Stereotype representation of women in media

 BY- PRIYAM BASU THAKUR

The fall of communism in USSR & East European countries &  the emergence of USA with the principle of globalization-liberalization-privatization caused a big change in economy. Newspapers of India were confined between local or national level before the starting of Foreign Direct Investment. With the rapid growth of Information Technology Internet, satellite cable TV boom, digital communication spread over the world. In the age of convergence industry people considered news as a commodity. Now-a-days media is a lucrative business not only for public service. In this reason developmental news grab less attention by the editors. 

        

Women are a larger part of our society & the media is a mirror of society. But in this case we can not find so many women issues in media. Editors consider women oriented news as “soft issues”. This fact is proved when a 17 year old tribal girl compelled to walk naked for almost 8 km. in a village of Birbhum district in West Bengal for the punishment of loving a boy of another community & mainstream media remain silent than other issues like fashion shows & so on. Women oriented pages in newspapers almost full with fashion, beauty tips, cuisine & many such materials. The mega serial’s of entertainment channels draw two type of women. One is full of family values, selfless, great. Another type is selfish, rude. Those well-dressed women of TV serials have no work to do & they were always busy in criticizing other family members. This is one type of insult of viewers intellect & emotion by previewing woman’s contribution in family in this manner. There is no event upon women’s health, laws etc. Joshi committee (1982-84) opines that “Doordarshan is at present dominated by feature films and film based programmes that exploit the female form to titillate and/ or through their socially insensitive approach simply trivialize and debase the image of womanhood.”

If media play his social role women movement can spread the every corner of the world. Feminist movement can convert into humanist movement which is impossible in contemporary situation.