Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Nakara Richards
Abstract
GENDER & SEXUALITY: POP CULTURE
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Pop culture has been evident within society, starting from the basics of the human.
Throughout many centuries along with the advancement of humanity, there were groups of
people who took advantage of the movement to introduce new moral ideas to the public.
Through this educating process, people soon realize the importance of pop culture became so
evident because of roles, gender and sexuality being displayed to the future generations.
Pop culture has stemmed from variants of individuals looking for a purpose for the future
to move forward, originating from prehistoric times until most recent years. With the discussion
of popular culture, there is the apparent argument that it corrupts the mind of the youth and isn’t
teaching them valuable information for them to apply when they are grown up. However, the
projection of the opposite gender and a wide spectrum of love for the same gender, and or
different genders has turned the public eye towards the most important thing. Popular culture
couldn’t have become such an essential piece to society if it wasn’t for the woman that carried
the strain on their shoulders as well people of spectral sexualities receiving discriminatory
oppression.
The battle between genders has been a constant topic before written on papers. Men have
and will always be viewed as the more dominant role in the public, politically and socially.
Women in pop culture were viewed as the “damsel in dismay”, often looking for the heroic male
to sweep her off of her feet to more precious lands. Women grew tired of the treatment, having
enough experience of what dominance is under their belt. Jennifer Lee O’Donnell (2014), a
professor at the University of Massachusetts, explains through a book review how women are
viewed through the public eye, and explains “the importance of recognizing abuse, incest, and
rape culture in the community”. This shows, even in recent years, that women are trying to make
an effective change by opening up about sensitive concepts that are demeaned by the public.
Beyond this book review provided by this professor, there has been an immense amount of
women that have done similars aspects such as Audrey Hepburn, known as a “UNICEF
representative and dedicated her life helping others”, and Gloria Steinem, who “wrote a powerful
expose about Playboy after going undercover”. Jessica Barber (2016) continues to give more
examples of women such as “Nina Simone”, “J.K. Rowling”, and “Debbie Harry” as other
GENDER & SEXUALITY: POP CULTURE
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distinguishable women that have improved the meaning of popular culture for their actions.
Women, after the centuries of oppression delivered by their counterparts, have asserted above all
After women placed their assertions on the community, there came another group of
minorities contributing their time and effort to bring their spin of popular culture to a wider range
of individuals. People who found their love embedded in someone who wasn’t the opposite sex
often found themselves not having anyone to look up to through their upbringings, publically
known as “queers”. Until recent years, sexuality was deemed as a an immoral concept in some
popular culture aspects, but the degradation goes further back. Samantha Ladwig (2018), a writer
for important newspapers such as the Huffington Post and others, wrote an article concerning the
LGBTQ+ struggles in the Hollywood community during the early 20th century. In her article
“How Hollywood Closeted Queerness for Capital”, Ladwig explains that, “There was a level of
discretion within the industry, not to mention a publicity system contrived by studios that
covered up any mishaps by paying off reporters or offering up a juicier scandal,” as well as “
Unless their so-called immoral interests directly threatened box-office sales, the industry turned
its head,”. Even if these people during the turning point of the century were tested on importance
of their salary or their own sexuality, many individuals fought for the right of having both during
the production, and continued to push this needed agenda to shed knowledge through popular
In recent years, it has been filled with people with orthodox and unorthodox views
towards the movement of women and queers in pop culture. Due to the uprise of their gratitude
in improvement of the popular culture recently, there has been many people who deemed their
ways as corrupted or perverted to them in addition to the minds of their children. When it comes
GENDER & SEXUALITY: POP CULTURE
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to topics such as “rape, incest, and abuse” (O’Donnell 2014), a wide majority are willing to
disregard the entire controversy as a whole; therefore, neglecting to give their children the proper
education on situations revolving these topics. However, the exposure of these topics “ [have the
ability] to make complex material familiar and familiar material complex.”, O’Donnell explains,
emphasizing the importance of familiarity since many people are still not convinced. Along with
the dismissing point of how ‘vulgar’ women can be to include the future in current and pop
culture, queers also faces the same unorthodox manner of corrupting children if it’s presented to
them. William H. Hays created a Production Code during the 1920’s that studios had to abide by,
including “the removal of nudity, white slavery, homosexuality, and others” (Ladwig 2018).
With the creation of this code, queers caught on a tighter leash than before, but fought against the
discrimination to prove the point that love comes in a spectrum that shouldn’t be limited to just
one gender.
Queers and women have been the backbone of popular culture for many centuries now.
There are moments shown in history where women have spent their time exhausting their voices
and their rights so they would be viewed the same. Also in similar moments, queers accepting
the demeaning requests from people above their heads while working silently to improve the
community. Popular culture couldn’t have had this strong of a formation from just a few males
wanting to step outside of the box for a change. Popular culture could have only excelled to have
such a healthy backbone was because of the discrimination and the oppression that was placed
References
https://www.theodysseyonline.com/13-awesome-women-pop-culture
Ladwig, S (2018, January 8). How Hollywood Closeted Queerness for Capital
GENDER & SEXUALITY: POP CULTURE
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http://web.b.ebscohost.com.eztcc.vccs.edu:2048/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=11&sid
=8e2cbe4b-f891-4a57-8eb3-36acfa8eadb7%40sessionmgr103
http://web.a.ebscohost.com.eztcc.vccs.edu:2048/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=5&sid=
43e47bba-3b1b-471c-8c02-93b9bb652b63%40sdc-v-sessmgr01