Feminism

1) What examples are provided from the two texts of the 'male gaze' (Mulvey)?

Pan Am and Beyoncé's 'why don't you love me'

Pan Am: The sequence opens with a mid-shot of the four identical stewardesses’ fragmented legs as they walk in unison through the airport, allowing the audience to relish in the rhythm of their walk and their bodies. As we cut to a long shot, slow motion provides even more visual pleasure as we can take in all the glorious period detail of their uniforms and of course appreciate their perfectly coiffed hair and make up. They cause male characters in the airport to turn and stare; while the stewardesses don’t acknowledge these looks, there is a knowing and empowered quality to their walk and facial expressions.

Beyoncé: The mise-en-scène again highlights the constructed and performative nature of femininity along with Beyoncé’s exaggerated and over-the-top performance. Throughout the video she plays at being a ‘housewife’, humorously burning dinner, parodying mopping floors and dusting, all the while playfully gazing at the camera providing the audience with knowing winks in her ‘sexy outfits’. This self-conscious address allows Beyoncé to be objectified, welcoming the male gaze but simultaneously also avoiding feminist criticism through this use of parody and humour. 

2) Do texts such as these show there is no longer a need for feminism or are they simply sexism in a different form?

There is still a need for feminism as the very fact that there are texts being made laughing at how women used to be treated still objectifies them and does not help in completely eradicating that unfair representation of women and so feminism is needs to continue in a new form to fix this.

3) Choose three words/phrases from the glossary of the article and write their definitions on your blog.

Male Gaze – The gaze referring to Laura Mulvey’s seminal article ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’ which argues that main stream Hollywood films subject female characters to the ‘male gaze’ of the camera, fragmenting and objectifying their bodies.

Post-feminism – An ideology in culture and society that society is somehow past needing

feminism and that the attitudes and arguments of feminism are no longer needed.

Nostalgia – A sentimental longing for the past, often only remembering the positives of the time.

Now read The Theory Drop: Gender Performativity (MM69, page 25) and answer the following questions.

1) How does the writer suggest gender performativity is established from a young age?

gender is a social construction: it is taught to us by external influences and it’s ingrained at

such a young age that we often mistake it as ‘nature’ rather than ‘nurture’. Children are taught to perform their gender from early on so that they align themselves with certain tastes and behaviours befitting their gender category.

2) What does the phrase 'non-binary' refer to and how does it link to Butler's theory?

refers to someone who doesn’t define themselves as either wholly male or female. It shows us that we are never wholly one gender but that we adopt the role of one from birth and influence by our surroundings to do so, the idea of being non-binary just breaks from the norms allowing a person to be who they choose to be without conforming to those societal norms of being defined by a gender male or female.

3) How and why does the media help reinforce gender stereotypes? The writer provides several examples in the final section of the article.

#everydaysexism on Twitter for numerous examples of how casually stereotypical messages about what it means to be male or female are spread and consider how far this influences

how you perform your gender. Whilst there have been more progressive representations on

some platforms, the mass media still has a way to go. It’s worth thinking  about whose interests are served by perpetuating these roles. When females are presented as inferior, males come out as superior.

1) How might this video contribute to Butler’s idea that gender roles are a ‘performance’?

Beyoncé within the music video portrays many different ways of acting and living as a woman and that it is not just limited to being a housewife or beautiful woman, but that there is more to what a woman is than just how they used to perform like in the time period of the music video. Furthermore the very idea that she highlights all these roles shows us that they are being constructed by Beyoncé herself as they are in society and creates the notion that these are not the true representations of how women really are just as Beyoncé is not a mechanic or a 50's housewife. 

2) What might van Zoonen suggest regarding the representation of women in this video?

The video clearly represents the idea that women are viewed as a spectacle as Beyoncé consistently wears very revealing clothing throughout the entirety of the music video and can establish the view that its the only way to appeal to men in this patriarchal society through this media of a music video which may have been felt not to be responded to correctly or with attention from the media and male audiences if it was not filmed exactly as it was in the video further reinforcing the idea of a 'male gaze' in media products but also that the media will reinforce the gender role of the woman to be subservient to men in this way.

3) What are YOUR views on this debate – does Beyoncé empower women or reinforce the traditional ‘male gaze’ and oppression of women? 

Personally I believe that it can be both as Beyoncé could be reinforcing the 'male gaze' as some men will not take the message to heart that she is trying to get out there to women, and so will only further create a belief that women are just objects to be viewed while it can also be argued that she empowers women as throughout the video even though the song is about asking someone why they do not love her there is no man ever shown let alone established that the women she is asking to love her is even a man at all further reinforcing the thought that women are powerful in that they have a choice to believe and do what they want and it is not predetermined that they will be subservient or not equal to men. 

1) How does the video suggest representations of masculinity have changed in recent years?

Men no longer have to act how they did in the past in order to be a man. The very notion of what it means to be a man has nearly completely changed as it is no longer about being the strongest, making the most money in the family or being with more partners with your friends but instead it dose not take all of that to be a man but is instead decided by who you are and how you choose to be and is not universal across all men.

2) What does David Gauntlet suggest about representations of men in the media over the last 20 years?

That masculinity is not in crisis and is instead evolving and the media explosions of the 80's and 90's allowed for the chance to actively reconstruct men's own identities and move away from traditional stereotypes.

3) What is YOUR view on the representation of men and masculinity? Are young men still under pressure from the media to act or behave in a certain way?

I believe that men are still undergoing a process of transition from traditional stereotypes into creating a new form of masculinity that does not rely on the ideas of old like violence or being macho. However I believe that young men are still under pressure from more traditional men who do state and encourage young men to continue that 'typical' behaviour of a man through the media such as podcasts and social media for example Andrew Tate but I do personally believe that on the other side there are some radical feminists that also put pressure on young men that then pushes them to feel overwhelmed with identity and so move towards those controversial figures and ideas such as toxic masculinity.