Media Representation of Ethnicity and Gender in Music Videos
Ethnicity in Music Videos
Duran Duran – Rio (1982)
Representation: Ethnicity is largely absent or tokenized. The video features a white British band surrounded by exotic, tropical imagery, filmed in locations like Antigua. Women featured are racially ambiguous or white, and largely passive.
- Key Example: The tropical backdrop is used to enhance the band’s glamour, but the local culture or people are not acknowledged — the setting becomes a backdrop for white luxury.
- Theory Link: Said’s Orientalism — the exotic is fetishized and consumed by Western figures; non-white spaces are presented as settings rather than sources of agency. This reinforces colonial narratives.
- Critical Point: Ethnic diversity is sidelined, reflecting 1980s media where whiteness dominated global pop culture. The band is positioned as aspirational Western figures in a racialized fantasy landscape.
Lizzo – Good as Hell (2019)
Representation: Ethnicity is central and empowered. Lizzo, a Black female artist, places Black women at the forefront, celebrating Afrocentric beauty, joy, and individuality.
- Key Example: In the music video set in a historically Black university (HBCU), Lizzo performs with Black cheerleaders and band members, using natural hair styles, bold fashion, and confident body language.
- Theory Link: bell hooks’ Intersectional Feminism — Lizzo challenges both racial and gendered stereotypes by foregrounding Black women’s empowerment in a joyful, unapologetic way.
- Critical Point: The video reclaims Black identity as powerful and aspirational, subverting traditional media ideals of beauty and centering Black culture on its own terms.
Justin Bieber – Intentions (2020)
Representation: Ethnicity is included through the uplifting stories of women of color, but representation is filtered through the lens of white celebrity saviorism.
- Key Example: Women from marginalized ethnic backgrounds are shown overcoming adversity — a Black single mother, a woman from a refugee background — while Bieber supports and highlights their struggles.
- Theory Link: Hall’s Representation Theory — positive representations are constructed, but still mediated by dominant ideologies. The power dynamic still places Bieber (a white male) as the one with resources and platform.
- Critical Point: While more progressive than Rio, and more inclusive than past videos, Intentions still relies on benevolent representations of ethnicity, rather than the celebratory self-representation seen in Lizzo’s work.
Gender Representation in Music Videos
Duran Duran – Rio (1982)
Representation: Women are objectified and passive, while men are central, dominant, and in control.
- Example: Female models lie across yachts and beaches in swimsuits, gazing at the band or passively enjoying luxury. The camera often lingers on their bodies with slow pans and close-ups.
- Theory Link: Laura Mulvey’s Male Gaze — women are presented as visual pleasure for the heterosexual male viewer, reinforcing patriarchal structures. Van Zoonen — female bodies are commodified in media, reinforcing traditional gender roles.
- Critical Point: The video reflects 1980s glam rock masculinity, with the band portrayed as glamorous, wealthy, and sexually desirable, while women serve only to decorate that narrative.
Lizzo – Good as Hell (2019)
Representation: Women — especially Black women — are empowered, independent, and full of agency.
- Example: Lizzo leads a band of female cheerleaders and musicians at a historically Black university. They’re shown performing, celebrating, and supporting each other without male presence.
- Theory Link: Judith Butler’s Gender Performativity — Lizzo subverts traditional feminine roles, showing gender as fluid and performative rather than fixed. bell hooks — the video empowers women by celebrating self-love and collective female strength outside of the male gaze.
- Critical Point: This video reverses traditional stereotypes, offering a powerful female narrative that isn’t sexualized but is still vibrant, fun, and dynamic.
Justin Bieber – Intentions (2020)
Representation: Women are portrayed sympathetically and positively, but still through a male-led narrative.
- Example: The video highlights women overcoming hardship (e.g., homelessness, refugee status), while Bieber provides financial support, screen time, and validation.
- Theory Link: Hall’s Representation Theory — although women are shown in a complex, positive light, the message is still filtered through Bieber’s male perspective. Post-feminism critique — empowerment is shown, but often relies on male figures amplifying female voices, which can unintentionally reinforce gender hierarchy.
- Critical Point: Intentions offers a more respectful and sensitive portrayal of women than Rio, but doesn’t allow women to control the narrative in the way Lizzo does.