Gender Stereotypes

Katniss Everdeen of The Hunger Games may not be perfect, but one thing she succeeds in doing is breaking many gender stereotypes. Women in media, such as movies, are hyperseaxualized and are not a real representation of real women. Whether it be women still having traditional roles or them having unrealistic body types, women are not properly represented in the media. In four diverse studies on gender and children’s entertainment done by Dr. Stacy L. Smith and Crystal Allene Cook they prove the need for more males in movie and television entertainment aimed at children.

How women are perceived by others, and how women perceive themselves, impacts their leadership roles in the work place. Stereotypes and gender biases are themes women have been dealing with for centuries. How women are perceived by social medial and television have been influencing how they are treated by men, and how they view themselves when it comes to taking a leadership role in their organization. According to Omega Institute (2012), “The rapidly shifting landscape of new media and technology, including reality television and celebrity culture, continue to reinforce gender stereotypes” (p. 1). This leads to men still growing up viewing women as home makers versus bread winner. With more women entering leadership roles in the work place they lack the respect from men due to how these men have grown up to know the typical role of a man and woman. Men tend to feel belittled due to the gender stereotypes seen on television, and this leads to women struggling to succeed as a leader with the lack of support from their male counterparts. Lack of confidence with women in the workplace is also influenced and effected by how women are perceived in social media and television. According to Steele (2005), “Exposure to stereotypic commercials persuade women to avoid leadership roles” (p. 276). As young women grow up seeing the typical gender stereotypes they lack ambitions to break the mold and

On August 26,1920, the 19th Amendment,which guaranteed women the right to vote, was formally adopted into the U.S. Constitution

Another interesting finding showed that female speaking characters are slightly more likely to appear in General audiences (G) rated films of about 31.6% than in Parental guidance (PG-13) rated films which is of about 26.5%. The percentage of girls and women in Parental guidance (PG-13) rated films (28.9%) does not deviate from the other ratings by 5%, criterion for documenting a meaningful difference. Thus, as the ratings increases for PG-13, the girls move out (Smith, Choueiti, & Pieper , Gender Roles & Occupations: A Look at Character Attributes and Job-Related Aspirations in Film and Television, 2012, p. 2).

Horror movies throughout history have been known to have their cheesy storylines or continuous bad acting. Especially horror movies. People nowadays could easily spot the flaws in a film and judge them drastically in reviews. Yet, little do people notice the ongoing discrimination between genders. Horror films tend to portray males and females substantially differently because of stereotypical views. There seems to be a pattern in which each gender takes a certain role in a movie continuously. Females are shown to be “objects” such as sex and emotional symbols, while males are shown as strong or powerful and moreover as the main bad guy. Although some of the newer edition films of the horror genre are displaying each gender more and more equal throughout the ongoing years, the gender discrimination dilemma still exists and can be seen by the statistics in the movie industry in general.

This proverbial mold of what a woman is, usually determined by her status as being motherly and staying involved in their children’s lives. The societal norm is often represented by someone who goes to every PTA meeting, every soccer game, and cooks every meal. Hollywood often provides society with the golden standard of what a mother should be like. The movie industry further promulgates this typical mold by typically portraying women in parts similar to these not only their parts but also the genre of movies women normally participate in. According to the Hollywood Reporter in an article about how “Movies in 2016 Featured a record Number of Women Protagonists”. In this article, it even went into to the cold hard facts where female actors are more likely to appear as protagonists specifically the genre of movies. According to their statistics, women would be most likely to land a leading role in a Comedy with the highest percentage of female protagonists in this genre at twenty-eight percent. In an unsurprising turn of events, the genre of films with the lowest percentage of female protagonists was the actions film industry with a reported three percent. Often times characters in action movies need to be portrayed as though they are serious and strong. If this is the case the implications of not portraying women in a more serious genre like action movies. This exemplifies that society and particularly writers and producers of Hollywood have trouble viewing women in strong leading

Guardians of the Galaxy makes great strides toward gender equality in film. There are many different points made to support this claim within this paper. Gender equality in film is important to the future development of our American society and society as a whole in the world.

Histories of world societies are, additionally, histories of contemplations and suppositions about women, about men, and about their associations. Since drama, dance, and literature are mainly dominated by men, those questions have usually been their questions and answers about women. Hammer found (211) that in educational films, it was shown that there are over twice as many male characters as female characters and twice as many male scientists as female scientists. This causes children and adults to see a lack of women in traditionally male jobs and possibly pick a traditionally “female” occupation. Women often have unimportant roles in movies made by men. They recently have been used to motivate or accessorize a male character. Whilst doing so, women are often seen in sexually revealing clothes or partially naked. They also hardly have speaking parts.

The aforementioned study also found that G-rated movies between 1990 to 2005 were narrated by a total of 83% of males while females only provided 28% of total speaking parts - minor roles included. Interestingly, this period happened to introduce the least amount of ‘damsel in distress’ tropes, even having a female character save a male character in one instance. This leads to contending loyalties of women; we are torn between our want to be in media as much as men and our want to be portrayed in media as more than one-dimensional

The first video we watched talked about different areas in the media where women are discriminated. Women have the least protagonist roles in Hollywood movies and make only 7% of the movie director in Hollywood. When a woman is the protagonist in a movie, her role is usually about getting a man or being a sexual character. In TV commercials or magazines, women are presented as sexual objected and as easy prey. Many commercials try to show young teenager girls dressing very sexual

In conclusion, we discussed the variations and growth of women's roles in movies from the early 1900’s until the present including the under represented, sexualized roles women played, how the gender gap has been shrunk, and the successes of many talented female actresses.when it comes to the portrayal of female characters in movies. We have made significant progress in the equal and fair representation of the sexes, but also still have a lot to change. It’s very simple and easy. Women need to be portrayed as who they are, the real, hard-working independent woman. We need to allow women to be women, not fake characters used to create sexist

In a recent study about inequality in the film industry, it was found that for films released in 2014, 26.4% of women were shown with partial or full nudity compared to only 9.1% of men and this trend has been consistent over the past several years (Smith 10). This gap in the sexual representation of men and women as well as less representation of women as a lead or co-lead in films says a lot about how women have always merely been used as “eye candy” in cinema and television in order to satisfy

Male dominance in Hollywood cinema was still very clear in films, but at the same time, many films with women in the lead roles started to emerge most noticeably in the 20th century. These roles were of real lead characters who represented real women. With contemporary films like Twilight, Hunger Games, Gone Girl, Maleficent and Divergent, it’s evident that female protagonist films are successful in today’s era. Box Office Mojo compared the box office gross from top 25 films from 2006 to 2015, showed that films with women in casting grossed $126.1 million and films with men in casting grossed $80.6 million. However, this does not necessarily mean that the roles of women are of protagonists: In 2014, only 12 percent of leading roles were female

There has not been a significant amount of studies done on the different sexes seeking help, nonetheless it is evidenced that women are most likely to seek and ask for help than men. The studies that have been conducted such as, cross-cultural studies, (Cohen, Guttmann, & Lazar, 1998; Moeller-Leimkuehler, 2002; Boldero & Fallon, 1995; Schonert-Reichl & Muller, 1996; Seiffge-Krenke & Shulman, 1990), empirical, observational studies, anthropological and ultimately research with adolescents have presented the same outcome of women asking for help sooner than men. Several different avenues of an individual’s life were used in the studies that were conducted such as one’s personal, medical and professional issues (Benesen & Koulnazarian, 2008).

Furthermore, the movie industry portrays this as well because of the lack of female representation in directors, writers, producers, editors, cinematographers, etc. In addition to this, the Bechdel test reflects the current state of women in society, highlighting the problems women face today, particularly underrepresentation, objectification, and stereotyping. Consequently, the Bechdel test can lead to the progression towards the equal representation of women in the media through the development of female characters that are well-developed, three-dimensional, and have increased role importance. Through the increased representation of women in the movie industry, it will result in the improved perception of women in the media; thus leading to the improved treatment of women in society. Therefore, movies should pass the Bechdel test because it raises awareness of the systematic problem of the media industry and reflects the current state of women in society today, thus leading to a progression towards the equal representation of women in the media and