Mean Girls At Work Analysis

After reading over the description of our film analysis paper, the movie "Mean Girls" that was produced in 2004, came into my mind because this movie contains several sociological themes. Although the film is over a decade old, most high school students seem to be able to relate to this film today since it shows us examples of sociological conflicts such as social conflict theory, social class, and sexuality.

Mean Girls is about a girl named Cady who joins an elite social group at her new school known as the Plastics. While socializing with the Plastics, Cady develops a new, mean girl, personality and ends up sabotaging the group’s leader, Regina, and becomes the new leader of the Plastics. Regina retaliates by spreading the burn book, a book the Plastics filled with insults and gossip about other students, around the school leading to a riot and Cady takes the blame. Cady realizes that her new personality is wrong and apologizes to the school, makes amends with her old friends, and forms a truce with Plastics who disband and become regular students (Mean Girls, 2004).

Harassment has plagued the world for centuries. Why should the workplace be any different? Sexual harassment and workplace violence are not only of historical roots, but contemporary issues are still present in the workforce today. Managers are addressing and combating modern sexual harassment and workplace violence, however instances still occur (Robbins, Decenzo & Coulter, 2011).

The movie chosen for this sociological essay is a very popular movie called Mean Girls. This movie was released in 2004, directed by Hollywood star Mark Waters, and screen play written by actor/comedian Tina Fey. For those who have never seen or heard about this movie, it is about a 16 year old girl named Cady Heron who lived her normal every day life growing up in Africa where she was homeschooled. One day, her and her family moved to America where Cady was enrolled into a typical public high school. This is what changed her. On her first day of school she met her two friends Damian and Janice who are students that are typically alienated from other students around the school. On her next day is when she meets the most popular and well known

According to Metz (2011), women are being deprived of opportunities and being squeezed out of organisations due to preconceptions about their dedication to a long term role, based on outdated gender stereotypes. In general, women experience higher rates of harassment at work, compared to men(McLaughlin, Uggen and Blackstone 2012).

Over the last several decades, great strides have been made when it comes to eliminating sexism and progressing towards gender equality. However, sexism is still ingrained in our everyday culture. This is evident in the fact that in 2017 women earn about 80 cents to a man’s dollar and are less likely to be promoted within the workplace. It’s an unfortunate fact the most women will experience some form of sexism throughout their lives. In this paper, I will address my personal experiences with both hostile and benevolent sexism, how the two forms of sexism differ, and how these experiences have affected me.

In our world today, there are many different types of cultures. In America especially, there is so much diversity within culture that it's what makes America what it is today. What is culture you may ask? Culture is basically a human’s way of living life through values, beliefs, behavior, and material objects. In the well-known movie, Mean Girls, there are a lot of different types and aspects of culture throughout the movie. The movie Mean Girls is about a girl named Cady Heron who lived in Africa and was homeschooled for most of her life, has to attend a public high school called North Shore. She is clueless at first and after a while she makes friends with a group of popular girls known as the Plastics. She fits in quickly and tries to adapt through high school. There are different types of cultures and subcultures at North Shore such as the Plastics, the Jocks, the Nerds, the Cool African Americans, the Cool Asians, the Foreigners, and the Losers. Everyone at North Shore high wants to be like the Plastics so some of the girls like to copy everything the Plastics do such as the way they speak and dress. In addition to that all the students are desperate to fit in so in order for them to do that they have to value sex, drinking, partying, makeup, and other typical teenage stuff. Mean Girls did in fact have a lot of different types of cultural aspects to it and there are strong examples to prove this.

“Stereotypes are categories that constrain and shape what a person believes about, and expects from, other people” (Bartlett 1910). The workplace is one of the most active environments for women to be stereotyped against. Women are judged in ways such as being weaker than, and not as active as a man. This can be a problem for a woman in a male dominated occupation by making them feel, or seem, not as valuable as a man. For example, women in the police field will face the struggle of being seen as weaker, gentler, and to submissive to fight crime compared to men. This type of behavior leads to women not receiving much earned promotions, and having more struggles applying to male dominating jobs.

