Bend It Like Beckham Gender Essay

Starting with how women are portrayed in media, Trolan (2013) states that in today’s society, individuals are shown magazines, newspapers, and television programs with articles and photographs, “of what it means to be a woman or man” (Trolan, 215). This is remarkably obvious when discussing the world of sport. Although women have achieved a somewhat higher level of respect in the everyday world, within the sporting world, “they are still viewed as women first and athletes second” (Trolan, 215). Krane, Choi, Baird, Aimar, and Kauer (2004) also articulate that women participating in sport live in two extremely separate cultures: the sporting culture and the culture in which they face the continual battle between being an athlete and being a woman. Being viewed as

In the article “I Won, I’m Sorry”, Mariah Burton Nelson has portrayed the images of female athletes in a way as what our society looks at these athletes. Even though female athletes are strong enough to play sport, skillful enough to win other male athletes, and passionate enough to devote themselves to sport, female athletes find it hard to overcome our society’s norms about gender roles. Furthermore, despite the fact that a large number of women have been contributing themselves to sports, only a small number of female athletes are represented in the media coverage since people don’t look at their real talents and skills; however, they look for the femininity in each female athletes such as how they dress in a march, how they show their charming

To begin with, Bend It Like Beckham is a film about an Indian girl named Jess who lives in London with her family who is very strict about the way culture shapes how they live. She is an amazing soccer player and is asked to join a great team by Jules, a girl who sees her playing at the park. Unfortunately, Jess has to hide this team from her parents for her mother strongly disapproves of the shorts that expose her legs, especially her large burn scar on her thigh. Moreover, she mainly does not want Jess playing soccer because it is masculine and unattractive in her eyes, and she should be focusing on attending a university. Jess’s mother states that Jess needs to learn how to cook delicious Indian food in order to attract a husband, rather than worrying about sports. Due to this presence of folk culture in her home, Jess decides to lie to

While participation of women in sports has increased, the media representation of women in sports remains problematic. Even the most talented elite female athletes like Michelle Kwan and Monica Seles are portrayed in a sexual fashion, as a way of deemphasizing their athleticism and neutralizing any possible threat they might seem to pose to male viewers. Very few male athletes are portrayed in such an objectified manner; they are portrayed as competitors first and foremost, not as personalities. Also, the media coverage of athletes is disproportionately focused on male athletes. The coverage of female athletes tends to stress individualized female sports where women can be sexualized like tennis and figure skating, versus competitive team sports like basketball and soccer.

When considering the roles of gender the main issues of this movie is how society portrays women as athletes with the abilities of men, yet these women were still expected to be pretty and wear dresses to play baseball. One scene in the movie, the baseball recruiter almost denied a talented young woman based on her looks.

In Gurinder Chadha’s British Indie film Bend It Like Beckham the main character Jess, is of very strict Sikh Indian heritage which her family follows. Jess wants to play soccer, but that isn't part of her heritage which is why her mother yells at her: “What family will want a daughter in law who can run around kicking a football all day but can't make round chapatis?”(Chadha 2003). Her mother tells her this because she is afraid that since Jess plays soccer she is drifting away from her Indian culture. Knowing this, Jess tries to give up soccer. If she keeps playing, then everyone in her culture will disown her because they wouldn’t see her as a typical Indian

From a young age, children are conditioned to always think about what they want to be when they grow up. Many of them dream to be a ballerina, firefighter, or an astronaut. With age comes maturity, and those aspirations pass, but simultaneously new, more realistic ones arise. To reach these new goals, these children work toward their dream through dedication, which can be seen in the studying or training they do. In today’s society females have more opportunity to do what they dream. There are young women who are assiduously working to get a college degree and a steady job. Then, there are also women who are training to become a professional athlete, with the aspiration of becoming a member of the United States Women’s National Soccer Team (USWNT). In today’s society, women can pursue their goals, however, if compared to men’s sports, there can be differences seen that keep women from reaching full potential, equality, and their dreams.

