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Brenna Manzello
CM 213- Gender & Media
1/04/18
Reading Response 1

In today’s society media affects people of all ages, races and genders. This paper will

talk about the three main themes that have been looked at within articles, the book and

videos. The first major theme talked about is how gender is portrayed in the media and

how stereotypes are created with specific genders. The second theme looked at is how

gender roles are viewed in the work environment specifically how females are portrayed

negatively in the work place. The third and final theme surrounds women movements and

how women triumphed their rights.

The first theme talked about is how gender is portrayed through the media. Before

we can go into depth about this topic we first need to understand the definition of gender.

Gender is a more complex concept than sex, sex is a classification society makes based on

biological and genetic factors. “Gender is defined by society and expressed by individuals as

they interact with others and media in their society” (Wood, pg. 21). Culture also has an

impact with gender. “Since it is made up of practices and structures that reflect and hold a

particular social order by defining certain social groups, values, expectations, meanings and

patterns of behavior as natural and unnatural” (Wood, pg. 31). With gender and culture we

also need to understand how communication plays a role with those. Communication is

viewed as being dynamic and systematic. There are two levels of communication, one is the

content level that is its literal meaning involving a literal message and implying the proper

response. The other is the relationship level that is less obvious but reflects and influences
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how people feel about each other (Wood, pg. 34). In order to understand the meanings of

gender it is important to understand culture and communication.

Understanding gender leads to the article from Media Smarts discussing how men

and women are portrayed through the media and stereotyped. The article talks about how

in the film Tough Guise; male violence is portrayed as being a normal expression of

masculinity. That leads to children’s television shows teaching boys that they have to be

tough, powerful, a loner or a leader. “Boys dream themselves into the position of their

heroes and experience a story similar to the one in the original medium” (Gotz, Lemish).

There are many stereotypes surrounding males especially in movies and television shows.

There is always the jock, the joker, strong silent type, big shot and etc. Then there is how

females are portrayed on media. Women are mostly viewed as sexual objects when their

bodies become sexualized in ads to grab attention and sexuality are linked to products that

are bought and sold (Graydon, S). Shari Graydon also discusses how media infantilizes

women portraying them as child like and innocent and vulnerable, which is linked to

potential violence (Graydon, S). According to Jean Kilbourne, “Women’s bodies are often

dismembered into legs, breasts and thighs reinforcing the message that women are objects

rather than whole human beings (Kilbourne, J). She also talked about how when women

say no to men’s advances it can be portrayed as just teasing to their advances.

That article summarized that the media expects men and boys to live up to a certain

stereotype and allowing violence to be a natural expression to show masculinity. The

article also showed that women are just viewed as being sexual objects in a man’s world

and dismembered to look a certain way in advertisements.

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This now leads us to the documentary The Mickey Mouse Monopoly; this film by

Chyng Sun summarizes how women negatively portrayed in the Disney films. Every Disney

movie that was watched growing up negatively portrays women as always being the

damsel in distress needing a man to save the day. Also the women in the movies sexualize

themselves in order to make men happy. In the movie Aladdin, Jasmine becomes seductive

to distract the buy guys, in The Little Mermaid; Ariel gives up her voice in order to get a

nice body to attract the prince. Beauty and the Beast show the character Lumiere ignoring

the word no from his love interest and still proceeding. Also Belle is verbally abused by the

Beast throughout the film but still falls in love with him. So overall Disney movies are

sending bad messages to children such as women needing to rely on men to save the day

and that women need to look a certain way to attract men.

This leads us to our second theme, which is how gender roles are portrayed in the

work environment. In the book Gendered Lives, “Media plays a role in teaching children

what activities and roles are rewarded for each sex” (Wood, pg.51). This means that when

children are exposed to television programs it shows boys being rewarded for engaging in

masculine activities and girls being rewarded for engaging in feminine activities (Wood,

51). Gender roles are also looked at with having women being known for being the

caretaker of her family and remain unequally portrayed in service and clerical jobs but men

are in executive roles in profit sectors of the economy. Men are still viewed as being the

breadwinners for their families while women take care of the children and the household.

