Women in South Africa ,media protrayal

Media Representation of Women in Africa Research Paper

People have become extremely attached to the media system as a tool for individuals to communicate with each other. However, society has a set of guidelines, rules, and expectations on a person’s appearance, behaviors, and how they interact with others. These are expectations that every individual in society is trained to follow and obey. These factors are based on an individual’s gender, race, and social class, and can be detrimental to the success of women. The media helps reinforce this process of socialization. With that said, there are many negative aspects to the media. The media has portrayed women negatively with regard to their body image, occupation, and gender roles through the interpretation of magazines and movies. Moreover, there have been many studies on the negative portrayals of women in the media and the relationship between media and women’s body image. The media's stories are shown through a camera lens; viewers only see stories from one angle. As a result, many minorities especially women in African countries such as South Africa, Egypt, and Nigeria are negatively represented in the media. This paper is specifically focusing on how African women are unenthusiasticallysymbolized in the media through three main aspects: consumerism, abortion, and the role of traditional housewives that lack their own independence in African media and politics. 

Unfortunately, western media has negatively portrayed Africa as the Dark Continent for decades. As a result, western nations see Africa as a continent that needs to be civilized, because African people are seen as savages who lack reason, culture, and intelligence. Therefore,westerners believed Africans needed to be enlightened through colonization. Despite the fact thatAfrica is traditionally presented as an under-developed third world nation, African nations have become more like the societies of the Western Hemisphere. Furthermore, since, colonialism traders, missionaries, and explorers have all played a role in perpetuating and disseminating certain images of Africa most of these images have been negative. Moreover, western nations have an extremely negative view of African people as malnourished individuals and naked children in front of the camera (class notes). This represention of African news by western media convinces the audiences in the United States, Europe and other parts of the world that the entire continent of Africa is hopeless, impoverished, and disease stricken. Western media news outlets fail to show positive images in Africa, such as images of skyscrapers, well-developed road network, and other manifestations of modern development. 

The western media has not only represented Africa negatively, but African women are also represented in an unenthusiastic light, with regard to body image and consumption.Negative perception of African women in the media occurs not only in the United States, but also in countries worldwide, including South Africa, especially through the interpretation of magazines. This is shown in a study by Tom Odhiambo, where he discusses how the culture of consumption plays a major role in socializing behaviors of black women, in South Africa, to the extent that consumption is essential to defining group identities of women. According to Sarah Nutshell, there has been an emergent black youth and middle class in Johannesburg, followingspecific cultural and consumptive practices portrayed in the media. She suggests that consumption and the presentation of the physical body in the manner of dressing, walking, talking and carriage are metaphors of what the contemporary South African society is becoming (Nuttall 2004:431– 452) (as cited by Tom Odhiambo). Tom Odhiambo expands on SarahNutshells’ idea of consumption, as being beyond just the individuality and style of women in South Africa, as consumption also reflects society in contemporary South Africa. As a result, Tom Odhiambo argues that the black female body is the subject of both manipulation and the intense gazes of businesses and corporations who produce the commodities, because they only see the physical bodies of females in South Africa as products that are available to consumers, and a place to advertise. Thus, they do not see females as human beings. The author points out that this form of consumption is so ingrained in South African society that popular magazines,such as Drum and True Love, seem to have unquestionably accepted the role of purveyors of advertisements in which the black female body embodies both the value of the commodities that ‘it’ advertises, as well as offering itself as an object of consumption. Therefore the black female body is used to promote consumption, while it simultaneously becomes a consumable itself. Thisis very contradictory, considering South Africa is society that is explicitly engaged in social transformation and the eradication of various forms of discrimination and degradation; the use of the black female body to highlight unrestrained consumption through the use of sexual objection is problematic. The use of uncritical depictions and negative portrayals of black women in popular media, undermine societal efforts to realize social transformation. Therefore, the notion of consumption is key to any kind of analysis that contemporary South Africa is subjected to, as it highlights the various forces at play in a post-apartheid context ( Odhiambo 2008).

This study is important because it shows how far the effects of the negative portrayals ofwomen in the media go, with regard to consumption in South Africa and the world. It also points out the contradictory consequences of negative media portrayal in South Africa. In addition, the study shows how South Africa’s form of consumption leads to South African women havingnegative perceptions of their own body image, because they view their bodies as sexual objects for consumption and not something they have to take care of. This study proves two aspects that I have learned from my research: firstly in South Africa, there is no female perspective in subjects such as politics, economy, sport or agriculture, and their voice is virtually unheard. Secondly however, women journalists are given more exposure than men in reporting on subjects that have to do with the body, home, and beauty. It is in television that they find the best professional opportunities, essentially as presenters, but they are only employed for a limited time, because in that part of the world it is uncommon to see women working beyond the age of 50 in any media (Odhiambo 2008). This study shows that representation of women working inthe print media is also poor: only 22 % of the journalists who write news are women (Odhiambo2008).  This brings me to the conclusion that not only does the media need to stop the negative representations of South African women, but they cannot be used as sexual objects to sell products for consumption. South Africa needs to find a new role for women in society, because the black female body is used to promote consumption, while it simultaneously becomes consumable itself. The use of uncritical depictions and negative portrayals of black women in popular media, undermines societal efforts to realize social transformation.

