Browsing by Author "Gouws, Moniq Esti"

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    The development towards a linguistic female gaze in selected American situation comedies
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2024-03) Gouws, Moniq Esti; Holm, Nicole; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Drama.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Mass media, especially the media we consume as entertainment, greatly affects our views on societal topics like gender performativity. This study investigates two situation comedies, Two and a half men(2003-2015) and Mom(2013-2021), to determine how language use in the series has developed from a male gaze to a female gaze influence. Discussions on the societal position of women throughout the 20th century, the feminist movement and feminist media theory is provided. Mulvey’s (1975) theory of the male gaze, based on Freud’s psychoanalysis, and possible definitions of the female gaze are explored. However, there is still a need for a female gaze in digital series, as the largest purveyor of societal norms in mass media. Linguistic theories on gendered language use and discussions on communication theory, transitivity and paralinguistic features are given along with comedy theory and the role gender and language play in comedy. The strong influences gender, language and comedy have on each other becomes an important point of departure for this study. A multimodal discourse analysis of both series is completed based on specific scenes and storylines that discuss the ways men and women, sex and parenthood are portrayed. Women in the early 2000s were portrayed as sex-objects, but later drove the narrative as the protagonists. Both series exhibit the double standard for mothers and fathers, but was initially portrayed as comedic from the male perspective, while the seriousness of the situation will only be portrayed later through the female perspective. Sexual desire remained an issue throughout both series, only presented through fragmentation and objectification, adhering to the male gaze. It was concluded that Mom contained more positive female language use than Two and a half men and portrayed women in many different regards, not merely sexually or in antagonized roles. However, both series still fall short of a true female gaze in terms of the double-standard of mothers and fathers and the sexual desire of both genders.