Ch05 Studying Media Representations

Module Studying Media Representations Objectives After completing this module you will be able to - identify the specific ways in which media representations uses images sound music intertextuality language and techniques to construct a version of reality associated with a particular phenomena group world institution or profession - apply these specific aspects of media representations to analysis of a media text - be familiar with websites texts that contain examples of texts illustrating certain types of media representations - construct a webquest that involve students in analyzing media representation of a particular phenomena group world institution or profession What Are Media Representations Media representations are the ways in which the media portrays particular groups communities experiences ideas or topics from a particular ideological or value perspective Rather than examining media representations as simply reflecting or mirroring reality we will be examining how media representations serve to re-present or to actually create a new reality For example beer ads portray drinking beer as a primary component for having a party SUV ads create the impression that driving an SUV as an exciting outdoor adventure And perfume cologne ads imply the using perfume cologne makes one sexually appealing These ads all create idealized experiences associated with the uses of these products experiences that may not jive with alternative perspectives on these experiences http www nothing-sacred net articles Similarly the Disney Corporation one of the major producers of film and television represents stories and fairy tales for children primarily in terms of White Western middle-class values And DisneyWorld Disneyland creates artificial realities that represent different worlds other lands in ways that sanitized and idealize any political cultural and ideological differences constituting the unique cultures of those worlds For example Safari boat trips represent Africa as a primitive jungle experience For a discussion of the role of Disney in constructing their own representations of different realities go to the following site and click on the video http www mediaed org videos CommercialismGlobalizationAndMedia MickeyMouseMonopoly Why Study Media Representations Why study media representations Media representations shape adolescents perceptions of experience their beliefs about gender class and race their assumptions about what is valued in society and their notions of urban suburban and rural life However it is important to recognize that adolescents are not simply passive dupes who accept all of these representations without some interrogation As James Tobin argues students are able to resist these representations resistance that is often specific to adopting stances valued in certain context particularly is they can parody or adopt creative alternatives to representations Creating a critical context in the classroom where students practice interrogation of representations helps them acquire a critical stance In adopting this stance they learn to examine the underlying value assumptions inherent in a representation and whether they accept or reject those assumptions For example in studying local television news representations of urban landscapes as rife with crime and danger leads them to challenge these representations as serving to reify suburban viewers presuppositions about the city as dangerous and problematic beliefs held by many suburban adolescents Students learn to adopt a critical stance by recognizing how the media serves to mediate or define ways of defining the world and their own identities For example the so-called reality television shows portray ways in which the sensationalized edited forms of television itself defines what program participants assume to be appropriate ways of behaving on television Audiences may then assume that these program participants are behaving in a manner considered to be normal normal in terms of how television represents reality Adolescents may also recognize that media texts represent idealized role models or identities that shape their own self-images For example in the program Merchants of Cool adolescent females who are preparing to be supermodels draw their sense of identities from images of fashion magazine models images that mediate their own self-perceptions http www pbs org wgbh pages frontline shows cool Adolescents may also recognize the ways in which their perceptions of gender class and race may be shaped by norms portrayed in the media For example in analyzing the portrayal of diversity on television students may note the lack of diversity on television in terms of white middle-class identities as the norm Research on the level of diversity of characters and people in prime-time children s television programs by Children Now found a lack of diversity According to Children Now's study Fall Colors - prime time remains overwhelmingly white with people of color appearing largely in secondary and guest roles Whites account for of the prime time population followed by African Americans Latinos Asian Pacific Islanders and Native Americans These findings were similar to those of other studies In its State of Children's Television Report the Annenberg Public Policy Center found that of children's programming on network and cable channels had no diversity while had a little and contained a lot In Tufts University Professors Calvin Gidney and Julia Dobrow found that to percent of lead characters on children's programs in the - season were either Anglo or Nordic The lack of diversity as well as the portrayals of people of color engaged in deviant social practices influences children s racial perceptions When asked to cast television roles from a collection of photographs of diverse people children had very definite ideas of what a good person and a bad person looked like After choosing an African American for the part of a criminal one white boy said he just looks like the type of criminal that would probably steal or something Children who chose Latinos for the criminal role explained it was because he looked mean or like he could kill someone When casting a white person for the part of a police officer one African American boy stated that he did so because he looks intelligent Children Now http www childrennow org media medianow mnsummer htm Using analysis of representations to construct their own representations Another important reason for studying representations is that students can then think about ways in which they create their own representations of experiences topics issues groups world etc For example in studying how ads use images to represent phenomena students can then create their own ads employing images in a similar manner Rather than simply studying different types of video shots angles or editing techniques for example students learn about these characteristics of film as they use video production tools to best represent their intended meanings Students can use multimedia software tools such as Adobe PremiereTM and Avid CinemaTM for video editing Adobe Photoshop for image editing SoundEditTM for sound editing Adobe PagemillTM Claris HomePageTM and Netscape Navigator ComposerTM for web site authoring and Microsoft PowerpointTM HyperstudioTM AuthorwareTM or StoryspaceTM for hypermedia presentations These tools can be used for larger projects in which students collect store edit and construct links between many images sounds texts or video For example one high school student used the computer-based video-editing program Adobe PremiereTM to create QuicktimeTM videos as part of inquiry project on romance My artifact was a video that I created by cutting parts of the movie Days of Thunder and pasting them together I then played the movie to the song The Distance by Cake While I was watching the movie to find clips I was mostly looking for scenes that involved two people who were romantically involved I was also looking for action scenes because I was trying to relate the social worlds of sports and romance The video part of the artifact turned out great It contained scenes that I felt showed a direct relationship between sports and romance The clips included many shots of race cars whizzing by There were also many shots of the two main characters separated What I was trying to do was show how the two worlds related to each other I felt that I was successful in doing so because I thought that my artifact showed how athletics can play a big role in romantic relationships Beach Myers p Students may also use audio or visual tools to represent their perspectives In creating documentary representations they may conduct audio photo or video interviews to capture people s perceptions of a world or experience For example one student used photos to capture her relationships with her friends It is a tradition that all my friends come over before the dance and get ready together Then we take a group picture of all of us on my porch and go to the dance I also have included pictures of friends in the hallway The hallway in school is where most of the socializing gets done either before homeroom during classes or after school It is noticeable that the two girls are friends because they have their arms around each other The other picture that I have is at Hi-Way Pizza The two girls look like they are good friends to me because they have chosen to come out together and spend time with one another The two girls also have matching coats in the background of the picture which could suggest that they went shopping together before Beach Myers p As they are creating these representations students are learning how to critique representations through critically examining their own uses of tools Studying Media Representations Studying media representations therefore involves interpreting the creation of new forms or ways of understanding reality As Stuart Hall argues this approach differs from more traditional notions of studying media representations as false or misrepresentations of some reality or experience This concept of misrepresentation assumes that there is a true or fixed meaning associated with some external reality against which a media text can be compared as either true or fixed to that reality However the meaning of that external reality itself is a construction of media Media texts are not simply external ways of representing a reality out there They themselves constitute the meaning of reality The cultural meaning of party time is created by beer ads which portray social practices that are valued by participants who believe that drinking beer constitutes having a good time To hear more on what Stuart Hall as to say about this go to and click on the video http www mediaed org videos MediaRaceAndRepresentation RepresentationandtheMedia Dan Chandler argues that this more constructivist approach moves away from analysis of stereotyping or bias that presupposes some fixed objective meaning to an analysis of the institutional forces or systems that use representations to construct and maintain their own ideological agendas He therefore focuses attention on the systems of representations that work to create certain cultural meanings through media texts to demonstrate that certain practices are natural or common sensical As he notes A key in the study of representation concern is with the way in which representations are made to seem natural Systems of representation are the means by which the concerns of ideologies are framed such systems position their subjects http www aber ac uk media Modules MC represent html Museums particularly anthropological or ethnographic museums that portray past cultural worlds can construct a version of those worlds that reflect certain cultural attitudes about those worlds Walsh From this constructivist notion of representation these museum exhibits are neither mirroring or reflecting past cultures they are actually creating a version of those cultures It is often the case that these exhibits of Asian African South American and or Third World countries often reflected a Western colonialist discourses that positioned For example museums as systems of representations portray cultures in ways that are assumed to be scientific During the th and early th century European and American museums often exhibited other cultures in as inferior primitive or exotic These exhibits reflected a Western political and ideological perspective of colonized sections of the world Lidchi For example an exhibit at the St Louis World s Fair portrayed the Igorots a Philippine tribe as purchasing and eating dog meat a representation that only served to portray them as primitive or savage Lidchi p Media representations and cultural models Hall also argues that representations reflect cultural values He notes that cultures serve ways of making sense of the world For example they provide us with maps of meaning or frameworks for classifying the world according to some hierarchical value system what is most versus least valued who has power and who does not what practices are or are not condoned or sanctioned These maps of meaning or cultural models serve to order people s lives As Gee notes Cultural models tell people what is typical or normal from the perspective of a particular Discourse they come out of and in turn inform the social practices in which people of a Discourse engage Cultural models are stored in people s minds by no means always consciously though they are supplemented and instantiated in the objects texts and practices that are part and parcel of the Discourse p For example value stances towards social practices in schools ultimately reflect cultural models Much of American schooling revolves around cultural models of individualism associated with middle-class values Bellah et al Within a middle-class value system the individual is assumed to be an autonomous being who is not dependent on institutional support Being a complete individual is equated with being independent from constraints or forces while being an incomplete individual is equated with being dependent on institutions Jung Within schooling the ability to act on one s own or being self-disciplined is highly valued in school as a marker of individuality lack of self-discipline is equated with an inability to control one s self and one s emotions Emotional expression outbursts are perceived as problematic and as needed to be controlled Jung Representations and discourses As noted in Module on critical discourse analysis media texts represent experiences in terms of various discourses constituting meaning Again discourses are ways of knowing or thinking based on for example scientific legal religious sociological economic political psychological orientations Museums represented colonized cultures in terms of the discourses of Orientalism reflecting a Western ideological position of the middle-eastern Muslim cultures as exotic mysterious elusive and potentially dangerous Said In studying representations students attempt to identify the various discourses shaping the representations of particular groups communities experiences or phenomenon These discourses reflect the economic political and ideological agendas of institutions corporations communities or political organizations For example as noted below students may examine how the beauty industry employs discourses of gender to define the ideal female body weight as slim consistent with the discourses of femininity popularity and appearance