scholarly journals Superheroines and superstereotypes?

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-105
Author(s):  
Maxine De Wulf Helskens ◽  
Frederik Dhaenens ◽  
Sarah Van Leuven
Keyword(s):  
Textual Analysis ◽  
Comic Books ◽  
Gender Representation ◽  
Remarkable Increase ◽  
Race And Sexuality ◽  
Intersectional Theory ◽  
New Millennium

Since the new millennium, there has been a remarkable increase in audio-visual adaptations of superhero comic books (Garcia-Escriva, 2018). Whereas these adaptations used to include predominantly male superheroes, they have started to feature more female superheroes (Curtis & Cardo, 2018). An increase, however, does not imply diverse and rounded representations, since women in superhero movies tend to be depicted in stereotypical and sexualized ways (Kaplan, Miller & Rauch, 2016). Even though previous research has addressed the films and series' politics of gender representation, there is a need for research that looks at televised female superheroes from a queer postfeminist and intersectional lens. Therefore, this study conducted a textual analysis, informed by queer postfeminist and intersectional theory, to explore how leading female superheroes in the Arrowverse series Arrow and Supergirl are represented. We concluded that female superheroes who assume a central role in the series are represented in a rather empowered manner, but that there are still improvements possible with regard to the representation of race and sexuality.

scholarly journals DEATH PENALTY TO DRUG TRAFFICKERS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF SIYĀSAH SYAR’IYYAH

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 45
Author(s):  
Wan Norhasnih Wan Husin
Keyword(s):  
Drug Abuse ◽  
Death Penalty ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Drug Trafficking ◽  
Textual Analysis ◽  
Islamic Perspective ◽  
Family Disintegration ◽  
Drug Traffickers ◽  
The Individual ◽  
New Millennium

<p>In Malaysia, drug abuse and drug trafficking began affecting the society seriously around the 70s and, the trend has continued unabatedly in the first decade of the new millennium. The outcomes are staggering, as it is the cause of various social ills such as murder, burglary, prostitution, and even causes family disintegration and erodes social relations. The main objective of this study is to analyze from the Islamic perspective on the death penalty based on the <em>siyāsah Syar’iyyah</em> principles since the punishment by death for drug trafficking is not an offence directly stated in the al-Quran and al-Sunnah under the hudud law. Based on textual analysis, the study finds that the death penalty meted out against drug traffickers is justified based on the severity of the act in affecting the individual involved, society and the nation. </p>

The Politics of Gender Representation in Charles Bukowski’s Poetry: Between Ambivalence and Misogyny

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-44
Author(s):  
Chaymae Achami
Keyword(s):  
Textual Analysis ◽  
Gender Politics ◽  
Gender Representation ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Female Characters ◽  
Literary Works ◽  
Representation Of Women ◽  
Realistic Approach ◽  
Positive Representations ◽  
Representations Of Women

The German poet and novelist Charles Bukowski has always been surrounded with controversy throughout his life. However, interestingly, it is his politics of gender representation that mostly triggers feminists and researchers together to condemn him for being misogynist, showcasing a degrading image of female characters in his prose writings. The latter genre is seemingly insufficient to directly accuse Bukowski and his literary works of misogyny. While some of his novels attest to a demeaning yet controversial representation of women, his poetry offers a nuanced version wherein heterogeneous portrayal of women becomes prevalent and therefore allowing the space for readers to encounter poems with an amalgamation of positive representations of women—being independent and intellectual. Because the misogynistic representation in Bukowski’s works is open to various interpretations, rushing into a compilation of hateful judgments concerning the author himself lacks justification and argument. In line with this background, the present paper discusses the limitations of the conclusions drawn with regard to Bukowski’s gender politics, arguing that there is a space in-between worth exploring in his literary works. Through a close reading method of textual analysis, the paper concentrates on selected poems from Bukowski’s collection Love is a Dog from Hell (1977) in order to contrast the positive and negative depiction of women. The paper, in other words, strives to bring into question the extent to which misogyny and ambivalence take roles in Bukowski’s gender representation of the female characters. The analysis undertaken has revealed significant results, in which Bukowski’s poetry comes to expose a more ambivalent and realistic approach towards gender—a reading which is highly needed in order to consider the different perspectives and possible interpretations of an author’s work before limiting it, or the author in person, to a set of stereotypical judgment.

Photographable femininities in women’s magazines and on Instagram

2021 ◽  
pp. 136754942110031
Author(s):  
Sofia P. Caldeira ◽  
Sofie Van Bauwel ◽  
Sander De Ridder
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Textual Analysis ◽  
Women's Magazines ◽  
Gender Representation ◽  
Fashion Magazines ◽  
Political Transformations ◽  
Representational Practices ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Visual Cultures ◽  
Aesthetic Values

This article explores the intertextual relationship between women’s glossy fashion magazines and Instagram. As the boundaries between the two formats are becoming increasingly porous – with visual conventions and discourses flowing bi-directionally between women’s magazines and Instagram – this article questions how they mutually reshape each other and the representations of femininities they carry. It explores the tensions emerging from these media’s distinctive ethos of gendered representation, and it questions how the politics of gender representation can be negotiated through aesthetic practices. This research empirically grounds these discussions in a multi-sited qualitative textual analysis, comprised of both a sample of 18 issues of three glossy women’s magazines’ titles (Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Vogue) and a sample of 77 randomly selected female ‘ordinary’ Instagram users (i.e. not celebrities or Insta-famous users), aged 18–35. Both Instagram and women’s magazines link gendered beauty to aesthetic values and the ability to look good in photographs, thus incentivising the pursuit of Instagrammable aesthetics. However, both formats can also highlight the everyday political potential of aestheticised representations. Relying on user-generated representations, Instagram has the potential to showcase a wider diversity of femininities, which can help to broaden the scope of who can be deemed photographable – an idea echoed by women’s magazines’ adoption of a popular feminist tone. These celebrations of diversity, reminiscent of strategies of visibility politics, and politicised discourses become materialised through aesthetic practices both within Instagram and women’s magazines. Yet, despite the emphasis on a social media-inspired feminist and political tone, political engagements on these media can also become enmeshed with postfeminist sensibilities, thus conflating fashion, beauty, and empowerment. This article explores how the on-going changes in these multi-layered and intertextual representational practices echo broader cultural and political transformations in contemporary visual cultures.

In Love with Inspector Morse: Feminist Subculture and Quality Television

1995 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lyn Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Textual Analysis ◽  
Social Dynamics ◽  
Discussion Group ◽  
Critical Distance ◽  
Gender Representation ◽  
Fan Culture ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Impact

This article consists of textual analysis of a highly successful television series, Inspector Morse, combined with qualitative audience study. The study of Morse and the fan culture surrounding it is presented in the context of a discussion of recent feminist work on the texts and audiences of popular culture. The textual analysis focuses on those elements of the programmes which contribute to its success as ‘quality’ television, and particularly on Morse as an example of the role played by nostalgic representations of Englishness in ‘quality’ media texts of the 1980s. The article goes on to discuss whether the presence of such representations in these programmes leads inevitably to a convergence of ‘quality’ and conservative ideology. The discussion of the ideological subtexts of the programmes then focuses on the area of gender representation, and on the extent to which feminist influences are discernible in this example of quality popular culture, particularly in its representations of masculinity. The second part of the article presents an analysis of a discussion group involving fans of the series, which was organized as part of a larger qualitative study of the fan culture surrounding the programmes. There is a detailed discussion of the impact of the social dynamics of the group on their readings of Morse. The analysis also focuses on the ways in which the discourses identified in the textual analysis, such as gender representation, quality and Englishness, are mobilized in talk about the programmes. Finally, the nature of the group made it possible to discuss the construction of a feminist subcultural identity in talk about a mainstream media text, and to identify irony and critical distance as key components of that identity, particularly in the discussion of the pleasures offered by the romance narratives of the programmes.

Existence of DNA in yeast microbodies

1978 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
pp. 232-233
Author(s):  
Masako Osumi ◽  
Misuzu Nagano ◽  
Hiroko Kazama
Keyword(s):  
Catalase Activity ◽  
Buoyant Density ◽  
Model System ◽  
Contour Length ◽  
Native State ◽  
Normal Alkane ◽  
Remarkable Increase ◽  
Dna Molecule ◽  
Mitochondrial Dnas

We have found that microbodies appeared profusely together with a remarkable increase in catalase activity in normal alkane-grown cells of hydrocarbon-utilizing Candida yeasts, and that the microbodies multiplied by division in these cells. These features of Candida yeasts seem to provide a useful model system for studies on the biogenesis of the microbody. Subsequently, we have succeeded in isolation of Candida microbodies in an apparently native state, as judged biochemically and morphologically. The presence of DNA in the purified microbody fraction thus obtained was proved by the diphenylamine method. DNA molecule of about 15 urn in contour length was released from an isolated microbody. The physicochemical analyses of the microbody DNA revealed that its buoyant density differed from nuclear and mitochondrial DNAs. All these results lead us to the possibility that there is a novel type of DNA in microbodies.

CIRCUMCISION OR NO CIRCUMCISION: AN OLD CONTROVERSY INTO THE NEW MILLENNIUM

2001 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. A16
Author(s):  
N. Fan ◽  
S.K. Leung ◽  
C.K. Wong ◽  
S. Tse ◽  
Y.S. Sze ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
New Millennium
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