Spike Lee’s “She’s Gotta Have it” series is a modern-day adaptation of his older work “She’s Gotta Have it” film in 1986. As Lee takes the audience around the beautiful and aesthetic scenery of Fort Greene, Brooklyn, the audience is introduced into the life of Nola Darling (DeWanda Wise). Aside from her work, Darling also juggles between three lovers: Mars Blackmon, Greer Childs and Jamie Overstreet. In a way to maintain control of her body, Darling creates rules between her and her lovers, some of which include: not interacting outside the bedroom and calling her multiple times before visiting. When first presented in 1986, Nola Darling’s polymorphism was alien and rebellious. A woman having multiple relationships on film is considered revolutionary. …show more content…
The biggest theme in Spike Lee’s “She’s Gotta Have it” is the idea of feminism through women empowerment. In doing so, Lee creates a powerful female protagonist that can be a potential role model towards a younger generation; however, Lee completely dismisses the male characters in his …show more content…
In a patriarchal type film, the focus is on the male character while any female character is nothing more than a supporting role who offers little to the story. This ideology is seen in the “She’s Gotta Have it” series. The power dynamic between Nola and her lovers is unequal –the dynamic is favored towards Nola. As the story explores Nola’s sexual life, a set of boundaries between Nola and her lovers are revealed. At the beginning of episode eight, Greer states, “As Nola likes to say, we are ‘fuck buddies,’ and with that comes ‘fuck buddy’ codes. She has her rules. We don’t really hang out. We can’t say we’re exclusive.” As Nola’s role of dominance is portrayed, the film reveals the relationship is Nola’s terms and her terms only. Nola is a strong main character, but her supportive cast, her male lovers, provide nothing of value to Nola or the plot. Not only does Lee fail to add new insights to bring up in discussion, but he also creates a disconnect with his male
Throughout history the portrayal of gender roles have been maintained by a specific standard, specifically where the man is the main figure, and the woman is the submissive figure that is being acted upon. However, lately, specifically the last ten or so years, many movies have shifted this ideology. These movies in modern times show increasingly more women in positions of power, as well as in marriages where there is an equal amount of power between both the husband and wife. There are also more movies showcasing non-traditional relationships, such as, domestic partnerships and LGBTQ+ relationships. One movie in particular that showcases a shift in the status quo, in terms of the masculinity and femininity expected from individuals especially that of a relationships, is Tyler Perry’s
In addition, her relationship with Gail is slightly masculine in the fact that she has no desire to be married or in physical relationships with males. and suggesting that while she clearly
In her essay, “The Importance of Work,” from The Feminine Mystique published in 1963, Betty Friedan confronts American women’s search for identity. Throughout the novel, Betty Friedan breaks new ground, concocting the idea that women can discover personal fulfillment by straying away from their original roles. Friedan ponders on the idea that The Feminine Mystique is the cause for a vast majority of women during that time period to feel confined by their occupations around the house; therefore, restricting them from discovering who they are as women. Friedan’s novel is well known for creating a different kind of feminism and rousing various women across the nation.
A woman’s work is never done: many American women grow up with this saying and feel it to be true. One such woman, author Jessica Grose, wrote “Cleaning: The Final Feminist Frontier,” published in 2013 in the New Republic, and she argues that while the men in our lives recently started taking on more of the childcare and cooking, cleaning still falls unfairly on women. Grose begins building her credibility with personal facts and reputable sources, citing convincing facts and statistics, and successfully employing emotional appeals; however, toward the end of the article, her attempts to appeal to readers’ emotions weaken her credibility and ultimately, her argument.
