Conference proceeding

II International Conference Gender
and Communication
Facultad de Comunicación de Sevilla 1, 2 and 3 de april 2014
Conference
proceeding
Juan Carlos Suárez Villegas
Rosario Lacalle Zalduendo
José Manuel Pérez Tornero
Editors
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De los autores y las autoras
Dykinson S.L.
TODOS LOS DERECHOS RESERVADOS
No está permitida la reproducción total o parcial de este medio ni su tratamiento
informático, ni la transmisión de ninguna forma o por cualquier medio, ya sea
electrónico, mecánico, por fotocopia, por registro u otros medios sin el permiso
previo y por escrito de los titulares del copyright.
EDITADO POR:
Juan Carlos Suárez Villegas
Rosario Lacalle Zalduendo
José Manuel Pérez Tornero
Abril de 2014
I.S.B.N. 978-84-9085-029-9
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INDEX
PART 1. The representation of male and female identities in the media in any format
Witching y bitching: gender representations in contemporany Spanish film
Baena Cuder, Irene
Hoe gender representations matter with generation in televisión?
Hannot, Muriel; Derinoz, Sabri and Levant, Bertrand
Egypt: a feminist identity
Heikal, Azza Ahmed
Feminism and women´s magazines: a discourse analysis of women´s identities and (partners)
relationships as articulated in two flemish women´s magazines of the twentieth century´s sixties and
seventies
Maaike, Van de Voordre and Martina Temmerman
Women sport reporters: feminity in a traditional male field
Marilou St. Pierre
Woman without body in Turkish cinema: fetishism in mass communication
M. Sami Bayran and Guncel Onkal
The magnificent century: reconstruction of the Ottoman empire family
Murat Iri
Overt sexism in media: a lexico-grammatical analysis of androcentricity in Egyptian print media
Nayef, Heba
Old-fashioned women. The representation of female image in the Italian television advertising
Panarese, Paola
PART 2. Analysis of discourses on gender identities in the media and other
communicative contexts (social networks, education systems)
Academic female subject amidst Bourdieu´s “habitus” and Butler´s “performativity”
Berfin Varisli and Gokcesu Aksit
Audience reception in Moroccan women´s magazines
Bouchara, Aicha
A reading of masculinity in crises: Behzat Ç
Merve Ayge Koseoglu
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PART 3. The co-education of children and young people through communication in
gender equality
Gender, nationalism and genocide
Azra Rashid
PART 4. Treatment and prevention of gender equality through education and
communication
Strategies to raise public awareness about gender problems through critical games
Prosperi, Valeria
PART 5. Criticism of reality and the representation of gender roles in the field of social,
economic and scientific labor relations
Women´s war work through a gendered lens: a critical feminist analysis of media representations of
women´s labour in the Canadian press (1939-1945)
Moniz, Tracy
ABSTRACTS
Telling the truth about Media and gender equality
Mariapia Ciaghi
Anti-violence initiatives in Europe: a comparative study on visual discourse to end gender-based violence
in Austria and Spain
Wolf, Birgit
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PART 1. The representation of male and female
identities in the media in any format
5
WITCHING AND BITCHING: GENDER REPRESENTATION IN
CONTEMPORARY SPANISH FILM
Irene Baena Cuder
School of Film, Television and Media Studies
University of East Anglia
i.baena-cuder@uea.ac.uk
Abstract: in the last thirty years Spanish women have entered the public sphere and have
achieved a progressive empowerment in their struggle for gender equality. These changes in
women’s roles have provoked anxiety among some men, who see them as a threat to their
privileged position in patriarchal society. This tension is suggested or openly depicted in
contemporary Spanish horror films created by a new generation of young male filmmakers in
which the threat and the element that brings horror to the narrative is usually a female character.
The film Witching and Bitching aka Las brujas de Zugarramurdi (de la Iglesia, 2013) offers a
filmic materialisation of this tension within the Spanish context, by presenting a battle between
male identities in crisis, anxious about the emergent role of women, and strong, independent
female characters, who are depicted as monsters.
Keywords: Gender, masculinity, monstrous-feminine, identity, horror film, Spanish cinema
1.Introduction
Women were the great defeated in the Spanish Civil War, independently of the side they
supported. The rights they had achieved during the Government of the Second Republic
were denied by the Franco's fascist regime, which imposed over women an extremely
reactionary role. Thus, according to the new order established, women had to stay at
home, looking after the house and the family, preserving family values and the Roman
Catholic moral. As a consequence, "until 1975, the date of Franco's death, a married
woman in Spain could not open a bank account, buy a car, apply for a passport, or even
work without her husband's approval, and he had the right to claim her salary"
(Montero, 1995: 381). With the transition into Democracy, Spanish society started a
process of deep change that had a special impact on women who started to move away
from these roles and to strive for others that had been denied to them for so long. In the
last thirty years women have entered the public sphere and have achieved a progressive
empowerment in their struggle for gender equality. These changes in women’s roles
have provoked anxiety among some men, who see them as a threat to their privileged
position in patriarchal society. This tension is suggested or openly depicted in
contemporary films, particularly within the horror genre, as one filmic materialisation of
this tension is the representation of strong and/or independent female characters as
monsters. However, these anxieties resulting from the emergent role of women in
society are present in most of Western societies and so is its filmic materialisation,
mainly but not exclusively, through monstrous representations of women, female bodies
and femininity in general, as Barbara Creed pointed out in The Monstrous-Feminine.
Film, Feminism, Psychoanalysys (Creed, 1993).
The film Witching and Bitching, aka Las Brujas de Zugarramurdi (de la Iglesia,
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2013) offers a good example of a filmic representation of this male tension
towards the female empowerment. The film was released in Spain the 27th of
September 2013 and its release was surrounded by controversy, due to the way it
portrays women as monsters and men as sympathetic victims. “La última película de
Alex de la Iglesia se caracteriza tanto por un enfoque misógino basado en los
estereotipos de la guerra de sexos, como por unas brujas con discurso feminista que se
libran de la hoguera” (the last Alex de la Iglesia's film is characterised both by its
misogynistic approach based on sex war stereotypes and witches with a feminist
discourse who avoid the stake) (Píkara magazine 31/10/2013). The film introduces a
desperate father who organises and perpetrates a robbery and tries to escape to France.
However, his initiative will be abruptly interrupted by a coven in Zugarramurdi, who
has another plan for his young son.
2. Hypothesis
The film is told from the male point of view and it displays male and female characters
in opposition to each other and in an open confrontation. Thus, whereas male characters
are in crisis and fighting to regain their advantageous position in a patriarchal society,
female characters are depicted as monsters, organised in a threatening matriarchy. This
dichotomy seems to give expression to the shared gender anxieties mentioned above,
resulting from the emergent role of women in contemporary Spain. Furthermore, Álex
de la Iglesia, the director of the film, recently commented in an interview with Diario
Público: "hay en la película cosas que me han pasado a mí. (...) De alguna manera, la
película refleja un sentir extendido" (there are things in the film that have actually
happened to me (…) somehow, the film reflects a shared feeling) (Diario Público 2209-2013), when asked about the relation between men and women in the film.
Moreover, the director openly talks about his fear of women in the same interview.
3. Methods
The methodology used was textual analysis framed mainly in Creed's theory of the
Monstrous-feminine. Moreover, the analysis has been historically contextualised in
Spanish society and its recent past.
4. Results
Told from a male point of view, the film presents a group of male characters struggling
to cope with women in general. Moreover, these personae embody the masculinity
stereotype and therefore, cannot talk openly about their anxiety concerning women as,
according to this gender role, men cannot show any weakness or feelings: "they are
conditioned to keep their anxieties to themselves" (Horrocks, 1994:144). The film
seems, then, as a way to materialise these shared anxieties and release the tension
through the comedy catharsis. As the filmmaker has expressed, "es una forma de reírme
de mis carencias y de mis problemas" ("It is a way to laugh about my lacks and my
problems") (Publico, 22/09/2013)
4.1 Men on the verge of a nervous breakdown
The male protgonists of the film embody different kind of gender tension related to
women. As they explain, they have been suffering this anxiety for some time
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and it was just a matter of time that they exploded. The catalyst of this explosion is
José's (Hugo Silva) divorce and his powerlessness regarding his son's custody. He
is living a situation of disadvantage in relation to his ex-wife and he cannot cope with
that. Thus, he decides to abduct the child, rob a we buy gold shop and escape to France,
where he hopes to start a new life, without his ex-wife.
The film introduces the protagonist duo (Silva and Casas) far from the galán roles that
they usually play. They are dressed as Jesus Christ and a soldier, two highly influential
symbols in masculine identities, and they carry heavy weaponry, displaying power.
After several comments disapproving the involvement of his son in the robbery, Jose
(Silva) breaks down while committing the crime and yells that he has had enough of
"the maintenance pension, the judges and his witch of a mother!" He cannot repress his
feeling any longer and he explodes. As Horrocks explains, "some men are fed up and
angry at being constrained (...) expected to always cope, not to collapse" (Horrocks,
1994:. 143). The tension can be observed in the filmmaking too; short shots full of
movement, close ups and a small indoor filming location. It all contributes to increase a
claustrophobic feeling. Significantly, another male character in the scene feels identified
with Jose and starts criticising his ex-wife and complaining about judges favouring
women in divorces. In their attempt to escape the police, they get into a taxi and abduct
the taxi driver and a customer. The film's pace slows down and Jose has calm down
now. At this point, the film has become a buddy road movie and the taxi offers the
perfect intimate locus in which the male characters open to each other and bond, thanks
to the outburst of sincerity and the common cause of their problems. Close shots, low
lights and a small, closed location in movement, help to express this confessional
atmosphere. On one hand, Antonio, Toni, (Casas) does not understand his girlfriend.
She is a mystery to him. He embodies the anxiety of some men who do not know how
to relate with women and who do not understand them. "tenemos escasa capacidad de
comprensión del mundo de las mujeres" (we have a very limited comprehension of
women's world) (Público, 22/09/2013) states de la Iglesia . Moreover, he tells his new
friends that Sonia, his girlfriend, is a wealthy lawyer "working on very important cases".
Furthermore, he states in a close-up that he lost his job and he is afraid of telling her and
that is the reason why he was involved in the robbery. The taxi driver, Manuel, sums up
his feelings when he suggests that he is, in fact, scared of her. Although Toni responds
violently to this suggestion (his manliness is being questioned) he finally admits that he
is. On the other hand, Manuel, confesses that he shares a lot with the fugitives as, in his
own words, "women have ruined my life too". He continues saying that his mother, his
sister and his wife frequently met for coffee and criticise him (a small familiar coven?)
Even Sergio, Jose's son, shares this disgust about women and complaints about how
girls at his school tell everything to each other, promoting an idea of women gossiping
and plotting against men that will be further explored when describing female identities.
However, they also want to make clear that they are not misogynistic: "I adore women"
Toni states. Thus, they love and fear women at the same time. Following inevitably this
collective expression of fear and intimidation in relation to women ends up in another
intimate and confessional conversation about erectile dysfunction. As Horrocks points
out, "the penis is the source of a man's greatest vulnerability, and his greatest feeling of
power" Thus, the author continues, "the erection becomes a fetish that measures one's
manhood, virility" (Horrocks, 1994:162-163). Moreover, Peter Lehman stresses out the
importance of making a distinction between penis and phallus. “The penis is the literal
organ and the phallus is a symbolic concept” (Lehman, 2007 p.5) Thus, whereas all the
characters in the car possess the first one, their complaints seem to be related
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with the lack of the second one, the phallus and this lack, as they express, is
related to women. Manuel relates a failed sexual experience with a "perfect
woman" who intimidated him so much that he could not get an erection. This dialogue
positions these personae far from the traditional male stereotypical character of the
galán or the macho ibérico (Iberian macho), the stereotypical hyper masculine
stereotype of "man as provider and taker of erotic initiatives" (Perriam 2003:97, quoted
in Triana-Toribio, 2004:152). In addition, the protagonist trio represent a type of male
identity not very frequently represented in our national cinema. "If we look at the actors
that have recently represented Spanishness and maleness for foreign and local
audiences, we find that the most common type is that of the photogenic lead
exemplified by Antonio Banderas, or Javier Bardem" (Triana-Toribio, 2004:152). The
director was aware of the sex appeal of the protagonist duo, particularly among young
audiences, thanks to their work in television in popular shows like, Al Salir de Clase
(Jongen, Zaramella, Palencia, Cuadri, 1997-2002), Paco's men (Pina, Écija, 2005-2009)
or, more recently, The boat (Escobar, Pina 2011-2013). Moreover, he has referred to the
duo as "seductores" (Seducers a la Don Juan) , where he also explains how they attract
"colas y colas de mujeres que quieren verles" (queues and queues of women waiting to
see them) (Fotogramas, 27/09/2013) and the couple has shared protagonism in
numerous marketing photo shoots, interviews and magazine covers (el País,
20/09/2013; Cinemania, Septiembre 2013; Fotogramas, 27/09/2013). However, their
personae do not represent this image of galan to which both of them are used to.
Instead, the characters embody the feeling of frustration and vulnerability that they
discuss in the intimacy of the taxi. They depict masculinity in crisis and the filmmaker
has decided to exploit it in a cathartic, comic way. "They remind me of Tony Curtis and
Roger Moore" confesses the director about the comic duo Silva-Casas (Público 22-092013). As Silva and de la Iglesia stated in interviews, Jose, Toni and Manuel are
"pobres diablos" (poor devils) (Fotogramas 27/09/2013) and other men identify
themselves and pity them at the same time. "Me hace gracia y me da pena" (I find it
funny and sad) says the director (Público 22-09-2013). After expressing openly their
feelings to each other, the group realises that women are their common enemy. Then,
they turn against women once again, expressing how they feel vulnerable and afraid to
be abandoned. "They are demons!", resumes Toni. Carried away by the male bonding,
Manuel states that he feels "one of the gang now" and he expresses his admiration for
Jose and his initiative, saying that he "would have liked to do the same thing but didn't
have the balls to do it", praising his virility at the same time. Nevertheless, the
momentum is abruptly interrupted by a civil guard car and the resulting persecution. As
a result, they end up, unknowingly in Zugarramurdi, the Spanish Salem and home of
Spanish witches, who will put an end to their bromance.
Meanwhile, another car is working as well as male confessional locus: a police car.
Calvo (Nieto) and Pacheco (de la Rosa) are a couple of police detectives investigating
Jose's crime who have decided to follow Silvia, Jose's ex-wife hoping that she will lead
them to the fugitives. Soon, both men engage in a conversation about women. Detective
Calvo shares his thoughts on the case. He thinks Silvia is involved in Jose's plan as an
accomplice but Pacheco disagrees as he thinks that “she is only a worried mother”.
However, Calvo starts talking freely about women in general and how “they are never
thinking what they seem to be thinking”. Moreover, he admits he has no idea of what
they really think and then, he compares them to spiders and how they spin a
comfortable spider web around you only to poison you when you less expect it. This
statement deepens in the idea of women as treacherous, cold, manipulative and
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evil and how men know little about them. Pacheco deduces that he has problems
with his wife/partner Raquel. Then, Calvo advices Pacheco to leave his girlfriend,
in case he has one, because “en cuanto sepa que te tiene cogido por los huevos !te los
arranca de cuajo!” (as soon as she finds she's got you by the balls, she'll cut them off!)
Nevertheless, when Pacheco feels death is close after being captured by the coven, he
confesses Calvo that he has feelings for him. The film introduces this homosexual
identity as an alternative to the heterosexual masculine one. Moreover, at the end of the
film, these personae will represent a non-traditional nuclear family formed by the two
detectives and a rescued victim from the witches; a womanless happy family.
4.2 "La bruja de tu madre" (your witch of a mother)
The depiction of the witches in the film seems to be strongly influenced by Goya's El
Aquelarre or El Gran Cabrón, included in the painter's famous Pinturas Negras (Goya,
1820-1823), which supposes one of the main referent to witches representation in Spain.
Thus, the mise en scéne, the closed location in a cave and the chiaroscuro lightning
remind of this painting. However, the main difference that the film introduces not only
in relation to Goya's work but also in relation to other cinematic depictions of witches is
the fact that there are no male figures among the witches, not even the devil or a male
evil spirit. As a result, whereas the witches in El Aquelarre are gathered around a male
central figure known as El Gran Cabrón (The big male goat), who represents the devil,
in de la Iglesia's film, the witches summon a female goddess who represents female
power, matriarchy and the cult to the feminine.
Regarding the narrative, as Creed states, “there is one incontestably monstrous role in
the horror film that belongs to woman – that of the witch” (Creed, 1993:73).
Consequently, all female characters in the film without exception are represented as evil
witches who torment men. Only Silvia, Jose's ex-wife and Sergio's mother, starts the
film as a woman who becomes a witch when she meets the coven in Zugarramurdi. We
first know Silvia through Jose's comments about her, when he breaks down and tell
everybody that he is “fed up with the divorce, the shared custody and the witch of his
mother!”, referring to her. Later in the film there is a phone conversation in which she
calls Jose to check on how is her son. This conversation ends up in an agitated
discussion. However, we do not see her on the screen until a police officer informs her
about the robbery and his son's abduction by his father. Then, we can see that she is a
nurse, working at a hospital and, as soon as she knows what have happened, she runs
after his son in order to save him since she does not trust in the police to find and save
his son. As soon as the witches find out about her presence in the house in
Zugarramurdi, they make her one of them, taking part in the ritual and offering his son
to the mother goddess. There is a physical transformation that shows her becoming
witch. She wears the same dark eye shadow around the eyes, her hair is undone and she
is dirty. She is now the witch her ex-husband thought she was when he introduced her to
the audience.
The first female characters to appear in the film are the witch protagonist trio formed by
grandmother Maritxu (Pávez), mother Graciana (Maura) and daughter Eva (Bang). They
are shown plotting around a cauldron therefore they are organised and they already have
a plan in which the male characters play a part. They have foreseen what is about to
happen: the robbery and the escape plan to France. This brief sequence defines the
behaviour and the role that the witches are going to have throughout the film
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and Graciana is pointed as the leader of the coven. Furthermore, it depicts women
as cunning and manipulative as, according to de la Iglesia, "Los hombres somos
seres medio tontos que vivimos en un mundo de confusión. Y las mujeres lo tienen todo
clarísimo y nos manipulan" (men are silly human beings who live in a world of
confusion) (Diario Público 22-09-2013).
The next time we meet the witches is when the male protagonists arrive to
Zugarramurdi. This village is known because the Spanish Inquisition judged forty
women for witchcraft and burnt eleven of them in 1610 (Dueso, 2010). Legends of
aquelarres (coven meetings to perform rituals) are frequent in the area and the story was
first taken to the cinema in 1984 with the film Akelarre (Olea, 1984).
«Los juicios por brujería serían una manera expeditiva y aleccionadora de
imponer la nueva doctrina religiosa imperante, en este caso, el catolicismo, y, de paso,
dar
un escarmiento ejemplarizante utilizando como cabeza de turco a los individuos
más díscolos de un determinado grupo social» (Dueso, 2010:47), y, al mismo
tiempo, eliminar
a la mujer de su rol preponderante a nivel social y religioso”
(Witchcraft trials were a way to impose the new doctrine (in this particular situation,
Catholic doctrine) and to set an example by using the more unruly individuals as
scapegoats. Women were also targetted in order to deprive them of any soical and
religious power/influence. (Vilariño 2012:556).
De la Iglesia chose Zugarramurdi because to him, “Zugarramurdi es símbolo de una
cultura y una religión alternativa en Euskadi. Con el poder matriarcal, los akelarres, la
lucha contra el pensamiento occidental... Es el reino de la diosa madre y de todo lo que
supone la religión ancestral”. (Zugarramurdi is a symbol of an alternative culture and
religion in the Basque country. With matriarchal power, akelarres, the fight against
occidental thinking... it's the realm of the mother goddess and everything involved in
ancient religion) (Público 22/09/2013). Moreover, he decided to film in the real
locations in which the events took place in the XVII century, including the cave.
However, the storyline is not that of a witch hunt in which women try to prove their
innocence or that in which a coven perform a ritual and summon the devil. This is a
male story in which men are the victims of powerful witches seeking justice so they can
recover the place they deserve in society. They want to bring the goddess mother back
to the world and stop the worshipping of the “false prophet”. The female goddess works
as a symbol of femininity and ultimately, what they plan is to end patriarchy. As a
consequence, women are represented as monsters. They bring horror to the narrative as
male characters fear them but, where is the root of this fear? As Creed points out, the
R.C. Church accused women of “copulating with the devil, causing male impotence,
causing the penis to disappear and of stealing men's penises” (Creed, 1993:75). As a
result, it seems that the fear of witches and its consequent persecution is based on a
“morbid interest of witch as other and a fear of the witch/woman as an agent of
castration” (Creed, 1993:73). A materialisation of this male anxiety takes place in the
house's kitchen, when Maritxu puts on a metallic, sharp set of teeth and shows it,
menacing, to Toni, who is then shown in a close up shot displaying his face in fear. This
image is a reference to the vagina dentata and the fear of castration. Moreover, Maritxu
will attack Toni and bite him in an arm. It seems then, that the trope of witch to depict
woman is very suitable in a story told from a male point of view in which men feel
powerless and their virility is threatened by intimidating, empowered women.
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In addition, the male personae seem astonished when they encounter the witches,
who have an empowered identity, very different from the traditional female
othered role that they expect from women in a patriarchal society. For example, when
Maritxu is introduced in the storyline, running a bar to which the group of men will
soon arrive, she is represented as a very strong, assertive, bad-tempered, bossy old lady.
She is rude to her customers and she repeatedly insults and even hits a man who seems
to be related to her in some way. She is the boss and consequently she has the authority
in the bar. Nevertheless, when Jose and his friends arrive to the place, looking for some
food and rest before crossing the border, he feels empowered, particularly after his
friends' support. The camerawork shows him empowered as well, using low angle shots
that give an image of dominance. However, Maritxu does not recognise this authority
and she addresses to them like she does to the rest of the people in the bar,
disrespectfully. Soon the men will feel uncomfortable around her and will leave the
place at once. They are afraid of her. Furthermore, the witches are monsters because
they reject the “proper feminine role” (Creed, 1993:42), bringing abjection to the
narrative. When Eva is alone in her room, sexually playing with a broom, Jose and Toni
observe her as voyeurs. Then, Toni asks the other peeping Tom what she is doing with
the broom and Jose answers: “barrer no, desde luego” (definitely not sweeping the
floor). The men are turned on by her sexual game but they also point out to how she
does not meet the traditional female role of woman as house keeper, always engaged in
cleaning and domestic jobs. Thus, the witches have broken the boundaries between
male and female roles and stereotypes and they do not recognise patriarchal authority.
Moreover, their intention is to destroy patriarchy and bring back the cult to the primitive
mother goddess who ruled the world before the advent of Christianity in an attempt to
establish a matriarchy. As a result, not only the witches but everything related to the
feminine is depicted as monstrous. Their body, thanks to the help of the make-up and
special effects teams is constructed to make them look dreadful. Dark eye shadow,
surrounding the eyes, eye lenses and radical hairdos help harden their features. In
addition, when the coven is trying to capture the group of men, the witches move like
animals, jumping to the walls and walking on the ceiling. Furthermore, the coven will
meet to hold an aquelarre and they perform a ceremony in order to summon the mother
goddess. This part of the film takes place in a “terrible place, most often a house or a
tunnel, in which victims sooner or later find themselves is a venerable element of
horror.” (Clover, 1992:30). Thus, the group of men become victims once they have
entered and old mansion and the house is a domestic, traditional female locus.
Moreover, the ritual mentioned to summon the mother goddess takes place in a dark
cave connected by dark tunnels that remind to a intra-uterine cavity. “This intra-uternine
settings consist of dark, narrow, winding passages leading to a central room, cellar or
other symbolic place of birth”. (Creed, 1993:53). Finally, the most significant element
of horror in the narrative is the figure of the goddess mother of the world, which is not
only linked to femininity but also represents it. She is shown as a huge naked female
body in the shape of the Palaeolithic Venus of Willendorf, with big breasts and a big
womb that is believed to represent fertility.
“In it we see all the strange laws of primitive earth-cult. Woman is idol and object,
goddess and prisoner. She is buried in the bulging mass of her own fecund body” (
Paglia,1990:54) As any other power of nature, this eternally pregnant figure is the giver
of life but can also be destructive, as we observe when she steps on some witches, as
she cannot see. Moreover, as everything feminine in the film, she is depicted as
monstrous. Thus, she is a mother and a goddess and she is a monster too. “Kristeva
discusses the way in which the fertile female body is constructed as an abject in
12
order to keep the subject separate from the phantasmatic power of the mother”
(Creed, 1993:25). Thus, witches evil power seems to be ”part of her feminine
nature”, linking monstrousness to the female reproductive system (Creed 1993:76-77),
in this film, particularly birth, since the goddess is the Mother of the world. The
primitive ritual’s zenith takes place when the goddess swallows the chosen one, in this
case, Jose’s son, Sergio, and later she gives birth to him. The process is displayed
carefully, including what happens inside the goddess’ body. The boy travels from
mouth to bottom, coming out by the anus and not the vagina. When the boy is expelled
from the body, he is covered in body fluids, like an actual birth and he is welcomed in
her real mother’s arms. Again, this sequence remembers to some Goya's works, incuded
in the collection known as Caprichos in which we can find several depictions of
witches, such as Proclamación de Brujas (Witches Proclamation) (Goya, 1797) or
Sueño 6. Pregon de Brujas proibiendo a las que no pasan de treinta años, por mas
merito que tengan (Dream 6. Witches Announcement forbidding those who are not over
thirty, despite their merit) (Goya, 1796-1797). Both drawings have a main female figure
holding a small boy like a wind instrument. Thus, it looks like she was going to devour
him but she is, in fact, insufflating air to his body and the air comes out from the boy's
anus. On one hand, the drawings relate to the idea of the human body as empty, without
any organs. Thus the air come in through the mouth and it is immediately expelled by
the anus, just like, in the film, the boy comes into the goddess body through the mouth
and he is almost immediately expelled by her anus. On the other hand, both witches
have wide hips and voluminous bellies that “revela su capacidad sexual o tal vez su
embarazo” (reveals her sexual capacity or perhaps a pregnancy) (Mena Marqués, 2012),
which reminds to the mother goddess' body and her “inflated mounds of breast, belly
and buttock” (Paglia, 1990) Moreover, in Sueño 6 Pregón de Brujas, there is also a
Dominican monk who is represented wearing donkey's ears, a symbol of ignorance. The
Dominican order was responsible for the Inquisition, the institution that prosecuted and
burnt the witches in Zugarramurdi.Regarding the witches' main occupations at the time,
Mena Marqués explains how “El ejercicio de la profesión de sanadoras y parteras
residía asimismo en la autorización de la Iglesia, que se oponía a todo conocimiento
empírico y desconfiaba por ello de la autoridad y del poder de esas mujeres”(healers and
midwives needed an official authorisation from the R.C.Church, which opposed to their
empirical knowledge and, consequently, mistrusted the authority and the power of these
women) (Mena Marqués, 2012). This repression from the R.C.Church over women,
which is not exclusive of this film, is expressed in the film by the witches' plan's main
aim, which is to put an end to the reign of the “false prophet” and to bring back the
worship to the goddess mother. Goya also shows this repression or injustice over
women through the drawing mentioned above. Nevertheless, Goya includes men among
the witches whereas the film does not, although we know that there were men among
the judged for witchcraft by the Inquisition in Zugarramurdi. This fact only increases
the director's intention to represent a sex war and a genuinely female monster.
5. Conclusions
Male characters depict alternative identities to those of the Iberian macho. They mainly
embody an identity in crisis, provoked by the empowerment of women. They share
collective anxieties that they have repressed for a long time as the ideal of masculinity
involves not expressing any kind of feelings and to live any circumstance in life
stoically. When they finally open up to each other, they find out that women and their
emergent role in society, are the origin of their problems. Thus, they see strong
13
women as a threat to their virility. As a result, all female personae are portrayed as
monsters; evil witches who manipulate and other men. With the purpose of
restoring the order, the male characters have to defeat the witches and eliminate the
threat the empowered women suppose. Consequently, the end of the film is meant to be
a happy ending in which men have overcome their identity crisis. They are shown
happy, as they have restored the patriarchal order in which they hold the power and
authority. Thus, Jose is again the pater familias of a nuclear family and Toni has
regained his confidence and he takes his girlfriend's mobile phone and hang up,
stopping her to attend a call from work. He is no longer intimidated by a successful
career woman. They are in charge now. They have the authority. In addition, Pacheco
and Calvo represent an alternative, equally masculine, nuclear family after symbolically
adopting Luismi, Eva's imprisoned brother. Although this seems to be a happy
(patriarchal) ending, the witches are shown in this last sequence, observing the group of
men from the distance. Silvia has taken Eva's place in the coven and they laugh because
they know that sooner or later their time will come and they will finally have their
justice. This ambiguous ending, that offer several readings, might be caused by the
director's wish of filming a sequel (fotogramas.es, 16/10/2013). Moreover, in this
interview, the director expressed his opinion of including "más monstruos y más
aquelarre, solo para joder" (more monsters and covens, only to bug you)
6. List of references
Clover, C.J. (1992) Men, Women and Chain saws: Gender in Modern Horror Film.
New Jersey, Princeton University Press
Creed, B (1993)The Monstrous-Feminine. Film, Feminism, Psychoanalysis. London;
New
York,Routledge
Dueso Alarcón, J. (2010) Historia y Leyenda de las brujas de Zugarramurdi: de los
akelarres navarros a las hogueras riojanas. San Sebastián: Txertoa
Horrocks, R. (1994) Masculinity in Crisis: Myths, Fantasies and Reality. Basingstoke :
Macmillan
Lehman, P. (2007) Running Scared. Masculinity and the Representation of the Male
Body. Detroit, Wayne State University Press
Mena Marqués, M. (2012) “Proclamación de brujas”, in J. M. Matilla, M. B. Mena
Marqués (dir.)(2012) Goya: Luces y Sombras, Barcelona: Fundación "la Caixa",
Barcelona: Obra Social "la Caixa"-Madrid: Museo Nacional del Prado. p. 144, n.
27
Montero, R. (1995) “The Silent Revolution: The Social and Cultural Advances of
Women in Democratic Spain” in Helen Graham and Jo Labanyi (eds) Spanish
Cultural Studies: an introduction: the struggle for modernity. Oxford: Oxford
University
Press.
Pp
381-386
Paglia, C. (1990) Sexual Personae. Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily
Dickinson. Yale University Press
14
Perriam, Ch. (2003) Stars and Masculinities in Spanish Cinema: from Banderas to
Bardem. New York: Oxford University Press
Triana-Toribio, N. (2004) Live Flesh: The Male Body in Contemporary Spanish
Cinema. London. Tauris
Vilariño,
J.
J.(2012)
“José
Dueso
Historia
y
leyenda de las brujas de Zugarramurdi. De los akelarres navarros a las hogueras
riojanas” El Futuro del Pasado : Revista Electrónica de Historia. Vol.3(0), p.554
Online Publications:
Castejón, M. (2013) “Las brujas de Zugarramurdi: entre el sexismo feroz y la
reivindicación”
Píkara magazine
31/10/2013 Available from
(http://www.pikaramagazine.com/2013/10/las-brujas-de-zugarramurdi-entre-elsexismo-feroz-y-la-reivindicacion/#sthash.4hcnuHUN.dpuf)
Viewed
on
February 2014.
Fotogramas.es (2013) “ Álex de la Iglesia sueña con dirigir la segunda parte de Las
brujas
de
Zugarramurdi”.
Fotogramas.es
Available
from
(http://www.fotogramas.es/Noticias/Cine-espanol/Alex-de-la-Iglesia-suena-condirigir-la-segunda-parte-de-Las-brujas-de-Zugarramurdi). Viewed on February
2014.
Guimón, P. (2013) “Un Aquekarre Delirante” El País, 20/09/2013. Available from
(http://elpais.com/elpais/2013/09/20/eps/1379688756_980243.html). Viewed in
January and February 2014.
Marañón, C. (2013) “Las Brujas de Zugarramurdi”. Cinemanía, 27/09/2013. Available
from
(http://www.cinemania.es/criticas/detalle/18667/las-brujas-de-zugarramurdi).
Viewed on January and February 2014.
Montoya, A. (2013) “Entrevista al director y los protagonistas de 'Las Brujas de
Zurragamurdi”
Fotogramas
27/09/2013
Available
from
(http://www.fotogramas.es/Peliculas/Las-brujas-de-Zugarramurdi/Alex-de-laIglesia-Hugo-Silva-Mario-Casas-y-sus-problemas-con-las-brujas) Viewed on
January and February 2014.
Piña, B. (2013) “Entrevista con Álex de la Iglesia”. Diario Público 22/09/2013.
Available from (http://www.publico.es/culturas/469758/prefiero-ser-malo-quetonto)Viewed on January and February 2014.
Films and tv series
Akelarre (1984) Directed
Cinematográficas
by
Pedro
Olea.
Vitoria:
Amboto
Producciones
15
Al Salir de Clase (1997-2002) Created by Pascal Jongen, Eduardo Zaramella, Elio
Palencia and Antonio Cuadri. Madrid: Bocaboca Producciones.
Los Hombres de Paco (2005-2009) Created by Álex Pina and Daniel Écija. Madrid:
Globomedia.
The boat (2011-2013) Created by Iván Escobar and Álex Pina. Madrid: Globomedia.
Witching and Bitching (2013) Directed by Álex de la Iglesia. Madrid: Enrique Cerezo
Producciones S.A.
Paintings/Drawings/Engravings:
de Goya y Lucientes, F. (1820-1823) El Aquelarre or El Gran Cabrón. Online image
available
at
(https://www.museodelprado.es/goya-en-elprado/obras/ficha/goya/el-aquelarre-o-el-grancabron/?tx_gbgonline_pi1%5Bquery%5D=el%20aquelarre&tx_gbgonline_pi1%
5Bgosort%5D=b&tx_gbgonline_pi1%5Bgonavmode%5D=search)
de Goya y Lucientes, F. (1797) Proclamación de Brujas. Online image available at
(https://www.museodelprado.es/goya-en-elprado/obras/ficha/goya/proclamacion-debrujas/?tx_gbgonline_pi1%5Bquery%5D=aquelarre&tx_gbgonline_pi1%5Bgos
ort%5D=b&tx_gbgonline_pi1%5Bgonavmode%5D=search)
de Goya y Lucientes, F. (1796-1797) Sueño 6 Pregón de Brujas prohibiendo a las que
no pasan de treinta años, por más mérito que tengan. Online image available at
(https://www.museodelprado.es/goya-en-el-prado/obras/ficha/goya/sueno-6pregon-de-brujas-proibiendo-a-las-que-no-pasan-de-treinta-anos-por-masmerito-que-tengan/)
16
HOW GENDER REPRESENTATIONS MATTER WITH GENERATION
IN TELEVISION?
Bertrand Levant
Département Études et Recherches
Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel
bertrand.levant@csa.be
Hanot Muriel
Département Études et Recherches
Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel
muriel.hanot@csa.be
Sabri Derinoz
Communication publicitaire, Diversité & Égalité
Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel
sabri.derinoz@csa.be
Abstract: this paper focuses on gender representations disparities observed in media by surveys lead in
the French speaking part of Belgium. It investigates how men and women representations evolve when
dealing with age. Interesting results have occurred: with young people, there’s a clear trend towards more
equality in terms of gender representations while with elder people, women suffer from greater and
greater inequalities when they grow older. This paper attempts to identify factors explaining how gender
representations matters with generation in television by using quantitative and qualitative indicators.
Keywords: television, appearances, gender representations, age, generation, societal changes, media
practices
In 2011, 2012 and 2013, The Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel1 of the French speaking
community of Belgium carried out three surveys (CSA, 2011 ; CSA,2012 ; CSA,2013)
concerning diversity and equality for 26 French speaking Belgian broadcasters’ 2
contents. They were based on a sample of one week’s programs monitored under five
diversity axes: sex, age, profession, origin and disability. Each person considered as
intervening was indexed under such criteria identifiable on television and giving
indications on the type of intervening, the type of intervention and the context of
appearance. These three quantitative surveys with qualitative aspects have made it
possible to determine trends seen in French speaking Belgian broadcasters’ practices
regarding diversity and equality.
Focusing on both sex and age criteria, two main trends from the three surveys are
obvious for all the media analyzed: women and old people are under-represented on
screen in comparison to their respective proportion in society. So, in 2013, the
proportion of women appearing on screen reaches only 36,88% (31,47% in 2011 and
33,5% in 2012) while they represented 50,92% of the Belgian society (Statistics
Belgium, 2013). The proportion of senior citizens of over 65 years old reaches only
The Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel of Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles is an independent
administrative authority in charge of broadcasting regulation within the French speaking community of
Belgium : http://www.csa.be/
2 In 2013, it represents 12 local public service channels and 14 “national” channels: 3 general public
service channels, 5 general private channels and 6 “thematic” private channels (cinema, sports, leisure,
people, economy). Always in 2013, the sample represents more than 430 hours of programs and 63.568
people indexed.
1
17
3,74% (2,68% in 2011 and 3,65% in 2012) of interventions while this category
represented 17,65% of the Belgian society the same year. This underrepresentation of old people has to be read with the over-representation of younger
categories. Always in 2013, people from 19 to 34 years represented 43,73% of all
appearances (37,13% in 2011 and 30,46% in 2012), while they are 20,15% of the
Belgian population in 2010 (Statistics Belgium, 2010). These gaps between
representations in TV and representations within society decrease for the 35-49 years
and 50-64 years brackets but confirm one phenomenon: the gradual withdrawal, agewise, of people appearing on TV.
G1 : Men/women appearances in TV (2013)
> 65 years
70,75%
50-64 years
29,25%
77,92%
35-49 years
65,42%
19-34 years
34,58%
55,44%
13-18 years
Women
50,36%
59,56%
0%
Men
44,56%
49,64%
< 12 years
22,08%
40,44%
50%
100%
If we combine both sex and age criteria, we observe in the three surveys that the
proportion of women appearing on screen decreases gradually from the 13-18 years
bracket where the proportion is the most important to reach its lowest rate for people
between 50 and 64 years old (see graph 1). Moreover, focusing on people of whom age
and sex have been identified, a double phenomenon can be observed: not only women
are under-represented in comparison to men, but they are under-represented especially
as they are aging (see table 1). So, in regards of people aged between 19 and 34 years
old, women represent 19,6% of interventions, meaning more than half of all
interventions on TV in 2013, and almost twice more than what they represent in society.
Concerning the 35-49 age bracket and the others following, the proportion of women
intervening on TV keeps on going down below their real proportion in Belgium. There
is only 1,08% of all appearances of people of 65 years and more, which represents
barely a ninth of this bracket’s real proportion in Belgium. Concerning the opposite
gender, similarly to women of the same age group, men aged between 19 and 34 are
over-represented. Unlike women, this over-representation of men remains in the 35 to
49 age bracket and they are represented more or less proportionally as their percentage
in population in the 50 to 64 age bracket. They are besides much better represented for
the 65 years and more, despite their lesser proportion in society in comparison to
women (ratio of 1 : 2,77 for men while 1 : 9,19 for women).
T1 : Men/women distribution by age in TV appearances and in Belgium
Baromètre 2013
Belgium 2010
Age
M
W
Total
M
W
Total
< 12 years
4,06%
2,75%
6,81%
7,49%
7,16%
14,65%
13-18 years
2,51%
2,54%
5,05%
3,59%
3,43%
7,02%
19-34 years
24,39% 19,60% 43,99%
10,11% 10,04% 20,15%
35-49 years
18,27% 9,65%
27,92%
11,00% 10,75% 21,75%
18
50-64 years
> 65 years
9,77%
2,61%
2,77%
1,08%
12,54%
3,69%
9,58%
7,23%
9,69%
9,93%
19,27%
17,16%
Total
61,60% 38,40% 100,00% 49,00% 51,00% 100,00%
Women suffer therefore a double discrimination because of gender and age. Two
indicators analyzed in the surveys, coupled with age criteria, can explain this double
phenomenon: professions identifiable on television and endorsed role by each of
intervening people.
The three surveys carried out in 2011, 2012 and 2013 revealed the stronghold of upper
socio-professional categories – SPC+ (managers, intellectual, artistic and scientific
professions) – figuring as intervening people whose profession was identifiable on
television. Indeed, in 2013, these categories represented 52,96% of identifiable
occupations (46,99% in 2012 and 46,32% in 2011). These results have to take into
account the fact that there are a lot of journalists intervening on TV, but it doesn’t
modify however this dominating representation: by isolating journalists, we reach
43,34% of intervening people whose identifiable occupations belong to SPC+ (37,3% in
2012 and 34,94% en 2011). For men just like for women, SPC+ stays the most
represented category in the three surveys, but it must be taken into account that some
variations for the other categories are not insignificant. By isolating the journalists and
other bias in the sample 3 , the second most represented category is systematically
inactive people for women and professional sportsperson for men. The proportion of
unemployment for women can be explained by the number of female students similar to
the number of male students on television, but these female students represent in
proportion a much more important share, because of the relative number of female
identified occupations in comparison to male identified occupations (on average three
male occupations are identified for one female occupation). The second place of
professional sportsmen can be explained by the fact that sports programs are mainly
focused on sportsmen than on sportswomen. Apart from these two variations, the
distribution of socio-professional categories represented in television is the same for
men as it is for women, by order and proportion, globally constant for the three surveys.
SPC+ are the most represented for men and women, they are also the ones that are most
subject to variations of sex and identified ages (see graph 2). Women with prestigious
occupations are more concentrated between 19 and 34 years whereas men appearing in
the same type of occupations appear more often between 35 and 49 years. This trend of
gradual slide of women occupying prestigious jobs with age becomes twice more
important if we consider another trend which is complementary to the former: the role
endorsed. Among all identified prestigious roles endorsed by women in the sample of
2013, 88,42% belong to SPC+ where it reaches 81,12% for men. Consequently, the
possibility to play a prestigious role is clearly determined by the social occupation, and
this condition is stronger for women. And this possibility fades also with age.
3
The 2013 sample has seen the number of « lifestyles » shows increases, where women are
predominantly represented. The coding of lonely hearts ads TV where only women appears have also
increase their proportion in the sample.
19
G2: Men/women distribution of professsions by age (2013)
80,00%
70,00%
60,00%
50,00%
Men - Others
40,00%
Men - SPC+
Women - Others
30,00%
Women - SPC+
20,00%
10,00%
0,00%
< 12
13-18
19-34
35-49
50-64
> 65
To summarize, these observations show two main trends:
1. Inequality between men and women in their representation on TV is a
phenomenon that intensifies with age: the older a woman is, the less likely
she will appear on television compared to a man of the same age.
2. Television highlights mainly prestigious occupations. Women with
prestigious occupations are less numerous on television and are more so with
age. This has a direct influence on the prestige of the role endorsed in TV.
This double discrimination of aging women can be explained by the following
hypotheses:
1. The gradual disappearance of aging women on TV is due to an endogenous
normative phenomenon related to the cohort to whom they belong: the (non)
public emphasis of their own image in the media.
2. The gradual disappearance of aging women on TV is due to a structural
phenomenon related to the cohorts to whom they belong: a disparity in
access and occupation of certain jobs, especially the prestigious ones.
3. The gradual disappearance of aging women on TV is due to a structuring
phenomenon of the media itself: the emphasis given to highlight younger
women or to ignore elder women.
Before discussing the elements allowing to confirm or reject the hypothesis previously
suggested, it is useful to compare these observations to other ones made on the same
basis and applied specifically to the representation of younger people on TV. Indeed, a
survey (CSA, 2013) on the image and the representation of children and young people
realized in 2013 on a different sample4 puts into perspective the first observations seen
in the three surveys of 2011, 2012 and 2013. The inequality of representations of men
and women for all the ages is much more tempered for the intervening people from 3 to
35 years, with a near equality for the entire sample: 49,91% of women for 51,09% of
men. However, it is necessary to take into account programs that over-represent one sex
or the other. So, by isolating on one side football programs where men are
4
Sample of 11.356 intervening people.
20
predominantly represented, and on the other, lonely hearts call-TV programs
where women are predominantly represented, this near equality has to be tempered
in the distribution of gender equality by ages (see graph 3).
G3: Young men/women appearances in TV
(2013)
26-30
55,55%
44,45%
19-25
54,25%
45,75%
13-18
52,06%
47,94%
3-12
55,27%
44,73%
0%
50%
Men
Women
100%
Nevertheless, this last observation must not diminish the first one: the study of
representation on TV of young people demonstrates a stronger rate of equality than the
studies on representations on TV of the Belgian population taken in all. The three
surveys mentioned above had already highlighted the fact that women were better
represented in the 13-18 age bracket and to a lesser extent in the 19-34 one. These basic
observations suggest three main hypotheses:
1. Structural phenomena in society can explain the fact that young people from
cohorts between 3 to 35 years today are better represented on TV in terms of
gender equality;
2. Structuring phenomena in the media can explain the fact that young people
from cohorts between 3 to 35 years today are better represented on TV in
terms of gender equality;
3. Egalitarian practices with young people in terms of gender equality are due
to the fact that they are young people, in relation with the nature of the
generation showed on television, and not in relation with the cohorts.
The analysis of few factors contributing to this relative equality of representation of
young men and young women allows to understand the nature of the phenomenon. The
identified occupations for each sex reveals a more or less equal distribution between
men and women, with few variations: the over-representation (massive, saying) of
sportsmen, the important presence of women in intermediary occupations due to
“lifestyles” programs, the important number of female journalists/anchorwomen
explaining the larger presence of women in SPC+.
T2 : Young men/women distribution of identified professions in TV (2013)
Professions
Men
Women Total
Sports
1171
11
1182
Intermediary professions
112
186
298
Nursery school students
11
27
38
Elementary school students
216
187
403
Secondary school students
126
99
225
Higher education students
62
49
111
Unemployed
people/job- 6
7
13
seekers
Social beneficiaries
1
1
2
21
SPC+
Low qualified professions
Army
Total
319
49
2073
502
7
2
1078
821
56
2
3151
This larger presence of female journalists/anchorwomen has direct consequences on the
presence time and speech time repartition (see table 3) between men and women (this
indicator was not estimated in the three first surveys). For the time of speech as for the
time of presence taken in absolute, we can indeed observe that they are longer for
women than for men. Isolating not only the speech time of journalists, but also
neutralizing sports programs massively male and night-time lonely hearts call TV
programs where only pictures of women related to the ads appear, no big disparities of
ages can be seen for the presence time and the speech time between men and women. In
fact, they are more or less perfectly equal under this criteria (see table 4).
T3 : Young men/women distribution of time of speech and appearances in TV
(2013)
Speech (in seconds)
Presence (in seconds)
Men
Women
Total
Men
Women
Total
3-12
2379
2144
4523
2279
1774
4053
13-18
1983
2704
4687
1996
1891
3887
19-25
20882
31022
51904
10648
23812
34460
26-30
30207
38848
69055
9323
19794
29117
Total
55451
74718
130169
24246
47271
71517
T4 : Young men/women distribution of time of speech and appearances in TV
without journalists, sportsmen and Call-TV appearances (2013)
Speech (in seconds)
Presence (in seconds)
Men
Women
Total
Men
Women
Total
3-12
1899
1871
3770
2133
1710
3843
13-18
1606
2475
4081
1647
1762
3409
19-25
11513
9220
20733
5496
6164
11660
26-30
10504
11849
22353
3638
2514
6152
Total
25522
25415
50937
12914
12150
25064
Two other criteria can help explaining trends of the equality of appearances of young
men and young women in the sample: appearance contexts and endorsed roles 5 .
Appearance contexts describe the surroundings of each intervening young person: TV
studios, streets or neighborhoods, sports areas, schools or classes, associations or youth
clubs, homes and institutions or companies. By analyzing the distribution by gender of
appearance contexts (see table 5), we observe that, globally, young men and young
women appear in a more or less egalitarian manner in all mentioned contexts except in
sports spaces and institutions/companies. Inequalities in contexts appearance can be
5
Factors of over-representations of one sex or another (sports programs, call-TV programs, journalists)
have been systematically neutralized.
22
understood by the male dominant representation of all in relation sports, including
sports spaces contexts of appearances, and independently to the sports dedicated
programs. Inequalities in appearances in institutional or company contexts give an
interesting indication, even if it represents a little of the total sample: on the 101 people
identified in institutional or company contexts, only a third were women. This very
relative result can be put into perspective with the social roles identified to young
people appearing on TV. On the 6628 young people whose social role could be
described (including having none), 690 have been identified as young workers (see table
6). And among these young workers, just a little bit more than a third (247) were
women. This disparity helps moreover to remind the observation of the other identified
social roles which are more or less equally distributed.
T5 : Men/women context of appearance distribution (2013)
Context
TV
Street/neighborhood
Sport areas
School/class
Association/youth club
Home
Institution/company
Other
Not identifiable
Total
Men
170
711
444
207
87
66
656
1037
3378
Women
195
676
177
229
3
120
35
786
1029
3250
T6 : Men/women social role distribution (2013)
Social role
Men
Women
Student
355
342
Street youth
81
60
Youth club member
5
2
Young worker
443
247
Youth movement member
10
8
Association member
18
14
Political party member
15
18
Field Activist
20
12
User/consumer
96
121
Artist
287
216
Other
43
28
No social role
2005
2181
Total
3378
3249
Total
365
1387
621
436
3
207
101
1442
2066
6628
Total
697
141
7
690
18
32
33
32
217
503
71
4186
6627
This observation, coupled with those established for the global sample as for the sample
focusing on young people, makes it possible to attempt a partial explanation to the
hypotheses proposed above: inequality between men and women in representation on
TV is more likely to occur when appearance contexts lead to a strong social
differentiation, like the professional world for example. Conversely, equality
23
between men and women in representation on TV is more likely to occur when
appearance contexts lead to a weak social differentiation, like the school
environment. In terms of access and representation of individuals, it could be an issue of
social status that determines that discriminations occurs or not on television, a social
status given – or aimed – by media and that individuals mediatize momentarily. In this
sense, it becomes possible that near egalitarian results for gender observed in the sample
focused on young people proceeds from a reduction to the fact that they belong to a
generation in which they are individually considered indifferent, despite the plurality of
their social and gender identities6. This suggests that, with age, media tends to operate
discriminations much more by individuation. These discriminations would be less
related to the fact that people from 35 to 49 or people from 50 to 64 belong to their
respective generations. It would be more related to social occupation and prestige which
comes with it on one side, and to normative systems structuring the representation of
men and women of these generations (those who have and will have from 35 to 49 or
from 50 to 64) or cohorts (those who have only today from 35 to 49 or from 50 to 64).
A study lead in the 1980’s on prime-time and week-end daytime network television
dramatic programming has showed that women are most concentrated in the 25 to 34
age bracket, while men are most concentrated in the 35 to 44 bracket (Gerbner and al.,
1980: 40). Moreover, the same study analyzed the gap between chronological age and
social age – life cycle stages. Systematically and for all chronological ages, a higher
social age is attributed more often to women than to men (young adults for 13-18,
settled adults for 19-29, older person for 55-64 and 65 and more). So, television seems
to depict always younger women than men. And they age faster than men. This
observation has strong consequences on the image of women showed in the media,
particularly on depreciation of importance and prestige of older women activities
(Signorielli, 2004: 296). Although this study was focusing on characters of dramatic
programming, which represent only a few of the samples analyzed here, the results of
the study quoted above gives similar trends: a little bit more than half (51,05%) of
women appearing on screen in 2013 are between 19 and 34 (while a little bit less –
45,52% - of men are between 35 and 64) and their proportion compared to men
decreases most strongly in the 34 to 49 age bracket. As for the issue of systematic
depreciation of importance and prestige of older women activities, the results have also
shown that from the age of 35, men occupying prestigious jobs – meaning also a
prestigious role – are systematically better represented in the SPC+ distribution by age
brackets for each gender, and are even more if we take as basis the number of
appearances in absolute.
