Smoothing the wrinkles: Hollywood, old age femininity and the pathological gaze

This article highlights that the new visibility of older female Hollywood stars is fully bound up in the production, reproduction and embodiment of a complex nexus of feminised discourses of “successful aging” that incorporates and naturalises ideologies of deferred retirement, cosmeceutical enhancement, and chronological decorum into longstanding formations of normative whiteness. Weaving through this are those pathologized ruptures to “successful aging” occasioned by signifiers of mortality inscribed on the flesh of older female stars and/or reproduced in their performances of abject, cognitive failure and which point to the broader cultural anxieties that attend western demographics of aging. Whilst the dynamic of this nexus serves to protect older female stars from alignment with pathologized abjection, it does so in ways that effectively privilege the terms of “successful aging.” Effectively, the new visibility of older female stars is thus rendered conditional on conformity to The Beauty Myth’s extension into old age and the effacement of potential ruptures to the ideological hegemony of “successful aging.

A plan for guided independent studies for senior students in the University of Connecticut School of Nursing.

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston University This item was digitized by the Internet Archive

Representation: the position of women in the media industries

SUMMARY Watching or listening to a news broadcast might give the impression that there are plenty of women involved in news and current affairs broadcasting. On the surface women appear to be well represented. However, a closer look at the statistics shows that, despite making up 51 per cent of the population and a larger proportion of the TV and radio audience, women are severely underrepresented both on and off air in news and current affairs broadcasting. A recent study showed that, in the UK, there were three male reporters on flagship news programmes for every female one. The situation is even worse for women as experts: in a 2010 study, women made up only 26 per cent of experts or commentators. We are particularly concerned about the representation of women in news and current affairs broadcasting because of the genre’s wide reach and role in shaping public perceptions about society. In our view, news and current affairs broadcasters have a particular responsibility to reflect society by ensuring a gender balance. This is especially incumbent on the BBC and other Public Service Broadcasters which receive statutory benefits. There are a number of obstacles to the progression of female employees in the industry. The fast-paced, responsive nature of news and current affairs broadcasting presents difficulties for those with caring responsibilities, largely women. Broadcasters could address this by doing more to promote flexible working. We were also told that sexist bullying still exists in the industry, and that older women in the sector have experienced particular discrimination. We have not been able to test fully all of these allegations, but condemn any such attitudes and practices. We urge broadcasters to take further steps to ensure they are eradicated. We also recommend that job and promotion opportunities are awarded on the basis of fair and open competition. We believe the current situation is unsatisfactory, and needs to be addressed. This cannot be done without a robust body of data. The current monitoring system, where data are not collected routinely or in comparable formats, is insufficient. Ofcom should require broadcasters to collect annual, comparable gender equality data on permanent and freelance staff, categorised by age, role and genre. Ofcom should also require broadcasters to set their own short, medium and long term targets for the use of experts, which should be monitored. This proactive use of Ofcom’s powers should be reviewed in one year. If the situation has not improved, Ofcom should consider delegating its powers to promote gender equality to a new body with this as its focus. Gone are the days when women were seldom heard or seen in news and current affairs broadcasts. Nevertheless, in this era of equality we were surprised and disappointed at how much further broadcasters, Ofcom and the Government have to go to achieve genuine gender balance

Aging, Stardom, and “The Economy of Celebrity”

Definition. The conjunction of aging and stardom refers to a new field of research emerging in response to the growing number of older actors who are highly visible within broader circuits of celebrity culture and who populate a burgeoning number of fictional films depicting the pleasures and problems of aging characters

