Taylor Swift- The Man
Ideology- Men are praised more than women as it is unexpected for men to carry out certain tasks for example; when the man was sitting in a park with his child playing with her.
Men are able to achieve much more the women
Lyrics express how taylor believes she would gain more respect is she was a man relating back to the 19thcentury where women weren’t viewed as important as men
The main ways that the videos represent gender Is similar in certain ways. Within both videos they show women as with holding less relevance and acknowledgement as men, women are seen as inferior in both music videos not just due to the lyrics sang but because of the actions taking place within the scenes as well. They are portrayed as inferior as in Swifts “The Man” she expresses how if she was a man she would gain more respect for certain actions that she carries out. This is because in society men doing domestic labour in absence of females are unusual therefore consistently praised as much. So, when society sees a man, for example taking a child to the park to play, their seen as a more important and more respectable gender because it goes against their nature & stereotype. Whereas a woman isn’t praise for doing the simple task as per say because women are made for child and domestic labour. Women are seen as defenceless and inferior against men in “Riptide” as well due to the physical representation of the women’s appearance alongside the narrative/ theme behind the music video, emphasised by camera angles. The effect of the woman’s makeup throughout the video reinforces the image of defencelessness and gradually in the vide the neatness and placement of the make-up gets worst in a way that it makes it seems as if a domestic violence act has taken place towards the woman. This makes her seem weak as she isn’t standing up or retaliating any violence back towards the abuser. The abuser is shown as a male figure, from society’s deception, due to the fact that the woman hast retaliated because in terms of male characters women feel unmatched towards their energy.
Furthermore, in “The Man”, and in “Riptide” women are sexualised especially in the beginning scene of “Riptide”. This scene has a sense of depersonalising as although the camera is recording her body, her face isn’t being shown resulting in the fact that she potentially has no idea that she is being recorded. This gives the audience the impression that women aren’t valued nor respected within this video and that they are only used to get messages across based on the lyrics being sang in the background. Basically, used as objects to a certain extent, as a male gaze attracting a greater audience. This is also evident in a scene in “The Man” where women are sexualised which is when they are on the boat celebrating and the rich protagonist is surrounded by women only dressed in bikinis and giving promiscuous and flirtatious body language towards the camera as well as the male figure during the close ups. Also, with them laying on the floor and him standing amongst them shows how he holds greater status and power. Reinforcing stereotypes that the male gender is more dominate against females.
Both videos consist evidences toward Van Zoonens theory that women are objectified as a result of western culture, but are shown in different ways in each video. In “The Man” women are objectified as reliant on men and no appreciated for the domestic labour that they do as it is expected. Whereas, in “Riptide” women are objectified as nothing but mere objects and used for others pleasures to send messages to a greater audience.
However, there are also aspects of representation of gender in both videos that differ from one another. In "The Man" Swift presents how men hold a stronger hierarchy than women and are more ‘eye-catching’ & interesting. This is shown through the fact that throughout the whole video the main protagonist is a male character. Although there are still female actors within the video there are very little camera action towards them and is predominantly concentrated on the male character in the video. Relating to post-modern society and society today this portrayal isn’t seen out of the ordinary because men are still seen as a more important gender in comparison to females. This follows audience expectations of the narrative because they already have an idea as to what the video would be based around due to the title of the music video beforehand. This relates to Halls Theory that stereotyping occurs when there is a representation of inequality of power, which in terms of “The Man” is completely true, as the stereotyping used in this video asserts full power to the male gender with more emphasis due to the use of the lyrics as well.
On the other hand, “Riptide” show men of having no importance due to the lack of male characters used and the absence of them throughout the video. Which challenges the audience’s expectations of the narrative, due the lyrics implying that the narrative would be from a male perspective. Whenever a male character is shown it isn’t used in a positive representation. For example, when the lyrics, “friends turning green”, a scene of two characters, one being male, to represent friends then followed by a subtle term to potentially reflect an aspect of envy, through the word “green”. Despite this, the absence of a male protagonist portrays how women don’t need to a man present in order to be/do certain things & in this aspect, to be objectified. This goes against Halls theory where stereotypes occur when there is an inequality of power because although a male protagonist is absent the director is still able to make women come across as weak and defenceless in the eyes of the media, through the theme of domestic abuse occurring throughout the video in close up camera shots and dark, mellow lighting in certain scenes. Compared to “The Man” where both genders are used consistently in the video to portray the inequalities of power through stereotypes.
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