More than thirty years have passed between the observations made by Gerbner’s study
and those described in this paper. They tend to suggest that little things have changed
between 1980 and 2013 in regards of gender representations evolution on TV with age.
However, results given by the sample focusing on young intervening people on screen
give ways to optimism and could be indications of something changing. Indeed, if we
change our point of view and see things in terms of generational dynamics, it is possible
that cohorts between 3 to 30 years today are better supporting egalitarian dynamics
reflected in the media, while older cohorts were less supporting. Several indicators can
give support to this affirmation. First, real disparities exist in the education level and the
degree achieved. Focusing only on university diploma awarded, women between 20 to
34 years are systematically more numerous than men, while 35 passed, men are
systematically more numerous to be awarded that kind of diploma (Statistics Belgium,
The fact that two thirds of the 6627 young people coded have “no social role” is evocating here, but we
need other taxonomy to better understand qualitatively these appearances.
6
24
2012). Knowing that the samples analyzed here have always showed overrepresentation of SPC+ on TV, differences regarding gender access to high level
degree can give a partial answer to inequalities of representations of men and women
from older cohorts, certainly at least in SPC+ representation on screen. Finally, it could
be a less personal neglect of older women than the absence of women occupying
prestigious jobs that could explain their much less important representation than in the
younger cohorts, since we know that the media mainly highlights SPC+. Conversely,
statistics on men and women degree levels could also give a partial answer to the near
equalities of representations regarding young people. Secondly, it is important to
consider structural phenomenon like activity rates which are lower for women than for
men and stronger for 50-54 and 55-64 age brackets (Centre pour l’égalité des chances et
la lutte contre le racisme, 2012). Although they are proof of recurrent phenomenon
specific to women like employment access discriminations or career renouncement for
family reasons, they would be independent from the media themselves that would only
reflect non egalitarian situations particular to society itself. Thirdly, the growing access
of women to journalistic professions, even though still under-represented and that the
evolution is very slow in Belgium, is a confirmed trend (Simonis, 2013: p13) that can
potentially modify media practices towards more equality of men and women treatment
on TV, but this has to be demonstrated, however (GMMP, 2010).
The central question is the following : are these changes observed in young people
representations likely to last as theses cohorts, in real-time, grow older? A study focused
on generational dynamics has showed that the overtaking of women’s degree level on
men’s degree level doesn’t lead to gender equality in terms of socio-professional level
and social status, we are far from it (Chauvel, 2004: 77). It suggests that the arrival of
new generations socialized in recent contexts that give support to innovation and lead to
a generalization of all the progresses is not mechanical. Similarly, we could claim for a
generational dynamic in the media only if we can have, over time and when these
generations will have more than 35 years, data allowing to attest or contest these
changes and to estimate their level of intensity. It is hard to estimate these kinds of
changes in representation of men and women in the media because changes in society
can be reflected in the media but are also dependent on media practices themselves. In
this regard, hypotheses suggesting that more egalitarian practices are due to appearance
contexts or belonging to younger generations should merit deeper attention by
qualitative surveys, applied to several media. This could allow to understand why, for
example, a journalists tends to reflect more equality in terms of gender representations
when covering youth subjects. These kinds of surveys would be likely to understand the
realities, or even the difficulties, that restrain media to show a more equal representation
of women in television, as information provider and as a member of society. The
proliferation of quantitative surveys on diversity and equality representations on TV
have already made possible to objectivize the situation but most of all to put at the
media’s agenda all the existing disequilibrium. The understanding of this unsteadiness
is already a fundamental step for positive impulsion towards more gender equality; the
next step is to identify all the mechanisms that can more or less equality be seen in the
media, and to systematize the good ones and to attempt to modify the bad ones 7. It is
within this condition that the optimism aroused by the results of gender representations
in young intervening people on TV might become a reality and might establish a higher
equality between men and women for the replacement of generations appearing on
television.
7
In the French speaking community of Belgium, this kind of good practices panorama has given some
margin changes (CSA, 2013).
25
List of references:
Books:
Janssen, M. (Ed.). (2012), Baromètre de la diversité et de l’égalité dans les medias de
Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles. Bruxelles, Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel,
Collection « Etudes et Recherches ».
Janssen, M. (Ed.). (2012), Baromètre de la diversité et de l’égalité dans les medias de
Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles. Bruxelles, Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel,
Collection « Etudes et Recherches ».
Simonis, M. (Ed.). (2013), La diversité au sein de la profession de journaliste.
Bruxelles, Association des journalistes professionnels.
Simonis, M. (Ed.). (2010), Quel genre d’infos ? Rapport final GMMP 2010.
Communauté française de Belgique. Bruxelles, Association des journalistes
professionnels.
Vosters, D. (Ed.). (2013), Baromètre de la diversité et de l’égalité dans les medias de
Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles. Bruxelles, Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel,
Collection « Etudes et Recherches ».
(2012), Baromètre de la Diversité > Emploi. Bruxelles, Centre pour l’égalité des
chances et la lutte contre le racisme.
Journal:
Gerbner, G., Gross, L., Signorielli, N. and Morgan, M. (1980), “Aging with Television:
Images on Television Drama and Conceptions of Social Reality”. Journal of
Communication, 30: 37–47.
Online journals
Chauvel, L. (2004), “Vers l'égalité de genre : les tendances générationnelles sont-elles
irréversibles ? ”, Revue de l'OFCE 3/ 2004 (no 90) , p. 69-84 .
URL : www.cairn.info/revue-de-l-ofce-2004-3-page-69.htm, viewed 07/03/2014
Signorielli, N. (2004), “Aging on Television: Messages Relating to Gender, Race, and
Occupation in Prime Time”, Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 48:2, 279301,
DOI: 10.1207/s15506878jobem4802_7 , viewed 07/03/2014
Online references
“Population par sexe et groupe d’âges pour la Belgique, 2003-2013”, Statistics
Belgium.
URL: http://statbel.fgov.be/fr/statistiques/chiffres/population/structure/agesexe/popbel/,
viewed 06/03/2014
“Structure de la population selon l'âge et le sexe : pyramide des âges”, Statistics
Belgium.
URL :
http://statbel.fgov.be/fr/statistiques/chiffres/population/structure/agesexe/pyramide/,
viewed 06/03/2014
26
“Enquête sur les forces de travail 2011-2012”, Statistics Belgium. URL:
http://statbel.fgov.be/fr/modules/publications/statistiques/marche_du_travail_et_conditi
ons_de_vie/enquete_sur_les_forces_de_travail_2011-2012.jsp,viewed 04/03/2014
27
EGYPT: A FEMINIST IDENTITY
Azza Ahmed Heikal
School of Language and Communication
Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport
1. Introduction
Arab Feminist is the rereading of the literary production from a feminist perspective as
opposed to the male biased point of view. Many Arab male writers sheltered behind the
female persona to express their political, national, or religious beliefs. This is a new
approach to the writings of two great Egyptian novelists to enable the reader to unfold
the female portrayal of character as a representative of their country "Egypt" either
politically or religiously. Nagib Mahfouz the Nobel Prize winner 1988 wrote a novel
"The New Cairo" which has been adopted as a famous movie directed by Salah Abo
Seif and Staring Sua’ad Husni, Ahmed Mazhar and Hamdi Ahmed. In this very popular
cinema production, the female character 'Ihsan' was portrayed to stand for Egypt in the
thirties on the other hand and to configure the situation many Egyptian women were
indulged in. The cinema has been a very popular means of communication in the 50s of
the last century, so the cinematic adaptation helped Mahfouz to spread his ideas to
larger number of audience thus the effect is enlarged and the motif is expanded.
At the mean time, Fathy Ghanem, an Egyptian journalist Lawyer and writer
courageously investigated the issue of many Christian girls' marriage to Muslim
Egyptians. Maria Sanrdo the Italian, Roman Catholic girl, daughter of Emelio Sandro
marries the young Muslim activist Karim Safwan. Cleverly, Fathy Ghanem, explores
his religious root of faith and God's Existence in all religions whether Islam or
Christianity through, Maria Sandro's journey towards faith and belief. The novel was
also adapted into a TV drama, banned from display in the formal official Egyptian
Channels and many other Arab TV's as well. The banning was due to the censorship
and social turbulence concerning such a debatable religious subject.
It is my hypothesis that the fundamental source of
conflict in this new world will not be primarily
ideological or primarily economic. The great divisions
among humankind and the dominating source of
conflict will be cultural.”(Said, W. Edward 2012)
2. Arab Feminism
Arab feminism is a new approach to literary production particularly of the Arab male
societies. However, this new critical approach is not fully crystallized and figured out
yet. If politics has been classically defined as a masculine business, the feminine
figures are always presented in the private domestic scenes being the source or the
reason of conflicts or disputes.
Conventionally, many Arab writers hide behind the scene of the feminist identity to investigate their politi
as a feminist identity they all fall in love or rebel against.
28
Arab women, historically invisible are part of
this trend. Arab women whose education and
mobility allow them to see and project
themselves as public intellectuals are becoming
visible at the local, national, and international
levels. Protesting their many exclusives from
their nations’ narratives, Arab women writers
are demanding to be heard and seen. (Cookie,
Miriam 2001)
The research is an attempt to correlate gender presentation in literature to different
means of communication whether the cinema or the TV. Since Egypt suffers from
illiteracy therefore, Cinema, and TV Drama are two means of communication that
assists the Egyptians understand and enjoy what is meant or aimed through the
presentation of the two female figures Ihsan Shehata and Maria Sandro in Mohfouz's
and Fathy's two novels as well.
To explore 'The New Cairo' or ' Cairo in the 30s', transferred name in the cinema 1966,
the research will concentrate on four major scenes that succeeded to a great extent to
portray the writer's vision regarding Ihsan as a symbol or an image of Egypt, the
identity. Mahfouz focused on how Ihsan, the poor, ignorant, beautiful girl has been
exploited by all men in her life. Here, Ihsan Shehata, or Souad Hasin, is nothing but
Egypt itself.
The first scene, stresses Ihsan's Poverty, ignorance and helplessness in front of a greedy
father and mother who deprived her from education and comfort in order to support the
rest of their big family. Communicatively, the cinematic scene, expresses in details the
poverty of Ihsan, her rotten clothes and dirty room in contrast to her immense beauty
and charm. Egypt in 30s was a country suffering the same conditions and upheavals.
The second scene is a severe opposition of poverty, beauty and charm seen against
richness, ageing and desire. When Kasem Bek Fahmy bought her body and beauty in
return of security and money to her and her family, Ihsan fell a prey to the man who
severely exploited her refusing to marry her due to social differences between them
since he belongs to the aristocratic ruling class. Besides, he is married and cannot
offend his wife although he could have married Ihsan religiously and officially.
However, he preferred to use her poverty and family's greed to satisfy his desires and
needs rewarding them only money to survive. Again Egypt suffered social discrepancy
at that time when the rich exploited the poor and gave them peanuts, owning the lands,
the factories, and above all power pushing most Egyptians to work for them as slaves or
servants without any social equality.
The Third scene is of Mahgoub Abdel Daem the young graduate from the faculty of law
who comes from the countryside to study and work in Cairo. Mahgoub belongs to the
middle class, educated but jobless with no origin or support. As a survival and a social
climber he accepts a very humiliating deal. As a man he agrees on being a pimp, or a
hushed to a woman sold to another one. He also exploited Ihsan supposedly legal wife.
Against all ethics, rules, religion codes and even human masculine dignity and honor,
Mahgoub, offers his wife to the new Minster Kasem in order to get appointed in his
office as the Minster's office manager.
29
Egypt and Ihsan were victims of the middle educated class who searched only for
its benefits and gains presenting nothing to the country or Ihsan expect the Legal
frame of belongingness and loyalty. The middle class, as portrayed through the
character of Mahgoub, accepted the corruption of the ruling aristocratic class and joined
them in their corruption, hypocrisy and exploitation of the poor, ignorant, beautiful
Ihsan or Egypt. Politically, socially, religiously Ihsan and Egypt are victims of the
father 'Shehata', the Minster 'Kazim' and the employee clerk 'Mahgoub'.
Women may choose to either openly express or to suppress such
divergences of interest, which they generally do at their own cost
in both cases. I discuss who formulates this dichotomy, who
identifies nationalism and feminism and benefits from this
identification.” (Rouhana H. 2003 P 5)
The Fourth scene is between Ihsan and Ali, the revolutionary communist who has been
a friend of Mahgoub and the beloved of Ihsan. Although he was the only male character
who truly loved and cared for Ihsan, yet he is exactly like all the other male character he
totally failed her. The early difference between Ali and the rest of the corrupt male
characters is that he didn't exploit or made use of her. His only sin or mistake is that he
fully indulged himself in politics and the theories of socialism, communism and equality
to the extent he lost his life and Ihsan's purity and love as well. At the end when Ihsan
went to meet him before his death being wounded and shot due to his political actions
against the regime and the British occupation. Ihsan confronted him with his wrong
which led to them both to separation and disaster.
She told him that words, books and fights would have not fed her hungry family nor
sheltered them against cold and insecurity. This is a climactic scene which crystalizes
the whole conflict of the movie or the moral which is the internal conflict between
theory and practice, politician and ordinary people, activists and poverty, life of words
and life of mouth and body. All have failed Egypt as they have all let Ihsan down and
pushed her to her own stained hypocrite sinful destiny being a mistress, sinful a wife
and a broken hearted lover.
Fouad Dawara, The national feeling in the literature of Nagib
Mahfouz: The novel by nature is a national art which means it is
the most artistic expression of the matured feeling of the national
distinguished identity… The New Cairo is a portrait of the
Egyptian society in the thirties …it has a number of the author's
echoes and experience at the university, and at the governmental
job. It is a portrait full of incidents, characters, and colours.
However, the two domineering ones are poverty and corruption
which are interrelated in multi layered structures (P.104).
Ihsan Shehata in The New Cairo with her poverty, ignorance, aspirations, and
eventually fall is nothing but the first draft which will be modified and improved for
several times introduced to the reader later under the name of Hameeda in Madak Alley
…Reery in The Quail and Autumn , and Zahra in Miramar. Whether, Mahfouz intended to
use the female characters as a symbol for Egypt in different stages of its life or not it is
undoubtedly clear that there is a great deal of similarity among Egypt and those female
30
characters (105) Thus , Nagib Mahfouz 's Ihsan is a political identity of Egypt at the
30s and later on.
Fathy Ghanem's novel" Bent Men Shubra" or a "A Girl from Shubra" was firstly written in
February 1986 after the assassination of El Sadat and the rise of terrorism in Egypt. Fanatic
groups in Egypt were spreading all over the country, killing, destroying, burning and
causing unrest inside Egypt. In a reaction to this fundamental weave of extremists, many
Egyptian writers like Bahaa Taher and Fathy Ghanem tried to analyze the roots and motifs
such religious dilemma facing the Egyptian society. Ghanem wrote "A Girl from Shubra"
to answer philosophical as well as religious problematic question about the historical
identity of Egypt. For many Egyptians, particularly intellectuals and Copts, Egypt is a
multicultural and multilayered religious country. No one can describe Egypt as a totally
modern Arab country since Egypt is a Pharaohonic, Patlomy, Roman, Arab and African
country by geography and history.
Religiously speaking, Egypt was an Orthodox country with the main Easter Orthodox
Church in Alexandria before the Arab came and settled in the 6 A.B. establishing one of
the greatest Islamic Empires in the world. Most of the Egyptian population became Muslim
while still about 20% of it is remained Copts. Eventually, after the death of Sadat, many
extremists financed by the western countries, America, and some Arab rulers planned to
turn Egypt as Iran an Islamic state, but instead of the Iranian Shia'a, Egypt was supposed to
be fanatic Sunni one. Nevertheless, the novel which became a T.V. drama in 2000 received
much debate and a lot of arguments. It was indeed a journey of both the female character
Maria Sandro and the writer Fathy himself. It is the journey of the whole country back to
its origin and roots towards light and tolerance. The realization that Maria encountered
twice in her life is religiously revealed in three main scenes.
The first scene is inside the church where Maria Sandro in the twentieth century Egypt is
free to practice her religion and express herself as a Roman Italian Catholic. She is living
in a country surrounded by Muslims and Egyptians and also Christians, Italians, Jews and
Copts at the mid of the twentieth century. This was Egypt a country of tolerance and
human acceptance that never practiced discrimination because of ethnicity or creed. People
in the mid of the twentieth century were living together in peace and harmony till the
Second World War erupted and Hitler with Mussolini formed an alley against most Europe
and Britain. So Maria's family had to leave for their homeland after the death of the father
and the threats of the Second World War. Maria felt very Egyptian and refused to leave
her homeland Egypt as she was born, educated, raised up and befriended with many
Egyptians in Shubra Cairo.
The second master scene is when Maria meets Karim Safwan who is a politician and an
activist is fighting the British occupation in Egypt at that period. Moreover, there are some
references that may correlate Karim to be one of the Islamic groups at that time namely
"the Moslem Brothers." However, it is not stated clearly but implied artistically by the
author in dialogue and action.
Karim Safwan accepts all Maria's sins and mistakes as long as she is ready to repent and
ask God for forgiveness. He did not ask her to change her religion and become a Muslim.
On the contrary, he respects her Christianity and leaves her to practice her rituals the way
she likes as a true Christian. Furthermore, he has never asked her to abandon her neither
31
her friend Nina, the Jewish nor father Lorenzo to whom she used to go and confess
her mortally sins.
When Karim proposed to marry Maria, she travels in her memories to recall her past life
from the King Farouk to Toni the handsome Italian prince, to Kosta the Jewish shop
manager, till Karim the Egyptian backward Arab Muslim. Maria's European community
brought her up to detest and despise the Egyptians and the Muslims viewing them as
inferior and backwards. Surprisingly when she met Karim's mother, the simple Egyptian
countryside woman, the latter did not speak about Maria's unveiled face or hair or dress or
even religion on the contrary the woman welcomed Maria and praised her name and
beauty. Moreover, the countrylady gave her gold and jewelries since she is the bride of her
son Karim. In a dialogue between Karim Safwan and Maria Sandro he said:
No, we will marry and you keep your religion.
She replied quickly: I will go to church to ask Father Lorenzo.
(Ghanem :96)
Karim went to the church to convince father Lorenzo to let him marry Maria, however,
the dialogue between Karim and father Lorenzo sums up the whole cultural conflict or
clash of cultures that is actually a clash of ignorance between East and West. Each side,
either East or West does not see the whole picture from different angles. Yet the
Western civilization still liver in superiority whereas the Eastern civilization resorts to
the fanatic past in order to assert its identity and recalls its past historical sovereignty.
Father Lorinzo: Marriage of different religions would not
bring religions near each other; on the contrary, it would lead to
the opposite. I advise you to think before you commit such a
serious action.
Karim said: Priest, I am the Muslim father, and this means I believe in Christianity and
the Bible. A Muslim's faith is a combination of all heavenly religions; the Old
Testament, the Bible, and the Qur'an, as well as all messengers and prophets. The
Muslim is the free human individual. Our prophet Mohammed married the Coptic Mary
who came from here Egypt… I have nothing to do except to fully respect your creed,
your church, and the Catholic woman whom I will marry. (Ghanem: 100)
This dialogue and that scene were not dramatized on the T.V drama, due to censorship
and the religious tension in the society. It is a narrative scene in the novel but not on the
screen, however, the dialogue is very illuminating and revealing of the essence of true
Islam not the one those extremists and terrorists are adopting and claiming. Analysing
the dialogue is essential to comprehend the motif within the whole artistic production.
The last culminating scene is the one between Maria and her grandson Karim before her
death.
It is said that his grandmother is Christian while her grandson is a member in
one of the fundamentalist extremist groups. (Ghanem: 107)
When Maria saw Karim in the hospital, she took him for his grandfather Karim Safwan
(the husband) as they both look exactly the same. For Maria, this is the second miracle,
the first one was when 'Karim' her husband was not dead often after the air raid in
Alexandria. Now it is 'Karim' the grandson who is back to her, after a long severe time
of separation. The grandson, who was against his grandmother Maria, calling
32
her a 'kafraa', or a reneged trying to cut all ties with her, he is now crying in front
of her after reading all her diaries. Maria's diaries document her journey towards
faith and true religion moving from impurity to repentance and marriage. She asked the
boy of 15 'Karim' to pray for her as she has prayed for him to be back to her
embracement.
Through prayers and tears, the two are reconciled grandmother and grandson or
Christianity and Islam.
"Ask your heart, this is Islam, this is faith"….(105)
Those were Maria's last words before her final journey towards rest and peace. In her
obituary column in the newspaper El Ahram, there were Muslim names beside Christian
ones, as there were Italian names side by side Egyptian ones also. It is God's will and
God's judgment but why do people try to judge or decide for themselves. Inside the
church the prayers were accompanied and attended by many Muslims who uttered
verses from the Qur'an while listening to verses from the Bible.
Ironically the coffin was taken from the church to be buried in the Muslim cemeteries as
agreed prior; Maria wanted to be with her husband Karim and son Saad.
Maria was an extraordinary woman who knew that God is in the heart of love and
chastity.
This is the faith and the religion Egypt has been experiencing all its history like Maria
Sandro who is Christian by birth and origin but mother and grandmother to Muslim and
Egyptians also by birth and origin.
The identity here, is national, cultural and religious since Maria Sandro is a true
portrayal of Egypt, the country, with various civilizations and religions, all interwoven
in a tapestry of history and culture unmatched and unrivalled.
Despite everything …Maria Sandro will remain forever memorial as the
meaning, and the human experience as well. (Ghanem: 109)
Naguib Mahfouz's Ihsan shehata and Fathy Ghanem's Maria Sandro are the feminist
identity both writers created, portrayed and presented to assert their national, religious
and political identities. The cinema and the T.V. drama communicatively deplored the
female identity configured and depicted artistically to the mass audience successfully.
Arab feminism is critically appraising the male production hoping to find new grands
that might prove that women have always been presented in the literary production not
on the secondary domestic level but on the front stage. The female figure is not related
simply to domestic or desire issues but rather the female character is the identity many
writers pursue consciously or unconsciously. We women do exist playing the primary
roles and we will not accept to act secondary.
Similar to black feminism Arab feminists tend to explore the feminist identity rooted in
the inherited legacy of male writings that portray the female as a figure of seduction or
as one of mystical connotations. Thus, the study analyzes and sheds light on the two
female figures of Mahfouz and Ghanem being drawn to represent not simply Egypt, but
more deeply to symbolize the feminist identity of the writers themselves. In fact, the
feminist identity is one of political rebellious and spiritual doubts. " But we are all
swimming in those waters, Westerners and Muslims and others alike. And since
33
the waters are part of the ocean of history, trying to plow or divide them with
barriers is futile” (said w. Edward 2012)
After almost a century of struggle and fight, Egyptian women are still in action striving
for their freedom and working for their liberation. Conservative voices are now judging
women and preventing them from achieving their goals and fulfilling their aspirations as
full partners in the process of social development. Women of the 16th of March 1919
who moved out of all constrains and ties that captured Egyptian society as well as
woman would shed tears over the retreat of some women and men nowadays. At the
moment the call of women’s liberation and movement towards enlightenment and
progress is facing a serious blow from the part of those who would hinder women their
constitutional rights of equality and citizenship. The relying on some Fatwas which
deny women equality with men despite God’s orders are but reluctant and backward
practices of religion over women. Fortunately, in the Quran, God equates between men
and women in rights, rituals, duties, and punishment. In other words women are
addressed as humans in as much as men are. Undoubtedly, gender discrimination is a
social and legal problem that stands as an obstacle in the path of women’s movement
towards enhancing their role in society. Thus, Arab feminist criticism is a means of
explaining the importance and the weight of the female not only in the society but also
in politics , religion , and culture. This rereading of literature and culture will shed
more light on the role of women in Egypt as an identity and belongingness.
3. Bibliography
Carlassare, Elizabith. “Commentaries, Society and Cultural Ecofeminism; Allies in
Renaissance” Ethics and the environment.vol5,issue 2000, p89
Cooke, Miriam.Women claim Islam; Creating Islamic Feminism through literature.
New York, Routlege, 2001.
Dawara, Foad. The National Feeling in the literature of Nagib Mahfouz. Elhelal
periodical, Feb.1970
Fathy, Ibrahim. Naguib Mahfoz: Between the Short Story & the Epic Novel. Family
Library, Cairo, 2000
Gerrad , Genette,Trans. Narrative Discourse. Oxford, Basil Blackwell,1980
Ghanim, Fathy. A Girl from Shubra. Dar Elhelal, Cairo, 1986.
Mahfuz Nagib. Cairo Modern. Dar Elhelal, Cairo, 1945.
Rouhana ,H. Critical Half. “On Feminism and National identity” 2003.
Said Edward. “The Clash of Ignorance”, The Nation, 4th Oct.2001
Seymour-Joun, Caroline. “The literary life of Cairo; one hundred years in the heart of
the city” (Review) vol. 12, No 2,2012
34
FEMINISM AND WOMEN’S MAGAZINES: A DISCOURSE ANALYSIS
OF WOMEN’S IDENTITIES AND (PARTNER) RELATIONSHIPS AS
ARTICULATED IN TWO FLEMISH WOMEN’S MAGAZINES OF THE
TWENTIETH CENTURY’S SIXTIES AND SEVENTIES
Maaike Van de Voorde
Department of Applied Linguistics at Vrije Universiteit Brussel.
maaike.van.de.voorde@vub.ac.be
Prof. Dr. Martina Temmerman
Department of Applied Linguistics at Vrije Universiteit Brussel.
martina.temmerman@vub.ac.be
Abstract: the popularity of women’s magazines, together with their great impact,
warrants an academic interest into the way these media articulate and represent
women’s identities and (partner) relationships. As we focus on two Flemish women’s
magazines from the years 1963 and 1973, we try to explore a possible correlation
between Second Wave Feminism and the way women and their (male) partners are
represented in women’s magazines of the sixties and seventies of the previous century.
Inspired by the method of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), we use Halliday’s
transitivity analysis to examine the processes through which women are represented in
their relationships. That way, we seek to find an answer to the following research
questions: what is Second Wave Feminism and how does it relate to the content of these
women’s magazines? How and to what extent does the articulation of women’s identity
and women’s (partner) relationships in these magazines reflect, complement or
contradict evolutions in the societal position of women?
Keywords: applied linguistics, Critical Discourse Analysis, journalism studies, media
discourse, gender studies, representation analysis
1. Introduction
Women’s magazines differ in various ways from other mass publications. In explicitly
and exclusively addressing a female readership, they stand out against the general
informative press that allegedly aims at a mixed audience. Moreover, women’s
magazines deal with feminine topics such as beauty, fashion, health and personal
relations (Stoll 1998: 547). A third, and perhaps predominant feature of women’s
magazines is their purpose to establish a personal, intimate relation with their readers,
who are addressed as a single community. In earlier research on women’s magazines,
this social group has often been described as a ‘surrogate sisterhood’ (McRobbie 1978;
Ferguson 1983; Winship 1987). The term refers to the fact that producers of women’s
magazines and their women readers are set up in a ‘sisterly’ relationship (Talbot 1992:
574). Talbot calls this ‘synthetic sisterhood’, based on Fairclough’s synthetic
personalization, ‘a compensatory tendency to give the impression of treating each of the
people ‘handled’ en masse as an individual’ (Fairclough 2001: 52).
By establishing such a personal relationship with their female readers, women’s
35
magazines are the perfect site for the transmission of social notions of femininity
or, as Wadia (1991) states:
‘women’s magazines contain a set of values and practices which are used to instruct
women what to think about themselves and how to conduct relationships with their
parents, their male partners (usually husbands), their children, their bosses and other
women; they are all about what women should be and how they should act; they are
promoters of the ‘ideology of femininity’. (Wadia 1991: 261)
From the 1930’s, when the first commercial women’s magazines were published, until
the 1960’s, this ideology of femininity offered in women’s magazines had remained
quite unaltered; the image of women presented was that of the housewife/mother figure.
Little attention was paid to women’s education, employment and politics, and topics
like reproduction, birth control and sexuality in general were conscientiously avoided
(Wadia 1991, Stoll 1998, Hülsken 2010). However, when Second Wave Feminism
arose in the 1960’s and 70’s, this image no longer corresponded with social reality, as
women began to work outside the home, to strive for equal rights and to think and talk
about their personal liberation. Women’s magazines were faced with a huge challenge,
as their female readership now had access to a variety of alternative, including feminist,
views of women and their roles (Stoll 1998: 547).
In this paper, we will focus on Second-Wave Feminism in Flanders and its possible
correlation with the way women are represented in two Flemish women’s magazines of
the sixties and seventies of the previous century. As we cannot analyse all roles and
relationships of women cited by Wadia (1991) in the quote above in the limited space of
this paper, we will concentrate on the relationships with (male) partners .
We seek to find an answer to the following research questions: what is Second Wave
Feminism and how does it relate to the content of these women’s magazines? What
idealised images of femininity and relationships do we find in the textual imagery of
these magazines? How and to what extent does the articulation of women’s identity and
women’s (partner) relationships in these magazines reflect, complement or contradict
evolutions in the societal position of women?
1.1. Situation of Libelle and Het Rijk der Vrouw
The origin of Libelle in Belgium has to be situated in 1938, when the Dutch magazine
(which already existed in The Netherlands since 1934) came onto the Flemish market.
During the Second World War, the production of the magazine was stopped, but from
November 1945 Libelle was published weekly again, this time in a separate Flemish
version. With the subtitle ‘Weekly for the Flemish woman’, the magazine was intended
for housewives of the middle class, but from the 1960’s it was also oriented towards
women who worked outside the home (Flour et al. 1995).
In 1970, Libelle merged with another Flemish women’s magazine: Rosita. Until then,
Libelle’s profile had been rather conservative. According to Flour (Flour et al. 1995),
the image offered in the magazine was that of a woman who, once married, devoted
oneself entirely to her husband, her children and her household. However, in the 1970’s,
this image no longer corresponded with the spirit of that age. As Second Wave
Feminism developed itself, social problems came to the fore and women obtained
different roles. As times changed, Libelle/Rosita was forced to adapt its profile. The
magazine paid more attention to pioneers, such as women with exceptional
36
(read: unfeminine) occupations. Labelling these stories as ‘exceptional’, however,
still endorsed the traditional sex roles (Flour et al. 1995: 149).
Het Rijk der Vrouw (‘Women’s Realm’) came onto the market in 1925 and was
intended for both young women and more experienced housewives. Its motto was
‘advice, service and versatility’. As the name itself suggests, this magazine included
fashion for housewives and girls, ideas for fancywork and interior design. It also
included several readers’ letters, often with moralizing advice on married life and
family life (Flour et al. 1995).
Libelle and Het Rijk der Vrouw competed with each other until 1990, when both
magazines merged. This merger was based on the fact that both magazines had a similar
target group: the average reader of both magazines was somewhere between 25 and 54
years old . Moreover, family life was of core interest for the readers of these magazines
1.2. Second Wave Feminism in Flanders
In the year 1830, when Belgium is still in it’s infancy, Belgian women had almost no
rights. Most women depended on the power of their husbands and they had no voice in
the political sphere. Therefore, the first wave of feminism (1850’s – 1920’s) consisted
of struggles geared towards equality of men and women in the public sphere, including
women’s right to education, to vote and to own property.
Second Wave Feminism in Flanders was inspired by various women’s organizations
that came to existence during the First Wave . A few Belgian women’s organizations
were founded around the turn of the century (19th – 20th century). The installation of
the Nationale Vrouwenraad (National Women’s Board) (1905) was a direct
consequence of First Wave Feminism. In the 1920’s, women of both socio-political
groups (a catholic and a socialist one) organized themselves in local catholic women’s
associations (such as KAV and KVLV ), on the one hand, and a socialist women’s
federation (SVV ), on the other hand. Moreover, the labour union had its own women’s
association, and in the 1970’s, the Flemish liberal women also united themselves in
their own organization.
All these women’s associations reacted in different ways when Second Wave Feminism
made its entry in Flanders during the 1960’s and 70’s. Some of them repudiated
feminist thinking and kept on treating traditional feminine themes like home help and
childcare. Others, like the catholic women’s organization KAV, were willing to
modernize their ideas. In 1968, KAV released a charter entitled ‘De vrouw nu: een
nieuw statuut’ (‘Women nowadays: a new status’). In this manifest, traditional feminine
roles gave way to a reorganization of the different responsibilities. Moreover, the text
pointed to the need of a new legal status for married women, which barely had changed
since the Code Napoléon (1804) and which stated that men own the common goods and
the properties of their wives. Eventually, women had to wait until 1976 for the
amendment of the law treating marital goods.
The catholic women’s association KAV was also responsible for another important
event in Flemish feminist evolution: it delivered Belgium’s first female minister,
Marguerite De Riemaecker-Legot (1965-1968). Since women were given the vote in
1949, not one woman had been elected. However, this was not yet a real breakthrough,
as Belgium had to wait until 1974 for the next female minister to be appointed .
37
As protest movement began to grow in the early 1970’s, some new autonomous
groups were founded. One of them was ‘Dolle Mina’ (1970), established after the
example of the women’s movement of the same name in the Netherlands. On the pretext
of ‘women too have right to lung cancer’, one of their first demonstrations was aimed at
an insurance company in which men were allowed to smoke, but women weren’t.
In general, their (playful) actions were mainly directed to family problems (better
childcare, more play areas) and a more controversial theme: abortion.
After the arrest of dr. Willy Peers (who was accused of performing hundreds of
abortions) in 1973, thousands of people hit the streets to demonstrate for his release and
the legalisation of abortion. While socialist women argued in favour of abortion, the
catholic women condemned it. Finally, in 1990, abortion was decriminalised in Belgium
.
In the second half of the 1970’s, the Flemish women’s movement began to realize that
not only political enactments were needed, but a total change of attitude. After hearing
some testimonies of assaulted women on the International Tribunal on Crimes against
Women in Brussels (1976), rape became a central theme. In order to be able to provide
appropriate assistance, women’s refuge centres were set up in several Flemish cities.
These centres provided shelter, direct assistance, recreation and education.
Second Wave feminists took ‘the personal is political’ as their motto. Selfdetermination, also sexually, became more important. The origin of lesbian women
organisations can be situated in this context. However, the relationship between these
lesbian groups and the autonomous women’s movements turned out to be very complex,
as some of the hetero-feminists didn’t want to be identified with their lesbian sisters .
After the invention of the pill in the 1960’s, reproduction and sexuality became two
different things. Having children was now a deliberate choice. This groundbreaking
evolution caused some important changes in the 1970’s: from 1973, it was no longer
prohibited to spread information and advertisements about contraception, and in 1974,
the law on equal parenthood was enacted, which granted as much authority to the father
as to the mother with regard to their children’s upbringing and the management of their
goods. During this period, in 1972, the Dutch feminist women’s magazine Opzij came
onto the market, together with other women’s magazines specifically aimed at coloured
or lesbian women. As we focus on non-specialized women’s magazines, these
magazines fall outside the scope of this study.
To conclude, we can say that Second Wave Feminism in Belgium was generated by
various women’s associations. In the 1980’s, these organisations give up their autonomy
in order to integrate in larger institutions, such as political parties and labour unions.
This integration was a crucial factor to finally introduce women in the political world .
After this brief outline of the most important events and evolutions during Second Wave
Feminism in Belgium, the general goal of this study is to find out if these developments
have had an influence on the image of women offered in Flemish women’s magazines.
As such, this paper is part of a larger historical study of Flemish women’s magazines in
which we want to compare the articulation of women’s identity and women’s (partner)
relationships in different Flemish women’s magazines with feminist ideas and societal
reality as it develops over time (1953-2013). Together with a former article on the
representation of men in Het Rijk der Vrouw of 1958 and Libelle of 2008 (Temmerman
and Van de Voorde, forthc.), the present paper serves as an exploratory study for this
large-scale historical research project.
38
Inspired by the method of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), we use Halliday’s
transitivity analysis to examine the processes through which women are
represented in their relationships. In an earlier stage, we also examined which names are
used to refer to women and men and how these choices contribute to their
representation, but as this extensive lexical analysis doesn’t fit in the scope of this
paper, we will shortly refer to the results of this analysis in our general conclusion.
2. Methodological framework
2.1. Critical Discourse Analysis
The tradition of CDA can be found in van Dijk (1993), Fairclough (1999), Wodak and
Meyer (2001) and Wodak and Chilton (2005). The framework has often been used to
examine representations (Stamou 2001, Pietikäinen 2003, Trioen and Temmerman
2009) and also in the context of women’s magazines, a CDA approach has proven to be
fruitful (Wadia 1991, Hyde 2000, Gill 2009, Van de Voorde and Temmerman 2013).
According to CDA, language should be considered as discourse, that is a form of social
practice:
‘Viewing language as social practice implies, first, that it is a mode of action […]. It
also implies that language is a socially and historically situated mode of action, in a
dialectical relationship with other facets of the social. What I mean by a dialectical
relationship is that it is socially shaped, but is also socially shaping – or socially
constitutive. Critical discourse analysis explores the tension between these two sides of
language use, the socially shaped and socially constitutive, rather than opting onesidedly for one or the other’ (Fairclough 1995: 54-55).
In this paper, we use critical discourse analysis as a method to uncover the ‘codes’ of
social relations in women’s magazines. More in particular, we want to find out which
textual and linguistic resources are used to represent women in their relationship(s) with
men and how these choices contribute to their representation in general.
2.2 Transitivity analysis
We use Halliday’s transitivity analysis (Halliday, 1994) to examine the processes
through which women are represented in their relationship(s) with their partners.
According to Halliday, language has an ideational component, which is ‘a fundamental
property of language that enables human beings to build a picture of reality and to make
sense of their experience of what goes on around them and inside them’ (Halliday 1994:
101). The grammatical clause represents this process, which consists of thee basic
components: the process itself (the representation of a situation or action), the
participants in the process and the circumstances which are related to the process. For
English, Halliday described three main types of processes (material, mental and
relational). These are easily transferable to Dutch, as English and Dutch are related
languages (Trioen and Temmerman 2009: 186).
Material processes can roughly be equated to ‘actions’ (the main participant bein the
‘Actor’, e.g. ‘the lion [Actor] caught the tourist’). Mental processes can be equated to
‘feelings’ (with the ‘Sensor’ as main participant, e.g. ‘Mary [Sensor] liked the movie’).
Relational processes are typically processes of ‘being’ and ‘having’. A supplementary
category is formed by the verbal processes, which refer to processes of linguistic
communication with the ‘Sayer’ as main participant (e.g. ‘his face [Sayer] tells stories
untold’). Halliday also describes the supplementary categories of behavioural
39
and existential processes, but these will be left out of the discussion, because they
are less relevant for our purposes.
3. Corpus/sample
For a largescale historical study of Flemish women’s magazines, we are compiling a
corpus from the 1950ies up to the present day. For this paper, we have selected two
Flemish women’s magazines from 1963 and 1973 to investigate if we can find traces of
Second Wave Feminism in the content of these magazines.
The corpus is limited to randomly chosen (by means of a randomizer ) issues of both
magazines from the years 1963 and 1973, twelve for each magazine and for each year.
This time span includes the rise of Second Wave feminist activism in Belgium. From
this sample all content mentioning female (partner) relationships is selected.
Since most texts referring to women in relation to men in both magazines are readers’
letters and the answers of the magazines to these letters, we’ve only analyzed these
particular articles, as they contain some sort of sex or relationship advice. That way, we
can draw some conclusions about the way women-men relationships are conceptualised
by both the women readers and the editors of the magazines and investigate if this
conceptualization is related to Second Wave Feminism. Other articles that pertain to the
subject of women in their relationship(s) with men are also used to investigate if Second
Wave Feminism has made its way through the content of the magazines, but in a more
general way.
Taking into account the polyphonic organisation of discourse that enacts different
voices (Roulet 2011), the advice articles are subdivided into two categories, according
to the main voice speaking. The first is the category ‘women readers’, which contains
the reader’s letters. The second category, ‘magazine’, consists of the answers to these
readers’ letters, which contain opinions and pieces of advice on relationships given by
the editors of the magazines. The articles originate from different columns, as illustrated
in table 1:
Year Het Rijk der Vrouw Libelle
1963 Brievenbus, Hartsaangelegenheden, Echtgenoot aan het woord
(Mailbox, Heart Affairs, Husband Speaking)
Vertel ons uw zorgen
(Tell us your worries)
1973 Psychologische problemen, Hartsaangelegenheden
(Psychological Problems, Heat Affairs)
Libelle/Rosita
antwoord
weet
raad,
Vraag
en
(Libelle/Rosita knows what to do, Question and answer)
Table 1. Advice columns in Het Rijk der Vrouw and Libelle (1963 and 1973)
The full corpus contains 78 articles: 54 from Het Rijk der Vrouw and 24 from Libelle.
We’ve collected more articles in Het Rijk der Vrouw as these texts are generally much
shorter. The difference in the amount of data also reflects in the number of words of
both corpora: the corpus of Het Rijk der Vrouw contains 20 667 words, while the
corpus of Libelle only consists of 11 195 words.
40
4. Analysis of the data
A transitivity analysis of the sentences in our corpus allows us to give a systemicfunctional explanation of the relationships between women and men as they are
represented in the magazines. We only examine those clauses, in which at least one
participant role refers to a woman and we focus on the processes having to do with
actions, feelings and communication. Relational processes with the verbs zijn (‘to be’)
and hebben (‘to have’) will not be included in the discussion, as these verbs need a
complement in the form of a noun phrase to express a meaning. As demonstrated before
(Trioen and Temmerman 2009, Van de Voorde and Temmerman 2013), a naming
analysis is more illuminating than the transitivity analysis in such relational processes.
4.2.. Transitivity in Het Rijk der Vrouw (1963 and 1973)
Text produced by the magazine’s editors
Actions (material processes) (50/84)
The majority of the processes are material processes. With respect to content, there are
few similarities between the verbs used. This is not so surprising, given the fact that
these verbs depend to a large extent on the subject of the readers’ letters and the answers
to them and thus are very diverse. Nevertheless, there are some verbs that can be
grouped together according to their meaning. A first group of verbs has to do with
making someone’s acquaintance: (iemand) leren kennen (‘to come to know
(someone)’), (iemand) ontmoeten (‘to meet (someone)’) and kennismaken (‘to get to
know’). A large group of verbs refers to a certain kind of conflict between a man and a
woman: beledigen (‘to insult’), in de steek laten (‘to abandon’), verlaten (‘to leave’),
negeren (‘to ignore’), ontwijken (‘to avoid’), wegvluchten (‘to run away from’) and
(iemand) pijn doen (‘to hurt (someone)’).
Furthermore, marrying is a central process. In all cases, the woman is the Actor, as in
examples 1 and 2:
(1)
Wat die andere jongeman betreft, mag je gerust zijn: je ouders kunnen je niet
verplichten een jongeman te huwen waar je niet van houdt.
With regard to that other young man, you can set your mind at ease: your parents cannot
force you to marry a young man whom you don’t love. (RdV 1963/14 – 24)
(2)
Alle ouders hebben natuurlijk graag dat hun dochter huwt met een jongen met
een mooie betrekking maar één ding wil ik u toch doen opmerken: geld is niet de eerste
vereiste voor een gelukkig huwelijk.
All parents would like their daughter to get married with a boy with a nice job, but I
would like to point out one thing: money is not a prerequisite for a happy marriage.
(RdV 1963/5 - 8)
Feelings (mental processes) (23/84)
The verbs houden van, beminnen (‘to love’) and verliefd zijn/worden (‘to fall/be in
love’) are by far the most frequently used in this category (15/23). Sensors can be men
or women, as illustrated in examples 3 and 4:
41
(3)
Uit wat u schrijft menen we te mogen afleiden dat hij ook verliefd is op u.
We believe that we can derive from what you’ve written that he’s in love with you too.
(RdV 1973/38 - 29)
(4)
Probeer hem eerder het gevoel te schenken dat u 100 procent van hem houdt en
dat u rotsvast in zijn genezing gelooft.
Try to give him the feeling that you love him for 100 percent and that you really believe
he’ll recover. (RdV 1973/7 - 21)
Communication (verbal processes) (11/84)
Verbal processes encode actions of linguistic communication. These processes include
verbs like zeggen (‘to say’), vertellen (‘to tell’), vragen (‘to ask’), beloven (‘to
promise’) and verwittigen (‘to inform’).
Text produced by women readers
Actions (material processes) (28/59)
As in the answers to the readers’ letters, the material processes in this category include a
variety of verbs. Simultaneously, we can divide these verbs in different groups,
according to their meaning. In the letters too, marrying is a central process.
Remarkable in this category is the use of the verb seksuele betrekkingen hebben met
(‘to have sexual intercourse with’), as this is the first time that we encounter a woman
reader speaking about her sexual life in our corpus:
(5)
Ik heb tot voor een jaar seksuele betrekkingen gehad met een man, die onlangs
aan kanker overleden is.
Until a year ago, I’ve had sexual intercourse with a man who died from cancer recently.
(RdV 1973/7 - 21)
However, we cannot call this groundbreaking yet, as this woman’s letter has nothing to
do with her sex life, but is aimed at the question if cancer is contagious or not.
Feelings (mental processes) (26/59)
Women readers mainly express feelings of love. The verbs used are beminnen, houden
van, liefhebben (all translated in English as ‘to love’), verliefd zijn (‘to be in love’) and
iets voelen voor (‘to feel something for’).
Communication (verbal processes) (5/59)
Only five processes are verbal. The verbs used are spreken (‘to speak’), bekend maken
(‘to , zeggen (‘to say’), bekennen (‘to confess’) en vragen.(‘to ask’). The Sayers are
always women.
4.3. Transitivity in Libelle (1963 and 1973)
Text produced by the magazine’s editors
Actions (material processes) (15/36)
Again, these verbs are very diverse, depending on the topic treated in the readers’ letter
and the answer to it. Examples are vergezellen (‘to accompany’), vernederen
42
(‘to humiliate’), respecteren (‘to respect’) and flirten (‘to flirt’). Here in most
cases, men are the Actors, as in example 6:
(6)
U hebt haar als studente leren kennen en u hebt toentertijd met haar geflirt,
zonder enige bedoelingen overigens.
You got to know her as a student and you’ve flirted with her at the time, without any
intentions for that matter. (Lib 1963/4 - 75)
Feelings (mental processes (15/36)
The feelings expressed through the mental processes all relate to loving someone:
houden van, graag zien and liefhebben (all translated in English as ‘to love’), verliefd
worden or verliefd zijn (‘to fall in love’ or ‘to be in love’). Feelings of men and women
are expressed, as the following examples show:
(7)
Dat uw man van u houdt lijdt geen twijfel: als hij nuchter is, is hij lief en aardig,
zegt u zelf.
There is no mistaking that your husband loves you: if he’s sober, he’s sweet and nice,
according to what you say. (Lib 1963/4 - 70)
(8)
Als je genoeg van die jongeman houdt om zo lang te wachten, dan moet je hem
niet loslaten.
If you love that young man enough to wait that long, then you don’t have to let him go.
(Lib 1963/48 - 66)
Communication (verbal processes) (6/36)
Verbal processes occur six times. The verbs used are vertellen (‘to tell’), zeggen (‘to
say’), uitvragen (‘to ask for a date’) en verwijten (‘to reproach’).
Text produced by women readers
Actions (material processes) (30/55)
The majority of the processes in the readers’ letters are material processes. Although
most verbs differ, there are some similarities in content, so it is possible to distinguish
some groups of verbs according to their meaning. A first group of verbs has to do with
making someone’s acquaintance. Examples are kennismaken (‘to get to know’),
(iemand) leren kennen (‘to come to know (someone)’) and ontmoeten (‘to meet’).
Another group of verbs refers to the possible relationships between a man and a woman
and the act of marrying: verkeren (‘court someone’), in het huwelijk treden (‘to get
married to’) or huwen (‘to marry’). Other verbs, on the other hand, have to do with
leaving your partner: verlaten (‘to leave’) and ontvluchten (‘to run away from’).
Feelings (mental processes) (11/55)
The mental processes include the verbs houden van (‘to love’), dol zijn op (‘to be mad
about’), veel voelen voor (‘to feel a lot for’), verliefd zijn (‘to be in love’) and stapelgek
zijn op (‘to be crazy about’). In most cases, women are the Sensors.
Communication (verbal processes) (14/55)
43
The neutral verb zeggen (‘to say’) is used four times. Other verbal processes are
vragen (‘to ask’), een woord wisselen (‘to say a few words’), beloven (‘to
promise’) and vertellen (‘to tell’).
5. Second Wave Feminism in Het Rijk der Vrouw and Libelle
If we look at both magazines’ content in general, we can find some traces of Second
Wave Feminism.
First of all, the traditional division of roles between men and women does not always
hold. Both magazines pay attention to women who leave their houses to work outside
the home. In 1973, Het Rijk der Vrouw publishes an interview with Mrs Wybo,
manager of a shoe factory. The magazine admits that her appointment is still quite
unique, even though women’s emancipation keeps on growing:
(9)
Mevrouw Wybo, een kwieke, frisse vrouw van niet te schatten leeftijd [...],
verheelt het niet dat zij er gewoon niet bij kan dat ik helemaal naar Izegem kwam rijden
om te vernemen hoe zij haar schoenfabriek leidt. Zij doet namelijk naar best vermogen
haar werk, en is daar nu iets speciaals aan?
Toch wel. Precies omdat een vrouwenhand aan de touwtjes trekt. Het gedaas over
emancipatie ten spijt blijft het in ons land een nog wat unieke situatie.
Mrs Wybo, a bright, brisk woman of inestimable age [...], doesn’t conceal that she
cannot understand that I came all the way to Izegem to learn how she runs her shoe
factory. She does her job to the best of her ability, and what’s so special about that?
It is special. Exactly because a woman’s hand pulls the strings. In spite of the blathering
about emancipation, this remains a quite unique situation in our country. (RdV 1973/4 74)
Another article hands the floor over to Kris Smet, presenter of a popular radio
programme. In her show, she proclaims feminist ideas, as she argues in favour of more
women in political parties and she breaks taboos in talking about sex education,
sterilization of men and contraception.
Libelle as well thinks women should be allowed to work outside the home. Answering
the letter of a male reader who believes his wife should stay home to look after their
family and their household, the magazine argues that women only benefit from working
outside the home, financially as well as personally:
(10) In de eerste plaats om het materiële voordeel: in elk gezin kan men weleens een
extraatje gebruiken. Ten tweede omdat een of andere activiteit haar vitaal en levendig
houdt en in vorm, omdat het werk haar een zekere tucht oplegt: op tijd opstaan, op tijd
komen, enzovoort. En, wat vooral voor u, heren, van groot belang is: zij blijft koket!
First of all, because of the material advantage: every family could use a little extra.
Secondly, because some kind of activity keeps her vigorous and active and in shape,
because the work charges her with a certain discipline: get up on time, be in time, and
so on. And, what is certainly important for you, gentlemen: she stays elegant! (Lib
1963/7 - 74)
44
The editors of Libelle are aware of the fact that times are changing for women and
men. When a female reader complains that her husband decides on all their
expenses, Libelle indicates that the man in question should be aware of the age they’re
living in:
(11) Uw man leeft onbewust nog in de traditie dat alleen de huisvader beslist! Maar
dat stamt uit een tijd toen hij alleen een salaris verdiende! Wakker worden en op de
kalender kijken: 1973!
