COMU2150 Media And Identity 3
Mar 13,23Question:
Task Description:
Choose one of the following options as the focus of your analysis:
Option One
As we discussed in week 2 of the course, Michel Foucault proposes that systems of social order and control are exercised through four major types of ‘technology’: 1. technologies of production, 2. technologies of sign systems, 3. technologies of power, and 4. technologies of the self. Of these, Foucault was most concerned with the latter two: technologies of power, which externally regulate the way individuals conduct themselves, and technologies of the self, which have to do with how people control themselves (their bodies, thoughts, and actions) through internal practices of self-monitoring, self-scrutiny, and self-regulation. As Foucault states, technologies of the self “permit individuals to effect by their own means, or with the help of others, a certain number of operations on their own bodies and souls, thoughts, conduct, and way of being, so as to transform themselves in order to attain a certain state of happiness, purity, wisdom, perfection, or immorality” (Foucault, Technologies of the Self, 225).
Choose a lifestyle influencer who has a prominent digital media presence a case study. Critically analyse your case study (their website, Tumblr, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube posts etc) in relation to technologies of the self. You might pick a health and fitness influencer like Emily Skye or Cameron Byrnes, a food and lifestyle influencer such as Hayden Quinn, a fashion and beauty influencer like Akanksha Redhu, or some other kind of lifestyle influencer depending on your own interests (as long as they are relevant to technologies of the self).
Option Two
Expanding on Simone de Beauvoir’s assertion that “one is not born, but, rather, becomes a woman” (de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 27), Judith Butler maintains that gender differences are not biological or natural, instead they are socially constructed. In other words, gender identity is tenuously instituted over time through the stylised repetition of bodily gestures, movements, and enactments, which work together to create the illusion that gendered identity is natural and stable. As Butler states, gender is “a constructed identity, a performative accomplishment […] the stylised repetition of acts over time, and not a seamless identity” (Butler, Performative Acts, 520). These gendered performances are acted out in accordance with dominant ideals and discourses, which provide a framework for our activities.
In week four we explored Butler’s theories of gender performativity in relation to the construction of celebrity identity, but how do these accounts influence everyday life? Examine scholarly material on gender identity presented in the course so far in relation to your own social media presence. You may choose to focus on selfies and other images that you post on a single platform such as Instagram, or you might like to take a multimedia approach. Either way, you should provide a close critical analysis of a sample of relevant images/texts. Remember, though you are using your own social media identity as the object of analysis, you will still need to maintain a critical scholarly approach.
Answer:
Introduction
How Gender Difference Influence the Everyday Life
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Table of Contents
Introduction. 3
Main discussion. 3
Conclusion. 6
Reference list 7
Introduction
Gender difference and gender inequality plays a vital role in various sectors of society. In a workplace, it is one of the burning questions that can create various kinds of discrimination in society. That is the reason the subject of gender difference can influence the daily works in many ways. In the modern world, everyone talks about providing equal rights of male and female. Moreover, most of the time it is found absent. Especially, for the celebrity people who are active in various social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and many more. Thus the daily life and daily activities are influenced in many ways. This is going to be described here briefly.
Main discussion
A gender difference mainly represents the differences between a male or a female person. It can indicate the actual differences between the genders. As the male and the female maintains different shapes of body along with some ability of work so a clear differences can be seen. The gender mainly indicates the social as well as the behavioural ways that are related with a male and a female. Many scholars and experts have presented different types of opinions and theories about gender differences. Some scholars say that gender differences are biological and it is a natural course of human beings (Falk & Hermle, 2018). On the other hand, some scholars disagree these statements. They feel that this statement is not right. Among them Sir Judith Butler feels that this kind of statements for gender differences is wrong. He said that the difference of various genders is not biological. Even it is not natural also. The differences of various genders are created socially by the human beings of society. On the contrary, the identity of gender is constructed over the period of time by using various stylish repetitions of body gestures, the movement of body, enactments and many more.
