Juxtaposing Views on
Sex/Power and Gender
Discourse: Popular vs. Critical
Media
UNIVERSITY AND SOCIETY SOSC 6.0 3930
PROFESSOR: INDHU RAJAGOPAL
M A R C H 1 3 TH 2 0 1 2
Presentation Outline
Part one
- Central thesis and variables explored
- Theorists utilized
- Main findings
Part two
- Thesis
- Theorists utilized
- Subtopics and themes explored
- Opposing argument and rebuttal
- Popular and critical media sources
- Main findings
Concluding thoughts
Discussion questions
Part One
An Inquiry into the Visible and
Invisible Oligarchy of Gender Power
in Higher Education
Part One
 Purpose: Fill the void in academic discussions which
have failed to adequately capture the processes that
shape female identity in organizations of higher
education.
 Thesis: Within this essay, I argue that oligarchic and
elitist power structures present in institutions of
higher education fundamentally subvert female
identity to produce docile bodies.
Variable One
 The Body
 For Foucault, the body exists in society where it is
incessantly controlled, disciplined and made to
conform to societal norms.
 Integral role in shaping, enforcing, and reinforcing
constructions of the docile female body.
 Institutions of higher education as repositories of
knowledge.
Variable Two
Power
 Foucault stresses that power is a relation that exists
at and in every level of society
 Power is used extensively to standardize behavior
and establish strict forms of identity
 The fortification of masculine superiority.
Variable Three
Knowledge and Discourse
 From a Foucauldian perspective, knowledge is to be
understood as an instrument through which power and
authority is exerted.
 The university is at the core of the creation and
dissemination of knowledge.
 The interests of elitist knowledge claims preserve the
traditional paradigm of gender inequality.
Theorists Utilized
Theorists used in discussing the body and higher education
 Azzarito “Future Girls, transcendent femininities and new pedagogies:
toward girls' hybrid bodies?” (2004)
 Debra Merskin “Reviving Lolita? A Media Literacy Examination of Sexual
Portrayals of Girls in Fashion Advertising.” (2010)
 Taylor and Setters “Watching Aggressive, Attractice, Female Protagonists
Shapes Gender Roles for Women Among Male and Female Undergraduate
Viewers” (2011)
Theorists used in discussing power and higher education
 Emily Kane “Education and Beliefs About Gender Inequality” (1995)
 Petra Verdonk et al. “Should you turn this into a complete gender matter?
Gender mainstreaming in medical education” (2009)
 Mino Vianello “Gender Differences in Access to and Exercise of Power”
(2004)
Theorists used in discussing knowledge and discourse in higher education
 Ruth Watts “Whose Knowledge? Gender, Education, Science and History”
(2007)
 Carinci Sherrie “Does gender matter? An exploratory study of perspectives
across genders, age and education” (2009)
Part One : Main Findings and Formulating Points
of Resistance
 The proclivity to produce docile female bodies is
systematically ingrained in the structure of institutions of
higher education and thus is difficult to overcome.
 However, where there is power there is also resistance.
 A reconceptualization of knowledge and the body.
 A multi-dimensional approach utilizing both subtle and
overt forms of resistance that serve to heighten women’s
status and position in oligarchic power systems in higher
education.
Part Two
Juxtaposing Views on Sex/Power and
Gender Discourse: Popular vs.
Critical Media
Central Thesis
Thesis: I argue that representations of sex relations and
gender discourses expressed in popular media
exacerbate stereotypical constructions of femininity
and the female body which is disciplined, normalized
and controlled. The portrayal of female docility in the
popular press is juxtaposed with critical media sources,
from which it is asserted offer emancipatory and
positive constructions of the female body that challenge
and resist normalization and discipline.
Foucauldian Framework
 Arguments for part two of my research project are
grounded in the works of Michel Foucault, most
particularly his discussions on the body, disciplinary
power and knowledge and discourse.
 Examine the role of these three Foucauldian concepts in
relation to popular and critical media sources.
 This framework will also assist in exploring how the
media simultaneously acts to privilege and solidify male
superiority.
Process of Docility
Objectified and Surveyed
Normalization
Disciplined
Female Docility
Subtopic One: Representations of the Body
Popular Media
 Popular media sources both covertly and overtly
sexualize the female body.
 The female body is commodified, and to adopt Foucault’s
conceptualizations, it is disciplined and made available to
the male gaze.
 Bufkin and Eschholz (2000) The authors critique the
prevalence of such representations in the popular media
(most regularly depicted in the ‘horror genre’),
suggesting that they serve to reassert the patriarchal
vision of gender and the controlled docile female body.
Subtopic One: Representations of the Body
Continued
Critical Media
 In contrast to the popular media, critical media
sources offer a counter or resistant construction of
the female body.
 This argument is substantiated in Thorpe’s (2008)
explication of femininity in snowboarding.
 Discursive constructions of the female body are
varied and range from women as respected athletes
to female snowboarders as cultural participants.
Subtopic Two: Representations of Disciplinary
Power
Popular Media
 Popular media conforms to stereotypical notions of
femininity and masculinity (ie. the passive female
dichotomized with the aggressive, macho male
figure).
 Consistent with this argument, Azzarito (2010)
utilizes a Foucauldian inspired analysis.
 Popular media formats encourage women to engage
in self-discipline in order to conform to dominant
norms of feminine docility.
Subtopic Two: Representations of Disciplinary
Power Continued
Critical Media
 Critical media sources inverse the power relation by
diversifying the images and rhetoric surrounding
gender.
 Luke (1994) reinforces this claim, stressing that
critical culture empowers individuals
 Critical media sources question the flawed
misrepresentations of female docility and discipline
found in the popular media.
Subtopic Three: Discourse and Knowledge
Popular Media
 The popular media disseminates ‘common-sense’
knowledge that is met with little scrutiny.
 Discourses and knowledge produced by the popular
media are a manifestation of wider patriarchal
values.
 Ross and Carter (2011) elucidate on this issue, noting
that news programming privileges male ‘voices’ over
women’s ‘voices’.
Subtopic Three: Discourse and Knowledge
Continued
Critical Media
 In the realm of Foucault’s discourse and knowledge,
critical communication mediums are again
positioned in stark contrast to the popular media.
 Knowledge claims in the critical media scrutinize and
serve to contradict those found in popular mediums.
 As Kelly and Stack (2006) affirm, critical sources
assist in ‘democratizing’ the media by presenting
resistant strategies, narratives and knowledge.
 Applying Foucault’s concepts of connaissance
(popular media) vs. savoir (critical media).
Oppositional Argument
 Critics may contend that it is incorrect to only
problematize the popular media while neglecting the
critical media as a facilitator of female docility.
 Critical communication mediums fail to offer policies
or practices to overcome such issues.
 A lack of pragmatic relevancy.
 Thus, the critical media is also responsible for
exacerbating the processes of normalization that
discipline female identity.
A Refutation and Rebuttal
 In rebuttal, I suggest that the critical media , in its
tendency to challenge norms presented by the popular
media sources, may serve as a transformative
educational instrument.
 A resource that offers alternative narratives that may
elevate the status and social position of women.
 This refutation is based within Tisdell’s (2008)
argument, that asserts the significance of the critical
media as a grounding for developing a counter
hegemonic resistance that challenges and undermines
existing disciplinary processes that construct the docile
female.
Popular Media Examples
Desperate Housewives (2004)
A prominent comedy/drama
series that depicts the lives of
a group of female housewives.
The women within the
program are explicitly
sexualized and objectified, as
the lifestyles of the female
characters are often premised
on their sexual desires and
promiscuity.
Popular Media Examples Continued
Film: Easy A (2010) A film
that is premised on a
young, female character
who deceits her peers in
order to convince them that
she has lost her virginity.
An illustration of the sexual
commodification and
normalization of women
whose worth is judged by
their conformity as docile,
passive sexual objects.
Popular Media Examples Continued
Female Perfume
Advertisements: Magazines,
television programs and a
host of other popular media
sources feature
advertisements directed at
female consumers. Most
notably in the realm of
female perfume
advertisements, woman are
featured in passive, and
docile suggestive poses and
objectified through the
commodification of their
bodies. The sexualization of
the female body becomes
normalized as a routine
aspect of ‘everyday life’.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76lPciEip3A
Critical Media Examples
A critical cartoon that discusses the sexual
objectification and exploitation of women, and
hegemonic patriarchal discourses more generally. In
representing the male gaze as primitive and ‘savage
like’, the cartoon essentially mocks male dominance.
Critical Media Examples Continued
A critical cartoon that
critiques the stereotypical
and normalized portrayal of
women in magazines. In so
doing, it problematizes the
tendency of popular media
sources to portray females as
slender, passive subjects to be
consumed.
Critical Media Examples Continued
The cartoon is a deliberately
hyperbolic depiction of gender
norms that are ingrained in
and enforced upon individuals
from youth. Analyzing this
cartoon from a Foucauldian
perspective, it is evident that
gender is a social construction,
that is utilized as a means of
maintaining the disciplinary
subversion of women.
Foucault’s Construction of Docile Bodies
 Cellular
(located bodies in enclosures)
 Organic
(Specified repetitive activities)
 Genetic
(Trained and timed in hard work of
production)
 Combinatory
(Division of labour and organizing ranks
& classes as units of production- Marx, Capital, vol. 1.
311-12) (isolation)
Applying Foucault’s Construction of Docile Bodies
To The Media
Cellular – The body is spatially located in films, television programs and other
popular media sources where it is objectified.
Organic – Consumers of popular media engage in repetitive tasks (ex.
consistently viewing a television program at the same time each week)
Genetic – Female docility is produced and individuals are trained from birth
to conform to gender roles (ex. as depicted within the previous critical
cartoon, both males and females are expected to play with toys that have been
deemed appropriate for their gender.)
Division of Labor – Though not a division of labor per se, popular media does
indeed provide clear ‘ranks’ consistent with the wider patriarchal society (ex.
the female gender is subversive and secondary to the male gender)
Future Directions
 How can the critical media can be harnessed as a tool
for progressive social development in the realm of
gender/sex and power.
 Advocating the critical media as an emancipatory
and positive instrument for challenging existing
disciplinary hegemonic gender norms.
 The critical media may serve as a basis for
reconstituting the female body and discourses on
femininity.
Concluding Thoughts
 There is a sharp distinction in the narratives, images
and discourses presented in popular media sources
on the one hand and critical communication
mediums on the other.
 Juxtaposing these sources assists in understanding
their impact in shaping the manipulation and
engineering of the docile female body.
Discussion Questions
 In light of the arguments presented here, it is viable
to conceive of the critical media as an instrument to
challenge the discourses and narratives found
within the popular media?
 What other measures or steps can be taken, beyond
the critical media, to elevate the status of women
and undermine the construction of female docility?
Works Cited
Course Literature
Azzarito “Future Girls, transcendent femininities and new pedagogies: toward
girls' hybrid bodies?” Sport, Education and Society. 15:3 (2010): 261-275.
Blackman, L. (2004).
Indhu Rajagopal. “Lecture 1”. York University. September 20 2011. Lecture.
Indhu Rajagopal. “Lecture 3”. York University. October 4 2011. Lecture.
Merskin, D. “Reviving Lolita? A Media Literacy Examination of Sexual
Portrayals of Girls in Fashion Advertising.” American Behavioral Scientist. 48:1
(2004): 119-129.
Taylor, L.D. & Setters, T. “Watching Aggressive, Attractive, Female Protagonists
Shapes Gender Roles for Women among Male and Female Undergraduate
Viewers” Sex Roles. 65 (2011): 35-46.
Works Cited Continued
Outside Sources
Bradshaw, Pat and Stephanie Newell. “Dreams of untenured female faculty: exploring the deep structures of power.”
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Carinci, Sherrie, and Pia Lindquist Wong. "Does gender matter? An exploratory study of perspectives across genders,
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Kane, Emily. "Education and Beliefs about Gender Inequality." Social Problems.
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Watts, Ruth. "Whose Knowledge? Gender, Education, Science and History." History of Education. 36.3 (2007): 283302.
Works Cited Continued
New Articles on Media
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Michelle Stack and Deirdre Kelly. “Popular Media, Education, and Resistance.” Canadian Journal of
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Tisdell, Elizabeth. “Critical Media Literacy and Transformative Learning: Drawing on Pop Culture and
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