26 Jun THE INFLUENCE OF MEDIA ON VIEWS OF GENDER
The Influence of Media on Views of Gender
Gendered Media:
The Influence of Media
on Views of Gender
Julia T. Wood
Department of Communication, University of North
Carolina at Chapel
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 program-ming,
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 pro-portions 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.
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