The Gaps Between Groups

Beginning at a very young age, media representations of men and women and masculinity and femininity construct social norms of gender roles and create our perceptions of what is 'masculine' and what is 'feminine'.  In Van Zoonen's chapter, "A 'New' Paradigm?" she calls this idea, 'socialization', which is the way in which "individuals become social subjects".  This is a process that begins in childhood and is continuous throughout adult life; it shapes the way in which we view what is considered 'normal' social behavior.  Van Zoonen focuses on some of the gaps that exist in the representation of women in the media.  'Distortion' is the idea that the media does not represent reality, seeing as women make up over 50% of the population in the United States, yet only make up a small percentage of what is represented in the media.  Though it is impossible to use one group of women to define what a "realistic woman" would be, the small percentage of women who are shown in the media are not seen to represent "reality" according to the concept of 'distortion'. Something that Van Zoonen mentioned was the gap between feminist media critics and ordinary female audiences.  She brings up soap operas, romance novels, and women's magazines, which made me think of Radway's "Women Read the Romance".  It is difficult for me to decide the right way for well-educated feminists to approach the 'ordinary woman', because who is to say that ordinary women don't know what is best for them or why they consume certain media, just as well as a feminist media critic would?  At the same time, women who study feminism and create scholarly works should have more qualified ideas.  This creates two separate groups of women, so how can one group represent the other?

In the section of Gill's book for today, she mainly focuses on the complete lack of the representation of certain groups of women in feminism throughout its history.  During the early stages of feminism, only white, middle-class, first world women and their experiences were considered, and black feminists criticized feminism for completely disregarding the experiences of black women.  Gill points out the dangers of not representing certain groups.  For example, while feminists were campaigning for abortion, black women's views of abortion were disregarded.  Many black women during the time would have argued for their right to not have abortions that were forced on them because of racist policies.  There were clearly large differences between black feminists and white feminists, and it is apparent that grouping them together and calling it 'feminism' had harmful effects.  These effects caused feminism to focus on not only 'race' and ethnicity, but also on "class, age and disability", which, as Gill points out, were all factors that were completely ignored.  Just as white, middle-class women were the only group originally represented in feminism, male experience was treated as human experience until the 1990's when the idea of men as a "gendered group" came about.  Having gendered groups has changed the idea that only women in the media were studied and gender itself was studied in the media.  Different groups of men exist, just as there are many different groups of women.

Escapism Through Fantasy

The idea of escapism encapsulated within romance novels is quite fascinating as pointed out by Radway. The denial of a present reality is achieved by a journey into a fictional world where love is discovered through an exciting romance. It is the hyperbole of the fantasy, which appeals to many of the women. Such stories are clearly unrealistic, but are understood as such. The fantasy world makes escaping easy and the comfort of a happy ending allows for the bleakness of daily news and family drama to be swept away.

It seems interesting that women (not all, but certainly far more than men) gravitate to romance novels for escape. Is it further evidence of a hegemonic system that begins when they are little? The escape to a place of a man’s love seems in a way misogynistic, yet this story line is aimed strictly at women. However, maybe it is okay to say, it simply does not matter. These particular women described happiness and relaxation when reading these books. If it truly does make them happy then who is to question their behavior? The authors are creating content their readers want, and they seem to have a clear concept of what that is. It is possible that examining the content of these novels as a reproduction of a hegemonic structure with man at the top is simply a case of over analysis.

Nothing But An Escape

Romance novels have never been my idea of "good literature." Even though I have very limited experiences with romantic novels, I have always thought them to be a little too superficial and unrealistic. To me, romance novels seemed to simply be an extension of society's flawed notion of romance and the relationships between men and women. I just didn't see the point of reading romance novels. Janice Radway's piece definitely gave me a slightly different perspective on the issue of romance novels and media consumption in general.

Before reading this piece, I had never even considered the idea of using romance novels as a form of escape from the realities of life. It had never occurred to me that the seemingly cliché characters and predictable story lines could actually serve as a way in which to immerse one’s self in an idealized fantasy world. Radway’s study of Dot’s clientele was very interesting to me because it gave the female readers of romance novels a chance to express themselves and to explain their love (or obsession?) with these novels. Although I do not plan to go out and start reading as many romance novels as I can get my hands on, I did begin to identify with the women on their use of this media as an escape from real life. For instance, I am an avid viewer of MTV’s Jersey Shore. As a fairly educated young woman, I am fully aware that the show’s portrayal of women isn’t the most favorable. However, I watch it because it provides a break from the stresses of college life. Once a week, I can watch other people party it up and momentarily forget about the giant assignment I have to finish.

The chapter in Gill concerning audience consumption was also very striking to me in the manner in which it analyzes different kinds of media consumption studies from different points of view. I was struck by the fact that things like differences in location could have such a profound effect in the consumption of media and the manner in which it is interpreted. As a very large consumer of media (especially electronic media), I was pleased to see that research was being conducted from the point of view of the audience; as opposed to the research done by academics without any consideration of the average audience.

How Romance Novels Relieve Women From Their Role as Nurturer

A thought that came to me as I was reading Radway's "Women Read the Romance" was that even if there are groups of people that do not believe that Americans still live in a patriarchal society, there are women out there who still feel the pressures of taking on the stereotypical and patriarchal labels given to women from the moment they are born. 

What are the kinds of roles that women need to play? We are the mothers and wives. We nurture and we are expected to be our own bosses in the home (not that I see anything wrong with that...). But Radway brings up a good point: She shows us through her research that women use romance novels as a means of "escape or relaxation (46)" from their everyday lives as mothers and wives in the home. 

How could their not still be remnants of inequality and patriarchy if largely married women between the ages of 25 and 49 (46) are using romance novels as a form of escape? 

I had a conversation with a friend of mine who is taking a Women's Studies class at Denison for the first time. He asked me "What's the problem with men working outside of the home and women staying in the home and taking care of children?" My answer was that there is no problem if women have the right to decide whether or not that is the life that they want to live. In other words, if women have the right to choose what they do in life, then I don't see a problem with being a stay-at-home mom at all (I still believe it is the hardest job out there). But if women still feel the need to play that role, a point that Radway explains is the reason why women read romance novels, then there is a sense of being trapped in a role you did not choose.