Figure 1: The image of gender difference
Source: (Jin et al., 2020)
These elements work together in order to create a seamless identity for the workplace. These provide a particular framework for the activities. That is the reason Sir Judith Butler presented a theory of gender performativity that helps to celebrate the identity of the gender (Jin et al., 2020). In the theory of gender performativity, Sir Judith Butler presented that the identity of gender can be destabilized. He said that the gender should be identified by the notion of performance. He presented that various kinds of norms are available that helps to identify the gender. For example, the relationships, the desires, the interests, different types of taste, way of speaking, way of dressing, linking with the opposite sex and many more can help in order to identify the gender of a person. All the things can be translated on the construction of the body. It can help to identify the dominance of the gender also. Sir Judith Butler again said that people live as men or women that are the internal reality of those people (Jung & Lee, 2020). However, various kinds of behaviours are available that can help to create the gender. For instance, the style of acting, the style of speaking, the style of dressing and many more that can create an impression of being a male or being a female person.
However, various kinds of gender differences can be seen in various social media platforms also. According to many scholars, the differences of gender are rooted deeply into the culture. Various human beings in mass media and social media platforms not only provides information and various entertainment but they can affect the lifestyle of other people also. they shapes their statements, beliefs and attitudes for others so that it helps to control the social lifestyle of other people by transferring various hegemonic ideology by using various invisible way. For example, in order to gender portrayals, other people of society establish hegemony of men by creating dominance of male over the female. Various kinds of gender representation of social media all over the world, involves the steroytypical portrayals of the form of masculinity and the form of feminity. Here it is found that masculinity mainly refers to the male. On the other hand, the feminity refers to the female activities. The body of male is essentialized in the cultural programs for different types of certain traits. The traits help to characterize the maleness or the masculinity. On the other hand, the feminity is also culturally created that is based on the shape of the body of a female. That is how the concept of masculinity and the concept of femininity are created culturally (Warner-Søderholm et al., 2018). It mainly signifies the differences that are created socially between the male and the female. However, many scholars argue that this type of gender differences is based on the concept of biology. However, as it is an age of social media platforms and the internet so various media is reinforcing the definition of gender stereotyping by using its content. Here, women in various social media platforms can portray a stereotypes in various social media platforms.
Figure 2: The image of gender difference in social media platforms
Source: (Thorisdottir et al., 2019)
As it is an age of the internet so the sector of communication studies are gone under massive changes. Nowadays, one way of sender dominated channels are transformed into two ways feedback oriented (Thorisdottir et al., 2019). New media and various social media platforms are started changing the scenarios in almost every aspect of communication as well as the livelihood. As the technologies are very much advanced nowadays so these kinds of changes has been seen slowly but easily and steadily.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it can be said that differences of genders are almost gone from various social media platforms. New social media platforms are carrying various participatory culture nowadays by using various kinds of media contents. The platforms are also expected to introduce various kinds of changes that can influence the role of gender. It is representing nowadays in various methods over the social media platforms. As the social media platforms allow various kinds of information delivery so constant engagement as well as continuous dialogue is necessary to discourage gender differences.
Reference list
Falk, A., & Hermle, J. (2018). Relationship of gender differences in preferences to economic development and gender equality. Science, 362(6412). DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aas9899
Jin, J. M., Bai, P., He, W., Wu, F., Liu, X. F., Han, D. M., … & Yang, J. K. (2020). Gender differences in patients with COVID-19: focus on severity and mortality. Frontiers in public health, 8, 152. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2020.00152
Jung, Y., & Lee, Y. (2020). An analysis of gender images of fashion style in BTS music videos using Judith Butler’s performativity theory. Journal of Fashion Business, 24(1), 88-101. DOI: https://doi.org/10.12940/jfb.2020.24.1.88
Thorisdottir, I. E., Sigurvinsdottir, R., Asgeirsdottir, B. B., Allegrante, J. P., & Sigfusdottir, I. D. (2019). Active and passive social media use and symptoms of anxiety and depressed mood among Icelandic adolescents. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 22(8), 535-542. Retrieved from: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11815/2038
Warner-Søderholm, G., Bertsch, A., Sawe, E., Lee, D., Wolfe, T., Meyer, J., … & Fatilua, U. N. (2018). Who trusts social media?. Computers in human behavior, 81, 303-315. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2017.12.026
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