Your husband subconsciously still lives according to the tradition where only the father
of the family decides! But that descends from a time when only he
made money! Time to wake up and look at the calendar: 1973! (Lib 1973/4 – 44)
However, although both magazines try to break with the traditional role division
between men and women, many articles are still role-reinforcing. In 1973, Het Rijk der
Vrouw publishes an article entitled Mijnheer blijft alleen (‘His lordship stays home
alone’). This includes several tips for women to prepare their husbands for staying
home alone when their wives and children have left for a holiday. The main concern is
how their husbands will run the household, what they’ll eat, if they’ll manage to do the
dishes, and so on. That way, this article confirms the traditional role of women as
housewives, representing their husbands as complete laymen with regard to the
household.
Moreover, both Het Rijk der Vrouw and Libelle maintain a traditional view on
marriage. In their letters, readers often complain about how unhappy they are in their
marriage or about romantic feelings they have for another man. If adultery comes up,
both magazines recommend their readers to hold on to their marriage, as if it is a
straitjacket that can never be removed. Example 20 illustrates this:
(12) Indien u in de toekomst als een plichtsgetrouwe vrouw al uw zorgen aan uw man
en kind zult besteden, dan zult u vlug het gevoel van tevredenheid kennen, waar u nu zo
naar verlangt.
In the future, if you will take care of your husband and child like a dutiful woman, then
soon you will know the feeling of satisfaction that you desire so much at this moment.
(RdV 1963/31 - 9)
This focus on married life is also reflected in the naming analysis and the transitivity
analysis. Names referring to women and men in both Het Rijk der Vrouw and Libelle
almost always refer to the fact that the named referent is married or is about to get
married. Examples are mijn man or vrouw (‘my man’ or ‘my woman’), echtgenoot
(‘husband’), echtgenote (‘wife’) and verloofde (‘fiancé’). Moreover, the transitivity
analysis has shown that marrying is a central process.
In both magazines, the verbs houden van, beminnen and liefhebben (all translated in
English as ‘to love’) have a high frequency within the mental processes (expressing
feelings), which shows that love was a central topic. As we’ve seen, love implies
sacrifices for women and marriage remains the highest good.
45
With regard to women’s sexual emancipation, both Het Rijk der Vrouw and
Libelle remain very careful. Neither of these magazines publish any articles about
lesbian relationships, birth control or abortion. In the 1963 magazines, no reference to
sexual intercourse can be found, in the 1973 magazines only one. In an article about
having children in Libelle (1973), the influence of birth control comes up shortly. The
magazine declares that family planning has caused women to feel more ill at ease when
it comes to getting pregnant, as women now have fewer children than they used to.
Moreover, being pregnant is in conflict with women’s liberation, as cited literally in
example 21:
(13) En met een zwangerschap begint die onherroepelijke, onvermijdelijke
verantwoordelijkheid van het moeder-zijn, die juist voor een geëmancipeerde vrouw,
die gewend was volop en vrij in het leven te staan, soms moeilijk te accepteren kan zijn.
And with a pregnancy an irrevocable, inevitable responsibility of being a mother begins,
which can be hard to accept for an emancipated woman, who was used to living freely.
(Lib 1973/14 - 126)
6. General conclusions
We applied the linguistic framework of systemic-functional transitivity analysis to map
out the representation of women in their relationship(s) with men in two Flemish
women’s magazines of the twentieth century’s sixties and seventies. In addition to this,
we’ve taken a bird’s eye view on the articles in the corpus and the topics they are
treating. That way, we wanted to explore if there is a relation between Second Wave
Feminism and the way women and their (male) partners are represented in these
magazines.
Our analysis has enabled us to draw some general conclusions:
1) Marriage is central in the lives of women in the sixties and seventies
As the language in both Het Rijk der Vrouw and Libelle illustrates, marriage is a central
and crucial factor in the lives of women in the sixties and seventies. The analysis of the
different verbs in the transitivity analysis has shown that marrying is a central process.
In addition to this, the naming analysis we carried out (of which the results are not
published in this paper) has also shown that women and men are almost always
represented as being married or about to get married. Examples of naming practices
referring to married women and men: uw/mijn man/vrouw (‘your/my man/woman’),
echtgenoot/echtgenote (‘husband/wife’) and verloofde (‘fiancé).
In general, we can distinguish three main phases in women’s relationships with men
that are treated in women’s magazines: in a first phase, a woman meets a man she’s
interested in and they start dating to get to know each other better. Material processes
like (iemand) ontmoeten (‘to meet (someone)’), kennismaken (‘to get to know’) and
(iemand) leren kennen (‘to come to know (someone)’) all refer to this first step.
In a second phase, they get engaged and eventually married. Names as mijn man or
vrouw (‘my man’ or ‘my woman’), echtgenoot (‘husband’) and echtgenote (‘wife’)
represent men and women as married. Moreover, verbs like in het huwelijk treden (‘to
get married’) or huwen (‘to marry’) also refer to this special occasion.
46
In a last phase, women are married and face all kind of problems. Verbs that refer
to a certain kind of conflict between a man and a woman are beledigen (‘to
insult’), in de steek laten (‘to avoid’), wegvluchten (‘to run away from’) and (iemand)
pijn doen (‘to hurt (someone)’). In such conflict situations, both magazines recommend
their readers to hold on to their marriage, as they consider it to be the highest good and
adultery is not accepted.
2) Traditional roles are carefully extended
Both magazines make room for articles in which women who work outside their homes
are interviewed. In their answers to the readers’ letters, they also support the idea of
women working outside and making money. However, many articles are still rolereinforcing. Moreover, in representing men and women almost exclusively as being
married, they support the traditional view on marriage.
3) A loving man is important in women’s lives
As the transitivity analysis has shown, love is a central theme. The frequency of the
verbs beminnen, houden van and liefhebben (all translated in English as ‘to love’)
indicates that women in their relationship(s) with men are a central topic in women’s
magazines. The negative attitudes of men in relationships are often discussed in the text
of our corpus (verbs as beledigen (‘to insult’), in de steek laten (‘to abandon’), verlaten
(‘to leave’), wegvluchten (‘to run away from’) and (iemand) pijn doen (‘to hurt
(someone)’ illustrate this), but at the same time, there is an idealised (hypothetical)
picture of relationships which is being kept alive with verbs like verliefd zijn (‘to be in
love’) and liefhebben (‘to love’).
4) Second Wave Feminism is mainly absent
‘Hardcore’ Second Wave Feminist topics like birth control, lesbian relationships and
abortion remain mainly absent in both magazines. In general, both magazines can be
called feminist in that they point out that women should no longer hold on to their
traditional role as housewives, but they should improve themselves financially and
personally by working outside their homes. However, as we’ve already demonstrated,
neither Het Rijk der Vrouw nor Libelle are consistent in communicating this message,
as both magazines in this era still often confirm the traditional division of roles between
men and women.
As this study is exploratory, further research on this fascinating topic (combining
different methods from the fields of sociology, communication studies and critical
(linguistic) discourse analysis) is needed in order to investigate the diachronic evolution
of the way women’s (partner) relationships are articulated in Flemish women’s
magazines, and in order to explore how these relationships are (re)articulated by their
readers.
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49
WOMEN SPORTS REPORTERS: FEMININITY IN A TRADITIONALLY
MALE FIELD
Marilou St-Pierre
Department of Communication Studies
Concordia University
Stpierre.marilou@gmail.com
Abstract: sports journalism is one of the last male bastions in the journalistic field. In this area, women
are still underrepresented, making up as little as 10-15 per cent on the staff. But in fact, representation is
not the only way to measure or explore the operation of gender in this field. This paper is a first
exploration, through the lens of gender, of the work of female sport reporters. Research conducted in
2011-2012 in the sports department of the French television station Radio-Canada, a public institution in
the province of Quebec, looks at how power relations operate in the field at different levels. Specifically,
this research unpacks the professional practices of female sport reporters, their relations with sources,
tone used in reports, and the topics covered by women. These results raise further questions about the
impacts of gendered power relations on the careers of female sport reporters.
Keywords: women; sport journalism; gender; relations of power; Quebec; Radio-Canada
1. Introduction
For a long time, journalism was a job almost exclusively for men. But, over time,
women in Europe and North America have gained access to the field. In the province of
Quebec, Canada, women entered the field in the nineteenth century. At that time there
was few of them and they lacked the possibilities for upward mobility (Pritchard and
Sauvageau, 1996). Gradually, from the 1950s and the 1960s, women began to occupy
an increasing position of the journalistic staff (Saint-Jean, 2000); by 2006, of the 4255
journalists in the province, 44.7 per cent were women (OCCQ, 2009). Despite numbers
suggesting advancements in the field, media institutions aren’t gender neutral and
horizontal segregation is still in place (Damian-Gaillard et al., 2009). Horizontal
segregation, or gender typing (Löfgren-Nilsson, 2010), means a repartition of
journalistic specialization based on a representation of masculinity and femininity. For
example, coverage of fashion, culture or social concerns will be associated to femininity
and more women will work on these subfields. These topics are considered extensions
of their domestic responsibilities, like care and education (Damian-Gaillard and al,,
2009). Horizontal segregation can also be found in subfields themselves. For example,
Neveu (2000) noticed in a study about political journalism in France that women more
often cover small political parties than their male colleagues, or are more likely to cover
topics that fall within a social scope.
A symptom of horizontal segregation is evident in the specialized subfield of sport
journalism. In the United States, France and Switzerland (Hardin and Whiteside, 2009;
Delorme and Raul, 2010; Schoch and Ohl, 2010), women account for approximately 1015 per cent of sports journalists. This low representation of women in sports
newsrooms is coupled with a context of work particularly gendered; in sport more
50
generally, men and women are rarely mixed. Sport is a field of homosocialisation,
and a place for the construction of masculinity (Messner, 1992).
The underrepresentation of women in the sports newsroom, and the fact that they are
working in a traditionally male-dominated field brings me to question the place
occupied by these reporters who also work with mostly male colleagues, who have to
deal with mostly male athletes, and who, simultaneously, are in a position of being
female, of being a sport reporter, and of being a member of a news organization (de
Bruin, 2000). How does gender affect the work of these women? How do relations of
power constructed by gender affect their professional practices? In this paper, I propose
to explore these questions through a 2011-2012 case study of the sports department of
the French television station Radio-Canada, a public institution. This study represents a
first step to better understanding the place of women in sport journalism.
2. Research questions
Sports journalism is a specialized subfield wherein gender is particularly prominent.
Before going further, it is essential to outline a short definition of gender, a system of
hierarchy and division of bodies, behaviours, skills, and so on according to two
categories: male and female, men and women (Bereni and al., 2008). These categories
are not closed, meaning they can be challenged. Also, due to the nature of gender's
social construction, we can’t know in advance what, in a certain period, in a specific
field, will be associated with masculinity and with femininity. But gender is also “a
primary way of signifying relationships of power” (Scott, 1986: 1067). It assigns to the
agent a position in relation to other agents (de Lauretis, 1987), and the assignment of
this position has consequences that are both symbolic and material.
In the case of sport journalism, as I said in the introduction, it’s easy to note the
quantitative underrepresentation of women. But, this observation does not tell us how
gender operates in this specific sub-field? In this research, I take a first step toward
understanding how gender works in sport journalism in the Quebec context. To do this,
I eschew a gender-neutral vision of journalism (Neveu, 2000), wherein professional
socialisation, or organizational socialisation, are conceptualized as the only way to
understand journalists' professional practices. As De Bruin (2000) explains, it is
certainly impossible to ignore other parts of the identities of journalists. They are part of
an organization with rules and routines. They are also professionals who are part of a
larger community with their own ideals and discourses. Despite these considerations,
we must take account of gender, because it too is a part of the identity that we bring
with us to the different parts of our lives. As well, applying Bourdieu's theories
(Bourdieu, 1992), we could say that organizations, the political economy of the media,
and the professional community, with its discourse about what is (good) journalism, all
contribute to structuring the field. This model offers a way of understanding power
relations. But gender crosses different social fields, and the journalistic field is no
exception. Gender must be taken into account to comprehend the professional practices
of journalists, and it must be questioned.
To say it in another way, gender is at the same time a structuring structure and a
structured structure (Robinson, 2005).
Revealing the underrepresentation of women in sport journalism is important, but my
intention is to understand the role of gender in the professional practice of sports
journalists, and how femininity is conceived across restrictive structures provided by the
organisation and by the profession itself. To better understand this issue and to
operationalize my research, I offer three subquestions:
51
1. Is there horizontal segregation in the field of sports journalism? How does
such horizontal segregation operate?
2. Is the use of source is gendered? If so, how?
3. Is the style of coverage gendered? If so, how?
3. Methodology
To answer to these research questions in the Quebec context, I studied the sport
department of the French television station Radio-Canada. Radio-Canada is one of the
rare media institutions in Quebec, public or private, to have enough female sport
reporters to allow a comparison with their male colleagues, and to paint a portrait of
newsroom politics. In the province, there are three francophone media institutions that
broadcast sports and produce sport journalism. Two of these are private: RDS (and the
related channels RDS 2 and RDS Info) and TVA Sports (an affiliate of the generalist
channel TVA). There are women working at these private stations, but their tasks are so
different from each other that it’s difficult, if not impossible, to make a comparison. The
contexts of their practises were too different for the questions I wanted to answer. Also,
in a majority of cases, they aren’t presented as journalists, but as animator, or coanimator. Comparatively, it’s possible to find more women who have the title of
journalist in the sport department of Radio-Canada.
Also, in concentrating my attention on a specific media institution, I wanted to avoid
differences between media institutions themselves. The position of sport journalism is
different in a generalist media institution, like Radio-Canada, than a speciality media
channel, like RDS or TVA Sport. It could be interesting, in a future project, to take
account of these particular contexts.
3.1. Content analysis
To start, I proceeded with a content analysis of sport news reports of March 2011,
broadcast six days per week (Thursday was the exception), and lasting between 10 and
15 minutes. Much like the Téléjournal 22 Heures, a conventional news program that
aired before sports news, the Nouvelles du sport follows the same framework as a
conventional news program, with an anchor, stories, conversations between reporters
and the news anchor, and expert analysis.
In the first phase of the content analysis, I segmented each news report to keep only the
news reports, the conversations and the analysis. In each of these segments, I detailed
the sport covered, the level of sport (amateur, professional) and the sex of the journalist
or analyst. Subsequently, I re-segmented each unit to isolate the sequences where a
source was quoted. By this, my goal was to count the sources, to categorize the sex of
the sources, and to define the occupation of the sources (athletes, coach, etc.)
The second phase was less quantitative and more qualitative. Based on observations
during the first phase, I focused on coverage angles, for example, the perspective
adopted by the journalist to talk about a subject (Le Bohec, 2010: 38-39). I also paid
attention to the use of emotion in the stories, and finally, to the transgression in the
presentation of news. By this, I mean the way the journalist transgresses the traditional
“hard news model”, characterized by an impersonal tone and a focus on the
transmission of information (Rowe, 1992), to adopt a more subjective tone in which it is
possible to distinguish an editorial style, or what Rowe (1992) calls a "reflexive
52
analysis." When this boundary is crossed, the journalist is no longer just a
professional; he/she is also a sport fan.
3.2. Interviews
After the content analysis, I conducted a series of six semi-structured interviews with
sport journalists of Radio-Canada. I chose them because they were the three men and
three women most present in the corpus. My questions were based on the results of the
content analysis. My goal was to confirm the results, particularly what I observed in the
inductive part of the analysis. I also wanted to understand these results, and the
relationship these journalists have to gender issues. I wanted to understand what, in my
results, was affected by the institutional context, and what was more gender-related, in
order to problematize the gender identities of female sport reporters.
4. Results
4.1 Women's presence and horizontal segregation
The first data that I collected was aimed at determining the presence of women sport
reporters in the news report, and to categorize their roles.
Table 1 — Type of content according to the sex of the journalist
Analyses
Conversation
Reportage
Total
Men
14 (100 %)
5 (55.6 %)
25 (59.5 %)
44 (67.7 %)
Women
0 (0 %)
4 (44.4 %)
17 (40.5 %)
21 (32.3 %)
Total
14
9
42
65
As we see in Table 1, women produced 32.3% of the content, compared to 67.7%
produced by their male colleagues. The biggest gap in representation between women
and men is in the analysis, where there are no women. Analysis segments account for
21% of the total content. The absence of women in these segments seems due in large
part to the topic of these analyses and the fact analysts are predominantly former
athletes. The vast majority of analysis segments were about professional hockey, an
unattainable sport level for women; the National Hockey League (NHL) is not mixed.
Women are thus automatically excluded from these segments. In the March 2011
corpus, there were no analysis segments about female sports. There was one segment
about a speed skating competition involving men and women, but the analyst was a
male ex-speed skater. Due to the absence of women in analysis, these segments were
left out of this study.
Excluding analysis, women produced 40% of the news stories, men 60%. In March
2011, 16 different journalists produced at least one story or on-air conversation. Of
these 16 journalists, only four were women. Two of these women produced 15 segments
of the 21 produced by female sport reporters. In the case of the 12 male reporters, the
work was more equally shared. Only one male reporter produced more than four
segments in the month, due to his beat: the coverage of the Montreal Canadiens,
53
the only professional (NHL) hockey team in the province. So, we can observe that
women represented 25% of the journalists in the corpus and two of the four
women journalists were over-represented by producing 70% of the feminine content.
I said in the introduction that the horizontal segregation can be understood as the
absence or near-absence of women in certain journalist specialization. But, In sport
journalism, previous research tends to have arrived at a similar conclusion: women are
relegated to the coverage of secondary sports (Delorme and Raul, 2010). In the case of
Radio-Canada, the situation seemed different.
Table 2 — Sport covered according to the sex of the journalist (number of segments, without analyses)
Male reporters
12
Female
reporters
10
Total
22
Hockey
American
football
3
3
6
Boxing
3
1
4
Soccer
2
1
3
Formula 1
2
0
2
Cross-country
skiing
1
1
2
Freestyle skiing
1
1
2
Baseball
1
0
1
Cycling
1
0
1
Synchronized
swimming
0
1
1
Speed skating
1
0
1
Tennis
0
1
1
Dance
1
0
1
Golf
1
0
1
Other
1
2
3
Total
30
21
51
Hockey dominated the coverage with a total of 22 segments. It’s important to note that
in Quebec, and generally in Canada, hockey is the most popular sport. In second place,
and far behind, we find the coverage of American football. The sex of the reporter
didn’t seem to affect the sport covered. But, if we dig deeper, it was possible to observe
a division of labour based not on the sport, but on its level.
The sport field, like other social fields, is crossed by tensions. One of these lines of
tension is found in the division of the field between amateur and professional sport. This
line isn’t always clear. For example, during the Olympic games, there is a mix of
professional and amateurs athletes. An amateur, in this sense, doesn’t mean that these
athletes aren’t top athletes. It means that these athletes aren’t paid for doing their job.
They can be paid by sponsorship or by state programs dedicated to athletes, but this is
not the same as professional athletes who are paid by contracts and who have insurance
against injury. There are also amateurs of all kinds, including children, teenagers, or
adults who are not top athletes, nor are they professionals. To account for these
differences in the content analysis coding, I created two different categories for
54
coverage of amateur sports, one for competitions among top athletes ("high
performance sport"), and another for amateur activities ("amateur sport").
Regardless, in both cases, amateur sports do not garner the same media attention in
North America (with the exception of the Olympics). In a subfield dominated by an
economic logic (van Zoonen, 1998: 126), the coverage of professional sports takes up
more media space, and is normally at the beginning of the sports news report. In the
case of my study, each time the Montreal Canadiens played, the Nouvelles du sports
opened with this news. Coverage of professional sport gives journalists a visibility that
amateur sport does not. Certainly, in a public institution like Radio-Canada, the amateur
sports are sometimes broadcast as part of the station's mandate. However, Radio-Canada
also competes with other channels for audience. In the end, the public station makes
more visible the same kind of sport news as other stations.
Figure 1 – Division of content according to the sex of the journalist and the sport level
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
Men
30%
Women
20%
10%
0%
Amateur
sport
Professional
High
sport
performance
sport
Other
The Figure 1 illustrates how coverage of segments (stories and conversations) was
divided according to the sex of the journalist and the sport level. Nearly half (47.7 per
cent) of the content produced by women was about professional sport. For male
reporters, this proportion reached 73.3%. In other words, half of the time, women
covered non-professional sport, or non-professional events while their male colleagues
spent just a quarter of their time covering non-professional sport.
During the interviews, I asked participant journalists how to explain the low presence of
women in the coverage of professional sports. First of all, a consensus emerged among
the interviewees: unlike at private stations, covering amateur sport isn’t seen as a
negative or lesser job at Radio-Canada. One female journalist said, about a private
channel:
I’m sorry. It’s sad to say that, but [at this channel], girls are enclosed in the
coverage of amateur sport. I say enclose because at this channel, amateur
55
sport is a secondary topic. Here, it’s not true. Here, the Olympic games
have an enormous importance. At Radio-Canada, amateur sport isn’t a
secondary topic, and for me, it’s a passion. (F2)8
At Radio-Canada, the difference in the coverage of amateur and professional sport
wouldn’t be related to gender, but due to the public mandate of the. Radio-Canada, as a
public broadcaster, has the mandate to represent Canadian diversity, which includes
amateur sports. Profits are not supposed to guide their choice of coverage.
However, I found a parallel discourse in the interviews with women, and with two of
the three male participants. If amateur sport is valued at Radio-Canada, it’s also a milieu
more easily accessible to women. "If we want to enter into the world of sport, I think
that the easiest way is when you begin by covering amateur sport," said one of the
female journalists (F1). Still, ease of access depends on which amateur sport is being
covered.
Suddenly, I begin to work in a small newspaper […]. I’m not sure that, as a
girl, I have the guts to sit down in front of [the coach of a popular local
junior hockey team]. I’m not sure because, firstly...I think he would tell me:
“what are you doing here?” (F1)
Despite the fact this journalist works for Radio-Canada, she had a hard time feeling
comfortable, and being accepted, by some athletes and coaches in amateur sport as well.
In a particular case, her access to the practices of a popular hockey team was reduced,
with the explanation that a young woman like her was a distraction for the players. It’s
important to note that in this case, the situation can’t be explain by the fact that coaches
and players are less accustomed to media coverage. Due to the popularity of the team,
despite the amateur status, coaches and players have to deal on a daily basis with
journalists.
Another female journalist interviewed said she never had problems covering amateur
sports, but that when she covered professional sports, it was totally different. Sexist
jokes and inappropriate behaviour were common. For example, one time, during a live
broadcast a football player kissed her on the mouth. She also revealed that one time, a
professional hockey player refused to answer her questions, but answered those of male
reporters. If these events were more frequent when she was a young reporter, everything
is not resolved with time.
It’s still happening. Sometimes, I’m in scrums, I will ask a question, and the
guy will look at me one second, after he will look at all the male reporters,
and he won’t look at me again. It’s still happening. Is it timidity? Is it…I
don’t know. But it’s still happening. A discomfort. It can have a discomfort.
It can happen. […] But at the end, I have my quote, it’s just that the guy
doesn’t look at my Kodak [my camera] (F2)
A male reporter believed that amateur sport is more easily accessible for women due to
its less pretentious character, and the general accessibility of its athletes.
8
The interviews were conducted in French and translated by the author.
56
At my beginning, I had a colleague who said to me that when she entered in
locker rooms, it was really, really macho. Guys made jokes like dropping
their towel, just to see her reaction. Can you imagine the discomfort? (M1)
But, in the amateur sport field, athletes “don’t have the vainglory of millionaires », said
the same journalist.
Two women journalists that I met said they had received offers from their bosses to
cover, on a daily beat, a professional sport team. In both cases, they refused. If it’s
impossible to conclude that this decision is directly and only related to the sexist
attitudes of some players, coaches or executives, it seems relevant to make the
hypothesis that these difficulties are factors in the decision they took.
4.2 Sources
It’s normal to see and to hear other sources than the journalist in reportage. Sometimes,
it’s someone who gives an interview to a journalist; sometimes it’s an excerpt from a
press conference, etc. In Table 3, I paint the quantitative portrait of the use of sources.
Table 3 — Appearances of sources according to the sex of the journalist
Male sources
Female sources
Total
Male reporters
82 (46.9 %)
29 (65.9 %)
111 (50.7 %)
Female reporters
93 (53.1 %)
15 (34.1 %)
108 (49.3 %)
Total
175
44
219
Despite the fact that women produced only 41.2% of the segments, their stories
contained 50% of the sources counted in this study. But, female sources were
definitively underrepresented by women and men sport reporters. They accounted for
only 20% of all sources, and they were only in six segments throughout March 2011
(four of these segments were produced by men).
When I discussed this with reporters, there were few differences between how male and
female participants approached their sources. Certainly, circumstances have an impact
on the use of source quotes. Firstly, sources must be able to express themselves clearly.
A journalist explained to me that sometimes, he doesn’t use the quote directly because
he can summarize in 15 seconds what an athlete will say in 45 seconds. Secondly, there
is the relevance of the source's comments. In the world of sport, the use of clichés and
stock phrases is commonplace, but such quotes do not carry much weight. Often,
journalists prefer to put one or two more facts into their story than include a quote that
doesn’t make sense or add much information to the story. Finally, Radio-Canada has
rules about the use of sources. One journalist explained: “when I have a conversation of
two minutes, generally, I am supposed to have two quotes from it” (H3). Journalists will
move away from the institution rules only in specific circumstances.
But, in the interviews with women, I discovered a real care to limit their own presence
in the stories and to leave space for their sources. “Me, I don’t think I take up space.
People don’t want to see me" (F1), said one female journalist when I asked about the
place of sources in her work. On the same topic, another journalist said that, if it’s
possible, she avoids concluding segments with shots of her standing alone in front of the
camera because “in sport, it ruins everything"(F2). She prefers when viewers don’t see
57
her. Instead, she doesn’t hesitate to put long quotations in her stories. In interviews
with male journalists, I did not notice a similar discourse.
The biggest difference between men and women sport reporters regarding sources is the
occupation of the sources.
Table 4 — Source occupation according to the sex of the journalist 9
Women
Athlete
Coach
Team executive
Fan
Former athlete
Family member
Journalists
from
media
Analyst
Other
Total
Men
34
13
12
4
3
4
52
8
4
7
4
0
2
1
8
80
0
1
5
81
other
Demonstrated in Table 4, sources seen in the stories of male reporters were most often
athletes (64.2%). For women, this proportion was only at 42.5%. Female reporters were
also the only ones to use family members as sources. They used quotes from coaches
and executives twice as often as their male colleagues. Certainly, assignments
contribute to these statistics. For example, it would be surprising to have a quote from a
player when you cover an executive meeting of a sport league. However, the gap is too
wide to be attributed to assignments alone.
I noted during the interviews that the relationship between journalists and their sources
influenced the place given to the source in the story. Relationships built by journalists
are crucial. Journalists must maintain respectful and cordial relationship with their
sources while avoiding the trap of over-familiarity, said a journalist. But, with time,
some relationships become stronger due to a shared passion for the game. These
relationships are particularly interesting for journalists, because they offer access to
scoops (sometimes) or to facts that help them “to better understand a situation”.
But, as noted before, women sport reporters have to deal with bad jokes and
inappropriate behaviour from some of their sources. Under these circumstances, it can
be hard, if not impossible, to get a good quote from athletes. It’s easier with coaches and
executives because, generally, they are doing press conferences. All journalists have the
same access to the same material. I also noticed that women reporters are really careful
in their relationships with male athletes. They want to be sure to act as professionally as
they can, without any possible ambiguity: “I can’t ask the phone number of a hockey
player in the same way that I do with a female hockey player, or a woman skater. The
reason behind the request must be clear. We must be careful with that. Me, I’m always
careful" (F2). During another interview, a woman journalist doubted that she could ever
develop the same relationships with male athletes as her male colleagues had.
Familiarity between a woman reporter and a man athlete could be seen as
9
Table 4 doesn’t take account of multiples appearances of the same source in a same segment.
58
unprofessional. These barriers, due in large part to a heterosexual view of the
world wherein men and women can’t have relationships without there being
potential for sex, seem to contribute to the use of fewer quotes from athletes in stories
covered by female reporters.
4.3 Coverage style
I did not find systematic differences in the work of men and women sport reporters, but
found some tendencies which seemed to be informed by gender as well as different
visions regarding what constitutes good sport reportage.
4.3.1 Angles
Journalists aren’t the only ones to influence story angles. Each morning, there is an
editorial meeting during which assignments and approaches are discussed. Nonetheless,
as explained by the journalists I interviewed, reporters express their points of view
during these morning meetings, and their personal styles influence their angles and
approaches.
I noted earlier that men tended to adopt a factual angle, typical of what is called “hard
news” (Rowe, 1992). The journalists explained what happened, in chronological order,
and sometimes added one or two facts to explain the context. Men appeared to be more
focused on the facts, and offered detailed descriptions to support these facts. When they
offered context, they most often used technical explanations, or reminders of previous
game results. When female journalists adopted a factual angle, they included feelings of
the athletes or their family members, emotive impacts or rivalry between competitors.
During interviews, women journalists raised the same concern about how to tell a good
story. If, in general, the concept of visual narrative is important in audiovisual
journalism, women were the only ones to express a direct concern about this topic.
I’m telling a story. It’s important. […] Sometimes, I prefer to drop one or
two facts, to privilege continuity, to make it more enjoyable [...]. This is my
style. I want to be sure that when people watch my report, at the end, they
have the impression that they watch a small story [...]. Each time, I have
the impression to sign a work of art. (F2)
Another journalist explained that she loves "the historical component, the human side "
(F1). Like their male colleagues, sometimes, they had to choose more factual angles,
employing statistics and hard facts to tell their stories. However, the female reporters
interviewed in this study were clear this is not their preference. This view of how female
reporters might work differently was shared by the male journalists interviewed.
I think that women are more original in their information treatment than
guys. My colleagues, they are girls that I really respect, because they have
a way to of speaking that I really appreciate. Us, guys, we are more
descriptive. It’s okay, but I don’t know, there is a propensity...or maybe it’s
the kind of topic they are doing. It is embodied. (H2).
One woman journalist said that she thinks that men are more descriptive than women.
59
They are “more factual, a little bit more factual. And human stories, for example
doing a report in high school with teenagers, it’s not their favorite thing” (F2).
4.3.2 Emotion and transgression
One of the most obvious sources of difference in tone or approach appeared in the way
that emotion was used in the reports. Men and women sport reporters used emotion in
the work they produced. In fact, as all the journalists said during my interviews, one
cannot dissociate sport and emotion. But, in the segments produced by women, I noted
that, at certain moments, emotion was used to drive the report. In other words, the actor
(athlete, coach, executive, etc.) and his/her entourage were placed as the centre of
attention, and their feelings emphasized. For example, when a football player
announced his retirement, the reporter didn’t focus her attention on his athletic past, but
more on the present, on how he felt, how his teammates responded to this
announcement, etc. I didn’t find any of this kind of angle in men’s segments. One of the
male reporters interviewed offered this comparison:
I know that women, if I compare their work with mine, have more emotional
consideration than me. In my mind, when there is a performance, I will ask
the guy, “Hey, you had a great performance. Tell me about your
performance.” And he will answer, “The hole was there. I took my golf
club, I hit the ball, I saw the ball roll and go in the hole.” The girl will ask:
“Hey, you did a great performance. You should be happy.” There is a
different twist to generate something else. This is my opinion. (H2)
I also observed that male reporters tended to make more personal comments, words
games, or use “I,” or first-person descriptions. All the journalists I met expressed their
concern about the ideal of objectivity, trying to make clear both sides of the story.
However, the men interviewed admitted to having the habit of personalizing their
reports, by saying “a small sentence at the end. Just a little twist, a question” (H2). For
them, sport journalism, because it’s a “light” topic, doesn’t require the strict respect of
the neutrality norm. In segments produced by women, this personalization of the
information wasn’t clearly noticeable. When I questioned them, they were conservative
in their answers, arguing the role of journalists, in sport like in other specialities, wasn’t
to analyse, or to make comments. A male reporter also observed that his female
colleagues were less comfortable expressing their own points of view. According to
him, this situation isn’t a question of ability.
Often, they [women] do not dare. I think about one my colleagues, who has
an excellent writing style, but who sticks to the script, despite the originality
of her reports. She has a remarkable sense of narrative. In two minutes, she
will pass the information that someone else could only do in five minutes.
But, she’s maintaining a corporate style. I told her my observation. Maybe
it’s sexist, but I think that she might dare more if she were a guy. She has
the capacity to dare. (M3)
The same journalist mentioned that another female colleague did not hesitate to “fight in
the shadow for a topic she thinks is important. But when it’s time to deliver the
information, she always takes a “corporate tone”.
60
When I asked women how they could define their professional style, they insisted
on a positive tone, on the importance of building a solid story, of finding “the story
behind the story.” Expressing their opinions or adopting a more personal tone was not
what they were looking for in their reports.
4.Discussion and conclusion
The results of the content analysis and the interviews provided evidence of the role of
gender in the professional practices of sport journalists. If women are underrepresented
in the sport department of Radio-Canada, despite the public status of this institution, I
also found traces of horizontal segregation. Visibly, the use of sources was different,
like the coverage style between men and women reporters.
What is interesting, and I think must be developed more fully, are the multiple reasons
behind these results. It’s one thing to note that women covered a larger proportion of
amateur sports, but the reasons behind this situation are still largely hypothetical. Why
did women I interviewed seem so unenthusiastic about covering professional sports? I
proposed that near-systemic harassment could be a beginning of answer. Here, we see
gendered power relations in action, combined with economic issues. Professional sports
are a lucrative industry. In mainstream media, professional sports are generally on the
front page of the sports section. Can women who are living through harassment or
situations in which they are uncomfortable, express their concerns freely? The three
interviews conducted with women suggest not. Or that when they do express
themselves, they must be supported by a male colleague.
I think that it would also be interesting, and in fact essential, to investigate the use of
emotions and the importance accorded to storytelling in the work of female sport
journalists. Does this style of coverage emerge from traditional notions of femininity
that prize emotions or is it a strategy to differentiate their work from that of their male
colleagues? Or is this emphasis on story-telling merely a way to compensate for “less
interesting” assignments, or inconsistent access to sources? Are the professional
practices of female journalists impacted by the (lack of) legitimacy they felt they had in
the field, like a male journalist invoked during an interview, or do the use of a
traditional impersonal tone is a strategy of differentiation from their men colleagues?
The idea of strategies has already been investigated by some researchers who are
interested in the place of women in journalism (Ross, 2001; Djerf-Pierre, 2007;
Damian-Gaillard et al., 2009). Women have used different strategies to establish
themselves in the field. Djerf-Pierre (2007) identifies three of them: be “one-of-the
boys”, which means to act like the men in the newsroom, be “one-of-the-girls”, i.e.
“using one’s specifically feminine capital to the full by specializing in subjects and
genres that particularly appeal to women” (Djerf-Pierre, 2007; 98) or the expansion
strategy, which means creating a new space. Ross (2001) talked about another strategy,
the retreat, “where women choose to work as freelancers rather than continue to fight
battles in the workplace.” (p. 535). But, are these strategies present in sports journalism?
Do women sports journalists consider their use of emotion, or the absence of opinion, as
a strategy? In a long term research project, will we find these strategies?
As stated previously, heteronormativy seems to affect the choice of sources and the
relationship women journalists are allowed to develop with male athletes. For the
women reporters I interviewed, this was a big concern and they insisted on the
professionalism every women should have in this situation. The results of this
61
research are consistent with other investigations in the field of sports (Hardin and
Shain, 2006), where women sports reporters must be careful of their attitude. But,
like the researche of Schoch and Ohl (2010) and Schoch (2013) revealed, women sports
reporters can also play with stereotypes, and representations of femininity to obtain
information from sources. For example, they can play the role of the seductive women.
For this reason, I think that it would be essential to extend the scope of a future research
project to different media institutions, in order to see how the relation journalist/source
is seen in different contexts (public or private institutions, experimented or young
journalist, amateur or professional sport, etc.).
In order to answer all of these questions I have proposed a future research project that
seeks to investigate the field of sports journalism deeper. I want to understand the way
gender has affected the field of sports and specifically the work of women, in that field,
in the province of Quebec in the last 40 years. My goal being to highlight the
professional career of women who have worked, and those who continue to work, in a
male dominated field.
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63
WOMAN WITHOUT BODY IN TURKISH CINEMA:
FETISHISM IN MASS COMMUNICATION
BAYRAM, M. Sami
Department of Philosophy
Maltepe University, Istanbul
muhammetsamibayram@gmail.com
ÖNKAL, Güncel
Assoc. Prof. Dr.
Department of Philosophy
Maltepe University, Istanbul
guncelo@gmail.com
Abstract: as a methodology of mass culture the reproduction of reality according to
various contents and divisions is a result of some ontological, epistemological,
ideological, aesthetic and ethical concerns which are sourced from the relation between
subjects and perceived phenomenon. Man, the subject of the reproduction process of
mass culture has been transformed an object by the process itself that is a result of latecapitalism’s motivation on desires being directed for meaning production. Spectaculars
observe this intention of the predefined and constructed fetishism process as “womenwithout-body” in Turkey’s cinema samples.
Keywords: female, body, fetish, desire-object
1. Introduction: Communication in Turkish Mass Culture
The difference in art between developed and underdeveloped societies can be grasped
through comparing their used role-models as main figures. Rural societies generally are
under the influence of unhealthy way of mass communication which is based on
ignorance. In this partial and ideologically oriented worldview the values are
determined heavily by temperance, emotions and traditions. Mostly industrial societies
are principally using cinema to criticize and to enquiry the actual way of capitalist
living. The advantage of cinema as an art here stems from its expanded sphere of
communication which is based on conversation. The cinema as an art might represent
the hidden motives of social history.
Turkey -as a young republican country after its independence war- has been in an
economical crisis during Second World War and industrialization has been realized and
applied by the help of Marshall the American President. This shift resulted in big
relocation movements to the relatively urbanized areas. Due to the unbalanced
economic conditions according to the areas they live in, Turkey has faced to a false
process of social transformation and urbanization. The values upside and down have
many causes on increasing criminal facts as well as violent behaviors in family life. The
divided economic line in Turkish society resulted in a hazardous discourse between the
genders. Especially the workers in fabrics were the main focus of Turkish art, cinema
and literature. “Men work, women should stay at home” is a good sample of this
conservative discourse. Additionally after 1961 many Turkish –male- workers
64
were employed in Deutschland. This second but internationally sourced
transformation also had disadvantageous for the feminine side of the society.
Women without any life/work experiences started to stay at home and they waste their
time by waiting their husbands’ invitation letters for Germany. The solipsism of women
in Turkey never lasts in.
The 1960s and 1970s Turkish cinema are full of evidences of this discriminatory
discourse and they have a common point to be discussed: The virginity and honesty of
women! In this respect, our presentation will also focus on the critique of sexually
oriented films of this special era considering the uprising value of traditions, honesty as
virginity, overwhelming attitudes against gender and its ideology.
The samples of Turkish cinema illustrate us that there is no communication between
men and women in daily life and because of the fact that the mentality between different
sexes is based on fetishism. The opposed sex is no longer to someone with full of senses
but a thing within body as an object. In this unjust “mutual” recognition all the
communication comes from the man-side and woman becomes sole instrument without
words. The film Ayrılamam (“I cannot leave”-1986) starts with ethical dilemma of a
passionate man whose brother’s wife becomes a temporary guest in their house. The
husband works in Germany but the woman is under the close observation of the others.
An earlier version of this type of “woman without body films” is Yilmaz Güney’s Baba
(“Father”- 1971) which narrates a girl’s tragedy after the imprisoned father. In those
films women are being presented such as sex-objects and the focus of camera is put to
the legs of women for minutes with a melodrama.
Consequently, the questions about Turkish cinema between the years 1960-1990 are
also the political questioning of the classes of society. Woman without body in Turkey
is still an instrument for the arabesque emotions of mankind. The men of the society
without communication with the opposed sex becomes the disguised actors of
surveillance society.
2. The Errant Spectacular in Cinema
The main hypothesis in this research/ case-study might be summarized as the definition
of woman without body as res cogitans facing the social perception of feminism; and
the relation between imaginary body-theory with the social structure of communication
among different sexes in Turkish society. This comparison also requires a reconsidering
strategy of phenomenology of body in cinema and intentionally created notion of
difference.
“Mass” as a concept in social theory represents a special type of social structure intends
to behave according to some pre-described but concealed target. In this sense mass
communication is a result of internal and extravagant outer reciprocity of all possible
communicative possibilities. The main scope of those probable possibilities is to divert
people into more humanitarian conditions and progressive new values. However, mass
communication as a communication type of a mass culture essentially based on groups
of people under the influence of that sort of culture. Thus, mass culture functions in
both ways; one is to spread knowledge and judgments about what’s going on daily life
and secondly reproduction of knowledge in terms of values and temporary but current
paradigms as well. The reproduction of communicative knowledge in mass
65
culture is not as in common as it sounds. Philosophically, mass communication is
produced by an ideology or worldview and it finds its meaning in its
comprehensive influence. Thus as the easy access of knowledge through mass
communication is free from time and place, communication becomes an effective and
commonly intersubjective production.
Mass communication is a part of social critique researches since its value-creating
power is under the shadow of technical trends. The main aim of mass communication is
not to create new values or make a progress in them whilst it much more focuses on the
technical usage of knowledge. Mass communication is a good sample of social
construction of knowledge both in individual and social levels. There is no tight
connection between meaning and value in mass communication since its instruments are
rather significant than its intrinsic reasons. In this respect spectacular of this
communication type are interested in the “action” dimension of it. On the other hand
mass communication is not just a mechanical process such as production and
consumption of knowledge. Mass communication deals with the usage of this
knowledge in terms of behaviorism. Practical issues of mass communication are quite
important because mass communication is a reflection of daily life procedure. On the
one hand mass communication resumes the daily life on the other hand it reconstructs
life perception itself. In short mass communication becomes a inevitable habit for the
consumer spectaculars.
Mass communication, for Bandura, might be conceptualized as “symbolic
communication” since it’s a voluntary action who are interested in those symbols
(2001:265). By the symbols of mass communication, the cognitive processes of the
individual spectaculars are directed according to the environmental psychology.
Additionally, mass communication is a sort of official gossip in terms of legalizing
incomplete deductions and detaching ethical concerns for a period of time (Ibid.266268).
2.1 Phenomenal Desire Management: From Desired Object to Desire Subjects
The legalization process of mass communication can be analyzed according to two main
approaches; historical revision and systematical comparison. Irving Fang divided mass
communication process into six different historical levels (1997:15). First level is the
level of scripture, second is the era of print. Printing is the starting point of migration of
knowledge from East to West. As a result of meeting paper with printing the reforms
process started to root in Middle Ages and after that in the Renaissance period. By the
spread of printing opportunities we observe that all the levels of society began to meet
the sources of the knowledge without aid. The modern world is remarkably based on the
economics and after a while economics determined religion and education which were
playing active roles in the social issues (1997:15). In the third step mainstream media
revolution is mentioned. Emerging from the first half of the 19th century as Samuel
Morse’s telegraph become an effective communication tool for spreading news around
with electromagnetic frequencies, it have closed all the remote distances mentioned. In
the third step the revolution of “entertainment” takes place. Maybe the much flourishing
era of the mass communication bring into reality as fun fact in the market. The fifth step
is the developing era of the communication “tools” and lastly the sixth step is called
“the highway” of the mass communication which means the communication without
66
borders with its all fast track in expanded areas. Thus, as Frang told us, there is no
longer local authority to control this flowing of knowledge (Ibid.).
The tools of communication in the hands of media patrols who function as social
engineers, become capable to move mass into the their own-designed “ought to” area
showing that all good/bad is valid under the commonly known definition illustrated on
newspapers, radio or TV. This is the point Lazarfeld and American sociologist Robets
agree on. These two intellectuals pointed out that the mass media is not a
communication indeed to direct people to a better world. The illusion of media does not
convert people more sophisticated but more ineffective stable position (Katz, 1957:6163).
The most crucial mean of mass communication then, a reproduction of the outer world
through its transforming instruments. Manoj Dayal, declares that people are disturbed
by the shows of mass communication anytime, anywhere: “…the house, outside the
house, the office, all around and no one can escape of it. And active engagement with
media in our all particular invasive individual area makes us uncomfortable.”
Audiences as the consumers of mass communication have the feeling of adventure
while watching the images; that is why they might be called as errant spectaculars
(Klinger, 1989:3). Spectaculars raise themselves in an irreversible illusionary sublime
position (i.e. “consumer”) by imposing them a higher position. As expressed in
Adorno’s criticism, the inconsistencies of the media knowledge reduced to a “natural”
position that consumers feel themselves in a magical world (1991:59). The hunger for
adventure is obvious at Cinema and spectaculars satisfy their errant in this visual area. It
is appropriate to defend the idea that cinema is a part of culture rather than being a deep
art object. The visual influence on cinema is not restricted by that. As cultural
phenomena, cinema is a heading subject for social sciences (Mitchell, 2001:166-169).
The memory of culture is the memory of films. Due to this connection, in this
presentation, two short cases are selected to illustrate the sexist discourse in Turkish
cinema.
3. Beyond Good and Evil: Women as an “Object” of…
The historical roots of masculine domination on women are commonly well-known.
From the beginning time of the civilization process the difference between men and
women become a great factor for identifying social classes and division of labor. The
framework of civilization process is not equal to today’s understanding of “society”
under the influence of post-modern discrimination. There is a shift from community to
family and from family to classes and finally the society itself. The classical
understanding of those differences were heavily underdetermined by comparing men
and women at-first-glance in physical appearance (body), natural ability, and their
various through faiths/cults or in religious discourses coming into social reality. Thus,
the historicity of remarkable distance between sexes results in “gender”. There are many
samples of the remarkable “distinction” between men and women such as laws, social
roles and status. To illustrate the early reforms of Urugakina (B.C. 2400) declares a
polygamist marriage prohibition meant for woman; in contrast it allows and promotes
polygamy for men. Women's perceptual position today originated from prehistoric sub communication and miscommunication like a kind of visual trends of that era were from
the major features. But no matter whatever the position of women, in Sumerian,
67
from the influence of religion in the Middle Ages was in a better condition, for
example, women were able to defend itself in court. Islam and Christianity in the
Middle Ages as the woman in the field of unconditional surrender in court to defend
herself alone even include a set of challenges. Despite this, all Asian women in
Sumerian mythology represented "abundance" (Altındal, 2004). However, we
understand that all of these understanding of the social reception of women still
commonly referred to as the spiritual greatness which could never be reflected in
practical life. For example, women could not put the law and did not have the ruling
authority. Women, unfortunately, all desire to be desired and attempted to control for
the feeding of live - ownership has been seen as a kind.
The works, theses and discussions on this discrimination cannot proceed anyway;
despite undoubtedly the most important factor to one side is that there are attempts for
destroying the other side to survive. This is especially observed and a pretty straight
forward objectivity with some emerging results. The existing efforts about
commodification of feminine increasingly involved that masculinity powers that support
the state of being of the other sex, ignoring the rights of women striving to bring to the
fore is the product of the same paradox. If we consider the ethical dimensions of the
society have to be a party to the destruction of the other side and there is no need to be
ignored. By negating, providing as they do not have subsisted, can be transformed by
changing the natural dialectic , but people who prefer carrying value of an organism that
can think and rethink in terms of being separated from the natural to the cultural
dimension.
And women as objects of desire are trying to establish a sense of ownership of the
values attributed to the unfolding of going back to Turkey as a society as long as the
global/ macro of a problem local/micro area again we can see the reflection . Her
intellect, emotions and values as carriers look as well as mentioned human features is a
type of object to look as ongoing glance and to the opposite sex as well as their gender
equity in terms of understanding undermining reality of the will. In particular, the
inequality is in close-classed society and quite low national income per capita when
compared to other countries, the gap between rich and poor is turned increasingly
perceived as objects of desire in countries like Turkey. Open in the subclass
"ownership" of impulses will arise. Thus, the circuit seen in early - civilized form of
lives - ownership of counting the contradictions of economic relations reproduced in the
mediation will not be an exaggeration. The subject of positioning itself as a poor and a
deprived woman for her children in this context as another object in question is to
determine.
Class divisions parallel to the wealthy - wealthy class around the fear of losing
everything for which they applied, we can say that all phenomena objectification. This
has created a woman transforms into objects of desire again. These two classes starting
point for women to objectify different, though, women have the perception and in
positioning the point where they are unfortunately common. Being (res extensa) and
thinking (res cogitans) women , with all assets other breed in communal and social area
covering much space and has the right to think about these issues. Women's
phenomenology in the context of these two years with the opposite sex has entered into
an existential conflict. But to say that a conflict must ensure the same conditions as
ontological. So far, we have reviewed the process realized in the situation is this;
woman in earlier civilizations was the struggle before to get emergence and
68
visibility is then captured itself to a conflict without social rights and equal
existence but a disadvantageous position.
4. Women-without-Body: Two films about women without-women
Surely, the communication of a society is a result of role – models which come
impressive that nurtures mutual contact and social movement, As a sociological
determinant, role-models varies from society to society. However, role-models in
developing agriculture-based societies, take time to grow and spread on whom can use
his/her mind in the face of industrialization critical cases "subject " models that are
established on the basis of "the other". In those communities the opportunity to
experience the different role-models are so limited and using the tools of mass
communication links , are directed to explore and understand the other. Here in this
sense and in the context of cinema it functions as on the one hand the analysis of the
current situation, but also going into the "other-lives" in terms of image transfer as an
effective tool.
As the global economic crisis which began in 1929, and additionally the economic
conditions after the Second World War, the impact of agricultural mechanization in
Turkey was the main ambition of Marshall’s aid and Turkey’s President Menderes
depended on his policies in the first half of the 20th century according to the rural-urban
migration. Especially to the big cities of the eastern region of Turkey exported cheap
labor functions as a part of the settlement after winning a stacked population, being able
to articulate on the issue of housing and urban culture began having face to face with
deep sociological problem. Unplanned urbanization, slummy housing , the conditions of
factory workers focused more employees resulting from distortions of life and
livelihood difficulties encountered other difficulties may be considered. Workers
working on the adjective was clear that the mostly male workers.
Immigration and working life urban culture, not of village life based on the structure of
sociological solidarity models make the poor poorer, the rich richer. Turkey, especially
from displaced families has evolved of the understanding that "men works, women sits
at house and so honor preserves ". Turkish films of the 1950s, after the dominant theme
of workers' families are struggling with the concept of honor. Urban-city life is worse in
urban exploitation thereof. If urban migrants are marginalized and "rogue " is innocent
enough to be instruments of ambition .
The second turning point in terms of social movements in Turkey in 1961 and signed
with Germany is mutual labor migration. In fact, rather than being mutually came to the
city from the village in two stages but could not find a job , or a family member have
been absent from most of the employees in this way men go abroad to begin with . Here
now, "left behind" and the other members of the family entrusted to Allah mere size was
evaluated in the way men and women are lonely res-extensa. The remaining femaleobject , the epitome of honor , pure peasant self-sacrificing mothers , or the size of the
person who has longed for but secondary . Not only spouses of workers who , in
Istanbul sit in the homes of the rich cannot find work and go to work everyday women
are created on the same fiction. Migrating families as a result of the economic aims of
the crowd of families based on the business section of the city's various interests can
benefit form. They convert their labor into money. '60s and '70s, the Turkish cinema has
established authority over women in this melodrama. All have led to the perception of
women.
