Cinderella portrayal of genders:

Women:

• Cold
• Cruel
• Bitter
• Jealous
• Vein
• Servent (Cinderella - gentle, kind)
• Evil - with cat sidekick
• Rude
• Demanding
• Ugly
• Step mother - always shown in dark lighting 
• Cinderella - beautiful, voice of an angel, unappealing clothes, emotional 
• Cinderella - falls into a heap on the floor & tries to run away
• Step sisters - dumb, terrible singing voices, colourful clothing
• Fairy godmother
• Kind
•  Magical
• Mentor
• Helpful
• Thief
• Weak
• Importance on clothing "Good heavens dear...you can't go in that." - Cinderella (45:16)
• Desperate - all the women in the town dressed up to dance with the Prince for him to chose one of them based purely on looks and their ability to dance which he will then go MARRY. + everyone tries to make the duke believe it's their slipper. 
• Clumsy - step sisters & by leaving her shoe
• "Foolish" - Step mother about Cinderella 
• Happy - Cinderella 
• Marriage is the most important thing in someone's life.

Men:    

• Kind
• Devoted Father
• Emotional - King 
• Angry 
• Father insists his son marries - social conventions of the time  
• Romantic 
• Cinderella & the prince - only speak 13 lines to each other before "falling in love"
• Generous 
• Aggressive - King goes blue in the face when things don't go his way (53 minutes)

14/8/15

When watching The Bachelor everything that we have learnt about so far this term helped when analysing it. Before if I were to watch the mind numbing show I wouldn't of seen all the different ways women and men are portrayed whether that be good or bad. I find the show quite pointless and it just pits women against each other for ratings as others, prodomentley females will watch it just to judge. It was interesting to analysis but I do not plan on watching another episode.

The Bachelor

How the women are portrayed:

• Desperate 
• Intelligent but portrayed as dumb
• Thrive off drama
• Only showing the "bitchy" moments 
• Positioning everyone to see it in a certain way - sorry for them 
• Set up to get people to fight - manipulating the characters 
• Female audience judging:
• Girls believe it's ok to compete over a guy
• Ok to take away a guy from another girl 
• Saying what not to do
• Let guys go around and take out heaps of girls - reinforcing steretypes
•  Sam is the good guy 
• If he was decent he wouldn't make all the girls go through heartache 
• Only the good moments are shown 
• Sam is great because he is the prize 
• Place so much emphasis on the girls bring bad not him
• Sam is a prize - it's a game
• Always the women's fault 
• Beautiful 
• Girls are playing detective - gossiping, backstabbing 

Focus on one female in familiar - personality, demeanour, itellegnt, emotional

Heather:

• Confident
• Outspoken
• Not afraid to speak up
• Cheeky with sam
• Shyly affectionate 
• Not wanting to show her emotions even though she likes him
• Possessive over Sam - shows when she is with him 
• Completely different when she is with the girls
• Opinons are more guarded
• All the girls were jealous because she had the white rose
• Sam wanted to go on a date 

Beauty & the Beast portrayal of genders:

Women:

• Old, beggar women - ugly 
• Beauty is found within - don't be deceived by appearances  
• Beautiful 
• Smart - reads 
• Expected not to value books and to be more interested in men 
• Ambitious 
• Women collapse and cry when things get tough 
• Emotional 
• Modest 
• Unable to follow simple instructions 
• Weak
• Domestic - takes care of the beast 

Men:

• Attractive, young prince
• Conceited 
• Prince talks down to Belle saying "How do you read this? there is no pictures." 
• Narcissistic 
• Old men are clumsy and crazy 
• Rude
• Men in control - plans wedding assuming she will say yes
• Only have children that are boys 
• Dominant 
• Agressive 
• "No one says no to Gaston" 
• Strong 
• If you're old, you're crazy 
• Impatient 
• Deep down emotional but refuses to show it 
• Violant 
• Charming 
• Messy 
• Compassionate 
• If you're old - you're ultimately crazy 

Both:

• Different seen as bad
• Belle drawn a lot smaller to the prince and the beast - symbolise his dominance 

Challenging Representations:

Snow White:

• What might a female character do that is different from the original? 
• Instead of working in the house she could get a real job like the dwarfs.
• Kill the Queen a lot earlier on in the story. 
• Not say yes to the prince's proposal because she doesn't know him - stand as a person by herself without a male counterpart. 
• She was portrayed as dumb when she was poisoned 3 times by the witch and had to be saved by the dwarfs the first 2 times and then eventually saved by the prince at the end - women can not save themselves. 
• Identify a situation in which she speaks. What might she say?
• Snow White hardly speaks throughout the fairytale, when she does I think she said hello to the dwarfs or says yes to witch for the poisonous goods. 
• Young children are the ones who will be watching these fairytales and it depicts women in a way that shows they are to be seen and not heard - this will result in girls thinking that should not speak up and boys to think they're in control and dominant. From a young age these stereotypes are drilled into young children through fairytales and other media they are exposed to. 
• When challenging the stereotypes she would say no to the witch when she was offering her strange objects or try and trick the Queen when she comes to visit next time. 
• "I don't need to get married yet, especially to someone I don't know." 
• What might she be rewarded for?
• Intelligence 
• Ability to do things
• Her personality 
• Cooking & cleaning even though she didn't need to
• What qualities would be valued in women? 
• Intelligence 
• Ability to do things
• Her personality
• Courage
• Strength
• Intuition 
• White 
• Bravery
• Kindness
• Assertive 
• Give them a voice
• What might she be punished for?
• Within the fairytale she would be punished by society for being intelligent and utilising it. Also, having a personality and speaking would cause a problem because women aren't supposed to have character depth or depth at all.

3/8/15

I am really enjoying this unit of work, I find it interesting to see the general stereotypes in today's society with celebrities, politicians and day-to-day people and how they are also portrayed in Disney films. I am looking forward to working on the assignment and excited to see what I can come up with. My favourite part of this unit is discussing as a class and seeing people's different views on the topics. Even though women are unrepresented in the media it is interesting to see how men men are represented as you can see the media doesn't just misrepresent women but both sexes. I loved watching the documentary as I am interested with how the politicians were represented compared to the men who are doing the exact same job as them. This until so far has definitely made me look at media stereotypes in a different way and I look forward to the rest of this term.

Disney Stereotypes

• You should change who you are for your love interest (The Little Mermaid)
• Men are hopeless and need women to take care of them (Snow White)
• Outward beauty is what makes you special & important - majority of Disney films
• Being white & thin is what makes you valuable (everything before Mulan)
• Weight determines your temperament (Beauty & The Beast)
• Women have to be strong and gentle (Pocahontas)
• Men are saviours - every film
• Being masculine means you are attractive and buff
• A women's appearance is valued more than her intellect 
• Women are helpless and need men to protect them
• Women are domestic and need to marry
• Overweight women are ugly, unpleasant and not worthy of marriage 
• Only one body type on women unless depicted as evil or rude