Preview

Beauty of Giselle and the Beast of Lebron

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1639 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Beauty of Giselle and the Beast of Lebron
The Beast of Lebron and the Beauty of Giselle
It has always been quoted from time to time that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. However, what we see is not always necessarily beauty but sometimes just an individual perspective of the viewer’s sense of the images they see. You see all of these different types of mainstream media that heavily influence and criticize our culture so negatively by the creators and executives who sometimes put there spin on the way we see and view things. Advertisements, movies, internet, radio and TV are sometimes with their images convey hate, racism, and inequality. For example, take Gisele a world’s top model, and a NBA star athlete Lebron James and you put them on the front cover of Vogue’s April 2008 issue with Lebron with his arm around Gisele showing facial expressions of King Kong. Meanwhile holding Gisele resembles Botticelle’s Venus. The result is going to be a buzz of speculation about what we are really looking at when we see this current issue of Vogue Magazine. Although the images of Lebron and Giselle intend to reflect an issue devoted to size and shape their facial expressions, postures, and similarities to past images inflict common stereotypes.
First, the facial expression of the Lebron James and Giselle gives the readers and viewers a sense of meaning and interpretation of common stereotypes. It is very evident to say and see that the facial expression of Lebron James on the cover of this magazine issue is a very deranged, crazy, and gorilla-beast image of him that is much related to common stereotypes of African-Americans. These characteristics of stereotypes about blacks have always been linked in media images of blacks. The African-American male continues to be the subject of extensive stereotyping. Such stereotypes are pervasive and reinforced by media images that deliberately discourage and devalue the African-American male as a crazy and out of control beast with a penchant for violence and that all

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    I would like to start of by thanking you for requesting that I analyze Susan Bordo's “Never Just Pictures” and recommend on whether it should or shouldn't be published in The Shorthorn. In short, Susan Bordo is an English professor of women studies who focuses on the media's negative portrayal of beauty through body image. Based on my analysis of this article, I recommend that you publish the article in The Shorthorn because I consider it to be interesting, controversial, and nuanced.…

    • 777 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In this week’s module, I find the topic on Lebron James and Gisele Bündchen’s Vogue cover quite interesting. To begin with, the magazine cover is strikingly similar to the King Kong movie poster such that both James and King Kong show angry facial expressions with their mouths wide open, while holding a white woman with one arm. The athlete seems to portray negative stereotypes about black men, one who is barbaric, animalistic, and obsessed with white females.…

    • 140 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Discrimination can take many forms and exist every aspect of society. After many years the fight against discrimination is still an ongoing process and for many it’s a daily struggle for many. The short documentary “The Color of beauty” examines the “blatant racism”(00:20) and discrimination that occurs within the fashion industry. The film revolves around Renee Thompson, an ethnic model trying to overcome the racism that exists in the fashion industry in order to make it on top. In today’s modernizing fashion has become a powerful driving force. The film, argues issue that Caucasian models are preferred over colored models, which is evident with the ratio of colored model to Caucasian models in most fashion choice. The film also points out that the difficulty colored models face due to a biased standard that the fashion industry has on beauty. It argues that more often or not, if a colored model is chosen, it’s due to his/her “unique” future. These so called “unique”(02:33) feature is common feature that many Caucasians. Elizabeth St. Philip, the director of the film, utilized a combination of logic, credibility, and emotional devices, in arguing and persuading an audience on the issue presented.…

    • 1193 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Beasty Lebron

    • 1472 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Stuart Hall, the author of “Encoding/Decoding”, explores the relationship between encoding and decoding messages, explaining how one component of media can be decoded in several ways. As individuals, we give meaning to the things surrounding us based on our own beliefs, values, and experiences, making room for numerous perspectives. Basketball idol, LeBron James and supermodel, Gisele Bundchen, were featured on the cover of Vogue Magazine, March 2008 issue. Following the release of the March issue, James was acknowledged for being just the third male ever to appear on Vogue’s cover, and the first African American. What would be considered a major accomplishment for anyone, especially a young athlete has now become a very controversial issue. The cover of the magazine has produced both positive and negative viewpoints. While some support James in his memorable accomplishment, others critique him for not being more careful with his image. How is it possible that the same image could have such opposite reactions? This derives from how individuals give meaning to the things around us because of our beliefs. When two people can be shown the same image and interpret it in to completely different ways, as seen in the controversy with LeBron James on the cover of Vogue magazine, it is apparent that their experience have influenced their way of decoding.…

