The Male Gaze

The male gaze is the power that male spectators in a patriarchal structured culture have over women. It is a pervasive form of vision in popular culture, because it controls every aspect of a woman’s life and is evident in almost every form of media.
Media dictates what a woman should look like. She is supposed to be sexy, which may entail high heels, skirts, and make-up.
From magazines to film the image of women is suppose to be one that will capture a mans attention. For instance, beauty magazines are used as guides for women on how to acquire the right look that will make her more appealing to men. They advise women on everything from how to cover dark circles under her eyes to how to remove unwanted hair.


The power of the male gaze is also evident in television and film. These forms of media depict what patriarchally structured societies assume women should look like, and the benefits she will acquire from adapting to that ideal.


As in the film “Secretary” by Steven Shainberg. Where a secretary realizes that in order to gain the attention of her male boss she needs to wear clothing that will reveal her female body to him.
On the other side Bell Hooks explains that women can win back their power from men by developing an oppositional gaze. The oppositional gaze is the critical analysis of media and how it is used to create the realty of a woman as being the victim. In order for a woman to break free of this victimization, she needs to develop her oppositional gaze that is developed through observing media, by means of watching and reading all kinds of media, then critically analyzing it. However, by passively watching media a woman can’t develop this oppositional gaze.

In reading about these structures I have come to understand that although the male gaze is so deeply ingrained in our culture we can eventually make it extinct by critically analyzing images the media presents to us. By understanding these structures I have come to realize that my own identity as a black female has not been developed organically, but developed on the basis of female ideals based on fictional images in the media.