Preview

Objectification Of Women In Music Videos

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
603 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Objectification Of Women In Music Videos
A key emergent theme present in the music videos screened for this discussion post is the objectification of the female body. Female objectification is, in essence, when women are deconstructed for the sexual enjoyment of another individual (Burgess & Burpo, 2012). As previously discussed, women in music videos (and other forms of popular culture) are often represented in parts, instead of a whole. In advertisements, for example, women are frequently displayed in body parts, such as their lips, legs, eyes, breasts, or stomach. When women are represented in parts, they are portrayed as objects, not humans. In other word, “when objectified, women are treated as bodies – and in particular, as bodies that exist for the use and pleasure of others” (Fredrickson & Roberts, 1997, p. 175). …show more content…
750). This narrow representation of women in the media can be understood as contributing to a culture of violence against women. By representing women as objects, they are effectively dehumanized. The dehumanization of individuals can lead to violence; it is much easier, emotionally, to mistreat an object than a human

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Miss Representation, the 2011 documentary about how the mainstream media depicts women negatively in the United States, educates the viewers on the harmful media representation that is brought upon women. Females who are featured in the media are often depicted as a sexual image to men. When the film states that “the media is selling young people the idea that girls’ and women’s value lies in their youth, beauty, and sexuality and not in their capacity as leaders.” it informs the viewer that the media is a dangerous tool used to explicitly demand what women should do, say, buy, and look like. The audience is directed towards anyone who is interested in learning more about the ways the media adversely portrays women. The tone of the film alters…

    • 166 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The documentary Miss Representation shows the false representation of women through media. The media’s portrayal of what a powerful women is includes harmful and artificial substances to the body. It is important for all of us to learn the truth behind media because false stereotypes are created. We must value and respect human beings and not as objects. People must know that they can be powerful just by being themselves and not by trying to be someone else. The truth behind feminist anger can awaken our society and start a change in the world. Our everyday lives are effected by these false advertised women in television, magazines, music videos, etc. The film points out that influential women do not need to wear clothes that reveal their body…

    • 229 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    Over years, the influence of mass media has increased tremendously, with the increase of technology. First there was reading material such as books, newspapers, and magazines along with photography. Then, sound recordings, films, radio, television, came thereafter; and now Internet, which is now the new media, is social media. However, theses types of media tools, do effect emotional arousal, sex and behavior identification, and changes in allocation of time, consumer purchase, and voting behavior. There is some evidence that mass media influence these types of interests and interest-related behavior, public taste, outlook and values, and inactiveness. In this essay I will be discuss developments, milestones, and applications exemplifying changes in media portrayal of sex and violence, I will explain how the negative effects of sex and violence on children have increased in media technology and how the negative effects of sex and violence on adults have increased in media technology, I also will make specific recommendations about how the problems of media portrayal of sex and violence might be minimized and I will show how media portrayals of sex and violence relate to…

    • 1221 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    anthro 2a final

    • 1892 Words
    • 8 Pages

    “I Enjoy Being a Girl” (music videos and women’s capitalist role as primary consumers and sexualized objects)-…

    • 1892 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The mass media, television, internet, radio, newspapers, magazines and film is part of our everyday life. It is a powerful tool that provides us with information and entertainment. It reflects our society and it influences the way we think. The media has been criticized for its portrayal of women as objects whose value is measured in terms of their usefulness to others. It becomes difficult to see them as thinking, feeling, and capable people. Constantly portraying women in a highly sexualized way makes it more likely all women will be seen as sexual objects. This becomes a human right issue.…

    • 468 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    As I watched ‘Killing us Softly 3’, I began to feel the clutch of Jean Kilbourne’s hand around my dignity as I already found myself preparing my mind’s susceptibility to her reprimanding me for being a part of the mass media culture who through its advertising objectifies women. Unfortunately for Mrs. Kilbourne however, these feelings of self-loathing were short lived. I realized that as a sympathizer for the hardships and discrimination that women are faced with, I was almost drawn into this amalgamation of carefully chosen advertising and continual castigation. I only approach this so critically because I strongly feel as though her prancing through what she would have us believe is ‘modern media’ is actually completely detrimental to her cause.…

    • 639 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Hip Hop Media Stunt Men

