Representation

In the media world different groups are represented differently as to how some people perceive them. As a group, teenagers are represented in the media world sometimes accurately and sometimes completely wrong. In the media teenagers are typically represented as cliches or stereotypes. Shows and movies represent girls as a constant source of drama and limit people by being in cliques. Another stereotype would be a dumb blonde in a friend group, the one who is always slow to understand and one who is more noticed for her looks rather than her smarts. Boys are also stereotyped in many shows and films. Boys are typically stereotyped as the jock, the geek, or the bad boy, but shows and films have created a combination of the jock/bully archetype. Archetypes, similar to this one, exist in the world but are not as cliched or dramatic as shown in shows and movies.

An example of where girls are represented as a constant source of drama is within the show "Pretty Little Liars" and the movie "Mean Girls". In the show and movie a group of girls are featured and are typically best friends and they have created their own little clique. These groups of girls would typically reject anyone from joining the group unless the "alpha" of the group wants to allow the person to join, mainly for bad reasons. Along with the movie "Mean Girls" the stereotype of the dumb blonde is utilized. The character Karen Smith is the blonde friend of the group and is portrayed as this character who is slow to understand and agrees with anything anyone says. An example of where boys are represented as a jock, geek, bad boy, or the archetype of jock/bully is within the shows "13 Reasons Why" and "Riverdale". The character Zach from "13 Reasons Why" and the character Reggie from "Riverdale" fit the archetype jock/bully within the shows. The show "Riverdale" dramatizes the archetype therefore exaggerating the thought of boys with this archetype in the real world.

I feel that these representation characteristics are unfair. As a teenager, still in high school, I don't see these types of cliques, stereotypes, or jock/bully archetypes at my school. Everyone has their own friend group and there is no one group, or group of girls, that is classified as the group that is a constant source of drama. Boys at my school may be classified as a jock or geek but there are archetypes at my school that are a combination of both. There are characteristics of a dumb jock or dumb blonde. Times have changed and because I go to a big school I feel that everyone doesn't have the time to meticulously shuffle through the groups at the school and classify one as certain stereotypical group.

I would retain the representation characteristics of geek (both genders) and jock. Although these characteristics are not directly classified to one person, they are still relevant to the real world. Someone may characterize a person as a jock, but that person could also be very smart which could also characterize them as a geek. This could create the archetype of jock/geek. I would challenge the representation characteristic of the dumb blonde. I would do this because no one is characterized as dumb and just because a person, a girl in this instance, is blonde does not automatically mean she is dumb. This stereotype could be offensive to blondes because there are blondes in the world who are quite smart and automatically characterizing blondes as dumb is wrong.