Judith Butler:

“Our bodies or sex do not define our gendered identities” – We do not have to conform to society’s demands of being masculine or feminine.

“Our gender identities are not fixed objects; they are constituted as a result of our behaviors” – Our identity will change depending on the situation we are in eg. a spending time with family and friends compared to a funeral

“Our genders are culturally rather naturally formed” – Society influences and interacts with the audience which changes people’s behavior.

David Gauntlet:

“Gender is socially constructed” – The way that both genders behaviors change is naturally reoccurring.

“Audiences realise they can change their identities” – They can be whoever they choose to be

“30 second glimpses of who we might become”– Suggests our identity could change overtime

David Gauntlett

“Contemporary media practices mean that heteronormatitvity does not completely dominate” – Heterosexuality doesn’t have full control of modern media.

“Gender is socially constructed” –  As a social construct, gender can vary in different societies and is liable to change over time.

“Audiences realise they can change their identities” – They can be whoever they choose to be and they cannot be held back by society.

“Audiences are active. They control the representations they want to engage with and can actively reject those that do not appeal.” – An active audience will engage and respond to forms of media in different ways and are capable of challenging the ideas within it.

“The media provides a range of products in which a huge diversity of identities is portrayed.” – In society, there are many people who choose to present themselves with a variety of identities.

Judith Butler

“Society constructs a binary view of gender” – A binary view is a social construct made up of two parts that are framed as complete opposites (e.g. male and female).

“Society also presents male/female relationships as the norm” – The world view is that heterosexuality is the normal or preferred sexual orientation.

“Audiences learn how to perform gender via the media.” – The media in today’s society constructs our own gender identity for us.

“Alternatives to the gender binary exist but are presented as subversive.” – Genders other than male and female exist but are seen as disruptive.

“The media reinforces heteronormativity through heteronormative representations” – The current media supports heterosexuality as the norm by only representing heterosexual relationships.

JUDITH BUTLER

Judith Butler discusses many ideas involved with gender representation such as gender fluidity and changeability. She states that gender is a “Social Construct” and that our gender identities aren’t established at birth, childhood or adolescence, but are formed through our consistent performances of gendered behaviour. She has stated that historically, gender has been viewed in a binary fashion – divided into categories based on stereotypes/characteristics that can’t be changed.

• “What it means to be a woman does not remain the same from decade to decade”
• The historical meaning of gender can change as its norms are re-enacted, refused or recreated”

MAYBELLINE

The Maybelline AD appeals to many people due to having a diverse cast of different genders, races and sexualities – this “cast” appeals to more than just straight white women and instead appeals to everybody, whether male or female, black or white, gay or straight. This shows a change in how we view gender and sexuality as just a few decades ago, this AD would never have been aired just because it included a black woman and a gay man. At the time, most if not all models where described as “Tall, white and skinny”, but now models can be anyone.

SCORE

The score AD appeals to straight white men, immediately it is obvious from seeing the male model being held up by women -hinting that he is royalty – that the AD is appealing to patriarchal views of society – where men dominated over women. Furthermore, all of the women in the AD are seen to be staring at and reaching towards the man as if he was a luxury. In addition, whereas the man is fully clothed; the women are wearing little, helping to sexualize them.

Judith Butler

Judith Butler is an American gender theorist who goes by ‘she’ or ‘they’ pronouns and is legally non-binary. Butler states that gender is ‘performative’ and a ‘social construct.’ She believes that our gendered identities aren’t established at birth, nor in childhood or adolescence, but are formed through a continuous performance of gendered behaviour. Butler argues that the dominance of heterosexuality representation in media maintains typical male and female identities as a social norm. She critiques the notion that gender exists inside the body and suggests that these gendered identities are realised through our desires, sexual contacts and physical expressions of love – they are not a fixed object and are created as a result of our behaviours.

Score

The women in the Score advert are young, slim and are wearing sexualised outfits that reinforce the idea of the male gaze. They are carrying a man above their heads on some form of pedestal as though he is a godlike being and are looking and reaching out to the man in awe. The exotic setting also fulfils male fantasies and promotes escapism. The text on the advert, “Get what you’ve always wanted” directly addresses the viewer which makes it more personal and implies that the product will make women attracted to you and fulfil your fantasies.

Maybelline

The Maybelline advert touches on issues of gender representation, ethnicity and lifestyle. Shayla Mitchell and Manny Mua are significant as they are makeup artists, beauty bloggers and brand ambassadors of Maybelline. They therefore act as a form of celebrity endorsement/box office draw, particularly to younger audiences who are likely to know of these influencers, therefore encouraging them to keep watching as it features people, they are interested in. The connotations of gold, the setting of New York and the slow motion sequencing of the mascaras being thrown on to the bed immediately focus our attention on the narrative of two friends having a fun weekend away with luxury and glamour.

Fluidity of Identity – To create identity of society and create specific ideas, where you can change the perspective of how you see the world .

