notes gender

THEMES IN MEDIA

Of the many influences on how we view men and

women, media are the most pervasive and one of the

most powerful. Woven throughout our daily lives, media

insinuate their messages into our consciousness at every

turn. All forms of media communicate images of the

sexes, many of which perpetuate unrealistic, stereotypical,

and limiting perceptions. Three themes describe how

media represent gender. First, women are underrepresented,

which falsely implies that men are the cultural

standard and women are unimportant or invisible. Second,

men and women are portrayed in stereotypical

ways that reflect and sustain socially endorsed views of

gender. Third, depictions of relationships between men

and women emphasize traditional roles and normalize

violence against women. We will consider each of these

themes in this section.

Underrepresentation of

Women

A primary way in which media distort reality is in

underrepresenting women. Whether it is prime-time television,

in which there are three times as many white men

as women (Basow, 1992 p. 159), or children’s programming,

in which males outnumber females by two to one,

or newscasts, in which women make up 16% of newscasters

and in which stories about men are included 10

times more often than ones about women (“Study Reports

Sex Bias,” 1989), media misrepresent actual proportions

of men and women in the population. This

constant distortion tempts us to believe that there really

are more men than women and, further, that men are

the cultural standard.

MEDIA’S MISREPRESENTATION OF

AMERICAN LIFE

The media present a distorted version of cultural life

in our country. According to media portrayals:

White males make up two-thirds of the population.

The women are less in number, perhaps because

fewer than 10% live beyond 35. Those who

do, like their younger and male counterparts, are

nearly all white and heterosexual. In addition to

being young, the majority of women are beautiful,

very thin, passive, and primarily concerned

with relationships and getting rings out of collars

and commodes. There are a few bad, bitchy

women, and they are not so pretty, not so subordinate,

and not so caring as the good women.

Most of the bad ones work outside of the home,

which is probably why they are hardened and undesirable.

The more powerful, ambitious men occupy

themselves with important business deals,

exciting adventures, and rescuing dependent females,

whom they often then assault sexually.

From Gendered Lives:

Communication, Gender, and Culture by Julie T. Wood, Chapter 9, pp. 231-244. 0 1994. Reprinted with

permission of Wadsworth Publishing, a division of Thomson Learning. Fax 800-730-2215.

3 1

T LI Y IIYC~

WI I H MEDIA

Other myths about what is standard are similarly fortified

by communication in media. Minorities are even

less visible than women, with African-Americans appearing

only rarely (Gray,

1986; Stroman, 1989) and other

ethnic minorities being virtually nonexistent. In children’s

programming when African-Americans do appear,

almost invariably they appear in supporting roles

rather than as main characters (O’Connor, 1989). While

more African-Americans are appearing in prime-time

television, they are too often cast in stereotypical roles.

In the 1992 season, for instance, 12 of the 74 series on

commercial networks included large African-American

casts, yet most featured them in stereotypical roles. Black

men are presented as lazy and unable to handle authority

as lecherous, and/or as unlawful, while females are

portrayed as domineering or as sex objects (“Sights

Sounds, and Stereotypes,” 1992). Writing in 1993, David

Evans (1993, p. 10) criticized television for stereotyping

black males as athletes and entertainers. These roles

wrote Evans, mislead young black male viewers in&

thinking success “is only a dribble or dance step away”

and blind them to other, more realistic ambitions. l&-

panics and Asians are nearly absent, and when they are

presented it is usually as villains or criminals (Lichter,

Lichter, Rothman, & Amundson, 1987).

Also under-represented is the single fastest growing

group

of Americans- older people. As a country, we are

aging so that people over 60 make up a major part of

our population; within this group, women significantly

outnumber men (Wood, 1993~). Older people not only

are under-represented in media but also are represented

inaccurately In contrast to demographic realities,

media consistently show fewer older women than

men, presumably because our culture worships youth

and beauty in women. Further, elderly individuals are

frequently portrayed as sick, dependent, fumbling and

passive, images not borne out in real life. Distirted

depictions of older people and especially older women

in media, however, can delude us into thinking they

are a small, sickly, and unimportant part of our

population.

The lack of women in the media is paralleled by the

scarcity of women in charge of media. Only about 5% of

television writers, executives, and producers are women

(Lichter, Lichter, & Rothman, 1986). Ironically, while twothirds

of journalism graduates are women, they make up

less than 2% of those

papers and

in corporate management of newsonly

about 5% of newspaper publishers

(“Women in Media,” 1988). Female film directors are

even rnonz-scarce, as are executives in charge of MTV It

is probably not coincidental that so few women are behind

the scenes of an industry that so consistently portrays

women negatively Some media analysts (Mills

1988) believe that if more women had positions o;

authority at executive levels, media would offer more

positive portrayals of women.

Stereotypical Portrayals of Women and Men

In general, media continue to present both women

and men in stereotyped ways that limit our perceptions

of human possibilities. Typically men are portrayed as

active, adventurous, powerful, sexually aggressive and

largely uninvolved in human relationships. Just as’ consistent

with cultural views of gender are depictions of

women as sex objects who are usually young, thin beautiful,

passive, dependent, and often incompetent and

dumb. Female characters devote their primary energies

to improving their appearances and taking care of homes

and people. Because media pervade our lives, the ways

they misrepresent genders may distort how we see ourselves

and what we perceive as normal and desirable for

men and women.

Stereotypical portrayals

of men.

According to J. A.

Doyle (1989, p. ill), whose research focuses on masculinity

children’s television typically shows males as “aggressive,

dominant, and engaged in exciting activities

from which they receive rewards from others for their

‘masculine’ accomplishments.” Relatedly, recent studies

reveal that the majority of men on prime-time television

are independent, aggressive, and in charge (McCauley

Thangavelu, & Rozin, 1988). Television programming foi

all ages disproportionately depicts men as serious confident,

competent, powerful, and in high-status ‘positions.

Gentleness in men, which was briefly evident in

the 197Os, has receded as established male characters are

redrawn to be more tough and distanced from others

(Bayer, 1986). Highly popular films such as LethaI

Weapon, Predator, Days of Thunder, Total Recall, Robocop

Die Hard,

and Die Harder star men who embody the

stereotype of extreme masculinity Media, then reinforce

long-standing cultural ideals of masculinity:’ Men are

presented as hard, tough, independent, sexually aggressive,

unafraid, violent, totally in control of all emotions,

and-above all-in no way feminine.

Equally interesting is how males are not presented.

J. D. Brown and K. Campbell (1986) report that men are

seldom shown doing housework. Doyle (1989) notes that

boys and men are rarely presented caring for others.

B. Horovitz (1989) points out they are typically represented

as uninterested in and incompetent at homemaking,

cooking,

and child care. Each season’s new ads for

cooking and cleaning supplies include several that caricature

men as incompetent buffoons, who are klutzes in

the kitchen and no better at taking care of children. While

children’s books have made a limited attempt to depict

women engaged in activities outside of the home there

has been little parallel effort to show men involbed in

family and home life. When someone is shown taking

care of a child, ‘1t is’ usually the mother, not the father.

This perpetuates a negative stereotype of men as uncaring

and uninvolved in family life.

Stereotypical portrayals

of women.

Media’s images of

women also reflect cultural stereotypes that depart markedly

from reality As we have already seen, girls and