Feminism in Animation

By Jade Read 1034743

Feminism has been around for many years; it goes as far back as the 6^th Century AD.  There is evidence to show that there were Greek women writers who ran all female schools.  Ever since then woman have continued to fight for equality between the sexes. There are many different examples of this such as during the French Revolution where woman tried to say that every woman is born free and has just as many rights as a man does. This was back in the seventeenth century, by the time the eighteenth century came around stricter laws were put in place and were therefore enforced so woman couldn’t even speak of such a subject. North America also had its fair share of Feminist activity; once again this was set in the eighteenth century. This is where a lot of boycotting of British made goods was done, along with black women defending themselves against men when it came to racial stereotyping, which included cultural and social activities as well, along with a general discrimination against woman. The best example of this can be seen when a black feminist named Sojourner Truth stood at the Second Annual Convention of Woman’s Rights in Akron Ohio in 1852. Feminism continued through the Industrial Revolution, the 19^th century, the 1950’s until the 1980’s and finally in the 1900’s.

When it comes to animation it would seem that masculinity rules, whilst the feminine role is left behind in the shadows.  “When it defines man as the enemy, feminism is alienating women from their own bodies.” (Paglia Camille, Vamps and Tramps) However, the real question of this blog is what is Feminism and how does it relate to animation?  Well, this blog piece is going to explain how Feminism has come to be shown in animation over the years. The three films that will be analysed in this blog piece will be the following: The Secret of NIMH, Spirit Stallion of the Cimarron and Who Framed Roger Rabbit. So, the first question that probably comes to your mind is what is Feminism? Feminism is when women feel that they should have the same equal rights as of that of a man. The reason why animation was chosen as the main subject, was due to the writer os this blog have a big passion for the subject. Also, lately it has become more and more noticeable than the previous years, the portrayal of women's looks has drastically changed in animation too.

One famous film has a very good example of how men seen woman as nothing but a sex symbol. Who Framed Roger Rabbit stars a female character named Jessica Rabbit. The famous live action animated film tells the story of Roger, a young cartoon rabbit who suspects his wife Jessica is cheating on him. So he hired a detective named Eddie Valiant to help him find out if this is true. However in the process Marvin Acme is found dead and Roger becomes the main suspect. The audience soon learns that a cartoon character, which later in the film turns out to be the real killer named Judge Doom who is also the man who wishes to make a motorway from the real world that leads to Toontown but in the process wishes to get rid of Toontown, killed Eddy’s brother. 

Jessica Rabbit. Notice the slim appearance and the sterotypical female look.

Jessica is designed to be the stereotype to a man’s perfect woman. Her features show this clearly with her long hair, perfect body, slim and beautiful looking in appearance.  The male gaze is particularly present in one clip in the film, where Jessica enters Eddie’s office.( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAnNvnViJpo) Whilst Jessica speaks, Eddie simply looks over her like he is longing to know her sexually. Eddie even goes as far as to imply that Jessica would pay him in sex, the scene clearly shows that she is meant to be nothing more than a sexual object. “When women's sexuality is imagined to be passive or "dirty," it also means that men's sexuality is automatically positioned as aggressive and right-no matter what form it takes.” (Valenti, Jessica The Purity Myth: How America's Obsession with Virginity is Hurting Young Women) Jessica even mentions that it’s not her fault she looks sexual with her own quote. “I'm not bad. I'm just drawn that way.” (Rabbit, Jessica, Rabbit, Roger 1988, Amblin Entertainment Walt Disney Feature Animation) When watching the film the audience is lead to believe that Jessica is cheating on Roger at the beginning, however later on you learn she is, in her own right, a female hero. An example being when she saves her husband Roger from Judge Doom at the end of the film.  

Spirit and Rain in a "typical" fairytale pose, showing that Spirit is dominant.

The next film that is going to be discussed is Spirit Stallion of the Cimarron. The story is based around a stallion horse that, like his father before him, grows up to be leader of his Cimarron herd. The film mainly focuses around Spirit, who's natural curiosity one day gets the better of him as man enters their land. Spirit is then captured by the men and is forced into a camp where the men try to break him but ultimately fail. This is where Spirit meets another main character of the film named Little Creek who is of the Lakota tribe. Once back at Little Creeks village Spirit’s heart is captured by a young mare named Rain and in the end he earns her trust. The village is then later threatened by the building of a railroad and Spirit is captured, only to escape and ultimately team up with Little Creek as well as saving the mare he loves. This film is a very good example of the typical male heroic story, in the sense of Spirit could be seen as a war hero. 

Spirit's Mother. Take note the typical gentle, caring and motherly look.

The whole film is very masculine and has hardly any female characters. The only two female characters in the film are Rain a young mare who Spirit meets later in the film and Spirit’s mother who is seen early on in the film.  Spirit’s mother shows the stereotypical female role of being a mother; the birthing scene however does not fully show all her rights of being a mother.  The beginning of the film simply shows her being affectionate to her new calf, taking care of Spirit and her watching him without showing much of how she took care of him, after that she is not seen in the film again. “Most importantly, remember that as women liberated from traditional stereotypes, we have the freedom to be as traditional as we please and still communicate the strength and ability of our gender in and out of the home.”- ( Feuerbacher, Haley)  The other female character in the film is a young mare named Rain, who of which Spirit finds himself slowly becoming sexually attracted too. The mare is typically beautiful and has that you have to get me attitude, which Spirit takes and soon gets her attention due to it.  

One scene shows Spirit running away with Little Creek on his back, then Rain comes in to the picture and he stares at her like she is a sexual object and is so lost in her attractiveness that he doesn’t realise the on coming trap. Then later on, there is a scene where Spirit awakens to see Rain out on the field beside the pen, where she is simply grazing. Spirit instead tries to impress her, however Rain herself is not interested and simply ignores him. ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hb7ncLgR2tQ 4:37- 5:09) This can show how the masculine attitude continues throughout the film, as Spirit is looking over Rain with his male gaze.  Finally, there is a scene where Rain is defending Little Creek from Spirit and Spirit simply comments with “Mares.” "The male is a domestic animal which, if treated with firmness...can be trained to do most things." (Jilly Cooper, SCUM (Society For Cutting Up Men, Solanas, Valerie). Which could be him implying that he feels that Rain shouldn’t be near humans and he finds it stupid that she is friends with one. 