By identifying these various discourses students can then examine the institutions constructing representations through the use of these discourses For further reading on methods for analyzing discourses in the media Fairclough N Analyzing discourses Textual analysis for social research New York Routledge MacDonald M Exploring media discourses London Arnold Rogers R Ed An introduction to critical discourse analysis in education Mahwah NJ Erlbaum Weissn G Wodak R Critical discourse analysis Theory and interdisciplinarity New York Palgrave Wodak R Meyer M Methods of critical discourse analysis Thousand Oaks CA Sage Methods for Analyzing Media Representations While students may have an intuitive sense of how the media represents certain phenomena they need to learn some particular research techniques for how to analyze these representations It is often useful to model these different techniques demonstrating how you use them in analysis of a particular example The following are some steps involved in conducting studies following by specific aspects associated with analyzing representations Select a certain groups worlds topics issues or phenomenon and then find different representations of this topic phenomenon in magazines TV newspapers literature Web sites Note patterns in these representations in terms of similarities in portrayals images instances of stereotyping or essentializing categories Note value assumptions in terms of who has power who solves problems how problems are solved Define the intended audiences for these representations - What appeals are made to what audiences - Whose beliefs or values are being reinforced or validated - How are certain products linked to certain representations for certain audiences Define what s missing or left out of the representation - What complexities or variations are masked over - What is included and what is excluded - Find alternative or counter-examples Consider the potential influence of stereotyped or essentialist representations of gender class race or age on people - List descriptions of others or oneself and note instances of stereotyping essentializing - Note how consumer practices reflect the need to live up to representations - Examine stories TV shows or mini-dramas in ads In analyzing representations students can focus on the following aspects - images The images employed that reflect certain positive versus negative value orientations based on cultural codes and archetypal meanings for example uses of dark or black colors to portray an urban area as dangerous or threatening Lacey In this semiotic analysis of representation students are examining how the meaning of images as signifiers wearing jeans vs suits creates certain signified or implied meanings casualness formality dress for success based on certain codes that link the signifiers with the signified meanings For example in reading the semiotic meaning of t-shirts students draw on codes for interpreting the signs on t-shirts Cullin-Swan B Manning P K Codes Chronotypes and Everyday Objects http sun soci niu edu sssi papers pkm txt These codes are culturally constituted Stuart Hall cites the example of the meaning of traffic lights the fact that the signified meanings of red and green are culturally determined based on a code system that indicates that in certain cultures red means stop and green means go The difference between red and green is what signifies the meaning based on the cultural code To determine how images are representing a social or cultural world you need to determine the code system underlying the media texts - sound music Media texts represent social worlds through the uses of sound or music They may represent certain regions of the world by using music associated with those worlds for example Samba or Calypso music to represent South American worlds These uses of sound or music are often based on audience s prior knowledge of certain types of music as associated with certain types of experiences or worlds - intertextuality Media representations also depend on audiences knowledge of intertextual links between the current texts and other previous texts using the same images language sounds or logos For example understanding the Energizer Bunny battery ads in which the Energizer Bunny suddenly appears at the end of an ad requires a prior understanding of previous Energizer Bunny ads Audiences understand the meaning of certain representations because they have knowledge of these intertextual lnks They enjoy fact that they are in the know about the intertextual references being made In analyzing media representations you therefore need to determine the intertextual links being employed to previous texts and how these links are being used to represent a world in a certain manner Dan Chandler s discussion of intertextuality http www aber ac uk media Documents S B sem html Gunhild Agger Aalborg University Intertextuality Revisited Dialogues and Negotiations in Media Studies http www uqtr uquebec ca AE vol gunhild htm - language In studying how language is used to represent experience you are studying how language actually serves to create realities or worlds The hyperbolic idealized language of advertising is used to create worlds in which flaws or problems are instantly dealt with or solved The language of sports commentary is used to dramatize the significance of a game to keep viewers watching the game Language is also used in media texts in ways that voice or double-voice certain discourses or cultural models As noted in Module under Critical Discourse Analysis language references mimics or parodies legal religious scientific business romance economic or medical discourses For example political ads about education that employ the words accountability results bottom line or major investments of tax dollars are voicing a business discourse or cultural model in describing education This language is being used to represent issues of education in terms of a business model in which being accountable to results i e test scores is the primary goal Thus schooling is being represented in terms of the discourses of business By noting the types of discourses being referred to in the language you can then determine the uses of certain discourses to represent worlds in certain ways In defining these discourses you are also determining how audiences are being positioned to accept certain representations as normal or common sense constructions of reality You may then describe how you are being positioned by these discourses by asking the question What does this text want you to be or think One approach to studying language use is uses to represent or construct worlds is to study language use in cartoons In cartoons language is often used to mimic or parody certain discourses The humor of cartoons is often derived from the juxtaposition of two totally disparate worlds or discourses that usually have little to do with each other By identifying the particular discourse s being ridiculed in a cartoon or similar groupings of cartoons students could then discuss other examples of how that discourse s functions in their own lives Students can find many cartoons on the Web For example they could go to The New Yorker collection of cartoons at http www cartoonbank com and under search type in a certain discourse such as business and study the consistent patterns in the language employed in cartoons related to business as reflected in the language of the following two New Yorker cartoons I don t know how it started either All I know is that it s part of our corporate culture The little pig with the portfolio of straw and the little pig with the portfolio of sticks were swallowed up but the little pig with the portfolio of bricks withstood the dip in the market The first cartoon pokes fund at the use of the popular notion of a corporate culture language that reflected the human resource management discourse The corporate business world is juxtaposed with the quite different practice of wearing polo hats The second cartoon draws on the discourse of accounting stock-market juxtaposing that discourse with the totally different world of the Three Little Pigs children s literature Some cartoons play one discourse off against the other The following two cartoons employ the discourse of romance the uses of language to build a romantic relationship--is set against other discourses We re a natural Rachel I handle intellectual property and you re a content-provider In this cartoon the discourse of romance is juxtaposed against a legal discourse I wasn t anybody in a previous lifetime either In this cartoon the discourse of romance is juxtaposed with a discourse of religious beliefs in previous lifetimes Students can search for cartoons on any number of different Web sites http www nytimes com pages cartoons http cagle slate msn com http www speeds-cartoons com Students could also study the use of language in parody on the following sites The Onion a journal site that ridicules current political coverage http www TheOnion com Modernhumor the contains different types of humor and parody http www Modernhumorist com False advertising http parody organique com Song parodies http www premrad com entertainment comedy parodies songs songs html For further information on this topic see an article by Laura Shin Laughing all the way to the Cartoonbank USAWeekend July http www usaweekend com issues web html - technique Different types of techniques may be employed to represent phenomena in different ways For example the close-ups of faces employed in soap operas emphasize the emphasis on the important of relationships and emotional conflicts communicated through nonverbal cues Carmen Luke argues that these techniques are gendered in that they represent gender in different ways Semiotic Elements Feminine Masculine camera angles close-ups private space long wide shots public space soft-focus regular focus top-down shot small stature bottom-up shot large stature color secondary soft pastels primary dark metallic pacing slow fast lighting soft subdued intimate bright glaring public sound soft sounds slow music hard sounds fast music http www gseis ucla edu courses ed a Luke LITLEX html - content analysis In studying media representations students could conduct content analyses of media texts Doing content analysis involves creating a set of categories or coding system for analyzing the types of certain phenomenon in a media text These categories focus on the surface aspects of a text in terms of the types displayed that indicate the ways in which that text is representing a certain phenomenon For example you might analyze the representation of topics on the evening news in terms by counting the number of minutes devoted to different types of topics crime local events national news health news weather sports etc Or you might analyze the gender role portrayals on children s cartoons as well as the ways in which cartoon characters interact with each other through physical violent interaction versus through language or through a combination of physical and language interaction In doing content analysis you need to attend to both the surface meaning of images language as well as the latent or underlying meanings that require your interpretation of what certain patterns in the result indicate about the representations employed Sweet Methods for conducting content analysis http www edteck com michigan lessons conanalysis htm http writing colostate edu references research content http academic csuohio edu kneuendorf content resources TOC htm Examples of studies employing content analysis Studies of content analysis of media texts http www geocities com CollegePark Residence analysismedia html Gender differences in toy commercials http www aber ac uk media Documents short toyads html Gender differences in children s commercials http www aber ac uk media Students lmg html Analysis of children s toy-linked cartoon shows http www aber ac uk media Students lmg html Representation and Censorship Another topic related to media representation is that of censorship Censorship often evolves from objections to the ways in which a certain phenomena is represented in ways that threaten or challenge certain beliefs or ideas When the rock group The Dixie Chicks objected to George W Bush s arguments for the War on Iraq there were numerous calls for censoring playing their songs on radio stations because people objected to their criticism of that war There has been considerable controversy about the often highly sexist violent messages in gangstar rap songs videos leading some to call for censorship of these songs videos Students could study censorship cases to examine how particular media representations were perceived to be threatening or challenging to particular beliefs or values One useful site is The File Room an interactive archive of censorship cases from throughout history http www mediachannel org arts fileroom Other sites related to censorship National Coalition Against Censorship http www ncac org American Civil Liberties Union http www aclu org FreeSpeech FreeSpeechlist cfm c American Library Association http www ala org Content NavigationMenu Our Association Offices Intellectual Freedom Basics Censorship Basics htm Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting FAIR http www fair org Freedom Forum http www freedomforum org Index on Censorship http www indexonline org People for the American Way http www pfaw org Project Censored http www projectcensored org Organizations which recommend some forms of censorship American Family Association http www afa net Christian Coalition http www cc org Family Research Council http www frc org Focus on the Family http www family org Representations and Public Relations Promotions Media representations are also used in public relations or promotional campaigns to portray some phenomena in a positive light For example casino gambling has been promoted as not simply an experience involving gambling but also as an enjoyable exciting even romantic experience To study the ways in which Internet web sites represent gambling in Minnesota casinos go to these different casino web sites Note the uses of images intertextual links and language Black Bear Casino http www blackbearcasinohotel com Grand Casino Mille Lacs Hinckley http www grandcasinosmn com grandcasinosminnesota index htm Jackpot Junction Casino http www jackpotjunction com Mystic Lake Hotel Casino http www mysticlake com Treasure Island Resort and Casino http www treasureislandcasino com The images employed in these sites represent gambling in terms of a glamorous pastime associated with entertainment and pleasurable vacations For example the Treasure Island site employs imagery of a tropical Caribbean vacation escape associated with the activity of gambling Tropical Rain Forest Casino Make yourself comfortable beneath a rain forest canopy as you double the stakes at the blackjack tables or try your luck at one of The Island's many slot machines Caribbean Village Casino Feel the tides shift amid the ornate windows and balconies of this tropical island village as you play The Island's video craps video roulette and more Caribbean Marketplace Casino Stroll along bright facades welcoming you to new attractions Wander into the new Island Pearl Gift ShopSM or Casino Host Office Or just relax at one of the many new high stakes blackjack tables or slot machines in this open-air atmosphere Sapphire Sea This is the entrance to start gaming after a bus ride A great addition to our