The Modernity Gaze of Chinese Female Media Image from the Perspective of Consumerism

Abstract

With the growing development of the market economy and the widespread popularization of feminist cultural trends, the consumption pattern of “her economy” has set off a huge social upsurge in China. The media platform and consumption culture have gradually evolved into an important way for mainstream society to differentiate, symbolize and regulate gender roles. Based on the images displayed by female consumers on the domestic mass media platform, this paper discusses the changes in modern women's gender roles and the new dilemma of gender consciousness from the perspective of consumerism. First of all, this paper expounds the relationship between consumerism and gender culture from two aspects based on a large amount of literature: the symbol construction of “others” and the modernity gaze that is not divorced from male power, and uses the text analysis method to interpret the cultural characteristics of consumerism implied in female media images, reveals the deconstruction of the former gender gaze by the modern female image and the identity construction that has not completed the new modernity enlightenment; Secondly, taking the threshold space as the core concept, it shows how women struggle between the old and new gender norms from the perspectives of the possibility and constraint of female temperament and the autonomy and discipline of female body; Finally, it comes to the conclusion that in order to create a female media image that is really conducive to the construction of social gender, it is necessary to carry out reflective construction in women's own way based on women's own experience and understanding outside the male gaze perspective.