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Ashley Browne
English 104 S8
Nicole Pena
27 November, 2013
Media: A Forceful Source of Gender Stereotyping in Fashion
Imagine yourself walking down the street in Chicago, New York, or even your small
town you were raised in. Walking down the street passing people as you move ahead, your eyes
wander to several different people and in that moment your mind is thinking to itself, “wow she
looks nice” or “dang what is he wearing?” Well according to the American Psychological
Association, “In our minds, that sense of judging or stereotyping one person at first glance exerts
a sense of control” (Fiske 624). This is interpreting that people stereotype one another the feel
control over someone to make themselves feel more elite. But, in the case of this paper, it’s not
necessarily the reason why people are stereotyping; it’s where people got the idea of stereotyping
from. It is hypothesized that the idea of stereotyping is being portrayed in the media. What
women and men are supposed to look like is so forced into one’s mind because media has a
powerful impact on what is socially right and wrong in fashion. Gender stereotypes continue to
be reinforced in media and that is causing people to stereotype each other.
There are many different types of media. And media, as we know, is the main means of
mass communication. Some of these media types that we see are seen through magazines, TV
commercials, fashion shows by clothing itself, and also department stores. Those four media
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types are particular to this type of research because there are many examples of how stereotyping
in the aspect of fashion are shown through them.
The first type of media that emphasizes stereotyping in fashion is magazines. If you’ve
ever read or looked at a magazine you can come to the conclusion that most of the women are
being portrayed as feminine and the males are portrayed in a masculine look. This is really
shown in the case of the covers of magazines. When taking a closer look at magazines like
Playboy and Maxim, I found out that they are particularly geared towards men, but, not every
type of man. They have used sexual images of women dressing particularly feminine, if wearing
anything at all, and they include ads that are geared towards men such as cologne, weapons,
workout supplements, men’s clothing, and men’s sports. The problem with this is that one, they
are portraying women to always dressing sexy which is considered a stereotype, two, they are
