Take a minute to think about how much media you are exposed to in one day—from watching television and movies and cruising the internet to reading newspapers, books, and magazines and listening to music or watching music videos. Does anyone in your family play video games? The majority of this media is produced by corporations and infused with advertisements.

Television

According to the Nielsen Company—a marketing corporation that collects statistics on media usage—report, the average American ages “18 to 34 spent two hours and 45 minutes daily watching live TV in the Fourth Quarter of 2015, and one hour and 23 minutes using TV-connected devices—a total of four hours and 8 minutes using a TV set for any purpose” (Nielsen Company, 2016). The pervasiveness of media in culture begs a number of questions: what are the effects of such an overwhelming amount of exposure to media that is often saturated with advertisements? How do media construct or perpetuate gendered, sexualized, classed, ableized, and racialized differences and inequalities? What is the relationship between media and consumers, and how do consumers interact with media?

Media expert and sociologist Michael Kimmel argues that the media are a primary institution of socialization that not only reflects but creates culture. Media representation is a key domain for identity formation and the creation of gendered and sexualized differences (Kimmel, 2003). For example, think back to Disney movies you were probably shown as a child. The plots of these movies typically feature a dominant young man—a prince, a colonial ship captain, a soldier—who is romantically interested in a young woman—both are always assumed to be heterosexual—who at first resists the advances of the young man, but eventually falls in love with him and marries him.

Disney movies teach children a great deal about gender and sexuality; specifically, they teach children to value hegemonic masculinity and emphasize femininity. Hegemonic masculinity refers to a specific type of culturally valued masculinity tied to marriage and heterosexuality and patriarchal authority in the family and workplace and maintains its privileged position through subordinating other less dominant forms of masculinity (i.e., dominance over men of lower socioeconomic classes or gay men). Emphasized femininity, meanwhile, refers to compliance with the normative ideal of femininity, as it is oriented to serving the interests of men (Connell, 1987).

What do Disney movies have to do with how people actually live their lives? It is because they are fictional, so pervasive in our culture, and shown to us at such a young age that they may shape our gendered and sexualized selves in ways that we do not even realize. How many times have you heard people say that they want a “fairy tale wedding” or heard the media refer to a celebrity wedding as a “fairy tale wedding?” This is one example of how the media reproduces dominant ideologies—the ideas, attitudes, and values of the dominant culture—about gender and sexuality.

Media also reproduce racialized and gendered normative standards in the form of beauty ideals for both women and men. As Jean Kilbourne’s video series Killing Us Softly illustrates, representations of women in advertising, film, and magazines often rely on the objectification of women—cutting apart their bodies with the camera frame and recrafting their bodies through digital manipulation in order to create feminized bodies with characteristics that are largely unattainable by the majority of the population. Kilbourne shows how advertising often values the body types and features of White women—having petite figures and European facial features—while exoticizing women of color by putting them in nature scenes and animal-print clothing that are intended to recall a pre-civilizational past. The effect of this is to cast women of color as animalistic, savage creatures—a practice that has historically been used in political cartoons and depictions of POC to legitimize their subjugation as less than human.

In addition, the media depict the world from a masculine point of view, representing women as sex objects. This kind of framing, what Laura Mulvey called the male gaze, encourages male viewers to see women as objects and encourages women to see themselves as objects of men’s desire; the male gaze is thus a heterosexual male gaze. These are just a couple of examples of how media simultaneously reflects and constructs differences in power between social groups in society by representing those groups.

Another way in which media reflect and simultaneously produce power differences between social groups is through symbolic annihilation. Symbolic annihilation refers to how social groups that lack power in society are rendered absent, condemned, or trivialized through mass media representations that simultaneously reinforce dominant ideologies and the privilege of dominant groups. For example, as we argued earlier, gay, lesbian, transgender, and disabled characters in mass media are often few and far between, and when they are present, they are typically stereotyped and misrepresented.

While Kilbourne’s insights illustrate how beauty ideals produce damaging effects on women and girls, her model of how consumers relate to media suggests that the consumers are passively accepting everything they see in advertising and electronic and print media. As Kimmel argues, “The question is…how the media and its consumers interact to create the varying meanings that derive from our interactions with those media” (Kimmel 2003: 238). No advertisement, movie, or any form of media has an inherent, intended meaning that passes directly from the producer of that media to the consumer of it, but consumers interact with, critique, and sometimes reject the intended messages of media. In this way, the meanings of media develop through the interaction between the media product and the consumers who are interacting with it.

Furthermore, media consumers can blur the distinction between producer and consumer by creating their own media in the form of videos, music, pamphlets, zines, and other creations. Therefore, while media certainly often reproduce dominant ideologies and normative standards, media consumers from different standpoints can and do modify and reject the intended meanings of media.