Mrs Brisby and her children. An example stereotype of a mother taking care of her children.

Speaking of women being stereotyped for being a mother, there is another animated film that shows this very well. The film is called The Secret of NIMH; the film is about a mouse named Mrs Brisby a young widowed mouse. She is in the process of moving her family out of the field they live in due to it going to be ploughed. However, tragic news strikes the family as her young son Timothy falls ill and so the moving process is stopped.  After hearing the news, Mrs Brisby goes to visit The Great Owl who then advises her to go visit some rats beneath a rosebush. Upon finding the rats, she learns that her husband had been part of rats who were experimented on. The place links with the title of the film and is known as N.I.M.H. The rats agree to help Mrs Brisby move her home, whilst her friend Auntie Shrew takes care of her sick son. However, Mrs Brisby meets a nasty creature known as Jenner who seeks to overthrow the rats by ridding them of their leader Nicodemus. Later, it is learnt that Jenner will go as far as to her hurt Mrs Brisby’s children in the process, this is when the male hero figure of the film Errol Flynn steps in.

Mrs Brisby and The Great Owl Scene. An example of how Mrs Brisby will do whatever she can to help her children.

However, compared with the other films that have been analysed. This film in particular isn’t negative against woman; instead it shows a more positive approach. How you may ask? Mrs Brisby shows a strong motherly instinct, even though she is always saying she wishes her husband were still alive, in a way she is a heroine due to she carries on as a single mother anyway. "The family unit plays a critical role in our society and in the training of the generation to come."  (Connor, O’ Sandra, How the First Woman on the Supreme Court Became Its Most Influential Justice). Also, as the film goes on she faces fear after fear with only one goal and that is to take care of her family. This therefore shows a more positive rather than negative feminine approach and shows that men do not always dominate when it comes to a lead role. Mrs Brisby continues to show this throughout the film with various scenarios, such as rescuing a crow who has a strange meeting with The Great Owl who himself is a frightening character. Also she shows a very heroic side when she drugs Dragon the cat, only to later find out this was how her own husband died. One scene in particular shows her courage, when she is locked away in a cage and escapes only to then help save the other rats. 

The other character that is also present is simply known as Auntie Shrew. She comes across as a bossy, nosey neighbour type character, which once again can give off a typical stereotyping towards woman. That being, that all female neighbours are nosey, however she shows some courage later on by saving Mrs Brisby. So in her own way she is too a hero, along with the fact that she helps spur Mrs Brisby in to action in the first place.

Bibliography

Books

Estelle B. Freedman, EF, 2009. The Purity Myth: How America's Obsession with Virginity Is Hurting Young Women . 2nd ed. New York: Ballantine Books.

Hooks, B H, 2000. Feminism Is for Everybody. 1st ed. London: Pluto Press.

Jessica Valenti, JV, 2009. The Purity Myth: How America's Obsession with Virginity Is Hurting Young Women . 1st ed. New York: Avalon Publishing Group.

O' Connor, SD, 2006. Sandra Day O'Connor: How the First Woman on the Supreme Court Became Its Most Influential Justice. 2nd ed. New York: HarperCollins Publishers.

Websites 

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Feminism in Gaming

Princes Peach and Daisy, the stereotypical 'damsels in distress'

Feminism is a wide and powerful thing. In the words of bell hooks from her book ‘Feminism is for everybody’, she says that 'Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation and oppression'. It changes the course of history, for example the whole ‘Votes for Women’ process back in the 1860s where women protested about their denied rights to vote, thus making them more equal to men. There is also the example of the equal pay protests still running to this day, where women want to earn the same amount of pay for the same amount of work as men in the workplace. The bottom line of it is equality between both sexes.

So, for my blog I wanted to explore into something I enjoy, which is gaming. Like Ellen has stated in her blog on Anime and Manga, ‘The world of Anime and Manga [much like gaming] is a large one, split into many genres and sub-genres, catering to hundreds of different types of people with varying tastes.’ The same can be said when it comes to the gaming community. There is always a game for everyone, be it something as simple as Tetris or as complex as Pokemon (It is a lot more difficult then it seems when you get into the stats of it).

I’ve never really looked at games from a feminist point of view before, so picking a couple was an issue, but I settled with Mario for its stereotypical ‘damsel in distress’ Princess Peach and Tomb Raider, because it’s almost the opposite with a skimpy clothed main character. The reason I picked these two games out of all the other games out there is because of the different types of feminism they both represent, Princess Peach showing the sexist half and Lara Croft emphasising the female hero, her appearance being something of a fan service to men and bringing out the male gaze.

A female night elf 'stripper'

Finally, I want to do a part on online gaming, so I’ve picked World of Warcraft for my example. I chose this because of the constant sexism in the game and the gender issues that go along with it. There is a lot of misogyny in this game, especially when it comes to girls playing it. Sometimes it’s hard for men to comprehend that there is, in fact, a woman playing on the internet.

Mario is a simple platform game where you play a red overall wearing plumber who happens to love a princess. You kill enemies by jumping on them or shooting them with fireballs from an upgrade called a fire flower. That’s the basics of it, there are other ways to kill enemies but that isn’t what this blog is about so I won’t go into it. The whole concept of the game is ‘save the princess from the big mean Bowser’. So just from the get go, there is already chivalry in there, that the princess is a defenceless woman that needs saving by a big strong man. There is also a hint of ‘the gaze’ here, Marios’ desire for the princess spurring him on throughout the land.

Tomb Raider is a game that I don’t know much about, so I had to look up some information on it. Luckily, a blog titled ‘A feminist look at Lara Croft: Tomb Raider’ was on hand to assist me.

