Education

1. “Women in transnational contexts: gender politics
and the media in Latin America and Brazil” –
pre-BSA PG conference
DR. CAROLINA MATOS
LECTURER IN SOCIOLOGY AND THE MEDIA
DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY
CITY UNIVERSITY LONDON

2. Key concepts and intellectual
frameworks
*Increasing dialogue between the academic disciplines of British Cultural Studies and Latin
American
* Post-colonialism and the “third world woman” – the persistence of problematic representations
* Beyond the “cultural turn” in feminist media studies - Redistribution versus recognition
(Fraser, 2013)
* Pre-feminist versus post-feminist media texts
* “Empowerment” and the difficulties with “sexist images”
* Cyber-feminism and the uses of new technologies in the struggle for gender justice
* Towards global gender justice and transnational feminist networks in a digital

3. Methods and research questions
* Feminism theory and multidisciplinary research: Feminist media studies, sociology and
development
* Interviews with international experts, feminists, politicians and bloggers
* Media analysis of ads and images from female magazines as well as discourses from feminist
blogs (2014/2015)
* Secondary data, including international reports on gender inequality
Core research questions:
*How do questions of gender, race and nation intersect in determining feminisms in the “Third
World”? What are some of the images and discussions surrounding the Brazilian women in the
media?
* Is the media contributing to advance, change, reflect of reinforce stereotypes and dominant
patterns?

4. Women’s oppression in an age of
globalization
* Post-colonialism and the emphasis on diversity of women’s experience of
oppression:
*As Mohanty (1990) argues that, “the homogeneity of women as a group is produced
not on the bases of biological essentials but on sociological universals. Women are
characterised as a singular group on the basis of a shared oppression. What brings
women together is a sociological notion of the ‘sameness’ of their oppression.”
* Focuses on 5 specific ways in which “women” is used in Western feminist
discourse. Has looked at the work of Fran Hosken (on female genital mutilation) to
writers from the Women in International Development School, who write about the
effect of development policies
* Oppression of women in Africa x oppression of women in Europe:
“In the texts women are defined as victims of male violence; as victims of the
colonial process (Cutrufelli); victims of the Arab familial system….; victims of the
economic development process…and victims of the Islamic code”.

5. Women’s oppression in an age of
globalization, and Third World Feminism
* Both Europe and Latin America face similar challenges in terms of
inclusive growth and of greater well-being for all
* Criticisms to universal definitions of citizenship (i.e. Young, 2000)
According to scholars like Philips (2010) and Young (1990) , the problem
with looking for a core humanity behind all the differences of class, gender
and so forth leads to equating equality with sameness, leaving untouched
inequalities in power.
* Discrimination against women on a global and national level:
Mohanty (1990) and Weedon (1999) have argued that, rather than portraying
“Third World women” as victims of patriarchal practices, such as genital
mutilation, attention needs to be given to the specific contexts in which
women live (in Weedon, 1999).

6. British Cultural Studies and Latin American
* Increasing dialogue between the academic disciplines of British Cultural Studies and Latin
American
* Research on gender and feminism has been strengthened as a tradition in Brazil since the
1990’s
* Brazil’s dictatorship ended in the mid-1980’s, and since then there has been a growth of
women in newsrooms, businesses and a “feminization” of politics
* In an interview given to McLaughin and Carter’s edited collection Current Perspectives in
Feminist Media Studies (2013), scholar Ana Carolina Escosteguy argued in favour of a wider
proximity between the two disciplines
* Feminist media studies is at a disadvantage in Brazil: research is still low and competes with
sociology and anthropology for space in a small number of feminist journals (i.e. Revistas de
Estudos Feministas and Cadernos Pagu)

7. Beyond the “cultural turn” in feminist media
studies
* Culture and economics:
* Both the materialism surrounding women’s subordination, the “things”, as well as the “words”,
such as the language and discourse we use to make sense of the world, need to be addressed in
analyses on gender inequality.
* Feminists need to remain engaged with socio-economic issues and the persistence of
inequalities (Jackson and Jones, 1998).
* Nancy Fraser (2013) has talked about the importance of redistributive justice (i.e. poverty,
material conditions economics) and recognition (i.e. cultural values, attitudes and beliefs)
* Limitations of discursive analyses (representations and images)

