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SEX AND THE CITY  **GENDER KNOTS AND THE CITY **  MALE DOMINANCE In his article Alan Johnson describes male dominance as men more commonly holding higher positions, and the more prestigious jobs in society especially in politics, religion, economics, education, military, etc. In the SITC (Sex in the City), men hold the higher positions, and often earn more money, which is, according to Alan Johnson, a common finding in the patriarchal society we live in, and which the show is based in. Carrie Bradshaw, the main character, is a free lance journalist who writes a column for the New York Times, and eventually for Vogue for $4.50 per word. At the end of the show and in the movie, she writes a book that becomes a top sellers in the United States and Paris. Yet, her eventual husband, “Big,” is portrayed as the fortune 500 type, with jets, limos, women, and all else that glitters, while Carrie struggles to afford the down payment on her modest apartment when it goes co-op. Counter-intuitively, Carrie’s three friends loan her the money for her 30,000 dollar down payment, each having enough financial resources to pay the whole some or at least half of the payment. One of Carrie’s friends is a successful hardworking lawyer who fought her way to becoming the only female partner. Another, Samantha, is a top publicist. Charlotte is a successful art curator who is financially stable because of her career and because of her first marriage. Each of these ladies represents strong dominant women.  MALE IDENTIFICATION Competition is a major component in two of the four characters lives, Samantha and Miranda. Both work in fields highly dominated by men and in turn are said to “act-like-men” at work. Competition is a quality, according to Johnson, that is valued by patriarchal society an linked to masculinity, as well as forcefulness, coolness, logic, decisiveness, control, strength, and toughness, which are all qualities portrayed by Miranda and Samantha. They are often called “ball-busters” and other such names that put them down for being too masculine, those around them at work feel they should be more female. The women portrayed in these high profile positions are also surrounded by a majority of men in the work place, making them what Alan Johnson would call the exception. An example would be in Miranda’s law firm, though she had equal status to the men, is outnumbered.  MALE CENTERDNESS Two points in Johnson’s section on male centeredness appear in the television series Sex and the City. One is that the largest focus of four main characters is men, and the many men they have in their lives including boyfriends, ex-boyfriends, and male friends. They congratulate one another on their ability to attract men, and pity one another when they cannot. Without men their lives are seemingly incomplete, whether or not they go about these relationships in a traditional way. Another factor in Johnson article is that men tend to become islands onto themselves and have a harder time maintaining relationship with other males, while females seems to have less difficulty relating to their own sex. In SITC, the four women’ relationships with one another are stronger and more important than any of their relationships with men. To show this, in the last episode, the last frame is the four of them walking down the street in NYC, arms linked.

THE OBSESSION WITH CONTROL Throughout the series the four girls warn one another to not let the man have the upper hand, because this means the man has control. At one instance, Carrie is offered a loan by an ex-boyfriend to buy her apartment that was going co-op. But no one would allow their friend to be “at the mercy” of a man. Samantha, a high power publicist never finds love, but often finds many gifts the men in her life use to try to “win her over,” to have some sort of power over her. As well, almost every boyfriends the ladies have had (minus one, Steve), has been more financially stable than themselves, leaving the girls, in terms of money, still less powerful than the men.  **Works Cited ** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">"BBC NEWS | UK | Magazine | Is it just the shoes?" //BBC NEWS | News Front Page//. Web. 15 Feb. 2010. <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7391901.stm>. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Johnson, Allan. //Gender Knot Revised Ed Unraveling Our Patriarchal Legacy//. New York: Temple UP, 2005. Print. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">"Sex and the City: Homepage." //HBO//. Web. 15 Feb. 2010. <http://www.hbo.com/sex-and-the-city/index.html#/sex-and-the-city/episodes/1/01-sex-and-the-city/synopsis.html>. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">PRINCESSES IN THE CITY ** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Carrie Bradshaw and her three companions, Samantha, Charlotte, and Miranda, are by no means princesses, or are they? Sure, there are no official kings or queens in New York City, but when Carrie’s narrative overture opens a season one episode, “Threes a Crowd,” with the words, “Once upon a time in a magical kingdom called Manhattan, a young woman fell in love.” This sounds very much like an opening to a fairytale book, as I believe was intentional. In many ways the girls can be characterized as princesses. They are the main characters in a story about a kingdom, Manhattan, in search of their princess, with help from nonsexual male sidekicks, complete with quests, suffering, deception, queens, marriages, and happy endings. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">The characteristics of traditional princesses (like those in many Disney films) as discussed in Parson’s article “Ella Evolving” include an obsession with heterosexual romance focusing on a prince, suffering before being rewarded (rewarded by obtaining a prince), and enemies that are almost always female, not male. In Dr. Rozario’s article, “The Princess and the Magical Kingdom: Beyond Nostalgia, the Function of a Disney Princess,” she discusses the tendency to have, and not complain about, motherly/female actions (children, cooking, cleaning, etc), the presence of nonthreatening male sidekicks (nonthreatening because they lack a sexual/romantic interest in the princess) which helps to make a plot centered around females even more dominated by males, and the rags to riches motif. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Not all of these characteristics/themes in princess movies are found in Sex and the City plots or characters but many often are. As for obsession with romance, the four girls are guilty. It is the basis of many of the plots and the topic of Carrie’s weekly column in the New York Star. In the show, each woman is looking for her prince or in Samantha’s case, has decided to stop looking. In fact, I feel Samantha plays a slightly subversive role. Only twice does she fall in love and each time she decides that she herself is her prince and that that was her suffering as well as her fairytale come true. Also Samantha takes a turn away from the stereotypical heterosexual relationship and for a short time is in a serious relationship with a woman. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Another princess theme present in SATC is princesses suffering before finding what they have longed deserved, often never giving up on their sweet and good ways, finding their happily ever after, which almost always involves a prince. This theme can be seen most clearly through Carrie Bradshaw and Charlotte York. Charlotte is looking for her knight in shining armor throughout the series, one with a large bank account, good looks, good breeding, class, and a good heart. And like a true princess she won’t give up her sweet and “innocent” ways and settle. But she is duped over and over again. Her first “prince” Trey MacDougal supposedly has it all. But she is mistaken and instead must deal with a failed marriage and messy divorce until, finally, her true white knight steps in to save the day. Her white knight end ups being much more reminiscent of the Beast than any other prince. She falls in love with her divorce lawyer, Harry, and although she resists at first, for he is scruffy, loud, not classy, she remains patient, sweet, and eventually learns to love her Beast and lives happily ever after. Carrie, on the other hand, must bide her time with many fake princes, though she met her “true” prince in the very first episode. Carrie’s suffering is often inflicted by her own prince, Mr. Big. Mr. Big even has a name that makes it seems as if he is bigger than life, and Carrie is swept away the first time she meets him. Mr. Big and Carrie’s relationship is an emotional rollercoaster and an endless quest to find one another at the right time in the right place. And yet after all the strife, Big rescues her in Paris after she breaks up with her then boyfriend, and they live happily ever after, including an eventual marriage. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Lastly is the tendency for the princesses’ enemies to be female and not male. In the case of SITC, Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte, and Samantha’s “enemies” (more rivals) tend to be female and not male. The girls are often locked in competition with ex-wives, ex-girlfriends, and other women. Carrie finds herself in a conflict with both of Mr. Big’s ex-wives. Charlotte must compete with Trey’s overprotective and jealous mother, Bunny. And then there is Aidan’s girlfriend who enjoys bad-mouthing Carrie around New York City. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Works Cited ** <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Parsons, Linda T. "Ella Evolving." //Childrens Litterature in Education//. 2nd ed. Vol. 35. 2004. 135-54. //D2L//. Web. <https://uwc.courses.wisconsin.edu/d2l/orgTools/ouHome/ouHome.asp?ou=1075904>. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Motherly characteristics, like those embraced by Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, and Cinderella are less apparent in the four girls. Only Charlotte shows pronounced maternal/traditionally female instincts. She unlike the other girls, constantly dreams of having children and a family. She often gives advice to her four friends much more mother-like than the others give to each other. This is much in part of her perceived innocence, often apparent by how often she is shocked by the actions and words o her friends. She prepares for children by creating a nursery, and when she finds out she is unable to have children, she spends her energy helping Miranda prepare for hers and goes to great lengths to have children of her own, including adoption. She also has a knack for housekeeping, decorating, organizing, planning and maintaining household order. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">It is very common for one of the girls to have a gay friend. Charlotte has Anthony, a party planner, and Carrie Stanford, Carrie’s confidante. Each of these men in romantically and sexually non-threatening to the girls and serves the purpose of giving the girls advice, encouragement, and someone to help and take care for in return. This is much like other princess movies such as Ariel who has Flounder, Sebastian, and Scuttle, Snow White who has the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella who has her mice, Jasmine who has Raja, Mulan who has Mushu, and Belle who has Chip, Mr. Clocksworth, and Lumiere. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Another princess theme is that of the rags to riches motif. Carrie is a prime example, she not only finds money, but also fame. She begins as a column writer, not well known, in the shadow of her already successful friends. She lives in a simple brownstone and struggles to make payments on time, and feed her clothing addiction. She slowly gains success, first by receiving more credit for her column, than her advertisements are placed on busses, she receives a job at Vogue, and eventually her chance to write her own book, a collection of her articles that is published in France as well as America. After this she is asked to write a follow up book. And that’s only in terms of her career. Her social life follows the same pattern, from unknowness to fame. At first she is unable to get tables at the newest hot spots around New York; but soon she is being invited to exclusive parties and is asked to be a model in a New York fashion show. When her book is published she has her own exclusive party and when she gets married she is chosen to be the main feature and cover girl of Vogue. Her wedding becomes huge and would have ended up on Page Six if it wouldn’t have been canceled. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Works Cited ** <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Do Rozario, Rebecca Ann C. "The Princess and the Magical Kingdom: Beyond Nostalgia, the Function of a Disney Princess." //Women's Studies in Communication//. 1st ed. Vol. 27. 2004. 37-59. //D2L//. Web. <https://uwc.courses.wisconsin.edu/d2l/orgTools/ouHome/ouHome.asp?ou=1075904>. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">VOGUE AND THE CITY ** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">For Carrie’s first article for Vogue magazine she is supposed to write about purses. She spends hours on her article only to have her editor hand it back to her covered in red marks. She’s told that there is too much “Carrie” in the article and not enough purses. She’s supposed to be “selling purses,” in her article. Later that day, at lunch with her friends, we see Carrie flipping through a host of images, all things she is supposed to “recommend” to her readers. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">? writes about how magazines sell, they sell items by selling an image, and convince reader to buy things will help to fulfill this image. In Sex and the City, the show, just like the magazine, sells. The character Carrie, as well as the show in its entirety, sells things and the idea one needs things and needs to be a certain type of women. Carrie is obsessed with shoes, and purses, and dresses, and fashion. She is constantly spending money on clothes, instead of on paying rent or cab fare. She herself is a victim to the magazine she reads and the culture she is in. We see her reading magazines and magazines often cover her coffee table. She not only buys stuff, she buys the idea. Carrie is determined to find love, and keep her career, and her friends, plus her nightlife, her figure, her sanity, a great wardrobe, pay for her apartment, live a cosmopolitan lifestyle, all of which is part of an image sold by magazines. ? writes how magazines promote certain ideals, and tells girls to be more involved in volunteer work, but never say, stop working all the time to buy clothes and let fashion lie. Instead they just push you to do a new thing, more things, which is the frame Carrie, and all her friends, participate in. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">The show itself sells. Like all T.V. shows, and serves to promote magazines messages. The show has sold Manolo’s, Cosmopolitans for bars everywhere, wedding dresses, Hermes bags. The list goes on. The show isn’t a magazine, but the show does represent the ideal magazines have been trying to create since the beginning of Seventeen magazine in the 1940’s. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Charlotte is the same on Carrie, yet different. Instead of the Cosmopolitan, sexy, career women lifestyle that has Carrie hooked, Charlotte is searching to become a Martha Stewart, domestic goddess and mother. Her ideal follows other magazine stereotypes, ones found in magazines based on cooking, keeping house, or raising children. More practical yes, but she still must buy things to create the perfect nursery and furniture to decorate her new apartment. Even more so she holds to the ideal that sex is to be kept “hush, hush,” and that although women may be sexy and attract men, they most due no more than kiss. At the four friends many lunches, she is constantly being shocked at what her friends speak about, and claims it’s not table conversation. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Lastly, Carrie’s almost wedding in the Sex and the City movie is a circular representation of magazines affect and the purpose they are trying to achieve. Carrie is a writer for Vogue, and Vogue asks her to do an editorial showcasing the couture wedding dresses of the season. The focus is dual, focusing on Carrie and the fashion at the same time. Carrie is idealized as the perfect bride with the perfect life, career, and husband, and to maintain this status, a star wedding dress is needed. Carrie becomes victim to her own magazines “advertising,” growing and adding more stuff to create the perfect wedding because it is what is expected, “It’s the dress,” she says at one point to Big to explain the growing number of guests. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Sex and the City not only provides examples of magazines advertising, like Carrie selling her audience fashion items through her articles, but shows the affect magazines ideals have on women, but represents the type of culture magazines help create, along with help from Seventeen and many other magazines. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">HARRY POTTER AND THE CITY ** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">The hit H.B.O series is, in part, a subversive show. Since the show does somewhat counter a patriarchal society, it is somewhat difficult to compare to the article, “From Sexist to (sort-of) Feminist //Representations of Gender in the Harry Potter Series// by Elizabeth E. Heilman and Trevor Donaldson, a book complete with unicorns and giants. Yet despite minor differences, many of the patriarchal themes in Harry Potter can either be contradict or supported by Sex and the City, minus the magic. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">First off, quidditch in Harry Potter is a sport dominated by males, with only a few exceptions. I do not believe this was Rowling’s intention, but a byproduct of her writing what she knows without much thought. Sex and the City has very little sports conflicts, none of the four main characters is worrying about the upcoming basketball game or running for a longer time than their boyfriend. In fact, physical exercise, sports, and outdoorsiness is treated as something a women does because she has to look good, or it is valuable to her health. Don’t get me wrong, these girls are competitive, but not in regards to these three subjects. Very few females play in quidditch, and if they do they are often casted as less talented than their male counterparts, at the same time it as if they are not doing as much for their teams, and this makes them more insignificant. In SITC, Charlotte runs, but only for fitness and because it is her “thing.” Miranda, every once and a while, is seen at the gym, where she almost always meets a new male partner (is that her point of going to the gym?). Likewise, girls in Harry Potter try out for quidditch only to catching Harry’s eye, not for the sport. Both Harry Potter and SITC show women participating and caring very little for physical activity. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">In Harry Potter girls’ and women’s interest are often portrayed as petty. For instance, much focused is placed on appearance either by the characters themselves or the narrator (Hermione goes through a makeover). They are catty and even flighty, annoying and pick and hammer every little thing they dislike. Even Bellatrix, a woman who should be feared for her evil talent and cunning, is often misguided and blind about her relationship with/obsession over Lord Voldermort. In Sex and the City, characters are often portrayed as strong, learning how to be independent financially, in relationships, within their careers and selves but, there are plenty of superficial situations that support these stereotypes of women. They shop, don’t eat for money for shoes, play games of status, feign over men, and participate in catty fights. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">One can hope that the two sides of these women will be paid attention to, the strong independent side and well as the flighty girly superficial side, to make a normal person. Harry Potter and Sex and the City affirm many of society’s economic and patriarchal behaviors, leaving the consumer to decipher between the two ideas. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Works Cited ** <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Donaldson, Trevor. "From Sexist to (sort-of) Feminist Representatin of Gender in the Harry Potter Series." //Critical Perspectives on Harry Potter//. By Elizabeth E. Heilman. New York: Routledge, 2009. Print. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">PHENOMENONS AND THE CITY ** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Harry Potter and Sex and the City are both phenomenons according to Jack Zipes in his article “The Phenomenon of Harry Potter, or Why All the Talk?” They both are huge works that are commonly known in part for being “unique” and in part because they follow the status-quo. He is right in saying in order to be popular a phenomenon must be conservative and reflect the values of the culture. I argue that both the Harry Potter books and Sex and the City use the spoonful of sugar method, attempting to change and but mostly follow society. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Zipes argues that the Harry Potter books are classic cookie cutter fairy tale stories about a white Christian boy who just happens to be special, and always succeeds. Sex and the City is about four successful white women who in the end at least have each other and their wonderful lives. And yet Sex and the City contributes to the idea, though often shrouded in cultural constructs, that women can be independent, financially stable, and without need of men (well sort of). But they remain in part cookie cutter television drama characters, of course; otherwise they would never have been as popular otherwise according to the Zipes’s article. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">But that doesn’t mean they aren’t supplying a bit of counter cultural information which is somewhat lacking in Harry Potter. The characters commit huge faux pas, for instance Carrie cheats with her now married ex, and is caught. I can’t think of many people who wouldn’t categorize that as Carrie’s bad, (well maybe except Samantha). She makes mistakes were as Harry Potter’s mistakes, are seen as risks worth taking, or excusable in one way or another. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Also, Sex and the City is written about women, for women. Women are the focus; their relationships are the focus (who in turn focus a bit too much on men) as well as their accomplishments, choices, failures etc. This is perhaps the biggest contrast to the Harry Potter books, as well as that SITC lacks a purely evil character. In Harry Potter, is Harry Potter, and Harry Potter like characters, and everyone else takes backseat. Although, in many ways, I feel the Harry Potter books are an improvement on past children’s literature phenomenons in regard to roles of women. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">What relates Harry Potter and Sex and the City the most is their phenomenal status, the fact that they both, in order to be successful, are conventional. Harry Potter is more structural and questions society less than Sex and the City. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Works Cited ** <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Zipes, Jack. "The Phenomenon of Harry Potter, or Why All the Talk." //Sticks and Stones: the Troublesome Success of Children's Literature from Slovenly Peter to Harry Potter//. New York: Routledge, 2002. Print. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">SIMS AND THE CITY ** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">How children play the Sims does not relate much to the primetime HBO TV series, Sex and the City. Rarely, if at all, are video games seen or mentioned unless seen in the room of a boy. Usually video games in this instance are used to show men’s “immaturity,” which apparently is related to video game usage; immature because it means they do not have bigger or better things to waste time on. This can be seen in the episode “Hot Child in the City,” from season three, were Carrie dates a man still living with his parents, smoking pot, and of course, playing video games. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">But perhaps what can be related is how girls use technology, as in regards to how boys use technology. Girls tend to use it as practical or as something to succeed. According to Catherine Beavis and Claire Charles in the article “Challenging Notions of Gendered Game Play: girls playing The Sims in the classroom “played Sims without destroying their homes or causing chaos, as did the boys. One girl named Sue replies what is the point of simulating and action when you can do the same thing in real life? Is that not better?” Carrie refuses for many seasons to own a cell phone, because a she is just fine using a regular phone. Is this the stereotypical girl response to technology, that if it is not necessary, then why? Do Miranda and Samantha have a phone only because they need technology for their jobs? <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Is this concept of “non need” for technology when it is unnecessary perhaps a feminine attitude? Is it why girls are not as in to video games? Because it is not necessary for their lives or their roles, and only when it becomes essential to their roles will they participate? <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">In the article, the other girl, Emily, disagreed with Sue. Her idea was that she could be just as competent as the boys //and// use it right. In regards to Sims this attitude is important. Susan played a “feminine game” as it was meant to be played, where as the boys spent much time burning their dream houses down, with little regret. Is it the domestic goddess who wants to