The representation of gender roles in the media : an analysis of gender discourse in Sex and the City movies

Media is a big part of people’s everyday lives. It influences both how we see ourselves and the world to some extent. There are many different types of media, for example: television shows, movies, the radio, news papers, advertisements which are placed in random places and the internet. In these different forms of media, there are images of men and women, which are represented in different ways and with different characteristics. Research has been made on a lot of movies and television shows and this thesis will be adding to this vast amount of research by analyzing gender representation in the movies Sex and the City 1 and 2. By using discourse analysis, the results show different types of gender representation and whether the characters in Sex and the City challenge the patriarchal privilege. Assuming social constructivism, we believe that these images of gender representation in movies affect our perception of what a man or a woman is. Our results suggest that the characters do still follow the patriarchal privilege but some characters do on occasion challenge them. However the outcome is rarely successful.