Masculinity in the Media

The relationship between masculinity and the media first came into focus in the 1970s and gained increased scholarly attention in the late 1980s. It continued to generate work that theorizes, interprets and evaluates masculinity with or in the media. In modern Western societies, it is considered ‘masculine’ to be aggressive, independent and active. There is a considerable debate as to whether these qualities really are sexual characteristics of the gender, whether they are biologically or socially determined, and in what ways they maintain male power.
Masculinity is defined as the state of an organism reflecting or displaying the appearances, traits and behavior pattern characteristic of the male species. As defined, this whole ‘masculinity’ does not necessarily implicate gender. Many societies have ascribed different and distinctive qualities to men. However Hollywood filmmakers seem to emphasize on the whole idea of masculinity in the male gender. The two films Disclosure an...