Gender representation and in particular misrepresentation is a key issue within sport and media today as female coverage of sport is overlooked in all forms of mainstream media. This issue is what we, as a group of 3, had to tackle and present to our academic peers in a student led seminar session. The issue derives from the main theme of sport and media and their relationship but could also be said to have direct links to other themes such as sport and (in) equality. Gender representation comes under both media and equality in terms of broader topics because it is the concern of the media to help broadcast more female sport and raise awareness of the inequality which exists to the wide audience it has to target, this doesn’t happen enough currently. Research by Cooky et al. (2013) suggests that female sports coverage on ESPN sport takes up around 3% of coverage time which is a shocking disparity compared to men’s coverage on the same channel. It also found that 0 news stories on WNBA were published out of season across multiple news channels while the NBA had 72 stories. Studying this topic is particularly important to understand historically and culturally why this problem exists as well as to look at the negative ideologies which exist within sports media around the subject of gender representation.

For this assignment, to make an intersectional analysis I decided to watch a movie. After searching and thinking for a while I picked the movie Bend it Like Beckham, since a lot of elements in this movie are applicable on my own life and I really could relate to one of the characters in the movie. As the title of the movie already implies, it is about football and takes place in England. Jesminder is a Sikh, Indian girl from a very traditional Indian family. She is not interested in fashion, boys and her looks; the only thing she is interested in is football. One time when she is playing in the park with her friends, who are all boys, Jules sees Jesminder play. Jules is an English, white

Bend it Like Beckham (2002/3) is a romantic comedy written, directed and produced by Gurinder Chadha, a Kenya-born British film maker who grew up India. Director Chadha’s films often reflect on her complex background. Unlike many comedies, Bend it Like Beckham is filled with plenty of important themes. One of them addresses the importance of cultural integration.

Media “combines notions of feminism and traditional stereotypes of feminity to reinforce male dominance” (Carty, 152) by making female athletes to become sexualised. Even if female athletes try and bring out new ideas on power and strength in the society, they have to take a step back and conform to the patriarchal society and their norms. This takes the society back from any progress made and the efforts of women for equality, go in vain.

Through the movies viewed in this course this semester, we saw women who were able to play against men and still keep their femininity. Nothing is lost when playing sports not traditionally meant for a particular race or gender. Society must become more understanding when it comes to the sports different types of people play and hinder from stereotyping anyone when they participate and perform well in that sport.

With the rise of feminism, gender inequality has been quite the topic in todays time. With the wanting of equal rights and treatment it has been pointed out as per which all places males have the hegemonic overview and women are the oppressed; one of the areas where its unequal in gender is in sport. This paper will examine and break down the issues regarding sex and gender biases within sports in modern day media and how it can be resolved.

In the last one hundred years women have made tremendous inroads in many facets of life. Of that there can be little doubt. Women may now hold jobs, own property and participate in professional sports. Today women can compete in sports, once a vestige of male domination; there is now room for women in that arena. But even today women in sports are not portrayed in the same light as their male counterparts. To a large degree this is because of today's cultural ideal of women.

Media coverage of female athletes on the sporting field is unfairly lacking due to the male dominance and preference of sport, therefore female athletes are using forgetting their athleticism and instead using their looks to fight for sponsorships and sporting media coverage. One example of this can be seen in source 1 with Swimmer Amanda Beard who has become known more for her look rather than her athletic accomplishments (Daniels,2009). Female athletes perspectives is for the media to represent the achievements of sportswomen without having to turn themselves into sexual objects. They want Australia to see past the challenge of gender stereotypes and show that women do bring competitiveness and athleticism to the court and field. The sports media scholars investigate the infrequent portrayal of female athletes on the field with the focus at women 's attractiveness and femininity. Females in sport are increasing in participation and popularity but are significantly underrepresented in media sports coverage but it can no longer be denied that women are progressing. Danielle Brogan, player in the Australian women’s soccer team stated in 2012 that, “People have already got this preconceived idea that women’s sport isn’t as