Hip Hop Music Video Analysis

Gender stereotypes conveyed by the media are described as men being masculine, dominant, and wealthy while women are described as weak, submissive, and nurturing. I watched ten hip hop music videos for my observation of what the media tells us about being masculine and feminine and each one emphasized, and I would even say promoted, the use of gender stereotypes. Hip hop music videos for decades have been exposing and objectifying women to make the rapper seem more masculine and dominant. From the ten videos I watched, the main themes throughout every video was the objectification of women, masculinity, and wealth. Most videos had few to no other men around, which is just them trying to prove how masculine they are being surrounded by dozens of women. Also, there were repeated actions of sexual assault and sexual dominance onto females, and the rappers repeatedly called woman vulgar names such as “bitches” and “hoes”. Some examples of this is Snoop Dogg’s music video “Gangtsa Luv” which is him sitting in the back of an expensive, luxurious car surrounded by dozens of women in skimpy, small swimsuits smacking them on their butts repeatedly. RZA’s music video for his song “Domestic Violence” shows repeated shots of men pinning down and hitting women; it almost seems like RZA condones …show more content…
There are depictions of countless abuse and assault against women, extreme masculinity by showing guns, gangs, and murder, and high heterosexuality due to the strong difference on the male to female ratio in videos. I partially think these gender stereotypes in music videos are still intact today because of the high demand for it. People will not watch the videos or listen to the music if there is not attractive females dancing around a rapper. Overall, these portrayals of men and women worsen the idea of the gender stereotype and is harming the society as