Selena Gomez: A Sex Object

It seems like Selena Gomez, a former Disney Star is all grown up and gone into womanhood. Does womanhood equal to being a sex object? Apparently it does, based on the representations of women in the media. But because Selena is only 19 years old, she has to prove that she is a real woman by posing in a sexually provocative position.

This magazine cover perfectly supports Goffman’s analysis of the relationship between girls and women in culture. Goffman argues that “little girls and grown women are presented as essentially the same, wearing the same clothes, having the same hair, doing the same things” (2009, pp.13). Because women never seem to leave childhood.

The infantilization of adult women have equated grown women with childhood and consequently increasingly equated young girls with mature womanhood (2009, pp.14).

It is no wonder, that young girls are increasingly dressed more and more provocative and sexually suggestive because girls are bombarded with such representations of how they should perform their roles as females.

What do you think a young girl will articulate after seeing this image of Selena Gomez? Especially if they were audiences of Disney’s Wizards Of Waverly Place.

-Angus Yeung

(2012, January 31). Selena Gomez Cosmopolitan Cover: Former Disney Star Is All Grown Up. Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/31/selena-gomez-cosmopolitan-cover_n_1244440.html

Selena Gomez Cosmopolitan Cover: Former Disney Star Is All Grown Up [image]. 
Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/31/selena-gomez-cosmopolitan-cover_n_1244440.html