FEMINISM AND THE MASS MEDIA

Prepared by: Emmanuel J. Bacud

I.) FEMINISM IN PERSPECTIVE

Source: J. Pilcher & I. Whelehan (2004), Fifty Key Concepts in Gender Studies
A.) ANDROCENTRISM
Androcentrism means a doctrine of male-centeredness. This term was derived from the Greek vocabulary.
Androcentric practices are those whereby the experiences of men are assumed to be generalizable, and are
seen to provide the objective criteria through which womens experiences can be organized and evaluated.
Some writers, particularly those influenced by psychoanalytical theory, prefer the terms phallocentrism or
phallocentric,
in order to draw attention to the way the penis (or phallus) acts as the symbolic representation of malecentredness. A related concept is that of phallogocentrism. Deriving from the work of Derrida and Lacan, this
term describes those ideas centred around language or words (logos) that are masculine in style. Postmodern
feminist writers such as Cixous argue that phallogocentric language is that which rationalizes, organizes and
compartmentalizes experience and it is on this basis that terms ending in ism (e.g. feminism) may be
rejected (Brennan 1989; Tong 1998).
A classic example of feminist work in response to the androcentricity of academic theories and research
is provided by Carol Gilligan (1982). Gilligans work engages with psychological theories of development, in
relation to morality and the selfother relationship. She criticizes the repeated exclusion of women from
theory-building psychological studies and their tendency to adopt the male life as the norm. Gilligan argues
that the androcentrism embedded in psychological research has led to a disparity between academic theories
of human development and the experiences of women, a disparity seen to be caused by womens
development rather than the faulty research and theory itself. In her own research, Gilligan includes the group
previously left out in the construction of theory (that is, women) and aims to show the limitations of
androcentric psychological research for an adequate understanding of the development of men, as well as of
women.
B.) GENDER ORDER
The gender order is a patterned system of ideological and material practices, performed by individuals in a
society, through which power relations between women and men are made, and remade, as meaningful. It is
through the gender order of a society that forms or codes of masculinities and femininities are created and
recreated, and relations between them are organized.
The concept of the gender order was first developed by Jill Matthews (1984), in her study of the historical
construction of femininity. According to Matthews, the idea of the gender order gives recognition to the fact
that every known society distinguishes between women and men, while allowing for variations in the nature of
the distinctions drawn. As systematic ways of creating social women and men, and of ordering and patterning
relations between them, it is not logically necessary that gender orders should be hierarchical, inequitable or
oppressive (1984: 13). Matthews draws an analogy with the concept of the economic order or mode, which as
a systematic ordering of peoples relationship to the means of production and consumption, may be capitalist,
feudal or communist in its specific content.
Connell (1987; 1995) has integrated the concept of the gender order into his social theory of
gender, and for this reason, the concept has become more closely associated with Connell than with
Matthews. For Connell, the relationship between the body and gender is a central issue for gender
theory. He argues that gender is the outcome of recurrent interpretations of, and definitions placed upon, the
reproductive and sexual capacities of the human body. Femininities and masculinities are the multiple effects
of these ongoing interpretations and definitions, impacting upon bodies, influencing personalities and shaping
culture and institutions. In Connells analysis, gender is a reoccurring creation of human agency, which at an
institutional and structural level also acts to constrain individual agency. For Connell, empirical research has
uncovered three major structures of gender relations, or the major ways in which the agency or practice of
women and men is constrained. The three structures, of labor, power and cathexis (concerned with
emotional relationships, including sexuality) constantly interweave with each other creating the gender
order, or the overall structure of gender relations in a particular society, at a particular time in history.
C.) FEMINISM
The word feminism itself originated from the French word fminisme in the nineteenth century, either as a
medical term to describe the feminization of a male body, or to describe women with masculine traits.
When it was used in the United States in the early part of the twentieth century it was only used to refer to one
group of women: namely that group which asserted the uniqueness of women, the mystical experience
of motherhood and womens special purity (Jaggar 1983: 5). It soon became understood to denote a political
stance of someone committed to changing the social position of women.
II.) MASS MEDIA AND FEMINISM
Source: Feminist Perspectives on Objectification, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
A.) Objectification of the Feminine Gender

Objectification is a notion central to feminist theory. It can be roughly defined as the seeing and/or treating
a person, usually a woman, as an object. In this entry, the focus is primarily on sexual objectification,
objectification occurring in the sexual realm. Martha Nussbaum (1995, 257) has identified seven features
that are involved in the idea of treating a person as an object:
1. instrumentality: the treatment of a person as a tool for the objectifier's purposes
2. denial of autonomy: the treatment of a person as lacking in autonomy and self-determination
3. inertness: the treatment of a person as lacking in agency, and perhaps also in activity
4. fungibility: the treatment of a person as interchangeable with other objects
5. violability: the treatment of a person as lacking in boundaryintegrity
6. ownership: the treatment of a person as something that is owned by another (can be bought or sold)
7. denial of subjectivity: the treatment of a person as something whose experiences and feelings (if any)
need
not be taken into account.
Rae Langton (2009, 228229) has added three more features to Nussbaum's list:
8. reduction to body: the treatment of a person as identified with their body, or body parts
9. reduction to appearance: the treatment of a person primarily in terms of how they look, or how they
appear to the senses
10. silencing: the treatment of a person as if they are silent, lacking the capacity to speak.
The majority of the thinkers discussing objectification have taken it to be a morally problematic
phenomenon.
This is particularly the case in feminist discussions of pornography. Anti-pornography feminists Catharine
MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin, influenced by Immanuel Kant's conception of objectification, have famously
argued that, due to men's consumption of pornography, women as a group are reduced to the status of mere
tools for men's purposes. Moreover, feminists like Sandra Bartky and Susan Bordo have argued that women
are objectified through being excessively preoccupied with their appearance.
III.) SURVEY OF RESEARCHES ABOUT FEMINISM AND MEDIA