Representation Of Gender In Womens Magazines.

"Women And The Medias Diverse Perspectives" By Theresa Cahill, Jane Campbell.

Key Quotes

• "The sexual objectification of women in advertising is frequently achieved by exploiting their sexuality , or by fragmenting the female body into eroticised zones such as hair, face, legs, breasts etc."
• "Mills (1995) reminds us that the fragmentation of womens bodies has two main effects; (a) the body becomes depersonalised, objectified and reduced to its parts and (b) since the female model in the commercial is not represented as a unified conscious living being, the scene cannot be given from her perspective."

- These quotes show the representation of how a woman is seen as an object and ornament in the magazines rather than an actual human being.  Their body parts become their personality within the magazine, people base their opinions and judgements of the model on how their body shape and appearance is rather than their personality. -

• Kuhn (1985) - "Whenever we look at painted, drawn, sculpted or photographed images of women it is important to remind ourselves that the image of women have traditionally been the province or property of men." 
• Coward (1985) - "women have to beautify themselves and make themselves all the more desirable and "siren-like" to catch mens attention."
• "The female is objectified for the male gaze."

- Women are shown in the mans ideal image of how a woman should look like for the male gaze. Women are judged on how men value and rate their image, a good image is how they will attract men. A womans reputation and status revolves around a mans perception on how he rates their aesthetic appearance. 

• "Many feminist critics argue that a womans self-consciousness is created through the complex interaction between women and the media" 

-Many women feel pressured by the images in magazines and feel a sense of self-worthlessness if they do not look similar to the models or have the same physique. Become self-conscious if they do not look like the women in the magazines believing they are not beautiful. Women's appearance becomes the most important thing to them, representation that a woman is an ornament to look at.

• John Berger (1975) - "Men act and women appear. Women watch themselves being looked at. This determines not only most relations between men and women but also the relation of women to themselves. Women turn themselves into an object and particularly an object of vision." 
• Laura Mulvey (1975) - "In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has said to been split between active/male and passive/female. The determining male gaze projects its fantasy on to the female figure which is styled accordingly. Women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so they can be said to connote "to-be-looked-at-ness". 

- Women are an object and used to be looked at rather than an actual human being. they are passive and believe that they are meant to be looked at resulting in them taking so much pride in their appearance.