Film

Another visual medium, film, is a part of many families’ daily lives. Mainstream movies are accessible to Americans via many formats. Although women and POC are represented in audiences in greater percentages than their population base, they are vastly underrepresented in lead roles both on and off-screen. In 2018, only one female, Greta Gerwig, and one person of color, Jordan Peele, were nominated for Best Director in the Oscars award show. In an analysis of speaking roles for women in the 900 most popular films from 2007 to 2016, fewer than one-third of the roles went to women. Representation is worse for nonbinary people, and when intersectionality of color and gender are examined (Tan, 2018).

When children watch a movie, they are exposed to a variety of people. What most of these actors and actresses have in common is that they are White. As of 2017, only 20% of all lead actors and actresses on screen were POC (Statista, 2020). To the children watching these movies, White people are the majority demographic being represented.

In one study, researchers found that when preschoolers were asked to draw a main character from a fairy tale, most of the students drew a figure with blonde hair and light skin. The findings imply that children, even those of color, saw that White skin meant a happy ending (Hurley, 2005). In their minds, only blond people with White skin were allowed to save the day and be stars.

When movies such as Home, Black Panther, or Crazy Rich Asians came out, POC flocked to see them. These movies lack obvious stereotypes, and POC play leading roles. Movies with successful POC are important because these movies challenge the idea that White culture is the norm. When movies feature POC, parents have the chance to show their children a main character with the same skin color or hair type as their own.

Representation in movies also pertains to how the characters are portrayed. Do they follow common, sometimes derogatory, stereotypes? Are they seen as the villain? Are they the first to be killed? When POC are being represented through stereotypes or typecasting (when a person is repeatedly cast for the same type of character, usually based on looks), it sheds a negative light on those people, even if the film has a more diverse cast.

In March 2020, The Washington Post Magazine featured a project in which actors of minoritized groups were asked what kind of roles they typically were cast in and what kind of roles they would like to play (Sakaguchi & San Martin, 2020). This powerful series emphasizes how easily stereotypes can be embedded in our minds. You can see Haruka Sakaguchi & Griselda San Martin’s full photography series at the Typecast Project.

Typecasting people contributes to the reinforcement of stereotypes of POC and other minoritized groups; it emphasizes the centrality of White people both as the norm and as the keepers of interesting plot lines and life stories.

Video Games

Video games are a form of visual media used by families, and the representation shown in games can have an influence on those who play them. Teens are a big share of the market; 72% of teens play video games, with 84% of them being boys and 59% being girls (Anderson, n.d.) In addition, 83% of Black teens play video games, while White teens are at 71% and 69% of Latine teens play. Despite Black teens being in the majority of those who play video games, they also tend to be one of the least represented in video games. The same could be said for Latine teens as well. Video games have a history of marginalized groups being portrayed poorly in games. Not all representation is good representation, so when there is a character from a marginalized group in a game, it doesn’t mean they are being represented well. Many video games have had characters who are packed with offensive stereotypes and tropes, while women are sexualized (Leveling up representation: Depictions of POC in video games | pbs. n.d.) Having only this type of representation can be harmful, especially for children, who may play a game in an isolated space, as shown in figure 12.21.

Dr. Katryna Starks, a media psychologist and game design teacher, notes how characters in video games can have an impact on gamers’ social cognition and strengthen your feeling of social support and identity. When these characters are being represented negatively, it can cause lots of harm for both people within marginalized groups and for society in general. As Dr. Starks says, “Black kids aren’t seeing themselves as the heroes. They don’t see themselves solving problems and wearing capes. We deserve to feel that these gaming worlds were made for us to be in, too, and that we belong there.” Characters in games can help shape your identity, so seeing people like you be represented poorly or just not represented at all can really cause damage to how you view yourself (Shliakhovchuk & Muñoz, 2020). Video games full of stereotypes and biases have the power to change or reinforce a player’s worldview. This causes implicit bias—a bias that occurs unconsciously. This is why it is so important for gamers to critically evaluate the games they play and the influence it has on them.

Another issue when it comes to representation in video games is the lack of customization options for characters in games. Many games give you the option to design your own character but include very few options for designing POC. Sometimes they do have Black hairstyles, but they aren’t designed in a very accurate way. Many gamers even create their own hairstyles. For example, the modding community for The Sims is huge and is one of the only places gamers can find hairstyles and skin tones that are more accurate to POC.

So why is good representation lacking in video games? One of the main reasons is the people working on these games. There are 428,000 jobs in the video game industry nationwide. However, only 2% of the professionals in this industry are Black (Toulon). Latoya Peterson, co-founder of Glow Up Games based in Brooklyn, New York, knows firsthand the type of barriers Black-owned startups face in the video game industry. When pitching to investors for funding for her game about the award-winning show Insecure, being developed by a women-led team, she had no success. Despite being backed by HBO, they were still being told, “We don’t think we can help you.” Mentors, family, and friends did end up stepping up for them, along with Techstars, a program that accelerates startups, the game was made, as shown in figure 12.22.