69
The perception of women in Turkish cinema as an object that evokes women's
sexuality is consistent with addressing. Undoubtedly, the commodification of the female
body as a result of the dominance of the culture industry is also quite common in world
cinema. But conservatives have a tradition, in other words, a society which values of
conservatism, not the individuals themselves, virtual screens and try to establish by
means of sexual freedom would not be an exaggeration to say that. What is interesting
in Turkish cinema only limited areas of the woman's body has been presented to the
imagery of men. Men inevitably restricted view presented to the audience the perception
and behavioral dimensions in the world of fantasy by the contagion has passed.
Mentioned in samples processed in the period of Turkish cinema in the theme
charwoman, aunt, daughter of our neighborhood, such as ownership and arabesques ...
we can observe that the origin of emotions replicated. The voice in society and the
oppression of non- representation of female figures are obtained for both the body has
been transformed into objects of desire. The purpose of the scenarios is based on
behavioral foundations of men on women is a way to communicate. But the attempted
communication "undressed" / words are not based on supply and subconscious is
focused purely sexual. Man woman body trying to establish communication leads to a
sense of fetishist. Now the opposite sex means of communication, religious feelings,
traditions, severe depression years of pent-up emotions in the subconscious of man in
the triangle of the request was meant to face the day. This breed has been part of the
communication is called. Sociality in the environment outweigh the awareness of
individual feeling depressed due to low levels of education who learn through imitation
and never on the unthinking man's view of women is a common feature of the audience.
Men’s trying to have a body, a portion is a point. The meaning of the feminine in the
world of the opposite sex has no place in a customized subject. Men's self is the source
of communication and launching their own superiority over women approached their
world. Connect masculine self- installing, self into the pipe leading to such trends will
lead to the birth of a communication problem (Kule,2002:53).
Connected to masculine urge to live out one-sided men's sexuality in the plane of the
emergence of a legitimate, if the woman and always will be redirected to illegitimate
restrictions on impulse, under these constraints led to the emergence of emotions can
create the fetish . This example creates space can be allocated specifically to stage one
of construction Allocate film, shot in 1986, is named “I cannot leave. At the beginning
of the film (18 min.) while her worker husband died in Germany, he left behind a
woman who was left alone in the house; we see a scene when she is making housecleaning. Over implied, hair, legs off the ground, but very little has been opened seeing
and director has made it the focal point of this camera. If the audience that this woman
spied, the brother of her dead husband’s eyes are directed to the “object” . What size are
what you desire nor the middle sexuality. There is no woman in the medium. The focus
of eyes in front and director of the audience made the object of desire of the transmitted
messages does not refer to any property. There is almost a direct instinct is not
desirable. Why does Director spend here lots of minutes? There are images of women in
the middle, but there is no body. If the body is closed, it is not obvious. It is a silhouette
in front of the camera. Women’s femininity is not, the body is not made for shooting is
the function attributed to women. The woman behind the camera function that converts
an object of desire, there is an ambiguous structure.
Another example that is directed by Yılmaz Güney and who is also starring at
70
the film: Father (1971). The film is mainly about the workers migration to
Germany from Turkey in 1960s and Cemal, the main character cannot pass
employment agency medical examinations because of that his tooth are missing.
Cemal's drama tells his adventure to rescue his family (one brother is sentenced to be
murder and the other is gambler) as well as Cemal attempts to take revenge. The movie
clearly emerges by fetishistic imagery. Minute 45: Cleaning woman who are not even
visible from the waist to the upper side. She makes cleaning and certain parts of
woman's legs in the doorway are being focused for several minutes. What is meant in
this case obviously, but no doubt the man watches a woman in the doorway , which is
mass media of television, film society is undeniable that followed . Cemal 's fight for
minutes with the example of the commodification of the female body are interrupted .
Because what the audience with social sub-text nor shall deal with their individual
dramas. Important and memorable, which makes cleaning a sexual object is that every
woman's essence. Pierre Ancet considered the statement with the object rendered the
relative body under "surveillance” value loss inflicted and the subject being is removed
almost (2008:17). Thus, women's social solidarity functions defined and completed, but
when she become a vehicle of masculine statement of unilateral dreams, woman
becomes just an object (res extensa) for the men in the sake of fantasy world.
In both examples, the common experience of the experimental behavioral description of
hysterical phenomena can be rendered counterparts. Marleau -Ponty and Schilder uses
the "phantom limb" concept at this point is concerned about the description. Unlike the
holistic view of social experiment , focusing on the perception of body parts, fetishism,
and the imaginary body of the concept of hysteria " other" and thus made subject can be
learned by others. In this context, an absolute link between women and femininity can
be drawn instead of saying that is a neutral relationship. Differentiated biological based
positioned on differences made the process of understanding moved to an area called as
the dream body (imaginary body) (Gatens, 2013: 68-69 ). Positioning is psychological
as well as sociological and also dominant in both senses of cinema as a mass
communication tool which is based on directly observable power.
5. Conclusion
The cultural conservatism, lack of political space required both ontological and ethical
studies substantiate that the presence of women as a whole in mass communication is
not being represented. In particular in the case of cinema recent examples can be found
to mobilize emotions as fetishes. The lack of women in cinema could be considered as
masculine dominated communication. Women are parts of proving the heterosexuality
of men. The second plan is also being addressed to women by representing the holy
labor of men and women is not legitimate itself without men as employees.
The communication between sexes is not solely a subject of alienation, capitalism itself
as a cultural structure of living together under an absolute culture based on market is an
effort to adopt an increasingly fragmented individual alienation (Sennett,2011:10-11).
This communication forms part of the global era and permanent residents find that very
moving and creating different perceptions in different perspectives also contains a lot of
significances. The gap between practices and values resulted in not to form male and
female subjects as the carrier of values according to a kind of idealism (Ibid.). Therefore
unusual subjects emerge as the actors of unusual habitants of their unusual lifestyles.
Men and women in those societies behave according to temporality of
71
perception and institutional values since they go between needs and values in the
dominant daily-business type lifestyles. Particularly in the case of Turkey, because
of the late-modernity, the history of Turkish cinema reflects both the imagination of
society and individual ethical dilemmas. The directors of Turkish cinema focus on their
own reality with its all historical, ethical, social and individual background and subconsciousness. And it is clear that they have the power of direct mass according to their
ideology. It also presents us, the art of communication in terms of "transition" features
as
the
reality-itself
in
the
focus
of
a
director
in
films.
The another question to be considered is the perception of reality in the case of male and
female bodies as to how the phenomenological prior to conversion into objects of
desire. The collective representation of the female body as a "normal" human being
becomes instantly "beyond special" and it corresponds to the representation of such a
perception. The inner life of the woman is tried to be explained out of her body and in
this sense of surveillance set woman-kind to an object of desire. Perceived woman -in
terms of Marleau- Ponty's understanding- is formed and re-establishing in terms of her
actions and objectives based on a possessive male gaze to the body (Ancet , 2008:22 ) .
6. References
- Adorno, T.W. (1991) The Culture Industry: Selected Essays on Mass Culture,
(ed. J. M. Bernstein), London: Routledge.
- Altındal, A. (2004) Türkiye’de Kadın, İstanbul: Alfa Yayıncılık.
- Ancet, P. (2008) Ucube Bedenlerin Fenomenolojisi, (çev. E. Topraktepe),
İstanbul:YKY.
- Bandura, A. (2001) “Social Cognitive Theory of Mass Communication”,
MediaPyschology, (3), 265-299.
- Fang, I. (1997) A History of Mass Communication – Six Information Revolutions
Boston, Oxford: Focus Press.
- Katz, E. (1957) “The Two-Step Flow of Communication: An Up-to-date Report
on an Hypothesis”, Public Opinion Quarterly, Reprinted, Vol:XXII, 61-79.
- Klinger, B. (1989) “Digression at the Cinema: Reception and Mass Culture”,
Cinema Journal, 28 (4), 3-19.
- Gatens, M. (2013) “Biyolojik Cinsiyet/ Toplumsal Cinsiyet Farkının Kritiği”,
(çev. H. Şimga Durudoğan), Özne: Feminizm ve Felsefe, 18. Kitap, ss. 59-73.
- Küle, M. (2002) Phenomenology and Culture, Riga: FSI
- Mitchell, W.J.T. (2002) “Showing Seeing: A Critique of Mass Culture”, Journal
of Visual Culture, (1), 165-181.
- Sennett, R. (2011) Yeni Kapitalizm Kültürü, (çev. A. Onocak), 2. Basım,
İstanbul: Ayrıntı.
Internet Sources:
- Dajall, M. “Mass Communication Lessons”:
[http://www.ddegjust.ac.in/studymaterial/mmc-1/mmc-102.pdf]
- (Film1) “Ayrılamam”: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYIAf8D5Y30]
- (Film2) “Baba”: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTjkKKrU0MM]
72
THE MAGNİFİCİENT CENTURY: RECONSTRUCTİON OF OTTOMAN
EMPİRE FAMİLY*
Murat Iri
Faculty Of Communication, Radio Television and Cinema Department
Istanbul University
mirim@istanbul.edu.tr
Abstract: the increased presence of Islamic references in daily life due to the ruling party's conservative
policies and thus, the creation of a conservative base are the reasons underlying the increase in the
historical narratives in the 2000s in Turkey. Similarly, the production of historical narratives has
increased in line with the ruling party's discourse which elevates the past. The Magnificent Century is one
of the series that reflect such productions. The aim of this study is to understand how the series represents
family in the Sultan Suleiman Era as an Ottoman Empire family. It has been thought that this family is
constructed with the conservative bourgeois romanticism, which is dominant in today's Turkey. In line
with this, five episodes of the first season form the population of the study.
Keywords: historical narratives, Ottoman Empire family, conservatism
1.Introduction
With the private television broadcasting that started in Turkey in the 1990s, there was
an increase in television series, the series produced for families, especially female
audience, became the most watched series. Such series, starting with the 2000s to the
present, has always promised a certain "guarantee" in terms of rating. Thus, the
presentation of these series was designed in accordance with the structure, hierarchy of
the social relationships, the values of the target audience, and the plots were formed by
including plenty of intrigue, misunderstanding and being misunderstood, violence, and
tear elements. Although these series appealed more to lower/middle class families and
women, due to technology, more improved products were offered to this audience,
providing advanced expressive language, camera, light, music, and editing techniques.
Among the common characters and events in these series are those that cannot come
together, others that cannot have a family, divorces, people missing, eavesdropping,
those that misunderstand/are being misunderstood, attacks of external forces, exploited
national sentiments, and victims of defamation and/or pride. A similar plot is
established in almost all the series, no matter what the issue is. On the other hand, for
today's "active" audience, the popular series are the ones that are smoothed and that
consider aesthetic concerns, turning the extraordinary events into a little unexceptional.
In the meantime, it is obvious that there are effects of foreign movies and series on these
series.
2.Hypothesis
The increased presence of Islamic references in daily life due to the ruling party's
conservative policies and thus, the creation of a conservative base are the reasons
underlying the increase in the historical narratives in the 2000s in Turkey. Similarly, the
production of historical narratives has increased in line with the ruling party's discourse
which elevates the past. The Magnificent Century is one of the series that reflect such
productions.
The series, which can also be defined as a family series, takes the Ottoman
family as the basis. The series centers on family members, relatives, and the
73
relationships and conflicts experienced in their social circle. The tensions and
conflicts in the love, work and community relationships are made use of in the
construction of the plot. Violence and sexuality are frequently referred to for the
maintenance and rating of the story. The series which is broadcast on a national
channel's mainstream line is about Suleiman the Magnificent. Suleiman is depicted in
roles and social relationships ascribed to him as an ideal man. The story centers on his
dilemmas between the state and harem as an Ottoman Emperor and his preferences. The
portrait of an ideal, fair father and manager is presented through the proposed solutions.
As a matter of fact, the idealized bourgeois love of today's Turkey's is redrawn.
3.Method
The series' narrative structure follows the exposition, climax, resolution chain in line
with the traditional narrative structure. This chain is reproduced during the resolution of
a conflict by bringing to the fore a new conflict which gradually emerges. In the present
study, it has been understood that the production, progression and resolution of the basic
conflict takes place in approximately six weeks. In line with this, five episodes of the
first season form the population of the study.
The aim of the present study is to understand how the series presents family in the
Sultan Suleiman Era as an Ottoman Empire family. It has been thought that this family
is constructed with the conservative bourgeois romanticism, which is dominant in
today's Turkey. First, the characteristics of the Ottoman family structure are analyzed
and the main characters in the series are described while the differences between the
female and male characters are underlined. For, the patriarchal and authoritarian
thinking structure is reconstructed in the series.
3.1 The Ottoman Empire in the Reign of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent and Harem
Suleiman is the 10th Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, reigning, from 1520 to his death in
1566. Suleiman's father, Selim I becomes not only a veteran Sultan by conquering Syria
and Arabia but also the protector of Mecca and Medina and the protector of the pilgrim
route. To highlight his superiority over the Islamic rulers, Suleiman uses the title of
"The Caliph of Muslims". Ottoman Sultans are veterans; in other words, they are
Muslim warrior Sultans fighting for Islam. He uses the term, Gaza (the battle for Islam)
to mean the sovereignty of the Islamic World (Inalcık, 2013: 66).
To be the Sultan, the Ottoman prince must seize the capital of the Ottoman Empire, the
treasury and its archives and have the support of the bureaucracy and palace officials.
In fact, the main factor in ascending the throne is the support of the Janissaries after
1421. The princes that lost the fight for the throne generally sought refuge in the enemy
territory, leading to the constant threat of civil war in the Ottoman Empire. Therefore,
Sultan Mehmet the Conqueror approved the law of fratricide (Sultan’s right to kill his
brothers) for the sake of the Empire. However, even this did not prevent civil wars. The
main reason for this was the custom that required the Sultan's sons to be sent to Anatolia
to serve as the governors when they become 12 years old. The Sultan's sons had a
palace and administration similar to the ones in the capital city. These princes serving
as governors tried to be a governor in a city close to the capital city and to find support
for this. Their impatience sometimes led to civil wars in the Empire. Suleiman's sons,
Mustafa and Bayezıt are executed in 1553 and 1561 due to their rebel against Suleiman.
2. Mehmet kills his 19 brothers and ends the custom requiring the princes to serve as
governors. He puts the Princes into special room, known as Cages, in the Harem. Thus,
Sultans become the symbol of a unitary state and power. Queen Mothers' intrigues
begin to play an important role in the fate of the reign.
74
With the emergence of the institution of Cage, the Janissaries become cat's paws
of the Queen mother and the eunuch, while the grand vizier becomes a toy for
these two Powers (Inalcık, 2013: 69).
The people living in the Harem barely had contact with the world outside. It was a
forbidden zone, with no contact with the world. The Ottoman Sultan's private lives are
full of obscurities. The main reason for this secrecy is that the palace is surrounded by
very thick and high walls and protected by extensive security measures. No man can see
the Sultan's women. Harem means the place where entrance is forbidden. It is located
between the Sultan's bedroom and the Queen Mother's flat. The princes' room is also
included with the system of Cage.
The Sultans' marriage to Turkish girls is abolished during the reign of Bayezit II, and it
becomes a custom that the Sultans marry Harem women. Harem women are selected
mostly from Circassia and Russian girls as they are famous for their beauty.
As Harem was the Sultan's home, everyone was required to pray and read the Quran.
The Sultan gave an odalisque (a special room) to the woman that he liked and allocated
this room to her, with other Harem women under her control. If any Harem woman had
a baby of the Sultan, she became a member of the master class. The woman who gave
birth to the first boy became the head-woman. The Princes had sexual intercourses
with their Harem women but it was forbidden to have babies.
During the reign of Fatih, the administration of the empire and Harem are in the hands
of devshirmes (Christians conscripted to be brought up for the janissaries). The boys
that were converted to Islam and educated for military profession or religious
disciplines in Enderun School had the opportunity to ascend to the upper positions in
the Ottoman military and administrative facilities. The concubines in the Harem were
able to rise to the highest positions of masters/mistresses, favorites, master women, and
queen mothers. The Sharia law is not followed in the marriages to the concubines
because the concubines are the Sultan's property and benefit from them as he wishes.
Starting with the reign of Fatih, it became a custom that the Sultans did not have
wedding ceremonies with their women. However, Suleiman got married to Hürrem
Sultan after a wedding ceremony and became the first Sultan that did not comply with
this custom. The concubines that had babies from the Sultan were called Haseki,
meaning the mother of a prince. It was not unusual for the Sultans to have more than
one Haseki (Ulucay, 2011: 40).
All the concubines of the Sultan that lost his throne were taken from the Harem
chamber and sent to the old palace. If they did not have any son that could be a Sultan,
they would lead a prison life until their death.
In the Ottoman History, the first women to be called Sultan were Yavuz's wife and
Suleiman’s mother, Hafsa Sultan. Thus, only the Sultan's mothers and daughters were
called Sultans. The mother whose son became the Sultan was immediately named after
Sultan. The highest position in the Ottoman Harem is to become a Queen Mother. The
second largest chamber after the Sultan's room in the palace is the Queen Mother's. All
work in the Harem was done by the orders of the Queen Mothers. Most of the time, they
were also involved in affairs of state and attended the Friday divine service.
Siblings, especially boys were given great importance in the Ottoman Empire. The
children were first required to read the Quran. They also studied Mathematics, history,
and geography. Those who got married to the Sultan's daughters were devshirmes.
They considered the Sultan as their fathers. Upon marriage, they also became a member
of the dynasty, enjoying more value and power. Some became grand viziers, and most
were admirals. They always obeyed the Sultan. They did not have the right to divorce
their wives. The sultan could only divorce her husband only with the Sultan's
75
permission. The princes, their sisters, and Queen Mothers visited their holy
fathers every Friday (Peirce, 1993).
3.2 The general characteristics of the series in Turkey and The Magnificent Century
Within a limited point of view, it can be stated that there are three types of series in
Turkey: Ottoman series (The Magnificent Century, The Ottomans years ago-Uprising,
Ahmet the Apprentice), detective series (Back Streets, the Naked Truth, Behzat Ç.), and
religious series (the Peace Street and The Little Bride). The common thing in all these
series is that the plot is based on a family or families. There are 70 series in each season
and 45 series are on screen on average each week. Most of these series appear on TV
during the prime time (between 20.00 and 23.00). These are most watched by
low/middle class people that can also be the characters in these series whose plot is
generally based on Istanbul. Male perspective is dominant.
Although we classify the series as costume series within the scope of our research, it is
due to consider the effects of such series on the low/middle class. According to
Vaslidevan (1994: 307), movie/TV industry considers two assumptions while defining
audience. The first assumption is that the lower/middle class audience enjoys the act of
watching itself, that is, the spectacles that are not ideological or social. The second, on
the other hand, is that this audience is sensitive to the religious and moral rhetoric
within the interest in mythic films. Therefore, such audience is motivated through
action images and moral issues.
To marginalize the enemy is achieved by feminizing him symbolically. If there is not
female character, then the hero and the viewer's gaze is directed to the physical
environment of the plot. Being a "woman" is attributed to this physical environment as
the other being desirable by the analogy of "motherland" (Selig, 1993: 120).
The metaphor of the nation turning into womanhood or femininity is supported by the
display of the hero's authority gained when he freed the nation from the weaknesses
experienced. This formation of masculinity links manhood and history. A relationship is
established between male sexuality and fighter/warrior ethos (Burgoyne, 1994: 212).
The images of masculinity in the series are highlighted through the dialog between the
self-admiration authority and the social authority. This dialog is between physical
power/control/action and law/order/ nation.
3.2.1The Magnificent Century – Deep Love
The series is based on three issues: Harem, the Ottoman Empire's foreign and internal
affairs. Basically, the life of Suleiman the Magnificent , the Sultan of the Ottoman
Empire and that of Hürrem Sultan are recast through Hürrem Sultan's struggle for her
sons' throne and the life in the palace. These three elements are connected to each other.
The study revealed how the concept of family and other concepts related to family were
reconstructed in the series. With this aim in mind, each episode was subject to discourse
analysis and the role of the male-dominated and authoritarian ideology in reconstructing
the Ottoman Empire family was investigated. Furthermore, a frequency analysis was
conducted in each episode on the number of the concepts such as family, dynasty,
father, mother, brother/sister, Queen Mother, and prince.
The light and color represented in the series is more similar to the work of the Frenchborn artist Jean-Baptise Vanmour than the miniature entitled the Sacking of the Bowls
of Levni, the Ottoman miniature master. In the painting, the Janissaries in the
background that have not yet reached the bows are drawn together with their underlying
tensions and darkness through an understanding of light and perspective. However, this
cannot be seen in Levni's miniature. It is so clear, relaxing, and bright (Gundogdu,
2004: 94).
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The camera moves so that it portrays the Ottoman army under the control of
Suleiman, showing brave actions in the battle scenes. When the Sultan is in the
public and during the parades, he is displayed by the lower angle using the camera and
thus he is glorified. When the camera portrays the relationships within the family in the
palace or the state administration, it rebuilds the hierarchical structure of the family. If
Suleiman is on the scene, he is displayed as imposing-looking and in a dominant
position in the top position; however, when he is not on the scene, he is replaced,
respectively, by the Queen Mother, (sister) Hatice Sultan, Mustafa the Prince and his
mother Mahidevran. There comes Pargalı (Ibrahim Pasha of Parga) and Hürrem. The
victory is Hürrem's.
4.Results
4.1 Hürrem comes to the palace
Suleiman, responsible for the district of Manisa, hears the news from Istanbul. His
father, Sultan Yavuz Selim is dead and everyone in the palace and the administration is
expecting him to come.
Suleiman comes to Istanbul and while kissing his mother's hand, he wishes that "May
God allow us to show the world the power of the Ottoman Empire. From that moment,
Suleiman becomes the Sultan.
The Vatican palace learns that Selim the father is dead and his son, Suleiman becomes
the Sultan. The Pope says that "The lion of Islam died; the lion passed away and now
the lab arrived"; however, Suleiman does not appear to be a lamb for them as at last all
obeys him.
Pargalı Ibrahim, Suleiman's devshirme chief falconer (Şahincibaşı) is one of the key
roles in the series. Being very close friends since childhood and being companions
beyond brotherhood led them to set goals regarding the Ottoman Empire's foreign and
internal goals. This relationship based on male friendship is, in fact, allows the series to
be analyzed over Suleiman and Ibrahim. Pargalı is now Suleiman's Hasodabaşı (chief of
the Sultan’s room).
In the first episode, the hierarchical structure of the Ottoman Empire Family starts to be
built. The Queen Mother comes after Suleiman and Alexandra/Hürrem Sultan is the
property of Suleiman. Suleiman and the Queen Mother decide whether Hürrem Sultan
should live or not.
The importance of having a family is underlined in the first episode; Suleiman tells
Pargalı that "It is time you had a family; even it is a little late." The idea that the family
is based on the blood ties is expressed through the Suleiman's words, "If had to select
my brothers, Pargalı would be my brother.
Suleiman is a poet and jewelry designer as well as being a good statesman. He designs
pieces of jewelry and gives them as gifts to his women. Recently, he has been working
on an emerald ring which he began to design in Manisa. Mahidevran, the first Haseki
that gave birth to his son thinks that he will give this ring to her. Her first quarrel with
Hürrem will be due to this ring.
While Suleiman is walking in his Harem, Alexandra gets his attention by shouting
"Sultan Suleiman" and falls into his arms, pretending to faint, which will the first
encounter.
In the first council meeting (Divan), Suleiman says that his enemy is not Shah Ismail in
the east, but Fransuva, Henry Tudor, V. Karl, and the infidels in the Vatican in the west;
his first target is Rhodes. These are the dreams that he and Pargalı have; they have eye
contact in love and passion. The male-dominant ideology develops in parallel to
religion-oriented ideas. Accordingly, the council meeting starts with the
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statement “This empire is not more powerful than God's law; the Quran commands
justice and justice will work with law".
Mahidevran, together with the Prince Mustafa, comes back from Manisa. Mustafa
wants to see his father. He says "I order; take me to my father. Is not this place mine? I
am the owner of this place". Mahidevran gets angry and tells him "The only owner of
this palace is Sultan Suleiman".
An entertainment is organized for Suleiman. Among the girls to dance is a Ruthenia
slave named Alexandra. Suleiman is fascinated with her dance. She takes the
handkerchief, opening the way for Hasoda (the Privy Chamber). However, Mahidevran
enters the chamber instead of Alexandra, through the efforts of the Queen Mother.
In this episode, the words of father, son, mother, prince, and mother sultan are uttered,
respectively, 15, 11, 9, 7, 7 times.
4.2 I name her Hürrem
Suleiman is surprised when he sees Mahidevran instead of Alexandra. They have sexual
intercourse; however, Suleiman thinks of the girl from Ruthenia. Following the
intercourse, Mahidevran sees the ring and wears it, thinking that it is ready. She wants
to take it but it is not finished. Suleiman takes it back and sends her out. He calls out
Pargalı; he gets very angry as the Haseki comes instead of the girl from Ruthenia. He,
therefore, scolds him angrily. He also tells the Queen mother, "He who wants to rule
me, the answer is to fold, my Queen Mother."
The Queen Mother gets angry with Mahidevran and asks her why she tells him that she
has sent her to Hasoda. Mahidevran says that she does not tell it to him; however,
Suleiman knows it since the only one that can dare do it is nobody but the Queen
Mother. He is not in Manisa anymore and nothing will be the same.
Alexandra understands why she cannot be in Hasoda and who is there instead of her.
She gets ready and she will be there soon. The assistant master, Nigar tells her that
Thursday night is important to all Muslims. If she gets pregnant at that night, a blessed
child will be born into this word. Alexandra enters the room. Everything is so
romantic. Pargalı plays the violin soulfully; Suleiman's sister Hatice Sultan watches
Pargalı. Love begins to invade these two souls. Alexandra sees the ring. She likes it a
lot; while Suleiman asks her “Have you liked it? I have designed it.", his image is
shown on the mirror. Suleiman admires his image.
Wednesday night is over. The Queen Mother, Hatice, and Mahidevran have breakfast
on Thursday morning. Mahidevran is very sorry; the Queen Mother gets angry, rebukes
her, and asks if she will meet him like the way she is. Mahidevran is hopeful again.
She has to get ready for the Thursday night; however, her helper, Gülşah gives her the
bad news. Alexandra is still in the private room with the Sultan. While Mahidevran is
feeling sorry since the Sultan wants to be with a Russian slave rather than with her,
Hatice interrupts and says, "My brother is a Sultan. We cannot talk about his choices. It
is none of our business. Mahidevran, you are Haseki. You are the very woman for him.
Do not behave as if you were a concubine."
Friday morning. Suleiman changes the name of Alexandra. Her new name is Hürrem.
She is given a private room. She is given gold and jewelry as gifts. Mahidevran hears
this news. That becomes a source of contention between these two women. However,
although both are advised to be smart, calm and not to argue, the prince Mustafa is
taught to be tough and use the sword better. He sometimes appears on screen while
playing the game of sword and beating the guards. Mahidevran's treasure is Mustafa;
her only concern is to work hard towards his happiness and training as a good warrior as
well as a good Sultan.
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The love and lovers in the plot are portrayed well in this episode. On the one hand,
there is the struggle between Hürrem and Mahidevran's love for Suleiman and on
the other hand, there is the love between Pargalı and Hatice.
Meanwhile, Suleiman and Pargalı talk about politics. They plan to seize Rhodes.
Pargalı talks about Aristotle, the advisor of Alexander the Great. He reminds of this
advisor's suggestion that even if you cannot beat, cause trouble. They adopted
Aristotle's principle, "It is difficult to swallow a big bite. Divide it into pieces and then
swallow. Divide and conquer." In fact, the same principle is applied in Harem.
Being angry with Hürrem, the Queen Mother puts her into the dungeon. One night,
Suleiman hears Hürrem screaming "rescue me" in an epic-style film. He asks Sümbül
for Hürrem. However, she is in the dungeon. Suleiman gets very angry with Pargalı
not knowing this. Suleiman takes her out the dungeon.
The next day, the Queen Mother waits for Suleiman because he comes to kiss her hand
every morning. But he does not turn up that morning since he protests the punishment
of Hürrem. That night, Hürrem enters Suleiman's room and has the ring on her finger.
4.3 The Ring
Hürrem awakens Muhibbi, the poet in Suleiman. They love each other so much.
Hürrem has the ring on her finger.
She meets Mahidevran, Mustafa, and Gülşah on her way to her room. Mahidevran sees
the ring, goes crazy, and wants to take it. She calls Hürrem a thief; Mustafa watches
what happens. This little boy witnesses this quarrel and watches her mother going crazy.
The camera shows his surprise and the way he watches what happens.
Mahidevran feels sick and spends her time on her bed. The Queen Mother names this
"Hürrem Illness". Mahidevran is pregnant. Hürrem feels very sorry when she hears the
news. The Queen Mother wants to give the good news to Suleiman; however, Suleiman
thinks that she knows the victory in Sham. However, the surprise is Mahidevran
pregnancy. Suleiman is very happy and wants to give jewelry as a gift to Mahidevran.
They all come together in Mahidevran's room. Suleiman hugs his son, Mustafa tightly.
Mahidevran and Suleiman are alone. Mahidevran asks him about the ring; the answer is
clear: "I felt like it and I approved it."
The Prince Mustafa does not want to have a sibling. He tells Suleiman, "You have no
sibling. I do not want to have any, either". Suleiman points to Pargalı. However,
Mustafa tells the truth, “It is a lie. Ibrahim is not your brother but servant."
Mahidevran comments on this, saying “Mustafa does not want to share his love with
someone else, as I do. We, mother and son, do not know how to share". In fact, this
confirms Mahidevran's (and Hürrem's) desire for monogamy instead of Suleiman's
polygamy. In this regard, the series is modernist because modernity is based on
monogamous family, and there is call for women seen as the bearer of Turkish
modernism. The audience is invited to approve the monogamous family.
Nigar, the assistant master is the one that advises Hürrem. Whoever gives birth to many
more children to become princes is the winner. Nigar suggests relying on Sümbül Agha
(the chief eunuch in Harem). Sümbül first asks her to be a Muslim.
Hürrem has the ring stolen in Harlem through the efforts of Gülşah and Mahidevran. It
is a must to find the ring. The Queen Mother says that it is a major offence in Harem.
Pargalı questions Nigar. Nigar suspects that Gülşah and Ayşe are responsible for the
stolen ring. Ayşe confesses everything. The Queen Mother asks Daye to take the ring
from Mahidevran's wardrobe. It is said that the ring has been found in one of the
concubines' bed. Daye has Hürrem wear the ring and suggests not losing it until her
death.
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Hürrem tells Suleiman that she wants to be a Muslim and becomes a Muslim after
saying the Islamic confession of faith.
The Queen Mother gets very angry with Mahidevran as she has the ring stolen.
Meanwhile, through some short meetings and sending letters to each other, the love
between Pargalı and Hatice continues. While Suleiman is very happy and has
everything under his control, Pargalı is not that happy. Something is missing because he
is a devshirme. He is not a member of the family.
Feeling so sorry, Mahidevran lost her baby. Getting out of bed, Mahidevran wanders
around the palace and meets Hürrem. She attacks Hürrem and takes her down. She beats
Hürrem and makes her face unrecognizable. "You did this. I lost my baby because of
you, murderer ...”
4.4 No room for emotions
Gülşah has hard time while trying to stop Mahidevran from attacking Hürrem. Sümbül,
Daye, and Nigar come and help Hürrem. Daye tells what happens to the Queen Mother.
Suleiman visits Mahidevran, who lost his baby, to express his grief, and goes out to
attend the council. The Queen Mother gets angry with Mahidevran again and says,
"How can you fight with a concubine? You are Haseki and this is the Topkapı Palace.”
Mahidevran blames Hürrem for what has happened, because Hürrem has said bad words
to her. The Queen Mother keeps her silent since Suleiman should not hear all these.
Suleiman declares war on the King of Hungary, Louis II.
Suleiman and Mustafa meet in the garden. When Mustafa wants to go to war, Suleiman
says, "It is not possible. If you come with me, who will take care of the palace and your
mother?” Men have to take of the palace and to protect his mother.
The Queen Mother wants to share with Suleiman the idea that she would like to have
Hatice, widowed at a young age, get married.
Suleiman tells Pargalı again to "fall in love and be happy; create your own heaven". As
Hürrem is in love with Suleiman, she has decided to be a Muslim.
Hürrem is on bed, with her face unrecognizable. She goes crazy when she sees her face
on the mirror.
She wants to see Suleiman. However, she does not go see him as she does not want to
show her face. To Pargalı, Suleiman says, "How dare! I order her to come
immediately." However, he cannot wait for her to come, enters her room and sees her
face.
He learns that Mahidevran has done this to Hürrem. Suleiman enters
Mahidevran's room and shouts, "How dare you attach my harem, privacy? If you attach
her, that means you attach me. I do not want to hear your voice again. What have you
done to us? You have killed us". Mahidevran cries a lot. She is not a woman anymore.
She should not be emotional, must act with the mind, and think like a man. Like other
women.
Suleiman visits the Queen Mother and asks her to send Mahidevran to the old palace;
however, he wants Mustafa to stay with him in the Topkapı Palace. However, this is
not in accordance with the law and custom as she is Haseki. Suleiman's answer is that
"She must be thankful as I do not take her head off; I do not want her in my life."
Suleiman has a heart-to-heart talk with Pargalı and says that he wants Mahidevran to be
sent away. He asks for respect in love.
The conflict between Hürrem and Pargalı also becomes obvious. Hürrem comes to see
Suleiman. Pargalı tells her to go now as he is working with his Sultan. However,
Suleiman hears her voice and takes her into her room. Pargalı feels defeated.
The Queen Mother wants Hatice to get married. Daye complains about Hürrem to the
Queen Mother. Eavesdropping on what Hürrem says, Daye hears Hürrem saying "I will
be the owner of this palace; everyone will be my slaves." While Suleiman is on
80
the way to war, the Queen Mother will punish her, and Suleiman will not find her
in the palace when he comes back.
Suleiman talks to Hürrem about his strategy before he goes to war. Hürrem tells
Suleiman that wars destroy families and humans land asks Suleiman why he is not
afraid of death. Suleiman replies that "If you think in this way, you cannot win a
victory. Do not fill your beautiful head with these issues. When you kill people, you can
also be killed. I did not invent wars. People survive by fighting; civilization is only
possible through wars. I should carry this empire one step further than my father,
Sultan Selim". Women represent what is emotional and what is inside, while men
represent rationality and what is outside. The last word belongs to men. Men have the
only power that cannot be unquestioned.
Hürrem does not want Ibrahim to spend more time with Suleiman. However, she should
get used to it. Ibrahim is the Sultan's servant, slave, companion, and chief. Hürrem
should know her place. Hürrem gets angry and tells Ibrahim that "You will see my
place, you, the snake Ibrahim." This is a clear declaration of war.
Before going to war, Suleiman enters Harem. He bids farewells to, respectively, this
mother, Hatice, (skipping Mahidevran), and Mustafa. He kisses his mother's hand. He
has her blessing on him.
4.5 Have many babies
Suleiman declares war on the King of Hungary and is at the front. As Suleiman is not
in the palace, the Queen Mother tries to have Hürrem get married to Chieftain Batur, the
son of Lala (meaning tutor) Kasım Pasha, and in this way, she thinks that she will get
rid of Hürrem.
Hürrem misses Suleiman a lot and gets Nigar to write a letter. Hürrem's language and
style is powerful and knows how to fascinate Suleiman.
The Queen Mother hosts an invitation that night. In line with the hierarchy in the
invitation, everyone except the Queen Mother and Hatice has sat on the ground. When
the night is over, Daye gives the news to Hürrem, saying "You are no longer a slave or
concubine. You are now free. You will go to Edirne palace as a bride tomorrow.
“Hürrem goes crazy.
Suleiman enjoy a great success at the war.
When the Queen Mother hears that Hürrem does not want to go, she asks Hürrem to
come see her and tells her that she has to obey her. Hürrem tells her that "I am
pregnant" in order to prevent this. Then, it becomes indisputable. Sümbül tells Hürrem
that "You are now pregnant. Nobody can kill you, especially when you have a boy" and
underlines the importance of being male.
It is necessary that Hürrem be thoroughly checked by a woman doctor. Meanwhile,
Suleiman seizes the Hungarian castle and gets the control of the castle. At the same
time, it is acknowledged that Hürrem is really pregnant. Suleiman's political and sexual
power has triumphed.
He commands his soldier, "Come on, my lions, may God be with you." Louis II, totally
unaware that the castle is now under the control of the Ottomans, inspires the young
couples in a wedding saying that "In order to defeat the Ottoman, you must have many
children for my wars".
Hürrem's friend from Ruthenia, Maria sees that it is necessary to be a Muslim in order
to do well in the palace and goes to see Sümbül.
Mahidevran knows that Gülşah has a poison that can kill people and take it from her.
Mahidevran wants to poison Hürrem.
Suleiman and Pargalı talk to each other at the word. Suleiman tells Pargalı that he
81
misses Hürrem a lot and advises Pargalı for the third time to "find a person that
will make you happy, Pargalı. Being alone is hard."
The Queen Mother warns Hürrem about the baby and tells her that "The baby should be
born happy. If anything happens to it, I will kill you. It is not your baby anymore; it
belongs to the Ottoman Empire. Keep this in your mind", which shows that women are
not valued. From now on, Hürrem carries a life of Suleiman's.
5.Conclusion
The series is based on the Ottoman Empire's foreign, internal affairs and Harem. All the
non-Islam characters that are not related to the Ottoman citizens are considered enemy,
traitor, and bad. On the other hand, Harem and the Ottoman citizens are both good and
bad. They are not completely bad; the conditions require them to be bad. In this regard,
being good/bad cannot be determined exactly. The relations in Harem are composed of
a combination of envy and ambition. Slandering and lying are permitted in order to lead
a love of happiness.
The only power is the Ottoman Sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, and the largest palace
is Topkapı. Topkapı is the place where Suleiman gains and refreshes his political and
sexual power. Suleiman and Mother Sultan represent the mind. This mind also
determines emotionality and patriarchy. Women should avoid emotionality, be
respectful, agree, and should not talk too much. They are asked to be wise within the
limits of Suleiman's and Mother Sultan’s mind. This Mother is going to be Hurrem in
the future.
The audience is invited to agree on this. Patriarchal and authoritarian ideology is
approved and reconstructed. That is why the names of masculinity are told 78 times,
while those of femininity are told 61 times.
6.References
Burgoyne, R. (1994), “National Identity, Gender Identity and the Rescue Fantasy in
Born on the Fourth of July”, Screen 3 (35): 211-234.
Gundogdu, M. (2004), “Lale Devri ve Ötesi” (The Tulip Era and Beyond) , İGDAŞ’la 4
Mevsim İstanbul, İstanbul: Dünya Yayıncılık, Sayı 02: 92-97.
Inalcık, H. (2013) (18. Basım), Osmanlı İmparatorluğu Klasik Çağ (1300-1600) (The
Ottoman Empire Classical Era 1300-1600), Çev Ruşen Sezer, İstanbul: Yapı Kredi
Iri, M. (2013), “What’s goin on in the back streets?: Reconstruction of Patriarchal and
Authoritarian Mentality in Contemporary Turkish Cinema”, The IAFOR: Journal of
Media, Communication and Film, Ed. By James Rowlins, Volume 1 Issue 1: 29-41,
Japan: IAFOR Pub.
Peirce, L. P., (1993), The Imperial Harem: Women and Sovereignty in the Ottoman
Empire, NewYork: Oxford University Press
Selig, M. (1993), “Genre, Gender and the Discourse of War: the A/historical and
Vietnam Films”, Screen 1 (34): 118-140.
Ulucay, M. C. (2011) (4. Basım), Harem, İstanbul: Ötüken
Vaslidevan, R. S. (1995), “Adressing the spectator of a third World National Cinema:
the Bombay Socail film of the 1940s and 1950s”, Screen 4 (36): 305-324
82
"I was there. How did I become invisible?"
OVERT SEXISM IN MEDIA: A LEXICO-GRAMMATICAL ANALYSIS OF
ANDROCENTRICITY IN EGYPTIAN PRINT MEDIA
Heba Nayef
Humanities dept., school of Language and Communication
Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport
hnayef@gmail.com
1. Introduction
Over the past three years, Egypt has witnessed sweeping changes in all facets of life.
The political events have reshaped the social fabrics of the society. Social relations that
govern the ruler and the ruled, parents and children, women and men, teachers and
students, etc. have started to take a new form.
Women divorced the role of the observer in public matters, and shifted to that of the
active participant. In the first wave of the revolution on the 25th of January, 2011,
women joined men in the struggle for freedom, but in the second wave of the revolution
on the 30th of June, 2013, women were at the forefront. For eight months, since the
November 2012 Constitutional Declaration which spurred demonstrations that
eventually led to the 30th of June revolution, it was women who took the lead. This
leading role was acknowledged by a number of public figures in their speeches, most
notably that of Egypt's Defense Minister, General Abdelfattah El-Sissi who, addressing
Egyptian women, admitted that it was the woman who "took her children, all of them,
and her husband with her and took to the streets." In his speech, he also requested the
Egyptian woman to "take them again and go down again to say (their) opinion of the
(amended) constitution." (T.V. speech broadcast on January 11, 2014). This speech
represented the first official recognition of women's leading role as 'Actors' not 'Goals'
in a matter that belongs to the male-dominant public sphere. This role was not exclusive
to liberal women but extended to Islamist women as well. The latter, even if they did
not take the lead, played a prominent role in organizing marches and rallies supporting
the 'legitimate' president. This pivotal role should have been foregrounded in the media.
This study explores whether media representation of women's engagement in the events
during the period of investigation offers an accurate reflection of their contribution. It
also investigates the influence of the Arabic language, with its androcentric nature, in
directing and shaping gender ideology in the Egyptian print media. The current research
thus addresses three focal points of research both qualitatively and quantitatively:
language, media and sexism. All three have particularly undergone significant changes
over the past three years. In the following section, the study deals with those three areas
of research.
Any observer of the events that have occurred in Egypt over the past year will realize
that media has stood out as the most salient and effective factor in shaping these events.
Media persons enjoy direct access to the public in a way that few groups do. This
advantage makes them among the society’s most powerful social actors when it comes
to moulding the social reality (Tuchman, 1978: 208). It is through media that the
"public mind" (Navasky, cited in Saleem, 2005:130) forms the 'mental models' that
control actions (van Dijk, 1995:31) drives agendas and create polarization. Yet media is
not only about producing ideologies and moulding the public thought. Media is
83
also the product of the society's ideologies as well as that of cultural and social
beliefs. Media "is not merely a mirror of society, but it does present to society a
mirror of its concerns and interests," (Froneman, 1997:11). It is this power of media
persons to serve simultaneously as the producers, distributors and re-producers of public
discourse (Hall, 1997), the power to direct the 'public mind', that has been in play in
shaping and fixing ideologies in the Egyptian society especially since 2011.
Yet if media enjoys this kind of substantial power and influence on the 'public mind', a
sweeping power to reflect, influence and direct, it is through language that this is
largely achieved. It is through language that one forms the mental models, acquires the
social knowledge, and attitudes, and obtains the ideologies that control their actions
(van Dijk, 1997:31). Language not only reflects the way we think but moulds it as well.
It functions as a transmitter of ideologies, traditions and beliefs from one generation to
the other (Miller and Swift, 2000:55).As van Dijk puts it,"we learn our prejudices
largely through text and talk, first from our parents and friends, then from textbooks,
television, and the newspaper, that is, from the symbolic elites: teachers, journalists,
writers and politicians" (van Dijk, 2006:60) It is also through language that various
types of discrimination and social injustices are reinforced and become fixated in a
society. Discourse plays a part in producing and reproducing social inequalities (Gee,
1999:173).
One of the salient forms of social inequality is gender inequality. In one of the most
expansive study of sexism that covered 57 societies, Brandt (2011) proved the temporal
precedence of sexism in enhancing gender inequality. The study made it clear that
"sexism not only legitimizes gender inequality, but actively makes it worse." (Brandt,
2011:1413). Gender is culturally constructed and not biologically constructed (Vargus,
2002:13), and one means of inflicting, supporting and retaining such inequality has been
done through linguistic sexism. Linguistic sexism is one type of sexism that is based on
the use of language. For it is the language that discriminates against women by
representing them negatively or which seems to implicitly assume that activities
primarily associated with women are necessarily trivial (Vetterling-Braggin, 1981:81).
Linguistic sexism has been the subject of many studies and debate for the past forty
years. Since Lakoff (1975) and Spender (1980) published their pioneering works on
sexism and gender bias in English language, there has come a surge of academic interest
in this field (See Cameron, Holmes, Lakoff, Mills, Mullany,Spender, Sunderland, Swift,
Miller, among others). Researchers in the field went on a mission of compiling what
they regarded as sexist items and called upon institutions and individuals to avoid using
them (Doyle, 1994; Graham,1975,2006; Kramarae and Treichler, 1985; Mills,J.,1989;
Miller and Swift, 1982, 2000; Schultz, 1990; Vetterling-Braggin, 1986). The field of
linguistic sexism in Arabic-speaking communities is still a burgeoning area of research.
With the pioneering works of Sadiqi (Sadiqi 2003, 2006) and Ennaji (Sadiqi and
Ennaji, 2006)in Moroccan Arabic, Abd-El-Jawad ( Abd-El-Jawad, 1986, 1989) and
Abudalbuh(Abudalbuh, 2012) in Jordanian Arabic and Nayef (forthcoming) in
Colloquial Cairene Arabic. Yet to the best of the researcher's knowledge, this is the first
attempt to analyse linguistic sexism in Egyptian print media. Modern Standard Arabic
(MSA) - the variation of Arabic that is being used mostly in Egyptian print media - is
the language subject of this research. Like many gendered languages, it displays a
grammatical and semantic gender bias that led some researchers to describe it as
"androcentric" in nature. The reason behind this androcentric nature, be it an inherent
androcentricity (Sadiqi 2003; Sadiqi, 2006) or only sociolinguistic in nature
(Abudalbuh, 2012) is beyond the scope of this study. The aim of this paper is to
84
investigate the effect of this androcentricity on the media representation of
Egyptian women in the public sphere.
2. Hypothesis
This study employs qualitative and quantitative methods ofanalysis of various types of
overt sexism in the front page news in the period of investigation. The aim of these
analyses is to explore the effect of the androcentric nature of MSA on the media
representation of women and their visibility in the male-dominated area of politics.
The hypothesis proposed by the researcher is:
H: The research expects that due to the androcentric nature of MSA, women's visibility
will be very low in both the HL and FP reports of Al-ahram newspaper, despite the fact
that women at the period subject to investigation were very active in their participation
in the political arena. In other words, the linguistic invisibility of women will lead to
their media invisibility even at a time when women were key 'actors' in politics.
3. Methods
3.1 Data collection and sampling
The data used for the research are taken from one of the Egyptian media outlets;
namely, Al-ahram newspaper. The corpus of the present study has been collected from
front page news reports published in Al-ahram during the period between 25th of June
and 30th of July 2013. Al-ahram Online Index has been used to retrieve the front page
items of this period. Data collection consisted of retrieving news reports that appear on
the front page of Al-ahead during the period of analysis. Both the headlines (HL) and
front page (FP) reports were analyzed separately.
The researcher chose Al-ahram because it is Egypt’s oldest newspaper with the largest
circulation. The newspaper is published in Arabic, and is the best known and leading
newspaper in the Arab world today.
Front page reports were chosen for more than one reason. Firstly, they usually cover the
most important political events. Secondly, they are usually the most read by newspapers
consumers. (Pasha, 2011: 132)
As for the period subject to investigation, it was chosen due to the fact that Egyptian
women during this period played a significant role in the political stage, participating,
and sometimes leading, political events. The period has witnessed two major events in
which women were in the lead. These were on the 30th June, 2013, when millions of
Egyptians took to the streets in massive protests calling for early presidential election
and the ousting of President Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood. Events culminated on
the 3rd of July when Defence Minister Sissi announced the overthrow of Morsi and
appointment of the head of the Constitutional Court as interim President. The second
major event was on the 26th of July when again Egyptians – with women in the lead –
took to the streets of Egypt to delegate the Egyptian military to fight terrorism.
In the process of data collection, the researcher used Al-ahram Online Index to retrieve
any front page item pertaining to any of the lexical entries shown in the following table:
85
Table (3.1) List of Entries Retrieved from Al-Ahram Online Index
Arabic
Transliteration
Translation
‫نساء‬
Nisaa'
women
‫سيدات‬
sayyidaat
ladies, women
‫مظاهرات‬
mozaharaat
demonstrations
‫متظاهرون‬
motazahiroon
(male) demonstrators
‫متظاهرات‬
motazahiraat
(female) demonstrators
‫اعتصام‬
'I'tisaam
sit-in
‫معتصمون‬
Mo'tasimoon
(male) sit-inners
‫معتصمات‬
Mo'tasimaat
(female) sit-inners
‫محتجون‬
mohtaggoon
protesters
‫تحرير‬
tahrir
Tahrir
‫مياديين‬
mayadeen
squares
‫ثوره‬
thawrah
revolution
‫مصري‬
misry
Egyptian
‫مصريون‬
misriyyoon
(male) Egyptians
‫مصرية‬
misriyyah
female Egyptian
‫مصريات‬
misriyyaat
female Egyptians
‫الجيش‬
al-gaysh
he army
‫مرأة‬
al-mar'ah
woman
‫مسيرة‬
maseerah
march
‫حواء‬
hawaa'
Eve
‫رابعه‬
Rab'a
Rab'a
‫النهضه‬
al-nahda
Al-Nahda (square)
‫شخص‬
shaxS
a person
The lexical items used in the research were chosen in what the researcher deemed a way
to facilitate locating front page news.
86
The items were then examined manually to make sure they are related to the
search topics. Retrieved items were then compared to avoid the occurrence of the
same report in more than one entry.
3.2 Tools of Analysis
The data are examined in terms of a qualitative analysis where they are analyzed in
terms of the overt linguistic sexism, and a quantitative one that tested the linguistic
visibility of women both in the HL and the FP. The aim was to find out whether media
reports on political events offer an accurate reflection of the times or if they are trapped
in the androcentric nature of MSA as well as the androcentric perspectives and notions
about women.
This study adopts Mills' taxonomy of linguistic sexismdifferentiating 'overt' forms of
sexism from the 'indirect' sexism form, focusing on the former (Mills 2008, Mills and
Mullany, 2011). Yet the researcher chose to employ different subcategories under this
term. This was done to best suit the nature and purpose of the research. (For the
subcategories used by Mills, see Mills, 2008)
This study observes four types of overt sexism that were employed to test the data
subject to analysis. These are: generic words, naming and lexical choices, coordinate
pairs and grammatical androcentricity.The following section briefly introduces these
categories.
3.2.1 Overt Sexism
The overt category of linguistic sexism includes any utterance that contains clear and
unambiguous language that refers to women in any negative way (Mills, 2008:10). It is
characterised by being institutionalised in nature. By institutionalised sexism we mean
well-established sedimented sexist language found in grammar books, government
papers, laws and regulations (Mills, 2008:42). As will be shown in a later section, MSA
with its androcentric nature has clear forms of such institutionalized form of linguistic
sexism in the grammar and semantics of the language. The most salient of these are
generic words.
3.2.1.1 Generic Words
The use of generic pronouns and nouns has been the subject of strong objection and
criticism of feminist linguists and other scholars for the past forty years. Scholars have
strongly condemned the use of generic words like 'he', and 'man' "in which man, but one
of two sexes, becomes all of humanity." (Stimpson, in Forward of Miller and Swift,
2000). Adopting a Sapir-Whorfian approach, even in its slight form, they claimed that
these lexical items, tend to make women linguistically invisible, as they often show the
tendency of a male bias even in contexts intended to be gender neutral (Wilson & Ng,
1988:160). Scholars embarked on studies to prove that such generic words are rarely
interpreted in a gender-neutral sense (e.g. Abudalbuh, 2012; Bern & Bern, 1973;
Khosroshahi, 1989; and Wilson & Ng, 1988).
