Task 1
Lil' Kim (Featuring Sisqo) - How Many Licks?
This is a music video of Lil Kim and I will be analyzing it. First of all you can tell from the songs name ‘’How many licks?’’ that it is a sexual song therefore the music video will also be expected to be sexual to express the title. The opening of the music video is a machine producing Lil Kim and other girls which looks like Barbies and at the bottom of the page it is says made in USA, this opening connotes females being represented as objects and it is easy to produce and are not much thought off as the machine keeps on producing more and more Barbie’s, it also describes how the body should look like as it says ‘’first start off with the thighs and how it should like and then the upper body part then on the screen it appears ‘’fully edible’’ which is specifically pointed out so that it attracts the males therefore females are seen as sex objects and the to please the males, also connoting sexy and edible to feed the men to fill up the males like its food.
The clothing of Lil Kim is a corset, tights and high heels shoes and very feminine colors such as pink, the clothes are tight and bright to show the body but also to stand out in the crowd which connotes how females should be like in order to get males attention and be confident as Lil Kim. The camera shots of the video are mainly long shots, high angle shot and side shot. The reason they are using long angle shot is to show the whole image of lil Kim and her figure. The high angle shot is used to look down on her this shows even though she is a rapper and has power but she is still a female and therefore by looking down on her she is still not stronger than males, the other reason they are using high angle shot is because she is wearing a corset and her cleavage is low so that the viewers are able to see her breasts which connotes pleasure. They also use side shots of lil Kim is to show off her figure and how big and proportion the body of females should be such as big ass, skinny waist and big breasts. It has shots of zooming into Lil Kim and other girls sexual dancing in her bra and underwear this identifies that females are just for sex.
It has other shots of a male sleeping while thinking about Lil Kim describing sex positions and the male is sweating and moving around to show that females are good for sex and turning on males easily. Having sex sound in the music and the high angle shot looking down on lil Kim shows she is still weak but able to give pleasure to the male. Showing a bunch of guys fighting over lil Kim shows that males are hungry for females and just want females just to please themselves even though they are weak and emotional. However towards the end there is a shot where lil Kim is wearing black and driving a car this shows that she is powerful but also connoting that females are able to ‘’drive’’ or control males and are as strong but also mysterious because of the dark colour which is the alternative representation of females.
Lil' Kim - No Matter What They Say
The music video that I will be analysing of lil Kim is ‘’no matter what they say’’, you can tell from the name of her song that it will be about her and that is being herself. The opening of the music video is different looks of lil Kim in like a picture frame small size connoting she has different sides to her rather then what only the media think of her as a overall. The main opening is that is a low angle shot looking up to her with dancers around her, this connotes that she is in power and we have to look up to her. The clothing of lil Kim is underwear and a short corset which is to show off her body and attract the male audience.
Throughout the music video there have been only two types of camera shots being used which is a low angle shot and a long shot which usually starts from the bottom and slowly goes up. The reason they mainly use low angle shots is to connote that lil Kim is in power, it’s all about her which is an alternative point of ideology of females as they are usually described as weak and emotional and rather have a high angle shot looking down on any female.
This music video is mainly focused on females and is considered to be in charge. However there is a shot of a camera shot of few females starting to show them and the camera slowly moves down which connote that male are below females and females are in control which is an alternative ideology of females. On the other hand even though lil Kim is trying to prove a point of females being in charge in some of the scenes she does act masculine which is rough and her body language this connotes that even though she is in charge and has power but because she sometimes acts like a male therefore it is referred back to the dominant ideology of male where as the strong and the powerful person, which lil Kim is representing.
Throughout the music video she is half naked with a lot of males around her which connotes a typical ideology of females being surrounded by males and getting all the attention to be used and seen as sex objects the other view of that is she is a successful rapper because she is alike like males which all goes back to do the dominant ideology of males. There is a high angle shot of lil Kim laying down with her underwear and corset and high heels on this is a typical camera shot of females this connotes they are weak and just seen as sex objects.
Task 2
Can't Stop Won't Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation
| Author: | Jeff Chang |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | New York : St. Martin's Press, 2005. |
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cant-Stop-Wont-History-Generation/dp/0091912210/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1323295511&sr=1-2
‘’Hip Hop says come as you are, we are a family’’
‘’It ain’t about security. It ain’t about bling bling. It ain’t about how much your gun can shoot. It ain’t about $200 sneakers. It ain’t about me being better than you or you being better than me. It’s about you and me connecting one to one. That’s why it has a universal appeal’’
‘’It brings white kids together with black kids with yellow kids, they all have something in common that they love.’’
‘’it gets past the stereotypes and people hating each other because of those stereotypes’’
Foundation: B-boys, B-girls and Hip-Hop Culture in New York
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Foundation-B-boys-B-girls-Hip-Hop-Culture/dp/019533406X/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1323295511&sr=1-3#_
| Author: | Joseph Glenn Schloss |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | New York, NY : Oxford University Press, 2009. |
‘’Hip hop is a problem, it is a cultural embodiment of violence, degradation and materialism.’’
‘’Hip hop is rapper exploiting women in videos and shooting each other in front of radio stations.’’
‘’It is a multibillion-dollar industry based on debauchery, disrespect and self-destruction.’’
Representing: Hip Hop Culture and the Production of Black Cinema
| Author: | S Craig Watkins |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 1998. |
‘’Black popular culture illuminates the volatility of racialized discourses and the fact that they are constantly being formed and reformed.’’
Dream Factory Deferred: Black Womanhood, History and Music
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dream-Factory-Deferred-Womanhood-History/dp/0595456863/ref=sr_1_17?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1323297677&sr=1-17#_
| Author: | Takeshia Brooks |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | New York : iUniverse, 2007 |
''The black female body has stood as a marker for excessive exotic and sexuality in western society for centuries''
Music Video and the Politics of Representation
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Music-Video-Politics-Representation-Moving/dp/0748633235/ref=sr_1_51?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1323299609&sr=1-51#_
| Author: | Diane Railton; Paul Watson |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Edinburgh : Edinburgh University Press, ©2011. |
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Music-Video-Politics-Representation-Moving/dp/0748633235/ref=sr_1_51?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1323299609&sr=1-51#_
‘’In terms of music video, negative images and misrepresentations are often those that are identified as sexually exploitative- images in which women are depicted simply as bodies or body parts to be observed and desired rather than social agents who have complex and drives of their own.’’
Hip Hop Hypocrisy: When Lies Sound like the Truth
‘’they dress as if they’re going to the playa’s pimp ball’’
Hip Hop Had a Dream: Artful Movement v. 1: Vol. 1 The Artful Movement
‘’Hip Hop Artists came up within their community’’
The Hip Hop Generation: Young Blacks and the Crisis in African American Culture
| Author: | Bakari Kitwana |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | New York : Basic Civitas Books, ©2002. |
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hip-Hop-Generation-African-American/dp/0465029795/ref=sr_1_14?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1325773834&sr=1-14#_
‘’we know that middle class African Americans do not perform as well as whites on standardized tests’’
Know What I Mean?: Reflections on Hip-hop
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Know-What-Mean-Reflections-Hip-hop/dp/0465018076/ref=sr_1_24?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1325774107&sr=1-24#_
‘’elevation of pimps and pimp attitudes creates a sadomasochistic relationship with female fans’’
Roc the Mic Right
| Author: | H Samy Aim |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Hoboken : Taylor & Francis Ltd., 2006. |
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Roc-Mic-Right-Samy-Alim/dp/0415358787/ref=sr_1_28?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1325774618&sr=1-28#_
‘’We need to throw out the old world of ‘’linguistic supremacy’’ and usher in a new world of linguistic equanimity’’
Media, Gender and Identity
‘’With the media containing so many images of women and men, and messages about men, women and sexuality today, it is highly unlikely that these ideas would have no impact on our sense of identity’’
‘’people somehow copy or borrow their identities from the media’’
Author: | |
Publisher: | London ; New York : Routledge, 2002 |
Task 3
Queen Latifah - U.N.I.T.Y.
Queen Latifah is a female rapper from the 70s back then their ideologies were dicing and cussing each other or their haters, even though she was a female rapper her behavior and the way she spoke, walk or dress was mainly because rappers were mainly identified with males and not females therefore in order for a female to fit in was to act like a female and be strong and be disrespectful. Back then the female rappers were not showing off their body all they cared about was the rap and were more masculine to fit in with the rest. These are reflected in media such as newspapers, TV, magazine etc., because nowadays the female rappers have to be explicit and attractive too to be successful and attract a wider audience, whereas back then in the 70s it was just about the voice the rap which made you cool and got more successful. The zeitgeists of the 70s were political awareness and political and economic liberty of women that continued to grow from that decade and onwards. Therefore the rappers were back then rapping about economical factors of their income or how females started to contribute to the hip hop culture.
Christina Aguilera, Lil' Kim, Mya, Pink - Lady Marmalade
This is a video clip of lil Kim with few other famous singers of this decade this music video shows and represents the females of nowadays generation and this century. This decade females have become more explicit and more sexual and prove the dominant ideology of females which is as sex objects, weak and emotional. Nowadays the music has become more personal and the problems they have personally and has become meaningless and are specifically targeted at another artist rather than rapping about what is occurring around the world at the moment therefore the music industry has become more irrelevant and only now one type of audience likes the music rather than a wider audience which would appeal to all of them. This music video is a typical music video of how music videos exactly look now half naked females with sex appeal to please the males gaze, which is different from the 70s where all female rappers were covered and weren’t explicit at all. These type of music videos changes males society ideology of females it will think less of females and just females would get less respect and more seen as sex objects and not taking serious.
