Common Stereotypes of Men in Media
Various media analysts and researchers argue that media portrayals of male characters fall within a range of stereotypes.
Various media analysts and researchers argue that media portrayals of male characters fall within a range of stereotypes.
Families, friends, teachers and community leaders all play a role in helping boys define what it means to be a man. Mainstream media representations also play a role in reinforcing ideas about what it means to be a “real” man in our society. In most media portrayals, male characters are rewarded for self-control and the control of others, aggression and violence, financial independence and physical desirability: “for boys, violence and dominance are aligned with norms of masculinity.”
May 25, 2011 (Ottawa) – Media Awareness Network (MNet) and the Canadian Teachers' Federation (CTF) today unveiled the theme for this year's annual Media Literacy Week– Digital Citizenship – calling on Canadians to encourage young people to reflect on their online lives, and their rights and responsibilities as they navigate the digital world.
Canada’s Broadcasting Act, last amended in 1991, outlines industry guidelines for portrayal of diversity.
This lesson helps children become aware of the types of violence that appear in the media, the frequency with which these acts occur, and how they respond to these acts. It begins with a guided discussion about the different types of violence and then, how violence is portrayed in the media. Using worksheets, students then survey the shows they enjoy for acts of violence and then, as a class, compile and discuss their findings.
Media violence has been taken up as a public policy issue by a number of Western countries. Central to the debate has been the challenge of accommodating what may appear to be opposing principles—the protection of children from unsuitable media content and upholding the right to freedom of expression.
This opening video to the Key Concepts of Media Literacy video series introduces students to the idea that the word media – which they may already know in the sense of the media industry (“the media”) – means channels of communication between a person or persons and their intended audience.
In this lesson, students watch a video introducing the media literacy key concept that media are constructions. They then explore this concept by considering a pair of cereal boxes and identifying the different elements of the box and the purposes they serve. In an optional final task, students pick a target audience and create their own cereal box to appeal to that audience.
What we see – and don’t see – in media affects how we view reality. Media works can be imagined either as mirrors that reflect an audience’s own experience, windows that give them access to experiences they otherwise wouldn’t have known, or in some cases both.
Media educators base their teaching on key concepts of media literacy, which provide an effective foundation for examining mass media and popular culture. These key concepts act as filters that any media text has to go through in order for us to respond.