Commonly referred to as a classic by millennials, Mean Girls, directed by Mark Waters in 2004, allows an interesting critique of racism when viewed through a sociological lens. The story follows Cady Herron, a normal teenager- except for the fact that she grew up in Africa, homeschooled by her scientist parents- as she is forced to integrate into the public-school system in Illinois. Never having been in an institution like a public school, Cady quickly learns what not to do and who to hang out with. Through trial and error, Cady assimilates and becomes a ‘normal’ American teenager who is part of the ‘popular’ crowd, befriending “The Plastics”; Karen Smith, Gretchen Wieners, and their leader, Regina George. The story of Mean Girls is not as superficial as it seems. This film illustrates the perils of not only teenage life, but current life in America, and accurately depicts the struggles that minorities face. Looking at this movie through Functionalist theory, the racial aggressions present are part of a larger institution of the public school system; insinuating that the micro and macro-aggressions directed towards minorities are part of developing the future generation and teaching them to perpetuate racial inequality in America, allowing white people to remain the majority race and to reap the benefits that come with it. The complexity of the movie lies within an interesting discourse that examines the effects and functions behind the racist

Mean Girls, ironically my favorite movie, in my opinion clearly and comically depicts the misconceptions and stereotypes that are perceived by society of early adolescents. Stanley Hall characterized adolescence as a time of “storm and stress” and this negative image has stuck with society. As we’ve learned and discussed in class, Sigmund Freud took the concept of storm and stress a step further and developed his stages of psychosocial development but saw adolescence as a time when major conflicts were already solved. . Anna Freud continued researching the same concepts as her father, and viewed the absence of storm and stress as a sign of a serious psychological problem in adolescent development. The stereotype of adolescence as a stage of “storm and stress”, or as labeled in society today, a time of moody, acne-laden teenagers, teenagers with raging hormones, or a time of rebellion and conflict with parents, some even considering teenagers a threat to adult tranquility. That being said, those are only a couple of the many stereotypes that are depicted in the film Mean Girls.

Primary research consisted of statistics I obtained from 2014 WBI national workplace survey taken by 1000 adults in the United States. Secondary Sources included books, and online resources. The results of my research, to be discussed more in depth in my report, reveal a startling truth that we need too bring awareness to that is harassment does exist in the workplace.

Sexism against women in the workplace is still common, particularly in managerial positions, which creates glass ceilings for women who can do as good or better job as their male counterparts. It is a sad fact that sexism still exists in the twenty-first century. What is the glass ceiling you may ask? The glass ceiling is (Bell, Mclaughlin, & Sequeira, 2002) as “the invisible or artificial barriers that prevent women (and people of colour) from advancing past a certain level” (Federal Glass Ceiling Commission-FGCC, 1997; Morison and von Glinow, 1990). As a civilization where we want equality for all – we should strive to eliminate inequality caused by the glass ceiling. I believe that if we do not seek to eliminate sexism, it will have a negative impact on us and future generations.

This research is about sexual harassment in workplaces. Sexual harassment has been seen all over the world, and it is more directed to women and also some men have reported the issues although not that much. The research was done due to the vast number of people complaining of harassment in their workplace and wanted to prove if it’s true. Harassment in workplaces is not only directed to job advances but also as a way to bully other employees, and this makes work productivity in any company.

In our society sexual harassment has been in the workplace for years. The use of sexual harassment in the workplace has been remembered best as a weapon used to keep women in their place which would cause them to forfeit promotions within their organizations. It was once believed that women were the only victims but the shift is now changing men are also reporting that they are also victims of sexual harassment on the job. In 1964 the Civil Rights Act was passed and employers began to recognize that they were liable for two types of sexual harassment. The first kind of harassment is Quid pro quo when a supervisor offers the employee sexual advances in order to get or keep a job, and also this harassment is used to determined if an

"Cold, shiny, hard, PLASTIC," said by Janice referring to a group of girls in the movie Mean Girls. Mean Girls is about an innocent, home-schooled girl, Cady who moves from Africa to the United States. Cady thinks she knows all about survival of the fittest. But the law of the jungle takes on a whole new meaning when she enters public high school and encounters psychological warfare and unwritten social rules that teen girls deal with today. Cady goes from a great friend of two "outcasts", Janice and Damien to a superficial friend of the "plastics", a group of girls that talks about everyone behind their back and thinks everyone loves them. Adolescent egocentrism and relationships with peers are obviously present throughout the film. I