“At very young ages girls learn they are supposed to be nice and put others needs ahead of

their own, while boys learn that they are supposed to take command and assert

themselves” (Wood, pg. 58).

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In todays society women and men can pretty much do the same jobs and have the

same positions in almost every job out there. However women still get mistreated for being

a woman whether it is a lower salary, lower position or getting sexually harassed. In the

article Tip of the Day: The unfair and imbalanced culture of sexual harassment at fox news,

we look at how sexual harassment takes place in the work place with little to no justice. At

Fox news they have had their fair share of sexual harassment cases over the years and

Gretchen Carlson finally took a stand against Rodger Ailes and got a $20 million settlement

and Rodger was dismissed. Then there is Bill O’Reilly who had an interesting view on the

sexual harassment investigations going on, “If you don’t like what’s happening in the

workplace, go to human resources or leave” (O’Reilly). However he was soon being

exposed for having $13 million worth of settlements made with women who accused him

of sexual harassment (Frechette, 2017). O’Reilly finally got fired for his actions but got a

large payout of $25 million for getting fired but still somehow deserved that amount of

money. That’s basically taking away his punishment by rewarding him with a large sum of

money. “Sexual harassment is all too often predicated on a powerful beauty myth and

double standard applied to women’s professional appearance” (Frechette, 2017).

The article Project Censored: Male Gaze and its Impact on Gender Portrayals in

Media, talks about how the male gaze shows how men control the media and their point of

views dominates the media messages. There are six companies that own 90% of the media

and all of the CEO’s are white males (Bedford et al., 2015). The male gaze is also portrayed

through the music industry with five major corporations owning 85% of the entertainment

industry being controlled by men. An example was when “Disney star Miley Cyrus appears

mostly naked in her 2013 Wrecking Ball video and drew attention at the 2013 Video Music
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Awards not for her artistry, but her decision to perform the dance move “twerking” in a bra

and panties on stage” (Bedford et al., 2015). Although Miley was aware of what she was

doing, however her nakedness was in the context of a cultural industry run mostly by men,

filmed by men and produced mostly by men (Bedford et al., 2015). Also the male gaze

theory suggests that sexual violence and rape is normalized making it a rape culture.

Statistics show that 1:5 women will be raped in their lifetime, 1:17 men will be raped, six

percent of rapists will spend a day and jail and 15:16 will not. “The Defense Department

estimates that 22,800 violent sex crimes were committed in the military in 2010” (Bedford

et al., 2015). 1:5 women leave the military as victims to sexual assault and have PTSD from

it.

After learning about the male gaze and unfair treatment in the work place this leads

us to the film Playing Unfair: The Media Image of the Female Athlete, this documentary

looks at how female athletes don’t benefit as much as male athletes do. Males get 60%

representation for being athletes while females only get 40%. According to this film, people

don’t view women athletes as athletes; they view them out of uniform for their bodies

rather than their athleticism skills. Sport commentators call women by their first names

and call men by their last names when talking about them during their sport that’s because

women are viewed as being more casual than men athletes. Also female athletes are always

doing photo-shoots that show off their bodies like models instead of representing their

sports. People are keeping women’s power at bay by sexualizing them, some women’s

sexual appeal is more important than their athletic ability such as Anna Kournikova who

has never won a singles match but has made the most endorsement money based on looks

and her body.

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Onto the last and final theme, which is how women’s movements have affected

women and their treatment. In the book Gendered Lives, we learn about women’s

movements that look place beginning in 1840 to 1925 the first movement took place.

“Women’s rights movement engaged in activism aimed at enlarging women’s political

rights” (Wood, pg. 70). Women didn’t have the right to vote until 1918-1920 when Alice

Paul and Lucy Burns conducted a nonviolent protest for women’s suffrage. The second

movement was with radical feminism also called women’s liberation movement. “Radical

feminist’s relied on revolutionary analysis and policies along with high profile public

events to call attention to the oppression of women and to demand changes in women’s

place in society and changes in relationships between men and women (Barry, 1998;

Freeman, 2002; Wood, 2017,pg. 73). The third movement was the third-wave feminism

that included women of different ethnicities, abilities and disabilities (Wood, pg. 87). Third

wavers were also more technology advanced and were able to use IM’s, texts, blogs and

YouTube. They also are known for their individualism with different goals, strategies and

identities.

