G A Z E

            The male gaze is the eye through which life for the modern day American and many other cultures around the world are perceived.  The stereotypical heterosexual male is the target audience for all media where female characters are overtly sexualized and undermined by the male presence.  It is the typical form in popular culture because most of the power players behind the scenes that control the media are heterosexual males This perception has become the norm in the industry, so much so that women have accepted it (Click to see the status of women in media http://wmc.3cdn.net/6dd3de8ca65852dbd4_fjm6yck9o.pdf). This blind acceptance of women's objectification by women themselves is followed by many consequences for women internally, as John Berger describes, "A woman must continually watch herself. She is almost continually accompanied by her own image of herself." As we become more aware of the forces making women accepting of the belief that the objectification of women is the norm, we begin to fight back against being trapped in a man’s world by beginning to be more critical of the world around us and not just critical of ourselves.

A parody (but pretty realistic view of the relationship between men
and women back then) of a woman's relationship to a man
from the perspective of a heterosexual man.

            The male gaze has been pervasive in our culture for centuries even before the media was as widespread as it is today. Author Laura Mulvey writes about artist Marie-Guiihelmine Benoist’s painting in 1800 named Portrait of a Negress featuring a somewhat half naked woman and its male gaze connotations: “…man’s social and political equal – yet her naked breast and naked hands, nevertheless, display the Black female body as evidently available to a male gaze”. This speaks to the concept of women being constantly watched by men and being seen as nothing more than her body. This standard for women is constantly maintained not only by men, but also by other women judging others like her. It is almost like a brainwashing system that girls internalize from a young age, and believe is their duty to fulfill the norms of a woman set by man. 

The oppositional gaze is similar to the male gaze in that it is the perspective of the ‘other’. In the case of oppositional gaze, the focus is more on race and cultural differences between the norms and ‘other’, as opposed to gender. This phenomenon has been more pronounced in popular culture for African Americans. The typical negative portrayal of African Americans in the media continues to force the race disparity to widen. This type of gaze can be used as a weapon to combat these effects as described by Hooks when writing, “Looking at films with an oppositional gaze, black women were able to critically assess the cinema’s construction of white womanhood as object of phallocentric gaze and choose not to identify with either the victim or the perpetrator.” Identification is a strong part of the media. To be an engaged audience, many tend to identify with characters on the screen, entertaining themselves, but also picking up values and lessons on how to act in the real world as they watch. They are forcing themselves to live up to a fictional characters' standards. When women stop trying to identify with the made up characters, and the fictitious ways that we should act, we are combatting our oppositional gaze to turn away from the cage that continues to enslave us. The same is also true for the standards given to men by the media on how to act like an appropriate heterosexual man.

     

Bell Hooks traces back time to when she believes the gaze originated. Hooks begins at slavery where white slave-owners punished African American slaves for simply looking. The literal gaze taught African Americans not to look and it moved over into parenting where children were taught not to look as a connotation of having manners. The oppositional gaze of not looking was transformed with media.

When most black people in the United States first had the opportunity to look at film and television, they did so fully aware that mass media was a system of knowledge and power reproducing and maintaining white supremacy. To stare at the television, or mainstream movies, to engage its images, was to engage its negation of black representation. It was the oppositional black gaze that responded to these looking relations by developing independent black cinema. (Hooks, 117)

Cartoon showing that feminism does not
exist for the sake of pushing the idea that
women are better than men, but that
we should work together
towards equality.

            Hooks speaks a lot about viewing the media critically as a part of the oppositional gaze. After this class I have truly been critical of the things I watch to get to the root meaning of what it is that I am watching. Now as I watch my shows and see racial and gender offensive undertones, I wonder who wrote the script, who was in the room and approved, and why am I as a woman in the audience so accepting of it. The structure put in place today is set up in such a way that the heterosexual white male is always on top.  The worst part, and the seemingly consequential part, is when society reflects the disparity and discrimination of the media world. It is best to stay out of Hollywood and start looking at the issues in the real world in a deeper context than just the surface, and bring men along for the cause. By acting ignorant of the injustices before me, I am supporting the belief that women are solely sexual objects, and I am supporting the fact that the world should accept me as a second-class citizen.

Work's Cited

Berger, John. "Ways of Seeing." 1972. 45-64.

Hooks, Bell. "The Oppositional Gaze: Black Female Spectators." Black Looks : Race and Representation. 115-130.

Mulvey, Laura. "Author/Auteur: Feminist Literary Theory and Feminist Film." Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. 90-110.