Alien1986 Gender Stereotypes

In the following few years, the challenging of segregation persevered and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed. The law banned discrimination in the employment and public places of business. Prior to this movie, I did not know too much about the space race and how difficult the whole operation was. I had not heard about these three ladies who made big changes in this era.

In the movies The Searchers by John Ford in 1956 and Cowboys and Alien by Jon Favreau in 2011 there is a large variation of how race and gender are represented in the movie. Even though these movies are 50 years apart there is are obvious links and differences in how race and gender are portrayed in these two movies. Race in The Searchers is portrayed by marginalising the Cherokee Indians. In The Searchers the Cherokee Indians are portrayed as “childish savages”, who hunt and kill “innocent” family’s and people and are the antagonists of the movie. However the Westerners are portrayed as the heroes of the

The Alien is a science fiction horror movie. Its setting in space and the presence of technology and artificial intelligence empathizes on its science fiction genre. Moreover, the presence of the Alien and the fact that it is a threat to human lives reflects it is also a horror film. The movie revolves around seven human beings that have the mission to return to earth from the space.

Feminist: the person who believes in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes. Sexual stereotypes are deeply imbedded into today’s society. Ideals of the gender roles are passed down from generation to generation, creating a gap between what is socially acceptable for a woman to do and what is expected of a man. One thousand years ago humans chose dominance by physical capability, simply because it was essential for our survival, but the world has evolved. One thousand years ago physical strength was the most important part of survival for human beings. Men in general are physically stronger therefore it made sense to have a man lead. The world humans live in has evolved and is no longer run by the physically entailed, but by the most intelligent or creative(Adichie). Though this world has evolved, the gender expectations and stereotypes have stayed the same. Sexual stereotypes in America limit men and women to abide with,by the expectations of masculinity and feminism, create a sense of shame for women, and create a gap in today’s job industry.

The film Close Encounters of the Third Kind drew upon the alien and UFO craze that was going on in the 1970s. The film was written and directed by Steven Spielberg and released in the year 1977. This film doesn’t have any superstar actors or actresses but interestingly enough, Meryl Streep auditioned but was not given a role in the film. Many things about this film are quite interesting, including the movie being filmed in an unused airplane hangar and the aliens being played by schoolgirls. The behind the scenes elements would make you want to believe that this movie would end up being a disappointment, but this assumption couldn’t be more wrong.

James Cameron’s 1986 film Aliens can be considered a tweener being made up of many genres including a maternal melodrama, woman’s film, war film, body genre, horror, and a science fiction film. Aliens manages to successfully change the classic horror and sci-fi movie to create a story that explores the place of women in these genres and challenges the roles they normally play. This is done by structuring a horror film to play upon the male fears of female reproduction and sexuality as core themes in the film so as to unnerve its dominant men. As a result, a woman’s film is created by placing its female character as the leading role. Aliens takes its central character Ripley, and places her into a position as the gender monster. Ripley is neither totally feminine nor is she totally masculine resulting in a motherly figure that is a true warrior. Even from her first appearance she is in command and a force to be reckoned with. In Aliens the roles of gender are clearly reversed, as Ripley is the strong female character who makes active judgements and survives what is trying to kill her. The male characters are largely submissive, most die quickly, others wait for her command. Ripley stands out as being a well-developed female hero who avoids the standard portrayal of women in horror films as passive, secondary characters, creating a woman that is in charge and motherly at the same time, thus producing a woman’s film.

“Aliens” was directed by James Cameron. James Cameron is 62 years old and he is a Canadian filmmaker, producer, screenwriter, inventor, engineer, philanthropist and deep sea explore. “Aliens” is a horror, science fiction and blood-thirsty film. This movie was released in 1986. The main character was a woman called Ellen Ripley. She was the only survivor on the spaceship and was saved by a crew from a company called Weyland-Yutani Corporation. She has been asleep and drifting for fifty-seven years. On an interview with all the executives from the company, they wanted to know testimony about the Aliens. However, everything that Ripley told them was all true, but the executives think the things that Ripley told them regarding to Aliens are made up by her. Therefore, the executives still decided to go on an expedition to that spaceship, also they want Ripley to go with them. They went on to spaceship and they found a girl called Newt. They went through a few fierce battles and this story end up with only a few survivors. In this movie there are many examples of gender stereotypes.

Moving forward to the 20th century, the 1979 film Alien and 1986 film Aliens depicts a very different hero to the ancient heroes like Achilles and Aeneas. Though there is a significant amount of variation in modern day heroes now than there was in the time of Homer and Virgil, these heroes are accepted for their character flaws as it makes them much more relatable to the modern audience, much like what Virgil was trying to do with Aeneas. Ellen Ripley, as introduced in Alien and seen in the , is a warrant officer on-board the spacecraft Nostromo, a commercial towing ship. Immediately, we see this person as being completely ordinary and would have lived a completely normal life if it weren't for the events to come later in the film. In fact, at first she seems like a side character. It is when the Alien is introduced into the narrative that she

During the Reagan-era in American society of the 1980s, there were more opportunities for middle-class college graduates and women for work as there was a rise in rise of hi-tech firms, finance and retail. Where as for men, the decline in heavy industry made it hard for men to find high paid full-time work in industry, in which so many working-class men joined the military. Yet Ripley with all these male attributes can relate more to men in the Reagan-era. ’ James Cameron rewrites Ripley as an action hero, as Aliens (1986) is a military expedition/combat film. At the same time, the political climate of the Reagan era informed the film’s conservative revision of Ripley into a socially authorized female role: the “mother” Ellen Ripley’.

Horror is a special kind of genre. While its main goal is to keep people on their toes, the truly spectacular ones will go a step further and truly make them feel something quite horrendous. The movie Alien, directed by Ridley Scott, is one such movie. Not only does it keep the audience tense and ready to jump at every corner, it deeply disturbs and re-imagines feminism in a very effective way. And while many people have criticized this movie for its very heavy sexual imagery, the work has a way of sending a message home with every viewer about the power women hold. Through imagery, bodily violation, and an attack on the audience, this movie truly has a way of getting its message across: and its message shall be delivered. The movie Alien emphasizes

Ridley Scott and Olivia Butler both took the topic of aliens and made it their own. While they have different story lines, there are still distinct similarities, but many differences as well. Ridley Scott took the idea of aliens and with that he created the movie Alien. In this movie, the humans are awakened from their sleep capsules to explore a distress call from an alien vessel. An alien attacks one of the crewmembers and that is when the trouble begins. In Olivia Butler’s short story, “Bloodchild”, humans had to evacuate their home, Earth, and found refuge with the Tlics. The Tlics then use male humans to incubate and give birth to their young. The aliens from Alien from “Bloodchild” share a general objective of trying to maintain their race, but they have a great deal of diversity at the same time. There are similarities that are seen in the lifespan of men, the process of impregnating the man, and the sense of sexuality throughout the film and short story. The distinction is most obvious when it comes to their characteristics, their mannerisms and their values. More specifically, the portrayal of the two different aliens the film and short story, the relationships between humans and aliens and the perspective of the humans on the incubation of the young.

Hidden Figures is a movie that focused on three women and the space race. Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary Jackson played a main role in helping NASA with the space race. All three of them worked to help for John Glenn’s flight to orbit the earth. The behind the scenes that lead up to Mercury-Atlas 6’s blast off was acknowledged in the movie Hidden Figures. 1961 is when all of the major change that lead to today’s history started to happen inside of NASA.

Alien abduction stories have always held a strong interest among people all over the world, captivating our attention and curiosity as they propose yet another unsolved mystery of gigantic proportions and unthinkable consequences for humanity to contemplate. More so in modern times, and especially in the western world, where the media is a more significant part of culture, many science fiction novelists and screen writers brought out the issue to the public in the form of entertainment. This, due its widespread appeal, gave these stories a certain level of credulity among the masses, and sparked curiosity for closer investigation.

It’s been said that James Cameron can go to his grave knowing that he directed two of the greatest movie sequels of all time. The first would be, Terminator 2, which I pretty much agree with. The second movie in question, Aliens, is debatable. First and foremost, let’s set the record straight. Even though it definitely has moments of horror, I would really classify it as a very suspenseful action movie, which Cameron excels at (Terminator, The Abyss and Avatar). As far as sequels go, it does expand on the story of the original, it gives us more Aliens and the characters are pretty memorable. This is quite interesting for a film that has a feet in the SciFi, Action and Horror genres all at once, and that alone makes it a very good sequel. Thus,

How women are perceived by others, and how women perceive themselves, impacts their leadership roles in the work place. Stereotypes and gender biases are themes women have been dealing with for centuries. How women are perceived by social medial and television have been influencing how they are treated by men, and how they view themselves when it comes to taking a leadership role in their organization. According to Omega Institute (2012), “The rapidly shifting landscape of new media and technology, including reality television and celebrity culture, continue to reinforce gender stereotypes” (p. 1). This leads to men still growing up viewing women as home makers versus bread winner. With more women entering leadership roles in the work place they lack the respect from men due to how these men have grown up to know the typical role of a man and woman. Men tend to feel belittled due to the gender stereotypes seen on television, and this leads to women struggling to succeed as a leader with the lack of support from their male counterparts. Lack of confidence with women in the workplace is also influenced and effected by how women are perceived in social media and television. According to Steele (2005), “Exposure to stereotypic commercials persuade women to avoid leadership roles” (p. 276). As young women grow up seeing the typical gender stereotypes they lack ambitions to break the mold and