In Arabic, generic words are said to be always in the masculine, that is, when a generic
word is used, only the masculine gender marker forms appear on verbs, nouns,
pronouns, adjectives, determiners, and quantifiers in the sentence (Sadiqi, 2003, 2006;
Abudalbuh, 2012). Yet scholars have overlooked the fact that certain female nouns are
used in the same generic sense without having a masculine counterpart. And
87
when these words are used, only the feminine gender marker forms appear on
verbs, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, determiners, and quantifiers in the sentence
(e.g.umah (nation) ‫ ةمأ‬, Houshoud (crowds) ‫ دوشح‬, sho'oob (peoples) ‫)بوشش‬. In order to
include this generic category in the analysis, the researcher adopts new analytical
approach of generic nouns. It recognizes two types of generics; false generics
(borrowing Sabatini's term) and true generics.
3.2.1.1.1 False Generics
These fall in the masculine category and they have both a generic meaning and a
masculine specific one. Example: ‫' مرم‬mar?' 'man', ‫(بخش‬shaxs) 'person'.
3.2.1.1.2 True Generics
True generic nouns do not have a gender-specific meaning and are used only in a
generic sense. They fall into two subcategories: female generics and male generics.
Examples of female generics were mentioned above, while examples of true male
generics are: ‫بوش‬sha'ab 'people'; ‫ روهشج‬gomhoor 'audience'.
A point worth noting here is that in the majority of cases of plural female generics, the
singular form is a true masculine generic. This is shown in the following table:
Table (3.2) Plural Female Generics & Their Singular True Male Generics
Plural Female Generics
Corresponding Singular True Male Generics
‫ شعوب‬sho'oob 'peoples'
‫ شعب‬sha'ab 'people'
‫جماهير‬gamaheer 'masses'
‫ جمهور‬gomhoor 'mass'
‫ حشود‬hoshood 'crowds'
‫ حشد‬hashd 'crowd'
‫ جموع‬gomoo' 'congregations'
‫ جمع‬gom' 'congregation'
The only exception noted in this study was ‫ةمأ‬/ ‫' ةمأ‬ummah/'umam 'nation/nations',
where both the singular and plural forms are female generic.
3.2.1.2 Naming and Lexical Choices
Names and lexical items of the collected data are examined and analysed in order to
discern the ideologies behind their selection, and the ideologies they reproduce. For the
act of choosing one lexical option over the other reflects the ideology of the chooser. It
is a process that is neither random nor accidental (Fowler, 2007:4). These lexical
choices are both the product of group ideologies and a tool to reproduce them. Using
these labels and lexical choices leads to setting up mental models that "constitute the
personal, episodic memory of individual people," (van Dijk, 2001:16). These mental
88
models will over time become an inalienable attribute that ultimately becomes part
of the culture and ideology of a group (Pasha, 2011).
3.2.1.3 Coordinate Pairs
The data are examined to see the order of the coordinate pairs. It has been observed that
MSA displays a regular precedence of masculine lexical items over feminine items as in
'‫' 'ءلانللم لاررلا‬arrijaalwannisaa' 'men and women'; ‫' لاورةا ء لاررا‬arrajul wal mar'ah' 'man
and woman'. This lexicalprecedence of masculine lexical items reflects and enhances
female subordination to men in the Arab-Islamic patriarchal social system. In this social
structure, masculine needed to always precede and dominate even lexically.
The data are closely analysed to see if this masculine precedence is retained in the
reporting of events in which women played a leading active role not a subordinate one.
This lexical precedence and domination of masculine lexical items is tested further in
the following point of analysis.
3.2.1.4 Grammatical Androcentricity
By grammatical androcentricity the researcher means these cases in which masculine
forms are used as a reference to mixed sex groups. Another type of grammatical
androcentricity occurs when masculine markers appear on verbs, quantifiers, pronouns
and determiners that refer to feminine nouns. This later case constitutes a violation to
the grammatical rule of gender marking agreement. Yet, ungrammatical as they may
be, they tend to occur in the news reports of Egyptian print media.
Ex. Masculine forms used in reference to mixed sex groups
‫لاوولجمشا ءلانللم لاررلا‬
'arrijaal wan nisaa' 'al-musharikoon
(Lit.: The men[+Masculine] and women[+Feminine] the participants[+Masculine] )
Trans.: The men and women participating …
Ex. Masculine forms referring to feminine nouns
‫'' لاوولجمشا لانللم‬annisaa' 'al-musharikoon'
(Lit.: The women[+Feminine] the participants[+Masculine]
Trans.: The women participating …
Instead of
‫''لاوولجملا لانللم‬annisaa' 'al-musharikaat'
(Lit. The women[+Feminine] the participants[+Feminine]
Trans.: The women participating …
4. Results
There were 130 headlines and reports analysed in the front page section of this study.
The total number of words covered by the analysis was 29,100 words. A qualitative and
quantitative analysis was performed. The former dealt with the various types of overt
linguistic sexism as defined by the researcher, while the latter was used to test the
visibility of women in the public sphere at times of active participation.
In the following section, the results yielded by the two types of analyses are discussed.
4.1 Overt Sexism
4.1.1 Generic words
89
The researcher recognizes two types of generic lexical items that appeared in the
data: true generics (with their subcategories of female generics and male generics),
and false generics (which lie in the masculine category).
The data analysed in terms of the generic items yielded 105 generics used in HL. True
generics were used 17 times (16.19%) against 88 times (83.80%) for false generic
lexical items (See Figure (1) below).
True & False Generics in HL
0,1619
False Generics
True Generics
0,838
Figure (1) Percentage of True and False Generics in HL
Examining the FP reports using the same tool of analysis rendered an almost similar
result with true generics scoring 24.74% against 75.25% for false generics (See Figure
(2) below)
True & False Generics in FP
0,2474
False Generics
True Generics
0,7525
Figure (2) Percentage of True and False Generics in FP
The high percentage of false generics, with their existing masculine-specific meaning,
produces the effect of creating a mental image of masculine rather than feminine
entities, especially when used in a male-dominant field. Tables 4.1 and 4.2 below show
the lexical entries of true and false generics in HL and FP respectively.
Table (4.1) False Generics
Entry
‫' معارض‬mo'aarid' 'oppositionist'
# of occurrence in
HL
# of occurrence in
FP
8
26
90
‫' محتج‬mohtag' 'protester'
-
3
‫' ثوار‬thuwwaar' (revolutionaries)
-
12
‫?'' أحرار‬ahraar' (Free men)
-
6
‫'' أنصار‬ansaar' (supporters)
11
37
‫' مؤيد‬mo'ayyid' (backers)
8
53
‫' متظاهر‬motazahir' (demonstrator)
31
233
‫' مصري‬misri' (Egyptian)
9
63
‫' معتصم‬mo'tasim' (sit-inner)
19
71
‫' مواطن‬mo'atin' (citizen)
2
58
‫' مشارك‬mosharik' (participant)
-
34
Table (4.2) True Generics
# of occurrence in
HL
Entry
# of occurrence in
FP
‫' ماليين‬malayeen' (millions)
5
9
‫' حشود‬hoshood' (crowds)
1
10
‫' جماهير‬gamaheer' (masses)
-
4
‫' شخص‬shaxs' (a person)
2
26
‫'' أناس‬unaas' (people)
-
-
‫' مرء‬mar'' (one)
-
-
‫' شعب‬sha'ab' (people)
8
134
‫' جموع‬gomoo'' (crowds)
1
13
4.1.2 Naming and Lexical Choices
91
In terms of the pattern of lexical choices used to refer to women in both HL and
FP, the data reveals a striking tendency to refer to women as 'women', 'girls' or
'ladies'. Such words were favoured to denotations such as 'female demonstrators',
'female participants' and 'female supporters', etc.
In all the six times of reference to women in HL, women were referred to as 'women'.
On the other hand, out of a total of 37 times in FP reports, there were eight times
(21.62%) in which women were referred to using lexical items that denote their political
activity, while in 29 times they were referred to either as 'women' or 'girls' (78.37%).
Table (4.3) shows the lexical items used to refer to women in HL and FP.
Table (4.3) Feminine Nouns
HL
FP
‫ سيدات‬/ ‫' سيده‬sayyidah/sayyidaat' (woman/women)
2
10
‫' نساء‬nisaa'' (women)
-
9
‫' نسائية‬nisaa'iyyah' (feminist)
4
7
‫' متظاهرات‬mutazaahirat' (female demonstrators)
-
2
‫مواطنة‬/ ‫' مواطنات‬muwatinnah/muwatinaat' (feminist
citizen/citizens)
-
2
‫موءيده‬/‫' موءيدات‬mu'ayyidah/mu'ayyidaat' (female
backer/backers)
-
1
‫مشاركة‬/ ‫' مشاركات‬nisaa'iyyah' (feminist)
-
3
‫'' أخوات‬akhawaat' (sisters)
-
-
‫فتاه‬/‫' فتيات‬fataah/fatayaat' (a girl/girls)
-
2
‫' مرأة‬mar'ah' (woman)
-
1
latoT
6
37
Entry
The data also shows that these were not the same lexical choices made to refer to men.
Male participants were referred to in almost all the cases (98.83%) in terms of the
political activity or process in which they were involved (e.g. demonstrators/ sitinners/supporters, etc.). Only in seven times (1.16%) were they referred to as 'men', six
of which were in coordinate pair with 'women', and in only one case as 'men'.
Such preponderant lexical choice reflects the idea that the biological distinction, even in
the middle of an activity in which neither gender nor sex plays any role, is foregrounded
as the most salient feature of the female participants. This linguistic sexist preference
reproduces the ideology that public space belongs to men and that women are primarily
women, while men are many things before being men.
4.1.3 Coordinate pairs
92
In MSA, like many other languages, there is usually a masculine precedence in
cases of coordinate pairs that involve masculine and feminine nouns. The usually
expected order would be ‫' ءلانللم لاررلا‬men and women'. The analysis revealed a few
number of cases that involved coordinate pairs of 'women and men'. There were eight
cases involving nominal coordination that involved women, three of which involved the
nouns 'men' and ' women'. In all these three cases, 'men' had precedence, as illustrated
in examples (1&2) below.
Example (1)
July 3rd
Demonstrators flock to Tahrir square and the Presidential Palace demanding early
elections and carrying red cards for the president as well as anti-MB slogans.
The number of demonstrators rose around Ittihadiya Palace, after the arrival of a march
of men and women from a nearby area. The protestors gathered before the main stage in
front of Heliopolis club reiterating slogans such as 'the people want the downfall of the
regime', 'the people want the downfall of Muslim Brothers' and (Leave .... Leave).
Example (2)
July 17th
Military alert in Suez, Morsi's supporters organize a march
The march started from El-Shohadaa street which is famous for having been a centre of
resistance during past wars, criss-crossing the streets of the governorate. It passed
through Tahrir commercial street, the Armed Forces street and El-Arba'een street to
reach Hamza mosque with the participation of men and women chanting: "O! Martyr.
Rejoice. We're waiting for you at the gate of Paradise."
Example (1) is an excerpt of a news report that appeared in the front page of Al-Ahram
on the 3rd of July. The report was a description of the anti-Morsi demonstrations. The
headline described how demonstrators were flocking to Tahrir Square and the
presidential Palace, waving red cards and demanding the ouster of the president. In the
report, there was a description of how they 'gathered' in front of the main stage chanting
'leave' and other slogans. Nothing in the process described involved anything that can
justify the advantage given to men when the noun 'men' was given precedence to the
noun 'women' in' men and women'. The reporter followed the androcentric rule of
masculine precedence. Women were described as doing the same things as men, yet
they had a second position, a reflection and an endorsement of women status in a
patriarchal society in which women play second fiddle to men.
This same precedence can be seen in example (2), which describes a march organized
by the other camp. That included demonstrators of both sexes. As it is shown in the
excerpt, the 'women' were equal participants in the event as 'men'. They both
'participated in the march' 'criss-crossing' the streets of the governorate, 'chanting'
slogans and protesting. Yet the androcentric usage of the nominal coordination rule that
assigns precedence to whatever masculine gives an unjustified superiority to men.
As it was shown in both examples, there was not a single non-androcentric reason to
justify giving superiority and precedence to men. Such precedence and advantage, when
repeated, creates an image in the reader's mind that supports masculine hegemony and
strengthens the ideology that men dominate the public sphere.
93
As mentioned above in the 130 Front Page reports analysed, there were eight cases
of nominal coordination that involved women, three of which included the noun
'men' while in the other five the noun 'women' was coordinated with the noun phrase
'old people' as well as the nouns 'girls' and 'children' as illustrated in example 3 below.
The significance of such association will be discussed below.
Example (3)
July 8th
Massive marches amid chants "People want to put MB to trial"
Large numbers of girls, women and old people took part in this march, carrying Egypt's
flag, and reiterating "They said women's voice is shameful; (While) Women's voice IS
the revolution."
Some young men encircled the feminist march to protect girls and women.
In this example the linguistic androcentricity draws a picture in which the world is
divided into two groups; one that includes 'girls, women and old people' who gather to
chant angry protests denouncing the Islamists' description of women's voice as
'shameful', while the other depicts 'women' and 'girls' as encircled by 'young men' who
are guarding them. Thus women are always being controlled even when expressing
anger against unequal sexist treatment of the ousted regime.
Thus, as mentioned above, the data revealed significantly few number of masculine
precedence and mixed sex coordinates. This can be superficially interpreted as a more
equal linguistic treatment of feminine and masculine nouns. But a closer look at all the
results reveals two points that are worth noting. First, women, in the majority of cases,
were mentioned in coordination with the words, 'elderly', 'girls', 'children', as illustrated
in example (3) above. So it looks as if there were two classes of individuals: one of
'men' and the other including 'everyone else'. The second point here is that associating
women with the 'elderly', 'children' and 'girls' supports the stereotypical mental image
that women belong to the class of the weak, the helpless, and those who belong to the
private sphere.
Examining the data in light of what Irigaray said that due to the binary division and
dualism in the way we see the world, women are seen as 'the other', as what men are not
( Irigaray 1985, cited in Baker 2008). It can be seen that this dualism was taken even
much further in the coverage of June 30th events. The overt linguistic sexism in the
language of these reports can be argued to be one that depicts men as one group and
everyone else – to wit, women, children, the elderly – as the other.
4.1.4 Grammatical Androcentricity
Analysing the data revealed that one form of androcentricity that rendered women
almost completely invisible in the events of June 30th was the use of masculine
grammatical forms to refer to events in which women took part. This was, in the
majority of cases, a subsequent result of using false generic nouns to refer to women
and men. That is because false generics involved grammatical androcentricity in the
forms of verbs, adjectives, pronouns, modifiers, determiners and quantifiers. The usage
of the masculine false generic nouns in the subject or object positions entailed using
masculine gender marking which led to the complete invisibility of women from the
scene in some of the reports. The following examples illustrate cases of
grammatical androcentricity in various syntactic forms.
94
Example (4)
July 1st
Tahrir demonstrators[+masculine]announce[+masculine]they[+masculine]will remain[+masculine] in Square till end of
armed forces' ultimatum amid anti-regime chants
Thousands of demonstrators[+masculine]in Tahrir Square welcomed[+masculine]a statement by the armed forces
in which they warned that if people's demands were not met within 48 hours, the armed forces would
declare a road map.
The demonstrators[+masculine]announced[+masculine]that they[+masculine would not leave[+masculine]the Square before
the end of the 48-hour respite, announced by the armed forces in a statement on Monday, till the regime is
overthrown. After the announcement of the armed forces' statement, their [+masculine]chants reverberated
through the Square, reiterating[+masculine]'Free[+masculine] revolutionaries[+masculine], we[+masculine] shall
complete[+masculine the march," and "the people have already ousted the regime."They[+masculine] also
sang[+masculine] the national anthem while raising[+masculine]Egyptian flags.
Example (4) is one of the numerous cases of grammatical androcentricity resulting from
the use of false generics. It is an excerpt of a report that appeared on Al-Ahram front
page on the 1st of July. The report describes the reaction of the demonstrators in Tahrir
after the armed forces' statement. Tahrir was full of demonstrators from both sexes, yet
the reporters chose to use the false generic masculine nouns. The false generic noun
'demonstrators' and its nominative and genitive variations
(almutazahiroon,
almotazahireen) respectively, as well as 'revolutionaries' appeared on both the FPand
HL in the masculine form. This resulted in the use of the masculine forms of various
grammatical categories: verb (announced, remain, welcomed, leave, complete, sang);
subject pronoun (they) ; adjective (free); gerund (waving, raising) and possessive
(their). Contrary to reality, this created the image that only men took part in these
events, resulting in the subsequent linguistic and virtual invisibility of women in the
report.
Example (5)
July 3rd
Number of protestors [+masculine]rises in Tahrir; feminist march reaches Square coming
from El-Darb El-Ahmar
The number of protestors[+masculine]rose significantly in Tahrir after marches from ElSayyidah Zeihab and Mostafa Mahmoud districts flocked in, bringing the total number
to tens of thousands who cannot enter the already-congested Square.
The marches involved all ages, including old men, women, men and children.
They[+masculine] were[+masculine]all[+masculine]keen on[+masculine] chanting[+masculine]one slogan
"Egypt … Egypt," while hoisting[+masculine]Egyptian flags , some others[+masculine] were
raising[+masculine]pictures of the glorious January 25th revolution.
The protestors[+masculine]demanded[+masculine]the departure of President Morsi and conduct
of early presidential elections.
Example (5) shows another type of grammatical androcentricity; that is, usage
of masculine forms in the presence of an explicit feminine noun in cases of
95
mixed sex groups. In such cases of mixed sex coordinate nouns, masculine gender
markers appeared on other grammatical items in the sentence.
The passage in example (5) is an excerpt of a Front Page report that appeared on July
3rd. The report was a description of the protests on Tahrir that day explicitly referring to
women participants. Yet the reporter used the masculine forms of nouns (protestors,
participants, others); verbs (cannot, were, demanded, raised) ; pronouns (they) and the
masculine forms in the gerund (hoisting, raising), again marginalizing any participation
of women in the events.
The data also revealed a strange case of grammatical androcentricity that violates the
grammatical rules of the Arabic language. In this case, the masculine gender markers
were used in relation to processes that involved only female participants. Example (6)
illustrates this case.
Example (6)
July 26th
Feminist march arrives at Tahrir Square, human shields set up to protect it
A feminist march encompassing hundreds of women reached Tahrir Square, coming
from Bab El-Khalq district, to participate in the 'No to terrorism' Million-strong march
to mandate the army and police to confront terrorism.
Th participants[+masculine]chanted[+masculine]"Free[+masculine revolutionaries[+masculine] ,we shall
complete the way', raising[+masculine]Egyptian flags , pictures of Gen. Sisi as well as
banners reading 'Thank you to the army and police', 'Muslim, Christian – one hand'.
A number of protestors formed human shields to protect and secure the march.
In this example which appeared in Al-Ahram on the 26th of July the whole report was a
description of a march of female participants heading to Tahrir to delegate the army to
fight terrorism. The reporter used the feminine form of the noun (the participants,
almusharekat) yet used the masculine forms in the rest of the syntactic items that
appeared afterwards. Thus the masculine form of the verb 'chanted' and the gerund
'raising' was used. A point worthy of notice here is that the female participants
themselves used the masculine forms of the words 'revolutionaries' not the feminine
form and the masculine form of the adjective 'free' and not the feminine form to refer to
themselves. Yet it can be argued here that the female demonstrators were using a wellknown slogan that happened to be, like the rest of political slogans, in the masculine
form. Thus they did not intend to refer to themselves using feminine lexical items.
The data also showed that in some cases women were referred to using masculine
nouns. Example (7) illustrates this case.
Example (7)
July 21
Army prevents feminist MB march from reaching Defence Ministry
The Armed forces sealed off a street leading to the Ministry of Defence to bar Muslim
Brotherhood women from reaching it to protest.
The march started from a nearby mosque after the arrival of another feminist march
from Rabie El-Adawiya square where supporters of ousted President Mohamed
96
Morsi are staging a sit-in to protest the killing of 3 MB women in Al-Mansoura, an
eastern governorate, two days ago.
The participants[+masculine]raised[+masculine] pictures of the deposed president,
demanding[+masculine] his reinstatement ... There were clashes between the
participants[+masculine, +plural] and the residents of Al-Abasiyya district.
The report, which appeared on July 21st, dealt with a march of MB women protesting
the killing of three MB women earlier. Though the report did not include any male
participants, yet the reporter used the masculine form of the noun 'the participants'
(almusharikoon) instead of the female variant (almusharekat) to refer to women
participants. The fact that masculine markers appeared later on the verb 'raised' and the
gerund 'demanding' as well as the use of the noun 'the participants' in its masculine form
for the second time, makes it unlikely that these cases and similar ones were typos.
Such cases, which occurred six times in the data, are flagrant examples of linguistic
androcentricity as there were no male participants involved.
Such recurrent usage of masculine grammatical forms to refer to events which women
were part of, or, in some cases, the only participants in leaves the reader with the image
that it was only men who participated in the events. This jars with the fact that women
were there either to demand deposition of Morsi or to call for his reinstatement.
5. Conclusions
Richardson argued that "journalism exists to enable citizens to better understand their
lives and their position(s) in the world" (Richardson, 2007:7). This study is an attempt
to employ journalism to serve this purpose. Through the analysis of linguistic sexism in
HL and FP reports the researcher aims at showing that certain linguistic behaviors
which are misjudged as normal and accepted as part of our everyday life can be very
'damaging' (Sunderland, 2006:97). Only when scholars come and point at them, as has
been done for the last forty years in English and other European languages, that one can
undo the damage.
The paper has shown that the androcentric nature of MSA has imposed a linguistic
limitation that led to a linguistic invisibility of women in the news coverage of June 30th
events. This linguistic invisibility was evident in the various types of overt linguistic
sexism discussed above.
The study has shown the linguistic injustice inflicted upon women though using false
masculine generics to report events that included women. The analysis has also shown
the tendency to use sexist lexical items that create the mental image that women are first
and foremost 'women' while men can be many other things than being just 'men', e.g.
'protesters', 'demonstrators', 'supporters'. It was also shown that coordination of
nominals used in the news reports enhanced the already existing stereotypical image of
male superiority. Not only did men enjoy the grammatical masculine precedence in the
very few cases that grouped them with women, but they also appeared as if they stand in
a class of their own. The world is divided into two groups, one of the powerful men and
the other included all the weaker humans: women, girls, children and old people. It was
also shown that the androcentricity of the Arabic language facilitates for the 'symbolic
elites', in this case front page news reporters, to ignore the significant role of women in
the public space and renders them virtually invisible, even though they were clearly
visible in the streets of Egypt during the events.
As shown in the paper, women in the Arab world are subject to many forms of linguistic
injustice, which reflects and reproduces gender inequality. In order to redress such
inequality, a lot needs to be done and many points of research need to be further
investigated.
97
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100
OLD-FASHIONED WOMEN. THE REPRESENTATION OF FEMALE
IMAGE IN THE ITALIAN TELEVISION ADVERTISING
Paola Panarese
Department of Communication and Social Research
La Sapienza, University of Rome
paola.panarese@uniroma1.it
Abstract: in Italy, the relationship between women and advertising has always been close. Commercials,
posters and print ads have hosted several female figures from the beginning of commercial communication.
Despite the differences of times and contexts, the Italian women representation matches with many results
deriving from the Erving Goffman’s studies. So, considering the findings of the Canadian sociologist as a
theoretical basis, this paper analyzes the image of gender in the Italian television commercials, with the
intention of assessing whether the old female identities have been replaced by new, empowered and more
modern figures. The research reveals that the female figures are still quite traditional. However, their
apparent stiff frames reflect a dynamic image. The new representations do not constitute a trend, but they
prove that the topic is more complex than what it seems and the issues are much more nuanced than in the
past.
Keywords: gender studies, advertising, representation, women, role portrayals, Italian television
1. Introduction
«Probably, we are consumers, more than anything else, more than just students,
professors, managers, milkmen or greengrocers» (Dalli, Romani, 2003: 5). We are
consumers because everything we do involves the use of goods and services, and
because the purchasing choices and the consumption practices play an important role in
the lives of the modern western societies.
We are all consumers, but we consume in a different way in relation to the contexts, the
moments, the moods, the economic opportunities, and our different social identities. In
fact, when we buy or use any product, we refer to cultural patterns that derive from our
place in the society and reproduce our class and education differences (Bourdieu, 1979),
but also our gender and sexuality ones (Edgell, Hetherington, Warde, 1996). It is known
that there are “masculine” and “feminine” objects, different purchasing practices among
men and women, and ways to use products that confer masculinity or femininity
(Kirkham, 1996; Ames, Martinez, 1996). The toys, for example, are ancient tools of
socialization to gender roles (Gunter, Furnham, 1998). Food preferences reflect gender
differences: in the western society the meat consumption is associated primarily to
males (and to hunting, strength, virility), and salads or light products to females
(Sassatelli, 2005). Moreover, men and women are partly responsible for buying
different goods (Commuri, Gentry, 2000) and they have various attitudes towards
shopping: women consider it as a pleasant occupation, men as a purely functional one
(Dholakia, 1999).
Therefore, many studies indicate that the purchase and consumption of goods and
services help to express – and to generate - masculinity and femininity. This also
depends on the social representations, historically and culturally situated and in
part shaped by advertising. In the Italian Fifties, for example, the need to market
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food, ways of living and new appliances helped to popularize a certain woman
image, distinct and independent, but also tied to the traditional role of
housekeeper, mother and wife (Passerini 1992). In the same years, advertising showed
less virile male images, proposing the purchase of specific goods as necessary to acquire
the status of modern man (Bellassai, 2003). In the last three decades, the visual codes of
fashion communication spread a new male identity (Bovone, Ruggerone 2006), more
feminine in appearance, manners and role (Sassatelli, 2010). Thus, advertising seems a
useful and interesting field of observation of the media discourse about the gender
dimension of social life.
2. Women and Advertising
In the gender studies, the focus of attention is often unbalanced towards one of the poles
of the male-female dichotomy, the women, probably because the topic is often related to
the development of equal opportunities policies for the “weaker” sex. This happens also
in the study of gender and advertising. However, in this field, the prominence of the
women does not depend only on the surplus of protection (or the lack of attention for
men), but also on the special relationship between female characters and commercial
communication.
In Italy, spots, posters and print ads have hosted different women portrayals since the
beginning of advertising, articulating two main figures. The first is the housewife, a
figure with a discreet beauty and a loving attitude, devoted to taking care of the family
and housekeeping (such as in Barilla or Ferrero commercials). The other icon is the
sensual woman, associated with various products and often “objectified” (as in the
classic Peroni Beer commercials, whose claim was Call me Peroni. I’ll Be your beer),
used as a communicative bait or a decorative element.
The portrayals of the housewife and the sensual woman/object are both examples of a
partial and stiffened representation of femininity, viewed from a male perspective,
according to a classic western tradition in which «men act and women appear, men look
at women and women watch themselves being looked at» (Berger, 1972: 47).
These images are the product of a process that Erving Goffman ,over thirty years ago
(1977), defined hyper-ritualization, a sometimes ironic, sometimes serious exaggeration
of the ritual forms of the gender difference that constitutes our daily experience. «If
anything, advertisers conventionalize our conventions, stylize what is already a
stylization, make frivolous use of what is already something considerably cut off from
contextual controls. Their hype is hyper-ritualization» (Goffman, 1979: 82).
According to Goffman, the gender representations in advertisements are meaningful to
us because they are ideal gender representations and because advertising is a very
powerful form of communication that offers the most sustained and concentrated set of
images in the media system. The consequences are not irrelevant if, as the Canadian
sociologist pointed out, in the advertisements there are many images that portray
women in poses and attitudes indicating their social inferiority.
With a widespread but not systematic analysis of 827 commercial photos, Goffman
noticed that women appear more often in a subordinate position, while men are depicted
in poses that indicate superiority or protection, depending on the social bond - familiar,
professional, affective - with their partners (this is a sign of the so-called hierarchical
function). In particular, women are literally placed below men, and can often be found
lying on the floor or on a bed, while men are standing upright. These positions are an
obvious expression of sexual availability.
102
Goffman also found the estrangement and the feminine touch phenomena. The
first refers to the depiction of women as distracted by the situation and entrusted to
men’s supervision and control. The second refers to the women’s tendency to touch her
body or to caress an object, whereas men firmly grasp things. In advertising, this is
considered a sign indicating that men control their life, while women are merely there.
Anyway, the analysis revealed strong and protective male characters, and docile,
emotional and childish female images. The only partial (but apparent) reversal of roles
is in the representation of family space, in which the woman is portrayed as the
protagonist and the man as a secondary figure.
The consequence of Goffman findings is a non-neutral representation of gender in
advertising; an issue that requires social and moral considerations and more detailed and
updated scientific analysis.
3. Feminization of Advertising?
In the past societies, characterized by a strong male hegemony, it’s not surprising the
presence of simplified female figures and ritual imbalances in advertising. Today, the
current situation should be different, considering the social processes of the
emancipation of women and the feminization of society (Fabris, 2003). Although these
thirty-year trends do not involve a radical change in the balance of power between men
and women, it is evident that some of the qualities, once associated only with the
feminine sphere, are now also shared by men. This is the case of the emotion's role
enhancement, the downsizing of work primacy in the definition of the identity, the
intuition value compared to deduction, sweetness in respect to aggression, lightness
versus strength, attention to the body against its instrumental use. The consequences in
the commercial market are evident: male’s entry in the fashion system, his attention to
aesthetics, male cosmetics’ take-off, sharing of tasks and purchase of household goods,
preparation of children and meals. In addition, there is a certain feminization of the
goods, such as in the primacy of healthiness in food, the success of soft clothes, the
spread of cars with rounded shapes, the diffusion of colors in the furnishing, and the
attention to design for the technology.
Also, the representation of gender in advertising has slightly changed: men express
feelings, once considered feminine, more often, such as joy or reflexivity, moving away
from the model of the Marlboro cowboy; their naked bodies have been displayed more
frequently; space for nuanced gender figures (androgynous women, effeminate men and
transgender figures) has increased.
On this basis, we carried out a new research of the representation of gender in the Italian
television advertising. The study is a part of a larger analysis conducted by the
GEMMA Observatory of La Sapienza University of Rome, whose general task is to
investigate the ways in which television accepts and encourages the change in the
processes of construction of identities and gender relations (Buonanno, 2014).
In this regard, one might ask, how Liesbet Van Zoonen did: «Moreover, we did not
know all there was to know about these old media already? What more could we find
about the stereotypes of women in advertising?» (Van Zoonen, 2011: 3). Actually, we
do not know everything there is to know, not only because, in Italy, the research on
gender and media has had an episodic character and did not give rise to a consistent
trend of studies, but also because both terms of the dyad have gone through processes of
redefinition and reconfiguration and they are still changing (Buonanno, 2014).
Furthermore, with regard to the relationship between women and advertising, the Italian
scientific studies are few and have been largely dominated by the reflection on
103
the sexualisation and objectification of the female body. Therefore, while not
wishing to underestimate the phenomenon, this research mainly focuses on the
analysis of women’s social roles in the Italian commercials, trying to update the past
researches and to answer the question "what else is there to say?" (Johnson, 2007: 14).
Thus, the specific aims are: to update Goffman’s analysis and test it in a different
country, time and medium; to encompass whether and to what extent the traditional
representations of gender exist and are widespread; to look for any “new” richer and
more modern gender representation in advertising; to provide a new basis for the future
Italian researches on this topic, that may go beyond the study of the representation of
gender, the focus on female figures, and the use of a traditional and rigid methodology
as the content analysis.
4. Methods and First Results
The research analyzed the contents of the six main Italian television networks (RAI 1,
RAI-2, RAI-3, Rete 4, Canale 5 and Italia 1), recorded for a week, from Monday to
Sunday (every day was chosen in a different week, between February and April, to
collect a greater variety of spots), between eight in the morning and two at night. Our
sample was composed by all the unique broadcasted commercials (815), excluding their
repetitions (9979).
The survey methodology was the content analysis, considered as a mix between the
"classical" approach of Berelson (1952) and the analysis as investigation. Since we are
aware of the limitations of this method, we integrated it with a subsequent qualitative
analysis of some case studies.
For the content analysis, we built a search tool containing an ordered sequence of
questions with which the television commercials have been interrogated. Each entry of
the survey corresponded to a variable that constituted the operational definition of a
property.
The questions were included in the following thematic areas:
– General features of the TV channel (network, time slot, date of registration)
– General features of the spot (advertiser, product category)
– Formal features of the spot (duration, presence of music, sounds or noises, text,
slogan, speaker, etc.)
– Features of the spot’s content (spatial and temporal setting, characters’ number and
type)
– The characters’ census and features (socio-demographic and aesthetic attributes)
– Presence of cases linked to Goffman’s study (hierarchical function, estrangement,
feminine touch, etc.)
– Additional information (presence of female empowerment cases or the feminization
of male roles, presence of transgender figures, presence of cases to be analyzed in
depth).
The analysis allowed us to collect a big corpus, also because the sample was quite large.
We recorded 9979 commercials, then isolated the 815 unique ones and analyzed them
and their 1798 characters.
The content analysis provided interesting results, but not entirely unexpected. The
findings of the qualitative analysis were rather most remarkable.
Some first general data, seemingly distant from the theme of the gender iconography in
advertising, can help in the reading of the research specific results. For example, it
could be useful to consider that in our sample there are mostly 30-seconds spots (2 of
5), broadcasted in the morning (43%) and promoting food products (over a
104
quarter). Their setting refers especially to current or indefinite places and times,
with an essentially realistic connotation, in particular in the food or the cleaning
products commercials.
Other data are closest to the topic of gender in advertising. For example, in more than
90% of the sample, there is a voiceover and it is male in more than two cases out of
three. This result is related to the traditional guarantee function of the advertising voice,
confirmed by the age of the speaker (an adult in 8 cases out of 10).
In this regard, the association between the gender of the voice and the advertised
product is interesting. Men dominate not only in the commercials for men's goods, such
as technology, cars, banking, or insurance services, but also in the promotion of food
and cleaning products, in which the male voices are two times as much as the female
ones, but the target is generally feminine. This is partially explained by the fact that the
detergents must be strong and vigorous and these characteristics are considered
typically male. So, when the detergents “speak” they have a male voice.
Only in the soft drinks and personal care products’ spots , women voices are twice as
much as men ones (but in the alcohol commercials there are only male voice-overs).
Anyway, the association between the gender of the voice and the product category is
interesting if connected to other results, such as the correlation between the presence of
a male voice-over and the presence of female characters.
5. One-dimensional Woman
Over half of the 1798 figures of our sample are women. They usually appear first, with
the function to introduce the story, and they are more numerous among the protagonists
(see Figure 1) and the endorsers (see Figure 2), while men apparently have secondary
roles. At first glance, these findings may suggest a female figure empowerment.
Actually, a closer look shows that the ladies of advertising are still quite traditional and
subordinated to the male figures. They appear more likely to in the spots of those
products (for personal care, house cleaning, furniture, food, etc.) where they are the
main target, in the role of housewives. Sometimes they are used as a decorative element
of the scene, especially when their presence is associated with men products.
However, the fact that they are more numerous and have a leading role in the
commercials should be read together with the fact that they are driven - as we have seen
- by men voices. Moreover, if it is true that women are more numerous among the
endorsers, they are also diffused among the common figures (buyers and housewives in
which the target of the spots can be identified), but not among the experts or the
professionals (doctors, dentists or scientists).
By relating the gender of the characters with some socio-demographic features, and
physical and aesthetic properties, more interesting results emerge. Women, for example,
are younger than men: in the sample, there are more girls than boys, more adult women
than men, but older men than women. This result is probably due to the widespread
appreciation of the beauty in advertising, more perceptible in young or juvenile women.
Also the link between gender and the setting of the spots is quite significant. Women
dominate in domestic spaces, while they are a minority in public spaces, in
business contexts and in workplaces. This confirms the old relationship between woman
and “housewifeness”, and man and career. Not surprisingly, 100% of the housewives
are females, and the total of the workers is male. This is a result that suggests some
oversimplification.
In addition, there are less women among the categories of professionals or
entrepreneurs, managers or teachers (See Figure 3). There is the same number
105
of the men and women only among the category of retired people, in a
representation that depicts them more as housewives or at rest (in each case at
home) rather than workers.
Fig. 1. Role of male and female characters (percentages)
100%
90%
80%
70%
41,6%
44,7%
57,0%
60%
50%
female
40%
male
30%
20%
58,4%
55,3%
relevant, but not
protagonist
secondary
43,0%
10%
0%
protagonist
Database: 1798
Fig. 2. Type of male and female characters (percentages)
100%
90%
37,7%
80%
70%
60,7%
56,4%
60%
50%
40%
62,3%
30%
20%
39,3%
43,6%
common
famous
10%
0%
competent
female
male
Database: 1798
106
Fig. 3. Work of the male and female characters (percentages)
100%
90%
80%
29,0%
33,1%
30,8%
45,0%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
100,0%
71,0%
66,9%
100,0%
69,2%
55,0%
20%
10%
0%
freelancer
manager/teacher
employee
worker
housewife
female
retired
male
Database: 1798
107
Moreover, the data relating to the physical or aesthetic features confirm the old
equation between beauty and femininity. The beautiful faces are feminine in four
cases out of five. Over 80% of the skinny figures is a female. The less conventional
(and probably more attractive for the Italian male) eyes or hair colors are the prerogative
of the female figures (all the red haired people, for example, are women, as just as the
80% of the blond ones). Most of the grey, black or white hair-colored people are men.
Women also dominate among those with blue or green eyes, respectively in three cases
out of four and in two out of three. If this apparently irrelevant information is read
together, it confirms the spread in the Italian TV advertising of young, skinny, and
exotic beauties.
In addition, the female figures are shooting especially in close-ups, while medium shots
or long shots predominate for men. This is a clear sign of the differences in the gaze on
gender: the camera focuses on the face, the eyes, but also on the shoulders, the legs or
the breast, probably to exaltate women’s beauty (especially in the cosmetics
commercials) (See Figure 4). However, one of the consequences of these shots is the
emphasis on the female emotions. Not surprisingly, over 70% of the cases of a marked
display of feelings refer to women.
Therefore, in our sample there is a preponderance of female characters whose young
and beautiful faces reveal their emotions. They are depicted as spontaneous and
uncontrolled and, perhaps, in need of a constant male presence in the background.
Fig. 4. Shots of the male and female characters (percentages)
100%
90%
27,2%
80%
40,7%
47,0%
70%
50,5%
66,5%
70,8%
60%
91,7%
50%
40%
72,8%
30%
59,3%
53,0%
20%
49,5%
33,5%
29,2%
10%
8,3%
0%
Extreme long Medium shot
shot, long
shot, mediumlong shot
Two shot
Medium-close
shot
Close-up
Extreme
close-up
female
Detail shot
male
Database: 1798
6. Old-fashioned images
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Apparently, it looks like very little has changed since the time of the Goffman’s
analysis. His search is not entirely comparable with ours, because it refers to different
times, contexts, and media, but the majority of the detected representations have more
than one point in common with the survey of the Canadian sociologist. In particular,
Goffman’s role function, often related to women with housekeeping and the family
care, is also found in most of our sample, populated by many housewives and few
female workers.
Our data also confirms Goffman’s description of man as “naturally” placed in a working
place, well dressed, and master of his emotions (he looks cold and controlled in the
65,2% of the cases).
Even the widespread presence of detailed shoots of the female body, typical of the
ritualization of subordination, can be traced in the sample of GEMMA: more than 90%
of the close-ups are feminine.
Many of the women figures analyzed, seem to be a crystallization of the traditional
advertising models. The image of the wife and the mother prevails over the others. She
appears as a simple and loving woman, with a reassuring middle-class beauty. Her
model is well represented not only in the many detergent commercials, but also in the
food ones, such as in the children’s snacks or family pasta spots.
An interesting example of this portrayal comes from the Findus spot of the Quattro salti
in padella ready-to-eat meals. It uses the typical registers and scenarios used for the
Italian réclame of the Sixties, where a voice talks to a woman who is primarily defined
as “mother” and “wife”. Its slogans are: “Attention wife! Do you want to go out for
dinner? Do not propose this meal to your husband!”, “Attention wife! Your husband
does not say a word during the dinner? Remove the dish from the table!”, “Attention
moms! This meal keeps children at home beyond age 40”. According to its creators, this
is an ironic campaign, because it refers to a far past and invites mothers and wives to
not defrost the ready-to-eat meals, while having the intent to get it done. However,
despite the intention, it reminds old stereotypes not completely outdated in the Italian
culture and too common in the television advertising to seem really ironic.
Despite the expectations and the concerns spread in the Italian debate on gender and
media, the sensual woman/object is not a very popular figure in our sample. If anything,
she is an element, sometimes discreet, sometimes gaudy, who serves to embellish the
scene or to attract the gaze. However, this portrayal often appears in the spot of products
more or less related to seduction, like underwear. A commercial of the brand
Intimissimi, for example, consists in only close-ups and extreme close-ups of the model
Irina Shaykhlislamova’s body, wearing panties and bra and staging the feminine touch
well depicted by Goffman. This is also that type of woman found in the commercials
with female endorsers chosen more for their beauty than for their skills or knowledge.
In the sample, for example, the presence of models or actresses like Eva Longoria,
Rachel Weisz, Laetitia Casta and Milla Yovovich (L'Oreal), Reese Witherspoon
(Avon), Uma Thurman (Schweppes), and Philippa Lagerback (Daygum) is quite
common. On the other hand, there are few endorsers not selected for their look. They
are generally beauties from another times (such as the show girl Raffaella Carrà),
involved in the promotion of food for mature women, or women athletes, such as the
swimmer Federica Pellegrini (Pavesini), chosen not for her abilities, but for her fame
and her fit appearance, widely displayed in extreme close-ups.
Thus, it seems that the main attribute of women in the Italian television advertising is
the visibility, because they occupy the scene, attract the eyes, and decorate the setting.
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5. Sui generis figures
If the whole sample shows mostly women from another time, between the frames of the analyzed spots
we have seen some glimmer of novelty. The qualitative analysis revealed, in fact, a few alternative and
more realistic gender portrayals.
These new features include women appearance in only one case, the Dove’s
commercials, populated by less young, skinny and perfect women than in the rest of
advertising. These spots are part of an original campaign, born in the 2004, dedicated to
the protection and enhancement of the real beauty and the feminine self-esteem. A
notable case is the Real Beauty Sketches spot, an interesting experiment to prove that
women are much more beautiful than what they think. The video shows Gil Zamora, a
FBI forensics sketch artist, drawing two different sketches for seven different women.
The first sketch is based on the personal description of each woman, the second is based
on a description given by a stranger she has just met. By comparing the portraits it is
evident that women perceive and describe themselves as less beautiful than they are. If
the novelties related to a more realistic appearance of women in advertising are just a
few, the cases of enrichment of their role representation are more numerous. For
example, they are depicted sometimes as professionals and ambitious workers. Inserted
in different workplaces and not confined at home. Flanked to the men and not
accompanied by them. They are that kind of women who appear in a couple of
Calzedonia’s commercials, with claims like “Let's hope it's a girl” or “Sisters of Italy”.
The second case, for example (discussed for the use of a female version of the Italian
hymn), shows the images of different women, in different moments of their lives,
followed by the dedication: “To Italia, Vittoria, Laura and all the others”.
This is not a real new case, because the prevalent perspective is still masculine: it
displays beautiful and emotive women with many close-ups of their charming faces and
shapely legs. However, it has the merit of showing the richest and most various female
identities, depicted in different contexts and not only at home.
A more original figure can be found with the multitasking mother in a Fastweb spot.
She is able to manage, with some difficulty, both family and career. This case shows the
woman as a heroine with an extraordinary normality and a great courage.
The dual role of worker and housewife, together with the rare function of guarantor,
appears in an advertisement for Mellin milk for children, with the slogan “I study it as a
researcher, I choose it as a mom”. The figure of the scientist woman who guarantees the
quality of the product also occurs in the long-lived spot for Lines è tampons that shows
a team of female researchers and uses the slogan “Designed by women for you”.
These cases are only partly innovative. Their novelty is limited by the fact that the
researchers are presented as guarantors of feminine or childish products, competent not
only for their profession, but also for their role of woman and mother.
However, an interesting case in the sample is the spot of the feminine perfume Chanel
No. 5, that uses a male endorser. During the time, the brand has chosen ultra-feminine
endorsers, such as Marilyn Monroe, Nicole Kidman and Audrey Tautou, but in a recent
campaign it prefers a man: Brad Pitt. In the spot, the actor plays a long monologue in
which the woman is celebrated, admired, loved and desired. The case is unusual not
only because a male figure is involved in the promotion of a female product (focusing
on attraction and not on identification), but also because the woman disappears from the
scene, she is deprived from her typical feature of visibility, and is evoked, as in a poem
of another time.
Even in the representation of men we note the prevalence of conventional portrayals,
and, with a closer look, the presence of some small opening signs. The novelties
concern those spots where the man takes care of the family, prepares meals or
110
gives advice about house cleaning products. It happens in ads showing men while
doing their shopping (Conad), advertising laundry detergents (Bio Presto and
Dash), or food products (Knorr). Even in these cases, however, the limited signs of
originality are restricted by the context. The two cases in which men are the guarantors
of food products, for example, involve two chefs, who appear in a domestic space and
suggest products to prepare meals, as professionals, rather than as home keepers.
However, another small sign of change comes from the figure of the father, who appears
with a slightly higher frequency than expected. He is certainly not a new character of
the television advertising, but it seems more widespread and has a more active role in
the child’s education, mainly because he appears more often alone at home with his
children (in the Batticuori commercial, for example).
It’s not only apparently original, however, the portrayal of the man as a seducer or an
object. It appears in a limited number of spots and repeats many of the clichés of the
representation of the bait woman. This is the case of a commercial for the Lavazza
espresso machines, or a spot of the men's perfume by Dolce and Gabbana, that both
show the sculptural bodies of beautiful models with those extreme close-ups typical of
the shooting of women.
However, beyond the noted exceptions, male and female continue to occupy different
areas of expertise and still reveal few points of contact. Not surprisingly, the hybrid or
transgender figures are almost entirely absent from the sample. The only case is in a
Mercedes spot,that shows a gay bar, connoting it as ambiguous and threatening and
describing its frequenters as abnormal and vaguely disturbing. Apart from the
questionable content, which has aroused much controversy, the gay identities are
present only in this case and appear as bizarre and threatening. Thus, there is no truly
balanced perspective on masculinity and femininity in the Italian television advertising,
and no representation of the plurality of existing genres and sexual orientations
(Leccardi, 2002; Butler, 2006; Arfini, 2007; Ruspini, Inghilleri, 2008).
7. Conclusion
Italian women and men are characters in motion. A plot of more and more widespread
transformations, aspirations and behavior has contributed to redefine their biographical,
educational, occupational and emotional trajectories in the last decades (Istat, 2004).
Women, in particular, live and promote a radical and rapid change. They are probably
the most dynamic component of the society, the ones that are changing more quickly
their social, cultural and economic coordinates, helping to influence the development of
the country. In detail, because they are varied and in constant motion, the female and
male reality is difficult to represent with just a few seconds of a spot. Thus, no wonder
that at first sight the research returns a general static image of gender identity, mostly
crystallized on old clichés and replicating the results of studies of nearly forty years ago.
At a closer look, however, the apparently fixed and rigid frame of male and female
figures reflect together a moving image. A slow movement, still far from the most
current settings and rhythms, that hides small elements of novelty. We note, for
example, images of women depicted in activities different from the house cleaning or
cooking. Competent professionals who try to combine work and family life and who
promote products different from detergents. Women with a more realistic beauty, who
appear not only in domestic spaces, but also on the public scene and in workplaces.
Even men are more often represented in the domestic space, exhibiting consumption
behavior, as well as the productive ones, assuming the role of fathers, and sometimes
deviating from the strenuous and constant display of manly attitudes.
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Thus, there is a timid transgression or evolution of gender boundaries. However,
the new openings are too few to permit generalizations and they show male and
female identities still divided, in which the possible approach occurs not through the
reduction of their differences, but through their representation in a new and more subtle
form. In fact, on the one hand, the images of the Italian advertising reassure traditional
identities, while they push them towards consumptions that destabilize the gender order,
as in the case of the spot for ready-to-eat meals, promoted by an old-fashioned
housewife; on the other hand, they promote a new awareness and attention, anchoring
them to consumption related to traditional roles, such as in the case of professional
women endorsing feminine or childish products. Moreover, when advertising attempts
to grapple with “different” images, it does it in a too cautious or hyperbolic way. This
happens in the commercials that focus on a flashy and unrealistic women's
empowerment, as in the case of the vengeful women of the old Campari spots or of
those obsessed by a car, in a masculine instrumental logic. This is also what occurs in
commercials that objectify men’s bodies.
Furthermore, the space for gender ambiguity of sexual orientation diversity is almost
imperceptible in our sample and has a weak consistency. Beyond the only case reported,
in the rare Italian commercials of the past, the transgender figures appear as anomalies
and disguises, useful to attract attention, rather than as representations of fluid and
unconventional sexual identities.
In general, the movement of women and men in the Italian advertising is slower than in
the society which the advertising is addressed to. This is understandable if we consider
the channel and the form of communication analyzed and the methodology used. The
channel is the Italian TV, which has a mature audience, and it is used to achieve a wide
target in a short time, giving above all space to the commercials of convenience goods.
Hence the tendency towards caution and the preference for tradition.
The analyzed form of communication is the advertising that in a few moments must be
able to capture the attention of an elusive target and convey a message that should be
understandable and memorable, despite the information overload. No wonder if it uses
stereotypes, clichés or hyperboles.
For what concerns the method, the content analysis is limited to frequency counts of
role portrayals that yield rather superficial and somewhat self-evident inferences
(Ferguson, Kreshel and Tinkham, 1990).
Thus, this first analysis reveals that the few partially new advertising images are
exceptions that tend, as often happens, to prove the rule. It is not a surprising or
innovative result, but it is necessary as a basis for updating the Italian research on this
topic and to build new, more refined and profound analysis. Hence, the intention to
move beyond the study of the sex-role stereotypes framework and the focus on the
female figures, to use different methods to overcome the limitations of content analysis,
to examine the persuasive implications of gender representation, to evaluate the intragender and inter-gender dynamics, the social-structural issues, the power relationships
between gender categories, but also to study the advertising production processes that
lead to the constructions of a certain gender representation in a “naturalistic settings”, so
that advertising practices are studied with a comprehensive analysis of the commercials,
the people, and the media.
For this reason, these results should be considered only as the beginning of a work that
needs to continue and develop, to expand the scope and enhance the quality of the
Italian research on gender in advertising, because we agree with Horace Newcomb and
Paul Hirsch, when they said: «We are more concerned with the ways in which television
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contributes to change than with mapping the obvious ways in which it maintains
dominant viewpoints» (Newcomb and Hirsch 1984, p. 70).
