Sexual Objectification In Music Videos: A Content Analysis

The topic of femininity in pop culture is important today because women are still far from achieving equality with men socially, economically, and politically. Music is a huge part of everyday life and affects millions of people. The music industry is intertwined throughout many outlets of the media. From commercials, to television, to the radio, music is a part of everybody’s daily life. What is noteworthy about trendy music today is that the messages that the artists are singing about can influence the listener's behavior, even though they may not consciously know this. With many popular anthems being so influential in every aspect of today’s world, we have to closely look at the correlation between music and how this alters how people act in today’s culture. Those who’ve been closely following the trends in country music over the last few years have had a sense that songs that objectify and degrade women (“bro-country”) have been on the rise, but it was only anecdotal evidence that we could

Instead of trying to claim their lives and educations to get better jobs women are shaking their bodies in music videos. These music videos are “playing significant roles in reflecting, reinforcing and sometimes subverting the dominant systems and ideologies that help shape gender” (Shaw and Lee 450). By putting women in music videos both male and female singers (but mostly male singers) are sexualizing and objectifying the female body. They are making women dance in the background with hardly any clothes on. Singers like 50 Cent have women in their music videos simply for “eye candy.” They are just there to be looked at, to be seen as objects, not human beings. By using objectification, which is “seeing the body as an object and separate from its context” (Shaw and Lee 216) music videos portray the female body as a piece of meat, with no feeling or worth. By continuing to promote this objectification music videos are encouraging gender ranking, which is the “valuing of one gender over another” (Shaw and Lee 119) to limit women and “keep them in their

This essay will argue that mainstream music reinforces the idea of women as sexual objects in the male gaze. Kitzinger has stated that “the sexual exploitation of women and children has played a key role in the history of the media” (2004) This essay will look at how this sexual exploitation is still relevant in modern mainstream music. This argument will be illustrated by drawing on the song/music video “Girls” by The 1975. (Powell, 2013). The band are of the alternative rock genre and use the video as a tool to emphasizes and critic how popular music portrays women. This will be highlighted by focusing on three main points. The parody to pop music videos; the use of costume and dance to sexualize and the focus on the youthful desire of sex

The role of women in today’s society has dramatically evolved from the views that society shared in previous decades. No longer is a woman valued for her etiquette, grace and virtues, instead we are constantly in competition with one another over being more provocative and sexually charged. A perfect example of this ironically acceptable behaviour is portrayed through the women we view on a daily basis in music videos. It is evident that the concept ‘sex sells’ is now being used in almost every advertisement and video that we watch on daily television and the indoctrination of this concept has spread wide and far throughout the entertainment

“...it should be remembered that the gendered character of the music industry… and music generally both reflects and serves to constitute the gendered character of wider social and cultural realities.” William A. Hamlen Jr. writes in his article, “Superstardom in Popular Music: Empirical Evidence”, about the music industry market. Hamlen’s article expresses how the music industry is male dominated because the “lack of female role models” allows for masculine culture to continue. Thus, male domination in the music industry creates a space that is difficult for women to enter. Female singers navigating through this male dominated space may have to compromise the brand, image, and music they would like to create for their own self.

An effective aspect in the music video ‘Booty’ by Jennifer Lopez and Iggy Azalea is music. This was because of the way they chose to use them by sexualizing women while doing so. For example “It’s his birthday, Give him what he ask for”. This quote is a good example of sexualisation in women as when this quote is said the camera is at a close-up shot which is flickering between someone’s booty and Jennifer’s face and higher stomach whilst she is singing the lyrics which remain very dirty and sexual. Through this example there is an effect on the audience because it is the way that they choose to use this to of which demonstrate that women are objects and can easily be taken advantage of therefore making them seem more like a toy for the use

"Sex sells" is concomitantly one of the most common and disturbing expressions in the contemporary society. The music industry is a place where sex has actually sold millions of records and where many artists were forced to employ more 'sexual' attitudes in order to really be appreciated by their fans. The sad truth is that it is very difficult for an artist to be appreciated if he or she does not use values that are generally appreciated by music consumers. Many artists have proved this argument to be wrong, but their number is much smaller in comparison to the ones who used sex as a main tool to sell their records.

