Study task 2 - Male Gaze Theory

Laura Mulvey’s text Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema (1975)

1. Her use of psychoanalysis as a feminist critical tool 

Personality is formed through conflicts among three fundamental structures of the human mind: ego, identity, superego, which is used as a weapon politically. showing the way that subconsciously society has structured the film industry. 
Castration is when a young boy develops a sense of subjectivity and becomes aware that everyone is not the same as he is. He gains A strong anxiety that someone will take him, he starts to believe that women will do this as they do not have their own, making the woman a symbol of threat in a nonliteral way.

2. The opportunity in contemporary cinema for more radical forms that break away from the patriarchal influence 

 Cinema in the modern day needs to start reacting against assumptions and stereotypes so that the visual industry can be changed to move away from the normal expectations of society's influence.

3. Explanation of scopophilia ... how it relates to cinema 

Scopophilia is the pleasure of looking, which Freud associated to be one of the instincts of sexuality. Scopophilia is seen to be the act of taking other people as objects objecting them to controlling a curious gaze. the extreme contrast between the darkness of the room and the intensity of the light on the screen creates an element of separation allowing the consumer to look in on the private world and former desire for the performer.

4. Explanation of narcissistic pleasure ... how it relates to cinema

Narcissism in regards to this industry is when there is a connection between the viewer and the character in which they have identified as a version of themselves, and all related to. The idea of the female characters to become an object of the scopophilia and the idea of the male character is to become a body in which someone can view their narcissistic scopophilia.

5. Summary of the two forms of visual pleasure ... and a discussion of the castration threat


It is always the woman in the movies that are positioned in the threat and the man. The diversion is not enough to be able to secure males pleasure, leaving them with the threat of anxiety has previously spoken about. The female character is punished for her lifestyle, represented by fetch sized objects such as stiletto heels, there to replace the missing phallus colours.

6.  The roles that men and women play in cinema and spectatorship - active/male, passive/women


 Mail characterisations within cinema drive the storyline while female characters are just there to be seen as a passive characterisation. It could be said that it seemed that the woman is simply performing to the male as if he is the only active participant in the cinema.

7. The constant threat of castration and how the male unconscious relinquishes it


 The constant threat of castration is on the males mind because of their rally age trauma of being curious of the female's body. 

Group Discussion Notes:

Storey, J(2001) Cultural theory and Popular Culture:
Cine-psychoanalysis:

• analysis of Laura Mulvey's text, secondary text
• aimed at students, explains/explores the original text, interpretation
• recognise the difference in texts, always look at primary texts

Dyer, R (1979) Stars:

•  Arguing with Mulvey
•  Creating a counterargument to counter rather than contrast

Male Gaze and Design:

• The male gaze is used when investigating designing a product towards a masculine market.
•  Developing visual responses which further explain the theories.