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PART 2. Analysis of discourses on gender identities in
the media and other communicative contexts (social
networks, education systems)
116
ACADEMIC FEMALE SUBJECT AMIDST BOURDIEU’S “HABITUS”
AND BUTLER’S “PERFORMATIVITY”
Dr. Gokcesu Aksit
Department of Sociology, Faculty Member
Maltepe University, Turkey
gokcesuaksit@maltepe.edu.tr
Berfin Varisli
Department of Sociology, PhD Student
Maltepe University, Turkey
vberfin@gmail.com
Abstract: in the context of a highly competitive and knowledge-intensive academic life, the role of the
“performativity” of the academics in their success has become an increasingly important issue. Pierre
Bourdieu, in his 1988 dated work Homo Academicus seeks sui generis characteristics of academics in
1950’s French intellectual arena. In that book, he proposes the notion of “academic habitus”, which
emphasizes the scholar’s family origin, gender, class and religion possesses a reflexive impact on his/her
intellectual research and everyday life. On the other hand, as feminist and queer theorist Judith Butler
brings the very notion of “performativity” forward, which she believes is internalizing the “ritualized”
repetition of cultural acts, empiercing outer space of the body and personality. This paper is an attempt to
find out a common ground of Bourdieu’s concept of “habitus” and Judith Butler’s “performativity”. We
aim to achieve this attempt through a brief investigation on four academic texts on the notion of female
academics in Turkey in order to understand the floating role of women in scientific community with a
special interest in the universities in Turkey.
Keywords: Turkish academic female subject, “academic habitus”, “performativity”
1. Introduction
The notion of “habitus” is highlighted by Pierre Bourdieu in his works between 1958
and 2002, and the notion itself has a long-standing legacy. Briefly, habitus is a process
that an individual ritually internalizes the social reality that s/he was born and become
an adult. The ‘ritualization’ process of habitus (yet Bourdieu himself never stated) starts
with the birth of an individual, continues to enlarge while the individual grows up,
shapens in accordance with the experiences, and follows the individual until the end of
life. The individual as a subject is under pressure of the norms and values, which
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mostly generate from culture, and those norms and values construct and reconstruct the self of the subject. The concept of “habitus” is used by many scholars
in many academic resources in order to understand the power of norms and values on
individuals. It is not an easy goal to examine Bourdieu’s general theory in this brief
sketch.
We must assert that we are only trying to understand the connection of Bourdieu’s
habitus with Butler’s notion of performativity as she mainly stated in Psychic Life of
Power (1997) for the scope of this presentation. It can be noticed that for example in
The Masculine Domination (2001), Bourdieu reflected views about masculinity parallel
to Freudian conception but it is beyond the narrow scope of this paper either. In this
paper we are trying to examine three academic articles and a PhD thesis, written on the
subject of Turkish female academics.
The reason that we have chosen that topic came out from the idea that Pierre Bourdieu’s
book Homo Academicus can be read as a harsh critic towards academia from inside
(Bourdieu, 1984). Bourdieu, describes the “academia” in Homo Academicus as “a tribe
he joined as a result of his upward social climb” which has continually turned the
instruments of his science upon himself” (Bourdieu and Wacquant, 1992, p. 36). What
Bourdieu believes and complaints from academia is, in his opinion, academia as a
struggle arena in which there is a flow of outer ethical interests of academics which
predominates over scientific aims. According to Bourdieu, there are various kinds of
outer ethical interests of academics, such as establishing “good” relations with the
chiefs and/or the political authority of the state etc. In this presentation, we aim to offer
a different kind of interest that we believe most of the female academics face in Turkish
academia; trying to escape from psychological discrimination that the junior female
academics face from their seniors. The details of this discrimination will be discussed
later in this presentation. By stating female academics, we are limiting our sample with
female academics that finished their doctoral thesis.
2. Performativity as a ritualized process
Judith Butler in her re-formulation of the material body, formulated “performativity” as
follows: “the reiterative power of discourse to produce the phenomena that regulates
and constraints” (Butler, 1993, p. 2). Butler attributes a specific role to the
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language and emphasizes the importance of speech in most of her works.
According to Butler, speech is more than a combination of vocals and has a power.
In her famous study, Excitable Speech: A Politics of Performative, she starts her
arguments about the power of language and linguistic vulnerability by asking the
following question: “When we claim to have been injured by language, what kind of
claim do we make” (Butler, 1997, p. 1)? The reason that she illustrates the linkage
between the linguistic vulnerability and emotions is to show that we, individuals are “all
linguistic beings who are formed in language” (Butler, 1997, p. 2). According to Butler,
language has the power to form the individual. Nonetheless, this formation occurs
through certain norms, which this study embarks upon establishing a connection
between. Precisely, Judith Butler underlines the relation between speech and norms
through the notion of ‘performativity’.
Although the author does not prefer to give a direct definition of performativity, she
provides the reader some hints in order to see the big picture of performativity in many
of her works. Briefly one can explain performativity, as a certain level of power
accumulating by ritualistic acts (mainly of speech), under the pressure of norms, values
and laws. Therefore, the lives of the individuals are formed through these repetitions of
performative acts. Butler herself names the condition of repetition as ritualization. And
the process of the ritualization starts within the family and more specifically it starts
immediately when the relation between the sibling and parents endures. For instance,
gender roles of individuals are started to be configured by the determined choices of the
parents. These choices vary from the colour of the baby’s clothes (i.e. blue for boys and
pink for girls) to the kind of the toys such as dolls for girls and toy guns to the boys.
Butler notes “the young boy and young girl who enter into the certain period in growing
up are already being subjected to heterosexual aims by prohibitions which disposed
them in distinct sexual distinctions (Butler, 1999, p. 82).
Butler, in her book Psychic Life of Power: Theories of Subjection states that there is a
relation between ‘performativity’ and ‘habitus’ and it has something to do with the
process of ritualization. (Butler, 1997, p. 210). As she noted down:
Pierre Bourdieu elaborates the concept of the habitus in The Logic of Practice, he analyses
the embodied rituals of everydayness by which a given culture produces and sustains belief
in its own “obviousness”. Bourdieu underscores the place of the body, its gestures, its
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stylistics, its unconscious “ knowingness” as the sight for the reconstitution of a practical
sense without which social reality could not be constituted.
Having said that, as an outstanding Bourdian scholar and a student of Pierre Bourdieu J.
D. Loic Wacquant explains “habitus” in the book called Invitation to Reflexive
Sociology as follows: a system of lasting and transposable disposition which, integrating
past-experiences, functions at every moment as a matrix of infinitely diversified
perceptions,
appreciations
and
actions
(Bourdieu
and
Wacquant,
1992,
p.
18). Therefore, “habitus” is a process that an individual ritually internalizes the social
reality that s/he was born and become an adult. To say that the subject performs
according a set of skills is, as it were, to take grammar at its word: there is a subject who
encounters a set of skills to be learned, learns them or fails to learn them and then and
only then can it be said either to have mastered those skills or not. To master a set of
skills is not simply to accept a set of skills, but to reproduce them in and as one’s own
activity. This is not simply to act according to a set of rules but to embody rules in the
course of action and to reproduce those rules in embodies rituals of action (Butler, 1997,
p. 119).
When these two statements first by Butler and second by Bourdieu and Wacquant are
analysed, we can conclude that a body is a kind of matrix, which has its own
perceptions and dispositions, which are shaped through a repetitive and unconscious
knowingness, and this knowingness is appreciable within its own obviousness. When
those perceptions clash with the norms and values of society, the individual uses
censorship as a defence mechanism in order not to be a victim of symbolic violence. In
the same book, Butler illustrates the arguments of Bourdieu, which French sociologist
points out in his Language and Symbolic Power that even “all symbolic domination
presupposes, on the part of those who submit to it, a form of complicity which is neither
passive submission to external constraint for a free adherence to values” (as cited in
Butler, 1997). Therefore, Bourdieu suggests that the rules of the norms are embodied
and we are aware of those norms such that we sometimes apply an implicit censorship
to our language for the sake of not cutting across the norms. Butler tries to figure out
how to understand the bodily operation of such a linguistic understanding if the
censorship is that implicit and what is its relation with politics? She answers her
question with the notions of “force” and “performativity”. The notion of “force” is
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coming from Bourdieu’s theory as he believes, according to Butler that “ the force
of the performative is the effect of social power, and as a social power is to be
understood through established context of authority and their instrument of censorship”
(Butler, 1997, p. 141). In Excitable Speech: A Politics of Performative, Butler brings
out the very notion of ‘bodily act’, an act that emerges from a person’s body within the
limits and the force of performative, i.e., gestures, mimics, body language etc. Hence,
she affirms that the speech act is a kind of bodily act and “is never fully separable from
bodily force” (Butler, 1997, p. 141).
However Butler, in contrast to Bourdieu, states that non-intentional norms also takes
place and a person with the performativity can confront the very norms that it
reinforced. This is a kind of construction and reconstruction process. The norms
somehow create a bodily speech, which is an outcome of habitus, the norms force the
bodily speech in order to obey the rules and at one point the bodily speech also find a
way to resist the norms from which it is produced. This is one of the most readable
conflicting point of Bourdieu and Butler’s thinking. Butler goes so far to comment, “it
is what Bourdieu fails to understand” (Butler, 1997, p. 142).
Butler almost touches upon Bourdieu’s understanding through the use of “modalities of
practice”. Butler explains this as follows:
Bourdieu states that “modalities of Practices are powerful and hard to resist precisely
because they are silent and insidious” in any of his works but especially in "Censorship and
the Imposition of Form:' There he writes of specialized languages, indeed, the specialized
languages of the academy, and suggests that they are not only based on censorship, but also
on a sedimentation and skewing of everyday linguistic usage -strategies of euphemization,
to use his phrase” (Butler, 1997, p. 142).
Butler touches upon the censorship phenomenon in a much broader sense than
Bourdieu and suggests ordinary language, which she believes, “records and
preserves social oppositions, and yet it does so in a way that is not readily
transparent” (Butler, 1997, p. 143).
3. Being a Turkish female academic
The common purpose of the academic studies that we examined is to elucidate the place
and situation of Turkish female academics and more specifically what it means
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to be a woman in Turkish academia. As noted above, we tried to underline the
commonalities of the positive, if any, and negative sides of being a Turkish female
subject. Moreover, we believe that those are outcomes of the interference and also the
convergence of Judith Butler’s performativity and Pierre Bourdieu’s habitus.
The role of gender norms is visible in the studies as feminization of field of research.
According to findings, in Turkey female academics tend to choose to be in the fields of
education, literature, humanities and social sciences which are believed to be much
more suitable for women. Other fields such as engineering, medicine and fields about
agriculture are highly masculinized which means the proportion of female academics is
much lower than the male academics in those areas of research. This fact can be counted
as the ritualization of everydayness because the female academics even at the beginning
at their career follows the routes that their parents and may be more broadly speaking
the society and choose a feminized topic to research.
In her PhD thesis, Dilek Er underlines this problematic guidance by stating that the
career ambitions of parents for their sons are much higher than the career ambitions for
their daughters. Parents wish their sons to be a well-educated person with a good career,
on the other hand, the situation for the daughters are much worse, such that they wish
their daughters to have a job which is related to motherhood and they also wish the
amount of time that she spends on her career will not exceed the time that she supposed
to spend for her children and housework (Er, 2008, p. 113). According to her, this belief
is the continuation of the gendered division of labour at home (p. 202). The gendered
division of labour at home can be characterized as the tasks that require much bodily
and mental power are expected to be done by men and women who are believed to be
more delicate, less powerful and more emotional than man are expected to be caring
mothers, good cooks and impassionate and loyal wives.
On the other hand, as an Ankara University faculty member herself Ozlem Ozkanli
(2007) approaches to the issue of role of gender norms from a different but still from a
close perspective. Ozkanli in her article titled as The Situation of Academic Woman in
Turkey attaches importance to the role conflict that most of the Turkish female
academics face. The notion of role conflict is very parallel to the role of gender norms
and means “the conflict between the academic career and family roles”. According to
Ozkanli, majority of female academics try to find a solution for this dividedness
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either by becoming distant from the traditional family roles or taking both the
academic and domestic “workload” (Ozkanli, 2007, p. 68). However the result is
either an unhappy family life or a decrease on academic performance. Ozkanli defines
the latter as abandoning administrative tasks such as dean’s office, presidency of the
university, thesis supervising; conduction less research and as a result a decrease in the
number of scholarly work for publishing in order to be able to spend more time for
family. Ozkanli explains the relative highness of the number of male academics in the
administrative positions and their success in the academic performance by the role
conflict.
Judith Butler states that “codes of legitimacy are established precisely through the
invocation of non-ordinary words in ways that appear to have a systematic relation to
one another” (Butler, 1997, p. 142). Starting from this point of view, we tried to
understand the role of speech act upon the female academics in Turkey. The result that
we conclude is very interesting because none of the female academics that are
interviewed by each of the authors mention any performances, which are related to
speech. We will try to discuss such occurrences (or none occurrences more preferably)
in the conclusion part accordingly.
The idea of role of norms, on the other hand, exists in all of the scholarly works, which
are examined throughout this study. The existences of norms, gender norms in Butler’s
words, were highlighted above, in the beginning of this section. As it is stated gender
bounded preferences, this is reflected upon the feminization/masculinization of some
special fields of research or gender division of labour in the household. Thus the lower
percentage rates of women working in high level administrative positions in Turkey,
mentioned above, as such roles contradict with the role of women in the household, as
mother, or wife (Ozkanli, 2006).
The absence of women in the political era is also a reflection of such contradiction.
Although such finding cannot be traced in all of the academic writings we reviewed, it
is a social problem Turkey deals for decades (Er, 2008, p. 179). This problem goes hand
in hand with the problem of the women’s low levels of participation in politics and the
quote system of Turkey for women. It wouldn’t be nonsense if we tell here that the
percentage of woman engaging in political arena is very low in Turkey, without
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exception of any political days until the new political era of today.
Nonetheless, the problem of feminization/masculinization of some special fields of
research, as mentioned above, brings forth another, yet equally important problem of the
role of women in the chief positions within the universities in Turkey. There is an
uncodified tendency in Turkish universities that throughout time, the academics selected
to be in a senior positions such as being a rector and/or vice rector are mostly from
masculinized fields of research (Ozkanli, 2010). Nonetheless, the percentage of female
academics being in a senior position i.e. Presidency of the university is relatively low,
compared to the universities worldwide.
Finally, one other important aspect driven from the academic writings reviewed, a
certain level of violence exists between the female senior academics and other female
scholars not in the form of physicality but in terms of psychology. We presume such
occurrence can be found in Butler’s thought provoking book Psychic Life of Power:
Theories in Subjection. We took our cue from this book that the construction and
reconstruction of female subject in Turkish academic circles. The fact that Ozkanli’s
claim of non-existence of gender discrimination itself, we argue, is a reflection of such
violence.
Turkish female academic lying midst performativity and habitus subjected under
psychological violence, which Bourdieu covered as “symbolic violence” in determining
habitus. Bourdieu in Language and Symbolic Power illustrates the existence of
censorship and in Bourdieu’s understanding and what Butler criticizes is living
according to norms without opposing it, is a kind of rational action. Therefore according
to Bourdieu, if keeping steps with norms is in the interest of an individual, individual
uses censorship very conveniently in speech, acts, choices etc. (Bourdieu, 1991, p. 128).
Bourdieu correspondingly seeks to expand the “ritual sense of convention” by symbolic
violence and “he contextualizes ritual within the social field of the "marketplace of
ideas” (Butler, 1997, p. 151) Therefore, the Turkish female subject is under the pressure
of such ritualization of symbolic violence affects her performativity in academic market.
4. Conclusion
In this paper, we briefly examine the female academic subject in Turkey with the
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motivation provided by Judith Butler, who admits that there is a linkage between
her very notion of performativity and Pierre Bourdieu’s habitus. Butler believes
that both performativity and habitus are processes of repetitive acts, in her words
“rituals”, which shapes the life of individual’s life, preferences and positions. Starting
with this point of view, we have chosen four recent academic writings, which explore
the situation of female academics in Turkish academia.
Interestingly, although those studies were conducted in different parts of Turkey and
with distinctive samples because one of them investigates woman academics in senior
positions i.e. rectors and vice rectors (Ozkanli, 2010), while the others look at the
general situation of Turkish academics (Ozkanli, 2007; Naymansoy, 2010). The result
driven from those studies are pretty much similar. All of the studies assert that the
gender roles emerge within the family have an impact on woman’s academics
performances and those roles manifest themselves in the choice of fields of research by
feminization/masculinization.
We believe that the masculinization/feminization issue also exists in politics. Although
a reasonable number of female academics express their tendency for political issues
(Ozkanli, 2007) and state their motivation to defend the rights of women and adopt the
issue of female identity into the society. They either do not prefer to engage directly into
the politics or they are being left out of the political sphere in order not to lose their
position at the university. The other very crucial reason of the absence of female
academics in politics is related to the fact that political arena is highly masculinized and
there is not much room for females within (Er, 2008, p. 113). Hence politics and
academy reflects as both conflicts with the roles of being a wife and/or a mother. We
bear in mind that this problem is another crucial area that requires further investigation.
In this paper, we solely examine the identity issue through the identity phenomenon in
Butler’s theory of subject. There are a reasonable number of sound researches done in
very recent times but we did not include those outstanding researches in our paper.
On the other hand, the gender roles that fiercely imposed by society, which is pointed
out in the introduction part of this study, as colour choices of parents, or toys, are
transtivise into a gender conflict that most of the female academics face through their
academic life. This gender conflict is the situation of straddle between the household
work and academic work (Er, 2010). Therefore this situation has a negative
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reflection on the academic performances of woman. Those performances, in
Butler’s terms performativity, are continually forced by opposing directions; one
through the roles of femininity like motherhood and wife and other forcing the subject
to the direction of administrative (political) roles, which are considered to be masculine.
There is another crucial finding from Ozkanli’s article (2007) The Situation Of
Academic Women in Turkey, which we think is open for a discussion. Ozkanli found
that the female academics prefers to reject the administrative positions such as dean’s
office, chief of department and even rectorate because of the role conflict that exists
between family roles and academic workload. However, we assume that there is a very
crucial nuance in this argument and suggest that there are very common occasions that
especially relatively less “powerful” female academics who are thought to reject those
positions with their free will, but the underlying reason might be quite different. The
senior academics sometimes put an implicit pressure on the female academics for
rejecting such positions for their interest.
Therefore, the last but not the least fact driven from the above-mentioned academic
writings, is the infamous psychological violence. The authors of those writings states
that there is a symbolic violence conducted by mostly senior female academics onto
young scholars. More clearly most of the female academics struggle with psychological
violence both from their male and female superiors in academic arena. In respect to this,
we believe that the subject matter of symbolic violence is highly crucial with many
aspects and should be researched from many different perspectives.
While touching upon all these problems by the light of the striking relation of the
female subject amidst performativity and habitus, we draw the scope of this presentation
very narrowly and solely on academic female subject. We believe that this relation
deserves further attention which can be conducted on many distinctive areas. Moreover,
the two theorists, both are very influential and eye opening academics, Judith Butler and
Pierre Bourdieu, deserves significant researches which are already conducted, but still
there is a room for more further research about those two theorists in terms of their key
concepts. On the other hand, the junction of the key concepts, performativity and
habitus, leads us to foresee many meritorious researches would be conducted.
An explanatory outcome of this study illustrates that the issue of speech and norms
remains a taboo in female academics. The interviewed female academics does
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not give any clue about either speech acts or ordinary language, that are
conceptualized by Butler, as it stated throughout this study in the section
“Performativity as a ritualized process”. Therefore it was a hard task for both of us to
subtract a comment about the role of norms over speech acts and the language used by
academics among their colleagues. We believe that this silence is an unspoken act and
has a reason. The female academics tend not to speak about the suppressive speech act,
which leads to linguistic vulnerability with a high degree of probability, shaped by a
range of heterosexual norms and values. Furthermore, while commenting that the
academia in general becomes over-masculinized, it won’t be bizarre to state that there is
a high level of heterosexual suppression over the female academics and “codes of
legitimacy”. In Butler’s terms, those are established precisely through the invocation of
non-ordinary words in ways that appear to have a systematic relation to one another. We
believe that this unspoken act itself constitutes a very substantial finding and enables a
valuable platform for further research.
5. Bibliography
Bourdieu, P. and Wacquant L. J. D. (1992) Invitation to Reflexive Sociology Oxford:
Blackwell Publishers.
Bourdieu, P. (2001) Masculine Domination. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Butler, J. (1997) Psychic Life of Power: Theories of Subjection. Stanford: Stanford
University Press.
Butler, J. (1997) Excitable Speech: A Politics of Performative. New York and London:
Routledge.
Butler, J. (1999) Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity New York
and London: Routledge.
Er, D. (2008) A Sociological Approach to the Situation and Problems of the Academic
Women in the Modern Turkey, Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, Firat University,
Elazig, Turkey.
Naymansoy, G. (2010) ‘Turkish Female Academicians and their Contributions to
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Science’ Gaziantep University Journal of Social Sciences 9(1): 203-232.
Ozkanli, O. (2007) ‘The Situation of Academic Women’ Education and Science, 32
(144): 59-70.
Ozkanli, O. (2010) ‘Structural and Cultural Barriers For Women in Senior Management
in Turkish Universities’ Mülkiye 36(268): 267-281.
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AUDIENCE RECEPTION IN MOROCCAN WOMEN’S MAGAZINES10
Aicha Bouchara
School of Arts and Humanities, Sais-Fès
University of Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah
aicha_bouchara@yahoo.fr
Abstract: audiences have been perceived as passive media consumers. However, recent research
disproves this belief by showing that audiences receive media productions critically. In
accordance with this kind of research, this paper investigates female audiences’ various
interpretations of Moroccan women’s magazines and studies the implications of which
category of readers these women belong to. In order to answer this thesis, a specific
methodology is adopted. While questionnaires form the quantitative methodology
which provides statistical findings about the reading activity of Moroccan female
readers, the qualitative methodology is undertaken by the study of two Moroccan
women’s magazines: Femmes du Maroc and Lalla Fatema.
Keywords: female audiences, commercial culture, pleasure, hegemonic, negotiated, and
oppositional readings.
1. Introduction
The media are political and cultural vehicles through which representations of race,
ethnicity, nationality, class, sexuality, and gender are displayed. These representations
have been analyzed by many cultural and media critics as well as feminists. These latter
have been the ones to shed light on a subject often marginalized in media research. In
fact, the study of gender politics in the media has revealed diverse and contradictory
discourses.
In Morocco, however, most of the analysis of media texts contended that a pejorative
image of women is delivered. This image limits the roles of women in traditional roles
such as mother and/or wife. Another derogatory portrayal is the sexualization of the
image of women in different media. Thus, such depictions do not reflect the ‘real’
situation of Moroccan women, and do not deliver a good model and other alternatives to
these women. Nevertheless, the analysis done on the level of production politics is
inconsistent due to the lack of audience research.
Until recent years, audience reception research has been a feature of cultural studies.
Indeed, since texts can be interpreted in different ways, cultural studies contends that
gender, race, class, sexual preferences, and different ideologies all influence the way an
individual interprets a text. Hence, ethnographic cultural research has been conducted in
the field of media in order to determine how media audiences explain media texts and
whether these have any positive or negative effects on them. Moreover, it was
discovered that the audience sometimes subverts the meaning which producers of texts
want to convey.
In order to give a voice to female audiences and investigate the way they interpret
media texts, this paper focuses on the reception politics of a very popular women’s
This communication paper results from my PhD research project entitled “Reception Politics in
Moroccan Women’s Magazines: Femmes du Maroc and Lalla Fatema as Case Studies” 2012-2013.
10
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genre which is women’s magazines in Morocco. This investigation comes to
research and test whether Moroccan women are active readers of media materials
and whether the media directed to them contributes in any way in the progress of
women’s call for equal rights.
At this point, many crucial questions about the politics of production and reception
should be asked: Do WM provide any kind of knowledge to their readers? What kind of
representations and identities do they present female individuals with? Do they
challenge patriarchal media representations of women? Can WM be considered
hegemonic media texts? What kind of feminist discourses are promoted in case they are
included in these magazines?
Many other questions concerning female audiences are crucial to the main thesis
question: Are readers satisfied with WM’s contents? Do their readers consider them an
authority or do they read them as a form of entertainment? Are these audiences
conscious of the various identities promoted in WM? And, if the answer to this question
is positive, do these readers adopt, reject, adapt, or are totally indifferent to those
identities?
1.1 Adjusting Production to Reception: New Visions
This research is based on the analysis of two dimensions of WM which are the politics
of production and reception. When we speak about WM as a genre, it is compulsory to
refer to the theories of popular culture and feminist analyses since these two areas of
research have come to deconstruct dominant discourses which marginalize minorities in
order to achieve hegemonic intentions.
The study of ideology is one of these theories. According to Marx, those who rule
possess people’s consciousness because they are the ones who think, who produce
knowledge through which the ruled are governed. Thus, social subjects are not free to
choose to adopt a certain ideology. Althusser explains that ideology has the capacity to
‘interpellate’ individuals as subjects, i.e. it entices individuals to believe in a specific
form of social reality, hence turning them into subjects dependent on a distinct
existence.
However, for ideology to be effective, it takes shape in a discourse. This is what
Foucault explains by showing that the focus of discourse is not on meaning production
but is rather on the relations between power and knowledge. In other words, discourse is
formed in the interests of those social structures which have authority and power. For
Foucault, those who own the means of communication, such as the mass media, are the
ones most likely to control our knowledge; hence making us inside a certain ideology
and outside another. In this way, however, discourse would seem an imposed ideology
unless this latter is presented as being true, ethical, and meaningful.
This manipulation creates a subordinate individual. This is what Adorno and
Horkheimer believe by explaining that the capitalist system encourages the duplication
of cultural aspects leaving no room for variation, hence shaping people’s minds in the
same manner. This culture industry hinders the mind from thinking creatively and so the
individual becomes passive to the ideologies and discourses produced by the ruling
classes.
Nevertheless, this idea that audiences are nothing but ‘cultural dupes’ has been
criticized and proved to be wrong. Cultural and Feminist studies of audience research
have shown that audiences have a more critical view on ideas/ products they receive on
the media. Cultural studies have focused on a neglected angle of media consumption
which is audience reception.
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In his article “Encoding, Decoding”, Stuart Hall contends that the decoding of a
message can be different from the encoded message. This means that the
interpretation of a discourse may not have the same meanings of the production stage.
Hence, readers can produce their own meanings. Therefore, Hall presents three types of
reading: First, the “dominant-hegemonic position” is when the reader re-produces the
discourses of the production level, thus entering the scope of the preferred reading
where she/ he is under the hegemony of the encoded text. Second, the “negotiated
position” is where decoding joins both an acceptance of the dominant ideologies and an
adaptation of that discourse to one’s cultural and social situations. The last type of
reading for Hall is the “oppositional” one. This reading goes completely against the
grain and refuses to adapt. Instead, it creates its own interpretation which defies
hegemonic discourses. Hall’s reading positions are similar to Elaine Showalter’s
identity processes. The first identity is the “feminine stage” which refers to the
internalization and reproduction of the patriarchal ideologies of one’s society. Second,
the “feminist stage” is an opposition and revolt against those standards which keep
woman as a second class citizen. Finally, the “female stage” refers to the phase in which
there is a search for an autonomous identity detached from the dominant standards.
Following the progress which cultural studies has achieved at the level of reception,
some feminist critics have criticized the exaggerated interest of feminist studies in the
production level of media texts on the expense of the reception level. Ang and Hermes
explain that feminist researches have been reductionist of female readers. This means
that feminists considered women as passive audiences, as victims absorbed by the
hegemonic and sexist contents of the media. Moreover, Ang and Hermes contend that
texts are polysemic and can be understood in many ways according to the cultural and
personal experiences of an individual. For this reason, the authors strongly defend
ethnographic research which seeks to investigate what the audience makes of media
texts. Moreover, this type of research bridges the gap between the feminist and female
audiences. Liesbet van Zoonen explains that the feminist focus on the production level
silences women’s voices and pretends to know “what is best for women” (van Zoonen,
1996:42).
There are some theories which present new visions about the relationship between a
media text and the audience. One of these theories is Eric Landowski’s “general theory
of interaction” in which he explains how meaning is produced and how it is related to
power. For Landowski, meaning is produced through interactions. He refers to two
kinds of regimes of interaction to show the different power relations between producer
and receiver of a specific discourse. The first regime of interaction is the “manipulation
regime” which refers to the way exploitation takes place in order to exert power by
arising curiosity using temptation, provocation, order, politeness, and coaxing. Such
attempts to intrigue create the desire to seize what is offered. Moreover, politically
speaking, manipulation is manifested when someone pretends to speak for the people
and claims to know what the people want. This is what Landowski calls faire faire or to
“make-do”. The other kind of regime is called “adjustment”. In this interaction there are
no economic ends but the main aim is to know what the other feels. Contact with this
other reveals her/ his feelings. This interaction is not supposed to be understood as
being a calculated plan. On the contrary, it is a spontaneous act and encourages respect
of the other’s autonomy. This means that it is an affective investment that may result in
many types of emotional creation. Nevertheless, adjustment can be a controlling tool to
faire sentir or to “make-feel” which makes of sensitive subjects the main target of this
regime. Emotionally vulnerable individuals are addressed through the interaction of
adjustment in order to make them feel a specific feeling. Sometimes, however,
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the adjustment regime of interaction is used for economic ends to achieve the
manipulation regime. It can be deduced that Landowski’s manipulation and
adjustment regimes of interaction are interchangeable.
Another important theory which tries to explain why the audience enjoys or loathes a
media text is the theory of pleasure. Laura Mulvey was the first to examine this theory
in film studies through the concept of scopophilia, or the pleasure felt while looking at
someone or something. For Mulvey, since the male character in a movie is the bearer of
the look of the spectator, then this latter identifies with the hero and sees the image of
woman as an object of desire to be gazed at. However, Mulvey failed to apply her
theory on women spectators.
Rosalind Gill examines the kind of pleasure women viewers feel when seeing the
female body being exhibited in advertisements. In fact, she contends that female
pleasure resides in choosing to become sexual subjects in order to gain power. This
means that women audiences appreciate images where women’s sexual appearances
seem to grant them with power. Gill is deeply concerned about this new idea of pleasure
through media and points out that “On one hand, it constitutes a recognition that gender
power relations are partially lived out at the level of appearances; more disturbingly,
though, it represents a shift from an external judging male gaze to a self-policing
narcissistic gaze” (Gill, 2007: 90). What is most important in this quote is the phrase
“self-policing narcissistic gaze.” In fact, while Mulvey showed long ago that the gaze is
produced by man towards woman; Gill asserts that the gaze is nowadays produced by
women towards themselves. Thus, the female spectator derives pleasure from
objectifying herself and seeing herself as a subject of desire and envy.
Pleasure has also been explained through Janice Radway’s female audience research on
the reading of the romance. Radway uncovers the fact that romance readers feel
pleasure when there is a process of identification with the heroine because there is a real
desire to be emotionally cared for by men; feelings missed in the real world for these
women, which makes them fulfill this desire at least in the fictional world of romance.
Another reason for identification is that the heroine expresses a strong personality in the
story. Women’s desire to “dissociate themselves from the stereotype of women as weak,
passive, and foolish individuals” makes them turn to fiction where they feel they can
live an experience of a courageous and bold woman who stands up to any kind of sexist
behaviors towards her (Radway,1983: 69). Other kinds of pleasure felt by romance
readers is that this type of literature enables them to escape from the real world and
devote some time to themselves. On the other hand, Ien Ang’s study of Dallas’ female
viewers reveals that pleasure is felt in resisting the ideologies in the soap opera. In fact,
female viewers find pleasure in mockery and irony. For Ang, irony creates distance
between the viewer and Dallas and imposes a ‘protection’ from the promoted ideologies
in such series. “Irony then comes to lead its own life and this viewing attitude becomes
a necessary condition for experiencing pleasure in the first place. […] creating a
distance between oneself and Dallas as ‘bad object’, is the way in which one likes
Dallas” (Ang, 1993: 409, emphasis in original).
The notion of pleasure is surely a problematic question, especially when it is studied in
relation to media. It has been given ambivalent meanings ranging from feeling pleasure
in objectifying the other or in being objectified, to pleasure in escaping the real world
and finding refuge and satisfaction in the imaginary world of media, to pleasure in
resisting different media discourses. Studying pleasure in media studies will not only
help in understanding how media promote their ideologies and discourses but will also
reveal how audiences feel about such media materials.
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1.2 Research Methodology
1.2.1 Questionnaires
Since this research focuses on female audience reception of women’s magazines in
Morocco, the survey technique used for data gathering is that of questionnaires. The
population of this investigation belongs to the upper and lower middle class, literate and
educated women, and residents of Meknes city, Morocco. The choice of this specific
population is based on many reasons. Firstly, the selection of upper and lower middle
class individuals ensures that many of them, if not all, are able to buy a WM, and, as a
result, have had a reading experience with this medium. Secondly, researching the
reception of WM automatically means that its readership is literate and may also have a
certain capacity of critical reading and thinking. Moreover, being a city in central
Morocco, Meknes is characterized by a conservative population on the opposite of more
liberal cities, such as Casablanca or Rabat. This is an essential factor to this research for
it sheds light on a population often ignored in numerous surveys of media use in
Morocco.
The sample for this population is non-random. Respondents were selected carefully
according to some heterogeneous criteria including different age groups (20s and
above), different marital statuses and different occupations which influence the
respondents’ answer choices. The total number of 250 responses were collected through
a direct administration of questionnaires (in three different languages: Arabic, French,
and English) and through e-mails. The results were analyzed using the SPSS software.
1.3 Moroccan Women’s Magazines: An Overview
By the end of the eighties, the number of printed press for female readers in Morocco
was very limited. Magazines such as Lamalif (1960) and Kalima (1986) were aimed not
only at women but to men as well. Both of them discussed social, cultural, and
economic issues from a political point of view. Unfortunately, these magazines and
others suffered much censorship which led to their closure in 1988 and 1989
respectively. It is in 1996, that one Moroccan magazine in French appeared and has
continued to exist 15 years later: Femmes du Maroc, which has been subsequently
followed by a huge number of WM (in French and Arabic) in the 21st century when the
press has acquired more freedom of expression. Unlike the previous generation of WM,
which formed a threat to the then political regime, modern magazines directed to
women have different agendas and are considered to be part of popular culture.
In order to understand their mechanisms, two very different WM, namely Femmes du
Maroc (FDM) and Lalla Fatema (LF) are analyzed. Each magazine has its own editorial
line which is noticeable in the choice of images, advertisements, topics, and
perspectives. One important difference between the two is language. The former is in
French and the latter is in Arabic. The language of a WM limits the type of audience.
For instance, French speaking WM are elitist and are not accessible to all Moroccan
female readers since the most spoken and/ or read languages in Morocco are Arabic and
Tamazight.
LF claims to be directed to women and to the Moroccan family. The Moroccan family,
however, is a description which is difficult to determine since there are numerous
examples of Moroccan families. In fact, it can either be a nuclear family including only
the couple, or the couple and the children, or one parent with their child(ren), or a more
extended family including the in-laws/ grandparents. In this sense, the magazine is
supposed to treat all kinds of families and tackle their problems.
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FDM claims following a feminist editorial line by discussing women’s social
issues and by the call for equal rights between men and women. Along with
tackling issues that concern Moroccan women, the magazine also claims to be
concerned with the woman as an individual, hence recalling an individualist society in a
feminist-community mold. The publication director stresses the fact that the magazine
extends its interests to topics which give pleasure and entertainment to female readers.
Hence, the blend between a feminist and a consumerist discourse makes of FDM a
magazine that speaks about and for women although it remains to examine whether it
speaks to them.
2. Analysis of the Results
2.1 The Commercial Dimension
Trusting WM’s evaluations of products and feeling gratified and/ or frustrated are two
essential observations which have been drawn from the respondents’ reactions
concerning the commercial dimension.
Half of the respondents trust WM in spite of being completely conscious of WM’s
commercial side but do not mind pages including evaluations of products. They
describe these pages as presenting various options for women especially that there are
instructions for each product such as for whom it most suits or for what reasons it can
be used. By including such information, WM gain trust from their female readers who
consider them a friend and an adviser. The language employed in WM makes female
readers consider themselves members of the same club and so belonging to a unique
group. For example, WM would address readers through the pronoun of the first person
plural “we” (“Nous” and “On” in French) or include articles entitled as “Confidences”
which give the impression that secrets among women are shared. In this sense, the
reading of a WM seems like reading a diary or enjoying a gathering between friends.
Therefore, since a friend is supposed to guide you towards what is beneficial for you,
then WM can ‘only’ tell the truth especially that it provides its readers with a multitude
of products to choose from and does not provide them with one option according to this
category of readers.
The other half of the respondents questioned the objective of WM stating that their main
goal is to make material profit and, more deceivingly according to them, such
magazines become a tool in the hands of advertisers in order to promote their products.
These respondents bare hard feelings towards any commercial nature in WM and
towards products in general. It is important to define the nature of these respondents in
order to understand the reason behind this distrust of WM. In fact, it is the youngest
category (between 20 and 30 years old) which rejects WM’s evaluation of a product.
This rejection can be explained by either the fact that these young women lack the
financial resources to be able to buy those products or because of a feeling of
confidence and self-assertion. In fact, a consumerist culture of beauty products delivers
the opposite discourse of accepting one’s self and celebrating it included in the same
WM. Therefore, this commercial discourse is unaccepted by these readers because, for
them, it is neither ethical nor meaningful: two necessary aspects for discourse to be
freely accepted according to Foucault. Consequently, this distrustful reaction confutes
the definition of popular culture as being directed to an uncritical and stoic audience as
the Frankfurt school examines.
After reading a WM, some respondents feel either gratified while others are frustrated.
The need to buy the products advertised may cause these emotions. In order to
understand this, a comprehension of what the act of buying represents for these
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women is essential. Buying provides pleasure for respondents which can be
explained by two aspects. First, some women seek gratification through buying
products in the hope of fulfilling a certain emotional void. Second, these women’s
financial independence permits them to buy which provides pleasure and self-worth.
This explains why some respondents become frustrated when they cannot afford buying
those products especially that they are claimed to provide satisfaction.
This power of WM to proliferate the commercial culture as giving gratification is what
Louis Althusser explains through his idea of interpellation, which is based on the fact
that ideology entices individuals to believe in a specific form of social reality. Also,
regarding Landowski’s concepts of the adjustment and manipulation regimes, these
respondents are the perfect target for WM. Indeed, the emotionally vulnerable people
are made to feel some specific emotions in order to create the desire to seize what is
offered. Hence, in this sense, to make-feel in order to make-do can be translated into:
make female audiences feel imperfect and having flaws in order to make them seek
perfection through using the advertised products.
It is neither possible, however, to pretend that the need to buy those products is false
and that it does not emerge from women themselves without being enticed nor assert
that these needs are real. Consequently, it is this uncertainty and confusion on whether
that need is false or real that make WM promise satisfaction and gratification when
using a product. Female audiences, however, are not all able to gratify that need and so
consumer anxiety and frustration are likely to follow the act of reading a WM.
2.2 On Providing Pleasure
The act of reading a WM makes respondents feel pleasure which resides in three
aspects: empowerment, space for women’s experiences, and discussion over emotional
problems.
22,4% of female readers show interest in editorial articles which empowers them, such
as a criticism of gender representations. Indeed, some WM present a de-constructed
patriarchal image of a woman’s role in Moroccan society by including the woman in
historical, economic, political, cultural, and sociological contexts. This variety
encourages women readers to understand that their position in their society does not
have to be limited in the family context but it can be unbounded. Respondents express
immense pleasure when they encounter pages introducing female personalities who
have succeeded in their responsibilities.
Another empowering aspect in WM is the discourse of loving one’s self and celebrating
it. FDM, however, takes this idea to an extreme point of view by making women
readers form a narcissistic gaze which promotes gaining power over men as it has been
suggested by Gill. On the opposite of this magazines’ intentions, although respondents
manifest the desire to read all articles which empower them and make them feel good
about their appearances and personalities, they defend this pleasure in order to gain
control over their bodies and accept themselves the way they are.
The second aspect of pleasure which women readers find in WM is the fact that these
magazines provide a space for women’s everyday experiences. When asked about what
type of editorial they are interested in, 68,1% respondents agree on useful advice
articles (cooking recipes and tips, religious pages, health pages and child care, and
solutions to everyday problems) as sources of entertainment and helpfulness. For many
readers of WM, sharing anxieties lets them know that they are not alone in a given
situation which lightens their burden in carrying a problem. For others, the pleasure felt
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when reading useful advice may return to the possibility of being previously
knowledgeable of how to react to some situations.
The last source of pleasure is the section dedicated to emotional problems in relation to
heterosexual love. Women readers send mails to WM about their emotional and/ or
sexual problems with men and seek solutions to their sentimental troubles. LF answers
their calls by constantly reminding readers that advice is offered for married women
since the traditional Moroccan society does not conceive of heterosexual love outside
the bonds of marriage. However, FDM offers a clandestine pleasure and dissolves the
bonds with those traditions and brings about different conceptions of heterosexual
relations by providing women (married or single) with the advice they need.
2.3 Feminist Concerns
After analyzing the questionnaires’ results and WM, it can be deduced that respondents
and Moroccan WM manifest the three identities presented by Elaine Showalter which
coincide with Stuart Hall’s reading positions. Moreover, there is a constant clash
between the values of tradition and those of modernity.
 The Feminine Identity:
The feminine ideologies promoted by this discourse are themes dealing with beauty,
consumption, fragility, docility, and foolishness attributed to women. This femininity
leads women to think of beauty the way WM present it, which is that women have
imperfect bodies that need betterment through consumption of products in order to
resemble the perfect model of beauty.
However, the questionnaire results show that low percentages represent women who
enjoy looking at fashion models and wish to resemble them, hence positioning
themselves in the dominant-hegemonic reading:
Age:
- 20s: 9,5%
- 30s: 10%
- 40s: 13,8%
- 50s: 12%
Marital Status:
- Single: 9,4%
- Married: 9,4%
- Divorced: 25%
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It is tentative to suppose that as women undergo complicated psychological or
physical periods in their lives, they tend to yield to the dominant standards about
beauty and body image in WM. Hence, commercial culture plays on audience
insecurities and doubts about themselves and make[s] them feel pleasure to fill in an
emotional void.
 The Feminist Identity:
Few respondents adopt the feminist position regarding WM’s editorials and fashion
images. To illustrate this:
- 10,4% of the total respondents contend that they don’t read WM, justifying their
rejection by either the futility of the magazines or the lack of time to read them.
- 5,6% adopted the “revolted and offended” position when asked about the way
they feel when reading a WM.
- 2,6% of the total respondents don’t like watching fashion model images because
they don’t feel any affinity with them
These low percentages show that female respondents rarely assume Hall’s oppositional
reading in order to achieve a feminist identity which is a defensive and antagonistic
stand towards WM and their discourses.
 The Female Identity:
An autonomous identity is demonstrated occasionally in the magazine FDM but not in
LF. The reason for the absence of this criterion in LF is that it focuses on the woman
individual as part of a family and so bound by the dominant discourses of the Moroccan
society. FDM, however, offers women some autonomous identities which do not mime
the dominant and traditional discourses. For instance, the magazine discusses the
financial emancipation of women inside the marital institution since, in a patriarchal
frame of thought, they are dependent on a male figure in their families in order to
sustain them. Another example is the single woman identity which is unacceptable and
rejected by traditional Moroccan society since the only status acceptable for a woman is
to be married once she reaches the appropriate age.
Female respondents, on the other hand, are aware of this incompatibility which justifies
their negotiating position. Although WM may present identities related to the female
stage, it is not possible for many women readers to adopt those identities since most of
them are contrary to the traditional Moroccan context. Their negotiated reading, as Hall
contends, permits them to adapt the hegemonic discourse to their socio-cultural
conditions, hence creating other meanings.
The only category of respondents which shows an autonomous identity is the one which
is indifferent towards WM. Expressing an indifferent response shows that the female
reader detaches her personal identity from WM’s contents and so her act of reading can
be either a dis-identification or dis-interestedness. Thus, we can say that these
respondents are either satisfied with their own identity and do not wish to change it or
that they aren’t satisfied with the identities presented.
 Feminist/ Traditional and Modern Discourses
The relationship between the Moroccan feminist and female audiences is characterized
by a big void because these latter’s opinions are ignored and considered incapable to
know what is best for them. This unstable condition can be witnessed in the relationship
between FDM and its readers. In spite of the informal tone which this WM adopts to
take the role of a friend to the female reader, there are other contents where feminist and
/or modern ideologies are promoted while traditional values and the opinions of many
female audiences are thwarted. FDM, for example, adopts some forms of European
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feminism. There is no presence whatsoever of African, Islamic, or Arab feminism.
The aim of this magazine is to call for a modern, liberal, and secular society.
The inside sphere, that is the home, is discussed in terms of the couple relationship in
FDM. Contrary to what a religious and traditional society expects, this relationship does
not always recall the marriage institution. Hence, woman and man are seen as
individuals, each having her/ his own desires and ways of thinking. The family
institution is only mentioned when there is an article about children and their education.
Moreover, FDM presents many modern identities especially those related to women
being in the outside sphere. For example, modern identities related to a woman’s
profession determine many aspects of her life and the way people see her. Another
example is how fashion may give a woman different identities such as a vintage
(revisited), avant-garde (post-modern), nude (skin colors), tribal (primitive African
tribes), or androgynous (tomboy) styles.
Thus, by presenting modern and sometimes post-modern identities, FDM focuses on
individualism and presents women as entirely autonomous citizens. The celebration of
the female self in this WM, a break from traditional standards, results in the opposite of
what feminism calls for which is sisterhood and unity. FDM’s approach to these
subjects is without any discomfort which, in a society where tradition is still very
present, creates, in the readers, confusion, annoyance and a sense of not belonging.
However, not all WM in Morocco can be considered to express feminist thought. In
fact, this is the case of LF which makes use of traditional and modern discourses in
order to reach as many readers as possible (women or men). The family institution
forms the pillar theme around which most of the magazine’s articles revolve. The
emotional relationship and the possible problems between man and woman are
discussed as far as the marital institution is concerned. This community spirit is
celebrated through enhancing traditional values especially those related to religious
practices (family traditions during Ramadan and the Aid). Moreover, LF transmits a
conservative ideology by the intentional omission of taboo subjects because it is a belief
that the typical Moroccan family does not discuss taboo subjects as they are considered
a source of embarrassment and a lack of respect inside that specific family.
However, even if LF adopts this traditional and conservative view, it tries to show a
modern image of Morocco by calling on the importance for women to acquire rights
without opening a serious debate. Another modern perspective is the one related to
consumerism. LF introduces women readers to discover other identity forms through
modern styles of dressing and make-up products.
Therefore, LF’s suturing of traditional and modern aspects of women’s lives is not
achieved in a fluid and careful manner. Respondents have expressed their disapproval of
LF because of either superficial readings of a subject or because of the exclusion of
topics which they consider more important to be put into debate. In fact, there is an
imbalance in portraying tradition and modernity which complicates their inclusion in
female audiences’ daily lives.
3.Conclusion
Most respondents are against the editorial line of most/ all WM in Morocco. They also
show that they are eager to read media contents to which they can relate. They need to
know about instructive subjects which would either help them in their lives or make
them understand their society better. Moreover, they are totally against the
objectification of the woman’s body when it comes to advertising products in WM.
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Nevertheless, other respondents expressed their approval and reasons behind
reading WM. These respondents are very satisfied that WM exist since they
provide them with useful advice, keeps them informed about new events, and suggests
to them the latest fashion and products. They also like the fact that WM introduces
positive role models of women who have succeeded in their lives despite their societies’
gender prejudices.
It is worth to note that WM receive two contradictory reactions. Some are against them
for different reasons which can be summarized in the fact that they do not satisfy these
readers’ aspirations. Hence, these audiences distance themselves from WM either by
boycotting them or by undervaluing the act of reading and turning it into a mere action
of leafing through them. Others value WM for they represent the only medium which
speaks personally to women and through which they have a space to express and share
their opinions, worries, and hopes.
Despite their opposite views and feelings towards WM, the common point observed
between both parties is that there is an obvious thirst of acquiring knowledge and of
bettering one’s self and life.
4.Bibliography
Adorno, T. & Horkheimer, M. (1976), “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass
Deception”, Dialectic of Enlightenment. New York: Continuum International
Publishing Group, pp.120-167.
Althusser, L. (1981), “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses”, Untying the Text.
Ed. Young, R. London: Routledge, pp. 1-60.
Ang, I. & Joke H. (1996), “Gender and/in Media Consumption”, Mass Media and
Society. Eds. Curran J. & Gurevitch, M. London: Arnold, pp. 325- 347.
Ang, I. (1993), “Dallas and the Ideology of Mass Culture”, The Cultural Studies
Reader. Ed. During, S. London: Routledge, pp. 403-420.
Foucault, M. (1981), “The Order of Discourse”, Untying the Text. Ed. Young, R.
London: Routledge, pp. 48-78.
Gill, R. (2007), Gender and the Media. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Hall, S. (1993) “Encoding, Decoding”, The Cultural Studies Reader. Ed. During, S..
London: Routledge, pp. 90-103.
Landowski, E. Oral Presentation: “Communication Politique: Analyse Sémiotique des
Pratiques et des Discours Politiques.” University of Moulay Ismail, School of Arts and
Humanities, Meknes. Morocco. 28th April 2010.
Marx, K. & Engels, F. (2001), The German Ideology. New York: International
Publishers.
Mulvey, L. (2009) “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”, Visual and Other
Pleasures. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 14-30.
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Radway, J. (1983), “Women Read the Romance: The Interaction of Text and
Context.” Feminist Studies, 9.1, pp. 53-78.
Showalter, E. (1982), A Literature of their Own: British Women Novelists From Brontë
To Lessing. London: Virago Press.
Zoonen, V. L. (1996) “Feminist Perspectives on the Media”, Mass Media and Society.
Eds. Curran J. & Gurevitch, M. London: Arnold, pp. 31-52.
Case Studies:
Lalla Fatema: N° 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35.
Femmes du Maroc: N° 159, 160, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170, 171.
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A READING OF MASCULINITY IN CRISES: BEHZAT Ç
Merve Ayşe Köseoğlu
Hacettepe University Communication Science Department
MA Student
merveaysekoseoglu@gmail.com
Abstract: we can assume television as a basin, has cultural products that shows
humanities in intense just like novel in 19th century and cinema in 20th century (Atay,
2014).
Popular cinema –so now serials- shows breakages –and also ghosts who can fix themof the so-called perfect, complete world of ideology. So also enables to see and interpret
symptoms of social sphere, how different political discourses penetrates in social
desires and leads them (Arslan, 2004).
Masculinity is one of the topics in our daily lives that offers itself as natural, normal and
ordinary. Hegemonic masculinity is a term to show and understand how some man
groups hold power & prosperity and reproducing it both on women and men (Carrigan,
Connell, & Lee, 1985) .Today, basic intention is to consider masculinity as total crises.
Chancing economic and social situations leads chancing gender roles and compulsory
redefinition; according to Selek always having confusing ‘hesitation’ (Selek, 2009).
Behzat Ç. is latterly very popular TV serial in Turkey which provides us space of
research in popular culture. In conclusion, in synthesis of all that acknowledgments, this
study will try to make a reading of masculinity in crises on/about Behzat Ç. serial.
In this research; basic method is analysis on parts of serial. First of all discourse
analysis on leading role Behzat and other characters, will help us to see entire story. So
we can see their position on crossroads of his city, job and relationships. Research
justivicates that there is some chances in masculinity that we call crises. And we can see
that crises in our everyday lives, so we can see and read it from also popular culture
productions. As an example from Turkey, TV serial named Behzat Ç. shows a man in
masculinity crises.
Key words: masculinity, masculinity in crises, popular culture, Behzat Ç.
