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The Codes of Gender (2010)

Directed by Sut Jhally

“Identity and performance in popular culture”

Documentary · 1h 13m

Arguing that advertising not only sells things, but also ideas about the world, media scholar Sut Jhally offers a blistering analysis of commercial culture's inability to let go of reactionary gender representations. Jhally's starting point is the breakthrough work of the late sociologist Erving Goffman, whose 1959 book The Presentation of the Self in Everyday Life prefigured the growing field of performance studies. Jhally applies Goffman's analysis of the body in print advertising to hundreds of print ads today, uncovering an astonishing pattern of regressive and destructive gender codes. By looking beyond advertising as a medium that simply sells products, and beyond analyses of gender that tend to focus on either biology or objectification, The Codes of Gender offers important insights into the social construction of masculinity and femininity, the relationship between gender and power, and the everyday performance of cultural norms.

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Cast

Crew

Director
Sut Jhally
Writer
Sut Jhally
Editor
Aaron Vega, Andrew Killoy, Sut Jhally

Details

Release date
2010-10-13
Runtime
1h 13m
Genres
Documentary
Original language
EN
Spoken languages
English
Countries
United States of America
Production
Media Education Foundation