    • 1472 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Media has a tremendous impact on the way society thinks today. Sources of media such as social media, magazines, advertisements, and television help to guide people’s perspectives. And one of the topics that it influences in society includes the way that society views female beauty. Many people feel that the media affects our notions of female beauty while many others argue against that. Valdes-Rodriguez in “My Hips, My Cadera, talks about the way her body is viewed in different cultures. And supports the fact that the environment you grow up in influences your perspective of beauty. However, while many agree that media does have an influence on our notion of female beauty, this notion can be attributed to different things, such as your culture…

    • 913 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Richard Sherman

    • 471 Words
    • 2 Pages

    As I watched the Sherman-Andrews interview over and over through the likes of YouTube and WorldStarHipHop, I couldn’t help but think back to the 2008 Vogue cover featuring Lebron James and model Gisele Bundchen. The cover, criticized as being racially insensitive, showed Lebron James “roaring” while holding the graceful ‘damsel-in-distress’ Gisele. Obviously, the cover’s similarities to the popular ‘King Kong’ visuals were more than coincidental. This time however, LeBron was replaced with Richard Sherman, and Gisele with Andrews. This juxtaposition perfectly exemplifies society’s perceptions of primitive blacks and the civil whites. It didn’t take long for this firestorm to reach the likes of social media. While many saw the Sherman-Andrews exchange as mere comedy, the racial undertones began to creep up like weeds. The racial epithets ranged from the somewhat conservative…

    • 471 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Manufacturing Beauty

    • 552 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Throughout the world, people are influenced by the physical attractiveness of an individual. A person’s physical attractiveness is determined by genetics, physical, and non-physical factors. In Cindy Jackson’s case, the physical attractiveness stereotype has been working in favor as she has progressed in her modeling and publicity career. She looks to continually improve her physical attractiveness by constant body modifications. Because she appears to be young and beautiful, she has caught the attention of media and people who admire her personal appearance, primarily received through a plethora of cosmetic surgeries. As the saying goes, physical attractiveness is only skin-deep, but looks themselves can be deceiving.…

    • 552 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    There are many different stereotypes of African American women found on television, such as, mammy, jezebels, or ghetto. These representations, not only make the African American woman look bad, but it also promotes the wrong example. These images were also created to empower the black women. Many African American women have been given roles within television that affects the way society idealizes them. These particular roles not only affect the individual’s character, but it also has an effect on the audience. Certain television shows tend to influence the audience to think as if all…

    • 370 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Winnie Harlow is not pretty enough to be the face of brands because her black and white skin, Serena Williams is an awarded athlete but she is too manly. A woman’s worth always comes back to what she looks like. As most of us probably think, this should definitely not be the case. A woman can be beautiful, but that does not define her. Not to be too pessimistic, we are moving forward as a society. Many people defended Serena Williams, like JK Rowling and others. Girls look up to Winnie, and they learn about how to accept themselves however they look. Her fans even do makeup tutorials tribute to her. As said, the media is also putting out more diverse images of beauty, like the Lane Bryant “I am no angel” campaign. This campaign paints curvy women as just as valuable as beautiful as skinny women. It is important to see both the progress and set backs we have had as a society concerning the standards of beauty. We are growing and learning to accept the diverse beauty present in the world, but in some sense, are still too focused on a woman’s beauty. In the end, we are all beautiful – in different ways, in similar ways – but our beauty does not define us, and we should not let…

    • 526 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Unrealistic Body Images

    • 562 Words
    • 3 Pages

    We rarely see real women portrayed in the media. This is why most women have low self-esteem and are unhappy with their looks. Women yearn to look like the women on the covers of magazines, and on the front pages of fashion websites with, as stated by former Cosmopolitan editor Leah Hardy, “ 22-inch waists, but they also had breasts and great skin. They had teeny tiny ankles and thin thighs, but they still had luscious hair and full cheeks” (Hardy, 2010). These women don't exist, but we still strive to look like them. Photoshopping in the media is not only altering images, but it is also altering the definition of beauty in our minds. It gives people the idea that if they don’t look like the people on those covers, they wont fit in with society. Magazines and social media sites need to realize that they are planting fake ideals, almost impossible to achieve, into young girls’ impressionable minds, and they are changing their concept of what really is beautiful and…