1. Introduction: My story about study
I have been living in a family for 27 years and in Turkey, so I know it a bit of them. I
want to see what is going on with men (and also women) around me. Actually, after
using some quotation from Behzat Ç. serial and see that they are useful and working in
daily life and men in my life having troubles day by day so I said I have to look it
closer. Gender is a topic that I am interested in for four-five years. It is so real, in the
middle of everyday life and so politic, around me, I am in it. I thought good point to
start to see power relations.
I had a flat mate from Seville, he was understanding me and my feminist sensibilities
but, Turkish flat mate was not. So I got, gender is global issue as Connell told but there
are some differences and you should see it culturally and historically.
I was a good audience of the show Behzat Ç: Bir Ankara Polisiyesi. It was so popular
among young people. For example, in Ekşi Sözlük (a popular dictionary that people join
and write their opinions about topics) there are 160 topics about the serial and under
‘’Behzat Ç.’’ topic there are 8550 entries in the end of first 30 chapters.
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In light of all above; Behzat Ç. brought together questions in my mind. And then
so this study focuses on Behzat Ç.: Bir Ankara Polisiyesi serial, which exposes the male
characters’ conflicting inner processes and allows presentations that can be commented
within the concept of masculinity crises. Study aims to see which images are using to
show masculinity crises and this crises reuniform hegemonic masculinity with an
example from Turkey.
2. Theoretical Background
Gender is always contradictory structure, arenas of tension (Connell & Messerschmidt,
Hegemonic Masculinity: Rethinking the Concept, 2005). It is relevant to culture,
technology, society and economy; it depends on time and space. But popular ideology
represents gender the stable, natural and something does not change (Connell R. ,
Politics of Changing Men, 2014). So all that causes makes it hard to handle even they
can be easily seen in our individual lives.
According to Connell, as masculinities and femininities are gender projects, gender is
reproductive arena of human bodies that should taken as system of social relations
(Connell R. W., The Social Organisation of Masculinity, 2004). If we take gender as a
system of social relations, we can take masculinities as the patterns of social practice
associated with the position of men. Masculinity refers to male body but is not
determined by biology.
With the help of post-structuralism effect on social sciences, identity became multiple
and reconstructive. So instead of one dimensional masculinity, new sociology of
masculinity offers multi-dimensional, historical, cultural and symbolic masculinities in
the context of power relations (Yüksel, 2013).
In studying masculinities, hegemonic masculinity helps us to handle different
masculinities, which is not only relevant to hegemony on women but also hegemony on
men. Hegemonic masculinity is not stable and certain, it is as dynamic as gender
explanation of Connell that differs from time to time in a culture. Even can change in a
man’s’ lifetime.
Hegemonic masculinity tries to explain how a minority of man hold power and power
positions, how legitimize it and reconstruct hegemony (Sancar, 2009). Only a minority
of man might enach it but it requires all other men to position themselves in relation to
it. It is ideologically legitimized (Connell & Messerschmidt, Hegemonic Masculinity:
Rethinking the Concept, 2005).
In critical masculinities study general framework is,





Different masculinities can be together in same culture
Hegemonic masculinity exists in a relationship with women and other men
Masculinities can be performed not only personal performances of men but also by institutions
or men groups
Even bodily experiences does not immobilize men identity, pleasures of body and getting injured
of body helps to development/management/performance of manhood
Actively constructed men and masculinities can change (Connell R. W., Masculinities and
Men’s Health, 2001)
Another big topic of masculinity studies is masculinity crises.
Today basic orientation is to take masculinity/ masculine identity as total crises (Cook
& Bernink, 2006).
Some writers like Lynne Segal, Walter Hollstein and John MacInnes says with
help of/after feminist and gay movement, modernity and globalization and their
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consequences in society, economy and technology that leads insecurity and
uncertainty, hegemonic masculinity is in crises because of lack of productivity
(Yüksel, 2013).
On the other hand, there are theorist like Beynon; because there are masculinities, we
cannot talk about one big crises about masculinities (Beynon, 2002). Also, according to
Connell, this changing situations does not damage patriarchy and hegemony of men
over women, crises tendencies, may provoke attempt to restore a dominant masculinity
(Connell R. W., The Social Organisation of Masculinity, 2004)
Tim Edwards states that masculinity crises gathers under two titles, inside and outside.
Inside crises in their personal life and insignificance, ambiguity and alienation. Outside
crises is about loss of their exclusive and primary positions in social institutions
(Yüksel, 2013).To him, there are three levels of crises in masculinity



As practices, reducing value of masculinity – relating it with negative features
Blurring gender boundaries
Masculinity as crises (Edwards, 2006)
In this study, in the light of all studies pointed up, crises in masculinity does not mean
an overall hegemony loss, but a crises both inside (including their perception about
topic) and outside (including loss of primary position in social institutions)
2.1. About Turkey: An Introduction Trial
There are many explanations about hegemonic masculinityculture to culture, time to
time. But we can find some definite terms in them. For example, they include
heterosexuality, economic independence, breadwinning, having nothing feminine,
emotionally recessive, estimated behaving, putting himself forward, knows what he
needs and what to want, hiding anxieties, mastery, toughness and so on (Alsop, 2002;
Peterson, 1998; Seidler, 1998; Carrigan at all, 2002).
There are of course some similarities with hegemonic masculinity in Europe between
Turkey, but also some original differences. For example age and statue can be seen as
some other dynamics (Ulusay, 2004) in Turkey. In addition if we try to make some
hegemonic masculinity descriptions in Turkey, we have to talk about military. It is not
the only but one of the most important institution (Özbay, 2012-2013) because of
obligatory military service. Order, uniform, violence are components of military. And
that normalize them in mens’ everyday lives. In general, military service called as being
man service. Space is another important component. We can take it as places like
gendered spaces, like night clubs and drinking houses (Özbay, 2012-2013) coffee
houses closed to women and helping men in socialization process.
In the beginning of 21st century, globalization, ethnical changes, new conservatism,
wild capitalism, relations with European Trade Union, savageness in Middle East and
Africa, changing economic, political and social conditions effected Turkeys’ familiar
parameters (Ergun, 2009).
To Özyeğin; changes in Turkey after 80’s can be listed such as privatization politics,
absolute capitalism, neoliberal globalization, relations with Europe (Özyeğin, 2011) as
results of these changes in society and politics, rise of religious, ethnic, gender
identities, rising nationalism can be count on. So they all caused some changes in settled
identities, caused crises (Ulusay, 2004). If we look closer for example, we can see in the
result of migration to big cities (Sancar, 2009), rising Kurdish movement, feminist
movement as causes of masculinity in crises, that those helped to construct masculine
identity as identities constructs on ‘’other’’s.
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When we look masculinity crises literature in Turkey, we see many terms used in
meaning of crises such as impossible power, crises, loss, lost of masculinity,
hesitation, transformation.
After those times, we were able to see ‘’men movies’’ rising in popular Turkish cinema
in 90’s. Buddy and road films in 9o’s, not a coincidence that men are all together in a
group, after loss of masculine power. This new male cinematography can be seen as
compensation off masculinity in crises (Ulusay, 2004).
In those buddy films, we see man are over again a big challenges, tasks or goals waiting
for them. They are in dangerous situations against bad guys with guns and their
friendship that always tested by that difficult tasks (Ulusay, 2004). Even there is no dad
in movies, there always are daddy role played one someone elses, there are idealized
symbolic fathers. They have to put leading role in masculine world, prepare him for that
world (Ulusay, 2004) just like Behzats’ big brother. Women characters are not as
powerful as men in those movies. They are generally speechless if not prostitutes.
They are also kind of road movies, showing inner journeys of men (Ulusay, 2004).
3. Analysis
Behzat Ç: Bir Ankara Polisiyesi is story by Emrah Serbes. First episode was totally the
whole book. And then he helped script writer Ercan Mehmet Erdem in some episode
during serial, that they are close friends. Also there is not a director for 3 seasons of
serial. There are totally 5 directors (Behzat Ç. Bir Ankara Polisiyesi bölümleri listesi,
2014) that enables us to write from directors’ eye. Totally serial continued 3 seasons
and 96 episodes and finished in 2013. Also they made 2 movies with the same crew.
Behzat Ç. is serial of the police commissioners’ life. He is solving murders in Ankara
with his team. Behzat is opponent to everyday life realities (Tekelioğlu, 2014) that he
handles organ trade, conflicts in police organization, works for transvestite murder,
helps student activists also watches over Kurdish guys. In 3 years time serial had some
serious problems with RTÜK (A government institution which controls TV shows
according to popular ideology) and punished many times for different causes such as
alcohol, curse, inappropriate behaviours and so on. Even RTÜK made Behzat marry in
second season. Finally this very popular serial finished because of that punishments
(Eyüboğlu, 2014).
Some people thought the story and characters were so rude and macho because of that
much alcohol and curses and too many man around. But it was so popular among young
people. For example, in Ekşi Sözlük (a popular dictionary that people join and write
their opinions about topics) there are 661 topics about the serial and under ‘’Behzat Ç.’’
topic there are 24495 entries in the end (Behzat Ç., 2014).
In ‘’towards a new sociology of masculinity‘’ Carrigan, Connell and Lee pointed out
that psychodynamics of gender is inseparable from social relations (Wedgwood, 2009)
which is also related to post-structuralist multi-identities and that enables us to handle
masculinities (multi)dimensional. So in this analysis this approach was really very
useful to understand Behzat totally.
Behzat means noble man in Turkish, but never learned his surname. Actually writer
says, Ç. is a letter that we are not using in Turkish properly, that’s why he wanted to use
it, (Cengiz E. , 2014) this is so ironic. Also we saw Behzat in Gezi time, leading role in
protest time said Ç. means Çapulcu (president called people in park). It also another
clue that how people saw Behzat realistic.
To Connell; state is a masculine institution (Connell R. W., The Social Organisation of
Masculinity, 2004) and Behzat is working for that masculine institution as
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police commissioners. Behzat became police because he punched a captain when
we has in military school. Then his soldier father helped him to be a policeman. In
police organization he is not the best. He always has troubles with his managers. But he
is good at his job and managers looks for him to solve murders despite he is not
obedient to organisation.
Paid work is a central source of masculine identity. It requires status, power, symbolic
benefits, skills and experiences (Collinson & Hearn, 2004). Behzat many times try to
quit but, he can never does. In one example he says, that he is leaving, but adds, he’s
going to work with his brother. But actually that all were joke. Another example when
he was proposing he claims himself as workaholic.
Behzats’ team consists of 5 men and a women in office. 2 of that 5 men are new
comers. New members are teased and tested to see if they’re ‘man enough’ to take the
insults (Collinson & Hearn, 2004). Also they are not able to handle murders outdoor,
they are taking care of the Works as women officer. In an episode, she asked Behzat to
go out for murders and added that she knows murder is something masculine. They
tried it for two episodes and then she back in office till the end of serials. Male
domination in work places, their being aggressive, humorous yet insulting, playful yet
degrading (Collinson & Hearn, 2004) just, you can see in office. That Eda (only women
at office) bothered with all those aggressiveness, bad jokes and curses around.
In 90’sTurkish cinema, this buddy films showed in dangerous situations against bad
guys with guns and their friendship always tested (Ulusay, 2004). As a team they come
over again a big challenges, tasks or goals waiting for them.Behzat is hegemony for his
team. In another saying he is father; listening them, protecting and teaching them as we
saw many times in 90’s Turkish ‘’man’’ cinema. Behzat has no daddy in serial time
but, he has a big brother who cares for him. He is always there, teaching him and
planning his life. This big brother has a family a son and he is manager of a shopping
mall. Also he has a lover too. So he seems to symbolize ideal Turkish family guy.
Men are more fragile and emotional when they are alone but in a group they became
more masculine (Cengiz, Tol, & Küçükural, 2004). But Behzat has his emotions with
him always. We are able to see him many times crying. Also he goes in mental hospital
few times. Normally hysterics is something feminine. In addition, body is important
symbol for masculinity but Behzat is vulnerable both physically and mentally. In an
episode there were 5 Behzats in an episode talking each otherThere are too much violence in the serial, including symbolic violence. He fights bad
guys in every episode. We can see Behzat and his team with their gun, with their fists
and so on. This provides them kind of power against hegemonic masculinity in case
they are not hegemonic enough. This violetic space gives an area to discuss masculinity
as Ta said for fight club. (Ta, 2006). Becaming policeman is an ideal workplace and
perfect masculinity symbol (Sancar, 2009).
Ercüment Çözer is the hegemonic masculine of the serial. He has networks, he is so
rich, he is fit, there are many women around him, he is doing whatever he wants, and he
has a surname. Also he killed Behzats’ wife Esra too.
In addition to his relations between other men in serial, there are many women around
him. In Behzat, there are some women but script writers are so unsuccessful writing this
characters like there is only Behzats’ doughter in all three seasons –who got in jailin
final-. Those women are powerful ones. For example; Behzat is working for Esra, she is
hierarchically above him. In addition women who drinks alcohol is not good for Turkish
men (Sancar, 2009) but we see Esra drinking in a traditional drinking house many
times. In the end of second season, hegemonic masculine Ercüment killed Esra, because
she was so powerful and it was not good for Behzats’ hegemony in serial. When
145
we talk people watching serial, most of the men said, she should die. Another
women, Bahar is a Behzats’ high school love who left him because he was going
to be policeman, lefts him second time. We saw Behzats’ daughter many times as
mentoring him. Those women are arbiter more than Behzat about his life. Other women
we see in Behzats’ life are two prostitudes as usual in 90’s ‘’man’’movies.
Also his mother comes in the middle of second season, is the most powerful women in
the serial. She is the only one who can fight with the hegemonic masculine Ercüment
Çözer. Mothers represents helplessness, dependency (Kimmel, 2004) which is not good
for Behzat. So we watch Behzat always having trouble and fightinh with his mother to
become a man.
We are able to see Behzat changing in serial time. He says ‘’Esra changed me a lot,
made me soften’’ in the usual drinking house. We see also hegemonic roles changing in
serial from one character to another, but there is no change in meaning of hegemony.
We just see problems and troubles about of whom exposed to that power. In the end,
Behzat could not be able to handle all those power problems and leaves the city. At last
scene we see him driving out.
4. Conclusion
Research objective of the study was both to see what is going on about masculinity –to
show and also make analysis on -in Turkey and to help global studies by showing this
case from the aspect of popular culture products.
To Connell, bodies are not docile or empty pages or done just by social process. So they
are neither out of history, nor prior but open to social processes after changes. To sum
up, they are alive and anchored their own historical contexts (Wedgwood, 2009).
Keeping in mind hegemonic masculinity also differs in the same time according to parts
of society I tried to show how masculinity having relations with hegemonic
masculinities and changing after all challenges in corporation to globalization and so on.
With the help of putting psychoanalyses in new sociology of masculinity enabled me to
make analysis about Behzat in multi-dimensional.
In Behzat we see a guy who is trying to be man all the time. He is really bad at
relations. When is not able to be a man actually. Even he seems as one of the characters
in 90’s Turkish movies, he has much more powerful women around him. Evden he is
the hegemonic one in his group, he is not as Ercüment. He is not as powerful as him
both emotionally, relationally andeconomically and bodily. So at the end, he leaves
everything behind, left the scene. A new gender politics for men means new ways of
thinking also willingness and openness for uncertainty and new experiences (Connell R.
, Politics of Changing Men, 2014) as we call crises about masculinities.
MacInnes asks ‘’A bad time to be man?’’ and answers it, also bad time for being a
woman (MacInnes, 2004). Gender identity does not mean sum of social institutions and
processes. It in fact is always in motion and can give us some points to make cracks for
political transformations (Yüksel, 2013). I am not as pessimistic as MacInnes, I think it
is wonderful to live these changes, being part of everything just like as everything that
made us who we are in a romantic notion.
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149
PART 3. The co-education of children and young
people through communication in gender equality
150
GENDER, NATIONALISM AND GENOCIDE IN BANGLADESH: A
RESEARCH-CREATION PROJECT
Azra Rashid
Department of Communication Studies
Concordia University
azra.rashid@concordia.ca
Abstract: currently, the feminist scholarship is divided on the relative importance of gender and ethnicity
in the context of violence endured by women in genocide. Despite some similarities in the gender-based
violence committed during war, women’s experiences in genocide are varied and rooted in specific, local
history. Instead of treating “women” as a unified category and transcending history, space and
boundaries, there is a need for detranscendentalization within the feminist discourse on representation of
women’s experiences in genocide. The feminist task is to not only resist and challenge the patriarchal
accounts of genocide but also to make visible the difference in experiences and the existence of repressive
mechanisms that create them in the first place. Such visibility and representation can help demystify the
otherness of the marginalized "other" and more specifically of women. In this paper, I explore the
potential of “research-creation” in investigating the lived reality of gender and the multiplicity of
gendered experiences of women in the 1971 genocide of Bangladesh.
Keywords
Gender, genocide, nationalism, research-creation, Bangladesh, essay film, representation
1. Introduction
The form that women’s pain and their trauma take in the visual medium has been a
central concern for feminist researchers dealing with the questions of gender and
representation. In When the Moon Waxes Red Trinh T. Minh-ha writes that oppression
can be located both in the story told and in the telling of the story (Minh-ha, 1991, P6).
How a woman’s story is told depends on who is telling the story and for what purpose?
Woman repeatedly finds herself removed from the modes of visual production and her
representation restricted and reduced to either being spoken down to or being spoken
about. That mode of address creates a power dynamics that is mirrored not only in
social relations but also in the ideology of nation and the mainstream narratives
regarding nationalism and genocide. This paper explores the alternative politics of
representation that makes room for multiplicity and reflexivity while also challenging
the dominant representations. By exploring the potential of “creation-as-research” as
methodology in investigating the lived reality of gender and the multiplicity of gendered
experiences of the 1971 genocide in Bangladesh, I argue that documenting specific
experiences of women can resist and challenge not only the gender-neutrality of the
memorialized images of war, but also the universalizing of gendered crimes of
genocide.
2. Theoretical Background
In Technologies of Gender (1987) Teresa de Lauretis argues, "Gender is (a)
representation" (P4) and "The construction of gender is both the product and the
process of its representation" (P5). Gender, as a way to classify individuals, represents a
shared characteristic that allows them entry into a group or class. Gender marks a
woman from a man not only through a difference in sex, but mainly through the
culturally conceived and assigned roles given to individuals in a society.
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However, there are also differences within the category “women”. An articulation
of “women” as a unified socio-cultural category presumes not only unity of its
subjects but also the universality of the shared characteristics and experiences that form
a woman. Such categorization creates problems for the specificity of experience and
history, as they may vary across different locations and cultures since women’s rights
have progressed differently in different parts of the world due to their varying
encounters with patriarchy, nationalism and colonialism. Transnational feminists, such
as Chandra T. Mohanty, have challenged the idea of "universal sisterhood" by
questioning the removal of agency from women by portraying them as ahistorical
beings and merely as victims. Mohanty contends that the idea of transcending history,
space and boundaries denies women their role in history (Mohanty, 2003). While
women's stories might have been omitted from history, Mohanty argues, women still
played historical roles and the idea is not to transcend history but to acknowledge
women's role in history. Additionally, patriarchy, even when institutionalized, has taken
different forms in its evolution in different parts of the world, conferring different
struggles on women in different geographical locations. Asserting the needs and
demands of Western feminists over the locally-defined needs of disempowered women
from Third world reproduces the ideas of hierarchy borrowed from patriarchal privilege.
Mohanty warns us against a particular reading of differences and codification of
"women's experience" as self-presentation of Western women, originating from "a
location of white, Western, middle-class privilege" (2003, P111). It is this way of
coding the information that makes everyone outside the West as the ‘other’. The
outsiders remain on the margin and out of the discourse since the only frame of analysis
and discourse available is dominated by the mainstream, which seeks to flatten the
differences to appear to represent a unified category of "women." The idea of universal
sisterhood denies a plurality of voices to women on the margins. Through projecting the
white, Western, middle class privilege as the experience of every woman in the unified
category of "women", some feminists not only take away the voice of the subaltern, but
they also present themselves as speaking for every woman. As a result, representation of
Third World subjects in discursive practices becomes a serious issue.
Representation of the "other" is complex, especially when differences within the
category are also taken into account. The dominant culture not only decides what maybe
considered the best ideas and rules of engagement in a society but it also takes away
agency from women by forcing conformity. A representation of women devoid of their
historical struggle and flattening all the differences that exist within the fold is a
reflection of the problematic position women are forced to occupy in society. In The
Spectacle of the ‘Other’ (1997), Stuart Hall writes, "Meaning floats. It cannot be finally
fixed. However attempting to 'fix' it is the work of a representational practice, which
intervenes in the many potential meanings of an image in an attempt to privilege one"
(P228). The meaning, privileged over all others, is dictated by the social institutions and
mass media, which operate within a system structured according to power and the
ideology that supports it. In essence it is the dominant culture that "fixes" the meaning.
Meanings are assigned from a position of power and inequality, linking the politics of
representation with the politics of gender and experience. If gender is produced by
experience, and gender is a representation, then representation of experience is also
crucial in feminist discourse and feminist scholars must make room for difference. The
feminist task therefore is to not only make visible the difference in experiences but also
the existence of repressive mechanisms that create them in the first place. Such
visibility and representation can help demystify the otherness of the
152
marginalized "other" and more specifically of women. In “Under Western Eyes’
Revisited” (2003) Mohanty argues, "In knowing differences and particularities,
we can better see the connections and commonalities because no border or boundary is
ever complete or rigidly determining" (P505). Recognizing divisions within a unity - at
points of differences rooted in history due to race, class and geography - would help
build solidarity and it is that acknowledgement that allows individual a voice within
collectivity. Difference must not be thought about as being on the other end of the
spectrum as sameness, and difference should also not be confused with individualism.
As Trinh T. Minha emphasizes in her work, there is room for difference within unity
(Minh-ha, 1991). By allowing differences, transnational feminist movement makes
room for historicization and a more honest representation of an individual's experience.
Difference allows room for creativity, as seen in the works of feminist filmmakers,
especially those with a transnational feminist approach, who put women at the centre of
the debate and challenge the standardization of women’s experiences and their
representation in mass media. Their creative approach, still grounded in the
documentary practice, offers a reflection of the society but more importantly they offer
an insight into the lived reality of gender. Every image in a film carries signs and
connotations that capture the biases of the image producer and the image consumer. In
doing so, it is argued that films, especially non-fiction, documentary films provide
evidence.
The term ‘documentaries’ was coined by John Grierson in the 1920s to name the
practice of the creative treatment of reality, which would offer a more direct access to
actualities than that found in the reconstruction of narrative cinema (Corrigan, 2011,
P162). Moving image gets its evidentiary status from the presumed objectivity of the
camera. But the moving images and words, all carry meanings that must be decoded by
the viewer with knowledge they already possess. To accomplish that a trust is
established between the viewer and the image producer, which informs the consumption
of the image as reality or depiction of a reality. In every frame of a documentary, the
image-maker is trying to convince the image-viewer that this is what really happened
and this is an honest truth. It is the viewer's trust and confidence in the image-maker
that helps mediate and construct meaning for the viewer, which sometimes can be far
from reality.
Observational documentaries, especially Cinema Vérité, claim to have access to truth.
With the advent of technology came light weight and portable cameras and portable
lights, which filmmakers with observational technique argue help to enter a situation
without altering the course of events, and they are able to do it solo, as a one-person
shoot. Such documentaries follow individuals around, silently observe the events in the
most unobtrusive manner possible, never ask individuals to repeat an action for camera
and contain long takes that are meant to capture the entire event in the film. Moreover,
these films by the virtue of minimal editing argue close to nil manipulation.
Observational documentaries claim to offer a closer look at a person's lived reality
while abiding by strategies validated by the industry. Observational documentary mode
treats the camera eye as a silent witness or as "objective" and without any preconceptions. However, it is impossible to separate the human eye behind the camera
from the camera lens. What is captured by the lens is decided by the person behind the
camera, who is also able to make sense of what is being shot and whether or not it is of
any relevance or interest. It is that eye and not the eye of the camera which decides if
the course of events unfolding in front of the camera would be deemed
153
important or boring by the viewer. Reflexive documentary filmmakers, on the
other hand, see the process of mediation in the name of providing evidence as
being exploitative and disingenuous. Documentaries made in reflexive mode pay a great
deal of attention to the consciousness of the process of making of meanings in a film.
Such films acknowledge the camera and its restrictions and the problems posed to the
issue of representation due to that. Reflexive filmmaking wants image-makers to be
conscious of the process and acknowledge the impossibility of representation of truth
and draw a clear distinction between truth and its meaning.
Within the reflexive style of documentary films, the essay film is most useful to the
feminist thought. Timothy Corrigan formulates the essay film as a testing of expressive
subjectivity through experiential encounters in the public arena, the product of which
becomes the figuration of thinking or thought as a cinematic address and a spectatorial
response (2011, P30). The expressive subjectivity of the filmmaker, which is considered
one of the most recognizable signs of an essay film, makes visible the articulation and
consciousness of the filmmaker. It not only creates transparency but also accountability
for a specific positioning of a knowing self. Instead of claiming access to a universal
truth, the filmmaker makes transparent the various visual possibilities and viewing
positions, and focuses on one point of view which is most accessible to the filmmaker,
which is her own. In essay films, as Laura Rascaroli (2009) writes in The Personal
Camera, “meanings are presented by a speaking subject as a personal, subjective
mediation, rather than as objective truths. It is this subjective move, this speaking in the
first person that mobilizes the subjectivity of the spectator” (P36). The essayistic
filmmakers, such as Agnes Varda, Chris Marker and Trinh T. Minh-ha, offer the
spectator a representation of social reality through their expressive subjectivity and selfreflexivity, which the viewer can either accept or reject. But, as Rascaroli argues, the
essay structure implies a certain unity of the human experience, “which allows two
subjects to meet and communicate on the basis of such a shared experience. The two
subject positions, the ‘I’ and the ‘you’, determine and shape one another” (2009, P36).
It is this articulation of the essay film, which allows multiplicity, and renders it the most
appropriate form of research output and the most useful to the feminist thought in the
context of gender studies Similar to a transnational feminist approach, the
consciousness of the essay film expressed through the essayistic subjectivity, demands
the viewing position of the “I” to build coalition with the “you”, and does not attempt to
squash the “you” into the “I”. This dialogue between expressive subjectivity and the
public is what allows people to see connections and differences.
The expression of subjectivity in reflexive style films is rooted in a place of
vulnerability and demands the essayistic subject take risks, engage in self-reflexivity
and find comfort in a self that is destabilized but better-suited to enter into a dialogic
relationship with the viewers. This destabilized self is not about transcendence, it is
situated in a specific location with situated knowledge, it maintains the “I” while trying
to find connections with the “you”. It is able to construct and deconstruct ways of
seeing, while also seeking perspective from different viewing positions. As Donna
Haraway writes,
The split and contradictory self is the one who can interrogate positionings and
be accountable, the one who can construct and join rational conversations and
fantastic imaginings that change history. Splitting, not being, is the privileged
image for feminist epistemologies of scientific knowledge. 'Splitting' in this
context should be about heterogeneous multiplicities that are simultaneously
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necessary and incapable of being squashed into isomorphic slots or
cumulative lists (1991, P193).
The transnational feminist notion of situated knowledge finds home in the expressive
subjectivity of the essay film. By allowing differences, transnational feminist movement
does not attempt to transcend history but makes room for specificity and a more honest
representation of an individual's experience.
3. Case Study: Nationalism, Gender, and Genocide in Bangladesh
Ethnicity, according to Fredrik Barth, is a process of maintaining boundaries between
the dominant group and the ‘other’ (Barth, 1969). This process is not grounded in
objective cultural difference but in identification of all members of the group as having
shared values and mutual interests. Within these groups membership is granted through
birth or other means of coming together to promote unity and progress - culturally,
economically and biologically - among its members. In this process, state becomes a set
of institutions with control and dissemination of resources necessary for progress of its
people and exclusion of non-members as the ‘other’ from the nationalist identity.
Through collective instruction and assigning significance to shared experiences,
common ideas and values, state can manipulate and instil nationalist sentiments in
individuals. Nationalism - a product of a collective imagination - can therefore be
deceptive. The ideology of nationalism can blur the line between nation and state.
Through a control over language and history, and by excluding the experience of the
'other' it removes any possibility for multiplicity and results in violence, similar to the
1947 partition of India and the 1971 genocide in Bangladesh.
Through the process of inclusion and exclusion, the outsiders and insiders are decided
and boundaries are created. Nationalism, as Ernest Gellner argues in his work, invented
nations where they did not exist before (Gellner, 1983). In the case of South Asia, prior
to the twentieth century, Hindu or Muslim nationalism in the sub-continent laid
dormant, if not entirely non-existent. Despite a history of living together for thousands
of years, in the early twentieth century Muslim leaders of the sub-continent put forth
what came to be known as the "Two-nation" theory, which stipulated that Hindus and
Muslims were separate nations based on ethnicity and religion. This ideology of
"nation" eventually led to the partition of 1947, creating a largely Hindu India and a
Muslim state of Pakistan. The newly-born state of Pakistan was divided into East
Pakistan, now Bangladesh, and West Pakistan, now the Islamic Republic of Pakistan,
with miles of Indian land stretched in between and insurmountable cultural and
linguistic differences. While West Pakistan was dominated by Punjabis with a small
population of Sindhi, Pathan and Baluchi nationals and an influx of Urdu-speaking
immigrants from India, East Pakistan comprised a predominantly Bengali-speaking
population and some immigrants from the northern Indian state of Bihar. The
agricultural riches of the country were in East Pakistan but the government was located
in West Pakistan. The government not only extracted the revenues without investing in
the people and economy of East Pakistan, but they also enforced an active policy of
suppression of a distinctive Bengali identity, including language and culture. As a result
of the grievances originating from inequitable distribution of resources, economic
exploitation, restrictions on Bengali speech in the public sphere, and lack of political
representation in national government, people in East Pakistan demanded independence
from Pakistan. The military dictators tried to suppress the separatist movement for
decades, but the floods of 1970, which resulted in massive death tolls and
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destruction in East Pakistan, proved to be the last straw. The flood-stricken people
received no relief efforts by the national government, bringing to the forefront the
government’s general attitude of indifference towards the people of East Pakistan. The
events triggered the war of independence, which lasted nine months, and Bangladesh,
meaning "Bengal nation" was created on December 16, 1971. Hundreds of thousands of
people lost their lives, and as Yasmin Saikia (2007) writes in Overcoming the Silent
Archive in Bangladesh, ten million people became refugees, several hundred thousand
Biharis became "stateless" in Bangladesh and Pakistan, and close to 200,000 women
were raped (P66). The Pakistani army established sex camps where Bengali women
were held captive to serve the soldiers and officers (Saikia, 2007, P70). This was done
to teach the Bengali nation a lesson about ethnic superiority, and Bengali women a
lesson about male dominance.
After the war of independence, Bangladesh faced the issue of dealing with the shame
that was supposedly brought to the nation by rape survivors and children born of rape.
To rid the nation of the "Bastard Pakistani" the option of abortion was made available
by the government and those who could not or did not get an abortion were abandoned
by their families and ostracized by the society. Some war babies were also exported to
western countries like Canada with the help of Mother Teresa where they were given up
for adoption. It was partly in the context of reintegration of these women into society
that the government designated rape survivors of the war as "Birangana" meaning
female hero (Saikia, 2007, P73). But it was also because of the national shame and
humiliation at the hands of the enemy that the Bengali government declared rape
survivors as “Biranganas”. By classifying rape as a sacrifice, the government attempted
to appropriate women's pain and suffering for their own propaganda of the nationalist
cause. The government made rape and violence against women of secondary
importance within the discourse of Bengali nationalism and in the war fought by men
on behalf of the nation to obtain nationhood. The few women who decided to seek
justice were shunned by their families and communities. Any evidence of mass rape in
1971, including police reports, medical reports, letters and photographs, was destroyed
by the government as part of the active national campaign of forgetting (Saikia, 2007,
P75). Moreover, the years that followed the war of independence saw a transformation
of “Biranganas” into “Baranganas” meaning prostitutes in the local memory (Saikia,
2007, P 73). As a result, the women were silenced and their stories were written off as
collateral damage of the war, as opposed to examining these rapes as a strategic and
carefully implemented policy by the enemy. One survivor told Saikia,
Don't ask me who killed whom, who raped whom, what was the religion, ethnic
or linguistic background of the people who died in the war. The victims in the
war were the women of this country - mothers who lost children, sisters who lost
their brothers, wives who lost their husbands, women who lost everything - their
honor and dignity. In the war men victimized women. It was a year of anarchy
and the end of humanity. Is this something to talk about? (Saikia, 2007, P71)
This is something to talk about. In Politics and the Study of Discourse (1991), Michel
Foucault argues that discourse is constructed by the difference between what one could
say correctly at one period and what is actually said (P63). The mediated images of war,
though seemingly genderless, contain an untold history of women and how meanings
and bodies get made in a society. The patriarchal and dominant narrative on genocide
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performs the function of silencing women’s stories in the name of the collective
and the nation.
The ideology of nationalism, which in its extreme form manifests itself in genocide, has
gendered power and social relations at its heart. Nationalism not only borrows from the
ideology of gender but it reproduces gender in all social relations by creating subjects
who are forced to occupy different spaces, public or private, depending on their gender.
Revisiting Teresa de Lauretis’ notion that gender is a representation and it constructs a
relation between one entity and other entities, on the basis of belonging to a class, a
group or a category (1987, P4), it is easy to see the same power hierarchy and
asymmetrical power balance mirrored in all collectivities and social institutions of a
nation. Woman, often referred to as the mother of the nation, is pigeonholed into the
traditional role of a caregiver akin to the space she is to occupy within a traditional
patriarchal family. In her role as a mother, she is prevented from equal participation in
society as a worker and a citizen. Socialized as a subordinate to man within a traditional
familial structure, a woman in "nation" finds expression in domestic space. While men
are the protectors of the boundaries of a nation-state, women are to reproduce it and
nurture it. The role of "reproducers" is in line with the metaphor of "mother" which is
often mobilized in a discourse about nationalism. And, because of this particular role
ascribed to women within nationalism, we see that from Korean “comfort women” to
the rape camps of Bangladesh and Omarska, historically women have been targeted
differently from their male counterparts in a conflict situation.
Genocide, as defined in Article II of the Genocide Convention, is an act committed with
intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group. The
acts include: killing or causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its
physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births
within the group; and forcibly transferring children of the group to another group
(Chinkin, 1994, P333). With genocide defined along the lines of ethnic divide and
reproduction, it becomes impossible to focus more or less on ethnicity or gender, as
both are markers of asymmetrical social relations and power hierarchy. Ethnic identity
is a product of the marking of difference, and gender of sexual difference. Sexual
difference marks a woman from man, based on different biology, language, culture, and
history. The oppression of women finds room for expression when the dominant culture
seeks to define what it means to be a woman, and tries to ascertain the truth about
women of a particular ethnicity by tying them down to reproduction and growth of a
minority group.
There is a need for feminist scholars of genocide to examine gender-based violence
against women at a point of intersection of patriarchy and nationalism, both intrinsically
gendered and militarized. In her explorations of genocide in the Balkans, Krista Lynes
(2013) notes that the complex relationship between gender, nationalism and genocide
divided the feminist community in Zagreb and in the West on the issue of whether to
put more emphasis on the gendered dimension or ethnic dimension of genocide. Lynes
aptly warns us that while focusing on gender may bring to light the prevalence of sexual
violence against women globally, it also jeopardizes a particular reading of gender and
ethnicity which was seen in the former Yugoslavia (2013, P49). A feminist reading of
genocide demands a marriage of the two very different approaches, perhaps a way of
looking at genocide that allows differences in history and experiences while also
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making room for sameness. There is a need to understand the differences and
similarities in women’s experiences in genocide and how they are represented in
mainstream, nationalist discourses, and account for them in order to build a better
understanding of how women's bodies are turned into sites of violence in an ethnic
conflict. Difference, which has been touted as a limitation, can in fact provide a space
for understanding and creativity. Research rooted in creative practices and dealing with
the issues of representation has the potential of creating a discourse on genocide that
can challenge patriarchy and unsilence the gendered victims of genocide.
4. Methodology
There has been a tremendous effort by researchers in Canada, including Kim Sawchuk,
Owen Chapman, and Andra McCartney, to theorize research-creation within the
existing framework of viable qualitative research methodologies. Sawchuk and
Chapman (2012) have argued in their article, Research-Creation: Intervention, Analysis
and ‘Family Resemblances’, that research creation is not a fixed methodological
approach. It can, in fact, take the form of research-for-creation, research-from-creation,
creative presentations of research, and creation-as-research – the four modalities not
being mutually exclusive. In any creative work, it is common practice for some basic
research to precede creation or production; similarly, it is often the case that the existing
creative works, especially audio/visual archives, help with research; and researchers
have always strived to find ways to creatively present their research findings. Finally,
creation-as-research, deemed the most controversial and complex of research-creation
methods by Sawchuk and Chapman, is research-through-creation (2012, P19). Creationas-research offers a unique way of knowing while also engaging with theory. Within the
realm of creative practices, the essay film – situated at the intersection of personal,
subjective and social history – has emerged as the leading non-fiction form for both
intellectual and artistic innovation. If the subject of inquiry is the politics of discourse,
the appropriation and visual representation of women’s stories within the discourse on
genocide, it would be logical to use creative tools as a way to explore that tense
relationship.
The essay film on the 1971 genocide in Bangladesh does not make any claims to
universality of experiences of women in war. The women featured in the film only
speak for themselves and are not called upon to embody an entire nation. Without
making a claim to some universal truth, it is my subjectivity, as a filmmaker and a
woman whose grandparents left India in 1947 to live in East Pakistan and left
Bangladesh in 1971 for Pakistan, that offers the viewers a representation of social
reality through the experiences of the survivors of genocide. The three subject positions,
the “I” (the filmmaker), the “she” (the survivor), and the “you” (the viewer) determine
and shape the meaning of the film. The film offers a unique meeting point of my
subjectivity as a researcher, filmmaker and a woman, with those of the survivors and the
viewers, and it attempts to create a space to communicate, challenge and resist the
dominant discourse on genocide by building a coalition between the three subject
positions. Furthermore, the multiplicity of women’s experiences is captured by
testimonies by Bengali survivors, including “Biranganas”, Bihari survivors, Bengali
Hindu survivors, women who fought with Bengali militia, Mukti Bahini and Mukti
Jouddha, women who gave testimonies in war trials, nurses and service providers,
activists, and gender historians.
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Ferdousy Priyabhashini is a rape survivor who was given the title of
“Biranagana” in the aftermath of the genocide. This is an excerpt of Ferdousy’s
testimony:
“It was after 3 AM or so at night. They
had tried to rape me for two days before
that night. As I said earlier they applied
Vicks on my private parts. They gagged
me, and it nearly suffocated me. So I
indicated to them that I will cooperate with
them if they uncovered my mouth. I
begged them to finish their business fast.
They were driving and stopping and
raping me. … They were really enjoying
it, it was obvious to me, but I was nearly
dead. Once they stopped the car and
dropped me out. They pulled me by my
hair. It hurt so much I couldn’t think if it was happening to me or someone else. They
kept shouting at me, “You are a Hindu. You are a spy.” I used to wear a bindi [dot] in
those days. They asked me to surrender and admit that I had committed murder. I
refused to do so. I was not a nationalist
or anything like that. I did not even love
my country then. I was struggling to stay
alive, being raped by five men. At home
my condition was no better without a
husband and with three children that I
had to provide for as well as my mother,
brothers, and younger sister. Where was
the time for me to think about nation and
freedom? …. Life after my gang rape did
not change much. I continued to work in
the office but I was not forced to have
sex. Everyone teased and insulted me,
though, on account of my rape, including my ex-mother-in-law and ex-sister-in-law.”
Bir Protik Taramon Bibi is one of two freedom fighters formally recognized and
honoured by the Bangladeshi government – Bir Protik is the fourth highest gallantry
award in Bangladesh. Here is an excerpt from Taramon’s testimony.
“I moved into the camp and started working for the freedom fighters. I would cook for
them but I would also hide their weapons so that if there were raids, people wouldn’t
find anything. When I was working there, I started calling Muhib Habilder “father”. He
started telling me that I had a lot of courage, that I was strong and fearless. So he said,
lets give you some more training. He trained me on how to fire a gun, etc. … After that
Muhib Habilder said that a rifle gun is not enough because the shots can go here and
there, I will teach you how to use a stun gun. So, he taught me how to use a stun gun.
So when ever there were little battles (or skirmishes) I would be cooking and doing
everything they asked me to do at the camp, I would also work as an informer, and fight
in gun battles. Once we were sitting for a meal and Muhib Habilder said, Taramon
we’ve just sat down to eat and we didn’t recce. I forgot to recce. Can you climb up the
tree and make sure that everything is clear? I climbed up the tree with a binocular and I
saw that there was a gunboat coming from the other side of the river. I just ran
159
down and shouted that there was a gunboat coming with the Pakistani army and
then they all got together. I was a part of that with my gun. We attacked the boat.
No one from our side was killed but a lot of the Pakistani soldiers were killed. And it
was a battle that we won. That was the biggest battle I fought.”
Saira Bano is a Bihari survivor. Supposedly from the enemy side, Saira Bano has been
living in a refugee camp in Dhaka for over forty years now. This is part of her
testimony:
“I was very small when I left India. It was when the Hindu-Muslim riots started. I don’t
remember a lot from back then. I remember, I used to go beg for money and a man
abducted me. I started crying which caught other people’s attention. He then let me go. I
remember that much. I used to beg for food. My entire family was killed in Calcutta.
There are no remains of them. My husband was killed in Kamalapur, Nawabganj.
That’s when I came here. My daughter lives in Pakistan. My son died in India too. I
came here young, now I am old. I have no one in this world. It’s just me, the people at
the camp and Allah. I fetch water for people who live in this camp to earn a small
living. I love drinking tea. If I don’t drink tea, I don’t fetch water for anyone. I don’t
care if I eat. But I need to drink tea. But here I have no stove, no door where I live, no
blanket. I sleep on the floor and it gets cold. You see how I live. … I came here when I
was young, now I am old and I don’t want to leave these people. They will bury me
when I die. People ask me to stop working but I say, no. If I stopped working, I would
get sick and die. I cannot stop fetching water. I like working. I am too embarrassed to
ask for charity.”
Using the visual medium, this essay film directly challenges the representation of
women’s trauma in the mainstream narrative on genocide. The essay film also
highlights the differences and similarities within the unified category of women. The
multiplicity of women’s experiences in genocide is captured through the testimonies of
survivors who experienced the war from various vantage points. Furthermore, the
testimonies of these survivors are juxtaposed against the nationalistic, memorialized
images of the 1971 war and resist
the collective memory which
either seeks to silence women’s
voices or appropriate their pain
for the nationalist purposes.
When positioned as such, the
film raises questions of whose
war is being fought, who is
fighting the war and who are the
winners
and
losers
of
nationalism.
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Academic research rooted in creative practice closes the gap between theory and
creative practice by focusing on creative art as a cultural industry, one that is compatible
with theory and offers insights into real problems in the real world, making practicebased research self-reflexive. Research-creation, specifically the essay film, has the
potential of bringing women’s experiences and their stories out of the private and into
the public domain and challenge the hegemonic reading of a conflict. It has the power to
name the experiences and individuals who were previously silenced in favour of the
nation. The essay film does not seek to flatten the differences, instead it sets the ground
for a joining together with the audience to have a conversation based on their lived
reality, experiences, and struggles. The viewers get a chance to interpret, translate and
reconcile the tension presented in the film with their own existing views and
subjectivities and they can either accept or reject what is being presented in the film. In
doing that, the viewers also transform into actors and agents of change. Additionally,
the essay film can help transmit knowledge produced through research back into
society. In The Emergence of Cultural Studies and the Crisis of the Humanities (1990),
Stuart Hall discusses the political nature of cultural studies in engaging with “some real
problem out there in the dirty world” (p. 17) and the need to translate knowledge back
into practice. Hall writes, “Neither the one nor the other alone would do” (1990, P18).
Practice-based research is communicative of problems and resolutions. It offers, as
Melissa Gregg argues, a multi-layering of arguments, which “would otherwise appear as
a dense and prosaic discussion,” and makes “the complexities of cultural debates more
attractive to a broader audience” (Gregg, 2004, P367). This is the ultimate potential of
research-creation.
5. Conclusion
Simone de Beauvoir writes, "Humanity is male, and man defines woman not in herself
but as relative to him; she is not regarded as an autonomous being.... He is the subject,
he is the Absolute - she is the Other" (1949, P16). Woman defined by man, as lesser
than him, is told that her story, her experience and how she came to be do not matter.
Through the absence of violence endured by women in the images of genocide, she is
denied her experience. She is asked to forget her gender and her ordeal and be part of
the collective aspirations and collective memory. Creation-as-research, in particular the
essay film, helps provide a better understanding and analysis to the study of gender in
the existing discourse on genocide. It allows the subject positions of the
161
researcher, the survivors of genocide and the viewers to unite in order to construct
an alternative account of history. In Simians, Cyborgs and Women (1991), Donna
Haraway writes about the importance of situated knowledge and webbed connections.
Local knowledge, which is partial by all accounts, has to be situated within the broader
framework of knowledge and power in order to provide a better account of the world.
The politics of location and positioning, not only of the survivors and the filmmaker’s,
but also of the audience’s, are at the forefront in the essay film. Haraway argues:
The only way to find a larger vision is to be somewhere in particular. The
science question in feminism is about objectivity as positioned rationality. Its
images are not the products of escape and transcendence of limits, i.e., the view
from above, but the joining of partial views and halting voices into a collective
subject position that promises a vision of the means of ongoing finite
embodiment, of living within limits and contradictions, i.e., of views from
somewhere (p196).
The situated knowledges of the survivors take us to a particular place in time, space and
consciousness of local history and enable the joining together of their partiality into a
collective subject position. It attempts to produce complex realities that are often
contradictory, political, and trans-local in nature. Without presenting a view from
above, research-creation makes room for an outlook on women's situation comes from a
specific position in history, from the testimonies of survivors whose lives were
interrupted if not stopped in the war.
6. List of References
Barth, Fredrik. (1969). Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organization of
Culture Difference. Bergen: Universitetsforlaget,.
Chapman, O., & Sawchuk, K. (2012). Research-Creation: Intervention, Analysis and
"Family Resemblances". Canadian Journal Of Communication, 37(1). Retrieved
from http://www.cjc-online.ca/index.php/journal/article/view/2489/2298
Chinkin, Christine. (1994). Rape and Sexual Abuse of Women in International Law.
European Journal of International Law 5(1), 326-341. Retrieved from
http://www.ejil.org/pdfs/5/1/1246.pdf
Corrigan, Timothy. (2011). The Essay Film: From Montaigne, After Marker. New York.
Oxford University Press.
de Beauvoir, S. (1949), The Second Sex. Pan Books, London [1988].
De Lauretis, Teresa. (1987). Technologies of Gender: Essays on Theory, Film, and
Fiction. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Foucault, Michel. (1991). Politics and the Study of Discourse. In G. Burchell, C. Gordon
and P. Miller (eds) The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, (Chicago: the
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University of Chicago Press. pp. 53-72.
Gellner, Ernest. (1983). Nations and Nationalism. Oxford: Blackwell.
Gregg, Melissa. (2004). A Mundane Voice. Cultural Studies. 18(2/3), 363-383.
doi:10.1080/0950238042000201563
Hall, Stuart. (1990). The Emergence of Cultural Studies and the Crisis of the Humanities.
October,
Vol.
53
(Summer),
11-23.
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from
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Hall, Stuart. (1997) The Spectacle of the ‘Other’. In S. Hall (Ed.) Representation: Cultural
representations and signifying practices. London; Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage in
association with the Open University.
Haraway, Donna J. (1991). Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature.
New York: Routledge,
Lynes, Krista. (2013). Prismatic Media, Transnational Circuits: Feminism in a Globalized
Present. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Minh-ha, T. (1991). When the Moon Waxes Red: Representation, gender, and cultural
politics. New York: Routledge.
Mohanty, Chandra T. (2003). Feminism Without Borders: Decolonizing Theory,
Practicing Solidarity. Durham & London: Duke University Press.
Mohanty, Chandra T. (2003). “Under Western Eyes” Revisited: Feminist Solidarity
through Anticapitalist Struggles. Signs. 28(2). 499-535. DOI: 10.1086/342914
Rascaroli, Laura. (2009). The Personal Camera: Subject Cinema and the Essay Film.
London; New York: Wallflower Press.
Saikia, Yasmin. (2007). Overcoming the Silent Archive in Bangladesh: Women Bearing
Witness to Violence in the 1971 'Liberation' War. In M. Skidmore & P. Lawrence
(Eds.), Women and the Contested State. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre
Dame Press.
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PART 4. Treatment and prevention of gender equality
through education and communication
164
PLAYING WITH GENDERS – STRATEGIES TO RAISE PUBLIC
AWARENESS ABOUT GENDER PROBLEMS THROUGH CRITICAL
GAMES
Valeria Prosperi
sdromp@libero.it
Abstract: this consideration is on gender stereotypes in culture and games, and focuses on ways to
communicate issues and insert subversive elements. I illustrate my research about the Italian gender gap
and the potentiality of critical games and my consequent game design process, showing strategies used to
make people have fun and reflect. I concluded this theoretical and practical work designing a board game
called Rigenerati! (“Re-gender yourself!”), a game aiming to raise public awareness about gender
problems specially in the Italian society.
Keywords: awareness, stereotypes, gender, critical games, empathy, work environment, Italian gender
gap
1. Introduction
This paper looks at gender stereotypes in culture and games, and focuses on ways to
communicate issues and insert subversive elements: I illustrate my research and the
consequent game design process, showing strategies used to make people have fun and
reflect.
This paper was originally a MSc thesis project developed at the Design School of
Politecnico di Milano in 2011 (under supervision of Maresa Bertolo, assistant professor
at Design department, Politecnico di Milano and Vanessa de Luca, at the time her
assistant): a theoretical and practical work designing a board game called Rigenerati!
(“Re-gender yourself!”). A game aiming to raise public awareness about gender
problems specially in the Italian society.
2. Hypothesis
I have focused my attention on a theme that appears controversial, not well known, in
some ways "uncomfortable", but extremely remarkable in daily life of all the
individuals, using the communication design tools to underline the critical points and to
propose some strategies to raise awareness considering the variety of the theoretical
approaches and being strongly provocative, encouraging a process of critique and
stimulating interest in the topic.
I decided to adopt a critical playing approach because games can convey important
messages, through philosophies of life in their systems of representation, and especially
in the game mechanics. Games can communicate dissonant messages, stimulating the
players to think from other points of view, simulating complex reality or forcing them
into non pleasant roles.
3. Context
3.1 Gender Stereotypes in Italian society
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From 90’ women’s issues re-entered the public discourse. They were sometimes
reporting “the decline of the differences”, other times denouncing a new and
violent wave of misogyny. Gender differences as expressions of values, systems of
power and economic relationships, constitute a theme of primary importance in a reborn
debate in the scientific and in the institutional and political environment.
During the years of the great protests, the focus was on concrete objectives, mainly
parity in the professions, civil rights and salaries. Perhaps feminists didn’t insist enough
on changing gender symbols, images and relationships as represented in popular culture,
trying to create new directions and educating to interpret stories. We need to challenge
cultural stereotypes and reject standard gender models; an alternative view that modifies
imagery and culture, we need to involve women and men tired and to be represented in
wrong and restrictive ways.
The role of communication is central: it produces the processes of construction of the
popular, accompanies and interprets social changes. Sharing the critical tools to read the
messages is an effective strategy to oppose stereotypes and critique mainstream
thinking: we need a communicative subversion.
Rights equality, wage equality and access to all careers, are in theory already offered to
women. They will remain however inaccessible to many women until the psychological
structures that prevent women to strongly desire these things are modified. Women are
currently positioned to feel guilty for attempting to insert themselves in a productive
environment (Gianini Belotti, 1987: 9)
Gender stereotypes are common simplified representations of reality that influence the
collective thought. "The prejudices are deeply entrenched in lifestyle: they endure, resist
revisions because they constitute a social utility. They furnish the certainties that human
insecurity needs”. (Gianini Belotti, 1987: 13)
Therefore I considered necessary a long immersion in popular imagery, whose wide
diffusion contributes to the development of culture. There’s still a vision that
differentiates the two sexes following the ancient symbols: masculinity is associated
with risk, adventure, exploration and dominion of the external world, whereas feminitity
with seduction, closed spaces and exaltation of beauty.
The analysis of stereotypes give us precious elements to understand what we expect
from women and from men and what is intended with "feminine" and "masculine"
behaviors: man is perceived as strong, rational, logical, independent; woman is defined
as calm, good listener, predisposed to affection and care. The separation between
masculine-production and female-reproduction seems clear. Young men are more
attached to traditional values (like family) and, meanwhile, they continue to be
imprisoned in the model of the "job at any costs" (the man must work) showing more
limited plans in comparison to coetaneous females. (Lipperini, 2010 :51)
Obviously the discussion is not to oppose men and women but rather to learn that there
exists differences and similarities between men and women that should be accepted and
respected. The purpose is to avoid directing potential gender identity, leaving the
individual to find their own way to define and express their own gender identity.
3.2 Italian gender gap
What is the Italian working context?
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From research How life of women changes (supported by Istat, the Italian National
Statistical Institute) it emerges that: women invest more in culture, they are better
in school, are more involved involved with their jobs in comparison to the past and
experiment with a multiplicity of roles in the different phases of life. But critical areas
remain: in the transition school-job, considering that women find job later, they are
worse paid and less satisfied with their jobs; in the barriers of job access with particular
reference to the loads of family tasks; in the interruptions of the job in concomitance
with maternity; in the strong difficulties in obtaining decision making roles; in the
disadvantaged economic situation of old women.
More recent Istat data underline how much gender asymmetry still exists in Italian
houses: they confirm that the activity of cleaning and rearrange the house and those
tasks related to the preparation of the meals are still exclusively a female competence.
The perception of woman as a manager, emphasized by fashion and common thoughts,
seem to not match Italian reality.
In the final classification of the Global Gender Gap 2010 by the World Economic
Forum (that takes in examination four factors: attendance to job and economic
opportunity, access to education, political influence, differences between men and
women in terms of health and expectations of life) Italy is to 74th on 134 nations, next to
last in Europe.
There are two further elements that demolish the false image of the winning woman in
career. First: horizontal segregation that restrict females to a number of professions due
to the persistence of gender stereotyping in professions that carry subordinate positions,
low salaries and scarce opportunities for career progress. Therefore women are 75% of
teachers, 93% of social assistants, and 77.6% of domestic collaborators. Secondly: the
vertical segregation that obstructs the access to business hierarchies. "There is not one
professional area, in our country, in which there’s a balanced gender composition in
higher levels, even if women are present from more time and are more. The case of the
school is symbolic: women are more than 75% of teaching staff but less than 40% of
scholastic executives: men, therefore, are less than 25% of teachers but more than 60%
of executives." (Pruna, 2007: 26)
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1.
Infographic: italian gender gap. Datas from ISTAT, rcfl, 2007
168
2.
Infographic: Care and family tasks. Datas from ISTAT, rcfl, 2007
169
3.
Infographic: maternity and employment. Datas from ISTAT, rcfl, 2007
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3.3 Critical issues: care and male involment
Many working women cannot rely on either the social organization or their
partner, so they often resort to a domestic collaborator. Italy holds the record of
European country for number of immigrants working in our houses.
A controversial but central issue that adds complexity to the discourse on roles, is
questioning dynamics, relationships and social order, by comparing care work to
remunerated work. Jobs are generally remunerated, implying an exchange of activity,
professionalism and salary. This model doesn't see and doesn't believe that relationship,
care, affections, parenthood, assistance, are also forms of work, even if not
remunerated, not visible and therefore, simply ignored. Women have two jobs: the
remunerated one and the free and invisible one.
As John Stuart Mill wrote, “women cannot be expected to devote themselves to the
emancipation of women, until men in considerable number are prepared to join with
them in the undertaking”. (Stuart Mill, 2010: 304)
My conviction is that change cannot happen without a reorganization of daily being:
from these reflections the necessity of a masculine involvement clearly emerges. The
same definition of female studies (recently abandoned in favour of gender studies)
appears extremely inadequate to indicate a group of complex phenomena that concern
society as a whole. The scarce presence of women is traditionally recriminated in
masculine areas such as technical and scientific careers. What is rarely considered is
that these rigid roles and stereotypes not only damage women but also men. Rigid
gender roles restrict men from to appearing fragile or sensitive or being involved in
activity that opposes with the more traditional concept of masculinity. (Lipperini, 2010:
13)
3.4 Sexualized cultural representations
We should pay attention to persistent of sexist stereotypes, as a pervasive element in
social relationships. Many projects have monitored female presence in media and verify
what models of women are communicated by mass media and what function they
develop in comparison to Italian cultural change.
The media themselves don't adequately interpret a public opinion that is composed from
men and women. There exists a monopoly of "masculine" information that still limits
the presence of women and doesn't exalt the roles that they have conquered in real life;
there is a notable distance between the new presence of women in society and the
female universe as represented by media.
Female identity is still predominantly depicted in a masculine world, and is not defined
independently, but rather in the various relationships with men. We commonly meet
"busy masculine characters in great adventures and female figures with scarce relief, or
simply passive waiting the hero. This is due to a masculine idea of the "adventure":
open and endless space to male gender, narrowness inside spaces to female." (Schembri,
2002: 27). This division of roles is not only found in the literary tradition, but also in
novels, comic strips, cinema and television. The actions, space and time reserved to
female figures has been extremely limited and circumscribed. More recently, the
seductive, timid and defenseless protagonists common until a few decades ago, have
started to be replaced by a new type of heroin, less vulnerable, but seductive and
dangerous. We again encounter the Madonna-Eva dichotomy a masculine creation of
female identity.
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Games do not escape these strongly sexualized cultural representations. Despite
the increase in the population of gamers, the characters depicted in games do not match
the diversity of the population. Characters are for the greater part depicted as middle
class white males.
Zimmerman examines the relationship between gender and game in the text Rules of
Play, and affirms that investigating the gender cultural rhetoric means to examine the
ways that games reflect, reinforce, question or subvert cultural ideas about the
categories of masculine and feminine, male and female, transgender and other concepts
related to gender identity. (Zimmerman, 522.)
4. Methods
4.1 Strategies to raise awareness through critical game design
After carrying out cultural and sociological research around the strong influence of
gender stereotypes in Italian contemporary reality, I have reflected on ways and tools of
communication to deal with such a delicate and controversial subject. I chose to adopt a
critical playing approach, examining in depth the relationship between stereotypes,
gender and Games Studies.
My intention is to avoid a dramatic tone of communication. I consider this matter one of
the biggest criticality in relation to communication of gender problems. Issues related to
stereotypes are often avoided by people, and an dramatic institutional approach with
explicit "educational" intents would only strengthen the feeling of "heaviness" that
some people experience. Recent studies have theorized that reflection can be introduced
more effectively through the tools of irony satire and paradox, and a “fun” component is
fundamental to stimulate the change of daily behaviors.
Critical playing approach determined to be the most effective and involving one.
This vision of social change as de-construction and re-construction of social
organization systems pushed me to direct my research and my communication strategy
toward a project that is a critique to Italian contemporary society, strongly influenced in
its mechanisms by gender stereotypes, and at the meantime includes, as playful project,
some elements of transgression of these mechanisms. Playing a simulation we discuss
critically its rules.
In this research I underline the subversive potential of games: firstly by showing that all
games contains an ideology (sometimes unconsciously transmitted), then secondly
examining how elements in games can stimulate reactions. Games can be used to
explore serious issues and can further:




encourage a process of criticism (hoping that critical thoughts in micro level
influence whole society);
induce to think with different points of view;
reduce complexity of reality through a simulated system;
give opportunity to experience critical situations.
My project consists therefore in a boardgame made to both entertain and stimulate
reflection. The idea to design a game that has as its primary goal social change
(entertainment being secondary), comes as a result of studies and research that
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show how games can convey important messages, through philosophies of life in
their systems of representation, and especially in the game mechanics. A game can
be an excellent vehicle for activism and political and social criticism, as it can offer a
critical view of the world from a conscious manipulation of its features. A game’s style,
rules of progress, context, scenarios and paradigms of victory and defeat can highlight
possibilities, limitations and conventions. Because every game carries it’s authors vision
of the world, convictions and ideologies, games can also communicate dissonant
messages, stimulating the players to think from other points of view, simulating
complex reality or forcing them into non pleasant roles.
4.2 Potentiality of subversive games: case history
We can think of games as a medium of expression, manipulating their instruments:
representation systems and styles, rules of progress, codes of conduct, context of
reception, winning and losing paradigms, ways of interacting. Mary Flanagan affirms
that Critical Play means to create or occupy play environments and activities that
represent one or more questions about aspects of human life. These questions can be
abstract, such as rethinking cooperation, or winning and losing; or concrete and involve
more real issues (Flanagan M. 2009: 6). Criticality can provide an essential viewpoint or
an analytical framework. Those using critical play as an approach might create a
platform of rules to examine a specific issue - rules that would be somehow relevant to
the issue itself. This does not mean that the games cannot, or should not, be “fun,”: it
means that there is a further desired outcome beyond entertainment.
Gonzalo Frasca in his essay Videogames of the oppressed examines the potential of
video games as a tool to stimulate critical thought and discussions on social and
personal problems. He analyses in depth the idea of simulation as a representative form
that, unlike other representative forms like novels, creates models that not only show
characteristics of the system, but also reproduce its behavior through a group of rules.
Games can offer the multiple and immediate meanings of life in society, in a way that a
single role or job could never offer.
Paolo Pedercini, affirms:
«[..] political games don’t exist, or better, they have always existed: every video
game – as every cultural product – reflect author’s ideas, visions and ideologies. Every
video game is essentially political. Game designers are usually too accommodating,
they give the players the possibility to play the part of valiant heroes, powerful generals
or frightful criminals to go along with their wish to escape from a boring and
frustrating life. It’s too easy! We can instead establish a healthier sado-masochistic
relationship with our users. We can force them in unpleasant roles to make them reason
using a different point of view. [..] Providing alternative visions and criticize the
conventional ones is exactly the critical game designer mission. [..] political games are
simply games that clearly declare their factiousness proving that all the video games
are factious». (Pedercini, 2006: 2)
Simulations have big potential as complexity reducers. With a simulation we can
describe complex systems in a clear comprehensible way. It is easier to understand a
social or economic system by manipulating its ludic model instead of reading its linear
text description. Playing a video game is a heuristic activity radically different to the
reductionist and analytical one based on decomposition and evaluation of single parts.
Clearly such as modeling is not a neutral or a scientific procedure, it is always a
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simplification of the reality, a subjective designer’s interpretation. We can say that
simulations are interactive theories.
With irony and intelligence groups of game designers like Molleindustria, Newsgaming,
Antiwargame, Metapet, Persuasive Games, Values at Play, deconstruct schemes and
contents of videogame language changing products that were considered designed to
entertain. Game designers can create over invented worlds and also socially reverse
environments, starting with personal mediated experiences. Today we are informed
about social problems like poverty, oppression and discrimination, but our relationships
with these issues tend to be. «Making people experience diversity, especially if it’s an
unpleasant condition, can be more effective because it gives most interesting ideas for
its comprehension than the basic documentation of Other existence».
In some of these games the game experience reaches the paradoxical level of
impossibility of victory: never win games in which players feel frustrated experiencing
continuous defeat. Refusing the binary win-lose logic gives the idea of inevitability of a
situation.
The world of board games is usually distant from social reality and today’s politics,
populated with characters of imagination, set in fantastic worlds, distant kingdoms or
remote times. In board games a realistic setting (and more often historical that
contemporary) is often used for putting to use exchange, management and expansion
mechanics, like in strategic and managerial games, but it remains a background, a
pretext to use some mechanisms, and it modestly affects the overall game experience.
Independent English games publishing house TerrorBull Games believes that
everything can be played: international politics, environmental catastrophes, life and
death. They don't believe in the existence of issues that can be discussed only in
respectful and calm tones: being 'hushed' represses opinion and abolishes discussion,
interaction and natural human responses. "Terrorism. Whatever. If it makes you laugh
and THINK at the same time, it's going to be a good game. If it provokes you, even
better. Sometimes you can't imagine a different way of looking at things until you've
had a shock."
Also the force that comes when players lose (negativity, nervousness) should be
exploited. By coming to terms with failure we take the challenge as our personal battle,
and free creativity and courage. The games are more enjoyable when creating a natural
conflict in a group. Boardgames are pleasant because they are true interactions, with
real people in a real space.
5. Results
5.1 Game Design and Social Impact
A board game is an ideal tool to represent behaviors and simulations, (although abstract
and simplified) and specific scenarios from the real world. So I decided to examine an
aspect of social life in which discriminatory practices are evident and problems related
to gender stereotypes are very far from being resolved, with the aim of highlighting and
exaggerating these mechanisms. To experience the diversity and try to fight the unjust
structures within a game, in addition to being fun, is more efficient than reading or
hearing a complex analysis from experts, due to the difficult nature of the matter and for
the aversion felt by many individuals towards these issues.
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My aim was to design a game that entertains but that also forces the players to
think with other points of view relating to gender and careers. These are the
project’s purposes: simulation of a complex and stereotyped environment, exasperation
of discrimination and point of view reversal experiencing different relationships with
the job system. Since the main argument relates to social relationship among people in
all aspects of society, I chose a board game in order to not lose the social aspect of
playing and keep a direct relationship among players. I also excluded a roleplaying
game in order for the game to engage with as many people as possible. The game
emphasizes the more problematic aspects of Italian work lifestyle, and all aspects of
game argument and game mechanics are inspired by numbers that have emerged from
gender gap reports (such as Italian vertical segregation, women’s percentage in
leadership roles, horizontal segregation, the different time spent in domestic tasks,
employment rates by gender and number of children and the difficulties conciliating
home and office).
5.2 Rigenerati!: gameplay and main elements that raise awarness
In Rigenerati! the player’s goal is to advance in career, facing the different reactions of
the game-system while they randomly change their gender. In the game system, players
experience different conditions and opportunities that society, especially work
environments, assign exclusively by gender. It is possible to try to follow eight different
careers: law, politic, housekeeping (“care field”), medicine, science, education,
economy and construction. In each match players have a character schedule with scores
of features (features are selected considering results arising from analysis of most
common stereotypes) and a family area in which they have to mark children. Starting
from a “training” level, followed by “job research” level players can collect “skills,
vices, virtues” cards, that represent resources useful for just one gender. Passing
“interview” point, players can choose a career card and start climbing up their career
boards, collecting points they need to advance to higher levels and draw an “event
card”. “Event cards” put players through “events”, which have different consequences
for men and women, a different score (depending on the player’s gender and working
area) is required to advance to higher career levels, there is a different family area (if
you find the card “Unexpected wish to motherhood/fatherhood” and you’re playing as a
woman you stop 2 turns, if you’re a man you can continue). Other examples of main
elements that raise awareness are the “Good appearance” card, that a women can use to
automatically pass the interview moment (men can’t use it); or the “Sweet eyes” card,
which women can use to make sweet eyes to her boss and be promoted to higher career
level without the necessary score (man can’t use it), the “Sexual harassment” card
penalizes only women, the “Easy tears” card is really dangerous for men but not for
women.
Adding fun and dilemmas to game play, strategic choices are influenced by the game
event “gender exchange”. “Gender exchange” may occur each turn, during which
participants have to turn their career card aside. They also must consider other points to
pass to a higher level, whether or not to have children in their family area and take
advantage of cards that favorite their new gender. Game testing revealed an average of
4-5 exchanges each match.
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6. Conclusions
Experiencing different treatment and discriminations is a very effective way to foster
empathy. With this game I try to induce cognitive empathy, inserting explicit references
to reality, and emotional empathy, giving players the possibility to assume different
roles and having experience of critical situations and perceiving the proximity between
their own reality and the game system.
Game testing sessions highlighted that this game entertains players and develops their
awareness of these issues: testers rated their game experience as meaningful, declaring
they had fun (particularly around the gender exchange) but also thought about issues
they were not used to reflecting on.
I hope that the game, over fun, stimulated interest towards these issues, among both
women and men. The playing experience involves a reflection about how working
failure can be caused by discrimination (since as players are favorite or hindered by
virtue of their in game gender) and about how much gender stereotypes and
expectations influence people’s daily lives.
I aim to ridicule these stereotypes by including them in the game, giving them
enormous power over game mechanics, and the possibility to be exchanged to the other
gender. I used common ideas of femininity, masculinity and the working world, to play
consciously with these stereotypes, and allowing players to clearly recognize and
identify them. I also inserted the “gender exchange” option to allow players to gain a
deeper understanding of gender issues by viewing the other gender’s perspective and to
spread an idea of interchange of roles.
Rigenerati! provides a representation of a cross section of society in which relationships
are complex and the rules are often not evident. Through mechanisms that benefit one
gender over the other, which facilitate the paths if people adhere to certain imposed
standards (which correspond to the models and the roles prescribed by society and its
institutions) we can highlight contradictions and inequalities. With a contextualized and
provocative approach I try to make individuals think, fight and talk, when playing
Rigenerati!.
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4.
Rigenerati! prototype
5.
Careers boards
Next page images:
6.
Game components: character schedule and timeline
7.
Career cards
8.
“event” cards
9. “gender exchange moment”
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178
7. References
Flanagan M. (2009), Critical Play. Radical Game Design. Cambridge, MIT Press
Frasca G. (2001) Videogames of the Oppressed, thesis developed at Georgia Institute of
Technology (available at www.ludology.org)
Gianini Belotti E. (1987), Dalla parte delle bambine. Milano, Feltrinelli
Lipperini L. (2010), Ancora dalla parte delle bambine. Milano, Feltrinelli
Stuart Mill J. (2010), On Liberty and Other Essays. Digireads.com Publishing
Pedercini P. (2006), Radical Game Design - Notes on Political Games Rhetoric,
http://www.molleindustria.org/docs/radical_game_design.pdf
Pruna M.L. (2007), Donne al lavoro. Bologna, Il Mulino
Salen K. and Zimmerman E. (2003), Rules of Play, Game Design Fundamentals.
Cambridge, MIT Press
Schembri R. (2002), Lara Croft e le altre. Palermo, L’Epos, Palermo
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PART
PART 5. Criticism of reality and the representation of
gender roles in the field of social, economic and scientific
labor relations
180
‘WOMEN’S WAR WORK’ THROUGH A GENDERED LENS: A
CRITICAL FEMINIST ANALYSIS OF MEDIA REPRESENTATIONS OF
WOMEN’S LABOUR IN CANADIAN NEWSPAPERS, 1939-1945
Tracy Moniz
Department of Communication Studies
Mount Saint Vincent University
Tracy.Moniz@msvu.ca
Abstract: through a content analysis of Canadian newspapers, this paper examines representations of
women’s wage labour during the Second World War in Canada to understand how gender identities were
constructed and negotiated in the news. Women’s participation in the paid workforce more than doubled
during the war, creating a situation that could challenge the traditional sexual division of labour. Using a
critical feminist analysis, this article focuses on the significance of femininity in framing ‘women’s war
work’ in a way that reinforced stereotypical values about women and their labour and upheld a patriarchal
status quo. News in the commercial and alternative press prioritized gender, not labour. In the end, news
media presented a ‘history’ of women’s labour that did not reflect the social significance of women’s
lives as wage labourers. This raises questions about the scholarly implications of using such media as a
chronicle of women’s history and calls for histories that more fully and equitably capture women’s
experiences.
Keywords: feminist media studies, public-private spheres, gender roles, women’s labour history, media
representations of women, femininity and war
1. Introduction
On September 10, 1939, Canada entered the Second World War. Men enlisted for active
duty overseas, creating labour shortages on the home front, and so the Canadian
government mobilized women to join the civilian workforce and aid in the ‘total war’
effort. Women’s labour force participation more than doubled throughout the war, with
more women working alongside and in place of men than ever before. By 1944, the
number of women working for wages full-time outside the home in Canada totalled
nearly 1.2 million—almost twice what it was when the war started—and approximately
800,000 additional women were employed part-time or on farms (Canada, Advisory
Committee on Reconstruction, Final Report of the Subcommittee on the Post-War
Problems of Women, 1944: 7; Pierson, 1986: 9). A woman filled one out of every three
jobs (Canada, Advisory Committee on Reconstruction, Final Report of the
Subcommittee on the Post-War Problems of Women, 1944: 8).
In the labour market, Canadian women offered the only solution to the nation’s labour
shortages throughout the war (Wartime History of the Employment of Women, n.d.:
29). This critical need for “womanpower,” as then Prime Minister W.L. Mackenzie
King called it, created a situation that could challenge the sexual division of labour
which traditionally relegated women to the home and positioned men in the workforce
(King, 1942: 5). A sexual division of labour is essential for the maintenance of a
patriarchal system and any deterioration of this division, such as women’s wartime
entry into the traditionally-male paid workforce, inherently threatened the patriarchal
status quo. The influx of women into the wartime workforce created a historical ‘tug of
war’ between traditional notions of a woman’s relationship to the home and the
simultaneous need for women’s workforce participation during the Second World War.
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Using a critical feminist lens, this paper examines news media representations of
women’s wage labour in wartime to understand how newspapers negotiated the
changing demands imposed on women by ‘total war.’11 Through a content analysis of
the commercial and alternative (labour) press, the study analyzes how gender roles were
constructed and negotiated in news of women’s wartime wage labour. It demonstrates
that, both within and across the commercial and alternative press, news media
prioritized gender, not labour. The article focuses on the significance of femininity in
framing ‘women’s war work’ in a way that reinforces stereotypical values about women
and their labour and upheld a patriarchal status quo. Despite women’s massive
mobilization into the workforce, the structures of female subordination and exploitation
remained unchallenged. In the end, news media presented a ‘history’ of women’s labour
that did not reflect the social significance of women’s lives as wage labourers. This
raises questions about the scholarly implications of using such media as a chronicle of
women’s history and calls for histories that more fully and equitably capture women’s
experiences.
2. Hypothesis
This paper addresses the following research questions: How were gendered roles
constructed and negotiated in news of women’s wartime wage labour? What impact, if
any, does this have on the way women’s history is represented?
Women’s workforce participation was central to the Canadian government’s execution
of the Second World War. Given this necessity and the magnitude of women’s entry
into the paid labour force, might the ensuing news coverage reflect the political
economic and social significance of women’s lives as labourers? If not in the
commercial press, then perhaps in the alternative (labour) press which, as “critical
media” of the “counter-public sphere,” can more readily offer perspectives outside the
established patriarchal order and question dominant social relations (Sandoval and
Fuchs, 2010: 147-148, 143 Comedia, 1984; Curran, 2007)? And, if not in the general
news or editorials, then perhaps in the women’s pages which, as some feminist scholars
have argued, provided a “highly influential public platform” for discussing women’s
issues and served as a chronicle of “women’s advancing status and participation in the
local community, the nation, and the world” (Lang, 1999: 150; Gabriele, 2006,
Fiamengo, 2008; Freeman, 2001). If so, this offers an exception to feminist media
theory which posits that “media have marginalized women in the public sphere” and
“purvey stereotypes of femininity and masculinity,” and this also challenges the
patriarchal values that these stereotypical gendered representations work to uphold
(McQuail, 2010: 123). This would then support a view of news as “the first draft of
history” and of news media as the “creators and preservers of the public’s picture of the
... past” (Kitch, 2001: 14, 28). And this, in turn, positions historical newspapers as a
chronicle or record that offers historians today evidence from which to reconstruct and
write about women’s wartime history.
3. Methods
This paper results from a broader research project—the author’s doctoral dissertation, “Women in the
Margins: Media Representations of Women’s Labour in the Canadian Press, 1939-1945.” The
dissertation analyzed representations of women’s labour (domestic, volunteer and wage, with a focus on
wage labour) in the commercial and alterative (labour) press. The research presented and discussed in this
paper came from this dissertation, which is cited in the list of references.
11
182
Research involved a comparative content analysis of representations of women’s
wage labour within and across the commercial and alternative (labour) press
during the Second World War. Content analysis allows for a systematic and quantitative
analysis of media content that reveals the “relative prominences and absences of key
characteristics in media texts” (Hansen et al., 1998: 94). In the case of this study,
content analysis enabled an examination of how many times female labourers and their
work was represented in wartime newspapers and how they were represented in the
news. Applying a feminist media studies interpretive lens then allowed for an analysis
of the relationship between various dimensions in the text, including the intersection
between media and the area of gender and labour as well as the media’s possible role in
the construction of gender and, as Liesbet van Zoonen (1998) explained it, in the
transmission of stereotypical, patriarchal and hegemonic values about women and
femininity.
The stratified random sample for the content analysis comprised 342 newspaper issues
published from September 10, 1939, when Canada entered the Second World War, to
September 2, 1945, when the war officially ended—216 issues of the commercial press
and 126 issues of the labour press. It surveyed the general news pages, women’s pages
and editorials, as applicable, in three commercial newspapers (Toronto Daily Star, The
Hamilton Spectator and The Halifax Herald) and three independent labour newspapers
(The Labour Leader, Toronto, Ontario; The Labor News, Hamilton, Ontario; and The
Citizen, Halifax, Nova Scotia) published in Canada during the Second World War. The
variables considered in the content analysis were the type of newspaper (commercial
versus alternative) and the placement of media coverage (general news versus women’s
pages, versus editorials) to identify the relationships among and between them. Of
relevance to this paper, categories coded for included topic of coverage, form of
coverage (article or photo) and discursive framing (key words to describe women’s
wage labour).
Archival research, largely of original government documents, further contextualized or
supported the data obtained in the content analysis.
3.1
Limitations of the Study
With historical research, the scope of the study reflects the nature of historical evidence
available. In addition to Toronto, Hamilton and Halifax, the Census of Canada 1941
also ranked Vancouver, British Columbia, and Montreal, Quebec, among the major
urban centres in Canada during the war. Ideally, this study would offer a national
perspective by incorporating a commercial and a labour newspaper from Vancouver and
the same from Montreal. However, while there was access to commercial newspapers in
both cities, there were no independent labour newspapers published in Vancouver and
Montreal for comparative analysis.
Furthermore, this paper does not discuss issues of race and social class, given that the
newspapers analyzed generally focused on the experience of the (largely) white,
middle-class women recruited en masse into the military-industrial complex during the
war (Copp, 1974:44; Palmer, 1992). This leaves the experiences of women of different
races and women on the low end of the socioeconomic ladder absent in the news and
from this research paper, even though women did participate in the workforce prior to
the wartime recruitment, particularly in the two decades prior and particularly among
the urban working class (Copp 1974: 44; Palmer 1992).
With its focus on news content, this study does not focus on audience—specifically,
newspaper readership or audience reception. The lack of primary audience research
precludes determining who read which section of the newspaper during the war
(McQuail, 2010: 121). As such, this research draws on secondary literature
183
which establishes that, given the separate spheres of ‘his’ and ‘her’ media, the
general news pages represented news written largely by men for men and the
women’s page represented news written largely by women for women (Byerly and
Ross, 2006; Kimmel, 2005; Lang, 1999). With respect to theories of audience reception,
scholars debate over “who controls the meaning of media texts”: the media or the
audience? (Kitch, 1997: 485). This paper remains focused on the content itself, and not
on how audiences engaged with or extracted meaning from these images.
4. Results
Coverage of women’s wage labour prioritized gender, not labour. Coverage consistently
portrayed working women in private-sphere, gendered roles, regardless of—or, rather,
precisely because of—their public role as wage labourers. This trend persisted in the
women’s pages as much as in the general news pages and editorials, which challenges a
view of the women’s pages as a space that “heralded the breakthroughs women made in
the paid workforce and drew attention to the frustrations and injustices women
encountered in their work in the home, on the farm, and in the factory” (Lang, 1999: 5).
This trend also persisted in the alternative labour press as much as in the mainstream
commercial press, which challenges a view of alternative media as a space that provided
alternative voices and perspectives to those in mainstream mass media and that
critiqued existing structures and advocated in the interests of all labourers, including
women. The latter point further demonstrates that while the labour press crossed class
lines in its coverage by representing and advocating for working class groups, it did not
cross gender lines by representing and advocating for female labourers. In the end,
Canadian newspapers repackaged news of women’s wartime labour in ways that not
only reinforced stereotypical values about women prominent in mainstream news and,
more specifically, in war news, but also in ways that challenged the idea that either
women’s journalism or the alternative labour press offered a ‘space’ for more
progressive identities for women than those traditionally found in the mainstream press,
such as that of public sphere ‘wage earner.’
The result is news coverage that does not reflect the political economic and social
significance of women’s lives as wage labourers. Irma K. Halonen (1999) argued that
women are consistently assigned a subordinate and objectified position in war news.
Representations of women’s labour in Canadian newspapers during the Second World
War offered no exception, with story frameworks and forms as well as discourse that
foregrounded femininity, subordinated and objectified female labourers, and confined
them to traditional roles.
4.1 Framing War Work: Gendering Story Topics
Among the topics discussed in news of women’s wage labour, coverage considered
women’s performance on the job, particularly in the commercial newspapers. Of the
131 news items about women’s wage labour found in the commercial press, 26 per cent
concerned how women performed in their jobs. This included coverage of workplace
absenteeism among women.
Newspapers projected the message that women’s ‘essential’ feminine nature interfered
with their reliability as labourers. An excerpt from a front-page news article in
Toronto’s labour newspaper, The Labour Leader, explains why “this disease
[absenteeism] was particularly rampant among women” and cites the following as
“some of [their] stunts”: “If a girl has a date on a certain evening, she first of all takes
that afternoon off, so that she can take a preliminary sleep. After keeping her
engagement, she then takes the following morning off, to get over its effects. If
184
there is a bargain sale at one of the local department stores, some will take an
entire morning off to attend the sale. If a girl feels the need of a permanent wave
and manicure, time is taken off from work” (1942: 1). News coverage pointed to
qualities associated with femininity as a main cause of workplace absenteeism. The
relationship between masculinity and femininity corresponds to power relations and
gains meaning in its opposition. For instance, ‘masculine’ connotes rationality,
detachment and power, while ‘feminine’ connotes irrationality, emotion, passivity,
frivolousness and dependence (Klaus and Kassel, 2005: 339; van Zoonen, 1994, 1995:
320). The press did not explore other possibilities for absenteeism such as childcare
issues or others related to the ‘double duty’ of work and home placed on women during
the war period. Instead, news depicted female workers as irresponsible, frivolous and
careless.
Other story frameworks reinforced this. During the war, working women made news
precisely because they were working women. Among the coverage, newspapers ran
“first woman to” stories: “First Women Employed at Nova Scotia Coal Mine” (Halifax
Herald, 1942: 9), “First Woman Operator Meets Romance on Sea” (Halifax Herald,
1942: 10) and “Women Pilots Aiding Air Force” (Labour Leader, 1940: 2). As Paula
Poindexter et al. (2008) argued, this story framework reinforces gender stereotypes.
While the coverage may appear empowering or celebratory on the surface, this story
framework undermines women by presenting them, by default, as second-tier.
Historically, women ‘made news’ when something strayed from the norm, and the norm
was not woman as coal miner, woman at sea, woman in the military, and woman as
foreign war correspondent. Novelty is a journalistic news value identifying the
‘unusual’ as newsworthy, whether it concerns men or women (McKercher, Thompson
and Cumming, 2011; The Missouri Group, 2011). However, media treatment of ‘first
woman to’ stories during the war more often served to explain these ‘firsts’ in ways that
reinforced women’s subordinate social position and upheld stereotypical values about
women than suggest a progressive shift in the sexual division of labour or social
structure, or herald these ‘firsts’ as progressive steps for women or, better yet,
humankind.
The article, “Women Pilots Aiding Air Force,” which ran in the Sept. 20, 1940 issue of
The Labour Leader, illustrates this. In it, readers learned that the first “women
members” of the British Air Transport Auxiliary “wear skirts, not trousers” and that
“even though women are doing a man’s job of work, that’s no reason why they
shouldn’t continue to look feminine” (9). The article explained that even the necessary
regulation flying suits and parachutes that women wore when flying only “improves
[their] beauty” and that, “all the same, when [they are] not in the air, [they] do pride
[them]selves on [their] appearance” (9). Such a story communicated less about the
importance of this ‘first’ for female labourers broadly, opting instead to emphasize that
these ‘women pilots’ retained their femininity. News coverage of ‘firsts’ with respect to
women’s wartime wage work highlighted women’s presence in non-traditional fields as
‘other,’ and this story framework objectified women by making a spectacle of their
entry into traditionally male-dominated labour.
4.2 Through the Male Gaze: Gendering Story Forms
Further curtailing the challenge that women’s wage labour posed to traditional publicprivate divisions, news coverage objectified female labourers, placing them on visual
display—most prominently for male readers in the general news pages. As Harvey L.
Molotch (1978) noted: The formal news business “is essentially men talking to men”
while the women’s pages “are a deliberate exception: Here it is the case that women
who work for men talk to women” (180).
185
For example, in the commercial newspapers analyzed, the general news pages
housed more than double the photographic coverage on women’s wage labour than did
the women’s pages. Of the 121 articles and photos on women’s wage labour in the
commercial and labour press, the general news pages comprised 39 per cent photos and
the women’s pages 17 per cent. More specifically, of the total photographic coverage on
women’s wage labour in the commercial newspapers analyzed (N=38), 82 per cent
occurred in the general news sections and 18 per cent in the women’s pages. By default,
photographic coverage in the labour press occurred in the general news pages because
the labour press comprised only an editorial and a general news section.
As Carolyn Byerly and Karen Ross (2006) argued, most mainstream media production
has been oriented to a male audience. Given the separate and unequal spheres of ‘his’
and ‘her’ media, as Michael S. Kimmel (2008) put it, or mainstream news versus the
women’s pages, the dominance of photos in the general news pages catered to the
presumed audience—men—and corresponded to John Berger’s argument in his 1972
book, Ways of Seeing, that, as in art, women are treated as objects of the male gaze.
Men are the spectators, surveying women’s femininity. Berger argued that this unequal
relationship is so deeply embedded in Western culture that it structures the
consciousness of many women and, as such, the ‘visual’ both reflects and perpetuates
assumptions and beliefs held within (and passed on through) Western tradition. Van
Zoonen agreed, noting that “the dominant visual economy is still organized along
traditional gender lines: men look at women, women watch themselves being looked at”
(1998: 103). Furthermore, this “traditional structure” persists because of the “patriarchal
will to maintain power”—a “will” especially pertinent in times of war (van Zoonen,
1998: 103; Goldstein, 2001).
The series of ‘War Worker’ beauty pageants commonplace throughout the Second
World War offers an example of this. These contests and the resulting news coverage
objectified women—literally put their physicality “on parade” (“Red-Headed,” Toronto
Daily Star, 1942: 3). What appeared on the surface as a public celebration of proud
‘women workers’ representing their companies and proud companies supporting their
‘women workers’ was another way to marginalize women as wage labourers by
reducing them to a spectacle—hyper-feminine objects for the male gaze—and
embodiments of wartime propaganda. Sarah Banet-Weiser described the beauty pageant
as a “highly visible performance of gender, where the disciplinary practices that
construct women as feminine are palpable, on display, and positioned as
unproblematically desirable” (1999: 3). The near full-page coverage of the 1942 Miss
War Worker and Miss Toronto pageants, which took place the same day, illustrates this.
Told alongside news from the battlefield, these articles heralded the winners (and the
‘runners up’) as role models for all ‘women workers.’ One article, “Miss War Worker
Makes Own Beauty,” describes Miss War Worker herself, Dorothy Linham, as “a pretty
19-year-old brunette” and knitter-turned-assembly line inspector at Research
Enterprises Limited who “‘eats right’ to keep healthy” and, thereby, productive on the
job. (Toronto Daily Star, 1942: 3). On the side, Linham also operated her own private
beauty parlour to “make herself pretty,” as the article proudly quoted her mother saying
(Toronto Daily Star, 1942: 3). This “beauty queen” cooks too and “looks after the
house” and her mother at the same time as she works to drive the war effort forward
(“Red-Headed,” Toronto Daily Star, 1942: 3; “Miss War Worker,” Toronto Daily Star,
1942: 3). Banet-Weiser further explained beauty pageants as “a profoundly
political arena, in the sense that the presentation and reinvention of femininity
186
that takes place on the beauty pageant stage produces political subjects” (1999: 3).
Politically, the ‘War Worker’ pageants and the ensuing news coverage subsumed
all employed women under a single, common identity—patriotic war workers who
worked outside the home solely and explicitly to further their nation’s ‘total war’ effort.
In this way, news coverage reinforced the idea that “woman’s ‘proper place’ is in the
home”—a “cornerstone of patriarchal ideology” (Nash 1982: 116)
4.3 Femininity First: Gendering News Discourse
Working in tandem with the visual objectification of women in the news was discourse
that foregrounded gender and gendered roles and, concomitantly, women’s femininity.
Foremost, the language used to describe female wage earners and their labour in the
commercial and labour newspapers analyzed placed gender (and its corresponding focus
on femininity) front and centre. Within the commercial press, 21 per cent of the 136
items about women’s wage labour used the term “worker,” most often qualifying the
term with the adjective “woman”—as in “woman worker.” In the 65 items about
women’s wage labour in the labour press, the proportion was 37 per cent. Other
descriptors also emphasized femininity and reinforced gendered roles—a proportion of
21 per cent in the commercial press and 17 per cent in the labour press. For example,
newspapers referred to female labourers as “ladies in the Air Force blue,” “girl recruits,
“plane factory beauties,” “wage-earning wi[ves]” and “war-working mothers”
(“Airwomen’s Pay,” Hamilton Spectator, 1943: 6; “Girls from West,” Toronto Daily
Star, 1942: 2; “Plane Factory,” Toronto Daily Star, 1942: 17; Dix, “Pocketbook is
Friend,” Halifax Herald, 1940: 7; “Quebec and Ontario Families,” Toronto Daily Star,
1943: 6).
As Byerly and Ross argued, media frame women in highly restricted ways that promote
“patriarchal” versions of “‘acceptable’ femininity” (2006: 50). The article “Do War Job,
Home Job, Too; Women Busy and Keep Fit: Many Women Doing Men’s Work and
Their Own Along With It” published in the women’s pages of the Apr. 27, 1943 issue
of the Toronto Daily Star further illustrates this in its discussion of how women handled
their ‘double duty’ with domestic and wage labour. The article begins: “The war
workers who make me want to stand up and cheer are the women who are successfully
putting in full time at some essential industry in addition to running their homes and
bringing up their children. Having to do double work isn’t bothering these women. It is
making them spruce up! All they want to know is how to keep fit and keep their
figures” (24). Here, the news reassured readers, again, that women would not lose their
femininity to the toils of the double duty.
The emphasis on femininity is further reflected in the sex-typing of occupations and
specific industrial tasks as either ‘male’ or ‘female’ during the Second World War,
which organized workers into a hierarchy of skilled male labour and unskilled female
labour, devaluing women’s labour and, by extension, their position in society
(Anderson, 1981; Kealey, Sangster, and Frances, 2006; Klausen, 1998; Kreimer, 2004;
Sangster, 2010; Sato, 2000; Stephen, 2000; Sugiman, 1994; Summerfield, 1984, 1985,
1998; Wilson, 2005; and Yang, 2000). Discourse on women’s workplace ability and
aptitude shifted such that discourse ‘feminized’ industrial tasks to accommodate women
in the factory without upsetting the traditional assumptions governing the sexual
division of labour and the established patterns of patriarchal authority” (Nash, 1982: 82;
Sato, 2000; Yang, 2000). Government and industry positioned ‘natural’ feminine
attributes that complemented homemaking, such as “patience” and “dexterity,”
as “special abilit[ies]” in manufacturing industries (Yang, 2000: 224;
187
Summerfield, 1998: 200). Newspapers described these ‘feminine’ attributes as an
ideal fit for the repetitive or operational tasks women were needed to perform in
manufacturing industries. As one front-page general news item that ran Nov. 27, 1942
in The Labor News, Hamilton, stated: “This war job needs the feminine touch in many
operations where deftness and delicate precision are of prime importance” (“Lace and
Frills”).
5. Conclusions
Women make history, not just play a designated role in history. Yet, just as Carolyn
Kitch (2001) argued in reference to 20th century summary journalism, journalists have
told stories in ways that “treat women as supporting rather than primary actors,” even
though women have played key roles in historical events (27). This argument takes on
particular relevance when thinking about the history of Canada’s working women
during the Second World War. Just because there was a weak discussion of the subject
of women’s labour in the wartime press and just because women were marginalized in
the stories published therein, that does not mean that women were not part of Canada’s
war story. More women joined the labour force than ever before in Canadian history.
Yet, the historical ‘record’ left by wartime newspapers did not reflect the magnitude or
political economic and social significance of women’s wartime labour. Rather, news
coverage minimized and marginalized women’s workforce participation, leaving
limited, if any, space for a broader or more progressive identity or for the possibility of
social change in the direction of women’s equality. Newspapers told a story that
confined women to the margins of history. As Michelle Hilmes wrote: “It is history
writing that has consigned women to the sidelines, not historical events themselves”
(1997: 132).
News media, operating within a patriarchal milieu, make “representational and narrative
choices in reporting” that tell a particular history (Kitch, 2001: 15). In the case of this
study, news media marginalized and excluded women’s part in history. Gender served
as a filter through which to communicate news of women’s wage labour. History told
from this perspective, then, does women’s history a disservice because news media
already structured women into gendered roles and so historical research based on such
media risks doing the same—that is, reinforcing dominant patriarchal perceptions of
women by replicating a gendered division of labour.
This paper demonstrates the significance of gender for understanding how news media
cover the subject of women’s wage labour and, in the process, it offers feminist media
and media history scholars a way of thinking about women’s history and, more
specifically, the historical relationship between news media and women, that goes
beyond dominant constructions of the ‘domestic’ to understand women’s wage labour
as a provocation to these historical gendered, public-private divisions.
Future research can strive to capture a broader and more progressive historical picture
of women’s experiences as labourers in Canada, including women of different races and
socioeconomic backgrounds. Studies may analyze news media sources geared to
women, such as working-class publications or trade union newsletters, to assess
whether these are vehicles of women’s oppression or whether they offer any real publicsphere possibilities. Another avenue for future research could probe at how women
viewed their own labour within the broader social context of the time.
Stories remain untold and, with that, so too does history. As Kitch wrote: “If news is the
first draft of history, then, … history is the last draft of news” (2001: 14). Applying
these words, then, historians today have an opportunity to write about women’s history
in a way that revises or reshapes or broadens that history—in a way that honours
this time in women’s lives and history.
188
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ABSTRACTS
193
ANTI-VIOLENCE INITIATIVES IN EUROPE: A COMPARATIVE
STUDY ON VISUAL DISCOURSE TO END GENDER-BASED VIOLENCE
IN AUSTRIA AND SPAIN
Birgit Wolf
Univeristy Krems, Austria
wolf.birgit@a1.net
Considering the efforts to resolve the widespread societal phenomenon violence against
women, information, awareness raising and the role of the media comprise one of the
key targets by the most important conventions and declarations to overcome it. The
women’s anti-violence movement, manifesting through initiatives by governmental
institutions, NGOs and individual activists, has made essential contributions to the
recognition of violence against women as a human rights violation, and is a crucial
player in the field of prevention and awareness raising issues. Information and
awareness raising about the social roots and complex contexts of the specific issue of
male-to-female intimate partner violence constitutes a core target for primary violence
prevention. However, its representation in the media and (audio)visual discourse
remains an under-researched and fragmented subject, especially if it comes to
contributions by the anti-violence initiatives. Therefore, this paper (based on Wolf
2013) aims to disclose the research gap by analysing how anti-violence initiatives are
creating social meaning on male-to-female partner violence. The results are expected to
contribute new findings to the field of feminist research and gender studies as well as
provide detailed insights about the information practices by the anti-violence women’s
movement.
Looking at the media representations in general, we can observe how different
programmes and formats are depicting rather similar (visual) narratives of clichéd
imagination on intimate partner violence, whereas the systemic nature of the problem
mostly remains hidden (Bonilla Campos 2008; Boyle 2005; Geiger 2008; Lopez Diéz
2005; Taylor 2009). This means that media discourse reconstructs stereotypes, effects of
re-victimisation and obscures the social roots and complex dimensions of gender-based
violence. Moreover, the landscape of visual culture seems a harbinger of normalised
symbolic violence against women (Bernadez et al. 2008, Boyle 2005; Carter and
Weaver 2003, DeKeseredy 2011, Eiter 2006, Selva and Solá 2003, Richards et.al 2011,
Wheeler 2009). Evidently, the visual of gender-based violence as such constitutes a
crucial account of discursively created social meaning maintaining normalised symbolic
violence. Hence, considering this lack and ambiguousness of mainstream media in
knowledge transfer about the complex societal issue, it is important to explore if there
are alternative contributions to visual discourse, as for instance through the antiviolence women’s movements. Thus, I analysed the (audio) visual discourse of antiviolence initiatives dedicated to prevent and end male-to-female intimate partner
violence.
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Based on theoretical framework for comprehending the direct, structural, symbolic
and discursive dimensions of intimate partner violence (Abramsky et al. 2011, Barnett
et al. 2011, DeKeseredy and Schwartz 2011, Pence and Paymar 1993, Galtung 1990,
1996, Bourdieu 2001), I contextualised the very issue with visual culture applying a
feminist and dispositive perspective (Berger 2010, Català 2005, Deleuze 1989, Foucault
1980, Jones 2010, Silverman 1992, 1996, McLaren 2007). Defining visual discourse of
anti-violence against women initiatives on the country level of Austria and Spain as
well as on the pan-European level as my research object, I tackle the questions of how
anti-violence against women initiatives shape the comprehension of intimate partner
violence with their contributions and which differences and communalities can be
identified? Establishing a mixed method approach for visual discourse analyses (Jäger
and Maier 2009, Rose 2001), I examined the (audio) visual material of the main antiviolence initiatives in Austria and Spain, as well as European-wide campaigns from
2007 to 2011 (Wolf 2013). The results show the core tendencies of the visualised
discursive arrangements displayed through the (audio)visual material provided by the
anti-violence movement.
The major part of the visual material shows victimising images, silencing the respective
women, many of them individualising the social problem. From the results we can
conclude that intimate partner violence is represented as a ‘women’s issue’, which is
mainly true for Austria and the European-wide initiatives, which fail to offer
contextualisation and visions towards the ‘beyond’ of gender-based violence, but rather
stuck in the actual situation. Good practices we can find in Spain. Spanish initiatives
mostly show contextualising depictions of (potential) victims or survivors, pointing
beyond the individual dimension, and – most important – they establish male-to-female
intimate partner violence as a societal problem. Concluding, I advocate for further
research to reflect on the creation of meaning as there is an urgent necessity to centre on
transformation and social change as well as to constitute constellations beyond violence
and increase the shaping of transitory visions.
Keywords: violence against women, gender-based violence, visual discourse,
communication, representation, violence prevention
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TELLING THE TRUTH ABOUT MEDIA AND GENDER EQUALITY
Mariapia Ciaghi
Journalist and Filmmaker
The starting point for our discussion is the importance of the role played by
communication in achieving a culture of substantive equality.
The different means of communication transmit the dominant models of reference for
the collective imagination, implanting, on a daily basis, overriding stereotypes of
women as well as men. Recent studies (Libro Bianco Donne e Media [Woman and
Media]) have in particular revealed that the depiction of women by the Italian media is
neither realistic nor plural, but rather it is disrespectful of a woman’s dignity and
clichéd, with the risk of entrenching male and female roles and reinforcing those
discriminations that already exist. As reported in Lorella Zanardo’s documentary “il
Corpo delle Donne” (the women’s body), watched by almost 6 million people, we often
see vulgar images on TV where a woman's body is the object of sexual desire,
something to be consumed and seduced. There appears to be no space for real women,
those who work, study and are culturally and socially committed: what is missing is a
well-rounded portrayal of the female universe.
The process put forward can be viewed as part of an established process of
democratisation, inclusion and respect for pluralities and differences, with the aim of
identifying communication as a factor for change in the managing of relationships
within organisations and outside of them.
Another point I would like to highlight is the issue of language: the Italian language is
often used to put across a male chauvinist and asymmetrical vision of the world. But
words can often become walls or bridges; they can create disparities or help in the
understanding of problems. When communication occurs what is required is accuracy
and knowledge of the meaning and significance of words. What gender of language do
we speak:
Italian is a sexed language that differentiates between male and female and can interpret
words on the basis of gender. The problem of gender emerges in particular when one is
speaking of professional roles.
The issue has been repeatedly discussed in official and other types of documents, but
manuals on style that invite people to avoid the use of sexist language, offering
suggestions for a linguistic equality, intended as equal opportunities for women and
men being appointed, and to use the language to avoid belittling one of the genders with
words.
As far back as 1987 Alma Sabatini published a document for the Prime Minister’s
Office – Ministry for Equal Opportunities entitled “Recommendations for a non-sexist
use of the Italian language” in which people were invited to use words such as ministra
(woman minister), chirurga (woman surgeon), rettrice (woman rector), procuratrice
(woman prosecutor), avvocata (woman lawyer) and so on. Some people object because
they say it is superfluous, of secondary importance. However the form is the extension
of the content and the style is not just a matter of aesthetics, it is also one of ethics. The
use of particular words conditions the interpretation and way of thinking; experimental
studies of psycholinguistics have demonstrated just this: “the use of the generic male
conjures up male images and is therefore neither generic nor neutral” (Orsola Fornara).
Therefore, if I say: the magistrati (magistrates), the architetti (architects), I am not
referring to women and men, but men. Changing the words also means slowly
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changing the thoughts associated with them.
During a press conference held shortly after her appointment as Chancellor, the
journalists addressed Angela Merkel as Cancelliere (the male equivalent in Italian of
Chancellor) and she invited them to address her as Cancelliera (the female equivalent
in Italian of Chancellor). At that point some of them replied: “but female Chancellor
does not exist!” and she in turn replied: “but as of now it does, because I am precisely
that”.
The aspiration is therefore that of activating a number of spaces for reflecting and
creating an awareness of the importance of the use of the language, of images and of all
those means of communication that are geared towards the respect and enhancement of
different genders.
Different resolutions and directives from the European Union have highlighted that in
the course of carrying out their work the means of communication must contribute to
this change in mentality in order to bring about substantive equality between women
and men. They have appealed for a stop to the use of images that endorse or exacerbate
the situation of discrimination that already exists, but to promote, through means of
communication and advertising a genuine depiction of the today’s woman at work and
with roles of responsibility.
I emphasise the importance of promoting a diversified and realistic image of the
possibilities and attitudes of women and men within society.
I’d like to close by quoting Ursula Doleschal: “In order for women to be more present
in the collective conscience, being represented in more equal terms compared to men,
we have to render them visible, therefore the feminisation of the issue is the only way to
obtain such a conscience”.
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