Gender Roles In Alice Walker's Miss Representation

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“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. Miss Representation persuades its audience to agree that women portrayed on television and advertisements negatively affect women's ambition …show more content…

They seem to solely skew towards television being the main cause of disempowered women. Without providing other influences on the stereotypes of women, the film’s views become bias. However, because teenagers spend 31 hours every week watching television, it becomes one of the leading causes of gender stereotypes. Also, based on the statistics provided of women being represented far less than men in America’s government, strongly supports Edelman’s quote, “You can't be what you can't see.” It is hard for young women to look up to empowered female leaders, when they are not being represented in the media.
Bringing awareness to the problem that women are heavily perceived as incapable of handling leadership through the power of social media, motivates people to join together and fight for justice dealing with gender roles. Miss Representation begins its film with a quote about power, and likewise ends with one. The statement concludes, “May we all make empowering women and girls a priority.” The documentary persuades the reader to agree that media has a negative impact on women’s empowerment and that through the interviews and statistics provided, give’s America a clearer perspective of what it means to be a