Gender Shift In Crime Dramas

Since the beginning of time itself, Television has been one the most influential pieces of media that the world has ever encountered. The beginning days of television depicted stereotypical mothers cooking and cleaning their homes for their husbands and children. Yet, as the decades passed, television took a dramatic turn, leaving the days of drama free entertainment as a vast memory. Now a day, however, when one hits the power on button to Bravo, the screen lights expand to ritzy socialites dealing with their everyday lives as “housewives”. Bravo TV’s hit number one reality television show, The Real Housewives of Atlanta, deals with the everyday lives of modern-day housewives. When speaking of these women and their family life, the

It is often said that the media and the arts are an accurate reflection of any given community. This is especially true in American pop-culture, where television shows depict the various stereotypes attributed to men and women and the roles they play in society. House, a highly popular medical drama that revolves around Dr. Gregory House and his diagnostic team, is a particularly good example as it represents the true state of the traditional gender roles in American culture today by, both, redefining and reinforcing them over the course of the show.

Modleski argues that soap operas are crucial in understanding women’s role in today’s culture. She claims that in viewing soap operas, the viewer can identify with each of the characters together, and is able to jump between each of the characters instantly, as she sets herself up emotionally with all of them. In the essay, Modleski states that “the family is, for many women, their only support, and soap operas offer the assurance of its immortality” (Modleski 131). The viewer that Modelski is referencing to is the mother, hence carrying out to all plot improvements and new events, although even in this state of explanation she does not, or cannot, create a particular bias or take an interest in just one of her ‘children’ over another (133). She suggests that being in this position of the ‘good mother’ popular culture can change one’s concept of self and one’s identity. In depicting opposed themes such as good

As society has continued to evolve socially, politically and culturally, so has the persona of television. Societal transformations have shape and reshaped television throughout its history. Programs ranging from ethical series to variety shows to family sitcoms mirrored not only the audience taste of entertainment, but also the change of values within society during the increase in television use. Gender roles and a strong sense of family intimacy were among the most prominently highlighted transformations reflected in television. Women and family contribute significantly when analyzing the antiquity of the television. Television programming was designed to emphasize family togetherness through illuminating the importance of domestic household maintenance. Domestic sitcoms, such as The Donna Reed Show exhibited these liberal roles in which women were expected to subjugate to subordinate statuses and confine their

Television networks are continually expanding their programming slates, and many in the past have switched to a year-round programming schedule that makes the phrase “summer return” basically absolute. On every channel, in every magazine, every darken theater, we see the way pop culture limits women’s role- girlfriends, victims, hookers, corpses, sex bombs, and “teases,” but why? Television, for most women, was the first place where they were able to visually see themselves represented. And for quite a while, they didn’t see much besides the loving wife, the dutiful daughter, gossiping girlfriends, fashion models, and the occasional maid, granny, or nanny. In Where the Girls Are: Growing Up

Gender and Crime Sex is commonly used to describe the innate biological characteristics of humans constituting their femaleness or maleness. Gender on the other hand, covers the social characteristics and usages associated with one sex or the other. Since such roles and customs can vary and be modified it follows that masculine and feminine the terms applied to the respective genders are much more flexible than female and male. In order to cover the subject of gender and crime it is important to explain its prehistory and standing as well as addressing the extensive material which appeared in the modern

In the multi-faceted dynamics of gender, the declaration of gender neutral is often in fact male oriented and dominated sexism. Gender roles are perhaps reinforced more strongly in law enforcement than any other of our societal systems. Consequently, the hegemonic masculinity (HM) of our patriarchal society has kept men and women in their place (Goodey, 1997), this male dominance that negatively impacts a female’s ability to advance in society appears to play a dual role of discrimination within the criminal justice system. Informal control of keeping women within their gender increases [the perception] of the likelihood of their being law abiding citizens, which may be why we see women being arrested for more incidents of prostitution and

The media plays a massive role in the construction of crime, this includes the reporting of crime, the sensationalisation of stories, over-representation of different social groups and age of offenders. Construction of crime is also through stereotyping both ethnicity and gender. It is sometimes argued that the media is an ideological tool that is used to distort reality from its viewers. Female killers are often considered as ‘oxymoronic’, as they are seen as contradictory. Females are generally seen as caring beings but once they commit violent crimes, they are judged based individual circumstances and it is not taken into consideration that they could just as violent as male offenders in their own right. In this essay, I will be focusing on the gender stereotypes in media, specifically focusing on female killers.

