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Madeline Weinberger
Dr. McLaughlin
Multimedia Writing and Rhetoric
17 November 2015
Annotated Bibliography
In my paper, I will study how the portrayal of womens intelligence in television and film
has developed throughout the last decade. This topic interests me because as a female striving to
have a career, it frustrates me that women are not typically given positions of authority in the
workplace as often as men are. This topic is particularly relevant because of the increased
number of women fighting for equality in the workplace and due to the fact that there are
multiple females attempting to gain their respective partys nomination to run for president of the
United States. The specific question I am going to answer is, has the portrayal of womens
intelligence in television and film changed within the last fifteen years, and if it has, has it
improved the overall female image. I propose that their portrayal has not significantly changed
and women continue to struggle to create and maintain careers without being considered out of
place.
Albang, Katie A. "Social Change through Digital Communication: A Project Designed to
Explore the Positive Impact that Advertising and the Media have in Empowering Change
for Women within Organizations." Order No. 1589391 Gonzaga University, 2015. Ann
Arbor: ProQuest. Web. 12 Nov. 2015.
This is a dissertation written by the author in order to get her PhD, and multiple
professors reviewed this source, which makes the source relatively credible. The intended
audience is scholars interested in understanding current media activity aimed to improve
the perception of women when it comes to their intellect and their ability to be a leader in
the workforce. It has multiple useful statistics to provide support for my position as well
as several supporting quotes. One quote that I find particularly useful is, Gender equality
in the workplace is an important issue that past generations have been striving to achieve
and have yet to reach (1). I can incorporate this quote into my research because it states
that gender equality has not been reached regardless of the portrayal of women in the
media today. The authors main focus was to talk about how the portrayal of women has
changed within the last ten years, and it will be useful to use statistics from this article in
my counterargument to show that little change has been accomplished.
DAmore, Laura Mattoon. Smart Chicks on Screen. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2014.
Print.
The author, Laura DAmore, is a reliable scholar who has written many different pieces
on womens portrayal in the media. The intended audience of Smart Chicks on Screen is
the intelligent women of this century who are tired of not being paid as much as their
male counterparts. The author conveys to its readers that the problem today is that the

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portrayal of women in film has not changed which makes people think of women the
same way that they have always been looked at. This book was written in 2014, so it does
a great job incorporating the issues of modern women. I can see some of the quotes and
information I found in the beginning of the book being used to support the claims that I
make. I found one very useful quote for my argument which reads, Hollywood has
slowly begun to give prominent and leading roles to women. However, the intellectual
representations of women are out of line with reality, in many cases failing to reflect the
successes and struggles that women have faced in a resistant social and political
environment (1). It also discusses women earning less even though they are just as
educated. Both of these points will be crucial to my argument in order to strengthen my
claim. To support the argument, this book also talks about specific examples of film
where it can be seen that women are not portrayed in the best light. I really liked this
particular quote rather than being presented as thoughtful, multifaceted, intelligent
individuals, women were often reduced to simplistic stereotypes either lethal sexual
temptresses or nave victimsthus undermining their intellect in screen portrayals (43).
This source is incredibly useful, and I can see using it to support my argument throughout
the paper, both with the statistics that it provides as well as examples.
Diez, Sofia. Portrayal of Women in the Media Propagates Sexism. University Wire, Oct 09
2014. ProQuest. Web. 10 Nov. 2015.
This is a news article which talks a great deal about how we do not realize that only a
third of the speaking characters in films are females until it is brought to our attention.
The audience of this article is frustrated females who are tired of experiencing sexism in
America when we have had the right to vote for almost one hundred years. She uses the
term we in her conclusion referring to the females that it is our responsibility to break
the stereotypes. The central argument of this paper is that womens intellect is not
properly represented in film, which goes hand in hand with my argument. It does a great
job discussing how we grow up in a society where this is normal, and we are taught from
a young age in all of the videos the different stereotypes that males and females have. It
also goes into how the intellect of females is portrayed, and the different stereotypical
nerds. I anticipate this source being useful when I discuss how women have been
discriminated against for a long time and gender equality is not some new topic, and it
also provides specific evidence of womens intellect in film. This source comments on
similar shows and films that DAmore commented on such as Big Bang Theory and
Greys Anatomy, it will be useful to compare what they say about the shows.
Hammer, Tonya R. "Controlling Images, Media, And Women's Development: A Review Of The
Literature." Journal Of Creativity In Mental Health 4.3 (2009): 202-216. Academic
Search Premier. Web. 9 Nov. 2015.
The author of this journal article is Tonya Hammer who is a professor at the University of
Houston and has been studying the portrayal of women in the media for a number of
years. This source offers good information and theory behind the point that I am trying to
make. It discusses the importance that film and popular culture has on our perceptions of
women, which will go along perfectly with the idea that mens ideas of women are

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shaped by film. The main purpose of this article is to urge people to begin thinking about
the power media has on society. One of the quotes that I found that I could use as support
is that Regardless of the stereotype portrayed in the films, studies have found that the
public continues to be influenced by what they are seeing, with the portrayals either
affirming or helping to construct its underlying belief system (212). This can be used to
support my claim that films can construct how people think. This source also gives some
great statistics about out of the women that are portrayed on film, how many of them
have a prime focus of finding a spouse.
Olson, Joan Runnheim. "Breaking the gender barrier." Techniques 88.5 (2013): 16+. Expanded
Academic ASAP. Web. 9 Nov. 2015.
This source can be used to present examples of gender stereotypes in film today, and it
does mention statistics on the gender wage gap. The articles main purpose is to raise
awareness about the injustices that women in the workforce face today. The audience of
this article seems to be women who have not yet joined the workforce but will in the
future. The author focuses on how in order for society to change, we need to start
influencing females at a young age. This article does an excellent job talking about how
gender stereotypes are instilled from a young age and the media only furthers these
stereotypes. It also discusses actress Greena Davis effort to try to stop these stereotypes
because she has witnessed them first hand and wants them to change. It also gives
statistics on the percentages of males and females in various careers, and then analyzes
why it is the case.
Smith, Stacy L., Dr., Marc Choueiti, and Katherine Pieper, Dr. "Gender Bias Without Borders."
(2014): n. pag. Annenburg.usc.edu. University of Southern California, 2014. Web. 8 Nov.
2015.
This source presents the results of a study that was done about the female characters in
films. Stacy Smith who has compiled the results of this study has worked on for multiple
years is the author. The research does a great job discussing the effects of women being
stereotyped in the movies. There were a couple of quotes that I found particularly useful.
For example, the percentage of female speaking characters in top-grossing movies has
not meaningfully changed in roughly half a century and our previous research shows
that few women hold positions of power and importance on screen (1). It also provides
useful statistics that can be used to make me more credible. It gives statistics about the
percentage difference of characters that speak in film between males and females. It also
gives statistics about the amount of times that women are put on the screen, and they are
judged in some way by their appearance. The most useful part of this article however is
when they breakdown the percentages of men versus women holding positions of high
power in companies.

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