...Representations of femininity...

Representations of Femininity


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Feminism has been a recognised social philosophy for more than thirty years, and the changes that have occurred in women's roles in western society during that time have been nothing short of phenomenal. Click here for a brief set of definitions. Yet media representations of women remain worryingly constant. Does this reflect that the status of women has not really changed or that the male-dominated media does not want to accept it has changed?

Representations of women across all media tend to highlight the following:

beauty (within narrow conventions)
size/physique (again, within narrow conventions)
sexuality (as expressed by the above)
emotional (as opposed to intellectual) dealings
relationships (as opposed to independence/freedom)
Women are often represented as being part of a context (family, friends, colleagues) and working/thinking as part of a team. In drama, they tend to take the role of helper (Propp) or object, passive rather than active. Often their passivity extends to victimhood (see the discussion of the misogynistic PantyRaider below). Men are still represented as TV drama characters up to 3 times more frequently than women, and tend to be the predominant focus of news stories.

The representations of women that do make it onto page and screen do tend to be stereotypical, in terms of conforming to societal expectations, and characters who do not fit into the mould tend to be seen as dangerous and deviant. And they get their comeuppance, particularly in the movies. Think of Alex Forrest (Glenn Close) in Fatal Attraction or, more recently, Teena Brandon/Brandon Teena (Hilary Swank) in Boys Don't Cry. America seems to expect its women to behave better than their European counterparts - British viewers adored the antics of Patsy & Edina in Absolutely Fabulous, but these had to be severely toned down (less swearing, NO drugtaking) for the US remake, High Society (which was a flop).

Discussions of women's representation in the media tend to revolve around the focus on physical beauty to the near-exclusion of other values, the lack of powerful female role models, and the extremely artificial nature of such portrayals, which bear little or no relation to the reality experience by women across the planet. It would take almost a whole A-level course to cover these representations and the issues surrounding them in depth (if interested, do Womens or Gender Studies at uni), but you might want to start by reading the following:

Women's Body Image in the Media
Media Report to Women - a roundup of issues
Images of Women in Computer Games - a discussion of PantyRaider
Raw Nerve - Offensive representations
Deadly Persuasion - the power of advertising (lengthy, but worth a read)
The secrets of marketing to women - the startling econmic truth