    • 329 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The media portrayal of men has affected our society for many years. The media tends to stunt men’s emotional depth and alter the ways that they are able to express themselves. Men will often turn to violence as a way to express themselves and to make themselves seem tougher than they actually are. These violent expressions are dangerous and involve not only other men, but can carry to the abuse of women and children. Misogyny is very present in modern day music and media.…

    • 329 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    There is a certain appearance that women must keep up, while for men, there is no particular appearance – they are judged on their music not their look (Davies 303). When women are displayed in magazine covers, they are wearing tight clothes and showing a lot of cleavage. “A simplistic explanation for the highly sexualised representation of women would be that individual male music journalists are unable to view women as anything other than sex objects” (Davies 304). In Groce and Cooper’s essay, they interviewed women in local rock and roll bands. One vocalist, Carole, mentioned, “I try very hard to be pretty to an audience.…

    • 1937 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Issue Paper

    • 1874 Words
    • 8 Pages

    Music videos came to popularity in the 1980’s with such television stations as MTV, BET, and VH1. The aim of these music videos is to market and promote different artists through the use of visual appeals. Gangster rap, a subgenre Hip-Hop music, presents violence, homophobia, and sexism in its lyrical content. This type of music presents the youth with an ideal identity, one that is consumed with money, cars, drugs, and multiple women performing sexual favors. Gangster rap videos usually focus on the buttocks, hips, and breast of women, (specifically black women). These videos depict black women as: hypersexual, money-hungry, sex objects. The success of these music videos relies on the imaging of these women in these videos and their use of their sexual appeal to sell the song. Music videos portray woman in a positive and negative light and these portrayals of woman could essentially play a role in a young girl’s self-esteem.…

    • 1874 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Media is one of the factors why women are perceived as secondary to men. This is why media has a major influence to the humanity because it can reach almost all the parts of the world. May it be in print media or in film productions; women are always depicted as inferior and submissive to men’s desires.…

    • 1942 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    In ‘killing us softly’ Jean Kilbourne’s notes that dehumanization, objectification, and violence agianst women are all related. First, the advert dehumanizes the woman as a human being and turn her into a fairy tale being. Second, the advert turns the women into a sexual object meant to create sales. Finally, the dehumanization and objectification create the image of a woman as a tool for man’s manipulation and sexual entertainment which exposes women to violence.…

    • 1212 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Women’s bodies sell. This is a well-known fact; from tabloids of bikini bodies to gyms with yoga pants wearing trainers in sports bras, the female form is top seller. No industry knows this better than the music industry. Recently Jennifer Lopez and Iggy Azalea teamed up on a music video focusing on what exactly…, women’s butts. Nikki Minaj’s video for her song Anaconda shows well-endowed women gyrating to the lyrics “don’t want none unless you got buns Hun”. Videos such as these put a feministic mask of empowerment on, but what are they truly selling? These female artists are selling that women are not worth anything more than to be accessories or viewed as sexual objects for men. What is this doing to our girls? The evidence tells us that exposure to these images increases anxiety and shame in adolescent and adult girls and women. The objectification theory states that in a society where women are frequently objectified and seen as objects rather than as women, they begin to self-objectify. They see themselves as objects for other’s viewing pleasures. This leads to women internalizing an outsider’s perspective of their body and what they should be doing with it.…

    • 1715 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Objectifying Women

    • 1199 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Portrayal of Women in the Popular Media. (n.d.). Retrieved June 1, 2012, from World Savvy: http://worldsavvy.org/monitor/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=602&Itemid=1049…

    • 1199 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Synthesis Essay

    • 1771 Words
    • 8 Pages

    Throughout today’s society, media contributes to almost everyone’s daily life. From informative news channels to comical television shows, media proves to be effective in advertisement, releasing messages and informing the audience. Although media proves to be wildly effective in advertising, releasing messages and informing the audience, periodically destructive and misleading messages are provided to the audience and directly influencing women. Cultural critics widely agree that media tends to negatively influence women and all the critics point to research which supports the belief that women are portrayed as subordinate to men, having no self control and having little self confidence in themselves. In addition, the media often identifies women as an object.…

    • 1771 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    Representation of gender in the media has always held a primitive view. Liestbet Van Zoonen concludes in her article Gender Representation and the Media that “gender appears to be an unstable phenomenon only ostensibly pinned down in the dominant discourse of binary and hierarchical gender relations, but in fact continuously escaping categorizations and definition”(1995, pg. 327). Throughout time a plethora of these representations of the female gender in media has changed. Women in today’s society have much…

    • 1214 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays