The Assignment

Feminist Analysis of Media

Year-Long Research Project

Ms. Duffy and Ms. Park

Task  

1. Choose a topic of interest that is suitable (and school appropriate) for examining media from a feminist theory perspective.  YOU CANNOT USE TEXTS THAT WE EXAMINED AS A CLASS.  You are not limited to these texts or kinds of media. For example:  

• Examine a 60s sitcom episode and the feminist movement (Where the Girls Are by Susan J. Douglas)

  • I Dream of Jeannie

  • Bewitched

  • That Girl

• Examine the temptress archetype in comics

  • Poison Ivy 

  • Catwoman 

  • Cheetah

  • Zatanna

  • Mystique

• Examine female expression of sadness versus anger/mommy first in Marvel media 

  • Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch in WandaVision and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

• Examine gender in Slasher Films

  • Halloween

  • Scream 

  • The Final Girls 

• Laurie Simmons’ art

  • Walking House

  • Walking Tomato

  • Blonde/Red Dress/Kitchen

  • Laurie Simmons. First Bathroom/Woman Kneeling. 1978 | MoMA

  • Laurie Simmons | The Love Doll/Day 30 (Meeting) | Whitney Museum of American Art

• Guerrilla Girls’ art 

  • Do Women Have To Be Naked To Get Into the Met. Museum?

  • Guerrilla Girls’ 1986 Report Card

Primary Sources

2. Depending upon your group’s focus, select 3 or more (school appropriate) primary sources for your group’s analysis. You may have 3 major texts, or 5, or 9; it depends on what your group hopes to accomplish and on the text lengths and complexity.  For example, a group that is analyzing three films will need to spend a lot more time than a group that chooses 3 advertisements.  Therefore, in order for a group analyzing advertisements to have an ambitious research project, they would need to choose additional primary texts to analyze in their argument.  There also must be some connection between the texts you’ve chosen.  Why is it necessary to examine these texts together (i.e. gender in Brian De Palma films – connected by the director; gender in 90’s hourlong teen dramas – connected by time period; gender in teen slasher films – connected by genre). 

   • If you are analyzing films, you can try to access the film for free using the sites suggested here, or I can request them through Swank K-12 Streaming (they have most films available, but not all).   Email me ASAP if you’d like me to try and request a movie for you on Swank. 

Secondary Source

3. You must use secondary sources to help support your analysis.  The number of secondary sources is entirely up to you beyond using 1 required secondary source.  Keep in mind secondary sources are not a substitute for your thoughtful analysis of your chosen primary sources.  The vast majority of your project should be composed of SYNTHESIZING YOUR OWN IDEAS about your primary sources to DRAW YOUR OWN CONCLUSIONS from a feminist theory perspective.  Secondary sources are there to provide a little extra support for your argument.  

The Issue

4. Use feminist theory to isolate a DEBATABLE ISSUE related to the topic of your primary sources and develop an argument about it. You must find the commonalities between your chosen primary sources in order to make this argument.  You must then synthesize these sources (combine them) to support your thesis.  Because it is a debatable issue, you must include a CONCESSION/REFUTATION in making your argument about your chosen media.   

   • For example, perhaps your primary sources relate to female hiphop artists that sexualize themselves and argue that commodifying their sexuality for public consumption is empowering. Your job is to prove why this is true or false. 

   • For example, maybe you want to compare and contrast media from different time periods to see if there is a change in the portrayal of gender to argue one time period  is more empowering than the other or maybe you want to argue that nothing has changed despite claims of progress..  Your job is to prove this. 

Documentary Video Essay

5. Create an engaging documentary video essay that captures your feminist theory argument using various rhetorical strategies to persuade your audience about your claim.  Your documentary must be 8-15 minutes in length depending on the number of people in your group (more people = more ambitious project).  We want concise, strongly argued, CREATIVE, INTERESTING films that show off your knowledge of RHETORICAL APPEALS & MODES (you can also use devices) and FEMINIST THEORY. 

You must cite all sources and include a Works Cited in the credits of your documentary, and lower third captions (text overlay for attribution of sources and references) using  MLA Formatting & MLA Citation.