"The video game turned movie, Lara Croft Tomb Raider, is filled with things to pick apart from a feminist perspective, yet it has an appeal that cannot be denied because of the power and strength that Lara Croft displays"

Basically it’s about a skimpy clothed woman hunting for artefacts and treasures. She gets into a lot of trouble but always makes it out alive. She’s like a female version of Indiana Jones, except she wears less clothing as shown in the picture below.

Lara Croft in Tomb Raider , note the shorts and overly proportioned boobs that seem to get bigger in every game.

Tomb Raider has also been turned into a movie, but I won’t be elaborating on this because my blog is about the games, not the movies.

Finally, World of Warcraft. It is the world’s largest online MMORPG [Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game] with millions of players joining and paying £8.99 a month to keep their characters going. The game has an in-game chat feature, which, I have experienced myself, does get a lot of sexist remarks. The whole social construct by most players is basically ‘girls do not play games on the internet’ and ‘girls do not exist on the internet’. Being on the receiving end of this a few times I could rant on it forever, but I have two other games to cover so I’ll try to keep my personal remarks to myself.

WoW [The typical abbreviation of World of Warcraft] has an avatar system where you can pick male and female characters, but most of the females you see running around are blood / night elves, and three quarters of the time they’re guys. Most do it to look at the avatars boobs, others do it for the joy of exhibitionism, other people thinking they’re female gets them attention. Part of an interview by socialists investigating BDSM in games such as WoW and Second Life explains a bit of this exhibitionism.

 "Originally, the guy... was talking to me a lot," wrote one man, "but I didn't realize that he was a guy, cause his avatar was a girl... It's a big joke with us really, because his girlfriend/fiancée thought I was hitting on him…"

Ok, back to Mario. The main thing that is noticeable in Mario is the fact that both the protagonist and antagonist are guys, so from the start it’s two men fighting over the princess. Mario goes to great lengths to save the princess’s life, half the time coming up empty handed [Sorry Mario but your princess is in another castle!] but in the end managing to retrieve what he sees as his. Mario really helps with the meaning of the quote ‘Men makes meaning, women bears the meaning’ (I wish I could find the owner of this quote), Mario is the strong man and Peach is the weak woman. Possession is a big thing here, because one would ask themselves if Mario see’s Peach as a life partner or as an object of desire.

Relating this to Tomb Raider, Lara Croft to many gamers is an object of desire. She is their fan service, I have heard many stories of men buying the Tomb Raider games for the simple fact that ‘if you angle the camera properly, you get a nice close up view of her tits’. It is no wonder why Tomb Raider is one of the bestselling games of all time, up there with James Bond (both of them selling 30 million units). I could sit here comparing those two games for ages, but I’ve started on this now and I really don’t want to start again.

Anyway I’ve gone off topic. Peach and Lara are both two sides of a coin, Peach being someone who has to be rescued whilst Lara rescues herself. The male characters in Tomb Raider are all minor, such as her butler, whilst in Mario they are the main characters; Mario, Bowser, Luigi and Toad just to name a few. Van Zoonen said in her book Feminist Media Studies that women are, in media "depicted as wife, mother, daughter, girlfriend; as working in traditionally female jobs (secretary, nurse, receptionist); or as sex-object." and in this case, the woman is depicted as a princess, soon to be wife of a plumber. Dominic Strinati adds to this by saying that "Women are either absent, or represented (and we have to remember that popular culture's concern with women is often devoted entirely to their representation, how they look) by stereotypes based upon sexual attractiveness and the performance of domestic labour.".

He then goes on to say that "Cultural representations of women in the mass media, it is argued, support and perpetuate the prevailing sexual division of labour and orthodox conceptions of femininity and masculinity." This leads me to my final point with the World of Warcraft community. The phrase ‘Get back in the kitchen and make me a sandwich’ attitude that most men have on such games. I did a blog not too long ago on World of Warcraft and how people can loose their identity whilst playing, taking on the forms of others. Well the game also makes you question your identity, especially when boys do not believe you when you tell them you’re a girl. The first thing that is normally demanded by men is pictures, as if you have to ‘prove your womanhood’.

Written here by a female blogger on a popular game critic website called ‘The Escapist’, a World of Warcraft player explains about how she was playing with a group of boys, then revealed she was a girl. She starts off with this in the entry;

"I've been watching and observing the internet for quite some time now. It's like a science project with the usual control and variables. The control is: I am a girl. The variables are the medium through which this fact is expressed. The results all point to the same paradoxical conclusion: I am a girl, but girls do not exist on the internet."

Then later on continues after showing an example of a typical chat on WoW she has had many times, where guys learn she’s a girl then demand pictures, but when she refuses to give said pictures they immediately assume she is a guy pretending to be a girl to get attention.

"I'm a girl, I play games and I exist on the internet. Or so you think. Time after time, I get told I'm not a girl and that I don't exist. It's happened so much that I'm beginning to think that it's true.

So, I spend some time getting to know them. Who are these mysterious creatures called girls if they don't exist on the internet? What does this mean for the men of the internet?"

She ends this introduction after showing another short line of people asking for pictures of her with this, showing her gender confusion after basically being told that she is not a girl. Throughout this entry, she uses the quote ‘girls do not exist on the internet’ a lot to emphasise what she is being told she is.

"It becomes more apparent to me that this is a real issue. Why is it I cannot be a girl if I don't show my picture? As time goes on, I get more confused." "I live in a bubble where the internet does not exist and am invisible in places pertaining to the web. I do not know what PvP is and I've never touched a first person shooter before. Why must I be treated like I am ignorant to gaming and the internet? The answer is simply that girls do not exist on the internet."

To summarise (because according to my word count I’ve been rambling for too long), these three games all show a different version of feminism and sexism. Mario showing it in the way the characters have been created, with a stereotypical princess in peril setting having to be saved, Tomb Raider showing it with a fanservice extremist duel wielding pistols and wearing incredibly short clothing and World of Warcraft, with its sexist male audience and the quote ‘Girls don’t exist on the internet’.

Bibliography

hooks, B., 2000. Feminism is for Everybody. 1st ed. London: Pluto Press.

