Week Monday 28 September: three lessons

 POWER & THE MEDIA: IDENTITY and GENDER

We are preparing for the 'Power' exam question. Your final essay may consider three topics. Today's lesson on how women are represented therefore may give you a third to a half of your final exam answer.

Please email me your completed essay by Friday 2 October.

You will write a short essay on power and gender as part of this topic in answer to the exam question: "The media construct identity." How far do you agree with this view?

• define how women are represented and the media's power to shape perceptions about identity
• give an account of three to four theorists with media examples
• The Bechdel Test
• Carol Clover – last girl theory: useful if analysing representation in horror films but mainly the sub genre of slasher horror. These are often aimed at catering for male audiences.
• Angela McRobbie – post feminist icon theory 
• Laura Mulvey – male gaze/female gaze: the female form is objectified in a range of media. 
• Tessa Perkins – stereotyping has elements of truth and are based on repeated representations, both in society and within the media. 
• Judith Butler – queer theory. Gender is not the result of nature but is socially constructed through media and culture. 
• brief conclusion that relates to the exam question

In our lesson on gender, we will use these resources:

• Laura Mulvey – male gaze/female gaze. Although Mulvey herself has rejected the male gaze theory in recent years there are still strong arguments suggesting the female form is still objectified in a range of media. Can we subvert the theory and suggest male performers/actors are objectified?
• Carol Clover: the representation of the last girl model in slasher films has evolved. First depicted as a hopeless damsel in distress who is bombarded with all sorts of dread and insurmountable fear and  panic at first, the moment she is drawn face to face with her attacker, since she then appears tough as a male as she fights against the attacker with a weapon in her hand in her hopes of survival. Examples of slasher films that utilize the ‘final girl’ concept are Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006, Scott Glosserman),  the 1997 film Alien Resurrection (1997, Jean-Pierre Jeunet), Urban Legend  (1998, Jamie Blanks). You may have newer examples?
• Angela McRobbie: McRobbie concluded from analysing constructions of gender in magazines that the media socialise us into gender roles: masculinity tends to be equated with power and aggression whilst femininity is represented in traditional roles, often as weak or subservient. These stereotypes perpetuate social ideas about gender. However, her Post Feminist Icon Theory suggests that female characters can also be determined, strong, independent and in control but also utilise their sexuality. “Lara Croft, Lady Gaga and Madonna, for example, could be identified as post-feminist icons as they exhibit the stereotypical characteristics of both the male and female – strength, courage, control and logic but also are willing to be sexualized for the male gaze. This control element of their own representation is crucial in understanding the theory”. In Rihanna's tv advert for Reb'l Fleur she has control over her representation: both knowing and innocent, Rihanna explores both sides of her nature in a visual palindrome.
• Digital technology has enabled the representation of the warrior woman in film: examples include Avatar with the CGI alien Neytiri (2009, James Cameron), Lara Croft Tomb Raider (2001), Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (2000, Ang Lee), Mei in The House Of Flying Daggers (2004, Yimou Zhang), Mulan (2020, Niki Caro), Captain Marvell (2019) and similar films like Captain America, Wonder Woman. 
• Robotic 'service' figures tend to be constructed as compliant females: Mia the synth in the popular tv series Humans (2015-18), Arisa in Better Than Us (2018, Netflix), Ava in Ex Machina (2014)
• The director of Avatar, James Cameron, is a notable figure in the screen history of the warrior woman because his previous films include two memorable examples: Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) in The Teminator (1984) and Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991), and Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) in Aliens (1986). 
• Judith Butler – Gender is not the result of nature but is socially constructed through media and culture. This theory challenges the assumption that there is a binary divide between gay and heterosexual suggesting in mainstream media heterosexuality is represented as normal. For Butler, gender is 'performative', like a theatre script that is repeatedly performed to a social audience, of acts associated with male or female. For Butler, gender is not innate, but "a series of acts which are renewed, revised, and consolidated through time". This suggests that performances of woman are compelled and enforced by historical social practice. For example, in films like East is East and Bend It Like Beckham, young Asian women are required by their parents to dress in particular ways that count as 'female' or 'suitable' (Jasminder may not wear football shorts, Meenah must wear a sari for visitors).
• Advertisements as gender scripts The conviction that advertisements are gender scripts is best summed up by Goodman (2002): ‘Because the media are the main information source about social processes and images and self-presentation, women are likely to attend to and use media images as guides for their attitudes and behaviours’. Many commentators position advertising as a powerful socialising agent among women, and, in particular, young women. In perhaps the seminal article in the field, Angela McRobbie (1978) studied Jackie! magazine and isolated a number of ‘codes of femininity’ centred on romance, domestic life, fashion and beauty used to indoctrinate young girls. Content analyses also suggest that a variety of subtle cues are used to tell young girls what might be considered suitably ‘feminine’ characteristics.

WATCH THE PRESENTATION ON THE BECHDEL TEST HERE

If you wish to read further, there is a downloadable pdf: 

WOMEN IN ADVERTISING: REPRESENTATIONS, REPERCUSSIONS, RESPONSES 

© Mercury Publications 

The representation of women in advertising has been the subject of discussion and debate for over four decades, with advertisers standing accused of utilising inappropriate and degrading stereotypes. This is currently a matter of prime concern in Ireland. The Equality Authority has recently issued a call for a background paper on the issue. This initiative has been welcomed by the National Women’s Council of Ireland. However, it has been dismissed as unnecessary by the Advertising Standards Authority of Ireland (ASAI) and by the Institute of Advertising Practitioners in Ireland (IAPI). This paper explores these issues and, in an effort to represent diverse views, draws upon discussion and empirical evidence from gender studies, consumer research, media studies and advertising studies. The paper highlights the fact that polarised views regarding the repercussions of gender representations are based upon understandings of how advertising impacts its audiences. Specifically, do advertisements operate as gender scripts or, alternatively, is gender textually mediated? The paper concludes with a number of recommendations for the advertising industry. 

Maurice Patterson, Lisa O’Malley & Vicky Story

FOUNDATION PRODUCTION LESSONS

Complete your Creative Critical Reflection questions: see last year's blog on your Foundation Production here. 

CREATIVE CRITICAL REFLECTION 1: How does your film opening use or challenge  conventions? CREATIVE CRITICAL REFLECTION 1: How does your film opening represent social groups or issues? 

CREATIVE CRITICAL REFLECTION 2: How does your film opening engage with your target audience? CREATIVE CRITICAL REFLECTION 2: How would you distribute your film opening? 

CREATIVE CRITICAL REFLECTION 3: How did your production skills develop throughout the project? 

CREATIVE CRITICAL REFLECTION 4: How did you integrate technologies - software, hardware, online - in this project?

All this work is done INDIVIDUALLY and must be completed BEFORE HALF TERM