non-smoking casino area Sapphire Sea is the place to enjoy clean air and the hottest new slot machines Have a cocktail at Barracudas smoke-free bar A convenient coat check and Tours Desk are also located here The intertextual links and language employed here draws on the discourse of romantic travel in a tropical world with the world of casino gambling Gambling is also represented through magazine ads and on-line casino sites in equally glamorous ways Susan Link in her CI Spring analysis of the representations of gambling examined these magazine ads Another form of literature with deceptive advertising in favor of casinos is magazines Magazines like Casino Casino Player and Gaming Times all have articles that create an idea that they are educating the reader on how to beat the casino In one edition of Casino Player some of the articles that lead you to believe this are Loosest Slots Awards The Wizard of Odds Ask the Bishop streaks and trends Inside the Sportsbook Players Club Spotlight and JV s Poker Room Each of these articles gives the reader insight into the players strategies and how to break the casino and the system The ads in this magazine also create a sophisticated image it is an appealing image of elegance Aces High Casino Trump Plaza in Atlantic City Harrah s Foxwoods of Connecticut and The Grand Casino all feature ads that encourage high class with a big payout The slogan for the Sheraton Casino and Hotel is Tunica s loosest slots stay here You should too Each casino encourages people to stay at their casino for the free perks elegant accommodations and loose slots with high payouts This in turn should bring the casinos revenue through gambling of on-site guests The free perks and shows they have entice people to stay there so that they will gamble on site Ads and magazines create enthusiasm for gambling and promote an image that is lavish and high class People want to stay there and be a part of the action-packed image that they create The message is clear- gamble at these casinos and win money The reality is that the casinos could not afford casinos and advertising of that nature without gambling losses of the people who attend the casinos The reality is much different than the message and image that is created The advertising is intriguing yet deceptive The underlying meaning is still the same- spend your money The message is the same whether it is through a casino or on the Internet Internet gambling has gone from being non-existent ten years ago to a multi-million dollar industry in The image of easy access gambling is prevalent in the online industry The advertising image and message are deliberate online gambling is the easiest to access and because there is no large edifice to support it financially it has the best odds The reality is that this type of gambling is an easy addiction Advertisers notice and capitalize on the accessibility of online casinos so they use propaganda that shows those same things According to Gallup Poll of adults believe that internet gambling should not be legal The people polled cite reasoning for this disapproval as accessibility to those who are underage and convenience for those who are pathological gamblers to enable their habit Gallup Pathological gamblers will cost America over billion a year as opposed to drug abusers who only cost the American Taxpayers billion a year Gambling and people are informed that online gambling is addictive costly and problematic but people are still vulnerable to the advertising because of the convenience and message Reality is much more ambiguous than it appears Studying Representations of Social Types or Groups In studying various representations of social groups or types students are examining how people construct generalizations about categories of people that scientists are nerds or Native Americans are alcoholics This analysis involves more than simply noting the stereotyping of these groups It also involves examining reasons for these representations as constructions of beliefs about people leading to questions such as Where do these representations come from Who produces these representations Why are their producing these representations How is complexity limited by these representations and What is missing or how is silenced in these representations Hall Representations of groups often serves to fix the meanings of perceptions of groups For example media representations of black men affect how the society perceives black men in the real world Hall http www mediaed org videos RaceDiversityAndRepresentation RepresentationandtheMedia Groups are also often represented in highly essentialized ways by promoting generalizations according to gender class and race group categories that all boys always do X and all girls always do Y or all working-class people are like X and all upper-middle-class people are like Y Jane Tallim Exposing Gender Stereotypes http www media-awareness ca english resources educational lessons secondary gender portrayal exposing gender cfm This essentializing fails to consider variations in identities contexts and cultures the fact that for example gender differences in one culture may be entirely different in another culture Such essentialist categories are based on biological or behaviorist perspectives rather than cultural perspectives For example essentializing males versus females as biological concepts fails to recognize that gender is a cultural construction evident in how people adopt or performs certain gendered social practices People who are biological males may adopt feminine cultural practices while people who are biological females may adopt masculine cultural practices Gendered media representations are important in that they are central to adolescents defining their identities as explored in the book Media Gender and Identity http www theoryhead com gender Representations of femininity Femininity is represented in the media by the multi-billion dollar beauty industry in ways that links certain social practices associated with femininity as central to defining one s identity as a female All of this can have a limiting influence on adolescent females as documented in the following factoids cited on the PBS program Girls in America http www itvs org girlsinamerica findings html - The average model today weighs less than the average American woman - If the measurements of a Barbie doll were translated into human terms a ' tall Barbie would be - - bust-waist-hips The average ' beauty contest winner measures - - - More than of grade school girls th grade and below report having been on a diet at least once of nine and ten year-old girls report having been on a diet Most of them were not overweight - of white girls ages - consider themselves overweight and only consider their bodies normal This is times the rate for boys - Girls start school testing higher in every academic subject yet graduate from high school scoring points lower than boys on the SAT - Prior to entering college of male valedictorians and of female valedictorians felt intellectually far above average After four years of college of the males felt intellectually far above their peers none of the women believed that about herself - When asked What is the best thing about being a boy the most common response among middle school aged boys was not being a girl When asked What is the best thing about being a girl the top answer was I don't know or Nothing followed by responses focusing on hair and shopping - of girls in grades - report experiencing sexual harassment One primary example of the role of media representations related to the construction of femininity is a focus on body weight This focus on slimness is a current cultural phenomenon that reflects current cultural beliefs In the late s women who were not slim were viewed in a positive light given they assumption that they were well-fed a status feature associated with class Since that time the ideal body weight as portrayed in the media has moved towards increasing slimness The Jean Kilbourne video Slim Hopes documents the ways in which the diet weight loss food and even smoking industry associates slimness with a positive cultural image http www mediaed org videos MediaGenderAndDiversity SlimHopes In media representations of female adolescent body weight slimness is assumed to be the ideal look These representations have resulted in adolescent females engaging in unhealthy eating habits and bulimia with long-term negative effects on their bodies For more information search for Standards of Attractiveness on the following site http www media-awareness ca english index cfm See also the video clip and resources from the Media Education Foundation s Recovering Bodies Overcoming Eating Disorders http www mediaed org videos MediaAndHealth RecoveringBodies A study conducted in by Children Now of media texts frequently used by female adolescents indicated that media texts emphasized the importance of adopting an ideal appearance Across media between and of women are portrayed as thin or very thin compared to between and of men Women are much more likely than men to make or receive comments about their appearance in all three media - on TV of women compared to of men in movies of women to of men and in commercials of women compared to less than of men Women are seen spending their time in appearance related activities such as shopping and grooming On TV of women compared to only of men can be seen grooming or preening In movies this grows to of women and of men In TV commercials it's of women to of men of the articles in teen magazines included a focus on appearance http www childrennow org media mc ReflectSummary html Such images may lead adolescent females to unhealthy eating practices and anorexia with highly adverse health effects One study http www thechiropracticvillage com id htm found that the majority of preadolescent and adolescent girls were unhappy with their body weight and shape This discontent was related strongly to the frequency of reading fashion magazines which was reported to influence their idea of the perfect body shape by of the girls It also obtained data showing that frequent readers of fashion magazines were significantly more likely to diet and exercise to lose weight and to get their image of ideal body shape from the pictures of grossly underweight models For other sites on body image http www bodyimagesite com http www aap org advocacy hogan htm A survey of adolescents perceptions of gender role portrayals on television conducted in sponsored by the Kaiser Family Foundation indicated that they are attending to these messages related to body weight Both girls and boys say the female characters they see on television are thinner than women in real life but that male characters on television are about the same weight as the men in real life of girls and of boys Older girls of girls ages - are more likely to think women television characters are thinner than women they know in real life than do younger girls of girls ages - Kids notice an emphasis on attractiveness especially for women and girls in television shows percent of girls and percent of boys say the female characters in the television shows they watch are better looking than the women and girls they know in real life Worrying about appearance or weight crying or whining weakness and flirting are all qualities both girls and boys say they associate more with a female character on television than a male character Playing sports being a leader and wanting to be kissed or have sex on the other hand are thought of as characteristics displayed more often by male characters Both girls and boys say the female characters they see on television usually rely on someone else to solve their problems whereas male characters tend to solve their own problems of girls and of boys agree Girls want to look like the characters they see on television Seven out of ten of girls -- and percent of boys -- say they have wanted to look like dress or fix their hair like a character s on television Furthermore almost a third of girls and of boys say they changed something about their appearance to be more like a television character Only of girls and of boys say they have ever dieted or exercised to look like a television character http www kff org entmedia -index cfm As documented in the video Playing Unfair sports coverage women s sport also frequently represent female athletes in ways that emphasize their femininity and sexuality--as being married or as mothers or even as sex objects In contrast male athletes are represented more in terms of their physical strength and skills http www mediaed org videos MediaGenderCulture PlayingUnfair For example an article in Golf for Women examined the degree to which sex appeal was being used by the LPGA to attract attention to women s golf Some promoters of the sport suggested that increased focus on the physical appearance of female golfers would enhance attention to golfing currently dominated by Tiger Woods and the PGA http www golfdigest com gfw gfwfeatures index ssf gfw gfwfeatures gfw lpgafeature html The article raises the question as to whether sexual appearance necessarily attracts more attention Everybody keeps saying sex sells says Mary Jo Kane professor of sport sociology at the University of Minnesota and director of the Tucker Center for Research on Women and Sport Sells what Maybe it gets a blip in terms of people who write about it in the sports world but does it translate to more sales on the ground Does it make the purses bigger Do corporate sponsorship and TV coverage go up Show me the data that says that Show me the research the marketing studies Show me a conversation where a person says 'I want to buy season tickets to a team because the players are sexy ' Media Awareness Project Sex in Advertising lesson http www media-awareness ca english resources educational lessons secondary ethics sex in advertising cfm To study media representations of female athletes students could examine descriptions and images employed in sports magazine articles about female athletes noting for example the type of adjectives or categories employed in describing these athletes Students could also examine the discourses of sports competition gender or bonding employed in these representations Femininity is also represented in the media as fulfilled almost exclusively through heterosexual relationships For example traditional Hollywood comedy or romance films as well as the romance novel portrayed females in the role of the nurturer who transformed the impersonal distanced male into a more loving character Radway Adolescent females in films such as She's All That conveys the message that popularity is achieved primarily by adopting feminine social practices http www imdb com title tt Similarly females on soap opera or drama are often represented as primarily concerned about relationships family personal matters home and talk while males are more concerned with business institutions self and competition outside of the home Female audiences are positioned to be engaged as part of being in the home focusing on domestic or interpersonal conflicts The Children Now study indicated that women were represented more in terms of being in relationships while males were represented more in terms of being in careers Women are most often portrayed in the context of relationships Men on the other hand are most often seen in the context of careers More women than men are seen dating across a range of media - on TV of women compared