The article, Gender, abortion and substantive representation in the South Africannewsprint media, by Tracey Feltham-Kinga and Catriona Macleodb, shows how the transformation from dictatorship to a democracy has created new abortion legislation in South Africa, which has led to significant changes in the way that abortion is represented throughout the country’s newsprint media. Feltham-King’s study analyzed how both sides of the abortion debate have been represented in the South African newsprint media from 1978 to 2005. She asked the following questions in her study: what is the gender of those called upon to comment on abortion in the newsprint media, from what position (pro-choice or pro-life) do these commentators contribute to the abortion debate, and is there a relationship between the gender of the commentators and their alignment to the abortion debate? (Kinga and Macleodb 2014). The Feltham-King study produced three main findings: firstly her research shows that not only is there an equal number of male and female commentators, but there is also an equilibrium of pro-life and pro-choice positions expressed by these commentators (Kinga and ,Macleodb 2014).Secondly, she points out the fact that even though the media is acknowledging the bifurcation of positions into pro-life and pro-choice, it is not enough to improve the negative representation of abortion in newsprint media. This is because simply recognizing the fact that South African media newsprint has developed a system that divides the issue of abortion into many different pro-life and pro-choice positions, without taking action, is minimizing the complexity of the debate concerning abortion. In addition, Feltham-King found that the media tends to portray theabortion debate as a clash of the elite and working class of South Africa. 

This organization of news media, based on gender and social position, has existed both during the Apartheid era and after 1990, when transformation of democracy and abortion legislation rights had started (-Kinga and Macleodb 2014). This proves that the media is just “speaking too loud”, and that the media does not care enough about the issue of abortion to take many actions in an effort to make more positive representations of women in South Africa. As a result, this means that nothing will change, unless South African citizens become more aware of this problem, and take a stand by actively try to change how their society views abortion, as the media only reinforces what a society believes and creates. Therefore, the third finding was the fact there is a statistically significant relationship between the gender of the reporter and their position on the abortion debate. In addition, in articles with only a female commentator, 67.1% of the commentators took a pro-choice position, and only 21.5% took a pro-life position.  Of those articles which contained male-only commentators, 54.3 % of them took a pro-life position and 14.9% took a pro-choice position.(-Kinga and Macleodb 2014). This is important because it shows that there is a significant gender gap between men and women’s positions on abortion and how they are giving a disproportionate negative biased representation of abortion in South African media, because more women are pro-choice and more men are pro-life. In order to have a more positive representation of not only abortion, but women in South African media and worldwide media, the representation of women cannot be based on gender but on facts.  

South Africa is not the only African country with negative representations of women in the media. Unfortunately, Egyptian media also presents a negative depiction of women. This isshown in the study of Egyptian magazines named, A critical cultural analysis: the portrayal of Egyptian women in the Los Angeles times, by Stephanie Livingston. This study is a critical cultural analysis of the portrayal of Egyptian women by the Los Angeles Times. By analyzing recent news stories, the study aims to identify whether articles reporting the experiences of Egyptian women exhibit exclusion, stereotyping, and assimilation. This study takes a critical look at themes presented by the texts, such as oppression and the symbol of the veil, and explore how cultural values and ideologies exhibited by mass media shape the depiction of Egyptian women. A variety of news stories about Egyptian women appearing in the Los Angeles Times before, during, and after the Egyptian Revolution of 2011 was compared. The findings of Stephanie Livingston illustrate three things: firstly the fact that mass media socializes Americans to accept certain myths and stereotypes that are based on deeply-rooted Western ideologies. Secondly, how these ideologies shape the mass media depiction of Middle Eastern women, resulting in portrayals that are not always accurate. Thirdly, she points out the fact if people can tell the difference between myths and reality, in mass media depiction of Middle Eastern women, then perhaps we can better understand ways in which distortions may hinder the advancement of these women both in Egyptian and the global society. (Livingston 2015) This article is important because it shows how the media reinforces negative stereotypes of Middle Eastern women, which leads to misconceptions and myths about their reality, which is detrimental to the success of Egyptian women.

Western media perpetuates a stereotype of veiled women largely based on sexist views, not on facts. This is shown in an article called The Media’s Imaginary Veiling of Womenby Nahed Eltatawy. The author talks about how the media is still representing women negatively, even in the 2016 Rio Olympics. The author specifically focuses on the beach volley ball game in Rio, where “bikini-clad German player Kira Walkenhorst was on one side of the net and Egyptian player Doaa Elghobashy was on the other side, wearing a full body suit and a hijab(headscarf)” (Eltatawy 2016). In addition the author also points out that despite the fact many people celebrated this image as a symbol of diversity, it also showed how veiled women are oppressed and how western society believes that they’re living in a backward culture. These stereotypes have existed since colonialization. According to the article, most women in the Middle East have been portrayed in ways that show helplessness, oppression, and lack of independence. This is the opposite of how these women really are, most women are very successful but the media fails to portray them in a positive light due to societal norms and cultural ignorance. 

Not only does the media negatively portray women in South Africa and Egypt, but they are also negatively stereotyped in Nigeria. As a result, laws have to be put in place in order to protect women. In Nigeria many women suffer from domestic violence, therefore according to an artile by Cheluchi Onyemelukwe Nigeria has passed a law called, the Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act. However, by itself, the law will have only a limited impact, in part because of its limited geographical reach. This impact can only be moderated by intensive advocacy to ensure that this legislation is adopted by all States in the federation” (Onyemelukwe 2015). In order to stop domestic violence in Nigeria, perception of women must be changed. 

Many minorities, especially women in African countries such as South Africa, Egypt, and Nigeria are negatively represented in the media and politics through three main aspects: consumerism, abortion, and the role of traditional housewives that lack their own independence. The reason why the media negatively portrays women is because of an inherent racism present in society which allows for misconceptions about African women and how they live their lives. Therefore, an apparent discord exists between the portrayal of African women in the media andreality. As a result of this discord, many countries around the world often cast women into the unfavorable role as solely care providers and sexual objects, thus, ignoring their potential, intelligence, and achievements in society.