Strinati, D.S, 2005. An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture. 2nd ed. New York: Routledge.

Zoonen, L.V, 1994. Feminist Media Studies. 1st ed. London: SAGE Publications.

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Feminism and the News Media

By Chris McKenna (u1007729)

Mary Stott, the long-serving editor of the Guardian Women's Page.

When first looking at the news media from a feminist perspective, the thing that initially caught my eye was that while most major newspapers have a specific section for feminist news and comment, the story selection in these can be quite different to the front pages. Specifically, rather than offering a feminist perspective on the day's main news stories, as determined by prominence on the first few pages, they instead almost exclusively stories that prominently feature women. If the front page headline is about a story involving the intersection of two male-dominated walks of life, for example the prime minister meeting senior banking figures, there will be little if any coverage of the story in the feminist sections. More likely featured will be the meeting of a junior female minister with a women's group – the section would be more accurately titled “women's news” rather than labelled as feminism.

To take a specific example of Monday 23^rd April 2012, the top news on The Guardian's website was about Ofcom investigating Sky News about email hacking, and about the record share of the vote gained by the far right in the first round of elections for the French President.

The latter story in particular should offer plenty of scope for feminist comment, building on the work of prominent authors like Amina Mama and bell hooks, looking at the implications for society in general and women in particular. Yet the top stories on the Feminism section are about an explosion in grass-roots feminist activist groups and about how two sisters are fighting the “pinkification” of girls' toys. In The Politics of the Smile: 'Soft News' and the sexualisation of the popular press (in: Carter, C., Branston, G. and Allan, S., 1998, p.18) Patricia Holland writes “[...] the introduction of lightweight features and all types of trivia, including the domestic, as well as a move to a 'softer' more ticklish type of news, has been seen as a feminisation of the new mass-circulation press, brought about by its desire for a broad appeal.” This desire for softer news to attract a female audience, with it's origins in the 1890s (ibid.) when attitudes towards women were very different, is probably the cause – it was the old women's pages which evolved into today's feminist and lifestyle pages – but did they change more than the name?

Searching through the archives even reveals no feminist comment on the role of Rebekah Brooks, editor of the News of the World, in the phone hacking enquiry despite playing a central role by any objective measure. The lack of coverage could stem from several reasons, but the most likely are either that it is too “hard” news for the softer pages intended for a feminine audience, or perhaps it is because it does not paint women in a positive role? While sexism is reducing in the media (Holland, 1991) it is still something that editors and journalists are sensitive to and conscious of, so one must it seems be very careful when criticising women so as not to appear sexist.

Rodgers though offers a different perspective, (c. 2008, in Sarikakis and Shade, p.192-193), putting the blame on the increasing “comodification” of news and the resultant needs of the large corporate entities that own the media outlets to sell advertising. This, she argues, places constraints on journalistic content, mandating against a change to the status quo of “uncontroversial content that does not offend advertisers and draws in revenue” (ibid.).

Looking at this as as man, it seems rather sexist from several perspectives; firstly it is implying that all feminists are women, and that women are not interested in the so-called 'hard news', preferring the softer human stories. It also means that women's issues are disproportionately featured, for the major issues are explored in the paper whether they affect men, women or both; but while the relatively lesser stories regarding and affecting women have a dedicated section in the papers, there is no equivalent for men's issues. This is even though it is well known that the women's and feminist pages are read by many men and have been so for many years (Jeger, L. The Guardian 2002).

Further, while there are increasingly many female journalists covering the majority of a paper's content, indeed there are women in senior editorial positions, the authors of the feminist sections are very nearly 100% female. As Stephen Heath says in Men in Feminism (in Jardine A. & Smith P. 1987, P.9) “Feminism is a subject for women who are, precisely, its subjects [...]. Feminism is also a subject for Men, what it is about obviously concerns them [...].”. Why then is this so unremarked upon?

It seems that exploration of the choice of news stories in feminist and pages of newspapers is almost completely ignored it seems in academic circles - when I started to research this, I was surprised to see that there had been only limited academic discourse on this subject. Why this is so is something that I have not been able to determine, as there is undoubtedly the depth of material available for study. It is however, outside the scope of this blog entry to conduct the required primary research, and it will have to remain as an unanswered question.

What has been explored in the literature though is the wider question of sexism in the news media and relevance women's and feminist sections play and whether they are a good or bad thing in the contemporary world. Lena Jeger notes that even the long-serving editor of the Guardian's Women's Page had doubts about whether it was a marginalisation or emancipation, “It was Mary Stott's background in "real" journalism that led her to think hard when the then Guardian editor Alastair Hetherington asked her to edit the paper's women's page in 1957.” (The Guardian, 2002)

Van Dijk (1995, in Paletez 1995, pp.13-14) argues that the presence of the sections marginalises women and highlights the underlying sexism of the journalistic profession. “Feminist scholarship has extensively shown the prevalence of male chauvinism in the mass media, even today, despite the modest gains in the employment of female journalists [...] and the slow acceptance of some major demands of the women's movement. [...] Most journalists are men and women have even less access to higher editorial positions [than ethnic minorities]. As sources they are less credible [than men], and hence less quoted, and as news actors they are less newsworthy. […] [N]ews content and style continue to contribute to stereotypical attitudes about women. Feminism itself is ignored, problematized [sic], or marginalized. Readers are generally presupposed to be male.”

Patricia Holland, writing in 1991, though was more positive noting that “The women's pages in the national press have provided a space for larger articles by women freelancers. The Guardian women's page, particularly under its long-standing editor, Mary Stott, gained a reputation for broadening the discussion of women's issues in that paper.” (Holland, 1991, p.18) She is also more upbeat about the role of women in the newspapers, “In 1987 Wendy Henry became editor of News of the World. She was the first woman to become editor of a national paper since Mary Howarth in 1903. […] After only a year she moved to edit the rival Sunday paper, the People. At both papers she was succeeded by a woman editor. The days when women were excluded from the newsroom were finally over.” (ibid. p.19)

Even as long as ago as the 1980s there was debate about whether a specific slot on television was needed for women and “Channel 4 continued to argue that there should be no specific commissioning editor for women's programmes.” (ibid. p.42).

