Traditional/negative media representations of gender

Tunstall (femininity)

Argues media emphasises women's domestic, sexual, consumer and marital activities to the exclusion of all else and ignores the fact that a majority go out to work. Men are seldom presented nude or defined by marital or family status.

Tuchman (femininity)

Argued the narrow range of role for women lead to their 'symbolic annihilation' in the media. This concept refers to the phenomenon where the mass media omit, trivialise, or condemn certain groups that are not socially valued. Media depicts females as mothers, housewives and sex objects as this is what consumers want.

Ferguson (femininity)

Carried out a content analysis of women's magazines, she concluded they were based around a 'cult of femininity' which promotes the idea that excellence is achieved through caring for others, the family, marriage and appearance.

Glascock (femininity)

When portraying aggression in media text, makes were more physically aggressive whereas females were more verbally aggressive. Also found these differences were found behind the camera where males predominate which relates to on-camera demographics (male gaze).

Katz (masculinity)

"Epidemic" of make violence rooted in media's inability to move away from stereotypical versions of what it means to be a man and that boys receive constant messages from media sources such as TV, video games, films, ads and porn that reinforce hegemonic masculine ideals of violence, sexism and homophobic ways of thinking.

Easthorpe (masculinity)

Variety of media, especially Hollywood films and video games transit the view that masculinity is based on strength, aggression, competition and violence is biologically determined and so a natural goal for boys to achieve.

Gauntlets (masculinity)

Many magazines aimed at make audiences continue to sexually objectify women and present images of traditionally masculine men. These magazines represent retributive masculinity- a way to reaffirm masculine authority by glorifying what is conventionally male.