Lack of plurality in media representation leads to the concept of otherness, which divides people into “us” and “them” and is typically used to refer to all groups of people outside of mainstream representations that tend to communicate the norm (Zevallos, 2011). Occasionally, media creators have been criticised for producing singular representations and excluding some groups of people for profit purposes, namely minorities, because it creates an unbalanced reality. Although, social movements and increasing attention to equality issues have pressured media industries, it is still a common problem of repeating conventions and promoting stereotypes to reduce the risk on financial side.
Television is one of the most powerful media, however it is not publicly revealed that majority of TV channels are owned by a small number of conglomerates that seek to be vertically and horizontally integrated to gain as much profit as possible. Given that businesses’ main objective is to maximise financial gain, it is amongst the facts that recreating a successful product is financially safer than launching a new one, so it is due to their benefit that they don’t usually innovate, preferring to reproduce successful shows. As outlined by Hesmondhalgh it reduces creativity when media companies choose to minimise risks and maximise audiences in order to gain financially, because once the product is made, reproducing it is associated with significantly less costs (2019, p. 34). An example of such media product recreation can be 26 seasons of the Bachelor.
Similarly, the film industry threatens diversity following the same patterns. Many mediums still tend to follow hegemonic representations, excluding or downgrading minoritiesю. As suggested by the four stages of minority portrayals, the recognition of minorities follows the order of stages with the first of non-recognition, second of ridicule, following by the third stage of regulation, and concluding with the final stage of respect (Clark, 1969, In. Sanborn & Jackson Harris, 2019). However, it is difficult to achieve the last stage, so producers rarely choose to represent minorities equally. At the same time, Bridgerton tries to bring equal representations, yet it results into social resonance after the portrayal of black queen and general discrepancy to historic evidence. This was, producers might have wanted to appeal to audiencias through the diverse cast, but it was still criticised.
Another example of stereotyping in media is video games. Many children are exposed to violent games; however, violence is not the only problem. Extreme female stereotyping is present in the majority of the games. While men characters are typically fully covered, female characters are either sexually objectified with as little clothing as censorship allows or presented as damsel in distress, which is a very common way to stereotype women in media. Similarly, there is an existent binary of women characters, a whore and a virgin, sexually objectified as opposed to sexually purified character, suggests that there are just two options for women (DeMarchi, 2014, p. 48).
To conclude, repeating conventions is a safe strategy against innovations that allows company to take less risk, while getting more profit. The vast majority of media companies operate for profit, which means that their main objective is to create media products that will sell; therefore, it is in their interest to use already existent strategies, which commonly result in stereotyping. Although, many acknowledge that stereotyping is unhealthy for society, as long as the product is successful, it is not in company’s interest to change their strategy.
References
Zevallos, Z. (2011). What is Otherness? The Other Sociologist. Retrieved April 28, 2022, from https://othersociologist.com/otherness-resources/
Sanborn, F. and Harris, R. J. (2019) A Cognitive Psychology of Mass Communication. 7th edn. Taylor and Francis. https://www.perlego.com/book/1517398/a-cognitive-psychology-of-mass-communication-pdf
Hesmondhalgh, D. (2019). The cultural industries. SAGE Publications Ltd. https://books.google.ru/books?hl=en&lr=&id=dwJ6DwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=hesmondhalgh+cultural+industries&ots=oJbvVWFxtc&sig=bAzVWH4n7UkjsfmxjWRJNZwHZ3c&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=hesmondhalgh%20cultural%20industries&f=false
DeMarchi, M. L. (2014). Avenging women: an analysis of postfeminist female representation in the cinematic Mar- vel’s Avengers series (Publication No. 167) [Master’s thesis, DePaul University]. College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences Theses and Dissertations. https://via.library.depaul.edu/etd/167
I believe the subject matter you've chosen is crucial. You've done an excellent job of laying out the media's portrayal of minorities and the prevalence of stereotypes. which has been talked about a lot in the movie industry.
ReplyDeleteOnce again, you've broken it down into manageable chunks so that it can be explained in a clear and concise manner. What I've learned so far has convinced me that this is a fascinating subject. What's missing, in my opinion, are any visuals or videos. In order to make it easier for readers to understand and to make your post look better, you could have included images, which would have made your post look more appealing.
This is such a great topic to explore. I enjoyed reading your blog and finding out more about the perpetuation of stereotypes. I agree with the previous post about how well you break down the topic in a great way that is easy to understand and follow without too much prior knowledge. The four stages of minority portrayal was a fascinating topic that I had not heard of before. Great work on the blog!
ReplyDeleteYou debunk a topic that is often overlooked in the present age. The homogeneity in approach to the presentation of the minorities is in fact a subject I cover in my blog as well, however you look at the issue at a bigger retrospective, including a diverse selection of media, which uncovers the true magnitude of the problem at present.
ReplyDeleteHello Lisa!
ReplyDeleteAt first, I have to say that I really enjoyed reading through your blog, it is a great topic to present. The thing I liked the most was the mention of stereotyping in video games. I wanted to write blog about video games at first, so I was really glad you made a mention here about that, and it is very true that in the video games, females are being portrayed way different than males (as a video games player, I know that from my own experiences :D ). What I would like to add to that specific area is that in most video games I have played, the main character that you played with was usually a man aswell, but it is changing nowadays as many game developers let you choose to play with either of them, and they also let you create your own looks and stuff, but that is not in every game and the majority of the games that has already strict main character will be male mostly.
I also loved the post about the TikTok, I have younger sister and we were talking about this "that girl" trend, as I was trying to tell her that she shouldn't believe everything she sees there and that it is not that ideal as it looks.
Great work!
That is a very good topic to explore, and that is very interesting that you looked at the problem from the business position. You explained everything very well and your examples are very understandable, so everyone could be involved in this problem through your blog. Stereotypes are a very current topic, especially from a gender perspective.
ReplyDelete