Media Part II

Part II of Chapter 11 discusses who is represented in the media. Women are underrepresented regardless of form in the U.S. media. male characters outnumber female characters in books, news, television shows, film, and video games. male characters outnumbered female characters and appeared more often as lead characters in children's books. These findings suggests to children that female characters are less important than their male counterparts. In news , women are less likely to be guest on Sunday morning public affairs shows, be apart of the local television news workforce, and the local radio news workforce. In the 2012 presidential election, women played a deciding role in the election but did not figure prominently in news coverage of the election or on issues that most directly affected them. In Entertainment, women are only 41% of all fictional characters on television and only about one in six films depicted 'gender balance' in an analysis of the top-grossing films from 2007-2008. Minorities are underrepresented in the media as well, in an content analysis of prime-time television shows from 2000 to 2008, the researcher found the appearance of Black characters declined and the representation of other minority groups and Hispanics were "nearly invisible. Video games underrepresent women and minorities as well. There is an over-representation of males, whites, and adults with the most popular games being the least representative of others such as the elderly, children, and minorities. When the underrepresented groups were represented it was usually only in secondary roles, social identity theory suggests that they will be seen as less important. Along with who is represented, the book discusses how people are represented. Sexualization occurs in many forms in our society, dolls being dressed in revealing clothing, children wearing underclothes intended for adults, and sexy Halloween costumes are examples. Television plays a key role in the sexualization of culture and has increased over the past 10 years. Men and Women's bodies are not sexualized in the same way, women are presented as sexual objects far more than men. In music videos, women are more likely to hyper-sexualized. Women are more likely to wear sexy clothing, depicted partially nude, and to be referred to as attractive. Women are sexualized 3 to 5 times more often than men. The book points out Cosmopolitan magazine which is directed towards women but also sexualizes women. Also, Cosmo only offers examples of heterosexual femininity, which presents a hegemonic message that a women's self-worth is influenced by the way she looks and how she dresses. Sexualization has also affected young girls. studies show that young girls oftentimes prefer the sexualized doll over the non-sexualized doll for their ideal self and equate sexiness with popularity. Exposure to sexual content on television contributes to young peoples sexual knowledge, beliefs, sexual attitudes, and behaviors but the number of hours of television watched also plays a significant role. When mothers teach their children to be critical of media, the child may be less likely to be affected by viewing sexual content. Also understanding that one's body is an agent of action and not just as an object of gaze can lessen self-sexualization. Sexualization Occurs even in children's books, and most often books aimed at young girls. Beauty standards are not the same for everyone though and race, nationality, and sexual orientation play a role in how messages are internalized. People self-objectify through the act of Sexting, which is sending sexually-explicit images via cell phone. Rresearch shows that sexting tends to be indicative of teens' sexual activity and potentially risky behaviors. Moving Along, Men's masculinity has been a topic of discussion. In advertisements, men are being encouraged to take back their masculinity. Men's magazines show men as being confused and insecure. The taking back of one's masculinity presented by certain advertisements show's that there are pressures put on men to be manly by over-performing a particular type of masculinity. Hegemonic masculinity is easily identifiable in the media and reinforces heteronormitivity. Video games portray hypermasculinity by the over-performance of masculinity. Although women make up 47% of gamers, games are dominated by male characters. Grand Theft Auto is a great example of the over-porformance of masculinity and violence by male characters. Also, the only roles women play are as prostitutes or pedestrians and women are not main character. Dominant media images unfortunately reinforce the gender binary of heteronormativity but many of us still consume. The danger is that people do not think critically and act as passive agents. It is important to be an engaged member of the cultural conversation, this is how you'll learn to employ an oppositional gaze. 1. In the figure on pg 239, pie charts show that during the 2012 presidential election, men were quoted far more than women on issues that directly related to women. Why do you think men's quotes were used more often than women's? 2. How do you think the underrepresentation of women in news, books, television, film, and video games can be changed/How do you think women can gain a voice in these forms of media? 3. Do you think the overperforming of masculinity in media has been detrimental to young men? If so why? If not, why not?