In 1995, American journalist and political activist Gloria Steinem wrote the essay “Wonder Woman” and published it as the introduction to her book Wonder Woman: Featuring over Five Decades of Great Covers. Steinem wrote this essay to discuss the promotion of feminism in popular media, especially in comic books. She begins the essay with a tribute to William Moulton Marston’s superheroine Wonder Woman, recounting with a nostalgic tone the hundreds of languid afternoons hiding in a tree and restless nights swaddled in blankets during which her childhood self would eagerly pore over the pages of comic books she had bought herself. Then, she switches to a more earnest tone as she compares the adventures of Wonder Woman with the societal burdens
Each female character possesses a unique personality and faced internal as well as external struggles that rivals the complexity of the male characters. Despite the inequity that these females face, they overcome it by showing themselves to be strong in the face of adversity and work to be unmoved by even the
Cultural theories by Kathleen Rowe, Laura Mulvey and Stuart Hall can help the audience seek an explanation to how these stereotypical gender roles are portrayed in the movie and how it can create power for the specific
“The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any.” Said and written in one of Alice Walker’s novels, Possessing the Secret of Joy. The novel encompasses the impact of having culturally controlled gender roles and brings awareness to how women feel powerless in their society. Her quote shows how quickly ignorance in humanity stunts the growth of empowered people. Moreover, this quote can represent the relationship between power and women, which, consequently, is discussed in the documentary, Miss Representation. Alice Walker’s wise words appear in the first shot of this film.
The film Girl’s Trip has been applauded for being a celebration of blackness in the primarily white film industry. The majority of the cast and the writers for Girl’s Trip are people of color. The film was much more successful than its “white counterpart” Rough Night in box office revenue and reviews. However, most of the black characters in Girl’s Trip shift through various controlling images throughout the movie. The reason these stereotypes are less obvious than they are in some other films is because each characters portrays multiple stereotypes and different times throughout the film.
Abstract Taylor Swift has been marked by her many fans as an icon of feminism and empowerment. Inspiring girls on how their own experiences and personal truths are something worth singing about. Illustrating what she claims to be female empowerment through ‘squads’ and award speeches. With the rapidly increasing influence of mainstream media, it is imperative to highlight how big icons such as Taylor Swift are manipulating and being manipulated by the masses, society and the market itself for profit and personal gains.
In the play A Streetcar Named Desire written by Tennessee Williams, the main character, Blanche DuBois, travels to New Orleans to stay with her sister, Stella, and Stella’s husband, Stanley Kowalski. Throughout the play, sexulaity is seen as a strong motivator for many of the characters actions. Early in the play, Stanley is introduced as a particularly sexual character, “ Since earliest manhood the center of his life has been pleasure with women, the giving and taking of it, not with weak indulgence... He sizes women up with a glance, with sexual classifications…” (Williams 25).
Black women are treated less than because of their ascribed traits, their gender and race, and are often dehumanized and belittled throughout the movie. They are treated like slaves and are seen as easily disposable. There are several moments throughout the film that show the racial, gender, and class inequalities. These moments also show exploitation and opportunity hoarding. The Help also explains historical context of the inequality that occurred during that time period.
INTRO - "An Act of Vengeance" by Isabel Allende is a latin-american piece of literature. - According to feminists critics, literature adapted to this patriarchal society we have, and the feminist author, Isabel Allende, has exposed how men and women are in the society through her characters Dulce Rosa Orellano and Tadeo Cespedes. - The feminism theory is the outgrowth of the general movement to empower women worldwide. It recognizes and critiques male supremacy combined with the efforts to change this patriarchic view.
Ridley Scott’s ‘female buddy movie’ Thelma and Louise centres around issues of male dominance and the freedom of release from society. Thelma (Geena Davis) and Louise (Susan Sarandon) are women suppressed by the men in their lives. They take a vacation to escape for a few days and after an attempted rape and murder they end up fugitives on the run for their lives. This unintended event ends up being for them the best adventure of their lives, as they are able to divest from the rules of society and become the independent women they are. By subverting the traditional role of gender in the genre, the film shows how feminism impacted the film industry by challenging Hollywood and the gendered myths and social patriarchy, providing women with a voice, and changing how spectators view how women are looked at through women’s eyes and their experiences.
Music has been around for a very long time. There are several different genre’s including; hip-hop, country, and jazz, rap, metro, and etc. Teens look up to those who they listen to, but many teens are interested in vulgar music. Rap influences young teens to drugs and violence. Thinking that it’s cool and that’s the way people are supposed to structure their lives to be.