Television sitcoms of the 1950’s through the 1990’s demonstrated the values and structure of the American family by portraying stereotypes. Since television sets became mainstream and entered almost every American home, the content of American sitcoms has reflected the culture of the times. Thus, as the popular American sitcoms of the 1950’s suggest, families living in the 1950’s were very tightly grouped and did everything together with roles of males and females clearly defined. In the 1950,’s women did the housecleaning and child care and men worked, providing for the family. In the sixties, women acquired more freedom in their lives. The 1963 Equal Pay Act and the 1964 Civil Rights Act came into effect. It was the end of the baby boomer

On September 20, 1984 a show aired that changed the way we view gender roles on television. Television still perpetuates traditional gender stereotypes and in reflecting them TV reinforces them by presenting them as the norm (Chandler, 1). The Cosby Show, challenged the typical gender stereotyping of television, daring to go against the dominant social values of its time period. In its challenge of the dominant social view, the show redefined the portrayal of male and female roles in television. It redefined the gender role in the work place, in social expectations, and in household responsibilities. The Cosby Show supported Freidan in her view of “castigating the phony happy housewife heroine of the

Criminality is still assumed to be a masculine characteristic and women lawbreakers are therefore observed to be either ‘not women’ or ‘not criminals’ (Worrall 1990, p. 31). Female offenders are hallmarked for tireless and inescapable coverage if they fit into the rewarding newsworthy categories of violent or sexual. It is always important to note the reason for overrepresentation of women criminals in the media. “Women who commit serious offences are judged to have transgressed two sets of laws: criminal laws and the laws of nature” (Jewkes 2011, p. 125). Such women are hence “doubly deviant and doubly damned” (Lloyd, 1995). When women commit very serious crimes, such as murder, they attract

Female Criminality consists of several outdated statistics regarding the rise of female offending. However, in viewing the current research on the subject, it appears that the overall theme of this dissertation's discussion is still relevant despite changes in the accompanying statistics as seen in viewing the following topics: the rise in female offending; the continual rise that females are committing more crimes than men; and the types of crimes that women are committing. In viewing Bruce Gross's 2009 article, "Battle of the Sexes: The Nature of Female Delinquency," as well as Elizabeth Cauffman's 2008 article, "Understanding the Female Offender," one can begin to see where current statistics regarding the female criminal lie.

While most of the violent crimes that happens most are them are belongs to men, women have not been the wilting flowers promoted so heartily by Victorian adorers and (right or wrong) often evident in today's society. Before we get into detail about the fascinating phenomenon of the Black Widow, it is worth a brief overview of women's escalating role in the world of violent crime, particularly in the United States.

We have decided to conduct this study with the focus on three sitcoms from the 1980s which are Fresh Prince, The Bill Cosby Show, and Full house. In addition, focusing on three sitcoms for comparison in todays time, 2000s which are Full House, George Lopez and Family Matters. Each of these research samples display a variety of roles played, race, gender and change in family perception. There will be significant differences in the family structures as a function of time and race/culture of sitcoms aired in the 1980’s versus in the 2000’s. More specifically, it is expected that there will be a significant differences in the portrayals of family size, social class, locations, origin, and gender roles.

Over the past two decades, the impact of gender role stereotyping on our society has been examined in numerous studies. The purpose of these studies was to determine whether the sex bias portrayed in books, TV shows and social media is still as prevalent as in the past. Modern Family is one of the TV shows that clearly prove that, the roles played by males and females have changed in by the time. Modern Family show is about a family that tackles normal, everyday problems. The show features three combined families Jay and Gloria, Phil and Claire, Mitchell and Cameron and how different genders in each family act. Because of gender stereotype issues like gay marriage, house wives and large difference in age between married couples, this show focused on challenging these stereotypes and solving such conflict in our society.