Adolescent youth within the United States spend between six to seven hours a day with some form of media, including television, music, the Internet, and smart cell phones (Roberts, Foehr, Rideout, 2005). With sexuality being presented in such an insensitive manner, adolescent youth girls are being pressured to confine to society’s expectations at a younger age due to explicit music lyrics and media, consistently being displayed by different outlets. One of the biggest ways that young girls are affected by the media is through television and music content. Within most of our daily life, the social environment from what we view and understand has been mostly characterized by the mass media and internet which have also used musical elements to

However, the visualization of music changes its nature. On the other side, women’s body has become a resource that is offered by music in making pop music culture. Gill (2007) points out the relations between feminism and media culture, which femininity is a ‘bodily property’. For example, women’s body becomes a means of promotion, which to meet the favor of male gaze. The commodified music combines with MTV that gives rise to the sexualization of music. That is to say, pop music culture objectifies women’ body, which ‘selling her sex’ makes women’s body the objective (Gill, R. 2007). Being too sexual and eager to perform for the male gaze is the manner that women are included in pop music culture. Accordingly, music has become an emotional

I believe the “Representation of Women in Music Videos” has formed a conflict between the public (Men AND Women) and the media. Women are more affected by the media because we (Women) are advertised to the members of the public in order to sell products for companies or to get people to watch their music videos because they’re hardly wearing any clothing or their breasts look really nice in this video, because ‘sex sells’. An example of how ‘sex sells’ is portrayed in commercials such as the “Victoria Secret” advertisements in the US. Victoria Secret is known for their famous lingerie fashion line and their Victoria Secret Models called the “Victoria Secret Angels”, who always hold a fashion show yearly, which is a known as a global phenomenon

Gender construct comes from many different things in this day and age. Music videos are one of them. Music videos today objectify women. In this video women are portrayed as sexual beings that basically parade their bodies around in their bikinis while being splashed with water to satisfy men. These videos make money! They are watched by millions of people and they make millions of dollars. The people watching these videos are not just men. There are women who watch these videos and support them by buying this type of music. Women are misrepresented in these videos showing everyone to views it as these women being here to satisfy men and are only good for their looks. I believe this video is an accurate portrayal of our culture on femininity

In the current music industry, the normalization of the over-sexualization of women makes the whole society focus on female performers’ body image rather than their music. Many female singers, especially pop stars, confront the challenge between sex-positivity and eroticism. After the likes of oversexualized female superstars had become the new definition of pop music, Adele Laurie Blue Adkins changes the way that the music industry markets female acts. Born and raised in the United Kingdom, the 28 years old singer is known for her soulful voice and meaningful songs that consistently top the charts. As the first artist having two titles in the top five of both the U.K. singles and album charts since the 1960s, Adele conveys a simple and powerful

According to Vogue magazine, “we are officially in the era of the big booty” (Garcia, 2014). Likewise, 2014 has been dubbed The Year Of The Booty (Ball, 2014). Meaning, today, the measure of a woman’s sex appeal is directly linked to the prominence of her behind. While music videos have long been critiqued for reproducing distorted ideologies of women’s sexuality, recent research suggests that female artists are more likely to sexually objectify themselves in their own music videos than male artists

Rap music videos were introduced in the 1980s; they have become one of the most popular music genres among young people (Hansen and Hansen 2000). In today 's music industry, image can trump talent, and many of the top stars have struggled with weight, often facing public and industry censure. This is an analysis of how image affects success in the business of music for women. In the music industry, record labels are not just looking for how beautiful a woman’s voice is; she also needs to be beautiful or have a gimmick, such as a beautiful body. Record labels are looking to see if she has the sex appeal that is the music industry believes the public wants. If record labels were to sign the artist to their label, will the music is able to sell? Most

There is proven knowledge on the impact of mass media and music consumption, and how it can play a vital role in the development of adolescents and self- identity. Due to majority of teens consuming music with an estimation of 18 hours per week (Arnett, 2002; Escobar-Chaves et al., 2005; Ward &Friedman, 2006), the exposure to music has been directly associated with numerous health outcomes for the consuming teen (Martino, 2006; Wingwood et al., 2003). There have been numerous studies that have previously examined the relationship between the exposure of sexual content in music and how it can affect the sexual behaviors of adolescents (Pardun, 2005). Based on this contextual analysis, I was able to review how media and explicit music lyrics and how it impacts young girls’ ideas of sexuality and self-identity (Berger, 2015). Based on of the lyric analysis I conducted utilizing Cooper’s review, results assessed 20 Top Billboard Hits, for the sexualization in a portrayal of women in top trending music lyrics. These results differed than Cooper’s findings due to the period periods of the songs examined and quantity of songs. This paper is generalizable to this discussion and sample, it only looked at 20 songs, and if increased could be used to determine data on a larger scale.