Sociology Essay Gender in Media

Can we say that men are now ‘objectified’ in visual culture in the same way as women? Make an argument as to why the social/political consequences of ‘objectifying’ images might be different, or that they should be understood as the same, for men and women.

This research essay contends that the frequency and the intensity of ‘objectification’ of women is far greater than that of men, and that this is a cultural hegemonic practice and a keystone of patriarchy. Gender and ‘sexual scripts’ are socially constructed dimensions of identity that are applied to, and form the foundation for, the hierarchy of the sexes. It is understood that representations of men and women in a visual context directly informs gender performance and reflects social values. Masculinity has indeed begun to manifest in advertising in ways that are more similar to the ‘objectified’ female body, with increased nudity and visual markers that indicate sexual receptiveness. However, what is constructed as the male sexuality still reinforces, even shapes, the male heterosexual fantasy: there is no ‘postfeminist’ equalization between the sexes, both men and women are exploited in order to reinforce a status quo that ultimately damages women. The social context of ‘postfeminism’ (Gill 2007) informs the analysis of images in media such that previous generations of feminist criticism are seen as neglecting new age ideals such as female agency, and that new age feminists are ‘reclaiming’ femininity and female sexuality as powerful, or ‘empowering’. The frequency and intensity of the objectification of men has indeed increased since visual media and advertising first became a prominent part of culture, and subsequently a crucial part of sociological analysis. However, it has increased proportionally far less than that of women, and this is quantifiable in surveys of advertising and visual media.