Role models and stereotypes: An introduction to the ‘Other’

Reading Summary

In Chapter 6 of What Media Classes Really Want to Discuss, Smith discusses the ideas surrounding “Us” and “Them” and introduces the “Other”. The idea of Us and Them starts at a very young age. Either with high school clique or with political groups. The words, ‘we’, ‘us’, and ‘you’, have a lot of rhetorical power. If you consider yourself t be part of us then you are automatically not part of them. Words like “us” have a lot of power because of the use of Ethos. The use of the word can make a person feel like they are a part of something and are not alone. Even though the use of the word may be inclusive, it is also exclusive in nature. Using “Us” immediately creates a “Them” who are technically supposed to be against you. This divide creates the “Other”, who is anyone who is not “people like us”. It is often too easy to blame the media and Hollywood movies for perpetuating stereotypes and using insensitive images for money, but of course, this is also a generalization. The media makers’ job is to maximize the story’s impact on the audience, and so they will use everything in their power to emphasize the little details and really make you think that an actor is a villain or whoever they are playing. The point of this chapter was not to create divides between the Us’s and Them’s but to recognize the way popular images create a forum for us to talk about the real lives of Othered people.

Outside Example

Mean Girls is a movie about a new student who moves from Africa to go to high school for the first time. She is introduced to the clique at the school of popular girls. These girls take her under their wing and make her into a new mean girl. She battles with the decision of wanting to be popular but also not wanting to lose the close friends she’s made at this new school.

Reading Connection

Mean Girls shows how stereotypes really get used in films and media, but also shows the creation of the “Other” and the divide between “us” and “them”. The head girl, Regina George, is the epitome of a rich high school mean girl. She has blonde hair, a pretty face, a good body, and talks down to everyone. Her close group of friends are pretty much the same body type but have dumber personalities. These are shown not only by what they wear but how they talk and address people. These stereotypes have helped to show the audience how they should think about Regina George and her friends. This movie creates the “other” by showing that everyone apparently wants to be “it” and wants to be a part of the most popular group in high school, but of course for there to be a popular high school group, there have to be the unpopular kids who get pushed around but still follow the popular kids. These are also very big stereotypes mentioned in the movie. The “Them” or the unpopular kids are dressed very casually and look kind of nerdy, in order to further push the idea that they are less than and create a thick divide between the “us” and the “them”.