While there is still work to be done, there have been some recent developments that provide hope that representation is getting better in video games. For example, the Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales game developed by Insomniac games, and Nixxes Software made for PlayStation was praised for its representation. In this game, you play as Miles Morales, a biracial Black and Puerto Rican teenager, on his journey to becoming Spider-Man and a hero. Jorge Castro, a YouTube gamer, cried as he watched the trailer for this game, saying, “It’s awesome to see my heritage, part of my heritage, being on display with a character that I love.”

Transgender and nonbinary people have found gaming to be an exploratory space for identity, first by taking on a different identity than assigned at birth while in the gaming world. However, more recent developments in gaming give players more freedom to choose their pronouns, shape their bodies, and select vocal ranges. Visual avatars are more unique and representative of diverse identities. Interviews with more than a dozen nonbinary and transgender gamers revealed that the wide range of tools that can be used to create a character’s appearance, as well as a virtual reality that accepts those changes, makes gaming a safe solace to explore queer identities (Small, 2023).

The good news is that there are more choices that better represent the social identities of all groups. Parents can be involved in making the choices for the games their children play. Trends show that more parents are previewing video games before they are purchased. In fact, 78% of parents say that they make all or most of the decisions, and 17% say that they decide on the games with their children (Vance, 2022). If you were a parent, what would you do? Would it be different depending on your child’s age? Consider how discussing this with your children might build skills and knowledge about evaluating games from various lenses.

If you would like to explore the topic of representation in media more deeply, check out the Representation and Humanization video and activity, which focuses on the representation of transgender people in television, film, and other media in the “Going Deeper” section.

Comprehension Self Check

Licenses and Attributions for Television, Film, and Video Games

Open Content, Original

“Film” by Elizabeth B. Pearce, Jessica N. Hampton, Hannah Morelos, and Katie Niemeyer. License: CC BY 4.0.

“Video Games” by Emily Miller and Elizabeth B. Pearce. License: CC BY 4.0.

Open Content, Shared Previously

“Television” is adapted from “Media” in Introduction to Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies by Miliann Kang, Donovan Lessard, and Laura Heston, UMass Amherst Libraries. License: CC BY 4.0. Adaptations: light editing for clarity and topic focus; addition of activity and media.

Figure 12.21. “Man in black shirt using computer” by Ralston Smith on Unsplash. License: Unsplash License.

All Rights Reserved Content

Figure 12.22. “Insecure: The Come Up Game” by Owen Bell. License: Fair Use.

References

Anderson, M. (n.d.). Views on gaming differ by race, ethnicity. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2015/12/17/views-on-gaming-differ-by-race-ethnicity/

Bettcher, T. M. (2007). Evil deceivers and make-believers: On transphobic violence and the politics of illusion. Hypatia, 22(3), 43-65.

Connell. R.W. (1987). Gender and Power: Society, the Person, and Sexual Politics. Stanford University Press.

Dornieden, N. (2020, December 22). Leveling up representation: Depictions of people of color in video games. Independent Lens. https://www.pbs.org/independentlens/blog/leveling-up-representation-depictions-of-people-of-color-in-video-games/

Hurley, D. L. (2005). Seeing white: Children of color and the Disney fairy tale princess. The Journal of Negro Education, 74(3), 221–232.

Kimmel, M. (2003). The Gendered Media. In The Gendered Society (2nd edition). Oxford University Press.

Nielsen Company. (2016). The Total Audience Report: Q4 2015. http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/reports/2016/the-total-audience-report-q4-2015.html. Accessed 31 March, 2017.

Sakaguchi, H. & San Martin, G. (2020, March 4). How Hollywood sees me…and how I want to be seen. Washington Post Magazine. https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2020/03/04/actors-color-often-get-typecast-two-photographers-asked-them-depict-their-dream-roles-instead/

Shliakhovchuk, E., & Muñoz García, A. (2020). Intercultural Perspective on Impact of Video Games on Players: Insights from a Systematic Review of Recent Literature. Educational Sciences: Theory and Practice, 20(1), 40-58.

Small, Z. (2023, December 27). Video games let them choose a role. Their transgender identities flourished. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/27/arts/transgender-nonbinary-gamers.html

Statista. (2020, February 17). Ethnicity of lead actors in movies in the U.S. 2019. https://www.statista.com/statistics/696850/lead-actors-films-ethnicity/

Tan, S. (2018, February 28). This year’s Oscar nominees are more diverse, but has Hollywood really changed? Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/entertainment/diversity-in-films/

Vance, P. E. (2022, September 28). Parents press start to help pick appropriate video games. https://www.esrb.org/blog/parents-press-start-to-help-pick-appropriate-video-games/