I Love Lucy Analysis

Gender is a sociological idea, in which it is not based on biology. While there is some biological differences between the sexes, the “meaning” of being male or female is based on social norms. Like race, these “biological” differences provided a system of enabling inequality between the sexes. History offers many examples of the gender norms over time. Women, for centuries, are few as the homemakers and often viewed as intelligent. Despite living in the twentieth century with greater equality, one does not need to go far to see how society and media influence our perception of gender. Advertisements in various media persuade its audience to buying their products. However, the means of attracting and persuading the audience can have underlying messages. Even in entertainment for young girls these underlying messages are prevalent. One example is the popular film, The Little Mermaid, in which the main protagonist is a young female. The protagonist gave up her identity to satisfy her lover. Even traditional gender roles are at work; the film showed young girls that to be happy and successful one had to find a husband and must relinquished one’s identity (Wood 1994). The generalized perception of male and female are polar opposites. Males are viewed as masculine, strong, authoritative, powerful, and devoid of emotions. Females are viewed as beauty, fragile, nurturing, emotional and sole purpose is to please men. These ideas can lead to sexism, which can have negative effects on

“A sex symbol's currency lies in her youth, her curves, in the suggestion that a sexual encounter lurks around the next corner.” (Sharon Krum, The Guardian) The media is one of the easiest ways to exemplify the power struggles between genders. In today’s society, celebrities, especially women, are judged largely on their appearance and sex appeal because it is critical for them to stay in the spotlight. This is a clear example of the inequality between the male and female, and what their roles are intended to be in society. Three Girls by Joyce Carol Oates is a story about a lesbian couple, and their observation of the behavior of a disguised Marilyn Monroe who, surprisingly to the narrator and her companion, wants to be seen as nothing more than a common person. During the progression of the story, the author provides perspective on the gender roles women faced in 1956 New York, and gives the reader insight into the thoughts and reservations of a lesbian couple in this time period. Through both implicit and explicit expression, Oates implements feminist and marxist ideas of power struggle into Three Girls in order to establish themes of imbalance and subordination by women in society.

It is not a secret that Lucille Ball was one of the first significant female actresses of her time, but the importance of that role is one that is often overlooked. Not only did Lucille Ball defy traditional domestic roles off-screen, but the character Lucy on I Love Lucy, was also untraditional in terms of the 1950s mindset. While Ball is merely looked at as a hilarious television star, the importance of her humorous personality is also valuable. In the 1950’s, the airing period of I Love Lucy, a woman's traditional place in the world was not one of humor and comedy. A woman's role at that time was cooking and cleaning and caring for her husband and children, along with maintaining a beautiful physical appearance. An example of such perfection for the time is the character June Cleaver, from Leave it to Beaver. June was the epitome of a perfect woman for that time. Perfect hair and outfit, always cooking decadently, faultlessly cleaned house, all topped off with curlers in her hair and a smile. In the 1950s and 1960s, a perfect woman would be a domestic, dutiful wife and mother who lacked economic independence, sexuality, voice, or presence of her own, and her identity was crafted by a patriarchal society. While Lucille Ball’s character in I love Lucy lacked

Rewinding back to the 1950’s, I Love Lucy was one of the most popular sitcoms on television. There were two main characters and they happen to be married. The husband’s name was Ricky and the wife’s name is Lucy. Ricky is a talented singer and part of a band. On the other hand, his wife strives to be famous and share her talents with the world. Her husband claims that she has no talent and she would be better off staying at home to be a housewife. Throughout the show, Lucy finds herself getting into trouble as she often tries to perform at Tropicana, the place in which Ricky works.

As explained in Judith Lorber’s excerpt from “‘Night To His Day’: The Social Construction of Gender”, gender is a socially constructed concept that everyone unconsciously adheres to (Lorber). As a socially constructed concept, representations of gender roles can reinforce or challenge the stereotypical images. In Killing Us Softly 4, Jean Kilbourne analyzed the advertisement industry’s representation of women and argued that the media plays a huge role in shaping gender formations (Kilbourne). Although objectification of women is still a prevalent issue, Kilbourne acknowledged that there are efforts nowadays that challenges the unrealistic representations of women and femininity (Kilbourne). Inspired partly by Killing Us Softly 4, the project is my way to reflect on how the Disney movies I had watched as I grow up represented gender.

Australian film and text have for years supported and broadcasted negative and inferior stereotypes of women. Criticising, embellishing, and mocking women’s behaviour, personalities, occupations and appearance. These stereotypes were heavily reinforced into the minds of the public and influenced their thoughts and actions. However these are gradually changing through the portrayal of women in a more positive way utilizing different film techniques and modern storylines. Traditionally women are portrayed as mothers and home carers and not as equal as men, mainly through the story lines, dialogue and music.

The first section of Gender and the Media addresses gender representations and the beginning of feminism. During the late 60’s and early 70’s, women’s rights movements were first introduced with the challenge of the media, prompting them monitor the way the media portrayed women. This portrayal starting in the late 1970’s has seen many transmissions since. Gil states: “I use the term feminism to signal a concern with enduring gender

Moving onto gender roles and ideas, these characteristics in genders are needed in any sort of story to suit the values and attitudes of the people of that time. Gender stereotypes are a major piece to the puzzle of a film. Women are generally seen as less dominant, pushovers, the cares of everyone and that they have no independence. Whist men are seen as the more dominant, masculine, heroes, brave and courageous. This is across all genres of movies, the girl is the damsel in distress and the boy ends up saving her at the end of it.

During the 18th and 19th century, patriarchy has been responsible for designing women’s role in society. Throughout history, men have been deemed as superior while women have been regarded as inferior. Society has this ideology that women are the sole laborers of a household; they were not granted the same privileges as men. In addition, women have been negatively affected by stereotyping. Women have been portrayed on television as being submissive to men. The depiction of women on television portrays the implications of a societal view of women. From a man's perspective, an ideal woman is a housewife who does all the household duties herself. However, over the years, studies have shown that gender roles have slowly advanced. Women began

What are audience of this text persuaded to believe, think, or do and how is this persuasion accomplished?

The media is constantly providing us with scripts about how to behave and interact. We both subconsciously and consciously internalize and execute these scripts, embodying the well known “life imitates art” theory. One of the most common script topic or theme is gender. Media then, especially television and movies, is a prominent educator of what it means to be “men” and “women”. In other words, gender is a construct that can be learned through absorbing what is portrayed in the media.

Growing up as a child with parents that were both fairly busy with work I often found myself sat in front of a television either waiting for the day to begin or to end. I remember watching shows and seeing how the boys always seemed to be more outspoken, hyper-masculine and the leader in a given situation while the girls were always the passive ones who were depicted as shy followers. Now that I am older I find myself watching even more television, allowing me to see how the media depicts men and women in society. For example, The Big Bang Theory, in its earlier seasons, it only had one female lead, Penny. Her character was very stereotypical in the sense that she was the scattebrained neighbor. The way that men and women are portrayed has

It only takes a second to attach a strong feeling or idea to a character in a movie, advertisement, or video game. Many characterization used are based on the assumed stereotypes, and are usually one-dimensional characters. Typically, these characterizations usually come from inherited family values, education, and the media. While stereotypes existed long before mass media, the media machine certainly helped to accelerate the cultural growth of all kinds of stereotypes. It is beyond this paper to answer why magazines employ these gender stereotypes, instead this research is designed to analyze

Filmmakers use traditional gender stereotypes to produce characters audiences can easily identify with by portraying conventional images of a person with identifiable characteristics. In previous years, the dominant representation of a women in film has been the passive, subjugated protagonist. However, through the development of female empowerment and added feminist representations of film, the female heroine transformed to become strong and independent women in her own right, as an individual character.

Studies regarding gender roles in media show that the feminine essence tends to be depicted as inferior, with women often being marginalized, disempowered and humiliated through a status that is based on their youth and looks; whilst men tend to be portrayed as superior with higher and longer lasting careers