Gender and the Media

            Media

            Gender communications scholars have theorized that media in a variety of forms ranging from video games, television, cinema, advertisement, online and print news media, and art are discourses and symbols that mirror and maintain our understanding of gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, religion, class, ability, and so on. The textbook argues that a communication and rhetorical focus to understand how media constructs, symbols that reinforce our understanding of gender. DeFrancisco and Palczewski partition the discussion of Media and gender within the following way:

1. Defining Media and How They Function:

            The textbook provides an exhaustive, yet open-ended definition for media, which ranges from print media, tweets, art, music, and even tweets. It is critical to point out that DeFrancisco and Palczewski avoid using the term The Media in favor of media to demonstrate that media is not mono-causal from one particular source, but rather exists within a complex process.

            The media is a bi-product of the cultural industry, which was first coined by Horkheimer and Adorno. The cultural industry constructs messages that generate demand for particular products, and in return, the cultural industry can provide back towards the public. This particularly applies to the advertisement industry.

            According to scholars, the average individual spends over 2.8 hours a day watching television. Dependence on media, more specifically, demonstrates the ways we view ourselves refers back to television as a way of understanding ourselves.    Since the digital age, media has become more complex and offered new avenues for individuals to express themselves and their personal identities.

A. Media Hegemony or Polysemy

            The text book argues that the ways social groups can make its beliefs seem logical, normal, and common sense is through appealing representations of the media, since it’s the basis for people to understand and formulate their social realities. However, it is argued that media messages are polysemy. In other words, they can be interpreted in many different ways at different times.

B. Media Polyvalence

            Scholars such as Celeste Condit disagree that media representations should view as Polysemy. Instead, she argues that these messages should be Polyvalence, having a multitude of valuations. This process occurs when the public shares a common denotation with a text, but they disagree about the valuation of these to denotations that they result in different interpretations.

2. The Gaze(s)

A. Ways of Seeing

            Scholars have been interested in examining how visual art is constructed for a particular audience and spectator. For example, Berger argues that European art of nude women was created for a male gaze. This constructed women as objects, which hurt their agency because women were seen as objects rather than agents with the power to act. This criticism spans beyond European art criticism, the visual images that are seen within advertising, film, and even the photos we post on Facebook. From a gender perspective, these ways of seeing shape of understanding of gender, such as, the European Art framed women as passive objects.

           

B. The Gaze

            Scholars such as Laura Mulvey continued the discussions surrounding the ways of seeing women in media. She agrees that these images construct a particular vision of women and gender, but believes that these views are always of the white male, which prevents the possibility of non-white gazes. Scholars argue that multiple gazes can exist within film and provide us with means and methods for resistance. Such as Brenda Cooper argues that women can mock these gender roles and the audience can willing choose to not identify with the man, but instead the female that resists these norms.

C. An Oppositional Gaze

            Scholars such as bell hooks argues that the media can no longer determine the position of the audience if they are conscious and refuse the act of positioning, which she defines as the oppositional gaze. She argues that we can all look through each other eyes and can refuse those visions. The oppositional gaze is comprised of four main elements. First, we must be conscious that we view culture from a particular perspective and as why we identify with that perspective. Second, the individual must acknowledge their participates in culture. Third, the oppositional gaze begins as a social critique and then becomes a political critique, once we understand the current and flawed representations, then we are able to move to create alternatives. Fourth, the oppositional gaze understands how media engages in the commodification of culture to supports its discrimination.

I provide the following three questions:

1. Bellow is a link to a super bowl snickers commercial. My question is, how does this text demonstrate a Polyvalence view on culture?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gjsoSY18kg

2. According to Bulter, gender is not scripted onto the body, but rather is performed. If we agree that media creates our understanding of gender, then does that mean gender is not performed?

3.  Is there a particular time you have viewed a text that was problematic because it was intended for the view of a white male, heterosexual, and other hegemonic views? If so, what alternative views did it exclude, and how could including those views remedy the text? Or is it impossible to remedy those representations?