliberately dupe women into a beauty myth, in which women focus their energy into this rather than challenging men
- McRobbie - young women are developing their own language of dealing with sexual inequality (raunchy language) and the popular feminist movement is the mainstream of commercial culture, allowing feminism a space where it was previously marginalised by traditional media
- Gauntlett - it is naive to assume that media representations reflect similar perspectives on gender and sexuality because the forms of media are so diverse and so is the audience - magazines for older women are presuming of traditional motherhood and heteroseuxality whilst for younger women it is more sexually flexible lifestyles
Theoretical perspectives on representation of gender in the media - postmodernism
- Gauntlett - positive about representations, focusing on the relationship between mass media and identity and argues that in contrast with the past, men and women no longer get singular and straightforward media messages that suggest there is one type of masculinity or femininity
- Mass media actually challenges traditional definitions of gender identities with the new emphasis on women’s achievements and the mass media also acknowledges men’s emotions and problems and the promotion of alternative identities produce greater diversity of feminine and masculine identities
Theoretical perspectives on representation of gender in the media - pluralism
- Symbolic annihilation underestimates women’s ability to see through gender stereotyping and manipulation and they believe feminists are guilty of stereotyping females as impressionable and easily influenced and they claim there is no real evidence that girls and women take any notice of media content or that it profoundly affects their attitudes or behaviour
- Pluralists also argue that the media simply reflects social attitudes and tastes, and is public demand - the media is meeting the needs of both men and women, and if women were truly unhappy with how they were being presented they would not buy media products such as magazines
- However, they do fail to consider that sections of the media may be responsible for creating those needs in the first place
Gender - How has the new media challenged stereotypes and effected gender perception?
How has the new media enabled a challenge -
- High profile women on Instagram face an epidemic of misogynist abuse as found in a study by the Guardian
- Aside from image-based sexual abuse, women also received countless violent messages and more specific death threats
- Social media platforms have an ultimate aim of profit and algorithms push videos and content that is popular and therefore makes money for them
Effect of new media on identity -
- Media has an impact on men and women, as it is fluid and changes over time
- Identity is affected by privilege, class, age and ethnicity
- User generated content can also affect identity
- Increased effect on men’s identity through magazines and online representation of the perfect body
- 87% of women and 65% of men compare their bodies to images they consume on social and traditional media
Representation of sexuality in the media
- Dominant heterosexual view (owners and journalists)
- Homosexuals are viewed as deviant or a threat
- Gay man - camp, macho or deviant (Craig, 1992)
- Gay women - butch or over-sexualised for the pleasure of men (Stonewall, 2010)
- Historic representation of gay men was shaped within the AIDS and HIV epidemic of 1980s - threat and moral panic (fear of loss of revenue)
- Cowan and Valentine (2005) - gay people were 5 times more likely to be negatively represented
- Symbolic annihilation - George Michael’s sexuality was outed by the media after he was arrested for a sexual act in a public toilet, and the media reporting on this was frenzied and constantly used the word shame
- George Michael was unusual in his approach to the media that “outed” his sexuality - he hit back with unapologetic interviews about his sexuality and then made this video; although it didn’t silence the media, he used his power and status to take control of the situation; but not everyone has the ability to do this
Sexuality - sociologists on representation
- Gross (1991) media often symbolically annihilated gays and lesbians by excluding them altogether, or trivialized, or made fun of them.
- Stonewall (2010) lesbian, gays and bisexuals are underrepresented in the media. 36% were represented in negative ways, in which gay people were depicted as figures of fun.
- When gay and lesbian characters appear in the media, they are usually cast and defined in terms of their sexual orientations, rather than just being characters who happen to be gay or lesbian.
- These representations appeal to certain news values (negativity, personalisation and out of the ordinary). They create titillation for an audience that view homosexuality as abnormal or perverse sex.
Changes to media representations of sexuality - advertisement / economy
- Pink pound / pink economy - this is the spending power of the LGBT community, and refers to the ability of the community to force representation by not buying products that are advertised only including straight people; many LGBTQ+ people are no longer dependents and have the disposable income to spend on consumer goods and so advertisers include them in order to keep profits
- On the other hand, there is little sign that the UK popular press is providing balanced and neutral coverage of LGBT issues; in the right wing press, homosexuality is consistently suggested to be wicked, sinful and unnatural, and editorials strongly oppose legislation aimed at bringing about social and political equality for gay people such as gay marriage and space is often given to commentators critical of gay lifestyles
- Advertisers, homosexual editors, producers and film directors - create the space for LGBTQ+ narratives that are accurate and fulfilling and positive
- Changes in social attitudes; Transgender representation = increased in the last ten years with shows such as Grey’s Anatomy and Orange is the New black
Sexuality - changes to media representations through the new media
- The New Media - content is user generated, and so LGBT individuals and organisations have constructed hundreds of sites to advise and support LGBT people, and Twitter and Facebook have been used to generate support for same-sex marriage both in the USA and Northern Ireland - Rainbow Pride Filters, 3.6 million #lovewins hashtag in 2015 supporting the Supreme Court’s legalisation of same-sex marriage
- User generation also allows negative opinions to circulate however, recording over 50 million homophobic comments in a 5 year period, and the existence of filters for programmes with LGBT people in 2015
- Increase in the amount of positive representations of LGBTs in commercials, films and television shows but there is still a way to go before such sexualities are portrayed in ways that are neither stereotypical or judgemental
Disability - media representation
Who shapes the media gaze of disabled people?
- Mulvey - it is straight, white, able bodied men who shape these images
Shakespeare -
- Media stereotypes of the disabled on television are crude, one-dimensional and simplistic and characters are used as a plot device, atmosphere or trait and such stereotypes reinforce attitudes towards disabled people
Disability - Barnes on representation
- Barnes (1992) argues that mass media representations of disability have generally been oppressive and negative. People with disabilities are rarely presented as people with their own identities. Barnes notes several common media representations of people with disabilities.
- They are rarely portrayed as normal people with an impairment
1) Pitiable and pathetic - Barnes claims these stereotypes are a staple of TV documentaries, which often focus too much on disabled children and miracle cures
2) Sinister and evil - James Bond criminals tend to be disabled
3) Atmospheric or curio - used for visual impact not storylines
4) Super-cripples - displayed with special powers, played by able actors e.g. Theory of Everything
5) Sexually abnormal
6) Incapable of fully participating in the community - rarely shown as teachers etc and so do not reflect everyday experience
Disability - Roper on representation
- Roper (2003) suggests that mass media representations of disability generally focus on pity. In particular, telethons can create problems for people with disabilities
- Children in Need - rely too heavily on ‘cute’ children to raise money, and do not represent the majority of the disabled population in the UK - telethons act to keep the audience in the position of givers and keep the disabled in their place as dependents
- It is about entertainment not actually helping understand the realities of being disabled and confirm social prejudices about the disabled
Disability - Karpf on representation
- Karpf (1988) suggests that there is a need for charities, but that telethons act to keep the audience in the position of givers and to keep recipients in their place as grateful and dependent.
- Children in Need, The Undateables
Disability - changes in representation
- Williams-Findlay - studied newspapers between 1989 and 2009, and found a steep decline in the use of stereotyped words such as brave but negative stereotypes and representations were still present because journalists still assumed it was tragic and disabled people are afflicted
-> Not regarded as newsworthy, and stereotypical representation of the disabled persist because disabled people and their organisations are rarely used as sources and so have little influence on language - Waston, Philo and Briant - compared tabloid media coverage in 2010 with 2004, found a significant increase in the reporting of disability - proportion describing them as sympathetic and deserving had fallen and some portrayals of those with hidden disabilities was particularly negative because they were called ‘welfare scroungers’
- Watson - articles focusing on disability benefit and fraud increased between 2005 and 2011 and this was leading to members of the public believing disabled people were claiming benefits fraudulently and rarely any articles about daily life for disabled people or discrimination against them, and noted an increase in derogatory language used
- However - more used in adverts, paralympics is reported more, CBBC presenters and TV shows - representation is improving in TV, not in newspapers
Disability - Sancho on representation
- Reported on the representation and portrayal of disabled people in peak-time programmes (5.30 pm to midnight) on five UK terrestrial TV channels using content analysis, focus groups and questionnaires.
- Disabled people were identified in 11% of programmes in 2002, but contributed to 1% of the overall television population.
