Mean Girls?

In the 2004 film “Mean Girls”, directed by Mark Waters, the main focus is teenage girls and what happens when many different ‘types’ are thrown together into one common environment (aka high school).

The way the director effectively portrays this and creates a dramatic setting in the movie with entertaining characters, is by portraying all of the teenage girls in the movie as really general stereotypes of teenage girls, putting them into certain boxes and stereotypes in the way they dress, talk and act, so that they are easier to identify with as being that stereotype, eg a ‘popular’ or a ‘nerd’.

A scene in with this representation of teenage girls is most evident is when Cady (played by Lindsay Lohan) first arrives at the High School and her new friend Janice gives her the basic outline of how the students are grouped together via a map to where everyone sits in the cafeteria.

"You got your freshmen, ROTC guys, preps, J.V. jocks, Asian nerds, Cool Asians, Varsity jocks Unfriendly black hotties, Girls who eat their feelings, Girls who don't eat anything, Desperate wannabes, Burnouts, Sexually active band geeks, the greatest people you will ever meet, and the worst. Beware of plastics."

These groups each show their collective stereotypical personas very clearly through their actions and costuming choices by the directors. For example, as Janice says “Girls who eat their feelings” the obviously, ‘unpopular’ group is shown onscreen, all looking really delighted over the burgers they are eating. They all are wearing unfashionable, unflattering clothes, are relatively unattractive, overweight, wither greasy, unstyled hair and what looks like no makeup at all. Then, the Plastics (aka the popular girls) , are all stunningly beautiful, sitting there nibbling at their lunches with snobby expressions. Each one is costumed extremely similarly to be in stylish, semi-revealing clothes with impeccable hair and makeup.

This representation isn’t very realistic at all as it stereotypes teenage girls to fall neatly into one social category, displaying all traits of this stereotype very clearly when in reality, even if they are stereotyped into a certain group, girls still usually display certain qualities that other group members may not possess. This is what makes them an individual!

This kind of representation of girls in the media can be blamed for the social attitude of teenage girls themselves. When they see this kind of portrayal, it is easier for them too to stereotype other girls like this as well; judging them and classifying them into certain groups just because they display some qualities of the stereotype. Once girls are identified as a certain stereotype, it makes it hard for them to break out of it and show individuality and embrace their own uniqueness.