The following essay describes a study made of eight American films, where the purpose of the study was to analyze how veganism was portrayed in the chosen films. Through a semiotic analysis, the aim was to investigate how views on traditional gender roles are reproduced in the way that the practice of veganism and discourse on veganism is portrayed in modern cinema. The reason for this study was firstly because most vegans are women, with a sizeable margin; close to 80% of vegans in America are women, while almost half of vegetarians are men. The question why so many vegans are women is something worth studying closer. Secondly, there has been very few studies made on this topic. There is a sufficient amount of texts which acknowledge and discuss the correlation between the practice of not eating animals and gender issues. Further there are accounts made on how vegans are typically portrayed in media in a society where the norm is to exploit animals. These accounts demonstrate that vegans are often portrayed unfavorably. However scientific studies made on how vegans are portrayed in film are practically nonexistent. This despite cinema being a large and powerful media tool for reproducing social and cultural values. The discourse on gender and veganism were missing a valuable angle and this was something that this essay aimed to bring to the discussions of both veganism and gender. By searching on internet for films which include either vegan characters or the word vegan, there were eight films found. And through an analysis of these the results concluded that veganism is indeed portrayed negatively in movies as well, however there is also another dimension to this negative perspective towards vegans: these negative portrayals of veganism in film is grounded in archaic views and values on traditional gender roles and equality.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:oru-55115 |
| Date | January 2017 |
| Creators | Guggenheim, Bim |
| Publisher | Örebro universitet, Institutionen för humaniora, utbildnings- och samhällsvetenskap |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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