    • 562 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “When people rely on surface appearances and false racial stereotypes, rather than in-depth knowledge of others at the level of the heart, mind and spirit, their ability to assess and understand people accurately is compromised” (Forbes). James A. Forbes explains that not only do stereotypes impair how people see themselves, but also how people treat others. He explains that people should be treated by their heart, mind and spirit instead of their outside appearance. Throughout history, media has encouraged stereotypes of people with all shapes, sizes and colors but, specifically black people. A stereotype is “ to give a fixed form to.” In the media very few African Americans are seen in a positive, non-stereotypical way, while most are seen in stereotypical roles, specifically athletes. Although people think that negative portrayals of African Americans in media have no effect on African American youth it causes them to mimic the destructive behaviors seen on television and social media therefore, the media should display more positive African American figures.…

    • 500 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    African American females in television shows and movies are often shown as the loud “ghetto” acting, angry black girl who is always “telling someone off”. Actor Tyler Perry has been criticized for illustrating African American females as “big momma”, another negative portrayal of black women. Other times shapely video vixens cause other black females to be portrayed as “jump-offs” or gold diggers. African American males have even greater judgments to overcome. They are viewed as a menace to society. They are illustrated as wild, angry, dangerous “gang bangers”. Black men are viewed as absentee fathers or abusive husbands. Although, in some cases, African American males do possess some of these characteristics, there are just as many black men that are positive role models. These ignorant judgments are called stereotypes.…

    • 418 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Black Males

    • 2364 Words
    • 10 Pages

    The article talks about African Americans that support the music in our society and are influence from the hip hop culture. Boyd questions the influence of hip hop on athletes. He elaborates on how they dress and act like hip hop influenced men. For example, he used Rasheed Wallace, NBA player, and pointed out that he wears cornrolls and air force ones and he was the first to get fined for wearing his shorts too long in a basketball game. Boyd also talks about emotion and hip hop and being emotional on the basketball court. He stated that black basketball players have a disadvantage because if they get too emotional in the game then they would seem like a threat, but if they are not emotional enough the black basketball players will be perceived as not caring enough. Boyd also discussed how society as a whole are not able to talk about sports or music with bringing up African Americans because they play such a vital role in both of those professions.…

    • 2364 Words
    • 10 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    When African-American NBA basketball player, Kendall Marshall, wasn’t getting enough playing time according to his father, he tweeted “I always said there was racism in sports. White guys in basketball are getting every chance to succeed even when they aren’t doing sh!t” (Marshall). Although the father quickly apologized, the media took every chance they could to bring this story to headline news by making the title “The Sixers Are Racist” (Deadspin) “Sixers Are Racist for Benching His Son” (SI) making the controversy more popular and causing a bigger commotion than it needed to be. Other professional athletes went public about their feelings regarding racism and sports and the results were not as expected. Fellow African-American NFL football player Benjamin Watson, responded to the Kendall Marshall controversy in an unexpected manner and goes on to say “…ultimately the problem is not a skin problem, but a sin problem. Sin is the reason we rebel against authority” (Benjamin Watson). With Watson, a professional competitive athlete exclaiming how racism isn’t a problem in sports, but in the way that “we (African-Americans) abuse our authority” (Watson), shows from an unbiased racially similar colleague that racism isn’t an issue in sports. An ESPN African-American football analyst, Michael Smith goes public…

    • 886 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    African American Equality

    • 1634 Words
    • 7 Pages

    In accordance with these images, viewers feel that the negative personality characteristics of African Americans shown on television are realistic images. On the other hand, viewers do not perceive the low-achieving status roles and positive stereotypes of African Americans on television as real or accurate portrayals. Viewers acknowledge several African Americans in real life achieving high status positions. For instance, Oprah Winfrey, Tyra Banks, Bob Johnson, Russell Simmons, and Condelezza Rice are all African Americans with high status and profile positions. For that reason, television viewers may see television portrayals as inaccurate representations of African Americans. However, the study further notes that African American television portrayals are repeatedly negative and often influence viewers to perceive them as unworthy. Similar to findings concerning the continuation of negative portrayals of minorities on television, the electronic media still encases negative portrayals of African Americans. These portrayals in turn have an effect on viewers’ perceptions of them…

    • 1634 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays