While we realize that girls read books that are full of stereotypes, from cereal boxes dominated by male characters to the birthday cards that tell them how pretty and "special" they are, but feature boys having wild, rollicking birthday fun, we've limited this discussion to the core reading material marketed to girls: books and magazines.
Specifically, teen series books tend to contain a lot of stereotyping because they're written very quickly and depend heavily on cliches. The authors of the book, "Packaging Girlhood" interviewed an author who worked for a company that published books for girls. This author told them that as editors and writers, they sit around a table brainstorming an idea. The editors made sure that the writers would make their girl characters more like-able by putting some spinach in her front teeth. The topics of these books are generally boyfriends, magic, shopping, girl talk and dreams-the usual. Since the hyped-up mean girl phenomenon, a new spate of books about girl-against-girl competition has arisen, as in several series: The Clique; The It Girl; and The A-List. One cliche that I have noticed throughout these books is that the lead girl is dissatisfied with herself and her body. The message I received from this was that to be a girl you have to be somewhat down on yourself and awkward. It makes girls feel as if their body will never be good enough, or always imperfect. Sooner or later some kind of competition is set up between the lead character and the more beautiful girl. There's always a girl who is prettier than the lead character and is a source of jealousy. Quite often the author makes her snobby or unlikeable, undoubtedly because the way to save girls' self-esteem is to teach her to say, "At least I'm nicer! At least I'm not her!" Comparing yourself to someone else only discredits who you are as a person. Girls generate their self esteem based off of how they compare to other girls. This only sets them up to feel bad about how they look or how they view themselves. Many of these books I never picked up only because I wasn't interested in knowing that being cool meant wearing a specific pair of shoes or getting clothes from specific stores. Many of these cliches are why girls act the way they do because it's all their exposed to by these writers and editors.
Hey Stephanie! This book sounds really interesting and applicable to the current world. I agree that clothing, books, movies, etc. designed for girls have become consumed by stereotypes. There is definitely a lack of strong, female characters in the media. I think that this represents a disturbing trend as it is teaching young girls to fit to a stereotype that is not necessarily in their best interest. I think that your point about a main character's dissatisfaction with her body was especially important. This sends a negative message to the young girls that read these books that they will never be good enough. This contributes to low self-esteem and many other issues. This book is obviously bringing attention to a very important issue! Hopefully the authors have some suggestions on how to create more positive role models and a greater variety of choices for young girls.
ReplyDeleteHey Lisa! Yeah I've really enjoyed reading this book because it's applicable to all girls of all ages, who try to fit the image of being perfect. The book is written by two doctors and they give good alternative reads, movies, and magazines that encourage strong female roles. It's mainly written for parents who want to rescue their daughters from marketers' schemes, that portray girls in an unrealistic way. I agree that there is a lack of strong, female characters within the media. The authors pointed out the Gossip Girl series, and how it gets girls to think at a young age, that they should be glamourous and consume themselves with shopping. It becomes detrimental to their self esteem because it sets themselves up to fail from trying to obtain this perfect girl image. I'm glad you found my post interesting! And thanks for commenting!
ReplyDeleteI think that the last thing you said about girls act the way they do because of they are surrounded by is totally true. I think that we live in a society that is very influenced by what they see and hear. We have an epidemic of girls not being satisfied with who they are becasue society says that they are not normal or not right, when girls should be happy with who they are becasue thats who they were born to be. The books that are out there now are only adding to this epidemic.
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