succeed at this type of game? Or is it because she wants to be what Sex and the City both represents and tries to sell to the masses, a cosmopolitan, have it all life, work, family, money, marriage, and lifestyle? If it wasn’t the Sims they were playing would Susan or the boys play different when the game wasn’t feminine in nature but masculine instead? <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">As far as I know, so far there has not been a Sex and the City video game. Many companies choose to capitalize on popular TV shows and movies by creating video games where the viewer can become the character, but they have yet to capitalize on Sex and the City. Not many movies and television shows aimed at women ever attempt to enter the video game marker, most likely because it is not a profitable market. Though to say the female video game market is insignificant is a lie because many games, for instance every Mary-Kate and Ashley game based off their televisions shows and movies have been profitable. But these video games were marketed for girls. Is it grown women that show no interest? Yet there are plenty of video games aimed at and purchased by grown men… <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Works Cited ** <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Beavis, Catherine, and Claire Charles. "Challenging Notions of Gendered Game Play: Teenagers Playing the Sims." //Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education// (2005): 355-67. //D2L//. Web. <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">ACTION FIGURES IN THE CITY ** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">In Inness’s article, ‘“It’s a Girl Thing”: Tough Female Action Figures in the Toy Store,’ Inness describes the differences between male and female action figures, as well as how each are used and sold. Female action figures are often sexually represented and are only helpers to male leads. Many female action figures come in groups or, when in co-ed groups, men still outnumber women. In Darren Stars' Sex and the City, a television show where women are portrayed more powerful than in most television, there are still many female and male stereotypes. For example take men’s occupations. Men action figures are hyper masculine and are always soldiers, spies, conquerors, or heroes but rarely are any part time stay-at-home dads or kindergarten teachers. Instead in their spare time they are journalist or business men. They often operate solo and are in control of many others. Few exceptions are seen the television show SITC. Even though the men aren’t action figures, spies, or superheroes, they are portrayed with many of the qualities associated with male action figures. Mr. Big is a business man. Aidan builds furniture. Steve owns a bar. Harry is a lawyer. Richard is CEO. Each of these men has jobs of power and if not self-employed, have no one to report to but themselves. They are solo-operators. Few times are women portrayed in the same way. Carrie’s editor at Vogue is a heterosexual male. Samantha is employed by companies and celebrities. Miranda is the only female partner. This is similar to the lack of female action figures being in the same league as male action figures. Even power rangers, where everyone is equal in terms of abilities, the men still outnumber the women, just like at Miranda’s law firm. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Female often have more stereotypically female careers. Carrie writes about love. Charlotte is an art curator. Samantha is a publicist and Miranda a lawyer, perhaps the least stereotypical. Even homosexual characters, who are decidedly more “female” than “male,” have stereotypical careers. Charlotte’s homosexual friend is a party planner. Sex and the City has been criticized by feminists because the show focuses on the girls very independent careers instead of concentrating on women being successful as a whole. According to Allan Johnson, it is easier to accept a women being successful and powerful in a patriarchal society if there is but few of them and they are still surrounded by men. Yet this is a fine line. Too much collectivism may enforce another female stereotype of represented by female action figures like Sailor Moon and Charlie’s Angels, which is that without a group of women equal to her who help her she cannot succeed. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Works Cited ** <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Brown, Virginia. "Sex and the City: a Sign of Women's Liberation?" //Direct Action//. Aug. 2008. Web. 24 Apr. 2010. <http://directaction.org.au/issue3/sex_and_the_city_a_sign_of_womens_liberation>. <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Inness, Sherrie A. “’It’s a Girl Thing’: Tough Female Action Figures in the Toy Store.” 75-94. Print. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Johnson, Allan. //Gender Knot Revised Ed Unraveling Our Patriarchal Legacy//. New York: Temple UP, 2005. Print. <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">DOLLS AND THE CITY ** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">In Inness’s article on American Girl dolls she points out a key fact of our culture. Toys are influential in emanating and socializing children, especially in terms of what is considered normal for each gender. Dolls are viewed as examples and role models as well as tools of marketing, as well as a way with which to create a market. I argue, like dolls, TV show characters play a very similar role in socializing and expressing gender norms. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">There are no such things as Sex and the City Dolls, and although each character may seem, in a sense, more alive than the dolls, they both represent a fictional person and a role model to females. SITC characters like Barbie, Bratz, or American Girl dolls have a very real image and marketability. Like other dolls each Sex and the City character has her own story, habits, goals, likes and dislikes that teach us about who each character is. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">According to the HBO home site for Sex and the City (see link at end of report) on Carrie’s character page she is described as always in and out of love. In other words, she is obsessed with love, which viewers of the show can surmise means almost solely heterosexual love. Her obsession with romance and relationships is fodder for her weekly column in the fictional newspaper, the New York Star, like titled “Sex and the City.” She is a small part bad girl, having an affair with a married man while in a serious relationship of her own. She is always on the cusp of fashion trends and is sure to be seen at the latest club, restaurant, gallery openings, and coolest parties. One of the only subversive qualities of Carrie seems to be her career, all else is not much different from a so called Barbie or Bratz doll profile. She is a successful journalist who eventually writes for Vogue and the New York Post as well as publishes her own book, which becomes a best seller. But Carrie’s career, although successful is still traditional. Her column still revolves around love, her articles for Vogue around fashion, very much like a doll. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Samantha is a confident PR agent with an uninhibited attitude towards sex. She tries Lesbianism and serious relationships but is unsatisfied with both because of her fear/dislike of intimacy. Samantha clothes are all designer, she even uses a celebrity client’s name to get a coveted Hermes Berken bag. Her publicist career, although very successful, is still in a stereotypical line of women’s work. She helps plan parties, extravagant social events, and wins her clients publicity. Despite her strength as a woman she still has a classical female characteristic to fall in love with a man despite the odds and her attitude against love and romance. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Charlotte is a well bred, optimistic, and an idealist. She believes in love and that each person has that special person. No mishap in her life can make her believe otherwise. She dreams of being the perfect bride, wife, and mother that would make Martha Stewart proud. She has a high sense of decorum and when she finally meets the man of her dreams he ends up being quite the opposite of her first husband and consequential bad marriage. The love of her life possesses none of her Upper East Side esthetic but rather is a sloppy, pushy, lawyer. And yet Charlotte, with her high ideals, falls for him anyways, and even converts to Judaism so Harry will marry her. Charlotte is a classic example of stereotypical femininity, a woman who wants the Barbie dream house life and yet she lowers her standards for a man. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Miranda career is far from the norm. She is a successful lawyer and partner in her law firm. She takes her work seriously. She is proud and self-assured as well as vulnerable and a cynic. Miranda is the least fashionable of all the girls her style more focused on work clothes. She finds a softer side with the birth of her son Brady, at a time when she must manage a demanding career and the care of her son. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">On the HBO site for Sex and the City each character has their own profile page showcasing their personality traits, careers, overview of their roles on the show, and of course their fashion sense. Just like the dolls individual personalities, used to sell slightly different images, it seems to mirror SITC goals, to sell their four products, to make each girl her own brand. Just like Bratz and Barbies the main focus if on fashion and typical careers. More subversive qualities of the characters are secondary. Dolls and movie characters alike help to socialize and teach gender roles to all ages of women. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Works Cited ** <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Inness, Sherrie A. "Anti-Barbies." 164-83. Print. <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">"Sex and the City: Cast & Crew." //HBO//. Home Box Office, Inc. Web. 26 Apr. 2010. <http://www.hbo.com/sex-and-the-city/cast-and-crew/index.html>. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">WHAT GIRLS WEAR IN THE CITY ** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">First of all, there are very few scenes in Sex and the City involving children until Miranda has a baby and Charlotte adopts Lily. Therefore, there are very few examples of children or teens apparel on either male or female characters. Even so, there are a few examples of children/teens/infant apparel that perhaps, together, give one an idea of the perceived ideas about gender that adults are being exposed to regarding their children. Examples of children’s’ apparel are found in two baby showers, one where the girls attend a mutual friend’s baby shower in Connecticut, and another at a baby shower Charlotte host for Miranda. Teenagers or tweens clothing is represented by a young girl Jenny and her friends, spoiled 13 year-olds and fellow New Yorkers for whom Samantha is hired to be publicist for. These examples are few and far between and not necessarily a complete view of the apparel options available to an American shopper, but within the context of the show it perhaps helps one understand the ideals the show is portraying through its characters as well as the show’s representations of children and gender. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">At the first baby shower in the episode “The Baby Shower” from season one of SITC we find ourselves surrounded by young children, both male and female, under the age of five. The young boys are seen wearing either khakis with white button down shirts with red bow ties, blue jeans and classic white shirts and boots, or like one toddler, hunter green polos with khakis and hiking boots. Just as Lamb and Brown describes, boys clothing tends to be much more functional and less about showing off. Even the actions of the children in the show follow the clothing choices; a young boy is seen playing with a squirt gone while a young girl is sitting quietly surrounded by females. The young girls at the shower are dressed in pale yellow, pink overalls, a pink dress, and a light blue coordinated outfit. These apparel choices help the viewer differentiate between the two sexes, for even the young children gender is communicated through very gendered colored choices, coordinated pastels for the girls and wearable greens, blues, denim, and browns for the young boys. At Miranda’s baby shower thrown by Charlotte in a “Vogue Idea,” a season four episode, Miranda receives green clothing, traditionally a gender neutral color for babies, and the young baby boy, Charlie, wears blue stripes and denim overalls with blue sneakers. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">“Hot Child in the City” is a season three episode were Samantha is hired as a publicist for a 13 year old girl’s Bah-Mitzvah. The young girl, Jenny, is always shown in full makeup, often to an excess, with a perfectly coordinated outfit too old and mature for her to be wearing. In her first appearance she is wearing a blue silk tank top with a matching blue French silk scarp wrapped around her back. In her second appearance, after she orders Samantha and her friends a 200 dollar bottle of Dom Perignon, she and her two friends are seen with perfectly stylish hair, large gold earrings, a number of bright bracelets, brightly girly printed tight tops, hip hugging jeans and skirts, glitzy bags, the newest cell phones, and once again full makeup. At Jenny’s Bah-Mitzvah she is wearing a spaghetti strap long black and white sequined dress while her friends where tight skirts paired with stomach showing sequin handkerchief halters, and once again more than enough makeup. No doubt the point of dressing these characters this way is to portray the girls as over the top spoiled brats that have grown up much too quickly, but nonetheless is makes one ask the questions why when they obviously have the money to buy anything they could possibly want, in the media spoiled brats are always showing dressing sexily and over the top, complete with every material object available for purchase, in very traditional female ways? <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;"> **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Works Cited ** <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">Lamb, Sharon, and Lyn Mikel Brown. "Pretty in Pink: What Girl Wear." //Packaging Girlhood: Rescuing Our Daughters from Marketers' Schemes//. New York: St. Martin's, 2006. 14-56. Print. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">“Ella Evolving” by Linda T. Parson **
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 200%;">“The Princess and the Magical Kingdom: Beyond Nostalgia, the Function of a Disney Princess” Rebecca Ann C. Do Rozario **

[1] http://www.hbo.com/sex-and-the-city/index.html#/sex-and-the-city/episodes/1/01-sex-and-the-city/synopsis.html

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The topic I chose was Sex and the City, the HBO series as well as the movie. The basis of the show is four single women in New York City and their journey and their goal to “have sex like men” and stop trying to find love. Carrie, the main character, says on the first episode, “It’s like the riddle of the sphinx… why are there so many great unmarried women, and no great unmarried men? [1] ” The show in many ways has challenged female stereotypes as well as reinforced others. Many women, and some men, of all ages watch this show and regard it as a window into the ideal of what a cosmopolitan modern woman is.