Another argument against the separation is provided by Riley (1988, p.16) when she comments that collective identities such as “women” and “lesbian” are impermanent and not fully defining, giving the example that “you do not live your life fully defined as a shop assistant, nor as a Greek Cypriot”. By this theory, there is no single homogeneous group that can be defined by the label “women” or “feminist”, so by including a separate section the editors, who define the structure of the paper, are “othering” (see Mulvey, 1975) those who they seek to include within it.

Rogers essay (c. 2008 in Sarikakis and Shade) though can be used to provide an argument for the value in separation – by having specific, predictable content sections with a defined target audience, advertising space is more saleable and therefore more valuable. This ensures that the feminist views will remain accessible in the mainstream media.

One thing that is clear though is that as we move towards the middle of 2012 the debate about the value and content of such sections is far from over.

(1478 words)

References:

Heath, s. (1986). Men in Feminism. in: Jardine, A. and Smith, P. eds, (1987) Men in Feminism, London: Routledge (p.9)

Holland, P. (c. 1998) The Politics of the Smile: 'Soft News' and the sexualisation of the popular press, in Carter, C., Branston, G. and Allan, S. eds. (1998) News, Gender, and Power, London: Routledge (p.18)

Humm, M. (1995) The Dictionary of Feminist Theory. 2nd edn. Columbus, USA: Ohio State University Press

Jeger, L. (2002). Obituary: Mary Stott. The Guardian [Online], 18 September 2002 16:03 BST. Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2002/sep/18/guardianobituaries.gender [Accessed: 22 April 2012]

Lorber, J. (2005) Gender Inequality. 3^Rd edn. Los Angeles, USA: Roxbury Publishing Company.

Mulvey, L. (1975), 'Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema', Screen 16(3), pp. 6-18, Mark Tribe [Online]. Available at: https://wiki.brown.edu/confluence/display/MarkTribe/Visual+Pleasure+and+Narrative+Cinema (Accessed: 10 April 2009)

Riley, D. (1988) Am I That Name? Feminism and the category of 'Women' in History. Basingstoke: The MacMillan Press.

Rodgers, J. (c.2008) Online News: Setting New Gender Agendas. In Sarikakis, K. and Shade, L. R., eds. (2008), Feminist Interventiosn in International Communication: Minding the Gap.

Van Dijk, T. A., (1995), Power and the News Media (pp.24-25) in D. Paletz (Ed.), (1995), Political Communication and Action. (pp. 9-36). Cresskill, New Jersey, United States: Hampton Press. Available at: http://www.discourses.org/OldArticles/Power%20and%20the%20news%20media.pdf

Anime and Manga - Through The Eyes of a Feminist

Written By Ellen Hoare - u1008677

The world of Anime and Manga is a large one, split into many genres and sub-genres, catering to hundreds of different types of people with varying tastes. With this blog entry I will be diving into this world, viewing it as well as it's fans, through the eyes of a feminist.

I won’t go into detail into what a feminist is and what the typical feminist stands for because I only have a limited word count and there is a lot to discuss. If you need to know the basics as to what a feminist is then click on the link at the bottom of the post or read through the books in my bibliography (The chapter ‘Feminisms’ in ‘Fifty Key Concepts In Gender Studies’ will also come in handy, as it did for me). I will however briefly describe all the genres and sub-genres that I will be talking about for if I didn’t you would be constantly scrolling to the bottom of the post and following links to descriptions, which would be incredibly tedious.

I shall start by explaining that with Anime and Manga there are genres that are synonymous with the typical genres of most films, games, and literature; such as ‘Adventure’ and ‘Fantasy’ there are some genres however that unlike most other things, are gender specific. Manga and Anime also cater to a much larger age range, there are Manga series specifically directed towards older readers (unlike most comics but a lot like un-illustrated literature).

Anime and Manga are rather equal when it comes to gender. The fans gender as well as the gender specific genres is fairly 50/50, making both Anime and Manga rather gender neutral and un-biased in this respect.

One of these aforementioned genres is ‘Josei’, Manga that is aimed at 18 to 30 year old women. The subject matter is usually much more realistic compared to ‘Shoujo’ Manga, tackling everyday issues or having a more believable supernatural feel. There is also a genre that follows the same style called ‘Seinen’, but this one is aimed at an older male audience.

‘Shoujo’ Manga is a genre that has a young female target audience. These usually have some form of romance and can be rather idealistic. There is also a male version of this genre called ‘Shonen’, but these usually focus more on fighting and adventure instead of romance and ‘slice-of-life’ topics.

‘Gender Bender’ is a rather popular sub-genre in Manga and Anime that appeals to both genders. The plotlines usually follow a girl dressing up as a boy, being magically turned into the opposite sex, getting body swapped into someone of the other sex etc. this goes both ways, so there are also stories about boys dressing etc, as girls. Gender bending is also rather popular with fans of various Manga and Anime series, this is because usually female Cosplayers like male characters better or there aren’t any female characters that are appealing to the female fans.

Haruhi from 'Ouran High School Host Club' - an example of the 'Gender-Bending' genre and of a decent female character.

Fan fiction is basically stories about characters and universes in TV shows, Anime, Manga, books etc. written by fans. These stories usually involve some kind of romance between characters that isn’t in the original story, and most of the time is a ‘Yaoi’ (gay) or ‘Yuri’ (lesbian) pairing. In chapter 2 of ‘Fags, Hags and Queer Sisters’ Maddison discusses research and theories into Slash fan fiction. The subject matter is mainly based on various ‘Star Trek’ series, but can easily be transferred onto the copious amount of fan fiction written for anime and manga series. Maddison mentions how this first started mainly with women writing gay pairings but ended up evolving over time to include male and female authors (both gay and straight) as well as including gay, straight and lesbian pairings. Maddison goes on to discuss that perhaps fans write these stories to fulfill some need to dominate by taking on a male role or by putting men in their place by depicting a “stud-like character on his back being f*cked by his superior officer or bent over a knee begging to be punished.” (While talking about Britta Matthews ‘Star Trek’ fan fiction ‘The Taming Of Tom Paris’) it could also be said for female cosplayers dressing as male characters; perhaps they are subconsciously trying to embody a more masculine persona?

Touru from 'Fruits Basket' - an example of a rather bland female character.

Van Zoonen summarized that when women are shown in mass media they are usually “depicted as wife, mother, daughter, girlfriend; as working in traditionally female jobs (secretary, nurse, receptionist); or as sex-object. Moreover, they are usually young and beautiful, but not very well educated.” This is true for most female characters depicted in both Anime and Manga with female characters usually falling into a certain character template. This gets me to the point of character stereotypes. Usually when there is a female character in a Manga, she can be annoying, down right useless, or just there for the male characters to fight over. This typical female character will complain about lots of things or be cute and obnoxiously happy all of the time for no reason. Another problem with women portrayed in Manga and Anime is that female characters can sometimes be too bland and dull. A reason for having such a bland character is usually so the reader can associate with her and imagine themselves in her shoes. These characters are usually the main character in a ‘Shoujo’ series. A perfect example of the doormat-style, bland female main character is Torou Honda from ‘Fruits Basket’. She is a lovely girl who is humble and sweet and caring and only wants the best of everyone. This character template happens a lot in ‘Reverse Harem’ styled series. An example of a rather good reverse harem female main character is Haruhi Fujioka from ‘Ouran High School Host Club’. Although this is also a gender bender series (she dresses like a boy just because she can, not because she feels this is the only way to be equal or anything) this character doesn’t really care about the line of boys wanting to date her and she has strong morals, not being easily swayed and being independent instead of having to be rescued or looked after.

Saiko from 'Highschool Of The Dead' This is a screenshot from the opening of the Anime and an example of fan service.

Fan service comes up a lot in Anime and Manga, it is basically non-explicit boob shots or panty shots (meaning you would see the female characters panties or see her cleavage) this is purely to entertain the audience and usually has nothing to do with the plot. An instance of this is the Anime ‘High School Of The Dead’, where the female characters are knocked about when fighting the undead (causing their boobs to giggle or their skirts to fly up, showing their panties) there is a communal female shower scene where they are all bathing together and having a water fight, and there is also several scenes where the female characters are half naked (fighting zombies in their underwear or sleeping nude), or a splash of water turns a girls uniform see-through. Camera angles are also used for fan service (like the camera being positioned so that you can see down a girl’s top or up a skirt). There is also fan service for women, which usually consists of male characters becoming shirtless or put in compromising positions (like falling onto another character).

Although fan service is mainly targeted towards a male audience, there is more ‘Yaoi’ than there is ‘Yuri’, some Manga authors riddle their works with fan service. One of these works is Yana Toboso’s ‘Kuroshitsuji’ about a young Victorian earl enlisting the help of a demon butler to help him get revenge on the people who killed his parents. This Manga is riddled with fan service and ‘Shotacon’, and is mainly for female entertainment.

This takes me on to ‘Hentai’, ‘Lolicon’ and ‘Shotacon’. ‘Hentai’ is a genre of Anime and Manga that focuses on adult sexual content. ‘Shotacon’ is a genre that focuses on sexual acts with young boys, whereas ‘Lolicon’ focuses on sexual acts with young girls. These are all legal and readily available in Japan (because no children where involved in any of the acts because it is all either drawn or animated.) Jane Pilcher And Imelda Whelehan write about how second wave feminism thought that pornographic images would “affect men’s behavior towards women, so that they are likely to treat them as merely decorative objects.” This can be seen as true with ‘Hentai’ Anime because in various scenarios women are seen as nothing more than something for a man (or monster) to have it’s way with. This can also be seen in the other genres of Anime and Manga, where the female character is nothing but a pretty thing to look at. There is a benefit for these genres however, as according to several surveys, having these pornographic paraphernalia so readily available to the public has lowered sexual crimes, not just in Japan but in other countries too.

In conclusion, both Anime and Manga seem to be equal with its gender specific genres and with its fan base. The way women are portrayed however is biased and would probably piss a lot of hard-core feminists off, but I believe it is just part of the Anime and Manga culture and it isn’t meant to offend anyone or put women in their place, it is just either harmless fun or rather lazy character writing as the male characters can also fall into rather boring character templates.

A more in depth and specific look at gender roles in anime and manga is ‘Gender and Gender Relations In Anime And Manga’ by Eri Izawa, which can be read online at: www.mit.edu/~rei/manga-gender.html

Bibliography

~Dominic Strinati. (1995), An introduction to theories of popular culture 2nd ed., London: Routledge Ltd.

~Jane Pilcher And Imelda Whelehan. (2004), Fifty key concepts in gender studies, London: Sage.

~John Armitage, Joanne Roberts, Editors. (2002), Living with Cyberspace: Technology & Society in the 21st Century, Cornwall: Continuum.

~Manick, (July 20th, 2004) MangaUpdates, http://www.mangaupdates.com, 3rd April 2012

~Stephen Maddison. (2000), Fags, Hags and Queer Sisters. Gender Dissent and Heterosocial Bonds in Gay Culture, London: Macmillan Press Ltd.

~Susan J. Napier. (2000), Anime from Akira to Princess Mononoke : experiencing contemporary Japanese animation, New York: Palgrave.

~Timothy Perper And Martha Cornog, Editors.. (2011), Mangatopia: Essays on Manga and Anime in the Modern World : Essays on Manga and Anime in the Modern World, USA: Greenwood.

~http://www.advancedanime.com/displayimage.php?pid=350562

~http://esciencenews.com/articles/2010/11/30/legalizing.child.pornography.linked.lower.rates.child.sex.abuse

~ http://www.fanpop.com/spots/fruits-basket/images/11876571/title/tohru-honda-photo

~ http://www.flickr.com/photos/23397962@N02/2442752253/

~ http://www.listal.com/viewimage/2536053

~www.mit.edu/~rei/manga-gender.html

~www.onemanga.com

The Gender Spectrum in Media

Written by Michael Bassick U1011473

Introduction. 

This blog post will be looking at the catalogue advert for the Mega push up bra featuring Andrej Pejic, An androgynous model, who is biologically male but has a feminine look.  I will be looking at this with a feminist perspective and discussing gender theory in particular.

FIG. 1, Daan, W. (2011) Mega push-up Bra [online] Available at: http://andrejpejicpage.tumblr.com/post/14159120248/andrej-pejic-for-hema-mega-push-up-bra (Accessed: 1 March 2012).

  

The Image above FIG. 1 (Daan, 2011) shows the model Andrej Pejic posing for an advert to promote the mega push up bra. The Advert caused some controversies as some people reacted negatively.

One of the strongest negative reactions came from a tabloid article titled ‘Fashion's ultimate insult to women: The latest way of demeaning real women is a male model dressed as a girl’ written by Amanda Platell. (Platell, 2011) The web link below leads to the article.

Platell, A (2011) ‘Fashion's ultimate insult to women: The latest way of demeaning real women is a male model dressed as a girl’ mail online, 25 February  [online] available at: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1360460/Andrej-Pejic-Fashions-ultimate-insult-women-man-dresses-woman.html (accessed: 1 march 2012).

Platell argues points in a way that feels like they have meaning to them but if you examining them closely they read likes mindless, driveling hate speech espoused by the like of social conservatives in America such as Rush Limbaugh and Pat Robinson who’s rhetoric consists of puritanical moralism.  The article was most likely written to get people's attention and to sell more newspapers as the article's points are invalidate and idiotic at best but the article does express sentiments that are held within certain segments of society.

This concept of Gender performance, Gender play or Gender Change, in this particular case to have a male represent a female role or feminine role, has existed through out history. There were biological males who were eunuchs; due to their status they occupied a unique position in the gender spectrum not being male, female or androgynous. Their roles were normally interchangeable from masculine to feminine.  These individuals existed During the Mesopotamia and also with ancient Mayan culture. Gender play can also clearly be seen during the time of the ancient Greeks with their myths of gender switching god and goddess. The Galli priests, in ancient Rome, who worshiped the Goddess Cybele, would castrate and beautify themselves to look feminine as a way to express their faith to their god. Moving forward to modern times towards the late 20^th century, gender performance becomes more popular in media with such films like the Naked Civil Servant (1975), where the main protagonist who is male takes on a more feminine role for the film. Another film, that also deals with this is The Crying Game (1992), that featured a male androgynous actor called Jaye Davidson who for the purpose of the film played an individual pretending to be a female. This relates to the mega push up bra advert (FIG, 1) as it’s a performance to illustrate the characters Gender role in the film. All these examples show that gender isn’t entirely biologically mutable and come into a wider variety of gender expression and social conformity. The study of this is called Gender Theory.

The tenets of gender theory are that gender is a social construction and is a performance by individuals that are assigned male or female at birth by their biological genitalia.  From that point they are also assigned gender roles, which restricts their expression of their behavior to comfort to what society deems acceptable for male and female roles e.g. girls playing with dolls and boys playing with toy cars.

Judith Butler (1999), foremost expert on gender theory, outlines some of the dynamics of Gender Theory in her book Gender trouble (1999) when she wrote

The performance of drag plays upon the distinction between the anatomy of the performer and the gender that is being performed. But we are actually in the presence of three contingent dimensions of significant corporeality: anatomical sex, gender identity, and gender performance. If the anatomy of the performer is already distinct from the gender performer, and both of those are distinct from the gender of the performance, then the performance suggests a dissonance not only between sex and performance, but sex and gender, and gender and performance. As much as drag creates a unified picture of “woman” (what its critics often oppose), it also reveals the distinctiveness of these aspects of gendered experience, which are falsely naturalized as unity through the regulatory fiction of heterosexual coherence. In imitating gender, drag implicitly reveals the imitative structure of gender itself-as well as its contingency. (Butler, 1999, p.175)

What Butler is saying here and how it applies to FIG. 1 (Daan, 2011) above is that there are 3 perspective of gender at play, ones gender identity ones anatomical sex and ones gender performance.This concept separates biological sex and gender. In the case of the advert above the model ‘Andrej Pejic’ is genetically and anatomically male but Identifies as an androgynous individual but for the purposes of this advert the model is performing a role of a women to promote the product. This can be seen as gender play similar to the Actor Jaye Davidson in the film the crying game (1992).  Andrej Pejic is using his feminine features in addition with the cosmetics and female clothing to create the achieved feminine appearance for the advert.

One of the goals of this advert is to demonstrate the effectiveness of the bra and in many ways it has achieved this by simply using a male model over a female model it can show how a piece of clothing has efficiently given the androgynous male model the figure of the woman. So if it can make a male look as though he has breasts then for a woman it should produce a better affect. Further more this may also attract a new audience for the product with male transvestites from this advert.  

The advert itself doesn’t actually show the bra but only the effect it has under clothing, as the model wouldn’t have the conventional body to advertise the bra in a traditional way. This is shown in FIG. 2 (below) with model Andrej Pejic posing topless.

FIG. 2, Lohr, T (date unknown), i – D [online], Available at: http://thomaslohr.com/site/?page_id=155 (accessed: 20^th April 2012)

The image below (FIG, 3) illustrates a typical bra advertisement from the clothing line George.

 FIG. 3, George style (2010) Entice Glam spot padded bra [advertisement]. Available at: http://georgestyle.george.com/2010/11/28/a-lingerie-buying-guide-for-your-man (Accessed: 20 April 2012)

The Differences in execution for the advertisements are very apparent when compared. The product of the bra is presented more directly in FIG, 3 with the model wearing nothing but the bra in the picture.

Chafetz, J. (1978) says “It should be clear that when the terms  “masculine” and “feminine” are used, it is assumed that the characteristics in question are socially prescribed and individually learned, and hence changeable, phenomena; they are not innate to the organism.” (Chafetz, J. 1978, p. 4). This quotes from Chafetz explains that the concepts of masculinity and femininity are just societal constructions that individual adopt as part of their gender role. This in forces the principles of Genders theory and is also demonstrated in FIG. 1 with the pose the model (Pejic) has chosen. The body language are timid yet inviting to the viewer and the way the model has placed his arms forwards slightly inwards towards his chest to amplify the effect of the bra. This shows a desire to reach a feminine appearance for the Advert.

So it can be seen through out history in modern day cultures that the traits of Gender theory are present and this idea of gender being a social construction has some weight to it.

Now looking into the cracks of the theory and acknowledging them brings a few issue to look at such as although the theory is based on studies a lot of the theory chooses to ignore or overlook the possibility of biological roots in the gender scheme of things. 

Steven Pinker, an advocate of evolutionary psychology, speaks about free will in a video from YouTube.com  (Bigthink, 2011).  . He speaks about how the brain is wired and controls our choices based on options given.  Pinker says, “ … Our behaviours are the product of physical processes in the brains.” (Bigthink, 2011).  With this quote you could argue that the way we feel, act and think are down to our biology because at our most basic we are chemical based creatures who react to the world through our senses and the processes the brain makes.  This could infer that how someone chooses to act feminine or masculine or, in the case of transsexuals, wanting to become the opposite sex isn’t always a part of social construction but may be deeper rooted in our biology with the way your brain and body chemicals are telling you how you feel you are or should be in terms of your gender identity, gender role and anatomical sex.

Christina Hoff Sommers wrote In the book ‘The War Against boys’, explaining the ideas of Dr Nancy Marshall, saying “According to Marshall, A child’s sexual Identity is Learned by observing others.” (Sommers, 2000)

This Idea isn’t 100% fact that should be noted. Although an individual who is born and grows up should be affected by their environment that they’re raised in along with social and cultural principles that are embedded in that environment.  But placing a set of these conventions of gender on the individual and saying that the individual will conform even if the gender roles/ performance, gender identity and anatomical sex do not match any innate biological gender behaviours of the subject is presumptuous to degree.

Colapinto, J (2004), in his online article, outlines the Case of David Reimer, an individual who was born a biological boy in 1965, with his twin brother. But Reimer suffered a serious accident at the hand of the medical practitioner during a circumcision at 8 months old, which mutilated his penis beyond repair.  His parents, who were distraught over the matter and not sure what to do, were eventually referred to Dr John Money, one of the worlds leading experts in gender Identity at the time. He put the ideas forward that Reimer parents could raise David as a girl and to give him a surgical sex change. Dr Money’s ideas were that this would solve the issues as he grows up he would identify as girl and the rest would fall into place.

Dr Money claimed that everything was a success and David now called Brenda was happy as a girl.  The unfortunate truth is that Brenda suffered many problems with adapting to female life as Colapinto (2004) explains

At age 2, Brenda angrily tore off her dresses. She refused to play with dolls and would beat up her brother and seize his toy cars and guns. In school, she was relentlessly teased for her masculine gait, tastes, and behaviors. She complained to her parents and teachers that she felt like a boy; the adults—on Dr. Money's strict orders of secrecy—insisted that she was only going through a phase. (Colapinto 2004)

It’s with this we can identify that the individual (David Reimer) wasn’t accepting the social conventions place upon him. It was later at the age of 14 that David was eventually told the truth about his biology from his parents. Colapinto, J (2004) quotes David Reimer saying "Suddenly it all made sense why I felt the way I did. I wasn't some sort of weirdo. I wasn't crazy." With this quote we can gather that the individual had underlining feelings that he belonged in another gender binary other then one he was placed in.  This harkens back to the point raised earlier about who or what we are could be deeper rooted in our biology. 

A quote from Bornstein, K (1995) from her book ‘Gender Outlaw’ expresses her thoughts as a transsexual woman on gender identity.  Bornstein writes

Gender Identity answers the questions, “who am I?” Am I a man or a woman or a what? It’s a decision made by nearly every individual, and it’s subject to any influence: peer pressure, advertising, drugs, cultural definitions of gender, whatever.  (Bornstein, 1995, p. 24)

With this quote the principle is established explaining what gender identity is and how it is developed. Bornstien (1995, p. 24) goes on to explain that, as a transsexual woman, she does not feel like a woman as she will never know how a biological female truly feels to be a woman but she does explain that she was certain she did not feel like a boy or man through the absence of feeling connected to these gender groups and this convinced her to transition from male to female.

What this demonstrates is the wider scale of gender. That Gender Identity does not just fall into the two main categories of male and female but there exist another alternative or alternatives to these. Andrej Pejic (model from FIG. 1) chooses to be recognised as androgynous for their Gender Identity. This term of using androgyny as gender identifier is being used in many other places for example a YouTube channel and Facebook, called Androgentics, operated by 5 individuals who all differ on their gender performance but also consider themselves androgynous with their Gender Identities. The links below is to one of its members individual channel videos.

TheMetallicSharpie (2011) True Life: I'm a Jeffree Star Wannabe.  Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrW9TlvSZkk&context=C41c42d3ADvjVQa1PpcFP3Qc8Cav4N5ceMllhubRfCe5ghEDrYcqE=  (Accessed: 14^th April 2012)

This just shows that the concepts of a wider spectrum to gender is present and that gender can act more fluid rather than conforming to one or the other (male or female).

In conclusion although gender theory is correct in areas to state that certain behaviours by the sexes are indeed social constructions.  It is indeed however wrong to assert the extreme, that all gender attributes and behaviours are nothing but social constructions. It is thus made clear that the assertion by proponents of gender theory such as Judith butler who argue that gender is nothing but performativity and is based on socio-cultural constructions. This is only a partial truth and it is shown in the case of David Reimer that certain gender behaviours may have innate biologic roots that go deeper and beyond socio-culture idioms. It can also be seen that there is a possibility to more than just the socially accepted male and female gender binaries. With Gender Theory it’s clear that the biological root notions can be incorporated into the theory to better understand the individual over the generalized Groups.

Bibliography 

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