Women are only represented as virgins or vamps in the media
How women are represented in the mediaThroughout 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. P
"Women may be participating in record numbers and succeeding spectacularly in sports, but "these women are routinely shown off court, out of uniform and in highly sexualized poses," said Mary Jo Kane, director of the Tucker Center for Research on Girls & Women in Sport, at the University of Minnesota. All women want to be seen as beautiful and this is why women's beauty products are such big sellers today. "It is widely believed to represent universal concepts of maternal emotion, the essential bond between a mother and her offspring and the dependence of that child upon her". This is where there is evidence that the media representations of women may reflect the values of a certain time period. "Generally, in the world of television, women tend to be confined to a life dominated by the family and personal relationships far more than men, outside the home, as well as in it. Her blonde hair, full figure and open smile were reflective of feminine beauty and sexuality in the American twentieth-century. One only has to observe the staggering popularity of Anna Kornikova, the girl rarely won a game of tennis however because of her attractiveness and ability to "play it up" for the cameras she became very famous. "Paul Trowler sites a study of women in advertisements, which found that women were seven times more likely to appear in personal hygiene product adverts than to not appear; 75% of all adverts using females were for products used in the bathroom or kitchen, 56% of women in adverts were shown as domestic housewives and only eighteen different occupations were shown for women, in comparison to forty three for men (Trowler,1988: 96). An example of a show where women where both objectified and presented in the housewife stereotype is Married With Children. This was evident in his famous painting of the time, Marilyn Diptych (1962). In other words, these two forms of media depict societies ideology of mothers. This usually occurs consistently in car commercials. They admired and loved her, but saw nothing but her breasts, her hips, her legs.
Common topics in this essay:
Marilyn Monroe,
Paul Trowler,
Representational Essay,
Marilyn Diptych,
Barbie Doll,
Nipimo California,
Anna Kornikova,
Heather Locklear,
Glenda Holste,
Daniella Klien,
sex symbol,
mother child,
sex symbols,
sturken cartwright 2004,
throughout history,
representations women,
cartwright 2004,
sturken cartwright,
ingham 1995,
mothers housewives,
images women,
evidence media representations,
sex symbols mothers,
symbols mothers housewives,
sexuality sell products,
|
Acceptance Essays