8. The "Third World women“: myths and
stereotypes

9. The "Third World women“: myths and
stereotypes

10. Pre-feminist versus post-feminist media texts
* Questions raised:
1) Can we actually talk about post-feminism media texts in these particular national contexts?
I.e. Yuval-Davis for instance argues that it is a mistake to take post-modernism and post-
feminism for granted
2) How can we conceive of women’s empowerment and agency in such images?
3) Is it right to ignore “sexist” or problematic images in a context where sharp gender
inequalities still exist and pervade the everyday lives of many women?
* Gender performance and rigid gender roles (i.e. Tuchman et al, 1978, Butler, 1990)
* Women’s empowerment: Internal and external barriers, the persistence of discrimination in
many spheres of life and the difficulties of dealing with a multiplicity of identities

11. Historical struggles and challenges
to rights
* Historical oppression: Brazilian women have traditionally been exploited, first by the
colonisers who used them as sexual slaves, whilst others were destined to a life of hard low paid
labour under horrible conditions, with only the more privileged encountering a form of “escape”
through marriage.
* Brazil gave women the right to vote in 1934, although most of Central and South America
gave woman suffrage rights only after World War II.
*After the 1960’s, a series of laws which were approved in the country started to improve the
situation of women, including alterations in the marriage law (Lei n. 4.121/62) and the
implementation of divorce (Lei n. 6.515/77). Main change came with the 1988 Constitution of
1988
* Current challenges – retreat of rights in Congress, such as the abortion law (2015 – the year of
“feminism” in the country)

12. The “Brazilian woman” myth
* Colonial modes of representation (i.e. Weedon, 1999)
* What are the roots of the social construction of Brazilian
femininity?
* The “Brazilian woman” (or Latin America, the Latina) is a
cultural stereotype in Brazil itself
* Since the colonial years, Portuguese and other Europeans
arrived in Brazil and were astonished and tempted by the
nudity of the natives (i.e. the exotic)
* Gilberto Freyre in Casa Grande e Senzala (1933) described
how the environment which started Brazilian life was highly
sexually charged, with the European setting foot in the
country and coming across naked indigenous women, or the
“niggers” of the earth.

13. Brazilian femininity and
stereotypes
* Brazilian women are seen as sex symbols internationally, and in Brazil,
as recent research has shown, a chauvinistic and patriarchal nuclear
family culture still permeates the imaginary collective psyche
* In many ways we can trace colonialist parallels between the discourses
on Brazilian femininity with Asian and Black
* Williamson (1986) has stressed how exoticism served an ideological
function, having had its roots in European colonialism (fascination with
black female sexuality/repulsion of colonial bodies) (in Van Zoonen,
2000).
* Questions of “empowerment” and “sexist images”

14. Cyberfeminism and the use of new technologies for
mobilization and counter-discourses

15. Improvements in gender equality and further
challenges
* Brazil has seen a reduction in inequality levels between 1996 and 2006, during the
governments of Cardoso and Lula
* According to the 2012 ranking of the World Economic Forum (WEF), Brazil has gone up in 20
positions on gender equality falling (82nd
position to the 62 from a list of 135 countries).
* Improvements in primary education and the percentage of women in ministerial roles
(7% to 27%).
Problems and challenges:
* Feminicide – the Maria da Penha law
* Low political representation - Brazil has one of the lowest rates of political representation in
the world, with a rate of less than 10% of women present in legislative bodies.

16. Thank you!
•Dr. Carolina Matos
•Department of Sociology
•City University London

17. Selected bibliography
* Bordo, S. (1993, 2003) “Introduction: Feminism, Western Culture and the Body” in
Unbearable weight: feminism, Western culture and the body, Berkeley: University of California,
p. 1 – 42
* Carter, C. (2014) “Sex/Gender and the Media: From Sex Roles to Social Construction and
Beyond” in Ross, K. (eds.) The Handbook of Gender, Sex and Media, London: Wiley Blackwell,
p. 365-382
* Orgad, S. (2014) “When media representation met sociology” in Waisbord, S. (eds.) Media
sociology: a reappraisal, London: Polity
* Philips, A. (1999) Why Equalities Matter, London: Polity Press
* Silva, K. and Mendes, K. (2013) “Negotiating the local/global in feminist media studies –
conversations with Ana Carolina Escosteguy and Anita Gurumurthy” in McLaughlin, Lisa and
Carter, Cynthia (eds.) Current Perspectives in Feminist Media Studies, London: Routledge, p.
127 – 130