Constructed Identity – Having the ability to change how you see yourself or the world.

Negotiated Identity – Negotiated Identity suggests that we contain a balance of our desires and meeting the expectations of others.

Collective Identity – Gives the impression that everyone belongs somewhere whether its in its own cultural or group.

“the boyband star turned cultural and style juggernaut announced the launch of Pleasing.” – negotiated identity where he is trying to portray the desires of others.

“However, he is adamant that his venture is more than a celebrity endorsement.”

“Pleasing is at odds with outmoded beauty industry ideas about masking and concealment.”

stylized repetition of acts – in other words non verbal communication

repeated performance – butler suggests that gender is forced behaviour or performance for example in my product I got Molly to hold up her hair to make her look like a female.

Fluidity of identity: This is the idea that someone’s identity is changeable to what they want it to be. There’s no fixed expectation for anyone’s identity. For example using male and female, they will not stick to the black and white idea of girl and boy. It’s more for a spectrum that they can go along. Their identity doesn’t necessarily have to match their biology. These are two separate things.

Constructed identity: The idea that we have these ideas of identity presented to us. That they are these fixed ideas that we take on and learn from.

Negotiated identity: There is some tension between this construct of identity in the media and how we present ourselves to the world. So due to this, there are always discussions on

Collective identity: Collective identity is associating with a group or a group associating as something. An example of this is belonging to a certain school a religion. You then get this expected identity associated with those groups that might not even match your personal identity.

1. Gender and identity is represented in many ways in which are communicated by us subconsciously all the time. Depending on your gender and how you wish to be represented, we undertake specific actions physically, verbally and non-verbally to communicate our gender and identity automatically.
2. For example, as a male you could represent your gender by dressing in a more masculine way, having facial hair or even by the way you smell.
3. By doing these different actions, society puts you into these constructed identity groups.
4. Judith counter-types these ideas that of gender representation. She doesn’t believe that certain actions should factor into how your gender is represented, such as why is body building regarded as a male thing to do? She thinks that these stereotypes and identifications are not fixed or definite states.
5. However Judith is implying that there is no “repetitive” acts that can depict who you are, its all a false idea created by humanity because that’s what is normal, however as we move and and as me mature we realise everyone does what they want and people don’t live by what others think or depict of them. Some people are born a gender but then change because they feel that isn’t who they are, and as the days go on, that is more and more publicly accepted by humanity and people will not need to put on a particular front to be a certain way in order to fit in.

Judith at home notes

Judith illustrates and creates the idea that there arennot specific aspects or qualities that make you your supposed gender, gender is a title and has nothing to do with the how you behave. You can choose and change your gender, be yourself and choose what person you want to be and whatever you do will not change who you are and who you identify yourself as. Judith Butler writes to identify and break the idea that genders have stereotypes and specific acts they carry out like football for men, netball for woman, pints for men and wine for women.

Judith Butler: ‘gender as performance’

identity can be a site of contest and revision‘

Butler (2004:19)

In many ways Judith Butler counterpoints earlier ideas of gender representation, for example, some of the ideas presented by Laura Mulvey seem to suggest that gender is fixed – male/female – that it is structured by institutions and those powerful individuals who are able to exert power and control – Weinstein et al. While still recognising those argments presented by Mulvey, Jean Kilbourne, Sut Jhally and others, Butler suggests that gender is fluid, changeable, plural a set of categories to be played out and performed by individual subjects in individual moments in time and space.

Put another, it suggests that we have multiple identities that are performed to different people, in different social settings, under different social conditions. For example, look at categories such as lipstick lesbian, butch and femme, girly girl and so on, which illustrate the multiple, plural nature of identity, representation and performance with feminist critical thinking. Which can be explored and mapped out into similar studies on male identity (again see work by Sinfield, Dollimore and others).

The idea of identity performance is explored further in another post: Representation, Identity & Self. However, to understand the approach of gender as performative is to recognises a ‘phenomenon that is being reproduced all the time‘, which perhaps suggests that ‘nobody is a gender from the start.’ The question for Butler (and for students of media and cultural studies) is therefore: how does gender get established and policed? Which, of course, is why we look at her ideas in subjects like Media Studies.

SCORE- The male in score is placed higher then the females which suggest that the man has more power over the females as he is being held up by them. Also the slogan “get what you always wanted” suggests that men always wanted women to go after them as the male figure in this advert is getting swarmed by females and they are trying to protect him and reach up to him. Also the females in this advert are shown in skimpy outfits which shows off a lot of their skin to show to men who see this advert that they get skinny girls who will show skin off to them.

MAYBELLINE- The advert as a whole is extremely cringy. But with this make up advert they have a male using the product as well and jot just a female which shows a change in society. In the advert they also specify where they are which gives us the idea of how wealthy they could be due to the fact that they are in a big well known expensive city. As well they have the characters all in dull colours to show the switch between before using the product and after using the product.