Task 4
How does the R&B genre construct certain gender ideologies? Why might this be a concern in a post feminist society?
‘’A man is still likely to earn more money than a woman, even one doing the same job’ [1]
‘30,000 women in the UK lose their jobs each year due to pregnancy, but there are virtually no consequences for a man when he becomes a parent’ [2]
http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/life/daniel-craig-in-drag-to-support-international-womens-day-video-2462821 [2] ibid
‘Men were much more likely to adventurous, active, and victorious, whereas women were more frequently shown as weak, ineffectual, victimised, supportive, or laughable or merely ‘token females.’[3]
Gauntlett, D. (2007). Media, gender and identity: an introduction (Reprinted. ed.). London [u.a.: Routledge.
Roland Barthes ‘there is social prohibition against the feminization of men, there is almost none against the masculinisation of women.’[4]
Macdonald, M. (1995).Representing women: myths of femininity in the popular media. London: E. Arnold ;. P215
‘The majority of women still see themselves as housewives and a high proportion of products are aimed at women in their traditional role rather than in their business role.’ [5]
ASA Spokesperson in the Guardian, 26 June, 1978
‘Stereotypes survive by undergoing change and by convincing us that they’re not entirely false.’[6]
Macdonald, M. (1995).Representing women: myths of femininity in the popular media. London: E. Arnold ; p13
Brian McNair calls this the sexualisation of culture ‘strip tease culture’.[8]
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/2449/1/Postfeminist_media_culture_(LSERO).pdf
‘‘The fascination with black 'butts' continues. In the sexual iconography of the traditional black pornographic imagination the protruding butt is seen as an indication of heightened sexuality’’ [13].
http://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~abarian/class%20pdfs/Selling_Ho-Pussy.pdf
‘A woman attired as a man may be seen as ‘power dressing’ or as adapting the mannerism of lesbianism’ [14]
Macdonald, M. (1995).Representing women: myths of femininity in the popular media. London: E. Arnold ;. P215
‘Many black women singers, irrespective of the quality of their voices, have cultivated an image which suggests they are available and licentious’.[15]
http://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~abarian/class%20pdfs/Selling_Ho-Pussy.pdf
'It is possession of a 'sexy body' that is presented as women's key (if not sole) source of identity.'[16]
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/2449/1/Postfeminist_media_culture_(LSERO).pdf
.‘Women are not straightforwardly objectified but are presented as active, desiring sexual subjects who choose to present themselves in a seemingly objectified manner because it suits their liberated interests to do so’[18]
[18] http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/2449/1/Postfeminist_media_culture_(LSERO).pdf
[19] ibid
[19] ibid
women have certain roles are ‘responsible for producing themselves as desirable heterosexual subjects, as well as for pleasing men sexually... defending their own sexual reputations, and taking care of men's self-esteem.’[19]
'Incorporated, revised and depoliticised’'[23]
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/2449/1/Postfeminist_media_culture_(LSERO).pdf
Despite the success of 'Slumdog Millionaire' why is it that there is still a lack of South Asian actors in Hollywood?
‘‘Ethnic minorities are continually misrepresented by racial (and racist) stereotypes.”
Rather than representing them as individuals,’’ the media identifies individuals by their ethnic groups to determined whether or not they are Hollywood material.
How and Why Does The Horror/Thriller Genre Exaggerate the Mentally Ill in Films Such as ‘Shutter Island’ and ‘The Uninvited’?
‘’Fictional film characters with mental conditions generally tend to fit into one of several extreme stereotypes, used to either shock, amuse or otherwise entertain us’’
‘’Begin with an equilibrium or status quo where any potentially opposing forces are in balance. This is disrupted by some event, setting in a chain a series of events. Problems are solved so that order can be restored to the world of fiction”
‘’People are exposed to so much violence in the media, violence no longer makes a strong emotional impact upon them.’
Hip to the Game – Dance World vs. Music Industry, The Battle for Hip Hop’s Legacy
‘’Hip-hop was largely a subculture and a form of style and expression developed by urban minorities.’’
Hip-Hop's (Still) Invisible Women
‘’The environments that allows black male rap artists and a white radio show host (both supported by large corporations) to call black women hoes in our mainstream media.’’
‘’Women should be more vocal in denouncing sexism in rap music and in our society because our livelihood and our lives depend on it’’
Rap Criticism Grows Within Own Community
‘’A recent study by the Black Youth Project showed a majority of youth think rap has too many violent images.’’
‘’Among the early accusations were that rap wasn't true music, its lyrics were too raw, its street message too polarizing.’’
‘’The music, dances and images in the video are clearly reminiscent of the era when pop culture reduced blacks to caricatures: lazy 'coons,' grinning 'pickaninnies,' sexually super-charged 'bucks’’
‘’Today, the most popular and successful rappers boast about who has murdered more foes and rhyme about dealing drugs as breezily as other artists sing about love.’’
Women rappers stay under the radar
"They don't know whether to be a gun moll for a gangster or a mother and they are confused as to what role they should take."
‘’Women are seeing success in R&B and pop music, but the “sexism and inequality”
‘’A woman should not have to choose to be a “good girl” or “bad girl” in the rap world, just like she shouldn’t in the real world’’
Task 5
1) Introduction- A brief explanation of my independent study and a discussion on representation and stereo types of hip hop music videos.
Hypothesis: The representations of ethnic minorities within broadcasting help to reinforce stereotypes and contribute to the development of moral panics.
My critical investigation is about representation of female rappers and in music videos. I will try to cover what exactly are the stereo types of females in general and how females in music videos apply those stereotypes. I will be using examples of scenes of music videos and quotes from magazines and books to back up my points.
2) Media representation of female rappers that reinforces the stereotypes. In this paragraph I will be discussing music videos of which I have analysed, and will show evidence of how stereotypes are reinforced, due to the various ways they are represented.
3) The development of female representation and stereo types of them from music videos and female rappers
For my specific female rapper I have chosen lil Kim as she is a typical female that reinforces the stereotypes of females. This paragraph includes moral panic of the way females are seen as nowadays and are treated due to music videos and female rappers."A moral panic can be put into focus by the continued use of stereotypes and the public’s overreaction at a supposed threat to society"
4) Gender and Hip Hop
As my critical investigation is about female rapper Lil Kim I will be explaining the history of females and feminine theorists and hip hop history and how it eventually combined and became something successful but at the same time raised stereotypes and how it became norm for females to be in the hip hop industry. This paragraph will also include ethnicity because so far there are only black female rappers therefore this might be the case that hip hop started off with black males.
5) Does the media and music videos of female rappers and females in general influence society?
In this section I will be discussing whether the media influences individuals such as males and females or if it affects them and looks at females in a different way than before. “The media, and particularly television, are often described as a ‘window on the world’ although in fact media are highly selective in the way in which they construct and represent the world back to us” - this quote links to whether the media chooses to influence or affect us to the fact that it is seen as a ‘window on the world’, and as a result puts into perspective that in some way by using stereotypes and representing females in a particular way. "Stereotypes have a complex relationship to reality. While stereotypes may be partial, they are not necessarily false: they generally control a grain of the truth" - this quote puts into perspective how stereotypes can effectively influence and affect us.
6) Does the media/music videos reflect how the society is really like?
In this section I will be discussing whether the media/music videos really reflect and expresses the society point of view or thoughts, or whether they the media and music videos try to turn the society into the beliefs that the media and music videos value.
“Hegemony is the process by which a dominant class or group maintains power by making everyone accept their ideology as normal or neutral, through cultural influence rather than force” - this quote links to if whether the media or music videos has chosen to represent people in a particular way in order to maintain power over its viewers by forcing them to become passive and to just accept the information of which they are being given.
7) Audience
In this section I will be discussing who exactly are the target audience are for Lil Kim and who Lil Kim is trying to target as a audience based how she represent herself in music videos. The audience theory puts into perspective if whether the media shapes an audience’s perception of the world around them and the people within it, or if whether it is up to the audience to decide for themselves if whether these representations reflect reality. It can be said that the media fills the audience with information which is resistant to social change but on the other hand it can be said that representations of ethnic minorities are open to different interpretations and that their meanings are not fixed, and therefore puts into perspective that it is up to the audience about how they want to interpret the representation of a particular group, it is not the media who is influencing them.
I will be linking the audience theory to the hypodermic needle theory as it states that media content is shot at the audience like a magic bullet, directly penetrating the viewer’s mind, in turn making us realise as the audience if whether we are passive and just accept the ways ethnic people are represented, or if whether we are active and decide for ourselves if the representations of ethnic people are real.
8) How far have female rappers come from how they were represented in the past to how they are represented now?
Within this section I will discuss how far female rappers have come and how now more and more females become a rapper this will also include history of how females started becoming a part of the rap industry. This will include famous female rappers from the 70s and successful rappers from this century and how it differs from each other their aims to be successful and to make it so far in the music industry.
Finally, I will discuss how the representation of female rapper Lil Kim and others has changed over time, comparing how they were represented within my historical texts to how they are represented within my contemporary texts which in turn has allowed for more equality between them within the workforce and within society. (S, H, E, P) - I can link this to a final point by putting into perspective that by having characters of different female rappers within music videos it marks a social change and puts into context that there is now greater equality for ethnic minorities now that we live in a more multi-cultural society.
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