In the article ‘Feminine Mystique’ at 50 written by Gail Collins talks about Betty

Friedan’s book written in 1963 and how it accused American society for its attitudes

towards women without discussing wars. “In 1963 most women weren’t able to get credit

without a male co-signer, they couldn’t sit on juries and husbands had control over

everything” (Collins, 2013). Feminine Mystique looked at how the nature of housework

changed when Americans moved from the farm then to the cities and then to the suburbs.

She looked at how the farm wife played a crucial economic role with manufacturing clothes,

soap and growing food and etc. The suburban housewife experienced no economic point at
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all. The Feminine Mystique is “a very specific cry of rage about the way intelligent, well-

educated women were kept out of the mainstream of American professional life and

regarded as little more than a set of reproductive organs in heels” (Collins, 2013). Some

women were outraged with the way they were portrayed in the book but others felt like

they were understood. Also in 1970 Friedan called the great march to celebrate the 50th

anniversary of women’s suffrage creating mass turnout in cities around the country

(Collins, 2013).

Lastly the film Iron Jawed Angels was about how Alice Paul and Lucy Burns made

women’s rights to vote legalized in the 19th amendment. The film shows their hardships

and triumphs within getting their goal. Once they went to D.C to begin their journey they

were attacked during their women’s suffrage parade but didn’t let that defeat them and

kept pushing on. After having an investigation take place against them, the women were

jailed. While in jail they all kept protesting and never gave up. Their stories made it to

major newspapers like the Washington Post and caught the attention from people around

the country. After three years in 1920 they finally were successful in their movement and

the 19th amendment was official. Their story was very inspiring and daring and made

things possible for women today.

Overall gender plays a major role in the media and the work environment. There are

many stereotypes surround men and women and different roles they have within the

workplace. Women are still looked at as being less important than men when it comes to

certain mediums. As of right now males have more power in the media industry and music

industry. Women have come a long way since the women suffrage act but still could

advance within today’s society.

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Bibliography

Bedford, C., Edelman, D., Kim, E., Freeman, L., Davis, L., Wing, L., . . . Huff, M. (2015, May
05). Male Gaze and its Impact on Gender Portrayals in Media - Censored Notebook. Retrieved
January 02, 2018, from http://projectcensored.org/male-gaze-and-its-impact-on-gender-
portrayals-in-media/

Collins, G. (2013, January 23). 'The Feminine Mystique' at 50. Retrieved January 04, 2018, from
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/27/magazine/the-feminine-mystique-at-
50.html?pagewanted=3&%3B_r=0

Frechette, J. (2015, May 05). Male Gaze and its Impact on Gender Portrayals in Media -
Censored Notebook. Retrieved January 02, 2018, from http://projectcensored.org/male-gaze-and-
its-impact-on-gender-portrayals-in-media/

Iron_jawed_angels.m4v. (n.d.). Retrieved January 04, 2018, from
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MediaSmarts. (n.d.). Retrieved January 04, 2018, from http://mediasmarts.ca/digital-media-
literacy/media-issues/gender-representation

Playing Unfair.mp4. (n.d.). Retrieved January 04, 2018, from
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a=c51dc391e9144f1b86310993a7f6d918

Sun, C. (n.d.). MICKEY_MOUSE_MONOPOLY.mp4. Retrieved January 04, 2018, from
http://permalink.fliqz.com/aspx/permalink.aspx?at=b32ef195b23246618034f6a71a015654&%3
Ba=c51dc391e9144f1b86310993a7f6d918

Wood, J. T., & Fixmer-Oraiz, N. (2017). Gendered lives: communication, gender, & culture.
Australia: Cengage Learning.