Women are only represented as virgins or vamps in the media

             How women are represented in the media
             Throughout history women have been allocated particular restrictive roles by the media, mother or sex symbol, virgin or vamp.
             Within the media women are commonly represented as either sex symbols or as mothers and housewives. These are the two contrasting ideals that will be discussed throughout this essay. The media forms where we most see this occurring are on various television shows essentially soap operas, in advertising, magazines such as playboy, various artworks, music and women's sport coverage. We are consistently bombarded with images of women in cleaning product and other domestic labor related commercials. At the same time as being sentenced to a life which consists primarily of cooking, cleaning and taking care of the children a woman must perform these tasks whilst looking beautiful but virginal at the same time. This is the idea the audience is so often presented with when we see women in the mother or housewife role in the media. The other half of the time however, when a woman is presented as a sex symbol, she is never associated with domesticity or children, she is the vamp who exists solely for men's viewing pleasure. Perhaps the most famous icon of her time was Marilyn Monroe, whose sex symbol status rocketed her to fame in the late1950s. Marilyn may well have been the first sex symbol mass produced and distributed by the media. Her role in all this is important and will be discussed in more depth later in the essay. Also if we examine the many western artworks depicting images of mother and child and compare it with the examples mentioned above, the question remains, is the media portraying the cultural values and ideals that exist within our society, or are they simply portraying society as they see it?
             One place where women are represented continuously either as mothers, housewives or sex symbols in the media is on television. "Television is widely kn...

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