Sicientific Project: Gender portrayal on children's television – deep-rooted change or stagnation?

"In the case of the Smurfs there is even more to learn about gender portrayal. For the basic principle of the Smurf is that his typical feature or role is reflected in his name: Grouchy Smurf, Lazy Smurf, Stupid Smurf, Clumsy Smurf, Papa Smurf (the leader) and then Smurfette and Sassette. The particular characteristic of the last two is to be feminine, the former as an erotically attractive woman, and the latter as a smart girl with red hair. Here masculinity and femininity are no longer contrasted, since femininity is only another feature to be found in a few appropriate stereotypes...

Although girl figures may appear pleasant and new at first sight, certain aspects remain the same. For whether it is Sailor Moon, Ocean Girl or Marie, all sympathetic girl figures on television are absolutely beautiful, markedly slim and have mostly long blond hair. Body proportions that do not correspond to the ideal weight (or a few pounds less) or facial features which deviate from the uniform ideal of beauty are not to be seen – unless as a problem and a subject of the plot. Many female figures in animated films also follow the "baby schema", and the rounded head is characterised by a little nose and big wide-set eyes. (Cf Mühlen-Achs, 1995, 31)... As is usual in Mangas, Sailor Moon is extremely sexualised and by far exceeds Barbie in the unattainable proportions of her body."


As is usual in this sort of study, this has a tendency to overinterpret. A short discussion on whether the media should reflect reality as it is, reality as it should be or reality as viewers want it to be would have been welcome; just as females and males have different standards of physical achievement, it is unrealistic to expect there to be an equal number of female and male protagonists.

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Jesus, Meet Evolution

"If we insist on approaching the tale of Adam and Eve as literal truth, we come out of the story with little more than frustration that our ancestors could be so stupid as to condemn all humanity by trusting a talking snake. But if we let go of this literalist fixation and dig to the moral and spiritual heart of the story, we confront a fundamental tenet of Christianity: that the Garden of Eden drama is played out every day, by our neighbors and ourselves; that we are not just condemned by the temptation and sin of our predecessors but by humanity's perpetual weakness in choosing evil over good; that we have all made choices to eat forbidden fruit for which we desperately want and need redemption.

Opponents of evolution fear that modern science advances a "materialist" worldview in which every aspect of existence is approached only on a crude, physical plane. But the literalist approach to scripture is precisely this--only when Christians move beyond it do we encounter the most meaningful realms of spiritual understanding and revelation. Thus, while intelligent design advocates desperately try to make science validate a clumsy interventionist God, C.S. Lewis envisions in The Screwtape Letters a Deity for whom the linear progress of evolution means nothing, because It operates beyond the bounds of space and time, intimately involved in "the whole, self-consistent creative act.""

Erm. Right. This sounds more like Transcendentalism.