to of men in movies of women compared to of men and in commercials of the women compared to of the men In contrast men are seen spending their time on the job far more often than women in all media - on TV of men compared to of women in movies of men and of women in commercials of men and of women Women are also more likely to be motivated by the desire to have a romantic relationship - on TV of women and in the movies of women compared to of men in each instance In contrast on TV of men are motivated by the desire to get or succeed in a job compared to of women In movies of men were motivated by their career compared to of women Magazine articles reinforce this message by focusing much more on dating of their articles than they do on subjects like school or careers http www childrennow org media mc ReflectSummary html Magazines for females focus primarily on topics related to creating and establishing heterosexual relationships Topics include focus on fashions cosmetics flirtation tips for attracting males romance marriage etc Much of these magazines is devoted to advertising of products associated with these topics so it is difficult to distinguish between the articles and the ads both are attempting to promote or sell the idea of being appealing to males as constituted by a discourse of romance and sexuality Students could analyze the most prominent topics themes in these magazines as well as the relationships between the content of the magazines that promote certain social practices associated with consumerism and the advertising that does the same thing creating blur between the two Vogue http www style com vogue Elle http www ellegirl com Seventeen http www seventeen com Adolescents are often socialized or positioned to adopt certain stances and beliefs about femininity through quizzes in these magazines The questions employed often presuppose certain attitudes associated with adopting an identity defined by being outgoing appealing to males using certain products or adopting practices associated with the idealized role models portrayed in the magazine By answering questions in a certain manner females are then scored on the degree to which they adopt the desired beliefs For example in a quiz in Seventeen Magazine entitled Are You Hot readers were given the following quiz Do you ooze sex appeal or play it cool Forget posting your picture on HotOrNot com take our quiz and find out By Melissa Daly Questions - of At a long-awaited party in your best friend's basement a group decides to start up a game of Spin the Bottle Everyone else is playing Are you in - Duh The game was your suggestion - Doubtful You're not very keen on exchanging spit with any random guy - Sure why not As long as you can rig that Coke bottle to point to your buddy's big brother across the circle You're taking a breather at the spring dance when the reggae version of Sexual Healing comes on - You grab your friends and start grooving -- it's too good a song to sit still - Shoot your boy a come-hither glance while lip-synching the suggestive lyrics - Break from the girls to go grind with the nearest guy -- it's a couples' tune A candid photo taken at the cast party for the play you were just in is being passed around class You're in the background leaning against the set with your arms folded talking to crew members perched on the stage legs crossed and one shoe dangling off your toe standing with friends holding a cup of punch and laughing hysterically The guy at the locker next to yours compliments you on the great new angora sweater you're wearing You reply - Oh you like it It's very soft wanna feel - Really I don't know I think the fuzziness adds a few pounds - Thanks It's new After receiving a score reader were then given the following advice Feeling the Heat You know what boys want -- you There's a definite sexual energy that confident girls give off and you've got it When a woman thinks she's attractive or desirable it adds to her sex appeal says Rebecca Curtis Ph D professor of psychology at Adelphi University in Garden City New York But while you're always game to cha-cha with the cute kid in gym class your value as a person doesn't depend on whether you can successfully proposition him You've got power to wait until someone appealing comes along explains Curtis Keep being your alluring self -- and it won't be long till he shows up For other Seventeen quizzes http www seventeen com quizzes qu fa pra question epl These practices related to a discourse of heterosexual romance are also reflected in advice books For example Ellen Fein's The Rules Time-Tested Secrets for Capturing the Heart of Mr Right advertise and encourage the idea that a women's mission in life is to find a keeper http www twbookmark com books index html Females are also represented in television commercials and magazine ads as consumers particularly in terms of assuming domestic family roles as homemaker cook mom cleaner laundry person and as finding satisfaction through shopping Or teachers are assumed to be middle-class white females Students could draw pictures of what they envision homemakers or teachers and then discuss how and why they portrayed these roles as they did http www nelsonthornes com secondary citizenship activate cl activity html In a Campbell SoupTM ad the mother is shown preparing the Supper Bake with a voice over stating that Any GOOD mom knows that a quick meal is a good one The following ads from the s portray the housewife as obsessed with cleanliness through use of Liquid Ajax or Man From Glad with its male image of power which needs to used by the female http www tvparty com vaultcom html These representations continue today in the image of a female housewife in the following ads that presupposes that it is the female who is responsible for cleaning the house http www homemadesimple com swiffer index flash shtml www tide com mytide It is also important to study counter-examples that challenge or interrogate these traditional roles of femininity as evident in representations of females in non-traditional magazines http www Msmagazine com http www sojourner org http www uppitywomen net These include New Moon for younger females http www newmoon org BlueJeanOnLine http www bluejeanonline com TeenVoicesOnLine http www teenvoices com about html Although as Lisa Featherstone argues some of the these magazines are not all that much different from the more traditional magazines http www metroactive com papers sonoma girlsmags- html On the other hand there are also many websites devoted to examining women s issues in more non-traditional ways http www cybergrrl com http www calarts edu xxchrom http www womensforum com and films about and by women http www wmm com http www reelwomen org http www womedia org http www mith umd edu WomensStudies FilmReviews In summary there is considerable interest in the influence of media representations of women on cultural constructions of female identities The following sites focus on critiquing gendered media representations http www mergemag org http www about-face org http www genderequity org medialit contents html http www mediaandwomen org http www girlsinc com ic page php id http www mediascope org pubs ibriefs tsm htm http americanart si edu collections exhibits cottingham tour-noframe html collections exhibits cottingham more-gender html Gender roles in Disney films http www geocities com esleelay f snow white html And Adbusters has included some spoofs on gender ads for example on thinness on an Obsession ad http adbusters org spoofads fashion obsession-w Chavanu B Seventeen self-Image and stereotypes Rethinking schools unit on advertising and media literacy http www rethinkingschools org cgi-bin hse HomepageSearchEngine cgi url http www rethinkingschools org archive sev shtml geturl d highlightmatches gotofirstmatch terms media enc media utf on noparts firstmatch Espinosa L Seventh graders and sexism Rethinking schools http www rethinkingschools org cgi-bin hse HomepageSearchEngine cgi url http www rethinkingschools org archive seve shtml geturl d highlightmatches gotofirstmatch terms media enc media utf on noparts firstmatch Media Awareness Project Gender and Tobacco http www media-awareness ca english resources educational lessons elementary tobacco gender and tobacco cfm Unit Alison Zimbalist and Javaid Khan The New York Times lessons Sex Guise and Video Games Assessing the Portrayal of Women in Video Games and Across Entertainment Media http www nytimes com learning teachers lessons friday html Masculinity Masculinity is also represented in the media in terms of physical aggression toughness competitiveness and domination as portrayed in ads and stories in men s magazines http www theory org uk mensmags htm http www theory org uk ctr-rol htm These practices as with representations of femininity are culturally bound They evolved out of the rise of the middle-class in the late s and early s in which their was a separation of work and home as distinct gendered realms Nixon Men began to become active in men s clubs as well as religious organizations service constituted in terms of a discourse of moral commitment to service And with the rise of a business or industrial economy men devoted more time to their work outside of the home creating a division previously noted in which men constructed their identities around work and women around the home Men also began to adopt more austere non-feminine dress Lace which was associated with masculinity in the s and s was now considered to be a marker of femininity More recent representations of masculinity emphasize the fixed nature of male identities in which complexity doubt or alternative identities is portray as a negative http www theory org uk ctr-rol htm This is most evident in cross-gender dressing films such as Some Like it Hot Tootsie Mrs Doubtfire and others which not only represent females in limited ways but also assume that adopting a feminine role is a violation of one s basic traditional male role For example in the following trailer for Sorority Boys the characters pretending to be members of a sorority are shown as ultimately failing to adopt feminine roles given their innate masculinity http www apple com trailers touchstone sorority boys html Another aspect of the representation of masculinity is how it is associated with physical violence as an expression of male outrage The video Tough Guise explores representations of violence as constituted by the need to assert one s masculine identity through bullying or violence against women when challenged by others or the system http www mediaed org videos MediaGenderCulture ToughGuise Students could also analyze portrayals of male violence in advertisements go to media violence on the following site http www media-awareness ca english resources educational lessons secondary gender portrayal advertising male violence cfm Media representations of masculinity could also be discussed in terms of violence to women For a discussion of how these representations influence perceptions of rape see Rapping E The Politics of Representation Genre Gender Violence and Justice Genders http www genders org g g rapping html Masculinity and sports An analysis of sports programming sponsored by Children Now in http www childrennow org media boystomen report-sports html found that male adolescents are five times more likely to view sports programs on a regular basis than female adolescents Analysis of the representations of sports indicated the following themes - Aggression and violence among men is depicted as exciting and rewarding behavior - Sports coverage emphasizes the notion that violence is to be expected Fights near-fights threats of fights or other violent actions are found in sports coverage and often verbally framed in sarcastic language that suggests that this kind of action is acceptable This message was found most frequently on SportsCenter times followed by the NFL games times Major League Baseball games times NBA games times and Extreme Sports time - Athletes who are playing with pain or giving up their body for the team are often portrayed as heroes This playing with pain theme was most common in the NFL games instances followed by Extreme Sports instances SportsCenter instances and NBA games instances - Commentators consistently use martial metaphors and language of war and weaponry to describe sports action On an average of nearly five times per hour of sports commentary announcers describe action using terms such as battle kill ammunition weapons professional sniper taking aim fighting shot in his arsenal reloading detonate squeezes the trigger exploded attack mode firing blanks blast explosion blitz point of attack lance through the heart gunning it battle lines are drawn and shotgun These war references were used most often in NBA games times followed by NFL games times Wrestling times SportsCenter times Major League Baseball games times and Extreme Sports times - Sports commentators continually depict and replay incidents of athletes taking big hits and engaging in reckless acts of speed and violent crashes - Games are often promoted by creating or inflating conflict between two star athletes Sports announcers often frame team games as individual one-on-one contests between two well-known individual players This theme was particularly prominent in the NBA games with instances - Many sports programming commercials that boys watch play on male insecurities about being man enough - Traditionally masculine images of speed danger and aggression are often used in the sports programming commercials that boys watch This emphasis on physical display of male prowess is evident in the popularity of professional wrestling with adolescent males as examined in the video Wrestling with Manhood http www mediaed org videos MediaGenderCulture WrestlingWithManhood The highly gendered world of professional football is evident in the representation of female cheerleaders for example the following from the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders s Homepage http www dallascowboys com cgi-bin Cowboys cheerleaders home jsp In the world of professional football females are represented in terms of images of passive femininity and sexuality images opposed to the high level of activity associated with the male players Men Can Stop Rape explores alternative representations of masculinity http www mencanstoprape org Gays lesbians In examining gender representations it is also important to consider the ways in which gays and lesbians are represented in the media http www duke edu sedgwic WRITING gender htm It has only been recently that gays and lesbians have even appeared in films television programs and commercials if they did appear in the past they were stigmatized in negative ways as highly effeminate or deviant This began to change with the film Philadelphia with Tom Hanks portraying a gay fighting AIDS and Ellen DeGeneres on her prime-time television program The video The Celluloid Closet documents the ways in which Hollywood movies shifted in its representations of homosexuality from helpless or tragic characters to more recent characters in films such as The Boys in the Band and The Hunger are portrayed in more complex ways More recently programs such as Will Grace and Queer As Folk and films such as The Birdcage have resulted in a shift in representations towards less stereotypical representations Wilke http www commercialcloset org cgi-bin iowa page column record While in recent years gay men have been desexualized in media QAF