‘Old Age’ Films: Golden Retirement, Dispossession and Disturbance

In its reliance on old age protagonists and storylines and a cohort of pensionable actors, an emerging cycle of British films (including Last Orders (2001), Iris (2001), The Mother (2003), The Queen (2006), The Iron Lady (2011), Quartet (2012) along with The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (2012) and its 2015 sequel) addresses many concerns related to the ageing population and ‘crisis of ageing’ discourse, whilst projecting certain troubling ideologies. In the play between cultural and generic verisimilitude, these films illuminate the inclusions and exclusions of the Thatcherite, neo-liberal, golden retirement dream in both pre- and post-crash contexts, whilst storylines and actors' ongoing careers combine to normalise the deferred retirement policies and extended working lives resulting from the 2008 banking crisis. This article argues that these films both utilise and disturb dominant stereotypes of old age. However, in turn, these disturbances are troublingly neo-colonialist, heteronormative and postfeminist

Crumbling Rejuvenation: Archetype, embodiment and the “Aging Beauty Myth”

Mobilising Jungian formulations of the archetypal crone, this paper explores the figure of the rejuvenated, wicked witch/ evil stepmother as represented in two big budget, fantasy films, Stardust (Dir., Vaughn, 2007) and Snow White and the Huntsman (Dir., Sanders, 2012). Through the figure of the ‘crone, a link is established between Jungian psychoanalytic understandings of myth as an expression of historically and culturally specific repressions; and Mythologies, Barthes’s semiological account of depoliticised speech, and its ideological function. From this position, the films’ CGI enabled transformations from youthful beauty to aged crone are located in the feminised regulatory regime of ‘successful ageing’ as it plays into ideologies of rejuvenation and chronological decorum as they are embodied by actors and/or stars. Given that both films end with the punishing, violent disintegration of the crone into abjection and death, this paper argues that they expose three prevailing cultural anxieties that are simultaneously mythical and mythological; one, a repressed fear that rejuvenation is no more than an ideological veneer that overlays inevitable decline and mortality; two, a repressed awareness of mortality; three, the ideological effacement of ‘old age’ as being both performative and culturally produced

Surface Active Agents: Chemical Types and Applications

Newsletter providing "a lighter, human interest side of the news" from the Boston University Medical Campus

Representation: the position of women in the media industries

SUMMARY Watching or listening to a news broadcast might give the impression that there are plenty of women involved in news and current affairs broadcasting. On the surface women appear to be well represented. However, a closer look at the statistics shows that, despite making up 51 per cent of the population and a larger proportion of the TV and radio audience, women are severely underrepresented both on and off air in news and current affairs broadcasting. A recent study showed that, in the UK, there were three male reporters on flagship news programmes for every female one. The situation is even worse for women as experts: in a 2010 study, women made up only 26 per cent of experts or commentators. We are particularly concerned about the representation of women in news and current affairs broadcasting because of the genre’s wide reach and role in shaping public perceptions about society. In our view, news and current affairs broadcasters have a particular responsibility to reflect society by ensuring a gender balance. This is especially incumbent on the BBC and other Public Service Broadcasters which receive statutory benefits. There are a number of obstacles to the progression of female employees in the industry. The fast-paced, responsive nature of news and current affairs broadcasting presents difficulties for those with caring responsibilities, largely women. Broadcasters could address this by doing more to promote flexible working. We were also told that sexist bullying still exists in the industry, and that older women in the sector have experienced particular discrimination. We have not been able to test fully all of these allegations, but condemn any such attitudes and practices. We urge broadcasters to take further steps to ensure they are eradicated. We also recommend that job and promotion opportunities are awarded on the basis of fair and open competition. We believe the current situation is unsatisfactory, and needs to be addressed. This cannot be done without a robust body of data. The current monitoring system, where data are not collected routinely or in comparable formats, is insufficient. Ofcom should require broadcasters to collect annual, comparable gender equality data on permanent and freelance staff, categorised by age, role and genre. Ofcom should also require broadcasters to set their own short, medium and long term targets for the use of experts, which should be monitored. This proactive use of Ofcom’s powers should be reviewed in one year. If the situation has not improved, Ofcom should consider delegating its powers to promote gender equality to a new body with this as its focus. Gone are the days when women were seldom heard or seen in news and current affairs broadcasts. Nevertheless, in this era of equality we were surprised and disappointed at how much further broadcasters, Ofcom and the Government have to go to achieve genuine gender balance