Queer as Folk has turned that around The thing Dan and I are most proud of in the show is making gay men sexual says Cowen I think this is very positive -- showing people who aren't ashamed of their sexuality It's the most political thing we're doing and the most important thing for straight people to see Cowen observes that for gay acceptance in media We're exactly where we were years ago for black people like with Sanford Son Good Times and Diahann Carroll in Julia - -- the first sitcom starring a black woman She was a saintly nurse but maybe we've skipped a step with QAF It can be argued that advertising thrives on stereotypes such as the happy family annoying in-laws or lazy husbands but they are not oppressed minorities Eventually blacks and women in advertising have kept up with the times Women today show up less often on the hood of cars as behind the wheels though they still regularly toil for household cleaners and blacks now appear in ads with such frequency that they represent the every man or woman But what of gay men lesbians and transgenders Advertising remain slow at reflecting social change thus homophobia and classic gay stereotypes continue to be regularly used as a source of comedy Lesbian representation is mostly limited to embodying straight male fantasies -- after all desire is the inspiration to buying most everything not reality Transgenders continue to be misunderstood by society and repeatedly appear as sexual tricksters of straight men or frightening monsters Another analysis of Will and Grace indicated that the gay characters are portrayed as operating in realistic social contexts while as the same time they are having to still deal with stereotypical perceptions that still persist in these contexts http writing colostate edu gallery talkingback issue brandsma htm Despite these changes analysis of primetime television programs for Fall by the The Gay Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation GLAAD found that The Fall season includes only seven lesbian and gay characters in primetime all of whom are white There are nobisexual or transgender characters Last year lesbian gay bisexual and transgender LGBT characters regularly appeared on network television Visit http www glaad org eye ontv index php for a complete list of the lesbian and gay characters appearing on television and a season-to-season comparison This fall only six shows on network television feature lesbian and gay characters returning shows Buffy the Vampire Slayer Dawson s Creek ER NYPD Blue and Will Grace and the new ABC drama MDs Eleven shows with lesbian and gay characters from the - season are not returning including Spin City Felicity Once and Again The Ellen Show and Dark Angel The only shows to feature a bisexual and a transgender character That s Show and The Education of Max Bickford respectively were also canceled last season From a rhetorical audience perspective it is often the case that audiences homophobic attitudes shape their responses to representations of gays and lesbians In a study of the reactions of six television viewers in their s to representations of gay issues on television these viewers reactions varied considerably due to differences in their attitudes http www aber ac uk media Students mtw html For further reading on media representations of gays and lesbians see The Columbia Reader on Lesbians Gay Men in Media Society and Politics Gross L Woods J Columbia University Press http www columbia edu cu cup catalog data HTM See also information about gays and lesbians in films http search aol com aolcom browse id source subcats and in commercials http www commercialcloset org cgi-bin iowa index html Racial and ethic group representations Students could also study the ways in which different racial or ethnic groups are represented both in terms of the images portrayed and the discourses of race constituting those representations see Module on discourses of race A study by Children Now http www childrennow org newsroom news- pr- - - cfm of the diversity of groups represented on the eight o clock shows in when children are most likely to be viewing indicated that - The o clock family hour is the least racially diverse hour on television Only one in eight of the programs broadcast during this hour have mixed opening credits casts By contrast two thirds of programs during the ten o clock hour when the least children are watching have mixed opening credits cast - African Americans account for the majority of non-white prime time characters comprising followed by Asian Pacific Americans Latinos and Native Americans In addition the study found that most on-screen racial diversity comes from the inclusion of non-recurring characters and that the number of diverse programs decreases significantly when focusing on a show s main characters only -Latino representation on prime time decreased from of total characters last year to this year Asian Pacific American characters increased from to By contrast Latinos and Asian Pacific Americans make up and respectively of the national population according to the U S Census Another study of representations of different groups on prime-time television in Fall found that the Latino population now the second largest minority population in America was represented only percent of the time even though they make up percent of the population http www usatoday com news nation - - -Latinos-absent-in-TV x htm The study also found that - whites accounted for percent of screen time and percent of all characters though they make up percent of the nation's population - blacks accounted for percent of all characters compared to their percent share of the population However much of this representation occurred on the seldom-watched UPN network This study points to the problem that certain groups are more likely to be represented on certain networks resulting in a segregation in terms of viewing audiences such as whites not viewing UPN shows TV networks Family Hour has least diverse prime time programming http www childrennow org newsroom news- pr- - - cfm In the following video clip from Race The Floating Signifier http mediaed org videos RaceDiversityAndRepresentation RacetheFloatingSignifier Stuart Hall critiques biological notions of race to argue that race is a social and cultural construct that is continually changing across and within different cultures Central to the cultural construction of race is Gramsci s theory of white hegemony http www theory org uk ctr-rol htm by which media representations serve to maintain and perpetuate a discourse of whiteness as the desired norm against which people of color are defined as other http afrikan net hype http www utexas edu world latinosandmedia index html In the following video clip from the video Cultural Criticism and Transformation http mediaed org videos RaceDiversityAndRepresentation CulturalCriticismandTransformation bell hooks examines the powerful white capitalistic institutional forces and motives behind representations of race as evident in the documentary Hoop Dreams the OJ Simpson case Madonna Spike Lee and Gangsta rap As she notes The issue is not freeing ourselves from representations It's really about being enlightened witnesses when we watch representations Based on their extensive empirical research on the representations of Blacks in television and films Robert Entman and Andrew Rejecki argue that given the dominant discourse of whiteness that frames representations of Blacks in terms of a hierarchy of power positioning Blacks in a subordinate roles They define what they describes as a bipolar portrayal of Blacks The predominate imagery of Blacks on television oscillates between the supremely gifted virtuous and successful and the corrupt criminal and dangerous with some Black athletes a bit of both much more so that it does with Whites There is little in the way of the merely ordinary those examples that fail to register a blip on a cultural radar screen calibrated to detect only the extremes p They note that local news broadcasts frequently portray urban Blacks as more likely to engage in criminal behavior than Whites Such depictions may increase Whites fears of entering Black neighborhoods as it reduces their sympathy for Blacks who are in fact more afflicted by violence and crime than most Whites p Given the lack of factual reporting and contextualizing of larger issues on the news they argue for the need for - providing accurate representation of knowable facts like the size of the Black population and the welfare budget -seeking to create dominant frames in the audience s minds that are rooted in such facts or at least in consciously chosen and openly announced value commitments that it selecting and highlighting and therefore popularizing understandings of social problems causes and remedies based on what we know not what we fear or unmindfully assume - providing self-critical material that offers context and clarifies the causes on the images that appear In this mode the news would report that Black crime rates are much higher than Whites but that Racial difference disappears if we control for employment status p And this clip from the video On Orientalism http mediaed org videos RaceDiversityAndRepresentation EdwardSaidOnOrientalism Edward Said examines how media representations of Mid-eastern and Muslim worlds reflect white Western discourses positioning those worlds as an exotic unfathomable other In the documentary video Color Adjustment portraying years of a slow evolution of representations of race on television Marlon Riggs demonstrates how African Americans on programs such as Amos and Andy The Nat King Cole Show I Spy Julia Good Times Roots Frank's Place and The Cosby Show were only portrayed in ways that did not threatened white dominant discourses of race These non-threatening representations are contrasted with more challenging portrayals of the Civil Rights movements on the news and in programs such as Julia All in the Family Good Times The Jeffersons Hill Street Blues and LA Law Professor Margaret Russell in an analysis of a s movie Soul Man about a upper-middle class white male who poses as a black applicant in order to obtain admission to Harvard Law School http www law utexas edu lpop etext lsf russell htm Russell notes that the film challenges affirmative action and race-based scholarships in ways that appeal to what she defines as the dominant stance associated with the assumed ideological stance of a white audience a stance she traces back to a tradition of Hollywood films beginning with Birth of a Nation She concludes her study by contrasting films such as those by Spike Lee that challenge this dominant white stance with films such as Soul Man In defending his film Do the Right Thing against the criticism that it might make mainstream white audiences feel uncomfortable Spike Lee asserted T hat's the way it is all the time for Black people Lee's point was that the dominant gaze still prevails uncomfortable perspectives are marginalized criticized or worst of all simply ignored A film such as Soul Man which capitalizes on an ostensibly alternative perspective to tell a tale about contemporary race relations is ultimately fatally flawed by the domi- nance of its vision By exploiting the effect of racial stereotypes without reminding the viewers of their continuing destructive force Soul Man misses the opportunity to make - either seriously or comically - a truly instructive comment about the nature of racism in our society Christopher Miller The Representation of Black Males in Film http www pressroom com afrimale miller htm Similarly analysis of representations of Native Americans in Hollywood films http www cowboysindians com reflect the ways in which Native Americans are portrayed in the Western genre as the deviant other who attempted to block the white s western expansion and exploitation of natural resources in the American west For lessons on studying contemporary Native American experiences that counter stereotypes about Native Americans http edsitement neh gov view lesson plan asp id Bret Enynon and Donna Thompson American Social History Project Picturing a Nation Native Americans and Visual Representation http historymatters gmu edu d A study by Children Now of Native American adolescents perceptions of the media http www childrennow org media nativeam report html indicated that Most said that they did not see youth with whom they could identify and who were true to life Further Native youth also stated that they do not see people of their own race I don't see any Native Americans in the media said a young Comanche boy from Oklahoma City When asked to identify Native Americans actors a few children answered Northern Exposure or There was an X-Files episode a couple of years ago This scarcity corresponds to many kids feeling left out and getting the message that minorities shouldn't be seen When Native American youth do see other Native Americans on television they experience a sense of pride As one teen said If I see a Native person on the television screen I feel proud of them I don't care what tribe they are as long as they're Native and making a difference Another commented I feel kind of good because like after so many shows about White people Indians actually get a chance to be on TV It makes me happy It shows we're getting somewhere On the rare occasions when Native youth do see their culture and race in the media it is often an unflattering picture As one Oklahoma City adolescent asserted Native Americans aren't highly respected They're not often shown as the main character or the heroine A teenage girl from Seattle told us When you do see Native Americans on TV it's like movies about reservations or something like that And they're all drunk and beating up on each other And they're poor Representations of Asian men and women http www lib berkeley edu MRC Amydoc html http members tripod com shockme allymcbealbioling html reflect negative perceptions of Asians not trustworthy or mysterious Bibliography UC Berkeley Library African Americans in films http www lib berkeley edu MRC AfricanAmBib html Bibliography UC Berkeley Library Native Americans in films http www lib berkeley edu MRC IndigenousBib html Bibliography UC Berkeley Library Chicanos Latinos in films http www lib berkeley edu MRC LatinoBib html Bibliography UC Berkeley Library Jews in films http www lib berkeley edu MRC JewishBib html For other related sites Xenophobia and portrayals of the other http mailbox univie ac at tillneg xenomale OSLO html National University course Representation and Diversity in the Media http www nu edu schools SOAS DOWC courses COM syllabus html University of Iowa Communications Studies site representations of racial groups in the media http www uiowa edu commstud resources GenderMedia http www uoregon edu dmerskin race htm lists of films organized according to racial representations http www lib berkeley edu MRC EthnicImagesVid html Analysis of representation of diversity in European media http www multicultural net To recognize the degree to which mainstream news typically reflects a white middle-class perspective examine the following diversityinc com site in which the news and current events are presented from a more diverse perspective How are the topics selected and analyses employed different from typical mainstream news coverage http www diversityinc com index cfm watchname goo-min New York Times lesson Elyse Fischer Sufferin' Stereotypes Examining Race and Ethnicity as Presented in Children's Media http www nytimes com learning teachers lessons monday html New York Times lesson Alison Zimbalist Kelly Bird and Jessica Levine TeleVisions of Race Examining the Portrayal of Race on Television http www nytimes com learning teachers lessons monday html Class Students could also examine representations of social class differences in the media as based on prototypical notions of working versus middle versus upper-middle-class groups One analysis of class representations in the media http www independentmedia org congress class html found that Class in the United States is still tied to the degree to which one controls the means of production but it is also about race access to power education and even one's belief system The corporate media deals with class issues in ways that obscure their most simple meaning New advertising campaigns about white trash chic treat class as a lifestyle choice while economic coverage in newspaper business sections unquestioningly parrots Greenspan's poison about inflation wage increases being the bogeyman and the only response to falling unemployment being increased interest rates Editors and producers both in the corporate media and in the alternative press fear class issues The corporate media knows that to talk about class is to talk about inequality which is to discuss corporate oppression But even alternative journalists steeped in the logic of journalism schools seek out the highest officials for comment on stories that matter Plain folk are used as props to support conventional wisdom As evident in the PBS documentary People Like Us see Module http www pbs org peoplelikeus people want to be perceived as middle class by adopting class markers of dress language social practices These class differences are represented on television in terms of a display of upper-middle class status symbols in commercials for expensive cars http www lexus com http www mbusa com brand index jsp http www cadillac com or luxury cruises http www royalcaribbean com asp default asp http hollandamerica com In analyzing representations of class differences it is useful to examine media texts organized around class hierarchies the PBS Masterpiece Theater Upstairs Downstairs Robert Altman s film Gosford Park or Titanic portray the disparities in social practices and values associated with different classes often leading to conflicts One example of class tensions within the same text is the PBS Mystery series The Inspector Lynley Mysteries A Great Deliverance in which the detective Inspector Thomas Lynley is upper class--the eighth Earl of Asherton and his partner Sergeant Barbara Havers is working class and has a strong resentment about upper-class people The program revolves around conflicts in their relationships as they attempt to solve crimes the series is based on the Inspector Lynley Mysteries book series by Elizabeth George http www randomhouse com features george Upper middle-class characters that emerged in prime time shows in the s such as Dallas and Dynasty http www museum tv archives etv S htmlS socialclass socialclass htm reflected an increasing sense of a new wealthy class during the Reagan and Thatcher era Some critics noted that the fact that these characters are often unhappy and conflicted was an attempt to convey the message to less-well-off viewers that accumulating wealth does not necessarily result in happiness a message designed to placate concerns about not having wealth During that same period the de-industrialization of the economy resulted in closures of traditional manufacturing plants particularly in England and Ireland A series of films about laid-off workers in these countries during that time--Brassed Off Trainspotting The Snapper The Van and The Last Monty all portray the plight often framed in a comic mode of male workers who must find new kinds of employment that had little to with their familiar traditional skills For example in The Van set in Dublin two works attempt to set up a mobile fish and chip restaurant only to encounter a range of challenges These films represent workers former employers as well as the British government as having little or no concern for their plight Other films about working-class characters in the s include http members aol com lsmithdog bottomdog CHRONFIL htm The Big Night dir Stanley Tucci and Campbell Scott cast Stanley Tucci Tony Shalhoub Isabella Rossellini subj tale of two Italian-American brothers in Long Island and their struggle to keep their little authentic restaurant and lives afloat cooks and restaurant owners Spitfire Grill dir Lee David Zlotoff cast Alison Elliott Ellen Burstyn Will Patton subj young woman comes from prison to small town in Maine to begin life again working in local diner screenplay by Zlotoff diner cook Sling Blade dir Billy Bob Thornton cast Billy Bob Thornton Dwight Yoakam J T Walsh subj retarded adult man Karl Childers struggles in a small Southern town surprise low budgeted independent film nominated for Oscar as Best Film mechanic Fargo dir Joel Coen cast Frances McDormand William H Macy Steve Buscemi subj murder and kidnap plot involving woman police detective and car salesman set in Fargo North Dakota script by Joel and Ethan Coen auto sales policewoman Secrets and Lies -British dir Mike Leigh cast Brenda Blethyn Marianne Jean-Baptiste Timothy Spall Claire Rushrook sugj slice of life of working class family dealing with young Black woman's discovery of her white mother Hidden in America dir Martin Bell cast Beau Bridges Bruce Davison Shelton Dane Jena Malone displaced autoworker and family struggle to get by after wife dies sharp and poignant depiction of hidden poverty in America out of work laborer Good Will Hunting dir Gus Van Sant cast Robin Williams Matt Damon Ben Affleck Minnie Driver subj Rough Boston youth with genius for math shows up MIT academics wins girl and gains confidence with counselor written by Damon and Affleck who received writing Oscars academia construction janitor community college teacher Ulee's Gold dir Vincent Nune cast Peter Fonda Patricia Richardson Jessica Biel Christine Dunford subj beekeeper father brings dysfunctional family together through hard work and struggles bee keeping October Sky dir Joe Johnson cast Jake Gyllenhaal Chris Cooper Laura Dern Natalie Canerday subj based on autobiographical book by Homer H Hickman Jr a coal miner's son in West Virginia who becomes inspired by launch of Stutnik satelite an against a life in the mines chooses to invent rockets with high school friends coal miners students teachers Television programs during the as The Archie Bunker Show Roseanne The Simpsons and Married with Children often portrayed working class characters as uneducated and racist For example Roseanne and her husband are overweight her husband drives a pick-up truck and their world is often highly conflicted phenomena equated with being working-class In contrast The Cosby Show portrays an upper-middle class family as concerned with consumer purchases and achievement The media rarely portrays the actual lives and experiences of working-class people for example showing how they often have to hold several jobs to survive the lack of affordable housing and day care and the decline in health-care benefits provided by employers One study found that in two years of PBS prime-time programming hours addressed the concerns and lives of the working classes compared with hours that focused on the upper classes http www media-awareness ca english issues stereotyping whiteness and privilege whiteness working class cfm And portrayals of working-class television families perpetuate stereotypes of the dysfunctional working-class family http www museum tv archives etv S htmlS socialclass socialclass htm Based on an analysis of two TV talk shows that portray working-class participants revelations about family conflicts and personal problems Laura Grindstaff found that while giving these participants voice to express their problems this expression is controlled and sensationalized in a manner that focuses on the dramatic as opposed to larger institutional explanations for these problems And representations of poor white trash in media texts often serve to perpetuate myths about the working class http www whitetrashworld com http www dailybruin ucla edu db issues view wohlwend html See also trailers for the movie Poor White Trash http www imdb com title tt However such a perspective fails to recognize the complex influences of class and race on identity http xroads virginia edu MA price film htm The view from inside the working class is much more complex The working class white is operating off his own cultural family and individual biases yet coupled with these are the pervasive historically assumed ideas that violence racism and fundamentalism are somehow inherent in his class Even if one becomes aware of the layers of identification applied to oneself and most people do not a battle against your own heritage is difficult at best and usually impossible The class to which we are born in which our family circulates and our formative years are spent is the guiding principle with which we view other groups and their cultural beliefs within our life experience Films that show poor whites as violent people who attack wealthy citified whites allow the rich to justify their treatment of white trash by portraying the poor whites as racist criminal and uneducated This allows other typically marginalized groups to join upper class whites against the white trash This justifies upper class stereotyping of poor whites and serves to aid in relieving upper class white guilt over treatment of others in the past The hatred and condescension of the poor seems to be the last available method of prejudice in our society Just as Americans have made an effort to educate understand and alter the treatment of marginalized groups and alternate cultures within our society we have held on to poor whites as a group to demean Making assumptions about groups of any sort on societal and biased definitions is flawed in any situation As with other groups there must be an effort taken to use an open mind and individual code to ascribe merit to those in our world Thomas Frank argues that mid-American working class people have bought into the false binary of the two Americas promoted in the media the Red the conservative central part of the country that voted for Bush in the election and the Blue the two coasts who voted for Gore a binary contradicted by Midwestern states that voted for Gore This binary leads to prototypical assumptions about people in the Red areas that they hold the bed-rock values of being humble reverent upbeat loyal and hard-working a prototype set against what is perceived to be the effete intellectual snobbish morally-questionable white-collar worker who inhabit the Blue areas Frank quotes Missouri farmer who described the kind of work he does as measured in bushels pounds shingles nailed and bricks laid rather than in the fussy judgments that make up office employee reviews p For Frank the class divide is therefore one that has been framed around a discourse of cultural difference revolving around notions of cultural authenticity in which working-class people are portrayed as basking in the easy solidarity of patriotism hard work and the universal ability to identify soybeans in a field p The fact that class distinctions are framed in fast-track capitalism in terms of cultural attitudes related to valued social practices serves as a means of masking economic realities of small-family farmers and business owners who have been put out of business by agribusiness conglomerates and corporations Deregulated capitalism is what has allowed the Wal-Marts to crush local businesses across the Midwest and even more importantly what has driven agriculture the region s raison d etre to a state of near-collapse p In his review of economic history Richard Ohmann notes that a major shift in economic policy occurred beginning in the s from one of what David Harvey describes as a stable Fordism to the instability of flexible accumulation through new sections of production new ways of providing financial services now markets and above all greatly intensified rations of commercial technological and organizational innovation Harvey p Ohmann notes that the instability and excesses of this casino capitalism p has resulted in a shift from stable well-paying long-term full-time jobs with benefits Ford believed in paying workers so that they could afford his cars and decent housing to flex-time part-time and temporary labor subcontracting and out-sourcing job sharing home work and piece work workfare and prison labor p This shift since the s has resulted in a parallel shift way from the New Deal politics of strong government support programs and government regulation to a diminution of government support and deregulation resulting in funding cuts for education job training health care social security child-care and housing particularly for low-income people Changes in the nature of work film clips of working in the early th century http memory loc gov ammem ndlpedu collections atwork atintro html These shifts have placed working-class people in a double-bind On the one hand the transformation from manufacturing to knowledge-economy jobs entail increased higher education beyond high school However cuts in state and federal spending due to tax cuts has resulted in large increases in tuition in state colleges and universities These economic shifts and cultural messages influences working-class adolescents identity construction around class and race leaving many of them confused about their social status and economic future They recognize that their class status has much to do with differences in cultural capital available to their middle- and upper-middle-class peers to which they may not have access Yet the popular media particularly conservative radio talk shows continue to reify false binaries of low-income people s authenticity associated with blue-collar work as set against the knowledge-economy workers These conservative messages deliberately shift attention away from the larger economic forces of fast-track capitalism and corporate control working against low-income people This suggests that some of the appeal of the conservative messages employs the traditional race-card strategy of pitting low-income whites against low-income people of color In his documentation of the evolution of white privilege David Roediger noted that in the s wealthy Whites provided poor Whites with small tokens of economic privilege and social status that served to create an economic hierarchy that set low income Whites against Blacks And given the rise of a post-Civil Rights racism since the s politicians continued to employ the race-card appeal to attract white voters Given the loss of well-paying jobs for low-income Whites since the s working-class Whites have increasingly defined their class identity in terms of racial polarization and resentment against Blacks and Latinos as scapegoat targets for job losses defining their sense of social superiority through othering Blacks and Latinos as inferior This othering takes the form of Whites distancing themselves from what they perceive to be low-level slave-labor work done by Blacks and Latinos and attempting to achieve what they perceive as middle-class status in terms of not being or living near Blacks or Latinos For bell hooks all of this serves to divert white working-class people s attention away from an economic system that fails to provide well-paying employment Not even the economic crisis that is sorely impacting on their lives at home and at work alerts them to the realities of predatory capitalism Their lack of sympathy for the poor unites them ideologically with greedy people of means who only have contempt for the poor Once poor can be represented as totally corrupt as being always and only morally bankrupt it is possible for those with class privilege to eschew any responsibility for poverty and the suffering it represents p In summary representations of gender race and class are often derived from institutional forces that represent groups other than themselves using discourses and myths that serve to maintain their own power and status in society For further reading about representations of gender race and class see the anthology Gender Race And Class In Media A Text Reader Dines Humez eds which contains numerous essays on the representations of gender race and class in the media William F Munn lesson plan Class in the Media Writing a Television Show http www pbs org peoplelikeus resources lessonplans media html Traci Gardner Comic Makeovers Examining Race Class Ethnicity and Gender in the Media http www readwritethink org lessons lesson view printer friendly asp id Representations of Different Age Groups or Occupations Media representations of different groups of people based on age children adolescents the elderly or occupation often essentialize generalize or categorize people based on stereotypical generalizations about individuals It is assumed that certain prototypical images language use or social practices of a group are represented in a single token representative person that a black gang member serves as a representative of all black adolescents Again what is important is to help students to go beyond simply identifying the stereotyping to determine the origins of these representations One of the incentives to essentialized generalize or categorize people into groups is to create a hierarchy in which certain groups are perceived as inferior scapegoats as did Hitler with Jews during World War II Another incentive is to use these prototypes to ridicule or parody the shortcomings of a particular group for example to create humor out of the stereotype itself Children adolescents Children are often portrayed in the media or films in negative or stereotypical ways For example based on an analysis by British -year-olds of British newspapers students identified what they perceived to be seven stereotypes of children in the media Kids as victims Cute kids sell newspapers Little devils Kids are brilliant Kids as accessories Kids these days Brave little angels A study by Professor Katharine Heintz-Knowles for Children Now of the representation of children on television http www childrennow org media mc content study html found that children are often portrayed as motivated primarily by peer relationships sports and romance and least often by community school-related or religious issues Children are also rarely shown as coping with societal issues such as racism substance abuse public safety or homelessness or major family issues such as family crises child abuse domestic abuse or family values And about of the children portrayed are engaged in pro-social actions such as sharing telling the truth in difficult situations meeting their responsibilities and helping others of the time while are portrayed as engaged in anti-social actions such as lying neglecting their responsibilities or being aggressive either verbally or physically Physical aggression was portrayed as effective in meeting the child's goal most of the time and deceitful behavior is seen as effective nearly half of the time In this study children of color were under-represented were white were African-American were Asian-American and only were Hispanic Latino as compared to the actual population percentages of of children under are white are African-American are Asian-American and are Hispanic Latino Another study for Children Now on the types of issues covered by news about children http www childrennow org newsroom news- pr- - - cfm indicated that the primary focus of the coverage was on crime and violence-about half of all television news stories and about of all newspaper articles Economic topics such as child poverty child care and welfare accounted for only of all news stories about children Only about a third of all stories dealt with public policy concerns associated with children Adolescents are often portrayed in being in a crisis state without providing them with tools for critically analyzing reasons for their problems In the following three sites David Considine argues that the media present adolescents with a lot of consumer options and portrayals of substance abuse but do not provide any critical analysis of these options abuse or strategies for coping with them http www ci appstate edu programs edmedia medialit ml adolescents html http www ci appstate edu programs edmedia medialit ml adolescents html http www ci appstate edu programs edmedia medialit ml adolescents html Children are also represented in television commercials in ways that socialize them to become active consumers with defined needs for various consumer products at an early age http www med sc edu toys htm http www education-world com a lesson lesson shtml New York Times lesson Annissa Hambouz and Javaid Khan Media Babies Considering the Effects of Electronic Media on Infants and Toddlers http www nytimes com learning teachers lessons thursday html Adolescents are also represented as members of prototypical groups jocks nerds druggie brains underdogs athletes etc Students could identify the nature of these groups in films and television programs and note the limitations of representations of these groups For example the trailer for the film The Goonies contains a number of stereotypical group representations http us imdb com Trailers Film Education unit Representations of Youth http www filmeducation org secondary Representation index html The elderly At the other end of the spectrum the elderly are often represented in equally limited ways A study sponsored by Children Now of prime time television programs in the Fall of http WWW Trinity Edu mkearl ger-tv html found that only of the characters were and older and only were fell between the ages of and in contrast to the reality that of the American population is over and are over There was also a gender bias only of women were over age In contrast as the study found web sites for AARP http www aarp org index html and for the National Council on Aging http www ncoa org present the elderly in a very different more positive light http www geocities com lightgrrrrrl Sandy Landis conducted an analysis of media representations of the elderly in her CI paper in Spring - In the May issue of Family Circle of the approximately identifiable faces in illustrations or were conceivably over years of age Of fifteen representations four were part of the same story and seven nearly half were connected with products or services to help with the problems of aging arthritis anemia incontinence and wrinkles - Of the approximately identifiable faces in the June issue of Better Homes and Gardens or were feasibly over Of these old faces three appeared in a single movie ad and five were advertising health products for the elderly - In the June issue of Good Housekeeping of the approximately identifiable faces only ten or were likely to be over Of these ten older faces three appeared in one advertisement for an upcoming film release and four were advertising health remedies for the aged - In the June edition of Woman s Day of identifiable faces or were possibly over Of these older faces ten appeared in a single photograph and five were advertising health products for the elderly Landis analyzed the representations of the elderly in film and television and found that they were highly one-dimensional in that any complexity of these characters were limited to one or two particularly makers of aging - Grumpy old man Grumpy Old Men Grumpier Old Men The Sunshine Boys It s a Wonderful Life On Golden Pond King of the Hill The Simpsons - Feisty old woman Tea with Mussolini The Golden Girls - Sickly old person Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory Key Largo It s a Wonderful Life The Big Sleep The Sunshine Boys - Mentally deficient The Simpsons On Golden Pond The Golden Girls The Whales of August - Depressed or lonely Fried Green Tomatoes Enchanted April - Having wisdom Murder She Wrote the Miss Marple mysteries Harold and Maude - Busy body Everybody Loves Raymond Murder She Wrote - Having a second childhood Cocoon On Golden Pond Arsenic and Old Lace One study by Meredith Tupper of the representation of the elderly in prime time advertising http www geocities com lightgrrrrrl found that advertisers avoid perpetuating negative stereotypes of the sick weak old person stereotype but elderly characters are still underrepresented relative to their percentages in the population particularly elderly characters of color No clear cut definitive negative stereotypes of elderly people emerged from this study in fact elderly characters did not appear in the anticipated commercial categories For example elderly characters did not appear in roles for products such as arthritis medication denture care products or skin wrinkle creams nor did they appear in sick weak fragile or absent-minded roles It appears that the image of elderly people in prime time television commercials is less negative than previously thought Advertisers may have taken the cue from published research and made an obvious effort to avoid perpetuating the sick weak old person stereotype However the effect of this has been to reduce the overall opportunities for visibility of elderly characters For instance Madison Avenue won't break the stereotype by routinely showing older characters in positive situations but it will make certain that older characters do not appear in negative stereotyped situations either As illustrated in the data from this and other studies elders are still significantly underrepresented in proportion to their true occurrence within the U S population Occupations Teachers Shannon and Crawford identify a number of different representations of teachers as caretakers jailer savior drillmaster keepers of wisdom facilitator guide-on-the-side technician agent of social change or underpaid unionist arguing that each of these representations portray only a limited partial perspective on the complex nature of teaching For example in the films The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie To Sir With Love Up the Down Staircase Dead Poet s Society Dangerous Minds and Good Will Hunting teachers are portrayed as totally dedicated loner saviors of students who fight against the often repressive school to help their students One limitation of this representation is that it ultimately robs teachers of a life outside and inside their work and separates them from the rest of us who are charged with educating and socializing children Shannon Crawford p For a unit on Images of Learning for studying representations of secondary teachers http www media-awareness ca english resources educational lessons secondary stereotyping images of learning sec cfm This lesson sites an article by Gavin Hainsworth http www media-awareness ca english resources educational handouts stereotyping tinsel town teachers cfm who identified a number of features of teachers in the following films Good-bye Mr Chips Blackboard Jungle To Sir with Love The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie Teachers The Breakfast Club Ferris Bueller s Day Off The Principal Stand and Deliver Lean on Me Dead Poets Society Kindergarten Cop Dangerous Minds Mr Holland s Opus The Substitute In Out Music of the Heart Pay it Forward Finding Forrester Screen teachers begin as youthful and idealistic Most teacher films are variations on the same story beginning teachers launched feet first into the harsh reality of the new school They are naive idealistic and completely unprepared for what faces them As Rick Dadier Glenn Ford Blackboard Jungle states I want to teach Most of us want to do something creative a painter writer or engineer But I thought if I could help to shape young minds sort of sculpt young lives that would be something After being hired on the spot to teach a class of academy kids that had already dispatched five substitutes Dangerous Minds Michelle Pfeiffer s character states I guess Ms Shephard s lesson plans will be in her desk Their dreams may even include innocent ambitions like Mr Chips It means everything to be here headmaster at Brookwood That's something to work for They believe that students will raise to our expectations and desire Jaime Escalante Edward Olmos Stand and Deliver Screen teachers get cynical advice instead of professional mentorship from their colleagues This fact is revealed in the staff room or first staff meeting scene Mr Chips is told that the boys are excited by fresh blood mustn t let them rag you look out for drawing pins and tacks on your desk and he is asked if he is athletically inclined not that they ever become violent with weapons or anything A good model for the stateroom cynic is Jim Murdock Blackboard Jungle He is introduced working out on a punching bag getting into shape to defend myself for the fall term because his school is the garbage can of the education system You take the worst kids of most of the other schools put them together here and you get one big overflowing garbage can You can't teach logarithms to illiterates says one teacher in Stand and Deliver Screen teachers always get the worst class This truism is timeless from the balls of paper flying Good-bye Mr Chips through leather-jacket boppers Blackboard Jungle twisters and swingers To Sir with Love to gangster rappers Dangerous Minds Stand and Deliver The Substitute The Principal all long after the bell has rung The desks are broken and vandalized and the students are completely out of control They are going through the file cabinets and the teacher's desk The Substitute There aren't enough seats Stand and Deliver which only partially explains why couples are sharing desks Blackboard Jungle Stand and Deliver Dangerous Minds Teachers The Principal Any attempt to teach the first class is shouted down by the students who throw baseballs Blackboard Jungle beer cans The Substitute or books To Sir with Love Stand and Deliver The bell to end classes always rings a few minutes after the one to begin leaving classroom and lesson in tatters Screen teachers can count on little or no support from the principal If anyone is of less help to the screen teacher than his her class or colleagues it is the screen principal Principals are insulated within their office from the reality of the classroom and are incompetent indifferent or intimidating Principal Eugene Horne Teachers runs back into his office when he sees two teachers fighting over the mimeograph machine and he knows neither who does the schools filing nor where the files are kept Principal Warneke Blackboard Jungle is more concerned with the softness of teacher Dadier s voice than with the false allegations of teacher racism in his class or the repeated weapons infractions or the attempted rape of a staff member There is no discipline problem here Mr Dadier not as long as I am principal here he says A death threat against a teacher is swept under the carpet by Principal Claude Rolle The Substitute because without proof of a direct threat he'd have a lawsuit on his hands Where screen principals use discipline they go to sociopathic extremes Principals Joe Clark Lean on Me and Rick Latimer James Belushi The Principal patrol their hallways with baseball bats that they are often called upon to use as well as other management tools like verbal intimidation and threats used on students and staff alike It is no accident that Rick Latimer is promoted to principal of his inner-city school after taking a baseball bat to his ex-wife s sports car he has what it takes to turn a school around Screen teachers face an increasingly violent school environment in which they themselves must become violent to succeed Mr Dadier Blackboard Jungle fights attacks by his students in the alley and in his classroom and he prevents a teacher rape in the library Principal Rick Latimer The Principal not only has to fight an attack by five students in his library whom he throws out the window but breaks up a teacher rape by riding his Harley labeled El Principal to the rescue down the hallway With bike and bat he takes down the crack dealers around his school and engages in a battle to the death The Substitute takes on KOD The Kings of Destruction Miami's top gang to avenge the intimidation of his teacher girlfriend but to do so requires all of his mercenary training and the members of his paramilitary squad The KOD are led by the schools principal Mr Rolle who is using the school for a drug transit point Principal Rolle shoots down students and teachers alike saying to one young teacher I'm just doing you a favour as he shoots him in the back A final showdown with automatic weapons grenades and bazookas is needed at the school to clean it up The two remaining mercenaries resolve never to work at a school again For further reading on media representations of teachers Dalton M The Hollywood curriculum Teachers in the movies New York Peter Lang Giroux H Simon R Popular culture schooling and everyday life New York Bergin Garvey Joseph P Burnaford G Eds Images of school teachers in twentieth-century America Paragons polarities complexities New York St Martin s Press Keroes J Tales out of school Longing and the teacher in fiction and film Carbondale IL Southern Illinois University Press Weber S Mitchell C That's funny You don't look like a teacher Interrogating images and identity in popular culture New York Routledge Students Students are also represented in often stereotypical ways in either pro-or anti-school And news coverage of issues such as testing and accountability often represent teachers and students as failing or lacking motivation in schools representations that do not account for a range of different aspects influencing student performance For example a study of media coverage of testing in North Carolina found that issues of testing were portrayed in one-dimensional ways http edtech connect msu edu searchaera viewproposaltext asp propID Coaches Coaches as is the case with teachers are often represented in films such as Hoosiers Rocky Rocky II The Karate Kid Cutting Edge The Mighty Ducks Hoop Dreams or Vision Quest as a driven hard-line authoritarian who tries to discipline players and is obsessed with winning at all costs or as a compassionate caring mentor Crowe Lawyers Lawyers are frequently portrayed in films http mentalsoup net jelkins coursefilms shtml such as A Civil Action A Few Good Men Amistad Before and After Class Action Erin Brockovich Guilty as Sin Music Box My Cousin Vinny Philadelphia Primal Fear Snow Falling on Cedars The Castle The Client The Devil's Advocate The Rainmaker The Sweet Hereafter The Winslow Boy To Kill a Mockingbird A Time to Kill Body Heat Bonfire of the Vanities Presumed Innocent The Firm Dead Man Walking Ghosts of Mississippi Rules of Engagement The Shawshank Redemption as using the law to fight the traditional establishment or status quo in ways that serve clients whose rights or civil liberties have been violated or denied However in other cases lawyers are portrayed as representing corporate interests against such clients Women lawyers are less frequent than male lawyers but they are portrayed as assuming important roles in defending women s rights and civil liberties http mentalsoup net jelkins women shtml Portrayals of television lawyers on Law Order Ally McBeal The Practice This Life often dramatize the role of lawyers as engaged in dramatic criminal court room practices a representation that does not capture some of the less dramatic roles involved in practicing the law Police criminals Police and criminals have populated many prime-time detective crime television programs such as Law Order Blue Heelers NYPD Blue Homicide Life on the Street Blue Murder or Silent Witness Criminal are often portrayed in films such as Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels Heat The Godfather Chopper Bonnie and Clyde Sexy Beast or on television in The Sopranos as engaged in practices that violate social norms in ways that are appealing to viewers but still represent illegal practices Similarly there is a fascination with portrayals of serial killers in films such as Silence of the Lambs Natural Born Killers Summer of Sam Manhunter Seven American Psycho The Talented Mr Ripley Copycat Hannibal Students could examine the ways in which the roles of the law enforcer and the law violator are often dramatized in ways that blur the distinction between the two The police may resort to the same violent means to stop a criminal and the criminal may employ detective work to allude the police Both may subscribe to the same cynical attitude regarding the level of institutional corruption Representations of crime or criminals are often constituted by discourses of race in which criminals are often shown as African American males Crime is often associated with racial stereotypes assuming that for example black males are continually perpetuating crime The following video clip from Framing an Execution explores issues around Mumia Abu-Jamal a journalist on Pennsylvania's death row in connection with the death of a police office http www mediaed org videos MediaRaceAndRepresentation FraminganExecution Doctors health issues Doctors have also frequently appeared in prime-time medical drama shows such as Casualty Chicago Hope City of Angels Crossing Jordan Diagnosis Murder Doc Dr Quinn - Medicine Woman Emergency ER Gideon's Crossing Holby City L A Doctors Peak Practice St Elsewhere and Strong Medicine On these shows they are often represented as similar to the representations of teachers as saviors or miracle workers who pull through in the end to cure a patient As the same time their own emotional or personal lives become involved in their work adding to the dramatic elements of these programs Doctors or reporters posing as medical experts are also represented on television news are providing medical advice or summaries of current medical research These representations which have received increased attention on television news reflect an increased attention to health issues by the viewing public In some cases however the information provided may be superficial or as in the case with some Internet sites misleading or inaccurate For example one study of the media representation of breast and bottle feeding Henderson Kitzinger Green found that breastfeeding was often portrayed as embarrassing difficult or funny while bottle feeding is presented as the normal and socially acceptable Students could examine how a particular medical or health issue is represented on dramas or the news in terms of the complexity or accuracy of the representation Institutions The media also represents various institutions such as the family or governments in ways that reflect certain cultural and ideological perspectives Families Television families have been represented in different ways across different decades since World War II While television families of the s were portrayed as patriarchic institutions guided by a omniscient wise father programs in the s such as The Simpsons Home Improvement Brother s Keeper and King of the Hill portrayed fathers as bungling and ineffectual There is also a shift in the role of the mother to someone who is more independent and assertive Some reality television shows such as the House Frontier House and Colonial House on PBS and The Osbournes on MTV http www mtv com onair osbournes portray conflicts and experiences of families in unusual contexts that challenge family unity One key aspect of media representations of the family has been the representations of the breakdown of the family as due to factors such as unmarried couples or dependency on government support systems These representations could be examined in light of alternative perspectives such as that provided by the Council on Contemporary Families http www contemporaryfamilies org in a report Marriage Poverty and Public Policy by Stephanie Coontz and Nancy Folbre that critiques the promotion of marriage as a requirement for receiving support - Although poor families are just as likely as others to consider marriage an ideal arrangement for raising children economic hardships such as unemployment low wages and poverty make it less likely that the hope of marriage can be realized Economic stability and not pre-marital counseling would play a critical role in allowing for healthy marriages for families in these circumstances - Despite significant increases in their hours of work single parents have not experienced an improvement in economic conditions in part because of the high cost of child care Much of non-marital childbirth cohort is comprised of cohabiting couples not single women living without a partner Welfare reform itself has encouraged this trend increasing economic stress on parents and creating a need to share financial resources often with partners who are unwilling or unlikely to marry - Hypothetical notions of reducing poverty by promoting the marriage of poor women so that parents can combine incomes are unlikely to be borne out Employed men and women are much more likely to marry partners who themselves have good employment prospects Individuals with the most economic barriers such as low educational attainment a history of incarceration or substance abuse are the least likely to marry Marriage stability is also difficult to attain under the stresses of poverty - The effect of creating a marriage bonus under TANF would be to impose a non-marriage penalty that would disproportionately impact African-Americans Programs designed to encourage marriage should be directed at all families and not just the poor They would more appropriately be built into public and private health insurance coverage for example and should focus on a range of family relationships and not just marriage Urban suburban rural communities Urban suburban rural communities are often represented in the media in ways that fail to portray the complexities of these communities For example urban communities or neighborhoods are often portrayed particularly in television news or crime shows as crime-ridden or poverty-stricken without providing addition contextual information about the causes of these phenomenon high unemployment lack of government support or lack of affordable housing Students could contrast these representations with more realistic portrayals of contemporary urban worlds in films like Do the Right Thing or Boyz N The Hood or documentaries portraying urban worlds http www frif com subjects urban st html Urban worlds are often very much in transition particularly in terms of the influx of new immigrant populations who attempt to settle in urban areas While television news often portrays stereotyped perspectives of these immigrants the Soul of Los Angeles Project sponsored by the Center for Religion and Civic Education used images to portray a different portrayal of these immigrants in Los Angeles http www usc edu dept LAS religion online commonground Betti-Sue Hertz and Lydia Yee Urban Mythologies The Bronx Represented Since the http www brickhaus com amoore magazine bronx html My History is Your History studies of Chicago neighborhoods http www chicagohs org DGBPhotoEssay mhyh html Street-Level Youth Media Chicago youth study their neighborhoods http streetlevel iit edu Webquest studying an urban neighborhood http www whitney org jacoblawrence resources webqst neighborhood html Radical Urban Theory http www rut com Metropolis Magazine http www metropolismag com The Citistates Group http www citistates com Suburbia is often represented as the idealized pastoral tree-lined contrast with urban worlds However these representations fail to capture the variations across and within suburbia particularly the fact that many inner-ring suburbs are struggling Students could examine how the media represents suburbia in terms of a discourse of whiteness as enclaves of white lives with little or no diversity As Matthew Durington argues http astro ocis temple edu ruby aaa matt html the portrayal of suburbia as a race-neutral homogeneous culture could be equated with the absence of diversity This history is reflected in popular culture such as television and film that represented the suburb as a white space While the number of films and television shows that have served this purpose is too many to describe in this paper both praise-songs of the suburb and critiques of it continually affirmate its existence as white space We are not allowed to witness the contemporary multicultural suburb for what it is As Silverstone points out the institutionalization of television rested on the ordinariness of suburban life in shows like Leave it to Beaver and had the effect of equating the suburb with whiteness Silverstone This historical representation of the suburb in popular culture established the suburb as homogenous white and hence with an absence of identity The labeling of whiteness as an absent identity or a colorless void is highly problematic because this way of thinking only naturalizes racism and power Fusco hooks A body of work has emerged in recent years investigating the notion of whiteness in a more critical fashion but outside of anthropology this analysis continues to trivialize whiteness through various cultural reads of films or haphazard linkages to larger social issues and trends Although the setting for these accounts of whiteness is often the suburb a comprehensive ethnographic analysis of how the suburb is created materially and how white identity is formed and projected symbolically among its inhabitants is still lacking This requires a research methodology that contextualizes the material development of the suburb the way that the suburb has been represented in popular culture historically and the means by which both of these influence identity formation in this environment Representations of suburbia also emphasize elements of open space a representation that fails to address issues of sprawl and zoning issues associated with the destruction of farm land environmental degradation increased congestion and blighted development For courses on surburbia see the following syllabi Judy Gill Dickenson College http www dickinson edu gill images suburbs pdf John Archer University of Minnesota http cscl cla umn edu courses suburbia html Steve Macek Mall of America Gale Encyclopedia of Popular Culture http www findarticles com cf g epc tov p article jhtml Lots of links on topics related to suburbia http cscl cla umn edu courses links html Lesson plan Sprawl